The rock band, Van Halen was known as a group of loud and proud rockstars with a high level of ego to boot. There's an infamous story of how they demanded "No Brown M&Ms" backstage at their venues. Although it became folklore that they would have such ridiculous demands, it was actually for a safety reason and teaches us something important about the way we approach our Terms & Conditions for selling our products and services.

Over 50 years ago, Elton John and Bernie Taupin embarked on a songwriting partnership that changed the face of the music industry. Their partnership wasn't built on competition - it was built on complimenting each other based on their individual weaknesses.

When launching and marketing our products, it's important to recognize that a strong partnership strategy can develop a sales channel for your business that grows your product sales by complimenting the weaknesses they may have. In return, you can be a better partner sending leads to those who compliment your weaknesses.

This week, we'll look at the Elton John and Bernie Taupin partnership model and how to implement it into our own product marketing plans.

Episode #1

Brand vs. Product Marketing is a chicken and egg kind of topic. Which comes first and what exactly does it mean to focus on product marketing vs. brand marketing? I believe product comes first and I'll explain why the product experience is what drives your company's brand experience.

I'll also share how a brand experience can rebuild the product experience for a company when necessary, We'll talk about the Smokeless Grill campaign featuring Snoop Dogg as well as Jaguar's most recent "Copy Nothing" campaign.

Resources for this week's podcast are the SMB Marketing Blueprint - a free 7-day email course designed to help small and medium-sized business owners or leaders understand various marketing channels and their relevance to their target audience. The course aims to provide tools and resources to build a marketing blueprint, focusing on the personas of the marketing channels and the buying process.

Find direct links to the resources mentioned on this podcast in the podcast show notes at Blueprint.AzolaCreative.com.