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Content Marketing

Don’t Kill Your Marketing: Learn Market Sophistication

January 10, 2021 by nxtwvlgth

Market sophistication is sort of a barometer for figuring out how many marketing messages, tactics and strategies a market has already been exposed to.

Every single market has a different level of market sophistication.

As the market becomes more mature, tactics and strategies will stop working or not deliver the expected results.

Does that mean the market is dead? No, but your marketing tactics are.

To better demonstrate the concept, I’ll be focusing mainly on the fitness industry – it has been pounded to dirt and is one of the most difficult markets to break into.

The 5 Levels of Market Sophistication

Level One – The market is fresh and your product or service is completely new or innovative. This is a pretty rare situation, but if you are lucky enough to be in such a market, the best approach with your claim is to be direct. You don’t need to elaborate your messaging here.

Level Two – There is fierce competition and you need to assert that you’re above the competition.

If your business is in this market, then it’s probably best to look at what ‘1st to market’ are already doing, how they are advertising, what claims they are making, and then enlarging on their claims.

In fitness, the 1st to market must have been claiming “reduce 5 kilos”, the competition came along and said “reduce 5 kilos in 10 days”.

Another thing that happens is the change in marketing terminology – from “fat reducing” to “weight loss diet” to “paleo” – when all of them are the same thing.

Level Three – This is where the problem arises – businesses have already copied the competitors tens of times.

The market repeatedly hears it to the point that they stop believing. Your best claims are like firing bullets on a Kevlar armor!

Even if your ad says “this will float fat right out of your body” – it wouldn’t sell your product.

This is one of the drawbacks of the so-called “competitor analysis”. Most marketers get stuck there and are unable to move or break through.

There is awareness of the claims made for your products and services, but not exactly how it all actually works. This is most likely the market situation of your business.

So what do you do when the market is in its 3rd stage of sophistication? Instead of explicitly selling your product you need to market the “how” of your product or service.

You need to shift the tactics from simple competitor analysis (doubling down) and start showing how the product works. Especially how it impacts your customer’s life and helps them achieve their goals and desires.

Something from “floats fat right out of your body” to maybe “blocks the absorption of fat in your intestine.”

Here’s the bad news though.

Your competitor will see what you’re doing, copy it and double down on it – until the rest of the market falls in line and educational content becomes the norm, leaving the best of your customers with skepticism.

Unless you were the 1st to adopt this tactic, simply educating your customers will not cut it.

This is when the market sophistication reaches level 4.

Level Four – It is just a continuation of elaboration and doubling down. Businesses are competing to capture the hearts and minds of the buying public. You have to ensure that the claims you’re making are in fact truthful, or you risk losing trust and business.

Level Five – It’s safe to say your market is completely saturated or nearly dead. Nearly dead because it’s very rare for a market to completely die off.

Customers in the market are fully aware of your product, your competitors, as well as the claims and tactics that you’ve employed so far.

What To Do When Market Sophistication Reaches Level Five

Start bringing in some uniqueness to your content, instead of simply educating your customers about the product like everyone else in your market.

A content-tilt maybe.

In fitness industry one of these content tilts can be “self-image identification”.

It means, you’re not just telling people about the process of becoming what they want to become, but you’re taking them on a journey with you.

Perception is reality after all!

I really like the example of Kino Body’s, Greg O’Gallagher.

Greg is selling lifestyle not fitness products – his mission statement is “transforming civilians into movie star shape in the simplest way possible”.

He not only delivers on the promise, but makes you self-identify with himself and the rest of his clients, who have found success with his products and training methods.

Wrap Up

So summing it up:

  • Figure out your market sophistication level before going all in.
  • Don’t get stuck in the doubling-down “competitor analysis strategy.”
  • If your market is saturated, i.e. “nearly dead”, find your content tilt.

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The Most Important Content Marketing Lessons from Red Bull

December 25, 2020 by nxtwvlgth

The first Red Bull drink was sold in 1987 in Austria. After 30 years, 169 countries and more than 60 billion cans, the company is the world’s most recognisable and profitable energy drink – with a premium price tag.

These days every marketing blog and conference seems to mention Red Bull as an example of brilliant marketing strategy – encouraging clients to follow in their footsteps.

Wondering why? Because Red Bull Gives You Wings.

It’s not the content of their drink. It’s all about their Content Marketing.

red-bull-space

80 mg of caffeine, 100 mg of taurine, 600 mg of glucuronolactone – that’s the content in a Red Bull drink.

Red Bull sends a 40-year-old male in stratosphere – tells him to jump out of a helium balloon from a height of 120,000 ft – free falling at the speed of sound.

