According to ESPN.com, Dr. Robert Cade passed away this week. You have probably never heard of Dr. Cade, but if you have ever played a sport or been to the gym, you have almost certainly tried Dr. Cade’s invention, Gatorade.
The story of the birth of Gatorade is one that every marketer should read, memorize and copy into their own campaigns. I’ll leave the entire article for you to read, but the bullet points go something like this:
- Discover a problem that needs a solution
- Create, test, recreate, retest, and recreate the solution until the customer likes it
- Find an anchor customer with influence and size
- When tempted to change the brand, listen to your audience
- Build products because you love the project, not for the money
- When you get bigger than you can handle, take the money and run.