Marketers Are Selfish

Marketing people like to put their own spin on advertising and promotion. They are creative, but marketing people are also selfish and like to be the “expert” at things. It’s impossible to be an expert in marketing because the world is always changing and things that worked yesterday don’t work today. Not to mention, there are millions of tools for the trade out there – some good, some great, some terrible. As far as being selfish, most marketers don’t like to share their ideas nor do they want you to know HOW they executed something.

It’s easy to say they knew it would be successful AFTER THE FACT. In truth, they had no idea and what started out as an experiment miraculously went viral. It’s not an exact science. It’s a bunch of A/B testing and trying new elements with old ones.

I’m constantly looking for new tools and strategies, yet the information I find out there is nebulous. Case studies are great, but when was the last time you found one that pertained to your specific industry or target market? Many of them are B2C vs. B2B.

Look, I’m not trying to put down my own kind. Yet there’s this frustration that builds in me because it seems that we are all struggling alone or in a sterile think tank team environment when we really should be working collaboratively. We should be open sourcing our ideas and I see it happening more and more.

This excites me.

Tesla Motors released their patents so other companies can leverage their technology to increase production of electric cars. This helps the environment and solves supply/demand issues, making these cars more affordable.

Former employees from Quest Nutrition started their own nutrition bar company that would be considered in direct competition. Do you think Quest is upset? NO! They are happy that bright individuals who contributed to the growth and success of the company has decided to spin off and try something different, but with the same core values. Quest isn’t delusional. They know one company can’t feed the world or fight metabolic disease on their own. What a fantastic story! And they tell it so well via interviews, videos and podcasts.

When you change your perspective to one of personal and professional growth, we are no longer in competition. We are merely challenging one another, perhaps even daring each other, to do it better. Take a great execution plan and see if you can go farther with it. I dare you.