Maslow's Marketing Filter

Written by Darrin F. Coe, MA


Maslow’s Marketing Filter

One ofrepparttar basics of all marketing and advertising training is a teaching of “Maslow’s needs pyramid”. This pyramid showsrepparttar 120073 different motivators and needs in a person’s life and how they are built one uponrepparttar 120074 other. Supposedly this is presented to helprepparttar 120075 marketing student understand consumer motivation and thinking. The problem is I’ve never seen it applied, inrepparttar 120076 text books. It’s presented asrepparttar 120077 foundation of human motivation and then it’s dropped.

I’d like to present to you a way to use Maslow’s needs pyramid so that you can get insiderepparttar 120078 consumer’s mind and develop an understanding of what’s truly motivating them as they consider purchasing your product or service.

Maslow’s needs pyramid present human needs such that each need is pursued and met beforerepparttar 120079 next level of needs can be considered; they build upon one another. The needs from most basic to most complex are:

– physiological needs: food, shelter, sex – safety needs: clothing, weapons, defense of self – social needs: social acceptance – esteem needs: acceptance of self by self – fulfillment needs: a feeling of having and fulfilling a purpose

Sorepparttar 120080 question is, “How do we use this paradigm to get insiderepparttar 120081 consumer’s head?”

Let’s consider a personal fitness training service. Here’s how it works atrepparttar 120082 most basic level. Place yourself inrepparttar 120083 position ofrepparttar 120084 consumer and think as if you are considering hiring a personal fitness trainer.

1. How will personal fitness training impact my acquisition and use of food? Of shelter? Of sexual behavior? (Now you see why sex is used in marketing so many products – we react to it instinctually)

2. How will personal fitness training impact my personal safety? – you’ll be in better shape and can run faster from a mugger, perhaps.

3. How will personal fitness training positively impact my standing in society? In my social circle? Access to different social circles?

4. How will personal fitness training positively impact how I think about myself?

Eddie the Erroneous E-Marketer

Written by Jason OConnor


Poor Eddierepparttar e-marketer has been plagued by errors in judgment all his life. From always pickingrepparttar 120072 longest line atrepparttar 120073 toll booth to buying lots of dot com stocks right beforerepparttar 120074 bubble burst, he constantly struggles with makingrepparttar 120075 right choices. From disagreeing that a car really needs oil changes every three thousand miles to insisting thatrepparttar 120076 eight-track is going to make a comeback, Eddie bumbles through life perplexed. One area that particularly suffers is his e-marketing efforts.

You see, Eddie recently got himself a new website for his business. Unfortunately, he’s been trying in vain to turn it into a vehicle for getting leads and making sales. He’s confused. He’s dazed. He thrashes about lost in a maze. Although he at least understandsrepparttar 120077 importance of e-marketing for driving traffic to his site, he’s like a hamster running on a wheel, wasting energy and getting nowhere. Let’s take a look at a few ofrepparttar 120078 more typical e-marketing errors Eddie regularly makes.

Treatrepparttar 120079 Web as a different medium The other day his business partner, Betty, showed Eddie a recent half-page ad they ran in one of their industry’s magazines. Eddie, excited at how prettyrepparttar 120080 pictures were, wanted it up on their website pronto. Did he alter it in any way before they posted it torepparttar 120081 site? Did he add a specific call to action hyperlink in it? Did he optimizerepparttar 120082 large print graphics so they would download fast in people’s browsers? Nope. He just tookrepparttar 120083 ad, as is, and posted it. Eddie has never been able to grasprepparttar 120084 idea that traditional marketing and e-marketing, while related, are notrepparttar 120085 same thing. What works in print doesn’t always work online. Why? Different mediums require different approaches. Look for Eddie’s static magazine ad in his first TV commercial, justrepparttar 120086 motionless ad onrepparttar 120087 screen for thirty seconds. Riveting.

The Web is interactive. Site visitors can click buttons, fill out forms, or post immediate comments in forums or blogs. When Eddie was having his site built, he really just wanted to have a way to talk about his business. He wanted to tellrepparttar 120088 world how great his company was andrepparttar 120089 exciting history of its formation. This is called brochure-ware. It’s just taking a company brochure, posting it online and adding a few links. To say that Eddie is underutilizingrepparttar 120090 Web is like sayingrepparttar 120091 ocean is mildly wet. The Web is extremely powerful and businesses have a choice of taking advantage of its power, or just scratchingrepparttar 120092 surface with simple brochure-ware. It’s similar to buying a tank, climbing in and liftingrepparttar 120093 hatch only to shoot spit balls atrepparttar 120094 enemy. If you have that kind of power, use it.

Ask your customers what they want Since Eddie doesn’t really grasprepparttar 120095 interactive nature ofrepparttar 120096 Web he guesses what his potential customers want and need. One day in a meeting Eddie was scratching his head, staring up atrepparttar 120097 ceiling and saying, “Gee, if there was only a way to figure out what our customers want, a way we could get in their heads, and a way to reach enough of them to get a really clear picture, hmm . . . ?” Thankfully, a timid but sharp junior associate raised her hand and suggested that they just ask their customers their opinions and needs directly, and do it online where they could ask a whole bunch of them.

Eddie jumped atrepparttar 120098 idea. Finally he was going makerepparttar 120099 right choice, albeit aided by a junior associate, butrepparttar 120100 right e-marketing choice nonetheless. They created an html form with forty ofrepparttar 120101 most important questions he could think of and posted a link on their homepage called “Customer Survey”.

Offer incentives Only three people ever filledrepparttar 120102 survey out, and that was it. Eddie was dumfounded. What went wrong? He was hoping for hundreds. The problem was that Web users are not patient and generally don’t like to fill out forms, especially long ones. Even more importantly, they don’t like to do something for nothing.

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