Tuesday 23 May 2017

Challenger MI Blog

"I did six years of planning to win the Championship from Jack Dempsey", said Gene Tunney, the epitomical challenger-turned-champion, "boxing's brainiest", and a very credible businessman too.

In the view of boxing journalist Mike Casey: "Tunney...ranks very high...in his ability to assimilate and analyse data and effectively act upon it...He studied his opponents in depth and knew their every move before he entered the ring...With typical foresight and calculated planning, Gene Tunney had been tracking Jack Dempsey for some time."

The ultimate challenger, he toppled Dempsey - the seven-year champion, an American icon and the first boxer to gross over $1m in a fight - twice!

Thursday 27 April 2017

White Paper: Altering Course to Provide Clarity in Murky Waters


“We’re not in the shipping business; we’re in the information business.” Peter Rose, Founder of Expeditors.

The UK’s freight forwarders are an important cog in UK PLC’s export machine – a machine that is ramping up in the wake of the Brexit vote, with the fallen pound making our products more competitive overseas, and with a government drive to increase exports, particularly among small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Exports have already risen since the Brexit vote, and are growing at the fastest rate in six years (CBI); and freight forwarders are there – particularly for those taking uncertain first forays into international markets – to organise shipments, as experts in the logistics network. They offer a variety of services, with some more diversified than others, from packaging and sending single items, to warehousing large shipments, to fully-operating as a company’s outsourced export department. And, of course, they act as import agents too.

This is a highly competitive industry, and particularly so given research from the US by consultancy firm A.T. Kearney – a good firm, with whom I have worked in the past – that showed the levels of profitability achievable in freight forwarding, with the top companies achieving a return on capital (ROC) akin to that of Apple.

From where I am based, near Telford – right on the M54, 25 miles from the M6, 29 miles from the M5, 40 miles from Birmingham Airport, and 80 miles from the port at Liverpool – there is a robust local road freight sector. Looking at the SIC code that most such companies file under, there are 1,261 firms in the immediate vicinity covering TF (133), SY (179), WV (441) and ST (508) postcodes. Turning to freight forwarding specifically – given only a small portion of these will be forwarders – the membership of the British International Freight Association (BIFA) shows 67 members within a 25 mile radius of Telford – which, clearly, is competition enough. They are mapped below, noting the gatherings along motorway corridors around the Black Country and West Birmingham – they are often treading on each other’s toes on the same business parks or streets.


Wednesday 19 April 2017

SMEs: Use Freelancers to Fill Your Analytical Skills Gaps

Recent research from PeoplePerHour shows that 67% of small- to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are now using freelancers to fill skills gaps in their companies, with a 4:1 ratio of freelancers to employees in those that do – a real demonstration of the flexibility in our SME market; and great for Challenger MI, specialising in market and competitive intelligence for industry Challengers and SMEs, given that they comprise 99% of our economy: around 3.5m potential customers!

The main reason for using freelance talent, cited by 55% of respondents, is to fill roles that companies currently lack the skills for; followed by gaining increased capacity and flexibility, cited by 37% of respondents.
These are strong arguments in favour of acquiring freelance talent, and they are as applicable to my profession – the market and competitive intelligence discipline – as to any other niche or specialist discipline, for a number of reasons. This is particularly so as most SMEs, unlike their larger competitors, do not have the capacity to employ analysts full-time.

Firstly, market analysis is a specialist skill-set, and especially so when it comes to analysing large datasets – both quantitative and qualitative – particularly in the form of survey responses or large amounts of sales data, for example. Not only is the analysis itself technical, but there is also a skill to initially asking the right questions, and then disseminating the findings in such a way as to ensure that action is taken upon them.
Research from LinkedIn, reported by the World Economic Forum, showed that, for 2017, the second most in-demand skill of all is statistical analysis and data mining; and the eighth most in-demand skill is data presentation and visualisation. Challenger MI does both on a freelance basis with, for example, the image below showing the visualisation of tens of thousands of data points relating to export markets for a micro-business that we looked at recently.
Secondly, freelancers add greater capacity and flexibility to an SMEs workforce; and, once more, analytical work is a prime example of where this is needed, as I all-too-often see it tacked on to another person’s job. For example, I recently looked at a job description for a ‘Marketing Manager’ at a local medium-sized company. In the job description, the employer outlined 28 responsibilities, and 11 desired skills; and, in total, six of these related to market intelligence. Five of the 28 responsibilities (18%) did so, suggesting that the Marketing Manager should spend roughly one day a week on them.

Given that this person’s role also includes the full spectrum of marketing – from web design and management, to branding, e-commerce, advertising, social media, packaging, PR – it is simply not possible for them to cover all of that and have the requisite expertise for market analysis, nor the time to do the work justice. It is an excellent opportunity to bring in a freelance analyst, for that one day a week, to get that work done to the utmost standard, while also freeing up the Marketing Manager’s time for the other 23 responsibilities on that list.
Furthermore, I make the point above that it is a specialist skillset; but, further, it is more than that: a specialist mind-set, too. Nowhere is this more perilous, in my opinion, than in the marketing field, given that analytical work requires left brain dominance, while marketing work – the advertising, the PR, outlined above – requires right brain dominance. There are often fundamental differences in personality and mind-set between these two types of people.
From another blog, here.

