Bruce Clark, associate professor of marketing at Northeastern University, has shared lots of wisdom on Twitter over the years. Here is a selection of his contributions, in no particular order.
Marketing is the Customer Lens on the Business
30 November 2021
A metaphor I use is that marketing is the customer lens on the business. Everything that involves how we interact with customers is marketing. To Tim’s point, that’s true for the company as a whole, not just the marketing department.
Use data for directional guidance rather than precise forecasts
16 May 2022
I talk with students about getting directional guidance from data rather than precise forecasts:
(a) Is the effect positive or negative?
(b) Is the effect big or small?
That gives you some ability to head in the right direction with a good guess at resources.
Survey Design: Don’t give people a reason to walk away
15 June 2021
When my students design questionnaires, I have them put all the questions in a table and one column of the table is “what are you going to do with the answer to this question?” Shortens a lot of questionnaires.
Every second a respondent spends with you is precious. Don’t waste them. A huge problem with online surveys is incompletes: don’t give people a reason to walk away.
Brand Broadly, Activate Narrowly
30 April 2022
(Replying to Les Binet on the distinction between brand building and sales activation)
This is also a nice summary of the targeting choice. Brand broadly, activate narrowly.
Financial Analysis for Marketers
by Bruce Clark, May 7, 2021. Read the full article on Medium.
“As you progress in or grow an organization, you are much better off if you understand how what you do relates to the financial concerns of the larger entity. At a basic level, someone who can demonstrate this understanding is more valuable to an organization than someone who cannot. You will also make better decisions.”
How managers see the market vs.
How customers see the market
28 April 2020
We think people notice our positioning a lot more than they do. A study from many years ago. On the left, managers who see a highly differentiated market. On the right, consumers who say you’re (mostly) all alike.
Organizations are moving averages of their people
30 June 2023
A line I have is that organizations are moving averages of their people. I was influenced by multiple people my colleagues have never met, and I presumably will influence people who never met me.
Optimal Level of Surprise for consultants
17 January 2019
I’ll relate this to what I call the “Optimal Level of Surprise” in consulting. If you tell the client nothing is wrong, why did they hire you? If you tell the client everything is wrong, they think you’re crazy. If you tell the client “here are three things,” ahhhh. . .
Distribution Channels
9 May 2019
More generally, eventually you hit limits on what you can get out of your current distribution channel, whatever it is. Then you open a new channel.
Return on Attention
18 June 2021
I’ll talk sometimes about Return on Attention. Management attention is limited.
Winner’s Curse: Highest Bidder Overpays
14 May 2021
And then there’s the winner’s curse. If there is a normal distribution of valuations around an acquisition, by definition the winner paid more than most people thought the acquisition was worth.
See also: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/w/winnerscurse.asp
Marketing Organizations
10 May 2019
AMA you’ve heard of. @MktgScience is an important liaison organization btw the academic community and practitioners. @theMASB1 (Marketing Accountability Standards Board) is a fascinating project trying to establish standards/metrics of effectiveness for marketing. (Think FASB.)
The 4Ps: product, price, promotion, place
23 December 2018
Here’s a 4P’s work-around (from my dissertation chair, so also old), how to use it without saying it. Why are customers not buying your product? Four typical answers: “I don’t like it” “It’s too expensive” “I’ve never heard of it” “I can’t find it” [Psst, 4P’s]
23 December 2018
Here’s the same idea as I apply it to the (old) Hierarchy of Effects.
Where are you losing people in your marketing process?
- Awareness (“I’ve never heard of you”)
- Knowledge (“I know nothing about you”)
- Liking (“I don’t like you”)Bottom of Form
- Preference (“I like you. I like everybody.”)
- Purchase Intention (“I’ll get around to it.”)
- Purchase (A host of in-store/on-site problems, e.g., stockouts, poor packaging/display, bad salesperson, product/price not what expected, competition at store etc.)
15 December 2020
I’ll take marketing for $200, Alex.
- Make stuff people want.
- Tell them about it.
- Price it in a way that you and they receive value.
- Deliver it in a way that fits with their lives.
29 February 2020
Looking for something to replace the 4Ps in marketing? Try 4Cs (with a bonus 4 for communication). 4Cs marketing model: 2 models with the same acronym | Smart Insights
Offer, Communication, Delivery
29 February 2020
One of the criticisms I’ve heard of 4Ps ties to this comment: it was designed for manufactured goods (and works pretty well for them). But most of the economy is now service based, where the product is . . . what?
In any case, you can see how complicated this gets for many modern offerings.That’s why I have the offer, communication, delivery framework in the outline in my article.
Packaging
1 March 2020
Some packaging is part of the delivery of the experience, e.g., motor oil in a container one can pour easily. Other packaging is purely decorative. I think it serves both, but I’m not in favor of the “fifth P of packaging” approach.
Packaging has also become important in supply chains. I believe both Walmart and Amazon have packaging standards for vendors to make things easy to store and distribute.
Paul Bailey asks: 23 January 2021
Following an interesting Twitter thread yesterday, how would you define Product, as a marketing term? For example, is the Product of a bottle of water the:
- Water
- Water + Bottle
- Water + Bottle + Graphics
Bruce Clark responds: 23 January 2021
So in the consumer sense, I usually describe products as “bundles of benefits.” To the extent all three of these elements contribute to a beneficial customer experience, they are all part of product. Even graphics can contribute: think about the coke bottles with your name.
How do you define the industry?
11 August 2021
1/ If I may keep the discussion going a little longer, in the strategy literature there is a long-established intermediate analysis level between industry and firm called “strategic groups.”
2/ Within an industry, groups of firms (say banking disruptors in Paul’s essay) compete in a similar way, and firms in these groups may rise or fall together (e.g. DTC health and beauty). Industry performance may mask substantial differences in group performance.
3/ This in turn raises the question of precisely what an “industry” is. Is DTC health and beauty an industry, or a group within an industry. This is important because that definition is so often the metaphorical (positioning) or literal (SOV) denominator of our thinking.
Research: Machetes and Topiaries
20 March 2022
Elsewhere I’ve made the distinction between “machete” and “topiary” research. Machete research is hacking away at an untouched area, often with rough results. Topiary research is beautifully sculpting a garden we already have. Both useful, but I know I’m a machete guy
Why do we do it that way?
27 December 2023
One of the most powerful two-part questions I’ve found from experience is to first ask “how do we do things here?” so you understand and then ask “why do we do it that way?” Sometimes the answer to the second is completely rational. Often it’s “ummm.”
Articles of Interest 