Before the Internet
Marketing, is the only industry that I am aware of that does not have to produce concrete results, and can still succeed.
Every marketer talks about branding, what is this mythical item?
The first time I became aware of how branding is not linked to quality was when I first heard about products like Nakamichi, Lynn and Magnapan. These products were recognized by the worlds leading independent audiophiles, as best in class, but almost no one I knew had heard of them.
Initially I thought oh well that is strange. The first time I heard music from a Magnapan, I was so blown away, I could not listen to my own HiFi, a NAD with AR speakers, without checking the cables, and connections over and over, to try and understand why system sounded like the radio in comparison to what I had heard.
The Dawning of enlightenment
Since 1995, I have slowly started relying more and more on the internet to make purchasing decisions. I have got to the point that if a product is heavily marketed in commercial media, I want to know the truth. Great sites like CNet where my first source, that help me to make enlightened decisions about products that I was purchasing.
As more and more people started contributing I slowly started learning to multiplex information. I was a bit like a combination of XOR and AND gates when making a decision. The first time I wanted a book that would assist me in getting my MCSE I found the one that was best by reading the online book reviews, and guess what it was the one almost no-one had heard of, was not available in the book stores I had visited, so I purchased it online (over 10 years ago now).
With better and better search engines and more content it was amazing how much information became available to the average consumer
Who can we rely on
As I earnt more money I was able to access nicer things, but often what happened I would buy a “respected” brand and find that for almost the same money I could have purchased a lesser known but far better product.
I was at a talk by a marketer about 2 years ago, at which they said that we all say we do not have marketing spend, but we wake up in our advertised bed, shower using our advertised soap and shampoo, brush our teeth with our advertised tooth brush and tooth paste, eat our advertised cereal, drink our advertised coffee put on our advertised clothes, and get into our advertised car and go to work.
Instead of sitting back and agreeing, I started thinking to myself why? And over the past 2 years I have changed the formula by looking at each part of that equation. For some of the products I used the internet to find opinions on product, for others I searched out experts, and the search was fascinating. I found that some of the products that are recommended online and by experts (like the tooth paste my dentist recommended) were typically cheaper or a little more expensive, but they made a real difference to my life.
I one of my searches I stumbled upon an interesting fact a leading beverage producing company spends 10 times more on marketing than on Research and Development. And they are not alone. Take a look at you favourite branded company’s financials (if they are a public company) and look at the numbers. What are paying for?
Future Enlightenment
I have now developed so much confidence in what I have found out that almost no purchase decision is made without either consulting the internet or an expert. The only real problem is wading past the over marketed brands. They have also become switched on to internet marketing, and hence using their infinite (so it appears) marketing spend they are slowly moving up the Search Engine rankings, taking the top places.
When I use my search engine I sometime go all the way to the bottom and click on a “7” and see if the pages there agree, or look for rare words that only the most elusive brands seems to mention.
So for those that have read this far, happy searching, and hopefully more and more the branding of a product will make less and less relevance to your purchasing decision.
Oh and by the way take a look at what leading marketers are doing to our food, this to me is the holy grail, when humans mess with our food to make it look more appealing or to produce more quicker but in fact the nutrient content of the branded foods is now significantly lower than the lowly un-marketed produce, support your local produce market and be amazed
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