FMCG marketing comes to semiconductors

TI's new Wolverine MCU campaign

Whilst the debate will continue to rage over whether B2B marketing and B2C marketing are similar or totally different, I have always believed that B2B marketers, particularly in high-tech industries have much they can learn from their B2C and particularly FMCG counterparts. After all, FMCG is the toughest, most competitive and most demanding marketing environment of all, requiring the most honed of marketing best practice. I was very interested therefore to see TI’s Wolverine campaign for its new MCU.

(http://www.ti.com/ww/en/mcu/wolverine/?DCMP=wolverine&HQS=wolverine-b)

The campaign and ads look racy, sexy, raw and above all interesting. If your didn’t read the buttons and you just looked at the dog tags on the left of the image, it could almost be an advert a pair of jeans, but no, it’s an MCU! Many companies which thought of themselves as primarily technically-based businesses have learnt that, as their markets become more commoditised they have to fight for marginal market share and often incremental share of mind with FMCG tools – Network operators like Orange, Vodafone; HP and Oracle in IT, etc, are some examples that come to mind, and as life gets more competitive in the semi industry, vendors here will also have to learn the hard way the FMCG way of marketing.

Posted on: Tuesday, May 15, 2012