Marketing is Out, Ideas are In

"The first 100 years of our country's history were about who could build the biggest, most efficient farms. The second 100 years were about the race to build efficient factories. Welcome to the third century: This one's about ideas."

This quote is from the article "Unleash you Ideavirus" which describes how the way to wealth in the 21st century is through ideas. The article describes how the most profitable endeavors did not make money through conventional marketing but by becoming an ideavirus, an idea that catches on through word of mouth.

I always thought that the way to profit from a product is through marketing, but this article makes a good point. The most popular products right now are ones that do not have million dollar television campaigns. The hottest jeans, T-mobile sidekicks, and bags have become popular through word of mouth and being carried by celebrities. If you want a product to be popular then all you have to do is put it in the hand of a celebrity and get it in People Magazine. There you have it - an ideavirus that will have people shopping across the country.

Right now blogs and text messaging are the new ideavirus. In order to get all political campaigns to make these technologies a part of their strategy, the celebrity campaigns need to use them. The Dean campaign proved this by creating a successful strategic Internet campaign. Once the big "celebrity" campaigns begin to take the Internet seriously, other campaigns will follow suite.