Acquisitions: Don’t Forget the Vision and the Messaging!

Acquisitions in the tech industries continue unabated.  Some companies are frequent buyers and others occasional buyers.  The reasons for buying are well understood and most deals make sense on the surface.  The integration of companies being acquired is not without risk and often gets down to retaining key personal.   After the big issues are resolved; financial details, the IT system combined and the organizations merged, life goes on.   Two important areas that are often overlooked is the integration of the vision and the strategic messaging.

The vision and messaging are indeed strategic. They differentiate you from your competition, they help your sales teams, they strengthen your brand, and they are the seeds for dozens of tactical activities both internally and externally.  If this is true, which it is, why aren't they front and center during the entire acquisition process?

Questions such as these needs to be addressed during this entire process:

1.       What’s the new strategic vision and message of the combined entity?

2.       Why are the buyer’s vision and messaging more compelling?

3.       How does the buyer's new vision drive an enhanced roadmap?

By address these key issues early and throughout the acquisition process the entire process is streamlined.  Everyone involved including employees, customers, investors and the media will see that the acquisition “makes sense”.  When this occurs resistive and negative forces will abate and the odds of a long term successful acquisition will increase. 

Please contact me if you’d like assistance in this area.  

The Myth of Numbers

Numbers never lie right?  That may or may not be true.  To the marketing professional it doesn't matter.  Your goal is to make the numbers support your messages.

For example, consider the following.

4 out of 5 doctors think drug X is great.

If you market drug X you'd say...   80% of doctors think drug X is great.

If you market drug Y you'd say... 20% of doctors think drug X is useless.

Same numbers, two compelling statements, yet two very different messages.

The lesson here is not to worry about numbers.  You can spin a story that supports your goals regardless of the actual "numbers"

Marketing is all about the color gray

Marketing is all about the color gray.  Nothing is pure white or pure black.  To the engineer it is black or white or a "1" or a "0".  Does the LED blink when it's supposed to?  Does the software do what it was intended to do?   Similarly, to the sales person life is black and white.  Did they make their quota?  Yes or No, 1 or 0, black or white.

No product or service will EVER be 100%.  It will never be perfect for the customer or consumer.  The goal of marketing is to take the "gray" and make it as white as possible in the mind of the customer.