What can we learn from Intel’s marketing strategy?

At a recent Forrester Marketing Forum in San Francisco, Intel VP and CMO Deborah Conrad shared how Intel changed its marketing strategy to connect with customers in a different way. I think every expansion stage software company can learn from this, or rather, should keep this in mind when devising their marketing strategy.

Yes, it is about the product, but these days it’s more so about experiencing the product: Intel realized that they needed to shift their focus from the chip itself to the experience the chip creates for the user. Historically, most technology marketers have centered their attention on flaunting the product’s features and functions, not necessarily the experience generated by the technology. Conrad talked about what B2B tech marketers could learn from B2C marketers, such as the BMW, which markets itself as “the ultimate driving machine” – its marketing messaging is based on the experience of driving it, not the horsepower, torque and braking distances.

Moving from a rational brand to an emotional brand: Intel realized this after having studied Pampers. Pampers had a rational messaging that focused on dryness, no-leak, etc. The company eventually discovered that its marketing was more effective when it appealed to the emotions of customers, in their case, happy moms. The logic worked like this for Pampers:

• Babies are happy when they are dry.
• Dry babies are happy babies.
• If babies are happy, moms are happy.
• Therefore, happy babies mean happy moms. Voila!

Intel had a “Pampers moment” when it understood the emotional side of technology performance, which had to do with not disrupting/annoying customers with unexpected application crashes, freezes and so on. For a technology marketer like Intel, this was huge as it opened up a new avenue for marketing where they shifted their thinking to the emotional connection of performance.

The “consumerization of IT”: Intel realized that among its enterprise customers, decision-making power was increasingly broadening to individuals who are not just in the IT department. Many more influencers and users these days are from outside IT. Hence, Intel expanded its marketing program and content to make sure that it catered to the non-traditional, “outside IT” decision makers as well. It’s important for technology marketers to realize this so they can be relevant to and can successfully engage non-IT influencers.