Fugir à comoditização

A mesma tendência em todo o lado:

"Many consumers now think of some legal services ... as commodities differentiated only by price.
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Commodities, after all, are uniform products that are selected on the basis of price, because price is the only thing that differentiates one offering from another. Services become commodities when clients see the outcome of a service as standard; that is, differences from one service provider to the next are irrelevant to the client’s desired outcomes.
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Most industries are experiencing an accelerating rate of commoditization and, therefore, pricing pressures in their markets. Many factors account for this:

• Most industries have matured, so that knowledge and quality that once separated competitors are now commonly available.

• Excess supply exists in most markets owing in large measure to the Internet, which has erased geographic boundaries, allowing companies to compete anywhere.

• Retailers use store brands to pressure manufacturers to reduce their prices.

• The Internet makes price shopping effortless for consumers and forces manufacturers into online auctions to win retail-store shelf space.

• A growing business service sector enables competitors to quickly copy good ideas.

• Customers have more control of companies’ images due to the rise in blogs.

Businesses try to escape commoditization through product innovation, branding centered on emotional benefits, and improved marketing communications."

Sugestões para fugir à comoditização?

"The recession offers unique opportunities to rethink your value promise and redefine the business that you are in. Before you create your next marketing plan or annual strategic plan, step back alone or with a group of partners and ask the following questions:

• 1) Why should clients work with you, versus other firms that also are qualified to meet their needs? Be careful to answer this question from the client’s perspective. ...

• 2) If you have a differentiated value promise, don’t rest on your laurels. What skills can you develop to make your value promise even more relevant, compelling, unique, and hard to copy? We work in a copycat economy in which competitors emulate others’ good ideas, creating more price-driven competition. The commoditization process is the gravitational force of the economy. You must keep improving your advantages to escape it.

• 3) If you lack a differentiated value promise, what problems and frustrations do your clients face with legal services? What does or could your organization do or have that no competitor could easily match that would address these challenges and greatly benefit current or potential clients?

• 4) How might you disrupt your own services to significantly decrease charges to clients for some or several services?

• 5) Would a different revenue model build a higher value with key clients?"

Estas questões, esta reflexão, não serve só para escritórios de advogados, aplica-se também a uma padaria, a uma empresa de enchidos, a um hotel do interior, a ...
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Fundamental assumir a condução do destino da empresa.
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Trechos retirados de "Surpassing the Gold Standard: Differentiate Your Practice in Ways that Really Matter"