In Part 1, I talked about the “evil” marketers who create frivolous problems in order to sell unnecessary solutions, as highlighted by a Forbes article focused on the fitness industry. However, there is a difference between “creating” a problem and “forecasting” a need. Marketers should be able to identify needs that people don’t know they have YET, thus informing people of the need and the solution before people identify the need on their own. As long as the product or service adds value to a person’s life, I wouldn’t consider this to be “evil” marketing, as discussed in Part 1.

I think fire is a great example of forecasting a need. The ancient man who discovered fire probably stumbled upon this need accidentally, but he helped his fellow cave-dwellers solve problems that they didn’t even know existed. For example, the heat from fire can be used to cook food, which kills harmful bacteria, which decreases the likelihood of food-borne illness and the undesirable effects of food-borne illness. Early humans did not know they needed to cook their food to achieve more desirable results when eating, but the person who showed them the benefits of fire helped illuminate a need, and solve a real problem. He wasn’t trying to dupe his peers into giving him something in exchange for fire they didn’t need, he was trying to give them a “product” that would provide benefits like warmth, sterilization, power, etc. At the time, humans knew they needed some of these benefits, like warmth, but they didn’t know about the “product” of fire to provide these benefits. Before “forecasting” became popular, I think a lot of these product benefits were discovered by accident, but then disseminated with purpose. Now, marketers make a habit of trying to forecast the next big need, and then create a solution to meet this need before the market realizes the need themselves. Today, this is usually called “innovating”, and falls under the “research and development” category after the initial discovery.

The problem is that now that our society has evolved beyond meeting the basic needs of survival, forecasting the next big need becomes much more complex. Instead of finding solutions to feed people to make their bodies function, we must now find a way to make them enjoy the feeding process. But, it’s not just about the taste of the food anymore, it’s about the other sensory experiences, and the emotions that those sensory experiences invoke. Thus, marketers are trying to find the next emotional need that is related to food. This is where it gets dicey, because it’s hard to define valuable needs at an emotional level. Part 1 of these posts suggests that solutions are not valuable if they don’t meet a need, but in our current world, “needs” are subjective. People “need” to have a high self-esteem, which is often tied to how the world views their appearance. Thus, the fitness industry has come up with “solutions” to meet the “needs” associated with high self-esteem as defined by the world’s view of a person’s appearance. The lines start to blur between offering knowledge of valuable solutions and “selling” through shady “marketing” activities.

These types of discussions provide a glimpse into why the cynics think marketing is “evil” or “hype”. It’s become extremely difficult to decipher and define true needs and problems for which actual solutions are needed. While the Forbes article focuses on the fitness industry and its’ shortcomings, these issues can be seen across all industries and marketing activities. While these issues are difficult to navigate, I feel that we as marketers must do our best to forecast needs and provide solutions to our customers, rather than creating problems and selling “solutions” that exist solely to make money. I believe we’ll improve our bottom line and our world by adhering to the more noble ideals of marketing.

This is also known as “Evil Marketing Hype” by the cynical types, who think that marketers are just trying to dupe them into buying things they don’t need. As mentioned in my “About” paragraph on this site, I don’t believe that it’s a marketer’s job to “sell” things to people, but rather to make them aware of the best solutions to problems they actually have. This article on Forbes struck me as a perfect example of the “evil” marketing: creating “problems” to sell “solutions”. The article discusses how words like “diet”, “firming”, “optimal”, “healthy”, etc. are used to convince people to adhere to certain fads that include high-end food, supplements, gym memberships, and other generally unnecessary products and services you must pay for.

