What No Celebrity Marketers?

Smarting at the lack of ‘celebrity marketers’ – here’s 2 we can adopt as our own.

 

OK – let’s be honest, marketers have not quite joined the ranks of celebrity chefs, interior designers, antiques valuers and other ‘experts’ that have carved out a niche on our television screens. Philip Kotler and perhaps Seth Godin are the closest we get but there’s a large swathe of our own fraternity that haven’t even heard of them (hence links supplied…).

 

However, there are 2 established experts in other fields who would qualify as ‘celebrity marketers’ who I’d encourage you to watch if you don’t already – Gordon Ramsey and Mary Portas.

 

Unwinding in front of More4 after a long day’s work, I’ve often been hynotised into a later bedtime then planned by the marketing nous Ramsey displays on “Kitchen Nightmares”.

 

I’m not a fan of the guy’s confrontational style, but his approach is always marketing-led. Understand the demographics and competitive offering in the locality and identify the gaps, combine that with the (sometimes hard to spot) strengths of the hapless restauranteur and you have a marketing strategy that gives them the best chance of success.

 

Mary “Queen of Shops” Portas is the same. She segments us all into fashion tribes, takes her time to understand what “tribes” are most prevalent in the troubled shop’s locality and then ‘tailors’ the shops offering to the most appropriate of them.

 

Gordon Ramsay Celebrity Marketer?

Gordon Ramsay - Celebrity Marketer?

Both have a deep understanding of their trade – be it Portas’s grasp of merchandising or Ramsey’s grasp of the commercial side of the restaurant business – but beneath that veneer of fashion and food lie the hearts of true marketers.

 

So rather than smarting at the lack of recognition the media gives to those of our craft, let’s adopt these 2 as our own and start looking down at those other professions (celebrity accountant anyone?) who have no entertainment value to exploit.