A New Marketing Strategy by Harvard: Milkshake Marketing

by: Cynti Oshin
Director Client Services/Business Development

Harvard Business School's, Working Knowledge, shares Professor Clay Christensen's concept of product development. He points out that 95 percent of new products fail. He asserts that often times the developer has yet to identify the basic problem a customer is facing and then build a product to meet that need. In the case of those products that have been developed as a result of 1. identifying the job to be done and 2. building the right product to do the job - the task of marketing should be clear. The examples given were "Fed Ex - gets your package from here to there as fast as possible. Disney does the job of providing warm, safe, fantasy vacations for families. OnStar gives peace of mind."

Building a better mouse trap (because you've got mice) that catches mice better than anyone (job completed) is all well and good. You've determined that the job exists and you've developed the tool to do the job. However, until your consumer places value in your better mouse trap - actually cares - your product will be amongst the 95% that failed. And as we say around here at S&E, it all boils back down to identifying who you are, what you do and why it matters.

When taking that insight into the marketplace, Christensen suggests you can then identify the 'purpose brand' - that which clearly reflects the 'job' that a product does. His example? Families needed an inexpensive way to preserve important family moments. As a result, Kodak developed the "FunSaver" camera to preserve good memories.

And ultimately, what does all of this have to do with milkshakes and marketing? There's a connection - check the article out.

http://bit.ly/gb1Bkh