The process of bringing a product to market is called product marketing. Simple enough, correct? To be sure, no. Individuals are demanding, competition is severe, and markets are saturated. Even the most successful brands must work at this.

New Coke was not only a commercial blunder; it sparked demonstrations.

However, the best way to learn is to observe the best—both excellent and poor. Thus, in today’s post, we’ll walk through:

• Six product marketing examples from leading brands such as Apple, 3M, and Clairol.
• Why they worked (or didn’t work).
• Consider the following takeaways for your own product marketing approach.

Let us begin.

Examples of product marketing: The advantageous

You do not need to be a large brand with a large budget to use the lessons and takeaways from these excellent product marketing examples. Continue reading to be inspired!

1. Apple’s Mac versus. PC advertising campaign

You cannot have a conversation about product marketing without addressing Apple. Specifically, its Effie Award-winning Mac vs. PC ad campaign, in which PC (the suit-and-tie-wearing office guy) is perpetually lagging behind Mac (the cool, hipster guy).

There are 66 distinct (and very amusing) iterations of the advertisement, but each video emphasises the same features: iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, and ease of use. Apple was unmistakably communicating to those looking for a computer capable of supporting personal and artistic requirements.

The takeaway: Instead of simply selling your value proposition, express what matters to your audience. Even a brand as large as Apple tailors its messaging to the personas it is targeting in each campaign.

2. SoFi: Don’t sell a product; sell an emotional connection

Numerous product marketers fall prey to the “product, not the experience” problem. Nobody wants your wares. Nobody desires any product. They are looking for a resolution to their situation. They desire to be released. Excited. Confident. Securing. Securing.

By focusing exclusively on the benefits, features, and facts, you activate only two parts of the brain—the ones that decode words into meaning. Include emotive language and imagery, and the game changes.

Consider SoFi. Is the advertisement below selling personal loans? Nope. It’s about prioritising sentiments of empowerment (“throw out superfluous expenses”) and dance-worthy excitement over financial savings.

The takeaway: Emotional marketing does not always have to entail tear-jerking Subaru tales. Simply utilise engaging language and evocative imagery to convey the feelings your buyer would have as a result of your goods.

3. Schlitz: Inform them about the manufacturing process

Schlitz Brewery in Milwaukee was struggling in the early 1900s. It was ranked eighth among American breweries and faced bleak development prospects. At the time, every brewer screamed about their beer’s “purity,” yet without a definition of “pure,” no brewer could top the other.

They eventually hired Claude Hopkins (who is now regarded as one of the founding fathers of modern advertising) and he requested a tour of the brewery. After viewing plate-glass chambers with beer dripping through pipes, twice-daily cleaned pumps, four-time sterilised bottles, and 4,000-foot-deep artesian wells, he had just one question: “Why in the hell don’t you tell your market you do this?”

It was because every brewer followed this protocol, but Hopkins strongly advised Schlitz to publicise these stories because no other brewer did, and these would help consumers understand what “pure” meant.

As a result, Hopkins created the following advertisements:

They jumped from tenth to first place in the American beer market in just a few months.

The takeaway: Don’t just write product descriptions; create actual stories about your potential consumers that include them, take them behind the scenes, and trigger emotions.

4. Nike: Do what your rivals will not.

When Nike attempted to enter the casual shoe market in the 1970s and 1980s, it trailed behind Reebok.

It then employed a hitherto unknown, and sometimes mocked, marketing strategy: celebrity endorsements. Nike’s initial famous athlete endorsements began in the 1970s with tennis player Ilie Nastase and running great Steve Prefontaine, propelling the company to a $270 million sales level. By 1990, after acquiring Michael Jordan, the company’s revenue had increased to $2.2 billion. Today, Reebok is around one-quarter the size of Nike.

The takeaway: Experiment with something new. Even if it’s something obscure or unpopular. You never know when you’re going to strike gold and rocket beyond your rivals.

5. National Dairy Board: Promote your products to your current customers

Pepsi and Coke dominated the beverage market in the early 1990s, spending more than $100 million on advertising just one of their kinds. Simultaneously, boring old milk consumption was declining in California, which was bad news for dairy farmers.

The National Dairy Board and the California Advisory Board were forced to experiment with their meagre $23 million advertising budget. The hired advertising agency Goodby, Silverstein and Partners (GS&P) reasoned that advertising to milk drinkers, rather than non-drinkers, might be the answer. They discovered through focus groups that people only drink milk in conjunction with something else. Additionally, they never consider it until they run out.

As a result, the first “Got Milk?” commercial was created:

By 1994, national milk sales had risen from a fall to a 7% increase in California. And, despite the fact that it was designed for California residents alone, it became a cultural phenomenon. The campaign won three Gold Clio Awards and continues to be one of the finest marketing campaigns of all time.

The takeaway: You do not have to expand your audience in order to improve product sales. You may sway the market by increasing demand among your most devoted supporters.

6. The Four-Hour Workweek: Make a commitment you can keep

Do you recall the Ab Rocket? Are you familiar with the Rock-N-Go exerciser? Alternatively, any of the other ab rockers out there? Consumer Reports identified these goods, which ranged in price from $100 to $200, as being equivalent to or less effective than no-equipment ab workouts in 2009.

Making a promise you can’t keep means you’ll survive only until your market realises, and with internet reviews as powerful as they are, this won’t take long. You are not required to keep your exact promise; all that is required is that you give value.

For instance, Tim Ferris’ “4-Hour Work Week” appears implausible. However, the book’s content does not reduce your workweek to four hours. However, it does provide a strategy for “escape from the 9-5 workweek, living anywhere, and becoming a member of the new affluent.”

The takeaway: Product marketers must make promises in order to entice customers to try new things. However, if your pledge is false, you will find yourself in hot water.