Barry Feig's Hot Button Marketing

Stupid Marketing Trick for the Weekend

Actual Subject Line of of an e-mail I received:

"Save thousands with unnecessary auto repairs."

Yeah, I guess that's much better than paying for repairs you really need.

STUPID MARKETING TRICKS (and some smart ones too).

Please submit your stupid marketing tricks to me for publication.

Okay, we're going to change the direction of this blog. Here I am waiting for my plane which is now delayed for the fifth time.

Perfect time to write a blog.

It is now 10 hours since my flight was supposed to leave. I just got back from giving a speech in China. The entire flight took 11 hours. But this is from Newark to New Mexico. Four hours, but really 10. Anyway, I'm reading the papers. looking for an available outlet for my computer and I realize that marketers do some really stupid things. For instance, the lady across from me has a Cingular phone. Only Cingular used to be AT&T before AT&T became Lucent and changed back to AT&T. So now Cingular is AT&T. Again. Bestill my beating heart, especially since my Dad has no idea who he has a contract with.

And then, of course, Sprint made the front pages by firing its customers. Really... if they complained too much, Sprint sent their noisiest customers notes saying. "we don't want your business" But did they get penalized for breaking the contracts too early,  like us commoners? Of course not. I gave up my first- born to sever my contract with a cellular "provider."  I gave up on Sprint a long ago, when I wanted a new phone. They said, "No you're too good a customer, you don't get one." Oh.

As I have often stated, The emotional appeal is where the money is. Hot button marketing is marketing to an emotional need. Let’s take water. People are going to bars and ordering Evian on the rocks. The rocks of course are made with tapwater. And did you know that Evian spelled backwards is Naïve.  One of the more popular waters is Aquafina. Do you know where it is bottled? At your local reservoir. So is Dasani, from the people who bottle the sugar water known as Coca Cola. Both speak about their amazing filtering processes that leach out bad tasting, (implied) bad for-you-minerals. But Dasani brags that they add minerals to make water taste to taste something like ... well...water.

Haagen Dazs is made in Hoboken, NJ. Do you know why it is called Haagen Dazs. Because it sounds nice. That's a good marketing trick. If they called their ice cream Hoboken's Best, that would be bad.

Just one more marketing trick. We have love affairs with our sports teams. We wear their jerseys and root for transient millionaires who don't give a damn about us. But we spend big money to wear their tee shirts. We don't root for a team as much as we root for a logo.

As Seinfield said...we're cheering laundry.

Please submit your favorite Stupid Marketing Tricks.

Next piece: American Airlines.

Become a Hot Button Marketer

If you are an advertising agency or marketing consultant, please e-mail me for what you need to be a "Hot Button Marketing Firm" with a "Certified Endorsement." Companies will pay you for your agency pitch. Otherwise, please enjoy this blog.

The "Inner" Hot Button Marketer

            There are a great many marketers out there. That's because everyone is a marketer in one form or another. The training starts young.  Very young -- at birth actually when you learn to get attention by crying.  It continues as you "sell yourself' to your teachers, friends and mates.  You've learned what to say and what happens when you say it.  This

is a primary function of marketing.

            To start with, successful marketers have different sense organs than other people in an organization. Marketers listen, keep people excited and generate ideas. Successful marketers have the ability to sniff out an opportunity that could be half a world away.  They do this by being be part of everyone's world -- even when they're not particularly wanted.  They know the pulse of their market and the heartbeat of the company the work for.

Marketing Starts with the Inner Self

            Marketing is a way of thinking -- not about yourself --but about the potential of the product you are marketing.  If successful marketers have one thing in common, it is the ability to become missionaries for their product. They extoll the virtues of a product or strategy to anyone who might be interested.  You're in the enthusiasm business. It's your job to create and generate excitement.  Now, you may say "I'm marketing toilet paper, who is going to be interested in that?" Ask a person who needs toilet paper in a hurry, if he's interested.  Successful marketers know that there is no stronger interest as self interest. Successful marketer think

of their product in terms of their customer's self interest.

