Josh Miles interviews Ida Cheinman, Principal of Substance 151, about Generation Z Marketing. 

About This Episode

Just as you thought you had the multi-generational workplace issues and marketing preferences of the millennial generation figured out, there’s a new generation on its way to the workplace: Gen Z.  

This episode runs 35 minutes.

Subscribe to PMS Show on iTunes

About Ida Cheinman

 

 Ida Cheinman has 20 years of branding, marketing and management experience with a primary focus on brand strategy and design across print and digital. With clients including U.S. Green Building Council Maryland, Barton Malow, Langan, Habitat for Humanities Chesapeake, TerraLogos eco architecture, St. Mary’s County Public Schools and many others, her work has earned multiple design awards and industry recognition, and she frequently speaks and writes on the subjects of branding and marketing.

 When founding Substance151, Ida made a commitment to advance sustainable values through the firm’s design practice, education and community involvement. Under her leadership, Substance151 has not only built a strong reputation for its brand strategy and design work, but is also recognized as an advocate for environmentally and socially responsible business practices. Ida has been named an Eco CEO by Baltimore SmartCEO. 

 

 substance151.com

 

 Article by Ida Cheinman About Gen Z Marketing

 

 Production of PSM Show is underwritten by:  

 

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  Let us know what you think about this episode. Should we do more interviews? Or, would you prefer just Josh and David (no guests)? Or should we get rid of Josh and David altogether? Use the form on our homepage to let us know.

 

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Transcript

Announcer: Welcome to PSM, the professional services marketing podcast. It’s insight applied.

Josh Miles: Hello and welcome to PSM show, the podcast for AEC marketers. I’m Josh Miles and I’m joined today by the crazy smart Ida Cheinman, principal and creative director for Substance151. Today we’re talking about Gen Z, but before we get into that, I want to say thank you to our underwriting sponsor SMPS. Head over to smps.org/buildbusiness to see all about Build Business 2019 in Washington DC from July 31st to August 2nd, 2019.

Announcer: This is PSM. Its insight applied

Josh Miles: Ida, welcome to PSM show.

Ida Cheinman: Thank you Josh. And I don’t think anybody ever called me crazy smart. I really like that. Thank you.

Josh Miles: Well, you’re very welcome and I think it’s well deserved. So, we’re going to get to show off some of your smarts today, but most of our listeners might know that I’m a giant branding nerds too. Initially when I reached out to you, I was begging you to come on the show.

Josh Miles: And selfishly, I really just wanted to talk about branding and maybe a little bit about firm culture until I found your research you had done on Gen Z, which reminded me back when I was running an agency, there was this thing that the market usually said about Millennials, which was, they’re the worst. But you recently wrote about Gen Z. So I guess first off, tell us about Gen Z. Who is this Gen Z?

Ida Cheinman: So, this is the next generation that will be a part of our workforce. They’re starting to enter the workforce right now. A lot of them are still in college. It’s your interns. And recent grads. That’s the generation that was born between 1995 to 2012 and they’re very different from Millennials. And it’s funny. I, as a business owner, had to address the Millennial challenges like the rest of us.

Ida Cheinman: But it took me the longest time to believe that this whole generational thing was real. And I think a part of it was that most of Gen X generation, we resent the fact that when we entered the workforce, nobody celebrated or wrote articles about it. And so I just kept thinking that all of this hype the media is creating will pass. But I’m older and wiser now.

Ida Cheinman: I recognize that the generations and the differences between them are real and they certainly affect both the culture of our workplace and the way we do business. So since I missed most of the buzz on the … or the bandwagon on the Millennial generation, I was really interested in researching this article.

Ida Cheinman: And I also teach. So the students I teach are Gen Zers and I definitely saw some differences, and it intrigued me. I think it’s going to be a huge marketing challenge. So, all of those reasons forced me to do a little bit more research and write this article.

Josh Miles: I saw this tweet recently and it said, this has got to be the most Gen X thing ever and it was a graphic from a newscast. And it said something about the silent generation and about the boomers and about the Millennials. And it totally left the Gen Xers off of the graphic.

Ida Cheinman: Right, we don’t even count.

Josh Miles: They don’t even know we are there, oh no,

Ida Cheinman: I know, I know.

Josh Miles: So the Gen Z, you said they’re wildly different than the Millennials. Tell us more.

Ida Cheinman: They certainly are. In general, as a part of my research about generations, I’ve seen it a number of times that Millennials are closer to Baby Boomers than Gen Xers, so it skips a generation.

Ida Cheinman: So one interesting fact that I saw is president of FutureCast, Jeff Fromm, described them as “old souls in young bodies.” And he elaborated on that point saying that they are digital, social and mobile to the core, but their values are more strongly aligned with the previous generations than Millennials.

Josh Miles: Interesting.

Ida Cheinman: I think one of the reasons for that, is they grew up with their parents going through the last recession. And they saw some of their parents who are professionals and always had good jobs, lose those jobs. They saw the financial struggle. They saw all the ugliness of mortgages. And they were very young at that time.

Ida Cheinman: There is a difference in how people draw those boundaries, but the most typical one is to say that they were born between 1995 and 2012, so they were relatively young when all of that was happening, but old enough to understand the turmoil we went through. So they’re much more skeptical, they’re not as privileged or entitled as people often describe the Millennial generation. They’re definitely much more pragmatic.

Ida Cheinman: But there are also their values. They’re very inclusive. They’re very purpose driven. They’re very compassionate. So there’s that almost like left brain, right brain or brain and heart, however you want to draw that divide, that exists within them, and this will make it very difficult for the rest of us to market to them.

Ida Cheinman: And there are already numerous articles about how difficult they are as consumers, but even in our B2B professional services environment, Millennials are already not just a large part of the workforce, but they’ve moved into positions that make executive and purchasing decisions.