As you probably know what they say about going that extra mile. Well, Red Bull went 23 extra miles in the vertical direction all for the sake of creating content!

Red Bull provides content that thrills and engages. They tell an incredible story and leave you wanting for more.

They’re a storytelling brand and own the realm of passion.

Whether it’s about music, gaming or action sports – these areas have cultures, stories and stars. Red Bull is paying a huge amount of respect to these audiences.

The brand is not treating customers like demographics but like the passionate people they are.

Mainstream media wasn’t good enough for filming and photographing these areas, so they took the ownership of it. With Red Bull Media House and Red Bulletin magazine they professionalize in their media operations.

Considering the origin of Red Bulletin, Red Bull‘s uncompromising effort to generate quality content is evident.

red-bull-car

The brand was sponsoring Formula One racing back in year 2005. They wanted to deliver the results of the event immediately after the race through their printed guides.

They curated information about the drivers and facts about the races, then pre-printed the magazine in bulk ahead of time. They also brought a printing press to the track and as soon as the race was over, they quickly printed the result and distributed it along with the magazines as the attendees were leaving the race.

Red Bull is a publishing empire now which also happens to sell energy drink.

If we can learn something from them – the only way to do content marketing is to be a story.

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December 20, 2020 by nxtwvlgth

Content has been ever-present but marketing has been about interruption in recent times. They interrupt you while you’re watching a TV or reading a magazine – and the bane of a good mood, those irrelevant company calls.

At first these desperate attempts were good at gaining attention, but what did the brands do with it once they were successful? It just hung there like the advertisements.

Earlier we had few channels and limited source of information. Now it’s an age where science and art are fused in a single honey: content and internet.

There are billions of people online and numerous sources of information. In a crazy and loud market like this quality is the only thing that can differentiate you.

The veil of illusion has been lifted off and people know when they’re being marketed to. Nobody cares about your product – people are trying to solve their own problems.

This direct situation opens up a new dimension for marketing. You don’t need to get through your customers, they’re already open to you.

But the moment you talk about your brand they’ll shut you out. Like a decent human being, your product has to be about more than just itself.

Trust is earned by sharing stories and our job is to uphold that trust. Your story should hold a promise of something valuable, and you need to deliver on that value.

The Furrow

Along with the content – content marketing has also been there forever. The first ads really were the content offering value and solution. At some point, we got sidetracked and started to talk about ourselves instead of connecting with customers.

If not the oldest, one of the best examples of content marketing is John Deere’s magazine The Furrow.

John Deere is an American manufacturer of agricultural equipment. Its magazine, The Furrow provides information to farmers on how to turn more profit.

Articles in The Furrow are neutral to the point where you may wonder whether this is really John Deere’s magazine. It recognized the need for customers to have an unbiased source of information. Anything that farmers can use to improve their operations makes it into The Furrow.

If you look at the entire history of the magazine, you’ll not find the words “John Deere” mentioned more than around 20 times and that’s going back about 120 years.

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Procter & Gamble

Procter & Gamble are yet another example of brilliant content marketing strategy. Imagine a soap company trying to sell more soap, how’re they going to do it?

They asked questions like ‘who are we targeting?’ Women! ‘What are their problems?’ They’re trying to build a household, their life is hectic and lacks entertainment.

So when they’re taking a break why not give them something they can relate to, narratives and characters that are meaningful to these individuals. It will be so immersive, they’re going to come back tomorrow.

This is how the “soap operas” came into existence. Procter & Gamble hired production houses to hire actors and writers, and then never interfered or put any directives. They let artists do their best to create something authentic.

They didn’t try and sell their story – they simply chose to tell their story.

And finally we’re returning to our roots. Marriot is an example of this change.

They’re openly saying that they’re a media company and their goal is to be the leading informational provider in the travel industry.

Marriot launched a global creative and content marketing studio solely for this purpose. Their focus is on developing content: digital projects, TV projects, film projects and even animation.

It becomes ugly when you put your logo on the screen and pause it for like 10 seconds. When you let creators do what they do best, things will start to look and sound real instead of being real-time.

Marriot is setting up an example, this shows when you can’t rely on media you’ve to become the media.

You naturally see it in the environment when it’s more like a culture than a program. Programs are boring and they die off after a certain time period. Whereas cultures thrive.

If you consider the case of all these successful content marketers, we can connect the dots on certain important points.

Being specific and relevant: find a niche or create a niche or find a niche within a niche but most importantly target your audience.

Deciding a content style: textual, visual or audio.

Sharing the content with consistency: weekly or daily.

And no matter what you sell, don’t be just B2B or B2C when you can always be P2P: connecting person to person and people to people. 

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