Marketing Heresies That Have Turned Out To Be True

I’m taking you back to junior high and high school – the places where rumors abound! Except, this time, we’re going to wander the heresies of marketing. There are plenty of heresies that float around on the Internet and in corporations all over the world. Some of these rumors have turned out to be true, though.

Great marketing does not require an agency.
It’s sad for those that work in the marketing agency world, but it’s true. Agencies are great at doing what they know. And what they know are things that have been done before. Agencies can’t bring an innovative campaign to a client unless they’ve done that innovative campaign before for another client. Agencies simply can’t afford to not bill for the learning curve it takes to research and test out what works. So, agencies stick to what they know so they can make money. If you want something totally out of the box, you should start with your in-house minds first.

Hands-on experience is better than relying on a marketing agency.
This one is true because no matter how much knowledge the agency has, if you don’t have the experience of doing some of the work, if not all of the work in a marketing campaign, you won’t be able to fully appreciate the agency. You also won’t be able to give clear direction if you don’t know what direction is needed. Sometimes you get lucky and you find an agency that asks the right questions of you, but most of the time you just need to get your feet wet. If you’ve never done the PR portion before, you won’t know how to best supplement that with promotional email unless you’ve been in the PR world. When your knowledge expands, you can make better decisions.

Letting customers voice their opinions – negative and positive – is an influential branding tool.
Many companies have thought about hosting a blog or forum, but decided against it because they don’t want any bad opinions to taint their image. People that are unhappy with your product or service are going to get the word out somehow, so you might as well let them get out the negative on your turf. Then you can monitor the situation and reply back effectively. Negative opinions don’t crash a business; a business that ignores the negative opinions is what causes the crash.

Be passionate about your product and your customers will become passionate too.
This sounds kind of clichéd, but it’s ending up to be true. You could have the greatest product on the market, but if your marketing materials are dull, no one will get excited. When you inject passion and excitement into a product, everyone that comes into contact with you and your marketing will catch that excitement. Excited and passionate customers produce more excited and passionate customers. It’s not true that you can’t influence your customers’ feelings – you can. But only if you are truly passionate yourself.