We here at Market-Driven Business certainly have a bias with the phrase “Market-Driven,” that’s for sure. To us, market-driven isn’t about doing research, it’s about using that research. Too many organizations or product people start their market-driven journey with training, but don’t do anything beyond learning the concepts.
Market insights are central to the success of teams solving problems for their market, but it requires the whole organization to know the market. This situation is most visible in Cloud software solutions – your market engages your business and product at every touchpoint – the stories you tell, the channels you use for communication, features you build and users your support. At each touchpoint your users and business have requirements.
Beyond the Research
The change in orientation from inside your business to transforming your teams and products to be market driven requires consistent sharing of fresh insights and changes in the market when they arise. Clear communication of your evolving market helps stakeholders understand changes in priorities and internal processes which encourage customer retention and share of wallet growth by providing the right messaging, packaging and ongoing enhancement to improve feature usage/adoption and more.
Market-driven Is a Team Sport
Bring members of your organization on what Pragmatic Institute calls “NIHITO” visits. The NIHITO visits or calls are market visits where you are only outside the building to listen, learn and observe. This means it’s not a support escalation, standard account review or sales call. In many ways these calls have no agenda other than curiosity.
Change Your Processes, Change Your Teams and Build a Culture
It certainly helps to intellectually know what market-driven is, but the real benefit comes through implementing best practices in knowing the market and sharing that knowledge to improve market interactions and business decisions.
