To Get New Marketing, Gotta have the Right Stuff

I was reading a Seth Godin blog entry today about his new book, Meatball Sundae. This entry was about organizations new obsession with Web 2.0 and Social Media Marketing. One thing he said hit home:

They [company's efforts] fail because the Web and the New Marketing work only when applied to the right organization. New Media makes a promise to the consumer. If the organization is unable to keep that promise, then it fails.

I see that a lot in organizations today. They think that all they have to do is market in the right way and the sales will come. Guess what? Web 2.0 and SMM are all about the end user taking back the power. You will soon no longer be able to have all the money in the world and a bad product, and expect to do well.

As a speaker I once heard said, we have circled back to the origins of communication. We started as people just telling stories to each other, making recommendations. Then marketing came into play and people lost that power, it was the media that told us everything. Now we are back to informing each other by stories. The power is back in the hands of consumers, and they will not buy if you don’t appease them with a good product.