The Saklad Method

The Saklad Method and the advantage it confers derive from long observation of why many great companies fail to unlock their full potential and achieve the profitable growth they so deserve.

Here’s how our method came about for producing that growth in highly competitive environments, and how you can put it to work no matter what industry you’re in.

Too many companies stumble when they should succeed

Over the years we’ve seen great companies that sell great products at great prices watch in dismay as corporate buyers hand their orders to competitors instead of to themselves.

Yet these great companies create offerings with the latest technology and buzz. Management’s desks are piled high with reports on markets and technology trends. And marquee consulting firms weigh in with reams of presentations and advice.

So what goes wrong, we’ve asked ourselves, and what can we do about it.

What’s the explanation?

Hundreds of hours of interviews we’ve conducted with those corporate buyers in the U.S. and Europe have revealed critical gaps in vendors’ thinking and action.

We discovered that good as they are at building superior offerings, few vendors recognize and act on the fact that corporate customers seek and buy fundamental business benefits for their companies. And that buyers don’t always value the latest technology most vendors want to sell them instead.

We observed that many vendors have trouble accepting that customers always have a choice. And that customers sometimes pick a competitor’s offering for reasons that vendors again need to act on, yet often don’t.

Growth and profits at too many companies are thus stymied by these critical gaps, which separate the worlds of corporate customers from the worlds of vendors.

We also saw that growth and profits suffer when companies spread themselves so thin they lack the resources to develop clear differentiation and a decisive advantage over competitors in any one market. These overstretched companies thus rarely become the leaders customers go to, and have trouble winning profitable business away from more focused vendors.

As the director of global sales and marketing at a $2 billion company we have advised put it: “Let’s not forget that we’re actually selling things to people, and that what they think matters. At some point you have to build differentiation. Instead, we devise strategies that are linear extensions of what we are, as opposed to what we should be.”

Ultimately, these and other observations demonstrate that rather than building on what it wants to sell, the successful company grounds its strategies in the bedrock of what customers want to buy and how they think, feel and act during the buying process, when vendors with different offerings compete for their business. 

How to answer the defining question customers ask, “Why you?”

At Saklad Consultants we pulled these observations together into a disciplined process for creating strategies that produce sustained, profitable growth in highly competitive environments.

Known as The Saklad Method, the process succeeds by analyzing how customers view their needs, your company’s strengths and your competitors’ weaknesses; and by locating the point where these critical factors in the strategy equation intersect in their minds.

We then use this understanding to develop market, differentiation and product strategies that act at this point and convert your edge into customers’ preference when they compare offerings and make purchasing decisions.

What sets our method apart from the usual inside-out, technology-driven way of developing core strategies is that we build them instead on the solid foundation of customers’ needs, perceptions and behavior.

This approach creates the competitive advantage that answers compellingly the defining question customers ask — “Why you?” — and gets their orders.

Combined with our commitment to understand your businesses, technologies and capabilities, and to tailor our services and deliverables to your requirements, The Saklad Method produces these key benefits your company can put to work to its lasting advantage:

• A clear strategic vision

• Focused competencies, resources and people

• Sustainable competitive advantage

• Customer preference

• Market leadership

• Maximized opportunities, minimized risk

• Lasting profitable growth.

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