Marketing, at its core, is about making people want something. It’s about shaping perceptions so that customers actively seek out a product or service. Yet, time and time again, when diving into product research or company data, the first thing people highlight is what’s wrong—the market conditions, the competition, the regulatory challenges, the inclusion concerns. Important discussions, sure. But they don’t sell.
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The job of a marketer is not to dwell on what’s broken; it’s to figure out what’s brilliant. It’s to find the aspects of a brand or product that are so compelling, so impressive, that they demand to be shared with the world. Marketing is, at its best, a craft of optimism.
I’ve said it before when discussing how to identify a product’s USP (Unique Selling Proposition) or the “Big Idea.” Yet, without fail, every new project I start brings the same experience: the sales team, the product team, and the support team all tell me about the problems. It’s like searching for that needle in the haystack, trying to find the thing that makes a product exceptional. It isn’t impossible but it takes a pretty disciplined mind to block out the bad and find the great.
And that’s the real skill: finding the optimism, but not unicorns and rainbow optimism. You need to be aware of what’s less than perfect so you don’t overpromise and disappoint customers. But the focus must remain on what’s great. It’s why the best marketing professionals are relentless in their pursuit of the positive angle. If you can’t find it, you can’t sell it.
Take any great brand—Louis Vuitton, Hermes, Apple, Rolex. Their best marketing doesn’t get into politics, world problems, return rates and other issues. They focus on excitement, innovation, and the promise of something better. Recently it became a thing for some brands to get into activism. If that is the genesis of the brand then ok. If not it is counter productive. In my opinion Nike is one of the latter – they are the epitome of a brand, one buys the brand more than the product (remember they have always been about making a cheap shoe and selling it expensive). Hence the image above, their first “Just do it” ad was just pure optimism.
Marketing is an engine of aspiration. It fuels desire, shifts perception, and drives sales. Without optimism, it’s just noise. That’s why every marketing strategy should start with one question: What makes this product so incredible that people need to know about it? The answer to that question is where the magic happens.
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About me: I’m a fractional CMO for large travel technology companies helping turn them into industry leaders. I’m also the co-founder of 10minutes.news a hotel news media that is unsensational, factual and keeps hoteliers updated on the industry.
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