I’ve talked about monetization in the past, and will likely do so again in the future. Why? For starters, understanding monetization is nothing less than an absolute requirement when it comes to understanding the relationship between your marketing strategy and your expected results. Monetization is essentially the process of turning a concept into money. Sure, we could make it more complicated, but that would be a waste of time.
Monetization is taking someone’s “awesome” idea and turning into revenue – which leads me to the reason why this topic is the focus of today’s blog post. You see, I deal with A LOT of “marketing experts,” “social media experts,” “management experts” and so on. Everyone is seemingly an “expert”…until you look through the magnifying glass and quickly realize that as “great” as their ideas may be, if they have not generated REAL revenue, then the ideas are crap.
Let me explain this concept via a recent experience that my client has kindly allowed me to share. My client manufactures eco cookware, specifically cookware that is PFOA FREE and PTFE FREE. There is no question that the products are great, but the means by which this company went about marketing to prospective buyers (professional chefs and consumers) was not effective.
Up to the point of working with my company and yours truly – the DARK LORD, the cookware manufacturer utilized a fancy brochure, as well as a series of FREE reports (both electronic and print) in an effort to educate their target buyers. About two years prior to that initiative, I had warned them that such an approach would not be effective in creating sales. The client decided not to give my company their business, and instead, went with a company based out of Ohio. Great.
Why did the cookware company go with another marketing firm? Well…let’s just say that, at the time, their internal “marketing expert” had convinced them that they (the company) needed to show prospective buyers how great their products were (and are) via the creation of a report specific to each benefit. For example, since the eco cookware requires no non-stick spray, the company created a report that focused on – you guessed it, The Advantages Of Cooking Without Non-Stick Spray.
The eco cookware company, their in-house “marketing expert,” and their marketing company, were all focused on what THEY wanted to tell their prospective buyers, and were not interested in what the prospective buyers needed to read and/or hear in order to actually pull the trigger on the purchase.
When I had heard that the eco cookware company had decided to go with that other marketing firm back in 2010, and after hearing about their new “strategy,” I asked their senior marketing manager, “HOW will you monetize your strategy?” In other words, what I was asking him was HOW will the reports ACTUALLY create new customers? I have nothing against reports or brochures, but when they are solely praised as being the end-all in terms of creating new eco cookware customers, well, to me that’s just a bunch of garbage. It’s not that the reports were a bad concept. It’s just that the reports were (and are) the wrong tool for THAT job.
What did they expect would happen? Did they expect that the prospective buyer would read the reports and go “AHH-HAH!”? In fact, they did not actually even consider what would happen after the prospective buyer read the report. They just reveled in the “greatness” of their information (LOL). When they found me earlier this year, they told me that they had fired most of the marketing team and had discontinued their relationship with their former marketing firm. Being the better man that I am, I only gave them the “I told you so!” for an hour instead of five hours. I know, I know…I am quite the individual.
The fact is that many companies and businesses over-estimate the power of information. They WANT to believe that, given the right information, people will make the right decision. In reality, that’s complete nonsense. People don’t make the right decision simply based on good information. They make the right decision when great information is packaged for optimal mental digestion.
In many cases of bad marketing, one of the problems is the inability of a company or business to monetize a marketing concept. In other words, everything sounds GREAT in the heads of those who’ve conceived the idea, but when that idea lands in the prospective buyer’s lap, it does nothing. It sits there like dust. It has no attachment to other strategies, and does not make the prospective buyer take ANY ACTION. In the real world, that means that the strategy has FAILED.
The POINT: Always ask yourself, “CAN this concept/idea be monetized, and HOW will it be monetized?” If the answer is NO, then you have a loser on your hands and you should be smart enough to turn around and run! Sadly, more often than not, most business owners and companies are so married to a specific approach that they would rather “prove” themselves right (even as the ship is well beneath the surface and making it’s way to the ocean floor) than abandon the approach and embrace something SMART. Oh well.
Have A GREAT Day!
…Dr. Marc & The Mind Virus Team