How does marketing work, and what is the goal?

Some of you may have seen descriptions like ‘Marketing is the actions that promote products, actions that help businesses to reach out to their audience and sell somethings’.

All talks about sales and promotions and it makes sense.

But I think marketing has a deeper goal.

Actually, that is why I decided to write about it, and maybe this thought will be interesting for you.

In my opinion, Marketing is the technology for changing human behavior after consuming information and the main purpose of marketing is to change human behavior.

This is a key thing. Behavior can be absolutely different.

You can buy something, try something, read, watch something, sign up on the website, go somewhere, or even board a spaceship, and go to war with aliens you've never seen before.

I will give you a simple example.

You are walking on the street, thinking about how your boss is bad, and suddenly you see the restaurant or cafeteria ad like ‘Сoffee with a chocolate croissant’.

And you think 'Hmmm... It looks so tasty! Damn, I want this!'.

So you enter this coffee shop and buy this coffee and chocolate croissant.

But the main idea is that 30 seconds ago you didn’t have any thoughts about it.

You saw the information, in this case, it was an image of coffee and chocolate, and your behavior changed.

30 sec ago you were thinking about work, about your bad boss.

But now you’re drinking coffee and eating croissants.

It looks so obvious but people don’t think in this direction and I don't understand why.

For all people, marketing is like Facebook ads or Google ads or how many leads we get today.

But for me, marketing is about changing human behavior and converting it into the actions that you need, as a seller.

The next point, let's figure out another important topic that will blow your mind.

Let’s talk about the foundation of marketing.

And you will see that it is based on two pillars.

These are a Psychological part and a Technical part.

The psychological part is information that changes human behavior. 

The technical part is how you deliver this information to people's minds.

Going back again to our coffee shop example, you see the image of these delicious chocolate croissants and you begin to want them.

This picture is the visual information that changes your behavior.

You begin to want to eat croissants after seeing it.

And the outdoor ads banner is a technology to deliver this information into your mind.

Another example.

You can see the same information about Croissants and this coffee shop on someone's Instagram.

The information is the same. But the delivery technology is different.

The problem is that people don’t divide psychological and technological parts.

They think in categories like YouTube marketing, Instagram marketing, Search Ads, etc.

In all cases, digital marketing or marketing channels are the technology to deliver information in different formats.

It can be images, short text or long text, video, or something else.

And the main point is if the information does not change human behavior the change of delivery channel will not help you.

This is extremely important, so I’d like to underline it.

If the information doesn't change people's behavior, then changing the delivery channel won't help you.

I’m sure you've seen a lot of people that said: 
'In my business, Google ads don’t work, I will try Facebook ads'.

And they are flipping different types of digital marketing again and again.

Of course, different businesses need to use different marketing channels, I just want to explain to you how it works in general.

So, the main idea is if your information, I mean offer, doesn't convert, any super modern technology won’t help.

I’ll tell you a story about my university friend.

You know, all of us had a strange friend in college.

He had a problem with communication with girls. He really didn't understand when his offer was not interesting.

He caught girls in the hallway between classes and asked them for a number.

Every time they rejected him.

After that, he found their numbers, I don't know how he did it.

Maybe in college time, he was working in a lead generation agency. 😆

So, he texted the first massage like 'Hey! Let's go grab a cup of coffee!'.

The girls didn’t answer.

Then he sends another message and another. Silence.

Then he thought 'Hmmm... Maybe I should call?'.

And after a few calls in most cases, he was blocked.

But he didn't give up, and he reached out to them on Instagram.

I’m not joking guys! He really didn’t figure out what the problem was.

And the problem was the product and the information that he delivered, not a communication channel.

Do you think people do differently in business?

They are doing exactly the same things.

That is why our team prepared a downloadable file with the map where you can figure out how to scale a digital marketing agency and transform it into a tech startup.

What sales technique do you need to use, and how to target high-paying customers?

It is actually our way in Apiway.

We started as a marketing agency and after that transformed our agency into a tech start-up, and you can learn more about it and replicate this path much faster than we did.

So, If you are interested in scaling your digital marketing agency follow the link below, download the file, and explore this map.

→ → → 5-Level Digital marketing career path ← ← ←

Another interesting thing that people don't understand, and I think it is very important is that the psychology part has not changed for centuries, but the technology part is changing very quickly.

The sales triggers that converted people 2000 years ago are the same nowadays.

But the technology of delivering information completely changed.

