Zyman, Sergio :

Sergio Zyman was formerly the chief marketing officer at The Coca-Cola Company. As principal of Z, a new consulting company, he has worked with such companies as Microsoft, 7-Eleven, Miller Brewing Company, and Campbells. A highly sought-after speaker, he frequently travels the world to speak to large audiences and has been featured in such publications as the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and Fortune. He lives in Atlanta, Georgia.

Why Have Marketing?
To Make Money

The sole purpose of marketing is to get more people to buy more of your product, more often, for more money. That's the only reason to spend a single nickel, pfennig, or peso. If your marketing is not delivering consumers to the cash register with their wallets in their hands to buy your product, don't do it.
A lot of marketers laugh when I say that. "Who are you kidding?" they ask. "Marketing isn't meant to sell. That's what sales is for."
Maybe in the old days, marketers could get away with simply bonding with their customers. You know the drill--shoot a commercial, add some soft music, and blow your budget on expensive airtime just to create an image in the consumer's mind. But today that isn't enough. Yes, you need to advertise and create images that you hope customers will like and remember in the store or at the register, but the only reason to spend money on them is if they help you sell more stuff.
A lot of people just don't get it. They are always going into rhapsodies about how a new distribution system, more efficient manufacturing, or an expanded sales force are really going to help the business grow or boost profits. But those aren't the things that produce growth and profits. You don't make any money until you sell the stuff, and you can't sell the stuff until you've gotten people to want it. And that's what marketing does.

Focus on Results, Not Activities
First of all, you have to understand what marketing is. Marketing is not advertising. Marketing isn't shooting commercials in Bali, or having a corner office with two potted palms and an ad agency bowing and scraping at your every whim. Those things may have passed for marketing yesterday. Many people still believe that that is marketing today. These folks may have fooled themselves and their bosses into thinking that spending a lot of money on creative advertising and running it on every television channel and in every newspaper and magazine in the world is marketing. But it's not.
Marketing is not even a combination of advertising and a whole bunch of other stuff added in, such as packaging, and promotions, and market research, and new-product development. Marketers do all those things. Those are marketing tools. But the tools are not marketing. Marketing is using the tools; marketing is deciding what to do and then using the right tools in the best way to get it done.
It's as if you have a hammer, a saw, a box of nails, and some lumber. You still need the carpenter to come in with the thinking and the skills to build you a table, and you need to decide if what you want to build is a table, or a chair. Marketing is a strategic activity and a discipline focused on the endgame of getting more consumers to buy your product more often so that your company makes more money. It is not just a collection of tasks that somebody has got to get done.
It is important to recognize this, because once you understand that the strategy is a key element in what you are supposed to be doing, it is going to change how you go about performing the tasks. When you think that your job is just about doing the tasks, then that is all you are going to do. If you are only task oriented, you'll think, "I've got to run five promotions, do six series of focus groups, and develop two ad campaigns this year" and you'll think you're doing your job--when you have really only done a few tasks.
The job of marketing is to sell lots of stuff and to make lots of money. It is to get more people to buy more of your products, more often, at higher prices. You're going to continue to hear that little mantra a lot in this book not because my editor was asleep at the wheel but because, as simple as it sounds, it seems hard for some people to get it into their heads. But that's what it's all about, what it has always been about, and what it will always be about. In fact, although some marketers will tell you it's impossible, the real job of a marketer is to sell everything that a company can profitably make, to be the ultimate stewards of return on investment and assets employed.
Sure, it's possible to sell more stuff if you think your job is just to run promotions. But, when you understand that the goal is selling and not just running the promotions, you end up selling a lot more stuff and making a lot more money because you do a lot more things, and are smarter about how you do them.

Understand That Marketing Is an Investment
When I first returned to The Coca-Cola Company in 1993 and developed the first round of television advertising, as a matter of protocol, I took it into Roberto Goizueta's office and played it for him.
"I don't like those ads," he said.
"Look, Roberto," I replied. "If you're willing to buy a hundred percent of the volume out there worldwide, then I'm happy to do advertising that you like. Otherwise, I've got to keep doing it for those damn consumers."
Of course, he got the point immediately. Moreover, from that point on, he told me, "Just show me the results, not the ads."
It's all about results. Just as Roberto wasn't the target audience of the ads I was showing him, seldom are you the target audience for yours. The marketer who insists that marketing is an art and says things like "you don't understand, I am the genius, I and only I (and my advertising agency, of course) understand my art. And, by the way, you can't measure it either" is done for. Marketing has to be tested and measured just like any other investment.

"What can I say about Sergio Zyman? He's a genius; that's all. And this book will tell you why."

