Volume is Vanity Profit is Sanity

""Why is a strong brand important?" one might say that it creates customer preference, lifts sales, or even makes the sales force's job easier. But the most important answer to this question is that a brand commands a higher price. And the stronger the brand, the higher the price.

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Now consider the seemingly naive question, "What's the value of a higher price?" The answer is higher profits for the company that markets the brand.

Profit is the reason companies are in business - not sales, not revenues, not growth, but profit. And one thing trumps all others in the business mix when it comes to profitability: the pricing integrity of the brand.

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Nothing can improve a company's bottom line better than protecting and enhancing its ability to command a higher price. This means that revenues are not the key metric of your firm's success; profits are. Profit is driven mostly by price. Price is driven mostly by brand perception. This makes brand building an activity central to the success of every professional firm.

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Sadly, growth for the sake of growth has become enshrined as the goal of business. Wall Street wants its growth projections, and any company that is not consistently increasing market share is seen as an investment risk."

Isto não é unânime, alguns empresários torcem o nariz a esta argumentação. 

Trechos retirados de "Positioning for Professionals - How Professional Knowledge Firms Can Differentiate Their Way to Success" de Tim Williams.

“Revenue makes you proud, but profit makes you rich” (parte I)

"In my research I am surprised time and again by the sheer number of companies that generate losses. For some, that situation persists for years. Why do the banks remain quiet? One reason is that they are effectively held hostage by their own loans. If they call in a loan, the company could go bankrupt and in the worst case the loan would be a total loss for the bank.

The reasons behind these ongoing losses are numerous, but rarely are they due to a lack of effort on the part of the entrepreneur. Some struggle their entire lives and never earn a satisfactory margin. Profit not only has a financial side for entrepreneurs. It also provides personal validation, proof of their abilities, and fun at work. Those aspects contribute to profit as an important motivator.

In this context, how the entrepreneurs think and how they motivate themselves play an important role. Do they understand that profit is more important than revenue? Do they want to appear “big” to the outside world and become the center of attention, or keep to themselves and enjoy their profit? A favorite saying of a friend of mine gets straight to the point: “Revenue makes you proud, but profit makes you rich.”

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an analysis of the world’s current profit situation revealed that a considerable portion of companies earn only modest profits. Many do not generate an economic profit, which means that they do not recover their costs of capital.

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Why does one company go under while an apparently similar firm not only survives, but prospers? 

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Wrong Goals

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revenue, volume, and market share goals serve as proxies for long-term profit orientation, but are not sufficient as stand-alone goals. So practically speaking, how do companies deal with goal setting? In my experience, only a few entrepreneurs and managers truly put the highest priority on profit. That certainly applies to their real behavior, though not necessarily to their official declarations during investor conferences or shareholder meetings. Key metrics such as margin, returns, or the absolute level of profit often get short shrift."

Trechos retirados de “No Company Ever Went Broke Turning a Profit” de Hermann Simon.

Lucro vs treta

Esta semana mais uma vítima, não da COVID, mas de um modelo de negócio que na minha opinião (conservador financeiro nos negócios) nunca teria sucesso: "Undandy fica descalça. Uma das jovens promessas da indústria portuguesa de calçado entra em PER" (li algures que tem mais de 6 milhões de euros de dívida e que o principal credor é o Facebook).

Desde 2006 ou 2007 que escrevo por aqui: Profit is Sanity, Volume is Vanity

Neste postal de 2007 refiro a minha compra de “Manage for Profit, Not for Market Share: A Guide to Greater Profits in Highly Contested Markets” de Hermann Simon, Frank Bilstein e Frank Luby ... livros que nos marcam e nos moldam.

Entretanto, ontem à noite li, de Hermann Simon, "Le profit ne doit pas devenir un gros mot!". Malheureusement, ici au Portugal, cela s'est passé il y a longtemps.

Portugal é o país em que só se fala de distribuição, raramente se fala em criação de riqueza. Como não se cria riqueza suficiente distribui-se com base em endividamento que alguém terá de pagar, a bem ou a mal. E vai-se distribuindo cada vez menos por cada vez mais... E não estamos condenados... nunca esqueço esta descoberta do tempo do confinamento acerca da Toyota.

