Best of Marketing Genius: 4 C's of Marketing

More Marketing Basics: The Four C's of Marketing
[First appeared on Marketing Genius February 2006]

We've all heard about the four P's of marketing. Now, let's take a look at another categorization system--the Four Cs. This system is newer, and in my opinion, is applicable to a wider range of marketing challenges.

The old system of four P's was created before the service/information economies were born--and thus it is best applied to the marketing of products, especially mass retail products. Now, for the 4 C's:

C - Customer
Who is your customer - or prospective customer? What are their needs? Where do they live; where do they work; and what do they do for fun? Where do they get information?

C - Competition
What competitors exist in the market space in question? And what are their strengths, weaknesses and positions?

C - Cost
What will your product (or service) cost? How does this compare? What effect will the cost of your product have on it's perceived value (or position) in the competitive marketplace? And most importantly, what are customers willing to pay?

C - Communication
How will you communicate your offering to customers? What modes of communication are available to you (or your client)? Which will be most effective ... and what will be the strategic mix of communications?

*C - Collaboration (We've added a fifth C)
Can you identify allies or partners who might be willing to help you promote your product or service? Can you share a reciprocal Website link? Is it possible to negotiate a cooperative marketing allowance or program with an organization (or company) that has complementary needs and objectives?

The 4 Ps ... the 4 Cs ... what use is all of this? These are purely and simply tools for analysis and planning. Yes, we really use them ... really think about them. And I encourage you to refer to the four C's or the four P's when you are planning your next marketing program or campaign.

Brand Tags - You Must Check This Out!

It is very rare that we repost content from other blogs or point our readers to other Web sites. Our policy, by contrast, is to offer original thoughts, observations and perspectives. In the case of Brand Tags, we find one of those very worthy exceptions that's worth encouraging you to go see. The creator of Brand Tags is Noah Brier, a New York communication strategist and observer/reporter of media trends, especially those related to Web 2.0.

Most marketing professionals and those among the audience who are marketing enthusiasts are students of brands. If you are like me, you enjoy getting inside a brand and understanding the associated perceptions, the factors that influence and constitute a brand's position. Brand Tags is an extremely simple and well done tool that has been created to solicit and analyze such perceptions. It is a tool that I could see becoming widely adopted in the professional practice of brand development. Brand Tags is the proverbial "simple, elegant" solution.

Kudos to Noah and his team for creating this innovative, promising Web application! Go check it out and please post your thoughts in a comment here.

Packed House. Standing Room Only. Full Media Coverage

The words in the headline of this article represent a successful event. Those words equate to what good looks like, from our clients' perspective.


Successful events require skill and tenacity ... and even a bit of luck.




Skill - you have to know how to do it. We rely upon our trusted RSVP process to guide us in strategy. Then, we rely upon talented professionals, failsafe systems, flawless execution to get the job done. You have to understand when and how to contact the media (if they are part of the event mix).




Tenacity - when things go wrong, or break or fail to show up (and they always do), you have to have the wits and the toughness to work through such adversity. Plus, you have to have the confidence and poise to avoid getting flustered.


Luck - you have to be lucky in the sense that bad weather, a natural disaster, a competing event or major world news event can hurt your event's attendance. Stuff happens.


Personally, I truly love working on events... love conceptualizing, planning, promoting and working events. And I love the high stakes nature of events. Many of my colleagues at Maple do, too. Regarding our performance in this area of our practice, Maple is "undefeated." Every single time, without exception, the results are: packed house, standing room only, full media coverage.

The photo above was taken at our most recent event, the public announcement ceremony for a tourism project in Beckley, West Virginia. See the packed house. You can see a few pieces of media gear, too.


No one does events better than Maple. That's not arrogance. It is, perhaps, pride in what we do ... and the passion that we bring to our work. And I make no apologies for such statements.


Whenever someone is engaged in something that they love, isn't it magic? Isn't it beautiful to see passion in action! Can passion rightfully applied ever be defeated?

This next photo below shows Michael Haid and I passionately engaged in our work at the event. It was taken just prior to the start of the press ceremony. Look closely and you'll also see the nice stage setup, the backdrop and the phenomenal artistry that our design team does on brand identity. More details about the event and the project are available here.

Overcoming Inbox Overload

Last week, I shared information from Jugglezine with observations on e-mail overload.

If you were troubled by that, take comfort in the fact that some of the world's leading technology companies and e-marketers are keenly aware of the problem. In fact, they are working feverishly to develop new technologies and solutions to improve, if not reinvent, the e-mail inbox. One of the companies that I frequently go to for information about the world of e-mail, electronic communications and online marketing is Silverpop. The following article from Silverpop CEO Bill Nussey and his head development guy provides a good overview of what's out there, what's being evaluated and what is coming.

Contemplating the Future of the Inbox
I've been inviting my colleague, Scott Voigt, our head of product marketing, to put together some guest blogs over the last few months. I am pleased to include his first blog entry below...

From Scott:A few months ago, the Internet was abuzz with the meme of Inbox 2.0. A couple of articles in the Wall Street Journal (here and here) and a post in the Bits section of The New York Times, pointed to a future where the inbox would begin to take more proactive role in managing communications, acting as much like a social network as it does a hub for receiving good ol' SMTP messages. Leading the charge on this new frontier are a number of start-ups (Boxbe, ClearContext, and Xobni to name a few) that are, in essence, using technology to help consumers manage their overload of email. More recently, we've seen some of the big inbox providers indicate that changes were indeed on the horizon. To wit, at this year's CES, Yahoo's Chief, Jerry Yang demonstrated a future version of Yahoo! Mail that included a "simplify my inbox" button, which, once clicked, would reorder messages based on "people that are important to me."

Here's a link to the full text of the Silverpop blog post.

Frankly, I am looking forward to the next-generation inbox. From my perspective, it can't get here soon enough!