It’s interesting most folks that consider themselves Marketers, especially of the online variety, seem to only discuss and have ideas about Advertising. But of the 4 P’s that make up Marketing – Product (which includes People), Price, Place (channel), and Promotion – Promotion (Advertising) is the weakest element of the four.
I say weakest because Advertising cannot fix a poorly thought out Product, Pricing Strategy, or Distribution system. It just can’t. Yet huge amounts of money are wasted trying to do exactly that.
Perhaps this why someone feels they need to publish a book that tells people Product is important in Marketing. To me, that’s the most circular or redundant idea for a Marketing book I’ve ever heard.
Marketing starts with Product, which should include all the audience or market segmentation studies (People) that drive the creation of the Product – defining the need. If you do this first and develop a Product which truly fills the need, AND you get the Pricing and Distribution right, the Product will literally sell itself to the core audience.
If you can make it that far, THEN the Product can perhaps be sold to the next segment out from the core through Advertising. All “Marketers” should know this.