Hermann Simon receia que no seu próprio país a criação de riqueza se torne algo politicamente incorrecto. Assim, lançou recentemente um livro só em alemão sobre o tema.

"se déclarer pour la maximisation des profits constitue aujourd'hui une exhortation bien singulière sinon dangereuse à assumer publiquement pour un chef d'entreprise.

Le profit est pourtant la mesure la plus importante du succès d'une entreprise, a fortiori en situation de crise lorsqu'il est question de sa survie, comme aujourd'hui avec la pandémie de Covid-19.

Or, il tend à devenir un tabou du monde international des affaires, qui devient presque complexé de faire du profit.

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Concéder à l'air du temps pourrait être dommageable, car maximiser le profit constitue la raison d'être économique de l'entreprise. Et contrairement à une idée reçue, il a une éthique. Nitin Nohria, doyen de la Harvard Business School, dit avec bon sens que « la première responsabilité éthique d'un chef d'entreprise est de faire des bénéfices ». Peter Drucker, le confirme : « Il n'y a pas d'opposition entre profit et responsabilité sociale. L'entreprise qui réalise un profit ne vole pas la société. »

Et il est funeste de tenter d'opposer les actionnaires aux parties prenantes comme on tente de le faire aujourd'hui. La maximisation du profit permet justement de créer un halo vertueux autour de l'entreprise, un « jeu à somme positive » car tout le monde gagne avec une entreprise profitable, qui investit, embauche… et alimente les caisses de l'Etat.

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Ce rapide diagnostic doit achever de nous convaincre qu'il faut absolument réorienter les entreprises vers la recherche de profitabilité afin de maximiser notamment l'effet des politiques de relance en France et outre-Rhin. Seule la réhabilitation du profit y parviendra…"

Where does your company stand in the x axis? (parte II)

Parte I.

Let us consider the example of a company with annual sales of 6 000 000 euros.
Let us consider that variable costs are 60% of price.
Let us consider that fixed costs are 1 500 000 euros.
So, that company has a net profit of 900 000 euros.

What happens when that company decides to increase price in order to improve net profit?
What happens to market share?

In the following table you can see how much the market share can decrease in order to just keep the same net profit.

For a 60% variable costs scenario: if you increase your price 10% you can lose 20% market share and still earn the same net profit.

For a 40% variable costs scenario: if you increase your price 10% you can lose 14% market share and still earn the same net profit.

In the following graphic you can see the same relationship but for different variable costs weights:

Do you know where does your company stand in the x axis?

Beware of market share delusion. Volume is vanity profit is sanity.

We are not inviting you to start increasing prices out of thin air without any justification. We are reinforcing the message: beware of market share delusion.

Where does your company stand in the x axis?

Let us consider the example of a company with annual sales of 6 000 000 euros.
Let us consider that variable costs are 60% of price.
Let us consider that fixed costs are 1 500 000 euros.
So, that company has a net profit of 900 000 euros.

What happens when that company decides to reduce price in order to gain market share, in order to increase net profit?

In the following table you can see how much the market share must increase in order to just keep the same net profit.

In the following graphic you can see the same relationship but for different variable costs weights:

Do you know where does your company stand in the x axis?

Beware of market share delusion. Volume is vanity profit is sanity.

Acerca da importância do lucro

Quase todos os dias vejo gente a cometer o erro de confundir lucro com volume de vendas.

O que é o lucro?

"There is only one true definition of profit. Profit is what the owner of a company can keep after the company has fulfilled all obligations towards employees, suppliers, banks and the state. All other profit definitions, such as EBIT, EBITDA and extensions are not profit."

O que é o lucro económico?

"Economic profit is a more demanding benchmark. It’s the profit that exceeds the cost of capital, the so-called weighted average cost of capital. You could say that only economic profit is real entrepreneurial profit. Because if you don’t exceed your costs of capital, you better invest your capital elsewhere and not in your company."

