MBA Geek

I came across a great post today by Danny Demichele, an Internet Marketing Consultant, who puts together a good argument how troubled times could actually have a positive impact on an online business. Here are 10 factors that you need to look out for:

• Gas - The cost of travel mean more people shop online
• Price Comparisons - The Internet makes comparison easier leading to more online purchases
• Advertising Efficiency - As marketing budgets get squeezed more money is pumped online into trackable advertising
• Less Big Brand Advertisers - As big brand advertisers shrink they budgets, smaller organisations get more space
• Previous Brand Reluctance - Manufacturers will allow more retailers to sell their products
• TV Shows - More TV shows will move online opening up advertising possibilities
• Investment Dollars - As more people move online, more money is pumped into the Internet
• Lower Overhead - Online businesses are typically cheaper to run that traditional models
• Less Taxes - Avoiding local taxes by shopping online
• Virtual Services - Helping customers reduce their costs

Danny is an SEO Consultant who focuses on internet marketing consulting and has a pretty rich background in Internet-based organisations. His website also has weekly tips to help businesses success, so look out for them after you read the post.

Image by culture.culte via Flickr

Some jobs are easier than others, even if they are pretty similar. Take for example working on the sales team of a company that has a monopoly in a certain product. Marketing in this case is rather easy as it involves maintaining the image of the company and persuading people that the company is really serving them the best they can.

On the other hand there are the really tricky marketing roles. For example, take Pepsi, basking forever in Coca-cola’s limelight. Now that’s a hard job. Or selling diet pills on the Internet, which is a really competitive market. Alternatively, try selling polaris suspension parts in a country that doesn’t really practice off-road racing. The secret is always to focus on your product’s strengths and making sure you understand the competitive environment you need to operate in.

A lot has been written about how effective a proper marketing campaign can be; however the corollary of that is also very true. A botched advert can turn people away, negatively damage your brand and have long term repercussions on the life-cycle of your product. You tend to see companies taking evasive action from this sort of negative marketing when a celebrity has been disgraced and Marketing Advertising companies start pulling out their contracts. For example, Kate Moss lost an H&M deal a couple of years ago because the company did not want their brand associated with that person (this was following an alleged drug incident)

A poorly planned campaign can have just as damaging an effect and companies need to make sure they don’t end up under the spotlight for the wrong reason. It’s important to gauge the climate an advert will be launched into and take into consideration political, economic and social factors. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying you need to thread on eggshells. But one needs to be aware that any advertising campaign is not released into a vacuum but into a rich environment where supporters will rally behind a product and competitors will try and use your efforts against you.

Interesting topic huh?

An interesting question that came to mind today was whether it’s easier to market a product or a service. I was thinking that product benefits may be easier to articulate; but a service may be something that is easier to persuade a customer that they need. For example .. it isn’t too hard to persuade someone that they need life insurance and persuade them to get some life insurance quotes. At the same time, if someone needs to buy baby clothes, well, it’s a need that you have to fulfill, there’s no way to get around that.

I suppose it does depend on what sort of product or service you’re selling, but personally I would prefer to be pushing a product that people need .. than a service that no one really wants.

An interesting post on Whooah.biz recounts the story of Glenmorangie, a Whiskey maker in Scotland who managed to seize the day and make turn an unfortunate situation around. Here’s the story:

Scotland Glenmorangie distilleries found that they had accidentally mixed the wrong sort of whisky. Faced with a dilemma they come up with a clever campaign; they used a direct mail marketing to ask for an official pardon and sold the whisky as a collectors item. The campaign generated a 23 percent response. 8 percent above what you would normally expect.

The best bit is still to come; their direct mail marketing grew. When they launched a special whisky called Arigh Nam Beist (shelter of the beast) for Halloween in 2007 their response rate was 69 percent. Virtually unheard of.

It’s a great story and a valuable anecdote that demonstrates that bad situations *can* be turned around. The whisky producer here decided to come clean with their customers, include them in the process .. and customers say this as a valuable behaviour which they were ready to reward.

Do you know of other great stories like this?

Seth Godin is working to promote his new book called Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us which is bound to be just as insightful as his previous books. Today I spotted a post on his blog where he’s inviting people who preorder the book to join an exclusive group to share ideas and thoughts and get to know each other. You got it: a tribe!

That’s a pretty great way to drum up interest in your new book, and at the same time demonstrate the principle that I’m pretty sure the book will go into. He goes into this in a bit more detail in his invitation post where he stresses that one of the attributes of tribes are the fact that they are NOT open communities that anyone can join. This exclusivity is what gives the tribe value and what entices other people to join.

Well, I’ve been meaning to buy one of Seth’s books for some time now but held off because I needed to study for my MBA. But now that’s over, so I’ll be going ahead with this one. Really looking forward to it!