Ricky’s Online Business Blog

Recently a friend started a discussion on Facebook about boy-girl relationship. Then people started to liken courting boys and girls to marketing.  I commented about it and guess it might be funny to post it on my blog too…

Marketing is applied everywhere, whether we like it or know it or not. Maybe we can learn from Peter Drucker on what he says about selling and marketing in his book Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices..

“There will always, one can assume, be need for some selling. But the aim of marketing is to make selling superfluous. The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well that the product or service fits him and sells itself. Ideally, marketing should result in a customer who is ready to buy. All that should be needed then is to make the product or service available.”

Now let’s apply and adapt marketing vs. selling (courting) to boy-girl relationship and see if we can get any insight from the wisdom

“There will always, one can assume, be need for some courting. But the aim of marketing is to make courting superfluous. The aim of marketing is to know and understand the guy/girl so well that you fit the target and sell yourself. Ideally, marketing should result in a target who is ready to accept your proposal. All that should be needed then is to make you available!”

I have been watching this video and am still deeply moved. It is one of the most watch-able commercials I have ever seen in life. Some of the acting may be too far fetched. But its message is profound.

Question – Why am I different from others?
Answer – Do you have to be like others?

Don’t seek to be like others! Everyone of us is unique and has our own destiny to realize in life!

From marketing point of view, the commercial is also great. Pantene shampoo is a functional product and has its conventional market of shampoo users. But now it seeks to cross over from functionality to emotional appeal. Instead of using logic to tell us why it is a better brand, it seeks to attack our emotion and win our heart over.

Not only will it persuade more people from the its traditional market to use the product, those who don’t use their kind of shampoo maybe bought over too. Who knows I might decide to buy Pantene for my family next time? Perhaps this is one of the blue ocean strategies to conquer a new market.

And the tagline is inspirational – You can shine!

By the way, I consider the Thai language very beautiful phonetically. It is a language I wish to learn if I had extra time.

Have you come across an one-page web sites before?  I bet you have.  A typical one-page web site consists of one page only.  Normally it’s a long sales letter for only one product or service.

When you see the catchy words and sentences at the top of the page, you may be tempted to scroll down to read the rest.  You may find out more about the product, its benefits, some customer testimonials, and of course a link to buy it.

Normally there is no link to any other page on the same web site where you can find more out more about the company, the product or service.  All information is contained in one single page.

Such one-page web sites have existed for more than one decade since the 90’s, advocated by Internet marketing gurus such as the late Corey Rudl.  However, nowadays many still advocate the use of one-page web sites to sell product.  Perhaps it may still be working.

For me, I normally consider such web site as mere advertisement, sales letter and simply spammy.  Normally when I come across such web site, I will simply leave and go elsewhere.

I once asked an Internet guru who is himself using an one-page web site to sell his training course.  He answered that on such web site, visitors have no link to click away and so must stay on and focus on the web site to read the rest.  Whereas visitors to a web site with multiple pages will be tempted to click around.

I reason that perhaps on an one-page web site, the visitors will be forced to follow the desired sales process by the seller, whereas this may not happen on a web site with multiple pages.

On regard to whether it’s spammy, the Internet guru said that if the web site is owned by your father or your trusted friend, surely you will not go away.  So the challenge is to build trust.

And what do you think of an one-page web site?