Posts Tagged ‘competition’

How will Electronic Medical Records (EMRs) improve quality and reduce costs?

Thursday, December 9th, 2010

By Barbara Bix, B to B Marketing Consultant

I started working in health care in 1994 in Boston, after working in high technology since the early 1980s.  One of the first things that struck me was the relative lack of competition in the local health care industry.

Few distinctions between health care “competitors”

There was relatively little differentiation, from a prospective patient’s perspective, between hospitals–other than care level and location.  When I polled my friends and colleagues, I realized that they could distinguish between Boston’s famous tertiary hospitals and the community hospitals–but couldn’t cite differences within either group.

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Posted in health care, Speaker notes | 3 Comments »

Are discounts a good way to increase sales?

Tuesday, April 20th, 2010

Especially in a tough economy, companies often discount their products and services to increase sales.  The advantage of this approach is that it attracts attention–and has the potential to get prospects that ordinarily would not buy to try out your goods and services.  The hope, of course, is that once they experience what you have to offer that they’ll buy again.

The question is does it work?  And for whom?

Discounts do increase sales volumes

There’s no question that discounts increase sales volume.  To find evidence, you need look no further than to a Reuters article that ran earlier this month about automobile industry sales.

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Posted in Marketing strategy, Pricing, SaaS | 3 Comments »

Is the competition distracting you from becoming a market leader?

Sunday, April 12th, 2009


By Barbara Bix -

What if Tom’s of Maine had tried to match Colgate or Crest feature by feature? Would they have ever succeeded? How about Netflix?

Unique product positioning is the key to success

Each of these companies entered markets where there was a dominant player—yet both succeeded. They understood, what many of us often forget, that satisfying the unmet needs of a distinct market segment is far more important than matching the competition feature-by-feature. While these are consumer examples, the same product differentiation principles apply for businesses that sell to other businesses.

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Posted in Marketing strategy | 3 Comments »