O coronavirus veio ilustrar como o lucro é importante:

"The Corona-crisis brings the hour of truth, and it’s exactly now. Companies which weren’t profitable in the past and have no reserves are the first to fail. After the crisis, profit will become more important than ever because making profit will be critical for recovery, for instance, to pay back incurred debt. That will be the second hour of truth." [Moi ici: Não esquecer um texto pré-crise de 2010 sobre os que não têm constância de propósito. Agora, os mesmos muito preocupados com a sobrevivência das empresas, são os mesmos que em Novembro último estavam de peito feito.]

Lucro, a realidade versus a voz populismo:

"In Germany people believe that the net profit margin, after all costs and all taxes, is 23%. The real margin over many years is 3.4%. Similar in the US. The believe is 32% net profit margin, the reality is 4.9%. The record holders are the Italians. They think that the margin is 38%, the reality is 5%. There are two messages: Real net margins are 5% or less, typically. Furthermore, people overestimate profit margins by 600%. That’s unbelievable."

O que costuma estar por trás de baixas taxas de lucro?

"The main reason are wrong goals: market share, revenue, sales orientation instead of profit orientation. This is exacerbated by conflicting goals between functions, for instance, between finance and marketing." [Moi ici: Estão a ver como posso ficar doente quando vejo ideias estúpidas pulularem sem contraditório?]

O que dizer de lucro e dimensão das empresas?

"large corporations are not more profitable. The median of the net margin of the Fortune Global 500 is 4.49%. This tells us that half of these giants earn less than 4.5%. Most likely they don’t make an economic profit, meaning that they don’t recover their cost of capital. That’s the case for half of the Fortune Global 500. The public perception is misguided by a few profit stars.
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profit always depends on the combination of three profit drivers and there are only those three: price, volume and cost." 

Trechos retirados de "REIMAGINE THE FUTURE: „Hidden Champions”, Profit, Krise und Zukunft"

Volume is vanity profit is sanity

Ontem à noite li "Prejuízos da Farfetch mais do que duplicam em 2019 para 373 milhões de dólares". Entretanto, de tarde tinha lido "Is Silicon Valley’s Love Affair With Direct-to-Consumer Brands Over?":

"When investors of the direct-to-consumer shoe brand Birdies pressured the start-up to burn through the $10 million it raised by buying more online ads and doubling the employee headcount, founders Bianca Gates and Marisa Sharkey resisted.
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“Our investors [were] like, ‘Spend the money!’ and intuitively, we were like, ‘This is silly,’” Gates told BoF. “Why grow faster if it costs us more to acquire customers than to sell the product?”
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But the sentiment among investors seems to be shifting, Gates said. “It was like a one-eighty. Now more than ever, there’s pressure to show profitability and product-market fit.”
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Few startups in the product category have been able to secure lucrative exits for their investors. Many are stuck on a cycle of aggressive forced growth, followed by fundraising higher and higher rounds to facilitate that growth — all without regard to profit.
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“You have this double whammy of increased customer acquisition costs and more competition, and this combination can be deadly,”
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As a result, venture capitalists — especially those investing in later stages — are shifting their strategy to invest more cautiously, favouring profit over revenue and organic marketing over Instagram ads, industry sources say.
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As valuations drop, the metrics that determine these figures are also shifting. Revenue used to be the prime indication of valuation for brands, said Frederic Court, founder of Felix Capital. “But eventually, these businesses will have valuations driven by profitability… it’s about generating a healthy profit margin.”
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Eventually, these businesses will have valuations driven by profitability.
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Investors today are less focused on growth metrics and topline numbers and more focused on the bottom line"

"o tempo das marcas tradicionais terminou"

Ao longo dos anos tenho escrito aqui no blogue sobre Mongo e sobre a suckiness dos gigantes. Apesar disso foi com alguma surpresa que li "Época dos construtores tradicionais acabou, diz CEO da VW":

"Foi num discurso duro e com um conjunto de mensagens alarmantes que o CEO do Grupo Volkswagen se dirigiu aos seus colegas seniores da administração, após a reunião global do conglomerado que dirige. Referindo-se ao futuro de um grupo que nos últimos anos liderou o mercado mundial em vendas, Herbert Diess avisou, segundo a Reuters, que o tempo das marcas tradicionais terminou e que a empresa que dirige tem de acelerar a sua remodelação para evitar transformar-se na nova Nokia,
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Para Diess, os objectivos a curto prazo passam por cortar nos custos e incrementar as receitas
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Para o CEO, a receita para atingir os fins passa reduzir a complexidade, incrementar a produtividade, especialmente na Alemanha, concluindo que, acima de tudo, o grupo tem de se concentrar mais no lucro e menos nos volumes de vendas. [Moi ici: Como não recordar o velho slogan deste blogue "Volume is Vanity, Profit is Sanity", como não recordar a "anorexia empresarial"]"