Ida Cheinman: So it’s not going to be that long before this generation is deciding which architecture, engineering or construction firm they’re going to go with. Again, their values and their backgrounds, and the high-tech, mobile natives that they are, will affect what’s important to them and how they both research, select and ultimately build relationships with the firms.

Josh Miles: It’s interesting both of my children are sort of on the young end of that range born in 2007 and 2012, so right at the very tail end, but our daughter, the older of the two in particular is often described by our friends as being such an old soul and so compassionate.

Josh Miles: So it’s interesting that this general research really hits home when I think about who she is as a person, as a consumer, as a future employee. But this kind of leads me to wonder, each generation tends to have things that they’re more comfortable with or that they’re better at. What are some of the strong suits of the Gen Z?

Ida Cheinman: So I think we’ve all come to value tech-savvy in the workplace because you don’t have to be a technology company to appreciate and use the technology. So I think that tech savviness of them is definitely going to be an asset to any firm or any company in general that will hire them.

Ida Cheinman: I think the values-driven, the passionate nature of them is also important because purpose has become a big part of brands and business. It will resonate really well with other Gen Zers but also with the Millennial generation and even Gen Xers. So I think there are parts of them that will fit very well.

Ida Cheinman: There are parts of them that perhaps will be a little less useful. The attention span. To say that it equals zero is an understatement. There is no attention span. I think it could be okay, but it also is very difficult and it might be that consumer products will figure it out.

Ida Cheinman: I think it’s going to be very difficult for professional services where a lot of what we do is long-term and it’s for the long haul and it’s about building relationships. There’s no immediacy. You have to be knowledgeable technically. And it requires the depth of knowledge and expertise.

Ida Cheinman: So I think teaching them is going to be a challenge because they can hold only so much onto your thoughts. I think for them to develop the depth of expertise is going to be challenging because that’s not how they operate. That’s not what they like, and yet it’s going to be required for them to make it in the world, in the professional world.

Ida Cheinman: So I think those are going to be definitely huge challenges. I think some of the values of transparency and experience and authenticity that are very important to them. Transparency, more and more companies are trying in general to be transparent with their financial and business strategies, and managers being transparent with those who work for them in terms of career goals and how to do better, how to succeed.

Ida Cheinman: So I think there’s a general movement toward transparency in the workplace. But I think this generation will make us all kick it up a few notches, in order to attract them and retain them and work with them and have them trust us because again lack of trust, that skepticism, is very prevalent.

Ida Cheinman: Everything is about the experience. So it’s both experiential learning and … But I think also that’s what the firms need. To have somebody who is all about the experience, in order to instill a sense of urgency for developing better employee and customer experiences.

Ida Cheinman: So I think that could work for and against both the firm and Gen Zers as employees. For companies, it’s not just transparency, but it’s authenticity, it’s speaking with an authentic voice. It’s do what you say you will do.

Ida Cheinman: And that goes for both how companies conduct business and what they promise during the recruitment process and this generation will hold them responsible. And I think all of those inherent values in this generation will change the way we do business, and definitely will change the way we think about, and do marketing.

Josh Miles: So this thing connected to the whole transparency issue, I think sort of related to that is really just the communication of who you are as a company and as a firm and as you said, the things that they’re promised in the interview or, I think most principals are probably thinking in their head well, man, we told them 18 months ago what our five year plan was or what our strategic goals were, what this new initiative was about.

Josh Miles: But they’re not repeating it and they’re not coming from many small businesses. I know this is just something that constantly plagues us just as principals, we’re not good at that communication piece. So how might firm’s address that differently with Gen Z?

Ida Cheinman: I think, and actually, your question I feel is two fold; the transparency and communication, but also it’s the repetition because again, there is no attention span.

Josh Miles: Yeah, exactly.

Ida Cheinman: So if you said something five months ago,

Josh Miles: It’s like you never said it.

Ida Cheinman: It’s not going to be resonating at the performance review which is 12 months from now. I think there are a lot of ways that firms can address that. It’s definitely train the trainer. So it has to come from the top. It has to be embedded into the company culture, that general movement toward transparency.

Ida Cheinman: And it depends, you could be an 800 or an 8000 or 20000 people firm, you could be a 35 people firm. So the ways, the mechanics of addressing it could be different. But whether it’s the principal who does interviews, performance reviews, and just general assessment of how everybody’s doing. Whether it’s five managers far removed who are doing that, everybody will need to understand that in order to get the most out of this generation of employees, as well as to offer them the environment where they can grow and thrive and make the company successful, right?

Ida Cheinman: Because if you help somebody to become successful as an individual, to grow professionally and personally and do their best work, then ultimately they will help your firm to become more successful. So I think it’s everything from training, from how you communicate the career path, from how you chunk it up into pieces, from just learning that every performance review maybe it needs to start with recapping the goals and repeating the information.

Ida Cheinman: But I also think that’s a little bit of that resentment taht’s is coming up again. It has to be a two way street. I mean they have to have jobs, they have to understand how to be in the professional environment. So I think there’s going to be a huge learning curve coming into something like a professional services firm, and understanding that not having any attention span is really not an asset.

Ida Cheinman: On the other hand, being able to very quickly grasp something new is an asset. So this generation itself will need to adapt to how we do business. But even in order for us to get them into our firms, we’re going to have to be very smart about how we message out the purpose and the brand and… Again, it can’t be just messaging and has to be authentically how we build diversity and inclusion into everything we do.

Ida Cheinman: And obviously that’s a big challenge for the AEC industry and there are huge strides being made right now. But still, the example I always use when I talk about culture, and I think diversity and inclusion is a huge part of it, is that you can talk about diversity and opportunity all day long. But if I’m a young female engineer and I go to your website and your entire leadership page looks the same, oh, and nobody looks like me, will I believe you?

