5 Questions With Marketing Expert Dr Lachezar Ivanov
Recently, we sat down with Dr Lachezar Ivanov to ask him some important questions about marketing myths and what marketers should focus on to get the best results.
1. What are the top marketing myths many professionals fall for?
“You’d be surprised how many people have never heard of the Cybertruck. I know for us online people, people watching this video, you’re like how could anyone have not heard of the Tesla Cybertruck? But you’d be shocked.”
Marketing myths surround us from all sides and threaten the existence of our brands.
We can spend days detailing all the little marketing lies we tell others and ourselves. So, it’s worth focusing on the most deadly marketing myths.
First, neglecting top-of-the-funnel marketing communications reigns supreme in the list of dangerous myths.
Put simply, many brands do not invest in brand building. "If you build it, they will come" is what many marketers wrongly believe.
This thinking has two outcomes: poor market share growth (or even decline) and weak profit margins. Let the world know if you have a product that solves a problem and can get it to consumers.
Here’s an improved recipe: “If you build it and advertise it, they will come”.
(See Coca-Cola as an example of how strong brands do it – increasing sales volume while increasing (!) prices.)
The second deadliest marketing myth is that price promotions are effective at attracting new consumers. It’s easy to see why inexperienced marketers default to promotions—they have an immediate positive effect on sales.
Promotions indeed belong to the arsenal of the educated marketer but should be used for the right reasons.
We know that price promotions fail to bring new consumers (without advertising), have a temporary effect on sales, can cannibalise future sales, and can lower the reference price.
2. Why do we believe in so many myths?
Because a great deal of what marketers do is based on anecdotes and intuition. There is a better way – evidence-based knowledge.
Let’s zoom in on the intuition part and take a practical example – media consumption patterns. It’s not uncommon for marketers to look at their own behaviour and infer how the general public behaves.
Ask marketers what percentage of the UK public claims to have used TikTok in the last three months, and they will tell you 35%. In reality, this number is 17% (half of what was predicted), a study found.
Such discrepancies can cause problems.
Before you trust gurus or your intuition, check the evidence.
(No, Seth Godin, Gary Vee, and Prof G, TV is not dead.)
3. How do you think AI will impact the role of marketers?
AI is a resource, or, as economists put it, an input factor of production. It’s early to declare which tools marketers use will benefit the most from AI as a resource.
We will see once the AI hype passes.
One area marketers and consumers can be stoked about is brand campaigns. In the right hands, AI tools for video creation can usher in a new era of brand advertising.
“Throughout the years, we have had so many wild ideas for commercials that we couldn’t realise because it would have been too expensive,” the advertising agency folks tell me.
Imagine turning on your TV to watch broadcast TV or YouTube, and every commercial is a marvel of creativity.
Exciting stuff, right?
4. What are some examples of companies that do great, effective marketing?
Let’s first distinguish between effectiveness and efficiency in marketing.
Effectiveness is about the scale of the effect. Looking at the top of the funnel, you can see reach—how many consumers you reach in total.
Efficiency is about what you achieve per unit of investment—a thousand views for $15.
Having defined the terms, let’s discuss Temu, the online marketplace that made headlines this year with its soaring ad spend.
In 2023, according to JPMorgan analysts, Temu spent $1.7 billion on marketing.
What stands out in their comms mix?
Temu spends both on the top and bottom of the funnel. They do TV (including the Super Bowl), social media, and paid search. The results?
It took Temu a year to reach 51 million U.S. monthly active users. Temu is gaining on Amazon, which spent decades building its user base.
Advertising increases market share. Shocking, right?
5. What are the best books someone interested in learning about marketing fundamentals should read?
There’s only a handful of books worth recommending.
You can start with Eat Your Greens: Fact-based Thinking To Improve Your Brand’s Health, a collection of essays.
Check the contributions from Shann Biglione, Peter Field, Ryan Wallman, Tess Alps, Paul Feldwick, Bob Hoffman, and Eaon Pritchard. Then, look for books by the same authors.
Don’t drink coffee while reading these authors; they are funny, and you might spill it.
Our Marketing: Master the Fundamental Principles of Marketing course, featuring Dr. Lachezar and other industry experts, is coming soon.
Click here to pre-register and find out more information.
