This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing" by Al Ries and Jack Trout. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.
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What is the Law of Sacrifice? What are the three areas where it is essential to sacrifice to maintain brand focus?
The Law of Sacrifice says that there are three areas where it’s essential to sacrifice certain products, messages, and ideas in order to maintain a narrow, targeted focus: product line, target market, and the temptation to change.
Keep reading to learn about the Law of Sacrifice.
The Law of Sacrifice
As many of The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing illustrate, it takes discipline and sacrifice to run a successful marketing campaign. The Law of Sacrifice says that there are three areas where it’s essential to sacrifice certain products, messages, and ideas in order to maintain a narrow, targeted focus:
More Products Do Not Equal More Profits
1) Product line: More products and services do not equal more profits because they dilute customers’ association with your brand. Customers are more likely to come to you if they know they can unequivocally rely on you for one thing than if you offer a smattering of everything.
For example, Federal Express dominated domestic shipping because the company focused on overnight service. As long as Federal Express claimed to be the leader of overnight service, it thrived. However, when the international shipping market expanded, Federal Express bought an international cargo firm to try to compete with companies like DHL, the market leader in international shipping. In doing so, Federal Express made two critical errors: It abandoned its focus on being the leader in overnight domestic service, and it didn’t replace “overnight” with a new association. Within two years, the company’s efforts to offer international shipping had cost the organization $1.1 billion.
Know Your Target Market
2) Target market: Marketers mistakenly assume that targeting a wider audience in their ad campaigns will expand their customer base. However, your marketing target (the audience your marketing message is meant to resonate with) is not your customer base (the people who buy your products). Focus leads to success. The most successful brands target a very specific demographic in their marketing—and that success leads to a much more diverse customer base. Targeted messages are more successful in general, which raises a brand’s profile in the market, leading to a larger customer base.
For example, even though smokers were predominantly men, cigarette companies have often featured both men and women in their ads, hoping to attract more women to their products. By contrast, Marlboro not only targeted men, but it used images of the manliest type of men: cowboys. As a result, Marlboro became the international market leader for cigarettes—and in the United States, the company led in sales among both men and women.
Don’t Believe Hype
3) Constant change: Resist the temptation to constantly change your marketing strategy in an attempt to follow the changing market. If you change often, you’ll lose focus and weaken the association you’ve created in the public’s mind. Instead, stick to the strategy that has been serving you well. For example, White Castle has offered the same square sliders for almost 100 years—in fact, the fast food chain didn’t even add a cheeseburger to its menu until more than 40 years after its founding. And the strategy worked well: White Castle trailed just behind McDonald’s in revenues at the time this book was published.
When the media creates a lot of hype about a company or a new product, it’s usually a poor predictor of success. When companies are doing well, they don’t need to manufacture excitement because it exists organically. By contrast, when companies are struggling—or when they’re taking a chance on an iffy new product—that’s typically when they start holding press conferences and reaching out to media outlets.
There are countless examples of innovations that the press predicted would be instant successes, but that ultimately flopped or took years to catch on. One example is the picturephone, which debuted at the 1964 New York World’s Fair. The picturephone—later called the videophone—was essentially a telephone attached to a television. AT&T tried promoting the technology in the 1970s, ‘80s, and ‘90s with little success.
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Here's what you'll find in our full The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing summary :
- Why the quality of your product matters less than customers' perceptions of it
- Why trying to appeal to everyone will sink your sales
- How Marlboro sold more cigarettes to women by marketing to cowboys
