Bob Parsons, the enormously successful entrepreneur who started Go Daddy (http://www.GoDaddy.com), and built it into one of the world's best known domain search and registration registration services, is truly a marketing genius -- a hybrid between Bob Guccione (the esteemed publisher of anatomically-focused 'art' magazines) -- and the guy who invented the legendary Pez dispenser years before the horrific accident that occasioned my birth. [As an aside, when I was studying Economics as an undergraduate, I felt a particular but unexplainable affinity for the 'trickle down' theory of macroeconomics - fascinating!].
Very few products or services are as distinctly uninteresting as domain registry and website hosting. Yet, these uninteresting things are necessities. The marketing issue is one of domination and capture of market share. Simply stated, if we web-trapped, internet-dependent, social media addicted businessfolk simply must have these services, and there are a bunch of competitors each of whom supplies pretty much the same [stifle yawn] thing, analogous to Bounty versus Brawny paper towels, which provider will I choose?
If pricing and service are pretty much the same at whichever vendor I bring my business to, I'll be inclined to go to the one with the greatest name recognition. GoDaddy is branded better than any other similar service. Here's why. Bob Parsons:
1) Brings other, more interesting subjects (a carnival of them) into his brand campaigning. Things like: Danica Patrick, and a host of other leather-clad young ladies; an incredibly stupid-looking logo; affiliations with NASCAR, and sporting events; unpolished, shameless 'homemade' business advice and inspirational videos; buying big expensive things and showing them off; going big-game hunting...and more -
2) Plasters the GoDaddy name and logo in every sports arena and public forum, as well as on every uniform, coffee cup, place mat and product placement target where it can legally be displayed -
3) Is an utterly shameless and controversial character in the public eye...the P.T. Barnum effect. He'll do anything to get attention for himself and his brand, and he does not separate one from the other -
4) Constantly campaigns (mass email, social media, self-serving press releases, paid advertising, sponsored ads, domain parking, and the like) with sales offers, product combination discounts, loss leaders, teasers and attention-grabbing previews of various events; and Bob Parsons makes everything into an event -
5) Quickly and quietly vertically integrating every domain-related service into his portfolio of offerings to create a "one-stop" shop. You never, ever have to leave his website to get every service needed from reserving a domain name to running an e-commerce business. In fact, you can't buy one thing on his site without a new 'splash page', pop-up or pop-over ad informing you of other compatible product offerings at a discount -- he has an annoying but unarguably sticky website, wherein he is constantly offering you things, and "making sure that you haven't forgotten some other things that you'll need sooner or later."
Parsons isn't likeable, and doesn't try to be. He just wants your attention, and he wants to keep it for as long as he possibly can. He courts controversy, craves control of an entire industry, doesn't care what anyone thinks.
If you are a Mad Marketing Guru [at http://MadMarketingTactics.blogspot.com], you'll bear this in mind: Do whatever it takes to get as much attention as possible for you and for your brand. Be fearless. Beta test in public places. The idea is to rush into the market with the most excitement and the minimum viable product, and fix it up once you've gotten some momentum and some money.
This is not what they taught us in school.
Poke first, Polish later.
Douglas E Castle [http://aboutDouglasCastle.blogspot.com]
http://SendingSignals.blogspot.com
http://Links4LifeAlerts.com
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