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December 11, 2009
50 in 50. #20: The Next Evolution of Marketing
I read a lot of marketing books. Why? Because smart marketers are always thinking about how to reach customers, engage them in a product or service, and, most importantly, encourage those customers to buy. So I try to learn marketers’ secrets and see how those techniques can be applied to reaching and engaging employees.
In The Next Evolution of Marketing, Bob Gilbreath offers an intriguing promise: to give his readers how to “connect with your customers by marketing with meaning.” The problem is that increasingly consumers are tuning out: DVRing past commercials, avoiding the hype and doing everything in our power to avoid the 3,000 advertisements we’re exposed to each day.
What’s needed, according to Mr. Gilbreath, is “marketing with meaning,” marketing that “invites customer participation.” What does he mean? “I believe that in a world in which consumers can actively choose to avoid marketing, the only way to win to create marketing that they actively choose to engage with.”
To create meaningful marketing, “you must first determine what makes people tick—what’s genuinely important to them and what they aspire to. Specifically, you need to uncover which of their needs remain unmet—not just in the laundry room or the grocery store, but in their larger lives.”
Mr. Gilbreath offers a comprehensive model called The Hierarchy of Meaningful Model, which helps you identify the three categories of customers’ needs and think about how your marketing can fulfill these needs:
- Survival needs (food, shelter, safety and clothing)
- Attachment needs (love, belonging, friendship, family)
- Esteem needs (confidence, creativity, problem solving, respect for and by others)
These may not be completely new concepts, but Mr. Gilbreath explains in detail how you use this knowledge to create marketing that engages customers. The Next Evolution of Marketing is not for the casual reader; you have to be very interested in marketing (or believe, as I do, that learning about marketing can help you communicate more effectively in any context) to invest the time and energy. Bottom line? If you are serious about marketing, the book is worth the investment.
Posted by Alison Davis at December 11, 2009 05:18 PM
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