O que vai minorando a queda das empresas grandes é a protecção de Bruxelas e dos governos dos estados com regulação e legislação. Estamos algures naqueles dias incipientes numa evolução exponencial de nenúfares, antes do dia 47. Que milhares de Local Motors floresçam.

Subir na escala de valor

Acho que muita gente se esquece disto "Why Gross Profit Is More Important Than Revenue":

"I’ve started encouraging the companies I’m involved in to focus on Gross Profit and the growth rate associated with their Gross Profit, rather than Revenue. Try the exercise and see how you compare to the companies you think you should compare to. And think about how much more value you could be creating with the same Revenue number but a higher Gross Margin percentage …"

"turning away from the apparent safety of the herd" (parte II)

Há dias li e apreciei este caso "How Should an Understated Luxury Brand Compete Against Bling?" com um interessante dilema estratégico.

Um responsável por uma marca de luxo de relógios suiços preocupado com a falta de "bling" (falta de espalhafato, falta de kitch, falta de animação para ser conhecida no mercado chinês)

Ontem encontrei este texto sobre relógios de luxo produzidos no leste da Alemanha, "How Eastern Germany’s Watchmaking Capital Is Beating Switzerland":

"the town of 7,000 is home to the greatest concentration of world-class watchmakers outside of Switzerland - with a business that’s growing even as Swiss producers retrench.
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Glashuette produced more than 32,000 watches last year, with a total value of at least 500 million euros, according to analyst estimates. These aren’t Swatches: The town’s 10 watchmakers tend toward the high end, and the priciest local producer, A. Lange & Soehne, has built a reputation that rivals those of giants such as Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet. Some of its watches top 1.9 million euros ($2.1 million), and its average price is roughly 50,000 euros.
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“Our customers like that not everyone knows what they have around their wrist," says Wilhelm Schmid, chief executive officer of A. Lange & Soehne. "We’re a very well-kept secret, almost like stealth wealth.”
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The German industry, though far smaller than Switzerland’s, is less dependent on sales to China, where the watch business has been hammered by an anti-corruption drive." 

Interessante como isto anda tudo relacionado. Voltando a "aumentar preços unitários ou reduzir custos unitários" ou lucro vs quota de mercado. Quando se opta por quota de mercado entra-se numa espiral perigosa, um atractor para o comportamento de manada. E quando se tropeça... parece que não se consegue voltar atrás com o abastardamento. Não é impunemente que se fazem estas asneiras.

O velho ditado

Há um velho ditado que aprendi com uma boutique de vinhos australiana em 2006:

"e que tal uma “boutique small winery”. Um gestor da "boutique" diz mesmo que é um negócio “high end fashion retailing”, em vez de inundar o mercado com produtos banais, e desesperar numa guerra de preços, atacar nichos específicos. É um prazer ver uma actividade ligada ao sector primário transpirar pensamento estratégico, demonstrar capacidade de distanciamento e de se situar no mercado."

Ou seja:

"Volume is vanity, profit is sanity" 

Ao longo dos anos tenho chamado a atenção para a curva de Stobachoff que tanto atrai os nórdicos a este blogue. Aprendi com Byrne aquela frase:

"in a typical company, 30 to 40% of revenues are actually unprofitable, while another fraction of revenues — often more like 20 to 30% — accounts for most of the organization’s profitability."

E ainda a relação 20/80/30 de Kotler:

"80% dos lucros de uma empresa são gerados pelos 20 clientes mais rentáveis.
E os 30? O que querem dizer?
Os 30 clientes menos rentáveis provocam um corte de metade dos lucros de uma empresa."