2000 years ago people used only word-of-mouth technology.

It was the only way to transfer information, you could tell someone something and that is all.

After that people learned how to crypt and decrypt information using alphabets and books.

What actually the book is?

It is encrypted information that you can transmit at a distance and time.

Imagine the ancient Rome time and you need to say something to your military general that performing let’s say in Germany or in Britain.

The only way you can use is to write a text.

The text format was absolutely dominating for 2000 years but the industrial revolution came and humanity got the radio and cinema.

It means that you could transmit information for thousands of miles in one moment.

Movies allowed us to create virtual pictures. This is another level of the Matrix.

In the movie, you can live in the other universe.

In the 1970s the era of mass television came, and now we live in this post-TV era, where every person can have:

His own TV channel like YouTube, or radio like an Apple podcast, or have their own newspaper like a blog on the website, Facebook, or Instagram.

But the crucial thing is that the content in books and newspapers is not so different from blogs.

Content in a theater is not so different from movies.

2000 years ago people watched gladiator fights in Colisum, eat bread, and drank wine.

What are people doing now?

They're watching John Wick in the cinema, drinking Coca-Cola, and eating popcorn.

TV is also not so different from YouTube, you know.

Let's compare old-school TV shows with some standups for example.

So, it means that in general the information is the same and didn't change for hundreds of years but the technology of delivering this information into the human mind changes very quickly.

Every 10 years we get a new platform for delivering information.

In the 1970s it was television, in the 1990s it was cell phones, in the 2000s it was Web sites, after Web sites it was Facebook, Instagram, and now GPT chat.

Technology is changing very quickly.

Another important conclusion I made about marketing is that every day people get up and ask themselves these questions:

- How do I need to live?

- Why should I clean my teeth twice a day?

- Why not one or three?

- Why should I eat popcorn when I'm watching a movie?

- Why Coca-Cola is the best drink for a Christmas party?

There are a lot of stereotypes and you do it automatically without thinking.

The question “How to live” is what people asked at all times.

Before the 20th century, the answer to this question was given by religion and the government.

If you read the Bible or other Holy books you will note that these books are the instructions for people on how they need to live, and these instructions are moral standards.

Reading the Bible you can figure out 'What is good and what is bad?'.

And you can rely on these moral standards, but in the 20th century, all changed.

The main shift in society happened because big corporations started telling you how to live your life.

Let's say, Coco Chanel told all women 'Why do you wear only dresses? Women can wear Trousers and it's normal.'

She said 'Moreover. It's not just normal. It's f*cking cool!'

And all women said: 'Damn, why didn't I think of that? Really? Was that an option?'.

Or, let's say 'Don't rent a hotel room. Stay in someone's place using Airbnb'.

'You don't have accounts on social networks. Are you crazy?'.

'You don’t like our agenda? Hmmm... Something wrong with you...'.

The government and religion help you to understand what you need to do in general.

But brands tell you what you need to do exactly in a niche where brands perform.

Imagine that your brain is like a rack with boxes, and every box is some category in your life that you are interested in.

For example car box. Imagine that in this box you can find rules about how you should think in this particular niche.

Let's say you like Marseds Benz. And in your car box category, you have information that Mercedes is the only worth car in the world.

Because it is the status thing and all successful people have a Mercedes and you can’t be a really successful person without Mercedes.

And your friend also has the same box but in his box, he has instructions that Tesla is the best solution because it is so cool, green energy, blah, blah, blah.

For all product categories, you have the box and brands are fighting to be in the first place in this box in your mind.

The best products create their own category. For example Jacuzzi. It is the name of the company. Or Xerox. or Pampers.

These categories of goods are named by the companies that invented these products.

The entrepreneurs create new boxes, new categories, and unique products

Marketers try to put your brand in the box and put your competitor out of this box.

You should understand that all battles are going on in the consumer's head.

And your goal as a marketer is to use the information and different delivery channels, I mean technology to change people's behavior as you need as a seller.

The first thing is that Marketing is the technology for changing human behavior after consuming information and the main purpose of marketing is to change human behavior and turn this behavior into the actions that you need as a seller.

The second thing is that marketing is based on two pillars. Psychological part and technological part.

The psychological part is the information that changes human’s behavior and the technological part is how you deliver information into the human’s mind.

The third thing is that the phycological part is not changed for centuries.

But the technological part changing very quickly.

And the final thing is that brands tell people how they need to live and try to get first place in a brand’s category box.