The right words

[Kobus Jooste]

I’m not a marketer, but have been told that I am a very good writer.  Somehow my ability to string sentences together cannot override my desire, re-enforced by years of scientific training, to provide an accurate statement when asked a question.  That, apparently, is not good for marketing.  As a student I once attended a business plan writing workshop where the section on marketing was headed up by an enthusiastic woman telling us how we create hype around a brand and make people want it.  I was very sceptical of all this, and asked her on what percentage of the populous this mindless tactic worked.  As an example, I told her about my sunglasses.  I’m colourblind, and do not venture outside without a polarized pair at hand.  Now there is a company that perfected the method, and make the lenses that are put in most fashion brands.  They also do their own sunglasses at a fraction of the cost.  I told the marketing lady that you have to be obtuse to pay a company four times the value of an item because they put their logo on it.  Apparently the world is filled with obtuse people.  Apparently, when someone asks you if your commercial tunnel will turn a rapid profit, you should nod vigorously.  Saying “If you know what you are doing, you have a shot.  If you are stupid, you will fail” is not correct.  So there – I can add marketing to the list of things that I just do not comprehend.  Having no real sales experience sucks.  As a scholar, you have to prove competency and subject knowledge.  As a consultant, you have to show competency and come at a good price.  As a researcher, you have to be able to communicate your ideas around the perceived problem and your proposed solution.  I have a very good track record at those, but actually SELLING something? 

 

I got thinking about the world we live in now.  We have a mountain of examples of soaring success stories and downright abysmal failures of products that were really not all that dissimilar.  We all know the tech ones, but that is not my scene.  As a typical outdoorsy male South African, I do the fishing and hunting thing.  A few years ago, I inherited a marvellous rifle from my grandfather.  Actually it was my Great-grandfather’s, but he did not have it too long and it really is not that old.  Well-crafted, frightfully accurate, but a classic example of a product that came short in a product stand-off.  This is a 6 mm Remington, or a .244.  It lost out badly against the .243, which now dominates the 200 calibre scene in South Africa.  The folks over at Winchester, so I recall from my reading, thought the .243 would be an ideal small calibre plains rifle, while the gents over at Remington thought the only serious use for a small calibre such as their .244 would be as a varminter.  A small difference in approach, miniscule differences in packaging and overall performance, but a huge difference in market share.  While every small game hunter in my family strolls up to the ammo stores and pick a box of Winchester .243 off the shelf, I piece together my own cartridges from jealously guarded 6 mm Remington cases I got with the rifle, similar powder and custom bullets that cost way too much.  There is not much between .243 and .244, but as the former became the norm and the latter a curiosity, it is infinitely easier to own and operate a .243.  Still, I flat-out refuse to have the rifle altered to .243 calibre.  Why?  Because I do not mind the extra effort for the trade-off of knowing that I am the fourth generation of my family to use it as it was crafted.

 

So what does an obscure rifle have to do with aquaponics?  Is this not the difference between aquaponics and grocery shopping?  According to my clever uncle, the majority of people on this planet are grocery shoppers and way too few of my countrymen and women will want to fuss for 40 days to grow something that is lying two minutes away in the convenience store.  If this is true, then aquaponics run the risk of being a curiosity, the outcast of agriculture practice.  The optimist in me is telling the poor marketer to look for new words.  The right words that will make a person stop, look and think.

 

I look at the wonderful buzz around entities such as Sweetwater and Growing Power, the steady growth of commercial ventures and then I look at the problems facing the people on this planet: the modern trends in urbanization, food supply problems and a general awareness of the need for and demand for less food miles on our produce and I get highly motivated.  On international forums, I see glimmers of a new world where home food production and small scale commercial activity on a community level is growing rapidly.  For some it is a question of health, for some a question of self reliance, and yet for others it is a sense of community and personal development that is the draw card.  Aquaponics therefore is not about the product at all, but about the person.  Looking back at my previous blog, I was musing the problems I had with people willing to accept the poor quality of food available in stores, and understanding the benefits of sustainable farming.  Now, having chatted with some international friends, it sounds as if the problem is mainly on my side of the pond.  There seem to be a ready market for concerned citizens in other countries that scrutinize product labels to see where these were produced and what is all in there.  How I long to go to such a place.

