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One of the biggest problems with social networks is social marketing. If you happen to be a part of a social network online, there is a good chance that you are being marketed to by someone that either has privy to your information or worse yet, someone close to you trying to push their goods on you. Marketers have this idea that if they can get close to you through your social network it will be a lot easier to sell you on what ever crap they want to sell you. The best of the marketers are able to create marketing campaigns that don’t even reach out to you directly but they somehow manage to reach others in your social networks and convince them that they should directly market to you. It’s one thing to create a product that is so good you will gladly endorse it and tell all your friends about it. Personally I probably endorse this little tripod I have more than any other physical product I own. I do this because I love the product. The best marketing is done when you have a fantastic product and people honestly recommend it to others.
Marketing is not about creating a good product however. Marketing really comes down to the selling of what ever crap you can by what ever means you can do it. Since social networks are relatively cheap and easy ways to reach out to a lot of people it’s no wonder that businesses and individuals put so much emphasis on social marketing. Obama 08′ is probably the best social marketing campaign produced to date, Oprah has that book club that does pretty well, imagine being an author that all of a sudden Oprah puts on her book club, that would be amazing. Marketers for corporations often are still struggling with ways to jump on this social networking wagon. It’s way more difficult to be a business or corporation in the social marketing game, for the most part social marketing works when it touches on a personal level although there are some corporations that manage to succeed in their efforts, most fail as they don’t really get it. The best of the social marketers are genuinely honest and create a human connection before trying to push their wares on you. Sure I follow Guy Kawasaki on twitter, have I ever personally given him money or bought any of his products, the answer is no. Same goes for MC Hammer or that cat that I follow on twitter while I think they are interesting to follow, and often have post some great links I don’t really see giving them money anytime soon, for the most part unless a product or service really screams at me, I will generally not be spending my money on anything these social marketers in my social network are promoting. Marketing is a tricky thing if you are a corporation trying to sell a product. If you are a wicked evil corporation like Monsanto, McDonald’s social marketing actually works against you as it’s way more difficult in today’s internet World to hide the truth from the masses. Honesty, truth and direct human connections are core concepts to social networking.
Now that I’ve been rambling on about social networking for a while I want to talk about Non-Social Marketing. My concept for Non-Social marketing is one where people are marketed to in a non social or private space. This might be when you are going to the bathroom, in the shower, shaving, getting dressed, touching yourself or even sleeping. Basically marketers have been so busy trying to do this social marketing thing that they are missing out on a huge opportunity to market to people when they are in their most private of settings. This constant push of marketing has made today’s consumer desensitized to advertising and marketing, marketers inherently will try to change tactics and methods to shock, amaze or trick you into getting whatever they want in front of you. It’s a strange psychological game that is being played. Marketing is a strange ever changing beast. The dose of marketing increases as we become more desensitized to it. It’s easy to market a good product or to market for a good cause, when it comes to other products or services, this task becomes way more difficult as society and social networks inherently are built in watchdogs to marketing trickery.
With non-social marketing you simply invade a persons personal space with your marketing. Currently this task is rather simple… Allow me to demonstrate.
THE NEXT TIME YOU POOP, THINK OF MoHDI.com
With a simple line of copy, I’ve marketed my personal site to you and there is a good chance the next time you poop, you will be thinking of Millions of Hundred Dollar Ideas. This it perhaps the most straight forward example of non-social marketing. Basically non-social marketing is a pretty simple psychological trick involving planting a trigger response in someone. While conventional marketing works in the same way direct non-social marketing is about having the trigger not kick in until the marketed person can directly focus on your product, service or campaign. While the example above will most likely work pretty well a better approach is to make the person being marketed to generate their own thought about the product or service. Currently I’m working to raise money for a non-profit that helps children which is dedicated to supporting students ages 6 to 18 with their creative and expository writing skills. So for this particular case it’s better for me to plant a more specific train of thought into persons head.
THE NEXT TIME YOU POOP, THINK OF THE CHILDREN
Now this line of copy is far better marketing in the non-social marketing realm. It plants the trigger response and also invokes follow up thoughts beyond the less specific mohdi.com wording from earlier. The brain naturally will wonder why they are thinking of “MoHDI.com” or of “the children” then ideally will go into a personal question and answer response process as demonstrated in the following possible scenario…
Think of the children.. why? oh.. cause we are helping them.. how can I help?.. donate a few bucks… why should I donate.. oh.. so years from now some illiterate kids aren’t going to beat me up and take my money.. why not donate a few bucks to the cause.. yeah.. I guess it’s really an investment in my future and besides I can write this off on my taxes.
This is just a basic method of non-social marketing. I believe that there are numerous ways to plant non-social marketing triggers in consumers that can be quit simple and can also be very complex and can reach consumers even in their dreams. Next time you hop in the shower, take a poo or have a dream be aware you might be being marketed to whether you like it or not.