Ida Cheinman: You can do the programs, you can implement, you can make strides, but your leadership team must mirror the workforce you want to have. And one of the things about Gen Z that was interesting to me is that already they’ve been … It’s been mentioned that they’re the most diverse generation.

Ida Cheinman: And I think we always lump diversity and inclusion together but they’re very different because inclusion is about how people feel. Do they feel included? There is a dialogue, there’s a two-way conversation about it. Do they feel included? What does it take to make them feel included?

Ida Cheinman: Again, the generation is just entering the workforce, and obviously a lot of people in the workforce have children of that generation, so they kind of understand how they work. But we still have a lot to learn and a lot to overcome. The processes from business strategy to brand, to marketing, to operations, to everything across the board will need to be re-thought and adjusted for this generation.

Josh Miles: So maybe in addition to thoughts around purpose and diversity and inclusion, social issues. What are maybe our firms doing wrong today that are just set up the wrong way for being ready to welcome Gen Z into the workplace. What else do we need to do maybe from a branding standpoint?

Ida Cheinman: So I think I already mentioned and we talked about it a little bit, a great sense of purpose and values. The firm’s brand needs to be guided by purpose and it’s all industries, across all types of firms. AEC has gotten on board. There are more and more firms that understand that they need to talk about things outside of delivering on time and on budget.

Ida Cheinman: But there’s still a lot of confusion about purpose. A lot of times people think about it as sustainability or CSR. But it doesn’t have to be, but it has to be very clear, whatever it is. And it has to come across in all communications and especially on career pages of firms’ websites and social media, and other public-facing communications.

Ida Cheinman: But there’s a difference between the Millennial generation that was the first generation that was truly purpose driven. The difference here is that skeptical, mistrusting nature of Gen Z. So you need to do much more than just say you’re great, you need to show and you need to walk the talk. Because if they catch any discrepancies between what you say and what you do, chances are you will not be able to recover because trust is a really big issue for them.

Ida Cheinman: So, there’s that. Then because of the attention span, not only all messages and communications need to connect immediately, they have to be relevant because if it’s just generic noise that has no relevance, that’s not tailored to that specific individual, they will just move on and not even notice that somebody is talking. So personalization is going to be absolutely critical.

Ida Cheinman: And I think a lot of those emerging trends, they’re really emerging for maybe the professional services industries, but they’ve been around in B2C for a very long time. And I think a big challenge for professional services, AEC, B2B marketers in general, will be understanding that this generation will need much more B2C-like experiences.

Ida Cheinman: The good news is that consumer industries have been doing a lot to personalize their experience, to pay attention to the experience, to tailor, to customize. And there are technologies that have been around for a long time. So at least we can all look for lessons learned and best practices.

Josh Miles: Yeah, I mean my running joke in the AEC marketing for years has been, if you want to know what AEC marketers are going to be doing in a few years, just look at what retailers have been doing for the last six months because that’s what we are going to catch up to.

Ida Cheinman: Absolutely. And we’ll need to get over our fear of asking for information. We need to get better at capturing information and learning more about the individual behaviors and preferences of that new generation because we have to make tailored, data-driven decisions to improve the effectiveness of our communications. To get their attention, to keep their attention, which is close to impossible. And so, yes. I totally agree and I always say the same thing.

Ida Cheinman: So think about all the real-time personalized experiences we get as customers every day, especially when interacting with retailers. It’s “you may also like” on Amazon and content and product suggestions as you move through your shopping experience, and there’s absolutely no reason why B2B professional services websites couldn’t use that technology.

Ida Cheinman: And really be sensitive to how a prospect moves through your website, and make sure that dynamic content we serve, it’s not just the latest five blog headlines or five case studies, or what we think is relevant to this market, but have the ability to serve that customized, personalized content in real time.

Ida Cheinman: Including calls to actions, including thought leadership, including relevant case studies, including industry trends and anything else that will make that path more relevant to the prospects and ultimately get them to the point of, wherever they are in their journey, either to contact you or send an RFP your way.

Josh Miles: What other tactics or approaches might retailers use that will work well for Gen Z?

Ida Cheinman: So, all the … Let me back up a little. So one of their pet peeves is talking on the phone, having a conversation with a real person. They don’t want that. Actually, this is one point that I can relate to. So to the degree that you can help them accomplish their tasks online, which means again, the forms need to be tailored and customized.

Ida Cheinman: Yes, you have to have meaningful chatbots. You have to be able to provide them with the information they’re looking for and take them pretty far down whether it’s a recruitment path and they’re looking to apply for a job at your firm or they’re looking to hire your firm.

Ida Cheinman: Provide those opportunities for them to get the information that they seek without having to pick up the phone, without having to get off the website, go into email and try to do something. So, they love texting, use in-app messaging, real-time support. All of those things are going to be very important.

Ida Cheinman: We are all finally getting into this content marketing thing, right? So finally getting it, finally know what to do with it. Finally, understand that it’s important. Well, for Gen Z content marketing is still going to be important, but it needs to be entertaining. I use in the article “content needs to edutain.”

Ida Cheinman: Again, the attention span is zero. They’re very into visual media. So videos, graphics, stuff that stimulates them visually, but also communicates. It’s not just pure entertainment. It does have to provide relevant information. Help them understand something or help them understand why your firm is the right choice.

Ida Cheinman: Starting to utilize those channels that haven’t been traditionally top of mind for AEC and professional services in general. And it will, that’s another interesting practical thing about Gen Z, social media. So we again in professional services, a little bit slower to adapt, but finally everybody gets it.

Ida Cheinman: LinkedIn is a big deal. And interestingly enough, Gen Z actually uses LinkedIn. They get the opening doors and making connections and building relationships. But it’s not their platform of choice. So, right now, it might be Snapchat and Vimeo and Instagram, but their preferences change constantly.

Ida Cheinman: So what we all will need to learn, not only adapt to their choices of social media but do it fast and also constantly evolve as their preferences evolve. They are not as loyal to a particular channel. So they hop. They go channel hopping and we need to go channel hopping with them if we want to stay on their radar.

