The Best Strategy of All: Having Great Products

The AdAge e-newsletter had a feature about what GM should do about its marketing, given its current situation.

Here is one response:

Produce the Best Product

Having worked with Mazda, Lincoln, Mercury, Jaguar and Land Rover, I know that nothing, absolutely nothing we do beats having the best product in the market segment.

Mazda defined itself in the '80s as a discount Japanese manufacturer and it is just now getting over that message. The launch of Zoom-Zoom, the Protégé, RX-8, etc., has built its reputation.

Nissan has made its move based on its product releases, not because of its wonderful campaigns. Word of mouth, enthusiast reviews, etc., sell cars.

So GM needs merely to produce the best product in its segments and people will buy. Americans would love to buy domestic, but we're trained to believe that foreign is better made and a better investment.

Christopher Laurance
Director of Interactive Services
Grey Direct
Los Angeles
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If we don't have the best product, isn't it imperative to work towards creating it? And not fooling ourselves about what we need to do?

Visioning, market positioning, market studies, etc., are all methods for helping us to create better places.