Tuning Into Your Market

Last Month at ProductCamp, I had the privilege to work with some of the great team from Pragmatic Marketing, like Graham Joyce and John Milburn.  They were kind enough to give me an advance copy of the new book from Craig Stull, Phil Myers, and David Meerman Scott entitled Tuned In.  After reading it cover-to-cover, I can recommend it as a great resource and vehicle for the message that Pragmatic Marketing has carried for years.

The whole point of Tuned In is that there is a better way of developing products and services, and better products and services to be developed if only we listen to and understand our customers.  This message will sound very familiar to anyone who has been to a Pragmatic Marketing training, or who has read their blogs.  It is deceptively simple, and it sounds so easy - why wouldn’t you talk to your customers?  Yet, most companies don’t.

Tuned In puts a wrapper around everything that Pragmatic Marketing teaches in their trainings, and David Meerman Scott’s message about how to talk with customers dovetails well with developing products that make sense.

My biggest beef with Pragmatic Marketing has always been that they are too theoretical, and that “the matrix” is academic.  That theory means that you leave the training with a head full of good ideas about what you should be doing, but few ideas on how you should be doing it (e.g. connecting with customers, getting buy in from Executives, etc).  My favorite part about Tuned In is that they start to break down these walls with some really great examples of putting the process to work “on the ground.”

Tuned In is not a how-to manual, but a good reference for you to refer to when you want to refresh what you learned.  I’d also recommend handing it off to a skeptical Executive - my copy was just over 200 pages and I nearly finished it on a round-trip flight from Austin to Vegas, so you may be able to fit it within their attention span.

Some of the greatest ideas are great because they are obvious - or rather, they feel obvious after you’re exposed to them.  The ideas presented in Tuned In are obvious and presented in such a “smack your forehead” way that makes you wonder why you didn’t tie them all together yourself.  The mantra of know thy customer is real, is powerful, and is true.  Reading Tuned In will get you re-energized, and it could be the spark that you need to get more budget, headcount, or political support - or more importantly, what helps you turn your product or company into a market winner.

On a side note, I’m going to try hard to keep Product Beautiful active over the next few months.  I just started a new job and we have our first child coming any day now, so time for posting may be reduced.  If any of you would like to guest blog on Product Beautiful, please drop me an email at pt.young@gmail.com to let me know - I’d love your help!

5 August 2008 | Lessons Learned, Product Management, Product Marketing, ProductCamp, Tactics, Theory | Comments