By Julie Rose 

Now more than ever, it’s crucial to balance future readiness with the demands of today.

The future isn’t distant. It’s already here and unfolding in ways most can’t imagine. If you look closely, the signs of what's to come are everywhere. Technology, consumer preferences, and industry landscapes are evolving at an unprecedented pace.

Yet, many still expect gradual change, a slow evolution of today’s norms. The reality is different. The future is coming faster and with more disruption than we’ve ever experienced before. To remain competitive, companies must adopt a future readiness mindset.

More Different Than Ever Before 

In the next 20 years, society will change more than it has in the past 300 years. We live in the Technology Era, where things evolve exponentially. This is hard to grasp because we’re wired to think in linear steps, not exponential leaps. 

For example, the stepwise expansion of grocery store refrigerated sections to include fresh snacks and functional beverages and grab & go meals was a slow, predictable evolution. But the rise of Instacart, which recognized paradigm shifts in eCommerce, the gig economy, and rideshare platforms was a significant leap that changed grocery shopping substantially. Today, 25% of groceries are bought through delivery services like Instacart. 

While we easily project near-term change, we vastly underestimate long-term transformations. 

Take TikTok, Zoom, Peloton, Alexa, Airbnb, and Tesla—none existed 5 to 10 years ago, yet they are now embedded in our daily lives, and disrupted industries almost overnight. 

How will your industry, competitors, and consumers transform in the next decade? 

The Power of Exponential Change 

Exponential technological growth, driven by Moore’s Law, is driven by the power and capabilities of technology doubling every two years, if not faster. This exponential curve is almost impossible for our linear human brains to understand. Let’s demonstrate: 

Imagine folding a giant piece of notebook paper in half. Now fold it again and again until you’ve folded it 42 times. How tall would that folded tower of paper be? Four inches? Four feet? Four yards? 

Wrong. It would stretch all the way to the moon (0.004 inches x 2⁴² ≈ 240,000 miles)! 

This is the power of exponential growth—small changes compound quickly, creating massive impacts. Companies and individuals who can think exponentially, recognizing and preparing for the transformational changes on the horizon, will thrive in a future that looks radically different from today. 

How to Prepare for Tomorrow, Today 

Here are four critical steps to get your organization ready for the era of exponential change: 

1. Narrow Your Lens   

With endless opportunities (and challenges) on the horizon, it’s easy to lose focus. Which do you want to solve? Where do you want to start? Narrow your focus to areas where you can make the biggest impact. Rather than trying to chase every opportunity, focus on solving the problems that align with your strengths and strategic goals. Successful companies of the future will be those that zero in on the right opportunities, rather than trying to cover too much ground (or worse, choosing to stand still).  

You don’t have to be Amazon, Tesla or Google X—but you better not be Blockbuster. 

2. Notice & Anticipate   

The future doesn’t usually arrive in the form of today’s familiar faces. Instead, it comes from the edges. Netflix didn’t resemble its current form in its early years, nor did Facebook. To see the signals of change, look beyond your immediate competition or traditional industry players. Explore the fringes of culture, markets, and technology. The future often looks weird before it goes mainstream—initially awkward, niche, and impractical—until it’s not.  

What are you doing to discover tomorrow’s signals today? 

3. Seek a Catalyst   

Driving disruptive change is tough, especially for established organizations. That’s why you need innovation catalysts—people who have the rare ability to get things moving and drive change. These are the people who can activate ideas by building trust, challenging assumptions, and breaking through organizational inertia. If you have them on your team, nurture and empower them. If not, hire them. Additionally, reevaluate your network. Seek and develop deep partnerships that offer 1+1=3 potential. 

Do you have a catalyst on your roster? Are your partners driving exponential potential? 

4. Practice   

Focus, anticipation, and catalysts alone won’t ensure success. You must also create the time and space to “rehearse the future”. Build experimentation into daily routines and make future discussions a core part of company culture. You still need to run day-to-day operations, but by weaving future preparation into daily practice, you’ll be better prepared when disruption hits. World class innovation companies like 3M, NASA and Nike create space, ring-fence funds and reward risk-taking and experimentation. 

What systems and norms do you have in place to enable learning about your potential futures?

SIVO is Your Future Readiness Co-Pilot 

While tomorrow’s marketplace will look very different from today’s, understanding human needs, beliefs, and behaviors will remain critical. At SIVO, our Custom Research and Growth Framework solutions will highlight tomorrow’s opportunities, and our On Demand Talent network offers “future-ready” experts ready to provide fractional support tailored to your needs.  Additionally, we are “rehearsing the future” by actively using and experimenting with AI tools that support our researchers in uncovering insights and optimizing efficiency.

Contact us at Contact@SIVOInsights.com or visit SIVO's Website to hear more about our investigation or to schedule a discovery call.  Let’s embrace the future together!