Assim, como não sorrir com este artigo "HTC only wants to make high-end phones, should be worrying for Sony":

"Sony doesn’t often get credit for for their strategic vision as they more often than not skate to where the puck is, with a delay, rather than to where the puck is going to be. With smartphones this was no different but with their mobile division in disarray, the company did something many pundits thought to be suicide – they exited the entry market and instead focused on high-end devices like the Xperia Z5, Xperia X, and now Xperia XZ. The results? A division that was once reporting over a billion dollars in losses is now recording profits.
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Now mind you there is a lot Sony could be doing to better the situation for themselves but their initial vision was correct – to put aside the volume driven mentality that drove the PC business and many Android makers into the ground and instead focus on profitability."

"a focus on profitability"

Às vezes, em projectos de reflexão estratégica, sinto uma forte concentração da equipa no crescimento da facturação.
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Chamo sempre a atenção para o topo do mapa da estratégia, a perspectiva financeira tem duas vertentes: facturar mais e mais produtividade. E que facturar mais em detrimento de uma menor produtividade é um tiro no pé. Assim, como não sublinhar este trecho:

"We find that a focus on profitability, rather than revenue growth or value creation, offers a surer path to enduring exceptional performance across all three measures.
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our research shows that growth tends to be more volatile than profitability overall, this suggests that steady growth in absolute terms is unlikely to result in long-run exceptional growth"

Trecho retirado de "Exceptional performance a nonrenewable resource"

Lucro vs quota de mercado (parte III)

Parte I e parte II.
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Outro exemplo:

"Lindt & Spruengli AG on Tuesday reported an 11% increase in full-year profit as the Swiss chocolate maker overcame a “persistently challenging market environment” where a hot summer slackened demand for chocolate and a strong Swiss franc weighed....
The maker of Lindor chocolate balls had previously announced a 7.9% increase in annual sales to 3.65 billion francs for 2015."

Este trecho que se segue faz-me lembrar as preocupações da APICCAPS com o aumento do preço das matérias-primas:

"Lindt said it increased sales in all its major markets, despite describing 2015 as a tough year where higher raw material prices and the elevated level of the Swiss franc were negative factors."

Quando não se está no campeonato do preço mais baixo as regras são outras. A estória, a marca, a sedução são mais importantes

Trechos retirados de "Lindt & Spruengli Lifts Profit in Challenging Market"

Lucro vs quotade mercado

Impressionante!

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A Lego, depois de perder as patentes, depois de uma experiência de quase-morte, quando resolveu deixar de olhar para a eficiência, de olhar para o denominador ... descobriu que o valor não resulta de uma folha de cálculo mas é um sentimento.

"Denmark’s Lego A/S reported a 31% increase in full-year net profit on strong revenue growth,
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The closely held toy maker said net profit came to 9.2 billion Danish kroner in 2015 ($1.34 billion), compared with 7.0 billion kroner in 2014. Revenue jumped 25% to 35.8 billion kroner, while operating profit grew 26% to 12.2 billion kroner.
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Mattel's 2015 revenue fell 5% from the previous year, and the company posted a 26% decline in its net profit to $369.4 million."

Parece uma trajectória à la Apple.

Trechos retirados de "Lego Profit Rises 31% but Mattel Remains King of Toy Market"

Volume e vaidade

Recordar:

Volume (quota de mercado) é vaidade
Lucro é sanidade

Mais um excelente texto de Rags:

"Apple never chased market share and was more than willing to let others fight for the low end of the market.
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Apple with just around 15% market share has 90% of profit share of the market.
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Market share is simply the wrong business metric to chase as I have written several times before. Businesses exist to create value for all stakeholders – customers, investors, partners and employees. Businesses must take actions that maximize this value pie so everyone’s share, however small the ratio is, is better than it would have been otherwise. The question of chasing market share does not come into play at all in this quest unless it is a side effect of increasing value pie.[Moi ici: Consequência ou obliquidade]
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Price is not a goal, it is not something you optimize for. it is not something your product deserves. It is not an invariant that must be adhered to. Price is a lever you have under control to maximize your share of value created.  You do not fix a price point to maintain perception rather you ensure the price point is aligned with the segment you choose to target and its needs.
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Religiously fixing a price point is an assured way to destroy value for customers and investors.
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Customers come first. We win customers by creating net new value to customers that is far more than other alternatives. We maximize the value to customers we become the preferred product and hence maximize our share of this value pie. Price is a way for us to get our fair share of that value created. Price is not the end, it is the means."

