Seth Godin says that the “new” best way to make an internal sale is to make a video of people on the street talking about your product. Now while I could poke plenty of holes in the fact that this is not a “new” tactic by any means, I do agree with the basic premise of what Seth is saying.
As a marketer and Brand Manager, you can easily get sucked into an echo chamber. And from what I have seen, the problem gets amplified in Silicon Valley. You just assume everyone knows what 3G means or that they guy on the street really cares about your new longer lasting scent (for us CPG marketers).
At P&G, one of the basic principles of the company is that “The Consumer is Boss.” And building off that, I believe every marketer should keep in mind that they themselves are not the consumer…not even close. A consumer does not live and breath your product every day. And while your salary depends on that brand or product, to the consumer it is just another item in their shopping basket.
Sometimes we Brand Managers need to be reminded of that fact. And Seth is dead-on that video of people on the street is a good way to do it. For sure it is more effective than a focus group.
Case in point, I bet the Google Chrome Product Team was shocked when they saw this video from NYC. Watch it for yourself and you’ll see that most people don’t even know what a browser is, much less care about a new one named after a metal.
Tags: google, market research, NASCAR Blindness
"New" in the sense that virtually no one outside of a big company like P&G has actually done this. Walked into customer support and said, "watch this." Gone to a sales meeting and instead of a ppt said, "watch this."
That's what I mean by new.
Seth – appreciate you stopping by and adding your thoughts. I would agree not enough people are doing this. We still fall back on carefully worded powerpoints instead of letting the real voice of people shine through. It is amazing what people will candidly say when asked and nothing speaks louder than an example like google's
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Excellent post, Dave. I think Seth's point is well intentioned, but clearly there are plenty of companies – big and small – who have used this tactic for many years. Anyway, that's not the point. The point is that many marketers suffer horribly from the "I told my sister about this product and she thought it was great" syndrome. Sorry, but your sister, mother, wife, you are (1) biased, whether they realize it or not (2) not statistically significant.
Ian, why do you say plenty of companies have so clearly used this tactic for many years?
As usual, a very good post.
I must admit how much I've taken for granted the widespread power of consumer ethnographies by assuming that so many other companies and agencies would be doing them… truth is, they do not. The have not used them to their own advantage to learn, and prosper in creating relevant and contextual products and marketing ideas. Many technology people I have encountered in silicon valley would find value on whether their technology or platforms matter to the potential end user… unfortunately it is not being widely used where it matters.