Josh Miles: So that makes me think of how the Millennials taught us or at least they would like to think that they taught us all about social media and digital things in general. But it sounds like what you’re talking about with Gen Z is maybe not so much a seismic shift, but like a constant state of flux and a constant state of chasing the next new thing.

Ida Cheinman: Yeah, I think the biggest changes will come not from new media, new channels and new technologies and of course that will continue to evolve and emerge as it’s doing all the time. But it’s really getting used to the pace of change, even more so than it is with Millennials or just the business environment in general.

Ida Cheinman: And I think that’s where social listening tools are going to be important because, really paying attention to what they’re doing and where they’re going and how they’re using different channels, and what works is going to be instrumental in catering to them and getting on their radar and trying to get their attention. Again, keep it for the few moments that we can.

Josh Miles: Yeah, this is fascinating. I’m sure we can talk about this for a long time, but maybe before we let you go, if you could leave our AEC firms with just one tip of something they should start thinking about right now to prepare their workplace for Gen Z, what would that be?

Ida Cheinman: Yeah, the “one” is a tough one. There is a lot going on. I think looking at some of the things that might already be on our radars, but marked as “Yeah, we can think about it later.” To really put those more advanced channels and technology at the forefront.

Ida Cheinman: Again, think about how you can be relevant. How you can lead with purpose and be authentic and earn trust. I think creative in marketing is going to count, which as a designer, I just love that. At the core, we’re a design firm, so we’re very excited about that. But it’s just that visual garbage that’s being generated every single day.

Ida Cheinman: I think we’re going to start taking the value of visual design and creative very seriously because it’s a path to the heart of Gen Z that’s how you get them engaged and keep them engaged. And getting ready for a very fast movement.

Ida Cheinman: So maybe thinking about it from the operational standpoint, start thinking about Agile and Design Thinking and other practices that help marketers and marketing react quickly, pivot fast, and start bringing it. It can’t be that you would develop a marketing plan and you work on it for six months and then maybe by the next year, you will begin to implement, by then it’s all old and meaningless. So fast, fast, fast. Find ways to structure your operations and your marketing function that it can react quickly and adapt to changes.

Josh Miles: Awesome. Well that’s a lot of great stuff and of course most of our conversation today was inspired by that article on the Substance151 website. We’ll make sure and link to that in the show notes before we let you go, tell our listeners where they can find you on the Interwebs and learn more about Gen Z and connect with you personally.

Ida Cheinman: Yeah, of course. So, Substance151.com is our website and we have a blog that has the article and many other articles. I’m on LinkedIn, I’m on Twitter. I’m in a number of other social media networks and I’m always happy to connect and I can talk about this forever. So if anybody has any questions, I’m happy to have this conversation. Again, I had a lot of fun researching and writing this article, so this is an interesting topic for me right now.

Josh Miles: Yeah, I can definitely tell. And perhaps we’ll have you back sometime in the new feature just to talk about branding.

Ida Cheinman: Excellent.

Josh Miles: Well guys, that’s about brings us to the end of another PSM show. Thanks again to our underwriting sponsor, SMPS and head over to smps.org/buildbusiness to see all about Build Business 2019 in Washington DC, July 31st through August 2nd, 2019. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for future shows or guests, please write to us at psm.show. You can scroll all the way down to that contact link at the bottom and drop us a line.

Josh Miles: That’s all for this episode of PSM show from Ida Cheinman, my cohost, David Lecours and myself, Josh Miles. We’ll see you next time.

 

David Lecours interviews Elke Giba of Giba Group about Positioning.

 

About This Episode

 Too many professional service firms suffer from generic descriptors about service offerings. Many offer the same category of service as competitors.

But despite seemingly endless similarities, there are practical and technical distinctions in your business practice that can help define how your firm stands out in the middle of a mundane marketplace. Stating exactly WHAT expert service your firm delivers, WHOM you serve best, and WHY your company is unique among the competition is how you position your firm.

This episode runs 36 minutes.

Subscribe to PMS Show on iTunes

About Elke Giba

Equal parts researcher, marketer and business advisor, Elke Giba helps courageous A/E/C firms plan to win more often through a foundational marketing strategy. She works with firms to shed the “full-service” moniker and transform into specialists, spotlighting the focused expertise that generates more business opportunities that grow the bottom line. An author and presenter, she speaks to business audiences on how to market their business more effectively and publishes marketing insights in industry publications and online. Equally at home in Dallas and Nashville, she still cannot two-step to save her life.

GibaGroup.com

Mentioned in This Episode on Positioning

• Define what positioning is, and what it isn’t

• How firms benefit from solid positioning

• What stops A/E/C firms from positioning their practice

• Simple ways to start positioning your firm’s practice areas

 

Production of PSM Show is underwritten by:

We Want to Hear From You

Let us know what you think about this episode. Should we do more interviews? Or, would you prefer just Josh and David (no guests)? Or should we get rid of Josh and David altogether? Use the form on our homepage to let us know.

Subscribe to our Podcast

To subscribe to the PSM podcast in iTunes – click here

 

Transcript

Announcer: Welcome to PSM, The Professional Services Marketing Podcast. It’s insight applied.

David Lecours: Hello, I’m David Lecours, and I’m joined by a special guest, Elke Giba, and Elke is here to talk to us today about positioning. So, welcome to the show Elke.

Elke Giba: Thanks for having me.

David Lecours: Before we learn more about Elke I would just wanna remind our listeners that we are sponsored by SMPS, who reminds us that business is transformed through marketing leadership, and if you wanna find out more about SMPS, got to smps.org.

Announcer: This is PSM. It’s insight applied.

