Creating Passionate Users: You ARE a marketer. Deal with it.

Neo-marketing, indeed. Kathy Sierra's post and ensuing discussion point out a lot of issues I have been grappling with in the past 5 years since I was anointed Marketing Manager.

You see, prior to that, I was a writer and just before that a molecular biologist. Yes, quite odd.

Nonetheless, I have been able to kick some serious butt, getting folks excited about the products I was marketing, succeeding in spreading good will and positive energy, and in avoiding the regular pitfalls of standard Marcoms.

Why is that? I had no training in marketing principles or techniques. I had no clue on how to create a PowerPoint presentation or what Value Proposition meant. I  never did a SWOT analysis or written up some USPs. Basically, I was less trained than a trainee. How did I do it?

Common sense. Honesty. Kindness. Trust. And a gut feeling as to how people really want to participate in the creation of a brand, the creation of a community around a product, in how they wanted to be respected for their opinions and not force-fed some rose-colored product-promise krap.

Sure, along the way I read some books   and listened to some bright folks. But most of these just reinforced my beliefs into what makes good marketing PR outreach cheerleading evangelism oh, you know what I mean, What I Did.

In the end, I was doing a concoction of public relations, media relations, consumer outreach, strategic and collaborative business development, clever sponsoring of companies and events, and participating in the give and take of the community conversation (and all with way less money than the rest of the company). When I look back and see how these functions are so deeply separated in most companies, I can see why Marketing, Comms, and PR get a bum rap. It's a half-assed, non-integrated, incomplete interaction with customers.

Enough of me. Go read the post and discussions.

Link, by way of our Chris Bouret: Creating Passionate Users: You ARE a marketer. Deal with it..

But the difference between what we now consider "old-school marketing" (otherwise known as The Four P's -- product, price, promotion, and placement -- heavy on advertising and "branding") and the "neo-marketing" we're doing here is frickin' huge.

And don't miss the rest of the blog - three braniacs write it and have some great posts on other topics.