Tag: content marketing

Who will listen?

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ABC is the trend-setting original German working glove, packed with innovative state-of-the-art technologies and super features.
ABC working gloves are the only one in the world to be equipped with the new and revolutionary anti-penetration material PATENTIX® – a high-tech, ultra-strong and lightweight textile felt. The material was originally developed in the United States as part of a special project for the US elite soldiers, Navy Seals, who would use bulletproof vests that were particularly lightweight and flexible.
The integrated PATENTIX® safety layer in the XYZ32 model shown, weighs only 32 grams and is thus 55% lighter compared to other textile anti-penetration layers used in working gloves. Finally a working glove without side effects! See, feel and try ABC at selected stores http://www.abc.com

Ad in airline magazine

It can be argued that the ad is not for me. That I do not belong to the target audience, as I am not a person who uses working gloves in the workplace. It can also be that people using working gloves in the workplace, or people buying working gloves to be used in the workplace, will immediately get the benefits of a working glove without side effects, and will then rush to the website and the selected stores to buy it.

And yet, there is a better way to make our audience understand what we stand for, what our product stands for. While most brands out there use the name of their products, the alphanumeric codes and acronyms of their models, the meaningless label of a registered trademark, and an endless list of pointless features, we could start by saying what all of it means to those who will have to chose between our product and all of the alternatives, and then use it day in and day out.

Sure, it takes a lot more effort. But if all we talk about is ourselves, who will listen?

P.S.: I have replaced the parts that could more directly identify the brand in the ad. Those parts are underlined.

Begin with listening

FabrizioLeave a comment

An important reminder by Bernadette Jiwa.

If you want to be listened, begin with listening.

If you want to be heard, begin with hearing.

If you want to lead, begin with opening to the people you want to lead.

If you want to sell something, begin with understanding the people you want to sell to.

It is that easy.

This is Marketing

Fabrizio4 Comments

What I wrote yesterday about the commoditization of marketing is deeply inspired by the work of Seth Godin.

This year, I have read his most recent book, This is Marketing, and despite having followed his blog for years now, and being familiar with most of his ideas, I felt it was the missing piece in my approach to marketing. A way to translate things that are already profoundly rooted in my practice into easy and plain words that everybody can understand.

You can’t be seen until you learn to see is the subtitle of the book, and that is a common thread througout the pages. The focus on empathy and on the necessity to deeply understand who you are serving is one of Seth’s mantras. There’s a metaphor he uses this time around, that is not only great at describing this approach, but also in differentiating it from the other side of marketing, the commoditized side.

It doesn’t make any sense to make a key and then run around looking for a lock to open. The only productive solution is to find a lock and then fashion a key.

Seth Godin

Marketing is about building a relationship, this should be nothing new to anyone who has read Kotler and his principles. And despite this being one of the oldest precepts of the field, we keep forgetting it, because other ways are more alluring and promise shorcuts to achieve results.

For Seth, it all starts by understanding what is the change you seek to make. Because every marketer is in the business of “making change happen” (and everyone who wants to make a change is a marketer). Then, understanding that changing everyone, seeking the mass, is not only unrealistic, it also sets us for mediocrity and disappointment. The only real possibility is identifying our “smallest viable audience“, the smallest market we (or our company) can survive on. And do our best work and responsibly bringing it to them.

This is Marketing is about a way to do marketing that considers affiliation more important than dominion.

Modern society, urban society, the society of the internet, the arts, and innovation are all built primarily on affiliation, not dominion. This type of status is not “I’m better.” It’s “I’m connected. I’m family.” And in an economy based on connection, not manufacturing, being a trusted member of the family is priceless.

Seth Godin

Affiliation, though, does not happen when you talk about how perfect your features are, or when you bombard people with flashy and catchy ads. It is a slow and long process, one that requires patience and consistency, and one that cannot be measured. And that’s where most marketers fail nowadays: they use the prime tool for affiliation (content marketing) and pretend to dress it for dominion (us, us, US!).

Eventually, if the marketer is successful, they will have served people that will spread the word (“the best reason someone talks about you is because they’re actually talking about themselves”, about their taste, about what is important to them) and that will speak up if they are missing (permission marketing).

This is Marketing is a beautiful read about mindset and change, one that is not for marketers only. Actually, it is for marketers only, but we all are marketers nowadays.

For a long time, during the days when marketing and advertising were the same thing, marketing was reserved for vice presidents with a budget. And now it’s for you.

Seth Godin

 

Learning from the past

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In 1900, Édouard and André had a problem.

About 10 years earlier, they had started producing pneumatic tyres for bicycles in Clermont-Ferrand (France), and after a while they expanded their business with pneumatic tyres for cars. Their pneumatics were special for the time, as they were not glued to the wheel, and therefore could easily be replaced. The problem was that in the whole France there were about 3,000 cars. Not much to have a viable business.

Their idea to overcome this obstacle was somewhat revolutionary. Instead of perfectioning their product (already excellent), or trying to gain market shares from competitors (whose product was inferior), they asked themselves a question that each marketer (and business person, to be fair) should ask themselves: what problem can we solve for our potential customer so that they would be more willing to buy a car (and our tyres)?

In one of the very first examples of content marketing, the Michelin Guide was born. A list of hotels and restaurant to make it easier for people to tour the cities, information about how to change tyres (Michelin tyres, of course), as well as a list of mechanics, car parts ads, maps and other basic information. Nowadays, more than 100 years later, when we hear about the Michelin Guide, we barely associate it with a tyre manufacturer, yet its name is well known (and respected) by everybody who likes to travel and eat good food.

The history of marketing and business is full of such anecdotes – another good one is how Procter&Gamble basically put the “soap” in “soap operas” when it started producing radio dramas in the 30s.

Content marketing is not an invention of the new wave of digital marketing. It is good to remember that the examples from the past who stood the test of time and deeply impacted our culture, have all started from a business need and a consideration that nowadays marketers seem to have forgotten: if you do not know who you are selling to and what they value, it will not stick.