What is Orphan Marketing?

It’s the best way to do your marketing.

It’s also more than that – it’s about succeeding.

The mission is to rid the world of marketing waste, stupid decisions, loss of perspective and promote personal success. You need help? You got it.
And how are we going to do it? For free. That's right - I am giving out the highly profitable commodity of marketing advice for free. Why? Because I like helping people and I love having a good problem to solve. You could actually be charging me a fee for this!

For years now I’ve seen people completely miss the point when it comes to marketing. Looking too closely at the unimportant things, missing the really important things (like customer interaction), controlling minute details (Like the font size on an advertising flyer) while going in completely the wrong direction (like promoting products that have diminishing demand – but at least the ad is perfect!) – these are things that orphan marketing is not.

I am so sick of seeing  lame iPhone apps, lazy marketing, wasted cash, frustrated people with talent, highly paid people without talent and worst of all things that don’t make sense. I’m sick of professional people missing the point! I absolutely hate marketing that is too safe, but even worse, marketing that is risky in a vague hope of just being noticed.

There is a lot of pretence out there. Everyone is trying to be like yesterday’s hero. Everyone is trying to run before they can walk. University degrees (more on that later) load people up with structures and theories but very few teach a person how to think. Marketing degrees load people up with examples of the world’s best companies with very little reference to how they got there, or more to the point, how they got into the position to launch into prominence.

Decision making is being replaced by reporting and research. Courage is leaking out of the business world as everyone moves towards self-protective crap. Believe it or not you can use market research in conjunction with creativity and experience. Fear and greed are the two most powerful forces in business, and it disgusts me.

So here are the principles Orphan Marketing promotes:

Making money without wrecking the joint:

Most companies are money making enterprises. Charities and NGOs are there to increase awareness and raise money. There are some non-financial measures of success but usually it's about money. Overall, cash is a way of measuring performance and it also helps employ people and run programs. But I will never promote ideas of making cash for the sake of greed at the expense of the greater good. Greed (give me more) is fine, theft (give me more and give him less) makes me sick.

Getting to the point

Make a plan, get to the point, stick to it, make progress and kick ass. That’s what it’s all about! Distractions are the enemy. Do whatever you like in your professional life as long as it helps you get to the point. Anything else is waste. Cut the waste out of your marketing and working life and you’ll be doing it the right way.

Skilful Human interaction

Such an underrated set of skills! Again, universities arm people with theories but not life skills. Why can’t you do a Masters of Sales at any accredited university? Every single business has salesmen and business developers, but they all make a long long list of mistakes before they’re any good. To succeed in marketing, to succeed in sales, to succeed in life you have to understand PEOPLE. I’ve got a psych degree and I can tell you, 95% of what I know about human interaction has nothing to do with my behaviour studies. I study people, I watch human interactions, and that's how I know how it all works.


Every situation is different:
Each company is different: the customers, the competitors, etc - it's all unique. Some marketing principles are universal, but these are few and far between. "That's what Nike do with their marketing" is not an acceptable line for anyone in small business, or a B2B industry, etc.


Not everyone is in a position of immense power:
This is where orphan marketing is different. We will answer questions and advice about your situation, whether you're the cleaner or the CEO. Our focus is on helping you in your current situation do good things. So if you're stuck, or even just a little unsure on anything to do with marketing (or your marketing career.)

So what’s with the orphan moniker?

Orphans start out lost, directionless and underprivileged. They are forced to attend the School of Life and become adaptable, cunning and creative. The few orphans I know are brilliant people that have been through some horrible life experiences and taught me a lot. This blog is a tribute to them. 



So if you want some advice from an expert, give me a yell on orphanmarketing@gmail.com