Marketing’s product disconnect

This newsletter comes from the hosts of The Marketing Architects, a research-first show answering your biggest marketing questions. Find us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts!

This week, we're exploring why product knowledge is crucial for marketing effectiveness with Jaime LaMontagne, CMO of Exact Sciences. Her experience reveals why marketers need to interrogate their products first, then become true cheerleaders. It might even require calling your baby ugly. 

—Elena  

Coca-Cola drives Liquid Death’s annual revenue every 72 hours.             

Despite being a darling of marketing case studies, Liquid Death hopes 2024 will be its first profitable year ever. So why do we think the brand is bigger than it is? It might be marketers’ obsession with promotional tactics over product. 

Product knowledge is the foundation for marketing success.              

Marketing is most powerful when built on deep product understanding. Too often, marketers focus solely on promotion while losing sight of what they're actually selling and why Jaime LaMontagne, CMO of Exact Sciences, shares how to put product knowledge at the center of marketing strategy. 

1. Embrace the customer environment. Time to get your hands dirty. Don't just read about how customers use your product—watch it happen. Stand in store aisles. Shadow service calls. Observe your product in action to get real knowledge of its value and challenges.
   
2. Cross the product-marketing divide. Take opportunities to work in both upstream product development and downstream marketing. Understanding why that widget is blue or that handle is curved makes your marketing sharper, smarter, and more authentic.
   
3. Question everything. Don't just accept product features at face value. Ask why decisions were made, how requirements were determined, and what trade-offs were considered. 
   
4. Stay close to change. Markets shift constantly. What worked last year might not work today. Regularly evaluate if your product still meets customer needs and whether your marketing reflects its current value proposition.
   
5. Connect multiple stakeholders. Great product marketing often means managing different audiences with different needs. Jaime’s team uses a matrix showing how a product's value translates across stakeholder groups, from physicians to patients to hospital administrators.

Listen in on our discussion.

“Liquid Death’s fame shows how badly marketers neglect product”     

Mark Ritson's article in Marketing Week explores how marketers overlook their most fundamental responsibility: truly understanding their product and the value it offers. 

Read the article.

Interrogate your product, then cheer it on.     

“Marketers are expected to be the biggest cheerleader for their products. But I want you first to call your baby ugly. Pick it apart, figure out why the competition's going to say something different. Why is the customer not going to want your product? Do that first, then you can become the biggest cheerleader.” 

— Jaime LaMontagne, CMO of Exact Sciences