Tonight, I made a list of 15 things I’ve observed after 4 years of study at the University of Illinois and 4 years of professional experience in Marketing. So here they are:
- It’s easier to sell one thing than several different products.
- Distribution = Very Important (Duh!)
- Marketing depends a lot on product quality – what can you do for the user/customer? What problems can you solve? Seth Godin talks about this quite often.
- Design matters – in product, communications, and everything else in this world.
- Sell benefits, not features.
- People are emotional buyers.
- The more you know about your customer, the better.
- Budget and resources matter.
- There can be an extremely wide variance from industry to industry – the key is to look for parallels.
- Humanize your company as much as possible – This is a great example.
- You’re more likely to find success with talented people around you.
- Be aware of the Pareto Principle (The 80/20 Rule) – 80% of results often come from 20% of customers.
- Ads that annoy / shout about your product don’t work; Ads that tell customers useful information or help them in some way do.
- There is such a thing as too many choices for the customer – it overwhelms them.
- Practice brevity. Whatever you’ve got to say, do it in fewer words.
Agree? Disagree?