 

Still, the opportunity here is just as great, once a good marketer has spread the right words to the target audience.  I really think that that is going to be the challenge for 2011.  Finding the right words to shift people’s mindset.  I will lean heavily on the old hands on the forum to try and comprehend what steps took place in their countries to make people interested in the type of produce that ultimately can be produced in a number of ways.  These individuals then went looking for a method, and many seem to be taking to aquaponics.  I’d like to understand what make them look, and what made them pick.  I think it is incorrect to use my own experience as a standard, as there are just not that many left-handed, colourblind 6mm Remington owners in the country.  Or am I mistaken?

[TCLynx]

Chi is right and I think part of the reason the USA is starting to really get on board (at least the more well off people) is they have been scared into "needing" it.  All the media hype over some of the food borne illness over the past 5 years have sent people into a tizzy over food security here.  (Sad side note being that this new food safety act seems likely to make things worse since it could put too much burden on the little guys who in general haven't caused the problems and further the industrialization of our food system instead of making it easier to grow/sell food on a more local level which would strengthen our food system, sigh.)

 

Anyway, currently the people who seem most interested here in Aquaponics are the ones who want the "local", "clean", "organic" or "chemical free" food for their family.  In many places it can be hard to get that so that means they NEED to grow it them selves and aquaponics is definitely an easy way to do it.  Now this kinda works for people who have the space and money to invest in growing their own food. 

Trying to expand that to a community level is harder and from what I've seen in Milwaukee, is generally non-profit and uses lots of local volunteers as labor.  It can succeed in growing food but it is not making anyone rich and can take up a huge amount of the founders savings to get off the ground in the first place with no guarantee they will get paid back.  Now if the founders are really good salesmen (Like Godsil and Will Allen) they are likely to find some enthusiastic investors and other sources of capital to build and expand.

 

So in South Africa, what potential clients/buyers can you identify?

And what are the selling points that will appeal? (Make them need it?)

 

Now if you have some affluent customers who are concerned about local food, that is probably fairly easy to come up with a Backyard scale system for them.

 

But since I know you are somewhat more interested in larger scale.  Are there groups our there who want to help feed whole communities?  Here in the USA the most common Urban community food centers/gardens seem to be religious (and there are two major aquaponic organizations based out of the USA that have turned aquaponics into something of a Religious Mission.)

 

Don't know if any of that helps?

[Chi Ma]

As much as I hate to admit it, I used to be in retail sales. In sales we were taught to make someone need something versus a want. Because if it's a need you gotta have it. A want you can be talked out of. So ask yourself why would someone need your system. 

 

FAB = Features, Actions & Benefits

 

Features: What is it? Growing fish and plants in a recirculating system.

Action: What does it do? It recirculates fish waste water to irrigate the plants which in turn filters the water.

Benefits: Why you need it? Rising cost of food, fresh food, organic food, small carbon foot print etc. etc.

 

These all can be elaborated on. This is what a prospective customer wants to know. Once you define this it's all gravy. Interrupt yourself from the sales pitch and let the customer ask questions. Once they start asking questions you know they are interested. Show them the system. Involve them. Give them something to remember you with. A head of lettuce, a fish, cucumber etc. Marketing is one of the biggest cost to a company. Scrimp on the marketing and the best product in the world will fail.

[Kobus Jooste]

Nice one Chi! That part of marketing I understand, but there is a different side to it that I am not all that good at - the persuasive "hard sell" that convinces someone to do or buy something they were not considering.  In aquaponics terms, and in South Africa, this sell would be to break the chain of confortable consumerism and to get people to take an interest in the quality and sustainability of the food they are buying or the lifestyles they are leading.  Marketers have got people so wound up about what the Jones have that both people in a family works non stop to try and stay on the hamster wheel. There is no time for aquaponic production because there is no time.  Cars cost as much as my house did six years ago (seriously - I paid less for a 4-bedroom house on 1300 meter square plot with pool and double garage than what you will now pay for an Audi A4) and you better throw it away after the warrenty lapses because you cannot afford to fix it if anything electronic packs up.  Your bathroom has got to reflect your status (what does that MEAN?!) and so it goes on and on.  I fear that aquaponics is associated with a lifestyle choice that few people make these days.  I'm surprised that someone isn't marketing an easy chair that converts into a coffin so that you can just die in front of the TV after working yourself to death to buy stuff that reflect your perceived status. My gut feel is that aquaponics will appeal to a specific type of person, and if we find the right buttons to push to see if we have a budding aquapon, we have a convert.  The rest of this world will stay on the hamster wheel. 