            It's winning the inner game that can make a marketer stand out. Sine I've worked with hundreds of marketers, here are the traits of the best ones.

Successful marketers...

            1. Never see themselves as victims.  It's an easy mindset to get into, for we are a nation of blamers. When something doesn't work, we look for someone to blame. A product may not be ideal, the competition is too strong. Your salary is lousy.  These are all temporary conditions. Moses had hundreds of thousands of followers hanging on to his every word. But many people don't know that Moses had a speech defect.  There always will be negatives but smart marketers overcome almost any negative with solid marketing that puts a spin on the product and turns a negative into a

selling point.

            2. Think proactively 100% of the time. They locate problems before they occur, along with potential solutions. There are always going to be problems that you didn't think of when you started a strategy. Smart marketers preempt disasters by finding remedies for potential dysfunctional situations before they occur.

            3. Solve problems. They think in terms of benefits rather than features. Successful marketing propositions don't start with a product, but with the answer to a customer problem.  Smart marketers know what customers want to buy and WHY they're buying them. If they don't know the driving forces, they learn them. That way there are no misdirections and expensive false starts.

            4. Manage chaos and manage in chaos.  Things don't happen in order, even though management types often crave linear time and work flows.  The successful marketer manages chaos -- in the corporate world -- and in buying patterns. He finds sales patterns where none seem to exist on the surface and builds on them.

           5. Think about building relationships as well as sales. Most people can sell a good product once. But it's the relationship that spurs future sales.

           6.  Know that consumers buy on emotion first and physical benefits next. How one sells to the consumer is just

as important as how it is sold.

           7. Borrow ideas from the competition freely and without remorse. Okay, they steal them.  Smart marketers know how the competition will react to a product and the plusses and minuses about competitive products. They become their competitor's best friend and customer until they know almost as much about competitive products as they do.

            8. Listen. Listening is an underrated art form. Customers will give you as much information as you need if your probe correctly. Successful marketers ask  -- and then listen!  The second part is where most people go wrong.  It's physically impossible to talk and listen at the same time and the weak marketer spends more time babbling than listening. Customers will tell you everything you need to know about how to make them buy your product when you ask the right way.

Successful marketers ask questions and shut up.

           9. Constantly evolve their products and their strategic thinking.  They continuously think of ways to make their product better.  They avoid tunnel vision by always looking for peripheral strategies and markets. The ideal product and target market has never been invented. Smart marketers improve their product and look for new target markets -- even

before the product or strategy hits the market.

          10. Fill their head with minutia about anything.  It doesn't have to be related to the task at hand. Mind chatter feeds on those little scraps of information you keeps in your head.  The answer to questions rest in your subconscious waiting to be set free at the proper moment.

                           

The Secret to New Product Success Revealed!

The Five Minute Guide to New Product Success

New product development and brand positioning doesn't have to be a slow tedious process like in most companies. It should be exciting and vibrant as you search for new ways to
develop business opportunities and new strategies to open up the consumer's skeptical heart.

One of the reasons the process takes so long and is fraught with failure is that companies come up with a product they can make and try to sell it to someone. That's backwards.

The best way is to find what people want to buy and thenmake it for them. There are many situations where a company needs to develop new products to keep machinery moving or to rid a company of surplus products. Perhaps you want to develop a flanking brand or enter a new category. These can -- and should be -- consumer driven too.

Whatever the reason for your new product hunt, your job is to create something that people want to buy. Here's how to do it. Quickly and efficiently.

Create a an inventory of hypothetical product ideas and possible product positionings. This is not that hard, even for left brained  people. As a marketer -- especially if you're a new products marketer -- you think of ideas all the time. Your mind is always on overdrive. Just allow your mind to relax and keep a note pad with you. You can even set up a brainstorming session with your people.

