How to Get People Excited About Your Product (Hot Button Marketing)

In the years I've been writing columns about strategic marketing, I've seen a great many products come and go. I'm thrilled that many of the products I saw over a decade ago are still out there. But I'm disheartened when a product leaves the marketplace, never to be seen again, or relegated to Joe's Pushcart discount stores.
It happens because marketers are selling through the intellect, while consumers are buying from the heart.
The old fighter Rocky Marciano once said, "hit the heart and the head will follow." It works like that in the grocery business tooWin the hearts of consumers and the mind will follow. I spend a great deal of time watching how people buy things in the supermarket. They'll pick a product up, put it down and compare prices. They get enormously frustrated. Then, they see a product that breaks all of the marketing rules. It stands out -- even at a higher price. The product connects with the consumer the moment she sees it in the case. This product has achieved Share of Heart.
Share of Heart is the emotional connection you make with the consumer at the moment she sees your product. Win the hearts of consumers and the minds will follow.
New product success starts with the consumers heart, not the mind. Of course, your product has to perform. But the supreme challenge is not only to build a better product, but to build a product that speaks to the consumer on a personal, emotional gut level.
Lunchables won a war of the hearts with a product that should fail by most standards. It's overpackaged, contains junk food snacks and oversugared fake juice. But it inspired a whole new category. So why should it succeed in a society that allegedly hates packaging, pollution and empty calories?
Because sending Lunchables with a kid for lunch makes the mom feel happy. She can smile at the package and rationalize the lunch by seeing on the package, "only two grams of fat." She feels like she's being a good mother. A purchased product is a manifestation of how consumers want to feel about themselves. How they want others to see and react to them.
You won't find much emotion in a phone book or in an almanac or in most supermarket aisles. It's up to today's grocery marketer to create the emotional hook. It should be in everything you say and do. Not just in advertising, but in the product itself -- even in the directions on the box.
It's up to the marketer to make everything about the product contribute to a positive self-concept.
There is no such thing as a parity product, just as there is no such thing as a low-interest consumer category. These are just products that haven't found their Share of Heart. Even something as mundane as frozen hamburgers can be exciting when we add an emotional cue. Look at the job White Castle hamburgers has done. Once considered just fast food, it has picked up nationwide cult status
When you fulfill an emotional need in a way that no one else has, you have won Share of Heart. And your product is going to leap off the shelf.

There are two reasons people buy products:

The Logical Reason -- it seems to make sense

The Real Reason -- the personality and image of the product meet human needs with emotionally satisfying benefits, even though the product itself may not seem to make a whole lot of sense.

It's called "Share of Heart". Share of Heart is the emotional link your product shares with a prospective consumer. Share of Heart is the single most important aspect of creative marketing --as important as the Big Idea -- or the big sales pitch.

We're going to be talking about it all in this blog.

Stay awhile -- here, or on my website, productdoctor.com, aka barryfeig.com (same guy).

E-mail me at feig@barryfeig.com with your marketing questions or go to the website to request my FREE E-BOOK, The New Product Workshop, Hands on Tools for Developing Winners. It was originally published by McGraw-Hill. On the site, click on Articles and Insider Tips. Lot's of FREE information there.

You can also check out my book, Hot Button Marketing, at Amazon.com (plug)

I'd also be delighted to post your contributions to the crazy world of marketing and selling.