Building Brandwidth: Closing the Sale Online

The purpose of marketing is to sell productD""'selling stuff is what sells stuff'""Dand that doesn't change if you are in a traditional company or a dot-com, reminds Zyman (The End of Marketing As We Know It), a former chief marketing officer at Coca-Cola who now runs a consulting company he founded with Miller. What Zyman preachesDwith gusto and solid advice based on long experienceDis going back to the basics of building a brand. Readers should not dismiss his revved-up, disarmingly hip tone (aimed at dot-com entrepreneurs under 35); his book is solid gold. The five key elements of building ""brandwidth"" (and, therefore, intrinsic value, which will attract investors) are, he says, brand presence (which rests on activating a brand in the marketplace); relevance (""Fixate on the customer, not on the product or the competition""); ""owning the position of relevant differentiation in your marketplace""; credibility (""you can't deliver on customer satisfaction unless you clearly define the customer benefit in advance"") and imagery (""Your brand is defined in your customer's perceptions""). Zyman is confident that ""gazillions"" of dollars are still to be made on the Web but that the ""easy money"" days are long over. For companies willing to do the critical work of marketing, he maintains, the sky's the limit. (Nov.)