Trechos retirados de "Apple’s Focus- Market Share? Profit? or Price?"

Acerca da produtividade e dos feriados (parte III)

Parte I e parte II.
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Voltemos à equação:

"Profitability = Intellectual Capital X Price X Effectiveness"

e ao resultado, o lucro em vez da facturação:

"We start with profitability, rather than revenue, because we are not interested in growth merely for the sake of growth. As many companies around the world have learned - some the hard way, such as the airlines, retailers, and automobile manufacturers - market share is not the open sesame to more profitability. We are interested in finding the right customer, at the right price, consistent with our vision and mission, even if that means frequently turning away customers. I have coined a corollary to Gresham’s law - bad money drives out good - from monetary economics, affectionately known as Baker’s Law: Bad customers drive out good customers.
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Adopting this belief means you need to become much more selective about whom you do business with; even though that marginal business may be “profitable” by conventional accounting standards. Very often the most important costs - and benefits, for that matter - don’t ever show up on a profit and loss statement. Accepting customers who are not a good fit for your company - either because of their personality or the nature of the work involved - has many deleterious effects, such as negatively affecting team member morale and committing fixed capacity to customers who do not value your offerings. This is why the new equation focuses on profitability, not simply gross revenue. When it comes to customers, less is usually more."

Continua.

Trecho retirado de "Measure what matters to customers : using key predictive indicators" de Ronald J. Baker.

A prova do tempo... tudo por causa de um Pingo Doce

Este título "Suinicultores entram no Pingo Doce de Braga e detectam falhas na rotulagem" despertou-me a atenção.
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Há qualquer coisa por trás desta acção, o Pingo Doce compra o porco no mercado nacional... ou comprava.
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Então, a minha mente recua a 2011 e à Raporal e a este postal "Especulação à volta da carne de porco".
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Entretanto, uma pesquisa no Google leva-me até "When modern distribution owns the piggy bowl" e... lamento!
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Lamento que as minhas previsões de 2011 se tenham cumprido. Confesso que era fácil, diferenciação sem marca própria dificilmente leva a margens superiores, diferenciação sem paciência estratégica dificilmente leva a resultados positivos. A leitura levou-me a identificar uma terceira falha:

"In 2013 Raporal had overcome the period of transition, and was working together with the large distributors. “Pingo Doce was responsible for more than 50% of the sales” referred Sr. Mário Guarda, one of the board members of Raporal and responsible for the meat slaughtering and meat processing units.
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The result of this partnership was an immediate success; in 2011 the “Pig with more flavour” was awarded the national “The Portugal Winner” prize. In terms of annual performance until 2013, sales were largely made under the umbrella of this contract, which allowed Raporal to continue to grow despite the economic downturn and decreasing consumption of pork meat.
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By 2013, the contract was half way through, and the board of directors used this “free flow” time to evaluate the agreement and the future of “Pig with more flavour” upon the end of the contract.
At this point it had become clear that the initial aim of the differentiation, which rested in the ambition to improve the relationship with a client, was not achieved, as negotiations remained very tough. Moreover Raporal did not create enough brand awareness, with the differentiated product, although this was never its main objective. Nevertheless it did succeed in increasing its sales volume, and more importantly the growth of its business.
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In 2013 Raporal had overcome the period of transition, and was working together with the large distributors. “Pingo Doce was responsible for more than 50% of the sales”, while the percentage of sales through small sellers was becoming more and more irrelevant.
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While sales volumes kept increasing Raporal could not help but see its profit margins go down, mostly because of the tough negotiation with modern distribution agents. [Moi ici: Abaixo faço duas reflexões sobre este sublinhado] In the attempt to improve these relationships, Raporal decided to invest in the differentiation of its product which later was sold exclusively under Pingo Doce’s brand. Although sales figures were very promising, negotiations did not get any better.
With a challenging period ahead, Raporal’s management was forced to continue to develop strategies that would gradually decrease the dependency on this modern distributor although clearly understanding that the market conditions dictated the need to sell to these agents if the aim was to maintain large sales volume."