Before we experienced a worldwide pandemic and the Great Resignation, employers knew how to keep and retain talent. The focus was on providing work-life balance, exciting roles, improved technology, and better onboarding and training. In this new age, people are requesting flexible work schedules and locations. A report by the Future Forum, a group within Slack Technologies Inc, found that “95% of employees want flexible schedules and 78% want flexible locations.” 

While not having to stick to a fixed 9-5 schedule and the ability to work from anywhere can be helpful to workers, employers need to dig deeper to understand how this will play out. These new ways of working come with drawbacks that can sneak up and drag down employee satisfaction and morale.

Our Employee Experience Insights Revealed 3 Major Challenges for Remote Workforces:

1. Work Time is Seeping into Personal Time 

Because the boundaries aren’t as firm as they once were. We used to have a built-in transition with the commute to and from work. Many of us no longer have that physical and mental transition that ends work time and starts home time.

2. Virtual Fatigue 

comes from being online all day, in virtual meetings, without truly interacting or collaborating with people face-to-face. Gone are the spontaneous “water cooler chats” and the conference room banter that happens before and after meetings.

3. Isolation / Loneliness 

If you find yourself talking to your dog or cat throughout the day, you are not alone. Working from home can create feelings of loneliness and isolation, as people find themselves rarely needing to leave their home/work office. This can be especially true if you started a job during the pandemic and you have never met your co-workers or manager in-person.

How can employers help their workforce strike the balance?

Many companies are incorporating new approaches to support employees in adjusting to flexible schedules and locations, such as:

• Incorporating consistent one-on-one meetings for personal connection

• Creating virtual team-building activities, such as cooking classes or happy hours

• Offering online mental health services

• Moving to a 4-day work week 

If you haven’t listened to your employees recently, now is the time. We can help you and your organization understand what employees REALLY want, and how to help them achieve the balance they crave in this new world we are navigating.

Let's Find Balance Together

With SIVO’s Organizational Intelligence Solution, we dig deep via employee interviews and group discussions to understand the challenges and engagement of the workforce. We facilitate leaders in the development of strategies and solutions to help employees cope with the “side effects” that come with flexible work schedules and remote work environments. 

Trending

Do customers want to ‘hire’ your product?

Are you facing these challenges?

More workload and pipeline projects than your team can execute

Questioning how to keep saying “Yes” to internal stakeholders

Not enough time or resources to meet multiple requests for actionable insights from leadership, product development, marketing, or strategy

How Can we Help?

SIVO Insights On-Demand Talent™ is a solution for Insights talent needs for teams just like yours. We leverage our extensive pool of Insights professionals, with years of experience and expertise, to help you achieve your business objectives.

We recommend three key steps for evaluating and making the case internally for hiring contract Insights talent.

As workforce talent continues to evolve, there is no shortage of options, including interns, short or long-term contractors, contract-to-hire, or direct hire. Below, we highlight the advantages of Contract Talent vs. Full Time Hire:

Trending

Do customers want to ‘hire’ your product?

Get Expert Consumer Insights with SIVO

We have started engagements in as quickly as one week. To discuss your needs and how we can match the talent with the best expertise for quick solutions in your organization, visit SIVO Insights On-Demand Talent or email Brent.Budke@SIVOInsights.com.

By Kerry Juhl

Brand positioning is a critical component of a successful marketing strategy. It defines how a brand is perceived in the minds of its consumer target, differentiating it from key competitors. A well-crafted positioning statement serves as the foundation for all marketing efforts and ensures consistent messaging across all channels. 

The SIVO team has spent many years helping brand teams develop and evaluate brand positionings across a variety of industries. While every positioning project is somewhat unique, we have supported our clients with proven frameworks and research approaches, leading to the development of successful brand positionings.  

The Positioning Statement

A positioning statement is a concise description of how a brand wants to “show up” in the world, highlighting the primary (and ideally, unique) benefit it provides, along with the rationale for how it can deliver the benefit. The statement typically includes the following format and elements:

For (consumer target), Brand is the only product type that provides (key benefit), because Brand has (feature/reason to believe), (feature/reason to believe) and (feature/reason to believe).

For example, Volvo’s positioning statement looks something like this:

For safety-conscious families, Volvo premium automobiles offer the safest cars on the road because they have advanced safety features, industry-leading crash test ratings, and innovative safety technologies.

The Brand Benefit Ladder

At the heart of developing a strong brand positioning is a solid understanding of the Brand Benefit Ladder, a strategic tool used early in the positioning development process. It helps brand teams articulate the value proposition by identifying benefits at four levels:

1) What it is 

2) What it does  

3) How it makes you feel 

4) How it can transform your life 

This framework ensures a clear articulation of the brand’s offerings and the emotional and transformational benefits they provide.  Depending on the brand’s maturity and the competitive landscape, positioning can be based on functional benefits (what it is/what it does) or a more emotional/transformational benefits (how it makes me you feel/changes your life).

