Future Demand Marketing: Why Performance Marketing Alone Won’t Grow Your Business

This week on Marketing Sucks, Amanda and Phil are talking about why performance marketing alone is not enough to build a business that lasts. After seeing James Hurman speak in Toronto about his book Future Demand, they break down the difference between marketing to people who are ready to buy now and building trust with the people who may buy from you in the future. From paid ads, retargeting, sales emails, and lead magnets to podcasts, founder stories, educational content, customer stories, and community building, this episode explains why your marketing needs both short-term sales strategy and long-term brand building. Amanda and Phil also unpack why so many businesses hit a wall when they only focus on immediate conversions, why future demand can be harder to track but impossible to ignore, and why the brands that stay top of mind are usually the ones people buy from when the timing is finally right. If you feel like your ads are slowing down, your audience is not converting, or your marketing is only working when you are actively selling, this episode will help you zoom out and build demand before people are ready to buy.

What You’ll Learn
✔ What future demand marketing means and why it matters
✔ Why performance marketing only reaches people who are ready to buy right now
✔ The difference between short-term sales activity and long-term brand building
✔ Why you cannot scale forever by only selling to your existing demand
✔ How brand marketing keeps you top of mind for future customers
✔ Why balancing performance marketing and brand marketing supports long-term growth
✔ Examples of performance marketing, including ads, retargeting, sales emails, and lead magnets
✔ Examples of future demand marketing, including podcasts, founder stories, customer stories, educational content, and community building
✔ Why emotional, memorable content helps people remember your brand
✔ How customer stories can build trust when your audience is not ready to buy yet
✔ Why only showing up when you are selling can weaken your results
✔ How to audit your marketing and see whether you are over-relying on performance content
✔ Why your future customers need to hear from you before they are ready to purchase

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:11

Welcome back to Marketing Sucks. I'm your host, Amanda Casinho.

SPEAKER_01 0:18

And I'm your co-host, Phil Ginther.

SPEAKER_00 0:20

And what sucks today, Mr. Ginther?

SPEAKER_01 0:22

What sucks is thinking that performance marketing alone is gonna do everything you need it to do.

SPEAKER_00 0:30

Alright, so for the people that don't know what the hell you're talking about, what is performance marketing and why are we talking about it today?

SPEAKER_01 0:37

Okay, well, the reason we're talking about performance marketing, and not only performance marketing, is that a few weeks ago we got to see James Herman speak in Toronto. And so for anyone who doesn't know who James is, he's what we would call an effectiveness icon. So he's somebody who's won over 50 advertising effectiveness awards in his career. And he recently wrote a book called Future Demand. And basically, this book, the whole the whole purpose of the book is to kind of separate your marketing into two buckets. One being performance marketing, paid media, you know, get the clicks, get the buys, and then also brand marketing. And how, you know, we kind of have this idea now that performance marketing is where it's at, and that's what's going to drive growth and scaling your business. But the truth is actually doing a combination of brand marketing and performance marketing is what's best long term. If you're picking up what I'm putting down.

SPEAKER_00 1:33

Yeah, I mean, so watching him live was interesting for me because it's like everything I've been saying or have said and believe in, anyways. So it was really nice to see somebody in the field. Yeah, validating it, who's won many awards because of this. And so what we're gonna do is we're gonna actually break it down for you. And so when we think about performance marketing, I want you to think about people who like performance marketing is for people who are ready to buy, like they're they're actively searching for the thing that you are providing a solution for. Correct. Correct. Future demand marketing is more about the the future person you didn't even know existed that would want your services one day. So it's keeping you top of mind so that once they are searching for it actively, then they have already grown to trust you and know you, so they'll buy from you faster.

SPEAKER_01 2:43

Yeah, yeah. I think like the if I was to like summarize his book in a single line, it'd be like, you can't scale forever only selling to people who are already ready to buy.

