Brand vs Product Marketing

The big difference between brand and product marketing is clear in the names. For the former, a company is marketing itself, above and beyond, its particular products. For example, I used to work for a large Pacific NW law firm. Its marketing strategies were very brand oriented. It wanted to create awareness and a good reputation within the community. Few, if any, of its clients would simply see an ad in Portland Business Journal and call to hire an attorney. Publishing ads, as well as planning events and marketing in the community, helped the company to create awareness that translated into potential clients doing research and deciding whether to hire the firm’s attorneys.

Product marketing is the promotion of a product above and beyond the brand it comes from. Nike might market a newly developed running shoe. The commercials will focus on that shoe, and all its benefits and promises. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that the shoe is coming from a well-respected and successful company. But the campaign would not focus on Nike as a company, but rather that particular new shoe.

Book publishers, for the most part, rely on product marketing. This is especially true of larger companies that have been around for a long time. Most consumers, though they will likely recognize the Penguin brand for example, will not buy a book they are not interested in just because it is from Penguin. So publishers must promote individual titles, in order to find the audiences that are interested in the particular subject or theme of those titles.

This is a little different for companies that publish for a very specific niche market. It is important for a brand like Timber Press to do some brand marketing, so that readers who are looking for horticulture books know that Timber is a company that can be trusted to produce a good product. If I want a book on tulips, I know that Timber might be a good place to look. But such publishers must focus their marketing plans on particular titles as well. They would want to make consumers aware that there is a new book on tulips, and simply putting out an ad for the press will not be an effective way to do this.

Overall, I’d say that brand marketing, while important for some publishers, is certainly not as effective in selling individual titles as product marketing.