Marketing 100

My ideal marketing scenario looks like this: you make a product and as time goes on you get feedback that you implement and the product gets better and better. Eventually it crosses a threshold such that it becomes contagious. Then it markets itself. At the same time users are forming a community around the product. They are improving it and adding value that you couldn't add alone. It becomes a lasting cultural phenomenon.

So that's the dream. But before it can come to pass I imagine that it will take time to find out who the market actually is. And some time to communicate with them and to sell the product. And time to optimize the product.

The trick is that right now I'm starting from scratch. I haven't sold a thing. So I need some ideas for how to get the ball rolling. Those ideas are to be collected in this post. When I came up with 100 company ideas there came a point when I had to choose one. Marketing ideas may be different. There may be quite a few practices that will bolster each other.

This time I will collect all 100 ideas in a single post by editing it every so often. Here goes:

1. Try to ride the American Idol wave. For example have them market it! (Brad Bushman, Rick Bradshaw)
2. Get a lot of free copies out there using the internet. (Cathy Webster)
3. Get a lot of copies out there by getting them installed initially with new computers. For example if all Dell laptops came with a free copy . . .
   
4. Try an internet subscription model. (Spencer Cook)
5. Sell to Universities. (Heather Cook)
6. Partner with a company that already distributes in the education or in the music market. Have them do the selling. (Jonathan Jones)
7. Sell it over Ebay. (Jeff and Katie Giras)
   
8. Sell it using Amazon. (Jeremy Wallace)
   
9. Advertize using Google.
10. Make the program and then sell the rights to it. Don't even worry about marketing. (Tom)
    

One thing I commit to doing: I will try and keep track of the number of copies sold so that I will know when the goal of one million copies sold is reached. I would like also like to keep the running total posted somewhere like McDonalds did for a long time. If you think that is a really bad idea let me know.