From 99 Marketing Traps and How to Avoid Them: A Survival Guide for Marketing Pros and Those Who Hire Them*
The people buying your products or services may have content expertise in several areas (in fact, they almost certainly do).
One area where they are not experts is in what it takes to get them to buy. They think they know all about that. They don’t.
Buyers think they can predict which marketing or advertising or promotional strategy will most appeal to them and bring them into the fold. They can’t. Buyers do know how they want to feel after doing business with you.
What they don’t know is the “why” behind what works, or how to duplicate it. That’s why one of the most consistently wasteful marketing exercises involves buyer research that directly asks buyers marketing strategy questions.
When a focus group discussion devolves into a discussion of advertising theory, you might as well head back to the snack table for another bowl of potato chips. You won’t be missing anything you can really use.
If You Know Anyone Who's Caught in this Marketing Trap, Here's How to Help Them Out.
Don’t ask your buyers how to solve your marketing problems. They don’t know, though they will be happy to tell you anyway.
It’s a waste of your time, and theirs. The one thing of value that they can tell you is what is important to them. That’s an area of expertise you can’t get anywhere else.
They can also tell you how they feel in a given situation. They will give you this priceless insight in all sorts of ways, through all their various marketplace behaviors. The better you know them, the better you’ll be able to “read” those behaviors and draw usable insights from them.
Focus groups, on the other hand, are the “speed dating” of market research. Do you really think you’re going to find what you are looking for there?
*Available now in both e-book and softcover versions.
