Book SummaryGuerrilla Marketing, by Jay Conrad Levinson

1-Page Summary1-Page Book Summary of Guerrilla Marketing

Many businesses assume they must rely on expensive mass-media marketing campaigns to build customer awareness and generate sales. However, this assumption doesn’t bode well for small businesses with limited resources.

Bestselling author and marketing guru Jay Conrad Levinson argues that, with the right marketing strategy, even the smallest of businesses can make...

Guerrilla Marketing Summary Introduction: What Is Guerrilla Marketing?

According to Levinson, guerrilla marketers don’t let limited resources prevent them from making a big impact with their marketing. Unlike traditional marketers, they don’t assume that the only way to build brand awareness and generate sales is to rely on expensive mass-market approaches.

Instead, guerrilla marketers focus their marketing efforts on reaching customers that already want what they have to offer. They then plan inexpensive ways to appeal to and create positive interactions with these specific customers—for example, by offering free samples and discounts to build customer confidence, getting involved in community and charitable events to improve customer perception, or providing an excellent after-sales service to promote customer loyalty.

We’ll explore how to find customers that already want what you’re offering and ideas for creating positive customer interactions throughout Levinson’s five-step process.

An Overview of Modern Guerrilla Marketing Techniques

The definition of guerrilla marketing has evolved quite dramatically since Levinson originally coined the term in 1984....

Guerrilla Marketing Summary Step #1: Define Your Target Market

To create a profitable marketing strategy, you first need to define your target market. Levinson argues that many businesses waste time and resources trying to get attention from customers who have no interest in what they have to offer. Knowing specifically who you’re selling to helps focus your marketing efforts on interested customers—thus contributing to increased sales and profits.

He suggests answering two questions to define your target market:

1. What are you selling? Describe your product or service and...

Guerrilla Marketing Summary Step #2: Research Your Target Market

Once you’ve defined your target market, conduct market research to understand this customer group’s specific interests and priorities. According to Levinson, the more you understand your target market, the easier you’ll find it to appeal to these customers and influence their purchasing decisions.

Levinson suggests that you should find out as much as possible about your target market, including:

• What motivates their purchasing decisions. This information reveals what aspects of your business, product, or service your marketing strategy should emphasize to maximize your appeal. For example, your target market’s primary motivation is to find an inexpensive way to permanently relieve back pain.

(Shortform note: While Levinson suggests that specific product or service benefits motivate people to buy things, other marketing experts argue that deeper psychological issues motivate all purchasing decisions. According to Josh Kaufman (The Personal MBA), people[ make purchases in an attempt to fulfill five basic...

Guerrilla Marketing Summary Step #3: Outline How You’ll Appeal to Your Target Market

After you’ve researched your target market, outline how you’ll appeal to these customers. This involves figuring out exactly how you’ll convince customers to choose you over your competitors.

Levinson argues that customers don’t just rely on specific marketing campaigns to judge your business, but on every detail they perceive about your business. These details lie in both your deliberate attempts to influence them—such as your advertisements and your packaging design—and the way you unintentionally present your business—such as the way a tired employee interacts with other customers on a busy day.

Since every choice you make impacts customer perception, Levinson argues that you should attempt to become more intentional about the way customers perceive your business. You can achieve this by:

1. Defining how you want customers to perceive your business
2. Aligning every business decision to support this perception

For example, you want customers to perceive your business as a luxury brand. You support this perception by creating distinctive, high-quality marketing materials and establishing a stylish dress code for all business representatives.

Let’s explore how...

Guerrilla Marketing Summary Step #4: Choose Your Marketing Channels

Once you’ve outlined how you’ll appeal to your target market, choose the marketing channels you’ll use to reach your target market.

Large businesses commonly rely on expensive marketing channels such as television and radio commercials, newspaper and magazine advertisements, direct mail, and billboards to reach as many potential customers as possible. Levinson argues that, while this approach does allow businesses to reach a large audience, their approach is untargeted—meaning that they attempt to appeal to customers who have no interest in purchasing what they’re offering. And since marketing to uninterested customers doesn’t generate sales, this approach is ineffective and often results in financial loss.

(Shortform note: Psychologists offer a contrasting opinion: Advertising to uninterested people can generate sales. This is due to the mere exposure effect—the premise that the more often you’re exposed to something, the more you like it. Research suggests that regular exposure makes a product easier to interpret and reduces the uncertainty you feel about it—thus increasing your confidence in it. And [your increased confidence influences you to purchase this...

Guerrilla Marketing Summary Step #5: Test Each Marketing Method

Now that you’ve decided how to reach your target market, test each method to determine the most profitable marketing strategy for your business.

Many businesses determine the effectiveness of marketing methods by measuring how much customer interest they generate. Levinson claims that this approach creates misleading results because increased customer interest doesn’t automatically translate to increased profits. Therefore, he argues that the only way to determine the effectiveness of different marketing methods is to measure how much profit they generate.

(Shortform note: Research clarifies why increased customer interest doesn’t guarantee increased sales and profits: People prefer to keep their options open instead of completing transactions. Browsing for products online or window shopping involves anticipating what it would be like to have all of these different things in your life. This process releases [restricted term] (the hormone that makes you feel good) into your bloodstream and increases your desire to seek out even more things that make you feel good. However, this [restricted term] hit stops the moment you stop imagining multiple possibilities and...

Shortform Exercise: Define How You Want customers to Perceive You

Consider how to distinguish your business from your competitors and appeal to your target market.

Describe your target market. (For example, your target market consists of women aged between 30 to 45 years who want to purchase custom handmade toys for children under the age of five. They primarily shop online.)