The Growth Director’s Secret: Why Businesses Struggle to Grow – And What You Can Do to Change It

Shortlisted for the CMI's Management Book of the Year Award 2018 and the Business Book Awards 2018 Growth can be the most important attribute that any business can have, and yet is commonly the least well-managed area of a business’ operations. Explaining why this is, The Growth Director’s Secret examines the structural/cultural factors that hold many conventionally-organized companies back. The book explores important new insights from neurological research, which reveal near-universal misunderstandings about consumer motivations, shopping behaviour and brand choice. Andy Brent shows how these flaws lead many businesses to develop bland, undifferentiated consumer propositions and wasteful commercial/marketing plans, which condemn them to year upon year of stagnant growth. The book challenges much current commercial and marketing thinking, and introduces important new ideas such as: · The Big Growth Mistake that almost all companies make; · Shopping on Auto-pilot; · the crucial Moments of Maximum Emotional Impact (MoMIs) where all brand choice decisions are made; and · Marketing at Open Minds – a challenging new way to think about building growth-orientated marketing plans. The Growth Director’s Secret is essential reading for business owners and managers, proposing a challenging and innovative Growth Paradigm for companies who want to break the constraints of conventional business thinking and set themselves up for significant, sustained, profitable growth.

Table of Contents:
Preface 1. The Growth Paradox 2. The Big Growth Mistake 3. The New Growth Paradigm 4. The Brain Science Behind Growth 5. Finding your Growth Sweet Spot 6. Becoming an Autopilot Brand 7. Moments of Maximum Emotional Impact 8. Building a Catnip Proposition 9. Marketing to Open Minds - i) Segmentation and Targeting 10. Marketing to Open Minds - ii) Bringing the Catnip Proposition to Life 11. So - what could possibly go wrong? 12. Summary - and The Growth Director's Secret List of references Index

About the Author :
Andrew Brent is an experienced strategist and marketer who has held senior roles in major blue-chip companies in the UK and around the world. Andy spent 13 years at Procter and Gamble in senior marketing roles in the UK and Europe before moving into retailing as Marketing Director at Iceland Frozen Foods. He spent 6 years in Asia in senior strategic roles for Hutchison Whampoa, helping build businesses across Asia. Back in the UK, Andy was CMO for Burger King International, overseeing the global expansion of this business, he spent 3 years as Marketing Director at Boots the Chemist in the UK, and then held CMO roles at Sky broadcasting and at Barclays Bank. Andy is founding partner of BloomGroup Consulting, a strategic consultancy helping businesses reposition themselves to deliver sustainable, profitable growth.

Review :
In The Growth Director's Secret, Andy Brent makes the important connection between the latest thinking in consumer behaviour, organisational strategy and board performance. Engagingly written and drawing on cutting-edge theory in understanding consumers, a must-read for not only senior marketers, board members and all those with responsibility for achieving organisational growth, but also for academics and students of strategy, marketing and consumer behaviour. A growth engine is only as good as the sum of its parts. The Growth Director’s Secret illuminates not only the parts, but the recipe for healthy, repeatable success. Whether you’re a small company or a large enterprise, diving into Andy’s insights will be a worthwhile journey. This book is fascinating reading that makes a compelling case for changing how we think about growing business. Brent gives an accessible summary of research on decision-making and highlights the implications for marketing research and strategy.