Connected Strategy: Building Continuous Customer Relationships for Competitive Advantage

Description

The Internet of Things, robo investment advisers, wearable fitness devices, remote health care operations...business executives in many industries are currently being inundated with a confusingly and exhaustingly broad range of technological developments that enable new business models. There is, however, a common thread among all of these developments: firms are fundamentally changing how they connect with their customers. Rather than having occasional, episodic interactions - where customers realise they have an unmet need and then look for ways to fill it - firms are striving to be continuously connected to their customers, providing services and products as the needs arise, even before customers become aware of them. Firms such as Nike, Disney, Progressive Insurance, McGraw-Hill Higher Education, Medtronic, Hewlett-Packard, and Tesco are developing and competing on connected strategies: creating superior customer experiences through connectivity while simultaneously driving dramatic improvements in operational efficiencies and reshaping their industries. Strategy and operations experts Nicolaj Siggelkow and Christian Terwiesch reveal the emergence of connected strategies across a broad array of industries and show how these strategies work, how they eliminate the trade-off between superior customer experience and low cost, and how companies can formulate, design, and implement them. In showing how to create a connected strategy, the authors reveal the four pathways - respond-to-desire, curated offerings, coaching, and automatic

Nicolaj Siggelkow is the David M. Knott Professor at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, where he also serves as codirector of the Mack Institute for Innovation Management. His research, which focuses on the role interactions among a firm's activities play in creating and sustaining competitive advantage, has been published in leading academic journals such as Academy of Management Journal, Strategic Management Journal, and Organization Science. He has won more than thirty teaching awards and leads many executive education programs on strategy at Wharton. He works with companies around the globe to help them create their distinctive strategies. Christian Terwiesch is the Andrew M. Heller Professor at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, where he also serves as codirector of the Mack Institute for Innovation Management and holds a faculty appointment in Penn's Perelman School of Medicine. He has written several books and published extensively in many of the leading academic journals, ranging from Management Science to the New England Journal of Medicine. He is an award-winning teacher with extensive experience in MBA teaching, online courses, and executive education. Author social media/website info: Nicolaj Siggelkow: linkedin.com/in/nicolajsiggelkow, nicolajsiggelkow.com, twitter.com/nicsiggelkow Christian Terwiesch: twitter.com/Terwiesch, terwiesch.com, linkedin.com/in/terwiesch Connected Strategy website: connected-strategy.com

"...enlightening and easy to read... The book is a worthwhile read for those looking to build new business models based on digital strategies. It is a useful resource for C-suite executives, strategic planners, consumer researchers, and others responsible for operations, marketing, consumer research, finance, and technology functions." - RTM (Research Technology Management) Advance Praise for Connected Strategy: Adam Grant, author, New York Times bestsellers Originals and Give and Take-- "In a connected world, companies live and die on their ability to create great customer experiences. In this book, two leading experts on strategy and innovation team up to explore how to create those experiences in a rapidly changing world. Their lively, practical book offers rich cases, evidence, and frameworks for gaining and maintaining a competitive advantage." Reid Hoffman, cofounder, LinkedIn; Partner, Greylock Partners; and coauthor, Blitzscaling-- "This insightful book blends academic rigor with practical, step-by-step tools that can help you design innovative business models for the Networked Age. Connected Strategy shows how to leverage continuous connectivity and emerging AI to make deep relationships that benefit customers and businesses alike. Read this book if you want to build a business model of the future." William P. Lauder, Executive Chairman, The Estee Lauder Companies-- "A timely and practical guide and a great resource for how to create deeper relationships with consumers. In today's increasingly competitive environment, connected strategies that seamlessly link consumers, companies, and suppliers will be the future in many industries." William McNabb, former Chief Executive, The Vanguard Group-- "In their brilliant new book, Nicolaj Siggelkow and Christian Terwiesch upend traditional thinking about how to build enduring customer relationships that create competitive advantage. What makes this book special--and a must-read--is the combination of a novel way of thinking about customer relationships with specific, practical advice on how to implement these ideas. I just ordered a stack of copies for my colleagues!" Michael E. Porter, Bishop William Lawrence University Professor, Harvard Business School-- "Siggelkow and Terwiesch's important book addresses the major transformation in how companies interact with customers in the Digital Age--a transformation that is reshaping almost every dimension on which companies compete. These changes have led to customer information sharing, collaborative marketing, the development of new kinds of products and services together with new support models, and new business models based on product usage instead of conventional purchasing. The book provides a rich, accessible, and actionable road map for understanding these important changes and their implications, which every company and its leadership team needs to understand and address."