[Chi Ma]

Bing Crosby sings a song that epitomizes marketing.

You've got to accentuate the positive
Eliminate the negative
Latch on to the affirmative
Don't mess with Mister In-Between

You've got to spread joy up to the maximum
Bring gloom down to the minimum
Have faith or pandemonium
Liable to walk upon the scene

(To illustrate his last remark
Jonah in the whale, Noah in the ark
What did they do
Just when everything looked so dark)

Man, they said we better
Accentuate the positive
Eliminate the negative
Latch on to the affirmative
Don't mess with Mister In-Between
No, do not mess with Mister In-Between
Do you hear me, hmm?

(Oh, listen to me children and-a you will hear
About the elininatin' of the negative
And the accent on the positive)
And gather 'round me children if you're willin'
And sit tight while I start reviewin'
The attitude of doin' right

(You've gotta accentuate the positive
Eliminate the negative
Latch on to the affirmative
Don't mess with Mister In-Between)

You've got to spread joy (up to the maximum)
Bring gloom (down) down to the minimum
Otherwise (otherwise) pandemonium
Liable to walk upon the scene

To illustrate (well illustrate) my last remark (you got the floor)
Jonah in the whale, Noah in the ark
What did they say (what did they say)
Say when everything looked so dark

Man, they said we better
Accentuate the positive
Eliminate the negative
Latch on to the affirmative
Don't mess with Mister In-Between
No! Don't mess with Mister In-Between

[Kobus Jooste]

Thanks for the kind response.  Part of me wants to be sceptical and write of much of the planet's populus as grocery shoppers, but on the other hand, if two good marketers can turn urban agriculture on its head in one place, then in theory it should be possible to pull the same move on the rest of them!  I have been thinking about a number of ways to gradually introduce aquaponics into the mindset of South Africans (urban food production is not such a strange concept here - we have large residential properties as just a generation ago, most people had fruit trees and vegetable gardens).  Marketers have been selling them convenience so long, it may be required that my promotion of the method is affected by it.  Hope not. 

[TCLynx]

You describe much the way I feel (about the truth in marketing that is.)  When people first started pushing me to turn aquaponics into a business, I resisted since the truth is, anyone who wants to put in a bit of research into learning about it, can build their own systems and those unwilling to learn, I feared were likely to mismanage a system and give me a bad name even if it were a perfectly designed system.

 

I also think that the impression you are getting of places across the ponds might actually be better than they really are.  Yea, we got some high profile places like Sweet Water in the USA and BYAP in OZ and many others and there are people concerned with healthy food locally but......  That is mostly just the people you see on these forums.  Most people are still caught up in the convenience and would rather sit around in front of the TV while paying the landscape company to mow the lawn and go to the grocery for food.  However, there are always exceptions.  Many of the less advantaged will jump at the chance to grow some food if they are taught how and given a place to do it.

 

Now people like Godsil and Will Allen are great salesmen and a big reason that Milwaukee, WI, USA is something of a hub of urban community food production.

 

Now if we want to appeal to the convenience minded individuals who might still be interested in local or healthy food.  We can promote Aquaponics as "automatically watered" or "drought proof garden" also "automatically fertilized" and even "complete meal including meat from the garden in a small space"

 

I personally dislike overblown claims of superior growth in aquaponics since they are often not terribly honest.  Like people making it out like you could put tilapia in poorly aerated, poorly filtered tanks and feed them lettuce scraps but still harvest 1+ pound fish after 6 months from fry and produce your own fry.  When the truth is more like yes, tilapia can survive poor dissolved oxygen levels, yes they can survive poor water quality, yes they can eat lettuce, yes you could do your own breeding but if you are doing any of these things, you likely won't be growing out lots of big fish in a short time.

 

(p.s.  I like the story about the Rifle.)