Let’s Clear up the Confusion About What Marketing Actually Does

Some people are very confused about what marketing does.

So let’s clear up the confusion.

Marketing is used best when working in tandem with other business functions such as product, sales, finance, operations, etc.

👉 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐞𝐱𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞.

Airlines are notorious for shrinking seats (that don’t recline), cramming as many seats as possible into a plane to squeeze as much revenue per square foot as possible.

They nickel and dime customers, hassling them about baggage size, charging for bags, reducing snacks, requiring an upcharge for every little thing, making it extremely difficult to change or cancel flights, having rude staff…

What if…

Instead of cramming more seats on a plane, you removed some? 🤔

You could remove an entire row and shift all the remaining seats thereby allowing everyone a little extra leg room.

Passengers could stretch their legs, store their bag, get out of their seat comfortably without having to climb over other passengers.

Any lost revenue from that missing row can be baked into the price of all the other seats.

You can also train your staff to be pleasant at all times, not hassle customers for slightly over-the-limit bags, not upcharge them for every little thing…

What if you offered better snacks, more comfortable seats, properly sanitized every surface, offered more flexibility with schedule changes and cancellations, offered exceptional customer service that customers can actually get a hold of.

If you did all this, you would have a superior airline service.

Then, you could use marketing to talk about it.

You could run ‘always on’ campaigns talking about the extra leg room, the flexibility, the snacks, the cleanliness, the friendliness, the no hassle….

Customers have a choice: fly with us and have a pleasant experience (sure, it may be a little extra), or fly with the other airlines that may be a little cheaper, but are dreadful experiences.

Which airline would you choose?

Sometimes, it’s not about asking how can marketing drive sales, but how can we do things better and then use marketing to promote those things.