As readers of the ForceBrands Newsroom, you already know that the worlds of food, beverage, beauty, and more recently, cannabis are in full swing. Never a dull moment. But sometimes it is good to look beyond these worlds to find true inspiration — to quite literally, look up.
In July 2019, humankind will celebrate 50 years since the first landing on the moon. Space Race 1.0 yielded the Internet itself, the GPS, the calculator, carbon components, and so many more goods and services that have since defined our everyday lives. Space Race 2.0 is already underway and Mars is the new moon. By passing Ultima Thule in the last few days, NASA is flying to the unexplored edges of space. Space Race 2.0 is once again creating a multi-trillion dollar opportunity and a multitude of innovations we cannot even yet fathom.
A key differentiator between the two space races is that Space Race 2.0 is driven not only by governments but also by the new rock(et)stars like Richard Branson, Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk. And curiously, as I discovered, most basic marketing and finance concepts that people still use today to drive brand-based businesses, or to invest in these businesses, also date back to the Space Race 1.0 period of the 1950-60s. Business models are overdue for a serious upgrade.
That is the theme of my first book, “Marketing Is Finance Is Business: How CMO, CFO and CEO Cocreate Iconic Brands with Sustainable Pricing Power in the New Galactic Age” (2018). It contains both inspiration and practical help for business leaders at every level, for investors, and for marketing and finance students. The daily priority of CEOs is to create sustainable business growth — to focus on the bottom line and on the top line. Structurally connecting marketing more effectively with finance is proving to be one of the greatest challenges for companies of all sizes. Some things to consider:
- How can I support my CMO and CFO to build a world-class marketing capability using scalable, repeatable models generating sustainable pricing power on my key brands?
- How do I keep my brand (portfolio) and corporate brand relevant to ever new generations?
- Everybody tells me to ‘be digital.’ How do I avoid Silicon snake oil tools that are clouding my company’s focus on the fundamentals of marketing, art, science, and discipline? What are those fundamentals anyway?
- Last but not least, how do I sell my current and future level of marketing excellence to my board, to investors, and to stakeholders, while everything around me exponentially changes?
Strap yourself in as this book presents a rocket ride, thoughtfully organized in the following four stages:
1. Look Up: Adopt a New Galactic Mindset
Marketing and Finance are both Mars and Venus. Understand the impact and transformative power of the last 50 and next 50 years of space. Start thinking beyond the historical model ‘think local, act local’ and think global, act global. Start thinking with a more unifying mindset that raises the bar: think galactic, act galactic.
2. Launch Preparation: Secure Basics Before You Fly
In flight, safety always comes first. Get your business marketing wings before you skyrocket. Your business should undergo a crash course, or rather, quick study of the finance model the CEO, CFO, and CMO should know before you fly. Also, understand the limits of models, and why people, in the end, crave miracles.
3. Lift-off: Successful Marketing in a Galactic Age
Discover my eight fundamental drivers of world-class marketing capability (MC), expressed in a simple and memorable rocket metaphor: the MC-Rocket©. Build a sustainable brand business for the new Space Age.
4. Escape Velocity: Successful Investing in a Galactic Age
As a CEO, how can I better assess and explain my level of marketing excellence internally and externally? How can investors pick the best marketing driven companies? Discover an advanced concept for a new marketing excellence and rating model: Alpha M™. Complete with its downloadable checklist audit, it will help investors assess and compare marketing capability excellence between companies to pick galactic winners. Over time, the model can even help predict top line growth.
To learn more, pick up a copy of the book here or on Amazon.com.