David Lecours: Alright, so this is the second time we’ve talked about positioning, and I don’t think we could positioning enough. Frankly, I think we could almost have every episode talk about positioning because I think it’s so important. But before we get into the topic Elke, maybe just give our listeners a little background on how you got here. The short story.

Elke Giba: Yeah, thanks. I am in my 8th year now as being an independent consultant specifically to marketers and AEC trades. And I started my professional career as a graphic designer and then, moved into web design and did a lot of work outside of the industry. But as I was looking at moving into starting my own firm, I really wanted to position myself in a group of people that I thought as though would benefit from having my experience and skill sets.

Elke Giba: I specifically chose this industry, and it’s a little unique in that, simply because I’m fascinated by the trade craft and, I think you’ll appreciate this David, that we as designers, graphic people, we spend a lot of time creating material that doesn’t have a lot of- It doesn’t stay around very long, right? Especially if it’s a website or digital platform, it can be gone easily and in just a few seconds.

Elke Giba: But within this industry, I’m just really amazed and awestruck by the craftsmanship that it takes to create these facilities that people use on a daily basis. And so, I intentionally wanted to be a part of that. So that’s what got me to this role. And I agree with you that I think that, we couldn’t talk about positioning enough. We need to talk about it often. Specifically within this particular industry. There’s a lot of room for improvement within positioning.

David Lecours: And you said something that really sort of struck out of me, is that you made this conscious decision to position yourself in the industry. So maybe mention the difference between the act of positioning versus the- So the verb versus the noun, which is like a perhaps a positioning statement.

Elke Giba: Yeah. This is a traditional marketing aspect. It’s a part of our marketing theory, is knowing who you’re serving, knowing what they need, what they care about, and really being intentional about your message whenever you’re choosing that topic. For me and choosing AEC it was a way to say, this group, this industry has a very unique problem. Especially when it comes to marketing. It’s a relatively new field, where people are really trying to figure out what it means, we have leadership who aren’t really sure how marketing could fit into their firm and their practice and how to really take advantage of it, and use it to their best benefit and in growing the company.

Elke Giba: So, I think there’s a huge opportunity to focus on your target market, your niche, figure out what their problems are, and then use your language to tell them how you can solve the kinds of problems that they’re facing. And that’s true. If you’re a doctor or If you’re a surgeon, you will specialize in a specific area. Or if you’re a graphics firm, a marketing firm, you’ll target a specific audience. Or if you’re an architecture firm, you’ll choose a very specific niche that you can focus on and really be intentional about who you’re serving so that you can position, right. That’s the first part I have. Is that language to let those kinds of people, those kinds of clients know what you can do for them and how you do it.

David Lecours: Yeah, absolutely. So I’m guessing you have a formal definition that you like to use when you define positioning. What is that?

Elke Giba: I would say that it’s- We talk about positioning statement, and generally speaking that’s how we- If we’ve heard the term positioning, that’s where it comes from. We have a positioning statement.And I’ve heard you talk about it, sometimes there’s a formula that you can use to create your positioning statements. But I would also think that positioning is in fact, the act of choosing your market and being very intentional about the kind of work that you can do for them, how you can solve their problems. So that’s not necessarily a formal definition, but it is maybe a more granular level of how I would define positioning in terms of just a statement. It’s actually a practice. It’s part of you’re intentional messaging that you might do around your firm and what you actually practice.

David Lecours: Yeah. And I think it’s a way of differentiating, right? It’s taking a conscious choice to position yourself as unique in the marketplace. Because we as marketing practitioners, the last thing we want is to be known as just a generalist, a one of many. Because then of course the only way we can compete is on price. And we don’t want to compete on price because we don’t want to be a commodity. So we have to differentiate ourselves. But not just be different, ’cause being different is easy, but being different in a meaningful way is something that really means something to the client.

Elke Giba: Yeah. There’s oftentimes we’d hear the whole notion, well, we’re a full service architecture firm, we’re a full service engineering firm and you and I both have this perspective that we need to get more intentional about that language and get really focused on the kind of work that they can do and the kind of problems they solve. And that’s where that uniqueness, that’s where that positioning actually comes up to the service and makes that differentiation really stand out.

David Lecours: So I think we’ve kind of defined it, but maybe we could say what it isn’t too. I think you have some thoughts around that.

Elke Giba: Yeah, I do. Because we see this often. Because it’s not necessarily the easiest thing to grab a hold of at the very beginning will resort to the things that are easy. For instance, we’ll talk about, where are the only firm that’s located in central Texas that does xyz. Well, your close, if you’re gonna get really specialized in saying what you do, that you’re the only firm in central Texas, but more often than not, where you’re located doesn’t really help you with positioning. That’s not necessarily going to be something that is unique enough to make you a differentiator.

David Lecours: So not a literal geographic position.

Elke Giba: Right. Not where I’m located, or even how long I’ve been in business. For me that doesn’t necessarily tell me anything about the firm. It’s simply says, you’re doing it successfully because you’ve been able to be in business that long, but really 35 years in business doesn’t tell a perspective client anything more about what you do and, just how long you’ve done it.

Elke Giba: So the other thing that I would say that positioning is not, it is not how long you’ve been in business. I would also say that I’ve seen a couple of times where firms will talk about, well, we’re the only- we’re a woman owned business. That’s great, but probably not unique enough to be a differentiator within the kinds of services that you provide. There are gonna be times when partners are looking for a specialty firm like that to make sure that they’re being judicious in their projects. But for the most part, it’s not going to tell a client anything about what you do or what kind of problems you can solve for them. So for me, those three things are things that do not qualify as they shouldn’t be part of your positioning statement. You should not worry about where you are or what kind of firm, you’ve corporate structure or, how long you’ve been in business. Those three things really, they don’t tell the client anything more about your firm and what you can do for them. So I wouldn’t include them.