-- Warren Bennis, author of On Becoming a Leader, University Professor and Distinguished Professor of Business Administration, USC Marshall School of Business

"A wizard at marketing discloses his magic. No matter what your industry, you will benefit greatly from Sergio Zyman's out-of-the-box thinking and contemporary concepts."

-- Charles R. Schwab, Chairman, The Charles Schwab Corporation

"This is a book that's sometimes arrogant, occasionally profane, usually profound and always entertaining . . . just like Sergio. If you read it and learn its lessons, you'll become a high voltage, successful marketer . . . just like Sergio."

-- Jay Chiat, founder, Chiat/Day Advertising

"This book is not simply about marketing; it is about how to choose the right objectives and achieve them and how to successfully build a business. No matter what industry you're in, Zyman's book is a must read!"

-- John F. Cooke, Executive Vice President, the Walt Disney Company Company

"No one is more provocative or passionate on the subject of marketing than Sergio Zyman. I've seen him literally mesmerize audiences. Somehow he's managed to capture all this in The End of Marketing As We Know It. It teaches as much as any textbook ever could, but does it in a remarkably entertaining way. You don't realize, until you're finished, that you are now much smarter about marketing. It's vintage Sergio."

-- Shelly Lazarus, Chairman and CEO, Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide

"The End of Marketing As We Know It is typical Zyman--brash, compelling, and eminently practical. I found myself using several of its conclusions and insights at staff meetings and presentations--of course, without crediting Sergio."

-- David J. Stern, Commissioner, National Basketball Association

"Here's a great marketing tip . . . Buy this book, written by the ultimate master. No marketer can live without it."

-- Dick Ebersol, President, NBC Sports

"Always insightful, always provocative and (almost) always right, the irrepressible Sergio Zyman mined his experience at a certain coca-colossus to write a marketing book, a management how-to, and a cola-war memoir all in one."

-- Bob Garfield, columnist, Advertising Age

"Nothing moves forward as long as people are comfortable. Sergio Zyman has single-handedly driven whole legions of professionals to the brink, forced them to rethink strategy, tactics, relationships . . . the fundamental underpinning of 20th century marketing. God love the hellraiser."

-- Dan Wieden, CEO, CCO, Wieden & Kennedy

"Sergio Zyman's voice is powerful. So are his insights. He never fails to challenge, inspire, or teach. The End of Marketing as We Know It is like being in a conversation with Sergio--without the fear of being assaulted. It is a must read for anyone who values achieving results in a highly competitive marketplace."

-- Patrick R. Fallon, Chairman, Fallon McElligott

HarperCollins Web Site, August, 2000

Marketing as we know it today is about image. It's about getting consumers to love your products. It's about producing award-winning commercials and promotions, and creating ads people like. It's about buzzwords like "events," "relationships," and "intimacy."

Problem is, it's not working.

So says the "Aya-Cola," Sergio Zyman, two-time marketing czar of Coca-Cola and today quite possibly the most famous marketer--and marketing gadfly--in the world. Brilliant and irascible, Zyman is best known for reinventing The Coca-Cola Company's marketing approach by spearheading the launches of such world-class global brands as Diet Coke, New Coke, Classic Coke, Fruitopia, and Sprite. Over a combined thirteen-year period, Zyman directed a zestful multibillion-dollar marketing effort, masterminding such timeless campaigns as "Coke Is It!" and "Always Coca-Cola," that resulted in sales of more than 15 billion cases of Coke products per year to over 5 billion consumers in 190 countries.

In The End of Marketing As We Know It, Zyman reveals, with characteristic flair, the counterintuitive and often provocative marketing strategies and tactics that earned him the nickname "Aya-Cola" on Madison Avenue and helped to increase the market value of The Coca-Cola Company from a mere $56 billion to an astounding $193 billion in just five years. Shattering the mystique surrounding the discipline of marketing and upending the tradition of creating popular, crowd-pleasing ads and promotions, Zyman recounts such illuminating anecdotes as why he decided not to rerun the much-loved "I'd like to teach the world to sing" Coke commercial and why "feel-good" marketing is pointless unless it results in sales. He also explores:

Why marketing isn't an art but a science
How a well-honed strategy is more important to your success than what your ads say
How everything communicates--and what that means to consumers
The rise of consumer democracy--and the threat of consumer communism
How marketing locally is necessary to build global equity
Why marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department
How ad agencies are fixated on the wrong things

And why:

It's crucial to increase your marketing budget--not to cut it--when sales are down
Megabrands are a terrible idea, but huge brands are a great idea
It's suicide to base your sales projections on previous performance
You must be focused on profit, not volume for volume's sake
It's sometimes necessary to enter a category just to kill it
All marketers must be accountable to shareholders

Visionary and rogue, The End of Marketing As We Know It captures a seismic shift in marketing, from the master of the trade.