Are You Enterprise Ready?

This is Peter Winick with Thought Leadership Leverage and I want to ask you a question. Are you enterprise ready? It’s a yes or no question, either you are or you aren’t, but establishing your platform for enterprise readiness is rarely that easy.

First, let’s define what I mean by enterprise readiness: enterprise readiness means taking your existing content and ideas and transforming them from a traditional medium into new modalities. For example, you just finished a book, enterprise readiness takes the ideas in your book and transforms them into blogs, video content, and speaking opportunities. As we talk about enterprise readiness, I like to focus on three pieces: your competition, your audience your product. 

Knowing your competition sounds fairly simple. You work in the productivity space, well so does that person. Suddenly this complete stranger becomes a competitor. But knowing who else is working in your market means more than just creating a Who’s Who list of producers—you need to find out exactly what their platform looks like. What do they do well? What do they struggle with? Who’s their target audience? How are they producing content? As you start answering these questions you’ll start to discover new opportunities and methods for delivering your content.

If Competitor A isn’t releasing video content, develop video content. You want to identify those gaps and use your strengths to fill them. Knowing your audience starts with identifying whether or not there’s even a market for your content. I can’t imagine there’s a huge demographic clamoring for a program that teaches cats to knit. But for now that’s assume there’s a market, who are those people? What are their needs and interests? Which of your competitors are they engaging with? How do they feel about the services their already receiving?

If you find that your answers to these questions are really broad or really ambiguous, then take the time to hone them in. You want to answer these as specifically as possible. Once you’ve gotten a feel for your existing market climate, it’s time to refine your product. What makes your platform unique? Is your message engaging? Is it enlightening? Is it inspirational? Do you have a strategy? Do you have tactics in mind? Do you have clear goals? Are your strategy, tactics, and goals aligned? Is your content in an enterprise ready format?

I want you to answer these questions with the needs of your audience and the weaknesses of your competition in mind, and if you can find a place where the two intersect, find a way to plug your vision into the gap.

So that’s just a few things to think about as you’re going to market. As you’re answering those questions your strengthening your product, and making your platform more relevant and effective. Thanks, and I appreciate your time.