Appeal to aspirations not reality

Some of the most dramatic marketing victories have been won by recognizing a simple fact: the tactical target of your communications program does not have to be the same as the market.

An obvious example fo this principle is the advertising for Marlboro cigarettes. In spite of the fact that the ads show only cowboys smoking the brand, Marlboro has become the No. 1brand of cigarette, among women as well as men. The tactical target is not the strategic market.

Prospects don’t take your advertising personally. Rather, they extract from the message ideas and concepts that they can utilize in their own lives.

There are many products where the target is designed to be considerably different from the market.

“Seventeen” magazine has a name and editorial position targeted specifically at 17-year-old girls. But who reads “Seventeen”? Girls who are 13, 14, 15, and 16 years old. When a young woman grows up to be 17, she usually outgrows “Seventeen” magazine.

Virginia Slims is a cigarette whose target is liberated women and female swingers. Each ad shows a woman who is 25 and “with it”. but the market is the middle-aged woman who aspires to that lifestyle. The average Virginia Slims smoker is more like 45.

Both Virginia Slims and “Seventeen” appeal to aspirations and not reality.

Public Opinions

People often respond to questions in a way  they deem is the most socially acceptable. (So take with a grand of salt on survey results, “public opinions”, or hypes on all the press).

Trends versus fads

There are some long-term trends that are very different from the short-term changes constantly taking place.

• A trend usually involves slow change. A fad is like fashion: it usually starts much faster and ends more abruptly.
• A fad usually gets all the press, because it represents something that’s happening rapidly.Trends get much less press because they take place slowly.
• There are often fads heading opposite/different directions in the midst of a (long-term) trend.  (So watch out not to be fooled by those fads)

There is always a market for an opposite point of view

Just figure a way to do the opposite of what everyone else is doing and you just might find yourself a successful hot new product.

Work up from detail to big pictures

“The devil is in the details”.

“One can formulate brilliant global strategies whose executability is zero. It’s only through familiarity with details — the capability of the individuals who have to execute, the marketplace, the timing — that a good strategy emerges.” (Andrews Grove, CEO of Intel)

The best marketing moves

The best marketing moves rarely look like big winners in advance. More than likely the best marketing moves have already been considered and discarded by your competitors.

Any concept that would get unanimous approval ion your own company is arelady being used by somebody else.