Seth Godin - All Marketers are Liars - Did he mean - All Marketers are Cheats as well?

Start with the consumer. Isn't that the basis of good marketing. Give them what they really want  and need, not what they don't.

Trouble is, too many brands start with a product that people don't really want. And the way to flog that is to lie.

Problem is: just how many people know what they want? How many people really do want what they buy and do we really have to have anything more than what we need?

Marketing is always going to be a lying, cheating, deceiving process these days.

Gosh, i can be so naive and negative sometimes.

hehe

"So inevitably lies form the basis of many campaigns."

- I'm a music producer, so I'm only ever involved in post' & am pretty ignorant of the process of pre' & production and of putting the actual basis of the campaign together.

Do you really have to lie ? (referring to the propaganda thread) - propaganda is rarely lyeing - more taking certain elements of the truth and representing them in the best possible light (for your purposes)

I think representing the truth in the best possible light - still is within the circle of Fair game (morally speaking)

Isnt it dangerous, both legally and from the POV of consumer perception of the brand/product to actually lie ?

Can we name n shame any campaigns that have actually been build on Lies ?

(common sense would dictate, that such shaky campaigns must be few & far between)

There will always be an element of lying, but brand managers consider their response to allegations of lying, prior to releasing the message. So even if you could prove they lied, you'd be hard pushed to make a real case. Its a very grey area.

I am sure if you were to select a campaign at random and analysed it long enough, you'd find some case for them lying.

Steve,

I think you are taking the title of Seth's book a bit too literally. It's been awhile since I read it, but the title, "All Marketers are Liars" also has a subtitle - The Power of Telling Authentic Stories in a Low-Trust World. Seth is using a compelling and provacative title to grab our attention. But what the book is really about is telling stories, not lies. Wrap your product in a compelling story that consumers want to believe in and they will buy your product. That's an oversimplificaiton, but the general gist.

Most of us don't work with brands that people REALLY need, we work on brands that (we hope) people want. Unless you are selling purified drinking water in Africa or life-saving medication, you need to tell a story to make the emotional connection and rise above the competition.

Check out Seth's website: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/ and I think you'll get a better idea of what he's about.

Check out my blog: http://eyecube.wordpress.com/dinu/ where I talk about Deeply Immersive Narrative Universes, which I believe brands should strive to create to make emotional connections with consumers.

Hi Rick,

Having worked as an exec for video games publishers, i know exactly what you mean about deeply immersive content. In fact i spent the last 10 years making the stuff.

But i am much more interested now in giving users tools to develop their own games. There is something dishonest about playing other peoples games. So in a way, virtual worlds fit into the category of devices that immerse kids in false and largely unconstructive places. Places that have been designed by others.

Children should be allowed to construct their own places and games and not be at the behest of games designer. Todays games paradigm is flawed and will be surpassed by designers who are willing to offer their expertise, in the form of tools - and not spend their time designing universes that lure and capture immature minds in as i say, largely unconstructive places.

I understand your point about Seth Godin. All i can say is that if he has been miscontrued, then he should not publish a message that says "All marketers are liars".

Other provocateurs might just take his mistake as an opportunity to bend the truth - still further -than he does. Then where would we be?

Steve, We'll put aside the Godin argument for a moment as it seems to be more about presentation now than content. Reagarding games, and content in general for that matter, I hear you and agree that moving forward giving consumers a large voice in content creation is the way to go. What gets me excited now are when creators/developers/producers incorporate content that originated with fans. For example, a Star Wars fan group called the 501st Legion create their own Star Wars costumes. They did such an amazing job that the 501st became part of the actual Star Wars canon. Or, in another area all together, Jones Soda uses consumers pictures on their bottles.

I'd love to see a world where fans can create their own Grand Theft Auto Characters for a MMORPG, and the best ones become part of the GTA V. The brand winners of the future will make content WITH their fans, not just FOR their fans.

"I'd love to see a world where fans can create their own Grand Theft Auto Characters for a MMORPG, and the best ones become part of the GTA V. The brand winners of the future will make content WITH their fans, not just FOR their fans."

I think Valve are hot on that tip. Some of the orange box came form the modding scene, right ? 

Yes, but it is a myth that you need a games industry to produce great games. There are some fantastic technologies out there already which integrated effectively would produce amazingly low-cost, high-retension "user content driven" online games. Its really just a matter of packaging the technology. This is of course - complete heresy!!! 

 http://www.brandrepublic.com/forums/showthread/9d060cdb-1880-4e1d-9312-e1caec86f633/d14639ff-c5cd-4960-9ebd-10f0ba7ec5ee