David Lecours: So one of the classic formulas I’ve heard for positioning is we do x for y. It’s pretty basic and that’s a great start. But I dunno about you, but I’ve found it challenging when working with our clients is that a lot of times they’re x is a lot of things right? They have a couple of different services and then they’re y is a couple of different things they work in a couple of different vertical markets. Does a firm have to pick just one, one service in one market in order to be effectively positioned?

Elke Giba: No, but I think it’s critical that they know what those unique, what those differences are, because it changes the message. To that end, you could in fact have a couple of different positioning statements and what that would do is just simplify the kinds of messages that you’re going to give to that particular market. So, if you are a multidisciplinary firm and you have lots of different services, then my recommendation is to try to simplify it. If you can focus on one that you use the most frequently, that clients know you for most frequently, then that might in fact be the one that you would work from the most. But it makes a lot of sense to have a couple of other ones ready so that you can be responsive to the different messages that need to be put out there. Your clients are different. Right? So that’s probably how I would approach that situation. I think that you can have- We can start with one, be a little bit more general, but then get really granular in your services.

David Lecours: Like that one is you’re leading statement, the majority of your work comes from this, this is what we’re gonna lead with, but it doesn’t cover everything that you could do. It’s just gonna be putting you in in a solid position so the client can get their head around it and then that’ll help create other opportunities. That makes total total sense.

Elke Giba: And lemme just add right here that that’s the key part. That’s a key thing that we wanna focus on when you and I are talking about positioning it’s not really to the benefit of the firm. It’s to the benefit of the client. The client is the one who has to understand what it is that you can do for them before they can decide whether or not they wanna choose you as a teaming partner or have you on their project. They need to be able to hear your message and evaluate for themselves specifically, this answers my problem. This firm will take care of my problem. And that’s all that they really are concerned about. And I think that opens so many other opportunities to you when you can communicate to potential clients, these are the kinds of problems that we solve. And if you’ve got that problem, we can solve it. It’s a different shift talking, letting the customer, the client pick you based on how you can solve their problem as opposed to, it’s an outward message. We are this, we are that. So that’s another way to think about positioning is thinking about it in that way. How’s the client? But what are they looking for? What are they hungry for? What are they searching for? And then using that as a way to position your firm.

David Lecours: Awesome. Hey, so I did a little research knowing we were gonna talk about this and, I found two or three positioning statements and I would love to read them to you and just get your take, as a fun exercise. Are you down with that?

Elke Giba: All right, I’m ready. Let it all to me.

David Lecours: Here we go. We designed the places where people love to be together. This is for a firm called Populous and they are architects. They designed stadiums, arenas, and convention centers, which maybe I should or shouldn’t tell you, but I did. So, now you know.

Elke Giba: I like it. The thing that I like about it as a marketer that I’m responding to directly is, the sense of emotion that comes into the positioning statement. Right? Their already attributing what it is that these spaces- They’re really connecting to their y, which I love. I’m all over that. The impression that I got when you just read the statement had more to do with, family homes and maybe even house of worship. It was an interesting spin when you added arenas and- Okay. Yeah, I can see that. So I think-

David Lecours: That’s a really good point. I think that this positioning statement rarely lives in isolation. It’s often gonna be combined with imagery, or be placed on a website. And so that will give context.

Elke Giba: Yeah, absolutely. Again, we’re talking about if we were going to use the criteria, is this addressing a problem that a client might have, right? Are they trying- Will they choose this firm to help them solve this problem about- or I’ve gotta have this really big space and it needs to be flexible enough to host a concert, and a big ticket sporting event. Well, there’s different questions around that. So depending upon who their audience is and how they’re trying to get to it, I think it’s a really strong start, and I like a lot of things about it. So I’d get the past.

David Lecours: And since they do olympic stadiums and they do large convention centers and master plannings for like giant spectacles and events. I think they can get away with sort of having that the more minimal and not being- And maybe a little more poetic too. I think they should have that.

Elke Giba: Well I was just gonna tweak it if I’d said [crosstalk 00:16:25] where people celebrate together.

David Lecours: That’s interesting.

Elke Giba: Anyway. We’re not doing free work. That’s [crosstalk 00:16:33].

David Lecours: I’ll read one more to you and [crosstalk 00:16:37]. Okay, this one is, we’re not architects who do healthcare. We are healthcare architects.

Elke Giba: There’s a whole range of practice, right? When you talk about- well, we focus on health care, but they’re actually practicing the skill set behind it. So I like this one. I think I’ve seen this one. I think I’m familiar with this firm. So, I’m thinking this is a really strong start too, I’d like to see them get a little bit tighter for each of these in terms of what kinds of health care, health care is a huge [inaudible 00:17:19], right? I mean, it is a- Or usually [inaudible 00:17:22] are you talking about health care facilities? Are you talking about research facilities? Are you talking about the local clinical facilities? All of those things. Is it multidisciplinarian? So, I think there’s an opportunity to get a little bit tighter, but it’s a really good strong start.

David Lecours: And, part of this I think is also beginning the conversation, where you’re not gonna give all the details and so, you’ve gotta be intriguing enough so that someone will want to have a followup conversation.

Elke Giba: Yeah. I’m gonna push back a little bit on that because, positioning I think- What I understand and I would imagine you have to is that, it can be really scary, because it’s the reverse of what we want to do, especially when we talk about new business acquisition, how do we find new clients? When you position your firm, you have to have some courage doing it because you will be, and you talked about this earlier when you wanted to talk different lines, but when you position your firm, we really need to stand on- This is our core practice. This is how we are known, this is our expertise. And that takes some courage. You have to be able to stand away and say, ‘that’s okay. I don’t need all this extra pieces or extra work that’s coming in that doesn’t directly align with what it is that we do’.