The strongest ideas -- a judgment call at first -- should be developed  into actual full color ads. (Don't go to your advertising agency for this -- they never do it right and it's too expensive....you can e-mail me to do it...hint hint.) You now have the backbone of your new product development plan in place. Pretty quick, isn't it?

Take these out to a local mall that has a consumer research facility. Have the staff buttonhole consumers and show them the concepts. Never allow respondents to read the concepts -- a great many people are embarrassed over their reading ability and many won't be able to comprehend the message. Instead, read them aloud as you show your concepts. Watch for your respondent's reactions. I'm not going to denigrate your intelligence by furnishing you with questions to ask. Your naturally marketing savvy should take care of that. The main
purpose of the mall intercepts is to get red flags about your concepts so you can change them accordingly.

Once you've made your changes, take your ads out to interactive groups(focus groups) in whatever market you're selling in. Yes, I know, I often say that focus groups are the most misused research tool in marketing today and I'm not going to take that back. But your goal is going to be different than in most groups. You're not going to ask consumers what they
want. You're going to show them what you can make. You're going to makeyour respondents react to your concepts. Each group should be a microcosm of the shopping experience.

After these groups, lick your wounds and modify your concepts. Throw out the bombs. Modify the ones that received lukewarm interest. Add new concepts based entirely on the reactions from he first group.

Then show them to new groups of consumers in a different area of the country(wherever you hope to sell your product).

Revise the inventory.

Show the revised concepts again. If your concepts were good you'll have awinner.

Guaranteed.

Here's how the whole workflow process for a typical (and almost always successful) new product works. Note that everything can be condensed into a much more concentrated time frame depending on your needs and goals.

FIRST WAVE: BROAD OPPORTUNITY ASSESSMENT

Initial concept development and ideation. One-on-one interviews, two focus groups. OBJECTIVE: Identify broadscale areas that have potential

Week 1: Start-up meeting, business recap, ideation

Week 2 : Creative review.

Week 3: Advertising concepts completed.

Week 4: CONSUMER REACTION

One-on-one interviews to eliminate red flags and get a preliminary reading of market and assessment of concepts.

After consumer reaction, refine concepts.

CONSUMER REACTION

Week 5: Review findings;

Begin refinement of probes in selected opportunity area; delete and add to inventory. Discuss areas to pursue, areas to stay away from.

SECOND WAVE: CREATIVE AND PRODUCT REEVALUATION

OBJECTIVE: Identify broadscale areas that have potential. Expand on areas that have merit. Further define areas of opportunity.

Week 6: Review of new and revised probes.

Week 7: CONSUMER REACTION

Week 8 : MID-PROJECT REVIEW

Review all concepts that received negative reaction as well as positive reaction. Work with R & D to fulfill successful products/concepts.

Week 9: Modify concepts, add to inventory if needed.

THIRD WAVE: ADDITIONAL CREATIVE MODIFICATION,EVALUATION AND REFINEMENT

OBJECTIVE: Continue evolutionary process, identify hot and cold areas. Zero in on strongest concepts.

WEEK 10: CONSUMER REACTION

Optimization of strongest concepts. Consumers can compare tangible aspects of products, packaging and positioning for concept fulfillment.

FOURTH WAVE (FINAL): CONCEPT VERIFICATION

OBJECTIVE: Verify and optimize all products/positionings, names, products,communications impact and key sensory performance characteristics. Fine tune all work to answer any questions concerning products strengths and positioning. the specific consumer hot buttons and target market. Optimize concepts and purchase triggers. Develop broad scale user profiles and define strength of market.

WEEK 12: CONSUMER REACTION

The results? You're Ready to execute the strategy and product or place the products and concepts into quantitative tests. You now have products, positioning, key product benefits,consumer purchase stimuli needed, target market definition, key communications.

And five minutes is all this article took you to read.

COMING SOON; MY FREE E-BOOK ON NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT AND BRAND POSITIONINGS. PLEASE E-MAIL ME AT FEIG@BARRYFEIG.COM FOR A COPY.