François M. Jacques

Quando me tornei chefe de marketing da divisão de cimento da Lafarge no final de 2001, os veteranos costumavam me dizer que havia apenas dois tipos de clientes: aqueles que gostavam de golfe e aqueles que gostavam de pescar. Bem-vindo à linha de frente de uma típica empresa de cimento — um mundo difícil povoado por vendedores grisalhos cujas propostas tinham como objetivo fazer amigos em vez de demonstrar que seus produtos eram melhores do que os da concorrência.

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Reprint: R0705G
When Fran&#231;ois Jacques became head of marketing at Lafarge&#8217;s cement division in late 2001, old-timers told him that there were only two types of customers: those who liked golf and those who liked fishing. Welcome to the front lines of your typical cement company, a hardscrabble world peopled by grizzled salesmen whose pitches are about making friends rather than demonstrating that their products are better than the competition&#8217;s.
It isn&#8217;t easy to establish a marketing function in a company that doesn&#8217;t think it needs one. From the start, Jacques tackled the challenge on a number of fronts. First, he formed a three-person steering committee with both his strongest ally and his most vociferous foe in the executive ranks. Then he set right to work applying marketing&#8217;s most basic and powerful tools&#8212;segmentation and pricing strategy&#8212;to four carefully chosen pilot projects. To make the value of those efforts quickly apparent, he measured their effectiveness with readily understood metrics. He shared the ongoing results as widely as possible by establishing regional networks of marketing and sales executives. He wove marketing into Lafarge&#8217;s mainstream management processes by becoming a fixture at the company&#8217;s strategic-planning, performance, and budgeting discussions.
Step by step, over the next four years, Jacques and his team of first temporary, and then permanent, marketers fundamentally transformed Lafarge&#8217;s commodity mind-set. Segmenting customers allowed people to see that they were selling to different groups that required different products, which in many cases could be sold for higher-than-commodity prices. Customer satisfaction surveys led them to improve supply chain execution and, ultimately, to change what they sold, so that their offerings were suited to a range of customer requirements, increasing value both for them and for the division.
Many firms have a marketing function in name only. These lessons can serve as a model for such companies looking to escape the commodity trap.

Even Commodities Have Customers

Reimpressão: R0705G Quando François Jacques se tornou chefe de marketing da divisão de cimento da Lafarge no final de 2001, os veteranos lhe disseram que havia apenas dois tipos de clientes: aqueles que gostavam de golfe e aqueles que gostavam de pescar. Bem-vindo à linha de frente de uma típica empresa de cimento, um mundo difícil povoado por vendedores grisalhos cujas propostas são fazer amigos em vez de demonstrar que seus produtos são melhores do que os da concorrência. Não é fácil estabelecer uma função de marketing em uma empresa que acha que não precisa de uma. Desde o início, Jacques enfrentou o desafio em várias frentes. Primeiro, ele formou um comitê diretor de três pessoas com seu aliado mais forte e seu inimigo mais feroz nas fileiras executivas. Em seguida, ele começou a trabalhar aplicando as ferramentas mais básicas e poderosas do marketing — segmentação e estratégia de preços — em quatro projetos piloto cuidadosamente escolhidos. Para tornar rapidamente aparente o valor desses esforços, ele mediu sua eficácia com métricas facilmente compreendidas. Ele compartilhou os resultados contínuos da forma mais ampla possível, estabelecendo redes regionais de executivos de marketing e vendas. Ele inseriu o marketing nos principais processos de gestão da Lafarge ao se tornar uma figura constante nas discussões sobre planejamento estratégico, desempenho e orçamento da empresa. Passo a passo, nos quatro anos seguintes, Jacques e sua equipe de profissionais de marketing, primeiro temporários e depois permanentes, transformaram fundamentalmente a mentalidade de commodities da Lafarge. A segmentação de clientes permitiu que as pessoas vissem que estavam vendendo para grupos diferentes que exigiam produtos diferentes, que em muitos casos podiam ser vendidos por preços mais altos do que os das mercadorias. Pesquisas de satisfação do cliente os levaram a melhorar a execução da cadeia de suprimentos e, por fim, a mudar o que vendiam, de modo que suas ofertas fossem adequadas a uma variedade de requisitos dos clientes, aumentando o valor tanto para eles quanto para a divisão. Muitas empresas têm uma função de marketing apenas no nome. Essas lições podem servir de modelo para empresas que buscam escapar da armadilha das commodities.

At&eacute; as mercadorias t&ecirc;m clientes

Reprint: R0705G When François Jacques became head of marketing at Lafarge’s cement division in late 2001, old-timers told him that there were only two types of customers: those who liked golf and those who liked fishing. Welcome to the front lines of your typical cement company, a hardscrabble world peopled by grizzled salesmen whose pitches are about making friends rather than demonstrating that their products are better than the competition’s. It isn’t easy to establish a marketing function in a company that doesn’t think it needs one. From the start, Jacques tackled the challenge on a number of fronts. First, he formed a three-person steering committee with both his strongest ally and his most vociferous foe in the executive ranks. Then he set right to work applying marketing’s most basic and powerful tools—segmentation and pricing strategy—to four carefully chosen pilot projects. To make the value of those efforts quickly apparent, he measured their effectiveness with readily understood metrics. He shared the ongoing results as widely as possible by establishing regional networks of marketing and sales executives. He wove marketing into Lafarge’s mainstream management processes by becoming a fixture at the company’s strategic-planning, performance, and budgeting discussions. Step by step, over the next four years, Jacques and his team of first temporary, and then permanent, marketers fundamentally transformed Lafarge’s commodity mind-set. Segmenting customers allowed people to see that they were selling to different groups that required different products, which in many cases could be sold for higher-than-commodity prices. Customer satisfaction surveys led them to improve supply chain execution and, ultimately, to change what they sold, so that their offerings were suited to a range of customer requirements, increasing value both for them and for the division. Many firms have a marketing function in name only. These lessons can serve as a model for such companies looking to escape the commodity trap.

Até as mercadorias têm clientes

Resumo.

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