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Seth Godin
Sell What People Are Buying
(and Talking About!)
A few years ago, after yet another unsuccessful sales call, I
realized the blindingly obvious: It’s a lot easier to sell
something that people are already in the mood to buy.
As obvious as this may seem, most marketers don’t get it.
For example, Butterball has invented a new use for turkey
(and its brand) and has introduced fast-baking pot pies,
now in your grocer’s freezer. The problem is that the
audience for this very retro food isn’t necessarily in the
market for a brand-new way to feed their family. What’s
worse, Butterball is introducing the product with TV
commercials running on the Food Channel.
I’m trying hard to imagine Butterball’s target customer.
The Food Channel viewer is busy watching a cooking show,
and here’s an insipid, soft-focus commercial for a glorified
TV dinner. How many viewers will even watch the
commercial Of those watching, how many will respond
in the way Butterball hopes Worse, how many will tell a
friend about this great new meal
On the list of people who are baking a frozen comfort
food for dinner, there are few risk-taking early adopters.
And among those adopters, very few, it seems to me, are
going to look to the Food Channel for the answer to their
“What’s new” problem.
Consumers with needs are the ones most likely to respond
to your solutions. Whether your prospect is an industrial
bearings buyer at Ford or an overworked househusband in
Tucson, you need to figure out who’s buying, and then solve
their problem. Butterball’s product is unremarkable. It
doesn’t solve anyone’s problem except for Butterball’s.
Butterball’s advertising and media choices make it worse.
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