Pushmi-Pullyu

Remember the exotic animal from Dr. Doolittle, called the Pushmi-Pullyu? It was a cross between a gazelle and a unicorn and had two heads at either end of its body. On his voyage to Africa to save monkeys, Dr. Doolittle met this mythical creature who used on head to talk and the other to eat. I believe their conversation took place in camel, a language Dr Doolittle knew very well.

How do you serve your market? Are you pushing from the outside or pulling from within your community of interest?

Did you begin your marketing efforts by creating a product and searching for customers to buy it? Or, did you belong to a community and listen to their needs? These are very different approaches to marketing. One pushes the product onto people. The other pulls the product toward them through their own interests.

1. Try to make something unimportant to them, important.
2. Interrupt people to gain attention.
3. Force ideas into a marketplace.
4. Risk annoying potential customers by not being part of the eco-system that they want to serve.
5. Pusher are outsiders.
6. Pushers talk and don't do as much listening. 
7. Pushers ask for things very early in the relationships. 
8. Use advertising as a means to tell their story.

Pullers Do These Things

1. Participate in community activities to understand needs.
2. Listen to learn about the market’s dynamics.
3. Hypothesize ideas that are often incomplete and start with ‘what if’…
4. Ask permission
5. Bring value and generosity to that market without asking for anything in return
6. Are patient as a way to earn the opportunity to commercialize relationships.
7. Focus on serving the needs of the community not their own self-interest.
8. Use utility-driven activities like educational seminars, training and social media to share knowledge and start through relationship building. 

As marketers, we have lots of choices. When we are part of the community we serve, over time we build deeper, more valuable relationships. The benefit to us is a by product of the investment we make. If we can be patient and act like human beings, good things will come to us.

What type of marketers are you?  







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