Marketing Forum: I spoke on "what makes you different?". Free copy of the talk

I was invited to give a talk at one of the Richmond Events MARKETING FORUM on board the P&O ship Aurora.


These forums have been running for many years and they take a huge pile of marketing people and provide some training via key note talks, discussion forums and then also connect them with suppliers (who fund the actual event).


I have been on one forum as a delegate some years ago at the height of the "dot com boom" when there was a "e- Forum". They are very intensive but if used correctly are great for finding out what peers are wrestling with, talking about and also who the hot suppliers are.


I spoke on the topic of: "What makes you different?"


This is the topic summary for the talk:


This is a world where you and your competitors are largely selling products with similar benefits and features. This is a world where the fragmentation of media makes it tougher to get your message to your consumers. This is a world where brand owners find their trade customers are not only their access to consumers - but increasingly their biggest competitors.

This is a world where you need to think about how you you can ensure that you are building a long term competitive advantage based on a unique, different but relevant and compelling offer to your consumers. In order to do this, what few key things should you be doing to make you different enough to generate value and long term growth in today's competitive global marketplace?"




There is a podcast of the talk that I did, and I have now put the slides and the script into a PDF format that can be downloaded below (click on the link, or "right click" and save to your desktop)


WHAT MAKES YOU DIFFERENT? (PDF of a talk by Gary Bembridge at the Marketing Forum)


I was very pleased how the talk went on the day, and here are the scores and comments from the survey done by Richmond Events of the talk:


Scores out of 5

• Please rate the content quality of this presentation: 4.43
• How well did the content match the programme description? 4.42
• How well did the session meet your needs: 4.23
• Speaker evaluation of Gary Bembridge: 4.53
• Session average: 4.36

Delegate comments:

• Very insightful and informative
• Excellent - very thought provoking, some great example which I can take back to my world and apply to make a difference
• Loved Backstreet Boys analogy
• Understand how J+J is different - suggestion fantastic use of other brands that didn't just cover the usual
• Loved the Backstreet Boys as marketing philosophers!
• Most interesting, dynamic and relevant presentation attended so far, well structured - and mainly thinking points to take away
• Excellent use of examples to engage the audience & stimulate interest. I especially liked the jam & marrow analogy! Brilliant presentation
• Would be interesting to extend this beyond packages goods. IBM is a good illustration of the belief
• Excellent
• Well presented - passionate about presentation and his own style complimented it well
• Made the importance of "brand awareness"
• More examples - good session that could be explored further
• Wonderful voice clarity - all other speakers could learn from this guy - it is less irritating when you are not straining to pick out the words
• Good examples - small/medium/large brand and related to subject area. Very interesting to see Dorset cereals - very relevant for my brand Plum Baby.
• Really thought provoking stuff, well delivered
• Good. Short!
• I expected more stretching ideas- very product centric approach - no emphasis on services