Deviant Marketing

Three questions to ask yourself before you start marketing:

Question 1: Who is your actual customer?

Who gives you money? Who makes the decision to give you money. That is your customer, that is who we want to make happy.

Question 2: What business are you really in?

Don't answer that too quickly. Most people get it wrong. What you sell people and what people buy are almost always two different things. Companies sell products or services, but customers buy solutions.

Think about beer commercials. Beer companies make and sell beer. But that's not what their customers are buying. Customers are buying parties, socialization, and having fun. That's why the commercials aren't about hop content or the brewing process, but about people in groups having a blast. Similarly Coke doesn't sell sugar water, it sells happiness.

So when you look to answer question 2, you have to divorce yourself from your products/services. You're not the hops content, or the sugar water. So, in answering this question, I want you to think like your customer (the person giving you money). Why do they really want to give you money? What solution are you selling? How are you the cavalry coming over the hill to save them?

Question 3: Why are you in business?

In our experience, customers are most attracted to companies who know why they went into business in the first place. Frankly, as you get your start your "why" may be your most valuable asset. Too many companies focus on the "how" and the "what." That substance is important, but not "why" your business is necessary for your customer.

Here's the core of this question: when you banged your fist on the table and said "There has to be a better way!" what were you fixing? That's probably your "why."