First, “problems” are created when industries use words in a way other than their intending meaning. For example, the Forbes article talks about the words “health”, “diet”, and “optimal”. Essentially, each of these words should mean the actions people take to make their body function at its’ highest potential. However, the fitness industry has turned these words into verbs with very little substance. For example, “diet” should mean the food you put into your body, but the fitness industry tells us that a “diet” is something you do to lose weight. When you start using words without respect to their original definition, you start to plant the idea that there is something inherently wrong with a person who is following a regiment based on the original definition of the word. This progresses into a “problem” that must be “solved”… therefore, the problem of “diet” becomes solved by adding unnecessary supplements or expensive food programs to create “optimal” results. But what is “optimal”? Well, I want to improve my “health”. But what is “health”? A person needs a measurable goal of “health” in order to reach “optimal” results. For example, one could define health as running faster or decreasing body fat by a certain percentage, and then take the necessary actions to achieve this goal.

Second, solving “problems” doesn’t actually add any value. In the article, the author mentions the immeasurable goals of “firming” or “toning”. In fact, muscles can only get larger or smaller, so there’s no value in saying that you want to “tone” a muscle. Are you looking to increase or decrease the size of the muscle? That’s the valuable question. For a solution to truly be a solution, it must add value. To use an example related to the Forbes article, let’s look at the Zone food program. This program aims to deliver “healthy” meals to your home to help you lose weight. In reality, a person can go to the super market and pick up these items and make the food themselves. Thus, the true value of this program is not that the healthy food will help you lose weight, it’s that the home delivery will help you save time and stress. If your goal is to save time and stress when making meal choices, the Zone program adds value. If your goal is to lose weight by changing your diet, the Zone program does not add value to your goal. I also touch on this theme in The Underlying Need post.

The Forbes article and my blog post are not to suggest that people don’t need help obtaining their fitness goals, but rather to highlight the practices of some marketers in the fitness industry. Instead of focusing on real problems with measurable progress toward a specific goal, many marketers create “problems”. These “problems” are followed by “solutions” that add no value to customers’ lives, but exist solely to make money for the company. There is, however, a difference between “creating” problems and “forecasting” needs, as discussed in Part 2.

I arrived back at the office with my brain bursting with ideas after attending NBAA 2010 in Atlanta, GA. The National Business Aviation Association hosted over 900 exhibitors at this year’s annual convention, and I picked up some great marketing ideas for next year!

I saw some brilliant freebies at many of the booths, perfect for the trade show atmosphere. First, one company handed out pedometers with their logos. This is genius, as everyone is trekking around the exhibit hall all day, mentioning how they’ve walked “a ton” during the show. Now, they can prove just how many steps they walked! Second, stain remover pens. PERFECT at a place where people are running around without access to a quick change of clothes, scarfing down food as they walk, and generally being in a situation where they might spill something on themselves. Lastly, I didn’t actually see this one, but it’s been brought up: hand sanitizer with the logo. Again, it makes perfect sense when you’ve got thousands of people shaking hands, grabbing escalator handrails, and handing out marketing pieces. I’m not one to pick up tons of freebies that I can’t use, but these three stood out as useful and intelligent for a trade show.

I was once again struck by how well products display vs. services. Many of the interior manufacturers, engine manufacturers, and airframe manufacturers had full-size plane fuselage, mini-bars, seating, functioning engine models, and parts displayed for attendees to tour and touch. It’s hard to put a tangible item with a service, but I think the ability to engage the sense of touch is key in a trade show situation. These tangible items allow customers to really understand what your company produces, and engages one more sense to make your message stick in their memories. I’m working on ways to improve our ability to engage the sense of touch for our services.

Finally, it was once again impressed upon me that nothing beats being there, face-to-face. You can Skype, Tweet, connect on LinkedIn, FedEx overnight, and have conference calls until you’re blue in the face, but nothing beats a good ‘ole handshake while looking someone directly in the eye. While technology significantly enhances our ability to do business, there’s something to be said for meeting in person, at least once. I know our company was able to make some deals happen in a more timely manner, and we were able to make some connections that we haven’t been able to attain via email.

I’m still processing everything that I saw, heard, and touched at the show, but these three broad ideas really stood out. I’m excited to distill all of my NBAA experiences into a comprehensive strategy to improve our display at next year’s NBAA!