Marketing and Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

It is interesting to think about how Maslow's hierarchy of needs relates to marketing.
At it's base are basic needs -  food, water, shelter and clothing.  Depending on your product or service, you could aim to market right for that area.

Buy my food!   You need to eat, after all!
 Buy this top!  You can't be naked!

These are crude examples but they aren't necessarily wrong. They also don't do a good job of selling the audience on why their hard earned money should be spent on YOUR food or YOUR shirt, rather than the next persons. A Savvy marketer would have to work on that.

Above the very basic needs are safety and security.   You can have enough to eat and a place to sleep but that isn't as sustainable without some measure of safety.  Knowing that you are going to be attacked for your bread helps you to rest easier at night and stay healthier.
That can be another area to narrow down your marketing. 
Buy this top -  it will keep you warm, dry and visible out in the woods.  
Now you are aiming for a more targeted audience.

Now the pyramid gets into the psychological needs  like belonging, friendships, love and esteem.
One can get by feeling alone, unloved or like they don't have anything to offer, but that is no quality of life.  It's a mentally dangerous area.
This leads to some marketing that is in effect saying:

Buy this product or experience!  
All the cool kids are doing it and you want to be a cool kid too, right?

 It's a version of capitalizing on peer pressure.  It's also known as "keeping up with the Jones'".  You want to feel as if your purchase was a smart purchase and a good use of time and your resources. 

The top of the pyramid is for self actualization and self fulfillment.  Many companies are advertising to people who should buy their product or experience in the name of self care. 

 No one will love you and take care of you like you can.  
Take time for self care, because you are worthy and worthwhile. 
Are you living your best life?   You will be, if you have my product in your life.

This type of marketing does make me think about things in my own life.  Like, am I living my best life? Then I look at the product and wonder, would it enhance anything or improve in an area that is lacking?   Most times I realize the answer is no, it wouldn't.  Collecting more things isn't going to help me and might actually contribute to stress from over spending or wondering why I have so much clutter.  

The Hierarchy of needs does not particularly include room for clutter or stuff or objects.  We don't need as much as we think we do to be happy and fulfilled.  It then takes some smart and deliberate marketing to convince us otherwise.

An Experience as a Business

I don't think that this is a new idea.  People have been paying for things like a murder-mystery dinner for a while now.   There are a few companies that offer "tipsy painting" which involves drinking and painting canvases. The idea is that social, in that these are group events and also an experience.
Anyone can drink and paint but a lot of people think they don't have the ability and enjoy the help of a teacher saying how to turn a blob of blue paint into an ocean.

A company I recently discovered, 1818 Farms, has turned buying flowers, into an experience.
1818 Blog
They grow their own flowers, then cut them, and drive them to locations to sell. Sometimes they offer bouquet making classes.  This is something that might seem unnecessary, as one can go into most any grocery store and buy flowers or pre-arranged bouquets but this offers a lot more customization and personalizing. They also emphasize a "seed to vase" initiative.  It brings an awareness to the fact that living plants come from the ground and are real things.

People can have a feeling of back to nature without having to dedicate the time and resources to growing their own acres of flowers.
This brings me to the idea of having a mobile farmers market.  People are loving the idea of choosing fresh, organic fruits and vegetables but getting to the farmers market isn't always convenient. Bringing the food to the people seems like a next logical step in a "farm to table" movement.  Personally, as I rather enjoy growing flowers, too, I love the idea of offering both fruits, veggies and flowers, to round out the experience and shopping.
It would be changing, depending on what is ripe and in season, so people would want to come back, again and again, for the freshest of what is in season.

Online Surveys

Online surveys are something that has become a business of its own.   You can get paid now, just to give your opinions.   Many companies offer a chance to win a gift card or even receive a coupon to use at their business. I've started seeing an increase in one question surveys on Instagram asking simply, which do you like more - A or B and you can see what the population and target audience/followers are interested in.
There are a couple companies out there that specailize in online surveys Zoomerang and SurveyMonkey.  I've worked a couple places now that have used SurveyMonkey for work related questions. It seems quick and easy to get going with them, as well as free.