Elke Giba: And sometimes that can be really scary to do that depending upon the size or shape, or age of your firm. So sometimes that can be a real challenge. And so it’s easier to be generalized and just have a very general positioning statement. But the more focused, more hyper focused you can become on that positioning statement means that you can get really aligned and very focused. You will become an expert in that field. Right? So we’re talking about vertical versus horizontal. Are you gonna be really hyper focused on that? And to be honest it just takes a lot of courage to say, ‘that’s okay. We used to do this kind of work in the past and we’re not going to do it anymore’. Even individually. Right? I don’t do websites anymore. Having to say that for a while was a bit of a challenge just to say I’m cutting out that business line out of my practice, but it’s better to send it to somebody else too. So anyway-

David Lecours: It makes total sense. And I wanna follow up on this idea of courage, but before we get too far along, I just wanted to clarify the firm, and I would just wanna give credit to the firm who’s positioning statement that is called Array Architects. They happen to work in all their multi offices, hundreds of staff people. So, they do work in almost all of those markets you mentioned. So I think for them it did work pretty well.

David Lecours: But you bring up this idea of courage and I think- Well I’ll let you answer the question. So what do you think is the single best hesitant, reason for hesitance, or resistance that you get maybe when you’re working with clients? Why do they fear positioning?

Elke Giba: It really comes down to- Well the single biggest thing? I have not found a single answer for that, it really depends on the leadership and what their used to doing, and where they’re coming from. If it’s a newer firm, If it’s a very broad based firm, they may be hesitant, and very focused simply because it cuts out some of their business line already. And that is a change in their business structure. So it’s a position to have a really firm strong position within a single core that, that’s a change in their business structure. And that can be really challenging.

David Lecours: I know offline we talked about fear. Speak to that a little bit.

Elke Giba: Fear gets into so many of these levels. I mean there’s the fear of not being able to take on new clients that come in the door, but the counterpoint to that is, if you take on everybody, then you’re never going to be able to be an expert.

Elke Giba: If you position yourself for a very narrow target, then you’re not gonna have a lot of projects variety either and [inaudible 00:22:13]. But again, you can’t be an expert if you are all over the board and you can’t really focus on a specific project type, or clientele, then you’re serving lots of different clients and you’re never really gaining expertise that you need to have. And honestly, it requires some uncomfortable naval gazing. We’re not really used to doing this. And that’s why I think it takes some practice and it takes some comfort to say, well I’m going to start here and then I keep refining and getting hyper, keep refining that positioning statement. So fear for me is- that’s the biggest thing. It could be. I don’t wanna limit the number of clients I have.

Elke Giba: I can even have a client that I really but they’re outside of my positioning that I want to go for. So I don’t wanna lose them. How do I- Well, that’s a whole different client relationship question. But that comes into it, right? We’re humans, we’re just trying to get aligned and make sure that we’re doing- But ultimately it comes down for me, it has to do with running your business, running your firm in a smart way so that when your clients are looking for people who can solve that problem, they can see you’re firm and recognize they can solve my problem. So it’s not for everybody, but for those that they’re ready to make that choice and really get hyper focused on their firm and what they practice, then it’s the right place for them. Did that answer your question?

David Lecours: And the idea that there is this fear because you’re asking people to narrow their focus and they feel like by narrowing their focus, they are going to limit their opportunities. But I would argue, and I think you would too. The converse in that by narrowing your focus, you’re going to be so good and develop so much expertise that it’s going to create opportunities that you don’t even know exists, called this adjacent possible. Right? You go into a room, you don’t know what’s in there, but by excelling it opens up these new doors that just never had existed prior. But it’s a huge leap of faith and I get it. And I think it requires that naval gazing and some introspection in order to get to a place where you’re ready to move forward in a great way.

Elke Giba: And when you’re thinking about leadership, the firm leadership and how they’ve built this practice, they’ve done it but with blood, sweat and tears acquiring clients one at a time and new projects to their list, and some of those are really hard ones. It’s a little uncomfortable to say, I’m not gonna try to get everything. I’m just gonna focus on specific areas, specific niche, and serve them. So that I can be an expert. So it can be really- It takes some courage.

David Lecours: And as are our friend David Baker likes to say, it’s about the work that you seek, not necessarily what you accept. And so, you’re gonna have other opportunities that if your pipeline isn’t filled and it’s a little bit outside your positioning, of course you take on that work. And actually probably because you’ll be so well known in one area, it might bring up other people that hear about you and to go, I really want to work with that expert. Cool. So let’s get a little more practical. And what might affirmed you to get started on positioning their firm, do they have to do this at the very inception or can they do it mid track?

Elke Giba: Yes, they can do it mid track. I was talking about my own practice and what I did. I did have a period where I was doing- I was trying to be a full service quote unquote marketing agency. For me it happens while I was in the middle of things, in the thick of things really evaluating the kind of work that I wanted to work on consistently and frequently and, and really become an expert in that area. So that’s part of it.

Elke Giba: You have to- You can start it when you launch your firm, think about the kinds of experience that you serve. The kinds of things that you’ve done, that kind of projects that you’ve worked on, the things you’ve enjoyed, the things you don’t enjoy about that work. There’s no reason you have to position yourself to work on stuff you don’t like working on. But I do think that it’s a constant refinement. I don’t think that your positioning is ever really fully fixed, right? That technology and the industry changes so dramatically and frequently. And, talking about fear, there’s probably even an aspect of if you pick a market that is no longer viable, I began to wonder if some of the firms that are serving large retail shops. They’re starting to think about, maybe we should shift a little bit and see if we can move this practice to another area that’s not quite so volatile, or government work when the budgets are down.

Elke Giba: Any of those things, it can be something that would be a part of it. But your question was, when can we do this? Yes, you can do it at the beginning. You can do it in the middle, but you should do it often. I wrote a column last month. Where the way to test to your positioning and I think that that’s actually a really good way to start to think about, am I positioned properly to be in with? And that’s just a visual exercise for you. Think about the clients that you served over the last 12 to 18 months and you’re thinking about them in groups, in stacks, and you categorize them according to either project type or project size or market, and then get a picture of where your work concentrates. What are you doing the most of?

