But if you can couple targeted incentives with a positive culture you have an even greater chance of success. Many sales people are focused on the wealth generating aspects of their sales incentive plan because that is what they’ve come to expect from their employer. Even when you crack the code on the type of culture that you described, many a talented sales manager will still look for the ability to generate wealth.

If the culture and incentive align, now there’s a powerful cocktail.

Although I have focused here upon the path toward creation of meaningful value, quantification is critical… to measurement, improvement, and management. In my book, The Alpha Factor, the formula shown for how people evaluate “value” provides the means for that measurement. The formula is quite complex, because people evaluate so many factors in order to justify what they think is the right price for a given product or service. But it is ultimately understandable and readily quantifiable.

The most critical factors in that formula that have the greatest individual impact are the levels of ego satisfaction (self-satisfaction and personal significance) generated through buying or using a given product or service. It is only in their absence that more traditionally-measured factors of functionality and competitive advantage play much of a role at all.

I would love to hear how you have addressed quantifying “value” for marketers. I know this is a growing problem for many companies, because traditional measurements (or even theories) of value-creation have proven themselves non-predictive of success.

Thanks again for your comment. It most certainly adds value to the discussion.

Have a great week.

Wes

Thank you for your comment. People did feel that no one cared and that made them ripe for pure emotion. Sadly, the Alpha Factor model cannot be used in this way with long-term success, and it has already started crumbling for our new President (much to his chagrin). It has also been used by other misguided politicians.

The sadder part to me is that neither party seems to recognize the critical value of COMBINING the “ego-satisfaction” factors of the Alpha model with “minimum functionality” that the model requires that proves the promises of ego-satisfaction.

The Alpha sells the highest level of ego-satisfaction that is PROVEN by promises of at least minimum functional performance. This election was a case of only one candidate recognizing people’s need for ego-satisfaction, even though he could not possibly fulfill the minimum functional performance (meaning success in creating a vibrant, healthy economic and cultural system) using the methods that he said he would use.

52% of the population voted for him, because they were not being offered such ego-satisfaction by anyone else. They were willing to trust that he might know what he was doing simply because people will “pay” almost anything for ego-satisfaction fulfillment.

It is the height of dishonesty, however, to use this model to gain a sale, knowing that it is not possible to fulfill the promise. That has been the case far too often in politics. I hope that changes, but it will take a more enlightened population than we apparently have had.

Let’s make sure we never fall into that trap with our businesses.

Yes, I do work as a coach to help business owners drive the Alpha model throughout their businesses. Give me a call, and let’s talk.

To answer the question posed by this actual Blog Post - will the iPhone survive the G1? Yes. It will. It’s not the G1 Apple needs to worry about - it’s Android.

An interesting observation here - ego-satisfaction is important, which drives the iPhone’s sales even up against other solid products. It’s “cool” to have an iPhone - it’s “cool” to have an iPod. However, Google is a massively dominating company, yet their rise to dominance was almost the exact opposite of Apples - a 1 field, plain-Jane website that was 100% focused on functionality. In fact, nothing Google has, other than Android - is pretty or really ego-friendly - yet they dominate - virtually 100% based on function.

But really, the iPhone was cool, still is cool, and will be cool for a while longer - but people get bored with single things and look for the next cool thing. Will Apple continue to set the trends? Maybe. But will iPhone always dominate? Not a chance. Sony Ericcson is already developing an Android phone, Sprint is already on board to carry Android, and the plethora of major players in the Open Handset Alliance is staggering - Apple really doesn’t stand a chance here.

Great analysis of how functional innovation can drive dominance. I have yet to see the ego-satisfaction portion of the Google introduction (other than among the early adopters), but you may well be correct. I need to go play with one and see what is happening there.

You are absolutely correct about the risk for Apple, if it continues its closed access policies. Apple’s fear of allowing programmers to create a plethora of applications has always been their limiting factor. If Google indeed has the ego-satisfaction covered and raises the bar functionally, then Apple will indeed lose its influence.

This is the Alpha model at work. It is very predictive. As long as you offer at least the minimum expected functional performance, the critical innovation needs to be in driving higher ego-satisfaction expectations than those offered by competitors. The entertainment apps you describe being created for the Google product are part of an ego-satisfaction focus. As long as they also drive greater businessperson ego-satisfaction (especially among salespersons), they may have it.

Thanks for the insights. I will go check it out in more detail.

Wes