Running fast to stay still
7th October 2014
What do we do?
 We sell, develop, configure and support business software for companies and
other organisations
 We know a lot about a few fascinating things:
 Accounting
 Manufacturing
 Distribution
 Expense Management
 Professional Services
 Customer Relationship Management
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What do we do?
 We sell PRODUCTS (15%) and SERVICES (85%)
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What do we do?
 For example, we sold SunSystems to Glaxo Smithkline (GSK) in 1992 for:
 Czech accounting
 Corporate accounting
 Stock purchases from foreign GSK subsidiaries
 Stock management
 Sales to Czech & Slovak Hospitals and Pharmaceutical Wholesalers
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What do we do?
 We sold Fourth Shift to Unilever in 1993 for:
 Management of Rama production
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What do we do?
 We sold expense@work to the UK Parliament in 2009 for:
 Management of MPs’ expenses
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What do we do?
 We sold Microsoft CRM to Konica Minolta in 2010 for:
 Management of sales contacts and opportunities
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What do we do?
 1992 – Just me
 2013 – 200 staff in 10 countries – 14 M EUR revenue
 But nothing has changed….
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What do we do?
In essence we have done the same for 22 years (albeit on an ever larger scale),
running fast to keep up with:
 Changing market conditions
 Changing culture
 Changing technology
 Increasing competition
Marketing the same things using…
 Different positioning
 Different messages
 Different media
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1992+
The Wild East
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1992+
 Consultant in Budapest from 1987
 Started LLP in Prague in 1992
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1992+
 Single product: SunSystems
 Single service: Me
 Target Market:
Inbound Anglo-Saxon Multinationals (Unilever, Price Waterhouse, Roche, KPMG, GSK, Shell, BP,
Philip Morris, Kraft Jacobs Suchard, etc.) intent on low-risk and rapid operational start-up – at
almost any price
 Sales lead times of 1 to 3 months
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1992+
 How to reach them:
 Embassy lists of investors
 Influencers (Big Six Accounting firms, IT companies (IBM, Bull, HP, etc.)
 Advertising (English-language journals, airport advertising)
 Joint seminars with Influencers
 Specialist PR activities
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1992+
 Offering one product and service:
 Product (SunSystems) that could do local accounting safely as well as corporate accounting
excellently – rapid implementation, easy to manage by local staff with ‘emerging’ skills
 Services : experienced resident ‘Westerner’ (me) to understand corporate needs, priorities and
style, and local employees to understand local needs and culture
 Good track record and references
 Good value
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1992+
 Tools and Media:
 Telephone
 Advertising
 Business Cards, Documents, Brochures
 Explicit Mission Statements, Slogans – YUK!
 PR Articles
 Working Style
 Mingling
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1992+
 Projection:
 ‘LONDON LOGIC PRAHA’
 Suits, Ties and Clean Shoes
 Welcoming Telephone Manner
 Punctuality
 Precision, Good Documentation, High Standards, Meeting Deadlines
 If you were competent in 1992 you were generally ahead of the competition
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1992+
 Message:
Reliable, knowledgeable, honest, experienced and pragmatic
consultants, led by a ‘Western’ manager, ready to help
fearful Western financial directors
hack their way through the jungles of the Wild East
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Advert example:
In 1927 Charles Lindbergh set out to fly the Atlantic in the Spirit of St Louis.
He carried a compass, four sandwiches, two bottles of water and
451 gallons of gasoline.
He was lucky.
If you’re a new arrival in the Czech Republic, you’ll need
the right systems and the right guidance for survival.
Don’t trust to luck.
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1992+
 Differentiation?
 Not much
 Competition?
 Almost none
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1992+
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6
5
4
3
2
1
0
Market Demand
Competition
Clarity of Message
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2000+
Soft Advice for Hard Money
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2000+
 Background Change:
 Increased local self-confidence, skills and experience
 Growing distrust of ‘Western’ advisers
 Slowing inward investment
 Increasing competition in products and services
 Advent of email and internet
 Increased market sophistication
 More sophisticated requirements

Sales lead times of 4 to 12 months
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2000+
 Change in LLP Focus:
 Fewer easy sales to inbound multinationals
 Increased focus on existing customers regionally, even globally
 Mid-market and new sector-focused sales messages
 Product diversification
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2000+
 Messages:
 Regional, International and Local
 Product independent
 Multi-sector
 Multi-lingual
 No more ‘London Logic’ – just LLP
 Targeted at local as well as international managers
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2000+
 Competition:
 High End – Vast companies such as SAP, Oracle, etc
 Low End – Local, highly competent and cheap
 Mid Market – Value for Money International Solutions adapted for Local Conditions
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2000+
 Differentiation:
 Regional, with Global capability and contacts
 Specialist knowledge aligned to niche-market product
 High standards
 Good prices by international standards
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2000+
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2000+
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2000+
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2000+
 In retrospect…
 Lack of differentiation
 Too general in terms of product and services
 Lack of clear focus
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2000+
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Market Demand
Competition
Clarity of Message
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2010+
New Tricks
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2010+
 Background Change:
 Emerging Europe had emerged
 Local buyers not foreigners
 Intolerance of linguistically lazy foreigners
 Highly sophisticated needs
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2010+
 Broadening of Marketing Media:
 Google Adwords
 Twitter
 Facebook
 LinkedIn
 Wikipedia
 iPhone App
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2010+
 Deep cultural change…
 Coalescence of Social and Business Media
 In tandem with…a coalescence of Work Life and Home Life
 Leading to…greater emphasis on individuality, on diversity, etc
 And…a growing informality in working style
 Brand communication more subtle and context dependent as media proliferate (no more one-
shot mission statements and slogans)
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2010+
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2010+
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Now
 Three companies focusing on three very different markets
 Three websites & three related brands
 Three sets of messages emphasising different sets of differentiating criteria
 Broader marketing media tailored for each company (e.g. Google Adwords
for systems@work)
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Now
 Marketing Know-How means the same (to me) as always - Showing, not
saying, at every opportunity
 No clichés - ‘We put our customers first’
 No superlatives – ‘We’re the best , we’re the biggest, we’re the cheapest’
 No ungrammatical nonsense – ‘To boldly go…’
 Good plain writing ,conveying ideas succinctly
 Honest comparison with the competition
 Good references
 Demonstrable Honesty, Curiosity, Imagination, Knowledge, Experience, Pragmatism
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Now
 Directed internally as well as externally - the strongest message lies in the demonstration of
values through the way each member of the company works and behaves
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2000+
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Market Demand
Competition
Clarity of Message
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Now
Profitability has mirrored these factors:
 High in the 1990s
 Low in the 2000s
 High again now
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And then there’s fashion too
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Running fast to stay still
"Well, in our country," said Alice, still panting a little, "you'd generally get to
somewhere else—if you run very fast for a long time, as we've been doing."
"A slow sort of country!" said the Queen. "Now, here, you see, it takes all the
running you can do, to keep in the same place.
If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!“
Lewis Carroll – Alice Through the Looking Glass
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