Thirdly, the use of freelancers brings in a fresh pair of, objective, eyes. This is particularly important in market and competitive intelligence, given the absolute necessity for objectivity, impartiality and the requirement to overcome bias – perhaps particularly where competitors are concerned – in your analysis.
Think about a customer survey, or a win/loss analysis programme: your customers are far more likely to give honest responses, from which a company can learn the most, if they know that they are talking to someone independent of the company – perhaps Market Research Society qualified, as in my case (!) – and who guarantees their anonymity.
Where competitor products are concerned, a company will, inherently, think that its products are superior – but are you seeing this from the same perspective as your customers? Bringing in an outside analyst helps to overcomes these biases; and others, too, such as confirmation bias, which is a particular pitfall for those inexperienced in analytical techniques.
Conclusion
Two-thirds of SMEs enlist the help of freelancers, but what I would really like to see, perhaps next from PeoplePerHour’s research, is the subsequent differences in performance between those companies that do and those that don’t – there are huge benefits to be gained from the flexibility and access to skills, and I would hypothesise that it is reflected in company performance.
Freelance analysts – the second most in-demand skill – should be at the forefront of this. SMEs’ larger competitors are recruiting stattos, and can accommodate employing full-time analysts. SMEs risk falling behind if they don't keep up with the big data evolution.
But more so than anything, I wholeheartedly believe that SMEs stand to gain greater competitive advantage from market intelligence due, among other things, to the reduced lead time between the production of intelligence and the action that can be taken upon it.
Hiring a freelance market analyst enables SMEs to exploit this competitive advantage and – as with all of the freelancing above – access these skills on the basis, and cost, upon which they need them. I work with SME clients highly flexibly on an ongoing, temporary, or project basis.
Indeed, I believe so passionately in these principles that I offer one day of work a week at minimum wage to local micro-businesses and start-ups, so that they can access a skill-set and mind-set that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to.
MBA-level analysis for minimum wage – I call it putting my money where my mouth is.
If your company is interested in adding market analysis expertise and capacity on a freelance basis, then contact me here.

Wednesday 8 March 2017

Let's Fire Shropshire Back into the Export League Table


There is nothing quite like a league table to focus minds. I know this through my intimacy with university league tables, noting Shropshire’s recent success on this front as Harper Adams University ascended to the lofty heights of No.1 ‘Modern University of the Year’, and the top 50 overall, in The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide; whilst also being the second fastest riser in the Complete University Guide. Once we – people, companies, universities, football teams – are ranked alongside each other, it invokes our inherent competitiveness, one of the key drivers of productivity.

Which is why – as the self-declared Bad Boy of Benchmarking – I could not pass over the SME Export Track 100, published by The Times in February 2017, without getting the competitive juices flowing. This particular league table ranks the top 100 UK SMEs by their rate of export growth over a two-year period.

PROBLEM

The interactive map below pinpoints each of the companies in the top 100, showing that there was not one Shropshire company in the rankings. There were nine Midlands companies, including two from the Black Country – one of which, Stiltz Lifts in Kingswinford, came 7th overall – and one from Staffordshire. Six of the top 100 are from the West Midlands which, given that the region contributes 7.3% of national Gross Value-Added (GVA), is not too bad. London is, of course, a hotspot, along with a ring around the M25 that encompasses the wider South East. Also the North West, around Manchester; Yorkshire, close to Sheffield and Leeds; Glasgow; and a half circle around the south of Birmingham. 



Monday 6 February 2017

Trump: what the left-brain saw, but the right-brain didn't


So, this blog takes a few tangents, and here is the first: I have noticed, increasingly, that I think in tangents. Two practical manifestations of this include my tendency to use em dashes in my writing, which – according to Grammar Book (case in point) – are used to indicate, "an interruption, or an abrupt change of thought" (aka, a tangent!) And, secondly, instead of the usual A4 or A5 notepad – or, increasingly, a tablet of some description – that is the accompaniment of virtually everyone in the world of work, I have started using an A3 clipboard and paper, because it enables me to better visualise all of the tangents I take in any given meeting!


[Incidentally, this very blog is a tangent: I told myself I was going to do all sorts of other things tonight, but – having spent my morning bike ride thinking about this (another one, I’ll try to do one per paragraph) – couldn't resist spending my evening writing it.]

Saturday 4 February 2017

The Father of Advertising’s Research Imperative


The picture below piqued my interest as I scrolled down my LinkedIn timeline recently; not because I have any expertise in advertising or copywriting – I am overwhelmingly left-brain dominant, and not particularly creative – but because of what this says about the creative process (largely a right-brain pursuit) in its entirety. Namely, that according to 'The Father of Advertising', it is still grounded in comprehensive research (a left-brain pursuit).
[Ogilvy’s 1955 letter, abridged]

Friday 13 January 2017

Shropshire, We Need to Talk About Productivity



The Office for National Statistics published the latest productivity figures last week (6 Jan 17), for Q3 2016, showing that national productivity was up 0.4% on the quarter, and 1.1% on Q1 2008, and hence, “the productivity puzzle remains.”[1] Alongside these, they also published productivity data at a sub-regional level, although this lags the overall data with the most recent publication running to the end of 2015.