‘The railroads are in trouble today not because the need for transportation was filled by others, but because it was not filled by the railroads themselves. They let others take customers away from them because they assumed themselves to be in the railroad business rather than in the transportation business.’ Theodore Levitt, Harvard professor and author
What’s your purpose? Why are you here?
The railroads are in trouble today not because the need for transportation was filled by others, but because it was not filled by the railroads themselves. They let others take customers away from them because they assumed themselves to be in the railroad business rather than in the transportation business.
On the 28th march, Simon Sinek will be in the The Netherlands to talk about marketing and leadership. On the event, we will be interviewing him about his carreer path. If you have any questions you would like us to ask him, make sure you drop a note!
Below, you find a video of one of his inspiring talks at Ted.
‘If you hire people just to do the job they work for your money. If you hire people that believe what you believe, they work for you with blood, sweat and tears.’
‘Business is the most powerful force on the planet and can be a positive instrument for change.’
Jay Coen Gilbert shares his vision to harness the power of business to solve society’s problems through B Corporations — a new standard labeling socially and environmentally responsible companies. B Corps helps corporations to be profitable while solving society’s problems.
‘Happy? As in chocolate pudding happy? Tickle Me Elmo happy? Getting to the truth of long-term happiness, of doing real work that matters–that has to be at the heart of what we do every day. But if we fall for the false siren of short-term, selflish, marketing driven happy, we’re doomed. Bernie Madoff was happy for a while…’*
Long-term, prosocial, marketing driven happy is the key to be succesful.
Seth Godin argues the Internet has ended mass marketing and revived a human social unit from the distant past: tribes. Founded on shared ideas and values, tribes give ordinary people the power to lead and make big change. He urges us to do so.*
How to apply his brilliancy to your brand? Find what there is in the world that you are not happy about. Discover which group supports your idea. Tell the story. Lead the tribe.
Michael Jackson has predicted the future of marketing more than a decade ago. That’s what you could suggest after reading Mark Woerde’s new book “How advertising will heal the world and your business”. In one of his most memorable songs, MJ asked people around the world to join him in the mission of ”heal the world, and make it a better place”. According to Woerde, that’s exactly what companies should do.
Woerde explains that more than 85% of consumers want to live a meaningful life and 74% thinks this can be achieved by helping others. As high as 59% of the people want to do more beyond just giving money.
There is a huge potential for companies to ‘help people to help others’. Woerde names these companies “prosocial brands”. A good example is Pampers. For every bag of diapers consumers buy, they donate 1 vaccine against tetanus. This enables consumers to help others in a very simple way.
Mark plead for a radical shift in branding; from ads to acts. I like the mission. It’s a great way of ‘serving the human being in the consumer’ (i.e. our mission). It’s a great way of adding value to people’s lives. And according to Mark, it’s also a great way of beating the competition: in the (nearby) future, there will be a shift from “survival of the fittest” to “survival of the kindest”.
We did something of the same kind(ness) recently. Great chance you’ve heard about the water problems in Eastern Africa. Still many people are suffering, dying. We wanted to do something with our partner eazie, and we knew ‘our’ customers did too. So we’ve started “Drink water, help Afrika. We decided to donate 1 euro for every water bottle we sell during the summer, in collaboration with Chaudfontaine. In this way, the eazie-customers are able to help others in a very eazie way. Customers were more than willing to participate, after we made it very convenient for them to help others. This resulted in more than 1.000 donations in the first two weeks.
Woerde built a great model of being a prosocial brand. Just read the book. Trust me, you’ll find some mindblowing material in there.
I was reading this article that discussed the topic of when people are most receptive for marketing messages. It compared people that were paid recently with those that where at the end of their salary. They found out that “newly paid consumers are more likely to spend money on “promotion-focused” products and services—those that make their lives better, if even in a small way. As the previous payday gets further away, though, consumers are motivated to choose products that are “prevention-focused”—that preserve their current standard of living.”
Of course, there is a psychological principal behind this. It’s all about the state of mind. If It’s pay day, you are primed with the stimulus of money. You automatically feel like you can afford more than you did before pay day.
The same is true for people having a lot of cash in their wallets. And people that receive tips as an expected part of their salary. And what to think about people getting tax refunds? Being aware of the money prime could help you saving a lot. If that’s your goal, indeed.
Is there a future in marketing? The noise of advertisers only becomes bigger and more intruiging. This documentary (divided into 6 parts of 15 minutes) shows there is. The answer is: psychology. Are you in marketing or advertising? Make sure you watch this one.
Rapaille
There are many ways one could use marketing psychology. Today, I will discuss a French-born American cultural anthropologist and author, Clotaire Rapaille. He is the author of the best seller “The Culture Code”, and more than 10 other books, including “7 Secrets of Marketing in a Multi-Cultural World”.
Culture
Today, Rapaille is best known for his contributions to the advertising and marketing business world, researching the impact of culture on business and markets. Rapaille is using psychology to understand the deeper belongings and fears of people. One of his populair concepts is ‘the reptilion button’. I quote:
Hot button
Rapaille’s theory asserts that one’s decisions as to product purchases, political candidate preferences and the like are influenced by sub-conscious ‘imprints’. These imprints, he says, are located within the ‘reptillian brain’.
“When you learn a word, whatever it is, ‘coffee’, ‘love’, ‘mother’, there is always a first time. There’s a first time to learn everything. The first time you understand, you imprint the meaning of this word; you create a mental connection that you’re going to keep using the rest of your life. … So actually every word has a mental highway. I call that a code, an unconscious code in the brain.”
“It’s absolutely crucial for anybody in communication — and that could be journalists, TV, media, all of it, or marketing people — if you want to appeal to people, it’s absolutely crucial to understand what I call the reptilian hot button. If you don’t have a reptilian hot button, then you have to deal with the cortex; you have to work on price issues and stuff like that.”
Message
In an interview, Rapaille explains, “A car is a message. It has eyes, a mouth, a chin. It has a face, and that face speaks to you. The Hummer, he explains, is “a war machine”, which says: “if you want to fight, I can fight. But you will die.”
Rapaille shows how important it is to get to the essence of the consumer’s mind. Marketing 3.0.
There are many ways one could use marketing psychology. This article shows the background of an American political consultant and pollster who uses language psychology to influence people: Frank Luntz’s. His specialty is “testing language and finding words that will help his clients sell their product or turn public opinion”. Lance states:
“80% of our life is emotion and only 20% is intellect. I’m much more interested in how you feel than how you think. How you think is on the outside. How you feel is on the inside. So that’s what I need to understand.”
A great example of his influence is his role in changing the public opinion about tax by simply changing ‘State tax’ into ‘Death tax’. Another example is his advice to the Republicans, using ‘climate change’ in stead of global warming’. You don’t change the content. You just change the way you say it.
Lance is trying to understand the emotions of people. Lance is using marketing psychology.