Reflexão 1: Não deixo de ser sentir um perfume de pedofilia empresarial por este caso. Não sabe o que é? Ver isto e isto.
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Reflexão 2: Aquele "While sales volumes kept increasing Raporal could not help but see its profit margins go down" fez-me logo recordar uma das frases que mais cito neste blogue:

Volume é Vaidade,
Lucro é Sanidade.

 2016 quase a chegar e ainda há tantas e tantas empresas a trabalhar para o market share como objectivo, quando devia ser uma consequência...
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Agora, imaginem que a Raporal tinha contactado há 5 anos este anónimo consultor da província... quanto dinheiro teria poupado? Quanto dinheiro teria ganho? Acham que este consultor iria mesmo propor-lhes "Ser ricos e com saúde" em simultâneo, ou iria trazer-lhes o incómodo de terem de se decidir e alinhar pelo que decidiram, ser rico e doentio ou pobre e com saúde? Acham que este consultor deixaria passar em claro o erro clamoroso de apostar na inovação sem desenvolver marca própria?
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Esta é a prova do tempo, o que previ e o que aconteceu. Há a outra prova do tempo, por exemplo aqui e aqui.
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A sua empresa está no lugar da Raporal em 2007?
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Será que podemos ajudar?

Demasiado lucro?

Para quem como este blogue, promove a máxima:

Volume is vanity, profit is sanity

Comecei de pé atrás com a leitura de "Too Much Profit Can Doom Your Company" ainda para mais fazendo de herói a Amazon.
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Contudo, depois percebi a mensagem:

"an excessive focus on profits can compete away investments that could lead to creating the next big thing."

Algo em linha com a lição dos nabateus ou "Acerca do lucro".

"Strategy = compete for profit"

"2. Strategy = compete for profit
Business is not about having the largest market share or about growing fast. It’s about making money. ‘I want to grow my business’ is not a strategy. [Moi ici: Recordar o truque de Roger Martin, uma estratégia é uma escolha, se o oposto dessa escolha for estúpido então não é uma estratégia] ‘I want to grow my business’ is the same as saying, ‘I want to be rich’. Those things (unfortunately) don’t happen by themselves. Growing is not a strategy, it’s a consequence. When someone includes growth in their strategy, there should be an orange light starting to blink. [Moi ici: Volume is vanity, Profit is sanity] That does not mean that you cannot use the word ‘growth’. I use it a lot in the analysis phase – for example, when you talk about growth areas of the business or when you look for growth platforms – areas where you can reach potential that will give you additional profit."

Trecho retirado de "Strategy Execution - The definitive guide" de Strategy Jeroen De Flander

Lucro em vez de volume (parte II)

Parte I.

"It is useful to think of customers in terms of two dimensions: net price realized and cost to serve. To show graphically the dynamics of the interplay between seller and buyer, we have devised a simple matrix. 

The vertical axis is net price, low to high, and the horizontal axis is cost to serve, low to high. This categorization is useful for any marketer. The carriage trade costs a great deal to serve but is willing to pay top dollar. At the opposite extreme are bargain basement customers - sensitive to price and relatively insensitive to service and quality. They can be served more cheaply than the carriage trade.

...

Serving passive customers costs less too, but they are willing to accept high prices. These accounts generate highly profitable orders.

...

Aggressive customers, on the other hand, demand (and often receive) the highest product quality, the best service, and low prices. ... Aggressive buyers are usually powerful; their practice of buying in large quantities gives them leverage with suppliers in seeking price deals and more service.

...

Marketing managers often assume a strong correlation between net price and cost to serve; they reason that price-sensitive customers will accept lower quality and service, and demanding customers will pay more for better quality and service. Thinking in terms of service and quality demands unfortunately deflects attention from the critical issue of cost to serve. In addition, weak cost accounting practices that average costs over products, orders, and customers often support the high-cost, high price myth. But as we have seen, costs and prices are not closely correlated."

Não me canso de surpreender com a quantidade de empresas que lidam com demasiados "clientes agressivos" no seu portefolio. Delapidando, assim, recursos escassos para servir clientes que pagam bem e, não remunerando adequadamente os que usa com eles.