...tao of marketing and other thoughts

Filed under: Axosoft, Marketing, Imported

"Geek Marketing Should be Like a Good Lover"
- Kathy Sierra, Creating Passionate Users

"Marketing is a conversation, but most people don't speak geek."
- John Dodds, Make Marketing History

The world's most famous geek marketer, Seth Godin, recommends Geek Mafia for weekend reading to his blog readers. On weekdays, he passionately argues that everyone in an organization, including the geeks building the product, need to be marketers.

Eric Sink, geek entrepreneur, has written extensively about marketing for geeks. He says, "...most geeks tend to shy away from marketing, citing their lack of creativity and graphic design skills. But these are typically not the differentiators which determine whether marketing is competent or not."

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So what about the conventional wisdom that states, (if not explicitly, then implicitly) that geeks need to stay out of marketing? Personally, I think that qualifies as an old wives tale, often perpetuated by geeks who'd rather be playing World of Warcraft than participating in a marketing brainstorm. There are just too many examples to disprove the assertion.

All you have to do is look at any successful ISV founded and run by a geek, and chances are you'll find some brilliant marketing decisions behind the success of the company. There are plenty of examples of geek-run companies that lost their souls (and sales) when they were taken over by purely fluff-marketing driven CEOs implanted by short-sighted VCs.

Obviously, the word "Geek" conjures up different images for different people. At Axosoft, a development-driven company, it's a term of endearment that refers to an intense focus, creativity, and imagination without regard (necessarily) for the status quo. At a suit-and-tie fortune 500 corporate office, it might mean "the nerds in IT who dress dumb (but probably make more money than me, dammit)" or "the dorks in that department we should outsource to Bangalore..."

It's in the spirit of the Axosoft definition that we are launching The Geek Marketing Contest.

I Should Enter this Contest If...

If any of the following statements is true, you should really consider spending a minute or two on submitting your great geek marketing idea(s), you've got an excellent chance of winning $5,000 from a blog comment!

• I double checked to make sure 1001110001000 equals 5,000 in the promotional image
  
• Weird Al Yankovic is my favorite musical artist, and White & Nerdy is my personal anthem
• I'm thinking about what angle to take when I blog about this
• I'm reading this after 2 a.m.
• I like Picard better than Kirk
• I like Kirk better than Picard
• I can't decide if I like Kirk or Picard better
• IMO the biggest philosophical question of the day is whether or not Google is the new "God"
• I know what LOL, ROTFLMAO, DQMOT, RTFM stand for
• I met my significant other on Second Life

...and if all of the above statements are true, what are you waiting for? You're probably over-qualified to solve this problem: what's the best way to sell bug tracking / project management / help desk software to geeks? Just think of the screaming quad core dual processor with accompanying 30" LCD you can throw $1001110001000 (base 2, that is — $1388 HEX, if you prefer) at!

Geek Marketing Makes Sense

Guy Kawasaki once said, "I would bet that approximately twenty-five people help Steve [Jobs] with his keynotes including product managers, VPs, PR flacks, IT geeks, and CEOs of partners and vendors." Even marketing extravaganza's like a Steve Jobs keynote aren't complete without geeky input.

For me, the M.C. Escher piece above ("Drawing Hands," 1948) evokes a sense of emergence, balance and harmony.  Along those lines, there's a similar sense of rightness I get about this contest.  I'm excited to enlist ideas from the tens of thousands of OnTime users and other smart people all over the world. Axosoft's marketing style strives to be like a transparent discussion between intelligent people with mutual respect for each other.  Please accept our invitation to join in with your perspective, and, just so you know, we're not afraid of the edges.

May the force be with you.  Engage!