Elke Giba: If you’re positioning phrase, if your positioning statement reflects that bulk of your work then you’re positioned correctly. If not, then it’s time to refocusing a little bit and practice it, polish it off, and get a little bit closer to being a true reflection of what you’re doing now. Or if you don’t, then stop picking those projects and start moving towards what you want to be positioned as. That’s, that’s the other way to do that. So, it can be done in the middle, and also at the beginning. But if you’re starting out and you’ve not done any of that work, how do you know that that’s really what you want to do? I think that’s probably the cautionary tale on doing it at the beginning.

David Lecours: We’ll link to that article in the show notes. If you go to psm.show, we’ll provide a link to that. So I guess what I’m hearing you say is that, the positioning statement is not forever. And I think that’s one of the fears clients have is when they attach themselves, they’re like, this is going to be us forever. And I think what you’re saying is that, no things will move around, but by the same token, it’s not something that you change from one proposal to the other because it just that makes you a little bit flighty.

Elke Giba: And keep in mind what you and I both talking about here is the reason that we feel so strongly about positioning, is that we want to help these firms get to the point where they’re not commoditized. Positioning removes that and- or at least avoids the opportunity for being commoditized. ‘Cause then you have a specialized skill, you’re really focused on, on your craft. And you can say we’re experts at this and then you can price a little bit higher than you would if you were just a run-of-the mill. We do everything, Jack of all trades, master of none. Then you’re just gonna get whatever is given to you, and you’re not gonna be able to pick and choose.

David Lecours: So our audience for the show are marketing professionals, specifically in the architecture, engineering, construction. We’re well positioned. So who should they be leading the effort for positioning, or should it be the c-suite, or a combination? Like what have you found is the best mix?

Elke Giba: This really needs to come from the leadership. It’s difficult for marketers, marketing managers, marketing coordinators to really be able to bring this to the table without them, without the leadership already thinking about it. Now, there are ways that I feel you can have that conversation with your leadership and have them start thinking about it. And that would simply- There’s a couple of reasons why you do this. One, it would give them an idea that you are invested in the success of the firm and that you want to know more about it. So simple question to the leadership like, tell me what you think is our best skillset. What did we do the best? What kind of projects do we excel? And start to have that conversation internally.

Elke Giba: If positioning is not already part of your practice, if it’s not already part of something that you’re doing. If you’ve moved a little bit further down the way and you have a positioning statement that you feel like as a pretty solid thing, then this is an opportunity when you have the next meeting where you’re talking about goals and kinds of projects that you want to go after, you can have this conversation even during the go no go phrase. Does this project really aligned with the kind of work that we wanna do?

Elke Giba: Yes or no. Well, if it’s not, then let’s not do this kind of work anymore. So those are little ways that you can start to have the conversation with your leadership. But my experience has been that, in order for it to really take hold and for everybody to be on the same page, the leadership really need to be the ones that are ready to make this change and to bring it to the table, and work on it as a group. ‘Cause it’s not just a statement, it’s an act. It’s a way of that you’re pursuing new work. It’s a way you’re pricing work. It’s all those different things and those are oftentimes spearheaded by the leadership team and not necessarily the marketing department. Although it should be, maybe.

David Lecours: I think marketing can take the lead and, if we follow the SMPS tagline ‘business transformed through mass marketing leadership’, marketers can lead and bring it to the attention and say, Hey, I’ll help facilitate this. But you definitely need to be involved and it can’t just be marketing driven totally. It’s gotta also come top down.

Elke Giba: Just for [inaudible 00:33:21]. One the ways that you can help the leadership figure out whether or not your positioned correctly is, look at the wind ratio. How many of the projects have you won, and how fair is your from aligned with that kind of work? So that would be a way for you to say to leadership, well, I noticed we’re getting a lot of these projects, we haven’t won them. I think it’s because we don’t talk about how’ve done that kind of work before. So that’s another way to broach the conversation with leadership and say, I’m really- I wanna get us to a better win rate, wanna make sure that really thinking about the projects that make up a fit for our team. So that would be another way to bring them into the conversation.

David Lecours: Okay. So, I gotta ask, does that the Giiba Group have a positioning statement?

Elke Giba: Yes. Yes we do. And it comes with hard work, right? You and I both will say that we have spent our own hours thinking about the kind of work that we want to do. And so it takes work on refinement. I noticed from the beginning that the kinds of things that I’m talking about it, and I’ve already mentioned it a couple of times before, is that I’m looking toward those courageous firms, those firms that are ready to make the decision. In my positioning statement, I talk about that I’m moving courageous AEC firms from being generalists to being specialists. And then I do that with foundational marketing strategy and activities. So that’s my- it’s not rote, that’s my- it’s moving them from, from being really generalists into a specialist and making sure that they’re taking advantage of that expertise, so it’s had one. I’ve worked really hard for it.

David Lecours: How bad. No. I hear you.

Elke Giba: Let’s put it out there.

David Lecours: And so if people wanna learn more about you and your firm, where should they go?

Elke Giba: Well, I would say go to the website. It’s Gibagroup.com, G-I-B-A only one B G-I-B-A-G-R-O-U-P.com. Or find me on Linkedin. That would be the other place where you could find me. And it’s Elke Giba, G-I-B-A. I’m the only Elke Giba, so I think if you get close, you’ll probably find me. But, there’s the website that might be the best way to find me.

David Lecours: I like it. All right, so that’s it for this episode of PSM.show. Love talking to Elke about positioning. So big thanks to her, and to our sponsor SMPS. If you, our audience, have any questions, or comments, or suggestions about future guests. That’s how we found Elke. Write to us via PSM.show. Just scroll down and there’s a simple form there. So, from Elke Giba and myself, David Lecours, we’re outta here.