Zoomerang offers a tutorial video on how to create better survey questions. The first one is "clearly define the purpose of the survey" or in other words, "what are you trying to find out".  If you don't know what you're looking for, your questions won't be to the point and won't give you the information you're wanting.
Next one is to keep the survey short.  They say this helps actually get people to take the survey and finish.   Have you ever thought you'd kill a minute answering a few questions and then 20 questions in, there is no end in sight?  The quality of answers can go down too. This goes back to the first tip - know what you want to know.  You can drill down quickly and more effectively.
Third and forth are keep the questions simple and close ended.   Close ended questions goes against a lot of what we have been taught in communication with others, but in this case, it is necessary.  The more closely you can get to some for, of "Yes" or "No" answer, the better.  Even a scaled answer, as in, on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being very satisfied, will help get a good result. And don't flip flop what your scale means.  If 5 is always the best, don't change it to 1 being the best, some questions later.   Also, don't change to a scale of 1-4.
Make sure the questions build on each other and flow towards a conclusion.  Don't start by asking "Do you put your shoes on left foot first and then right?" and 2 questions later ask about socks.  Socks go on before shoes, so ask in that order.
The next tips are to pre-test your survey and consider your target audience.  This will help make sure the survey makes sense and will get you the answers you're looking for and not waste anyone's time.
If you have a sausage making company, vegan and vegetarian shoppers are NOT going to help you on your survey.
The last tips are to send several reminders.   I know this has helped me answer surveys.  The first time that I get an invitation,  I might not be in a good place to answer.  I will surely forget but I'll usually be in a better place when I get a reminder.  It also makes me feel like my opinion is really wanted and valuable.
The last tip is one that i already mentioned - offer an incentive.   I know I have answered many surveys to be able to receive a coupon for a free food item at one of my local fast food places.   It doesn't hurt that I tend to be food motivated!

Guerrilla Marketing!

I really enjoy learning about guerrilla marketing.  For one, it makes my inner cheapskate happy and for another, it can really allow you to get creative.

I think it also goes hand in hand with niche marketing. You need to separate yourself from the pack and the best way to do that is to find your niche and the guerrilla the heck out of it!

Guerrilla Marketing Ideas  lists 25 of what they think are the best marketing ideas.   I like this article because it is recent, from July of 2018. It looks at using some of the less know social media sites, like Reddit, as well as really capitalizing on the internet.

         One idea is developing free themes for bloggers or websites. You can then hard code a back-link to your on site and piggy back from a bigger and more popular site or blog.
        Another is using a site like Hootsuite to follow buzzwords and hashtags that are trending and also use them.   You'll then show up in these searches.
       Twitter "leap-frogging" is another great idea.  Let the internet do the hard part for you, by taking advantage of search engines to see what are the trending articles/pages that most closely align with yours and then share your information with them directly. There is more information about that , here from the guy who coined that term.
      Utilizing LinkedIn is another idea.  I feel that this lends a certain legitimacy to your business and can tap into more connections and markets that Facebook and Instagram might pass by.
      The last idea is stickers and decals.  This partially appeals to my inner child but I've seen more and more people turning to a cute or clever sticker to hand out, for free. People love free and it gets them looking and thinking about your brand. Even more, when the stickers or decals are actually placed on a car, backpack or even wall.  It spreads your message further and to unexpected areas.

Being a cusp Millennial

As someone who was born halfway through 1980, I'm sometimes classified as a Gen Xer and sometimes a Millennial.  A new term has been coined for that age group - Xennial - which is for the  and micro-generation between 1977 and 1985.

XENNIALS  

       It seems like this term was first noticed in 2014, to describe this age group.  It is people who grew up in the days of playing outside but are now pretty tech savvy.  We grew up as tech grew up too.  We aren't as negative as Gen X but we aren't as overly optimistic as Millennial's.  It's a good balance.

       Reading this article, about 5 Traits older generations don't understand was pretty interesting, since I feel that I have one foot in each of those worlds.
      The last one was most interesting to me, Tackling Brand New Industries. The person in the article literally grew up to be a video game player and went on to teach others how to make money playing video games!  I can wrap my head around that easily.  That is fantastic for them!  Where my pre-millennialism starts to show is when I start thinking about how to make a very nice living off only having a YouTube Channel.

        How does one start? How much time is spent thinking about content?  How do you know what people want to see?
       Some of the homesteading vlogs I watch are so successful, both adults in the house (because most, if not all, are married with kids) have been able to quit their mundane jobs and vlog full time.
They garden, raise animals, and in some cases, sell their produce/animal product.   All thanks to a new industry, Vlogging.