On First Principles

I love seeing experienced marketers approach a situation with a First Principles mindset.

They dive into challenges with fresh eyes, are not afraid to revive what others failed and use their experience to support a solution, not limit it.

You would think it’s pretty common but it’s not. Most will back down if they hear “we tried it before and it didn’t work” or will try not to explore other ways to engage an unengaged audience group.
It didn’t work before; why would it work now?

The idea is that the only things you can take as absolute facts in your decision-making are those that apply regardless of the situation at hand.

All else that results from people/processes can, and many times should, be questioned and dissected to understand why and how to do better.

Some of my first principles that I rely on as what I know for sure:
• You’ll always operate within constrained resources.
• The customer journey is non-linear, and interactions can occur in any order.
• The engagements you can track provide only a partial view.
• Customer intent and priorities vary over time and between individuals.

These and others are always true in marketing. You can identify them because they apply to marketing at any organization, regardless of its type or industry.

What you can doubt, for example:
• Who is your ICP
• Ads on social network _____ never work for us
• People would never buy at that price point
• You should hire a content writer from your industry
• Everyone knows this acronym; it’s an industry standard
• etc.

These are all “truths” that people in your organization defined over time.

I’m not suggesting that you should open up everything. Some internal decisions are made for good reasons, such as resource allocation, balancing efforts, and managing risks.

However, if there is a need for change, it would be useful to examine and explore those internal non-first principles.