Positioning Types

There are a variety of positioning types that fit across the Brand Benefit Ladder:

Product Features:

Attribute-Based Positioning centers on specific features that distinguish the product.

Example:  For homeowners, Dyson vacuum cleaners are superior carpet cleaners because they offer superior suction, advanced filtration, and allergen removal.

Value-Based Positioning is linked specifically to the price value of the product.  

Example:  For price-sensitive shoppers, Walmart offers everyday low prices by leveraging its extensive supply chain and scale to provide unbeatable savings on a vast assortment of goods, ensuring customers can save money and live better.

Functional Benefits:

Benefit-based Positioning highlights the key functional benefits or solutions provided by the product.

Example:  For fitness enthusiasts struggling to exercise regularly, Peloton is the exercise bike that keeps you motivated to exercise because it delivers an immersive and interactive experience, world-class instructors, and a supportive fitness community. 

Problem-Solution Positioning focuses on the problems that the product solves for customers.

Example:  For individuals suffering from dandruff, Head & Shoulders provides effective and long-lasting relief from dandruff flakes and itchiness because it has a clinically proven formula that eliminates dandruff, nourishes, and protects the scalp. 

Emotional Benefits:

Lifestyle Positioning aligns the product with a particular emotion or feeling.

Example:  For athletes and active individuals, Nike enhances athletic performance and empowers athletes to reach their full potential through its innovative, cutting-edge sportswear products.  

Cultural Symbolism Positioning uses cultural symbols and references to position the brand within a cultural context.

Example:  For motorcycle enthusiasts seeking an authentic and exhilarating riding experience, Harley-Davidson is the iconic motorcycle brand that delivers powerful, custom-made bikes with a rich American heritage and embodying the spirit of freedom, rebellion and individuality. 

Purpose-Driven Benefits:

Innovation-led Positioning sets the brand up as a leader in innovation and cutting-edge technology.

Example:  For environmentally conscious consumers and tech enthusiasts, Tesla is the leading electric vehicle and clean energy company that offers a sustainable environmental solution via their innovative high-performance electric cars and cutting-edge technology. 

Purpose-led Positioning centers on what the brand is doing for the world rather than the product itself.

Example:  For socially conscious consumers, TOMS is the footwear brand that provides stylish and comfortable shoes while also making a positive impact on communities around the world though its One-for-One model, where each purchase directly contributes to improving lives in underdeveloped countries. 

Purpose-Driven Benefits:

Innovation-led Positioning sets the brand up as a leader in innovation and cutting-edge technology.

Example:  For environmentally conscious consumers and tech enthusiasts, Tesla is the leading electric vehicle and clean energy company that offers a sustainable environmental solution via their innovative high-performance electric cars and cutting-edge technology. 

Purpose-led Positioning centers on what the brand is doing for the world rather than the product itself.

Example:  For socially conscious consumers, TOMS is the footwear brand that provides stylish and comfortable shoes while also making a positive impact on communities around the world though its One-for-One model, where each purchase directly contributes to improving lives in underdeveloped countries. 

Regardless of the type of positioning and where it fits on the benefit ladder, all positioning statements need to be clear, credible, and differentiated from the competition.  It can then be used to inspire marketing executions across channels, to create consistent communications and connections to the consumer target.

Researching Your Brand Positioning

Developing effective brand positioning requires rigorous research, with the ideal approach being a combination of qualitative and quantitative research.  

1. Qualitative Exploration: This phase uses one-on-one in-depth interviews with current and potential consumers to explore brand perceptions and refine positioning language. It helps the client team explore and understand the nuanced emotional and rational drivers behind brand choice and allows the team to modify and improve the positioning statements in real-time, based on consumer input.

2. Quantitative Survey: Once the positioning statements are refined, quantitative research helps identify the most motivating positioning from a handful of alternatives. Surveys and real-world experiments (e.g., testing via digital ads) can be used to test different positioning statements among a larger sample, assessing the impact on brand perception and purchase interest.

By using a combination of qualitative exploration and quantitative validation, brand teams can ensure their positioning is not only compelling but also grounded in consumer reality. 

Your Source for Expert Consumer Insights

At SIVO, Inc., we are dedicated to helping our clients develop brand positionings that are clear, unique, credible, and most importantly, relevant to your consumer target.  We are trusted advisors in supporting your positioning development and will design custom learning plans that generate the insights needed to carve out a unique space in the market and connect with your consumers. This holistic approach will set the foundation for enduring brand success.

Contact us via our website form or email us at Contact@SIVOInsights.com today to schedule a discovery call!