The Carver's House

In the previous blog post , we talked about the one principle that drives most, if not all, marketing efforts for a product. And that's making sure that the perceived value of a product trumps the perceived cost associated with it. Value is relative. What's valuable to you may not be as valuable to your friend. That's why we call it perceived value. If you observe some of the recent shampoo ads shown on television, you'll note how marketers zero in on specific values to make their shampoos stand out: For instance, 1) In an ad for Pantene featuring KC Concepcion, the benefit that was emphasized was "you don't need a comb," aptly named, "The No-Comb Revolution."  2) In an ad for Sunsilk featuring Sarah Geronimo, the benefit that was emphasized was "great hair for 25 hours," which they encapsulized in a "25-Hour Challenge." 3) Meanwhile, Tresemme ads stress the value of "salon quality hair." (This is reinforc

Over on Facebook, a discussion took place about how Philippine publications can make headway in the crowded book market dominated by mostly American books. Like many other authors, I find it sad to see the big bookstores display foreign titles prominently in their display windows. In the stores themselves, the Filipiniana section is somewhere in the midst of the sea of shelves. In that discussion, the participants were talking about distribution issues, from the lack of distribution channels to the difficulty in convincing the big bookstores to push local books. These concerns are all valid, for sure, and these issues are similarly faced by Filipino comics creators. But is distribution really the main issue? I will argue that if distribution was the main problem, then every product displayed prominently in every mega-chain retail establishment would have no problem getting sold to the satisfaction of their manufacturers. But we all know that's not true. Hundreds of products the