SPEAKER_00 2:54

Yeah, I got it. I had a hair on my lip. Sorry, that entire time you were talking, I can like feel it. And so if you're watching this on YouTube, like you can you will see it. Okay. So if we make it like even simpler, performance marketing is like the cash register, and the future demand marketing is the reason people walk into your store in the first place. Okay. Or we can look at it as performance marketing is the link in your bio for them to purchase, but the brand marketing is the reason they see you on social or wherever you are and actually like choose to follow you and consume your content.

SPEAKER_01 3:36

Simple enough. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:37

Because I feel like sometimes the big words can make people just like tune the fuck out. And so if we make it, you know me, I love a good analogy. So just for me, it's like it's that's how I differentiate the two. Like one is about the immediate sales, where the next one is actually like the future is more about obviously that future purchaser, not necessarily who's buying today, tomorrow, or even next month. This could be somebody who's purchasing a year from now. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:02

So who currently exists today versus versus who's gonna exist in the future.

SPEAKER_00 4:07

So if we think about like the pattern in which like a business launches something or a business does business, right? We are looking at something launches, right? New company, we're good. We've got our website, we've got our social, and we're here. Hello world. Then it'll be the early buyers, right? So this company has an idea, the they have the people that want to buy it. So you have those early adopters, those early buyers, and it grows quickly, right? Because you have all these purchases. Then what will end up happening is if you haven't done future demand marketing, you it starts to dry up. So the the sales decrease, ads aren't performing as well, and your growth starts to slow down.

SPEAKER_01 4:56

Yeah, it's it stagnates. And it it's interesting because there are a bunch of charts on this presentation that he did. But the the one that I thought was really interesting to me was they they took like massive brands and they basically looked at how much they were spending on their own brand marketing versus performance marketing. And every time one outweighed the other, we saw that the sales go down. Yeah. But when it was like a 50-50 split, long-term growth always occurred.

SPEAKER_00 5:24

Yeah, exactly. So we're basically what we have to look at is what you kind of said in the beginning, which is like you can't scale forever with just people who are ready to purchase today, right? So like that's gonna dry up. Like the well will dry. So we need to always be constantly marketing to that future customer. And that can be really deterring for most business owners because they're not gonna see the return on what's happening now. That marketing. Like you're not gonna see the return instantly. You're going to and you, you're and you may not even be able to track it, to be honest, right? But I think about brands that do a really good job of this. And when I am ready to purchase, they're top of mind for me. So I'm gonna actually go and like Google them directly or go on social media and find them instantly versus having to research a bunch of stuff, right? So that brand awareness or that future demand marketing is really key for people who have a general interest in what you are doing or what you're selling. They're just not ready to buy yet, right? So he used a good example, like the cell phone, right? Like hat like when Apple is like releasing something, they're not it's not always about the person that's like currently looking for the phone. It's you know, for the five years from now or two years from now when you're like looking for the newest model. Like, what are you going to?

SPEAKER_01 6:44

What are the so we asked who's willing, who's in the market to buy a cell phone in the next like month? And like I think there were like seven people in the entire auditorium that put up their hands. He's like, What about the next three to five years? And everyone's exactly hand went up. Yeah. And it was just a it was a great and simple demonstration of the point he was making.

SPEAKER_00 7:01

So when we're looking at, you know, an audience that's not ready, like how do we engage with them then? Like, what would you say?

SPEAKER_01 7:09

Okay, this is another example he gave, and it was my it was actually my my favorite moment on the presentation. It was that that Volvo commercial truck, Jean-Claude Van Damme ad from years ago, where he's doing the splits between between the two trucks. So he lets this thing play. We all know what it is. He's doing the splits, the trucks are going in reverse, they're talking about their driving systems. And then when the video ends, he's like, Okay, how many of you are in the market for a commercial truck? And and everyone laughs, right? Because obviously no one there needs to be buying a commercial truck. But then he's like, let's look at what happens a year after this went to air.

SPEAKER_00 7:44

Right.

SPEAKER_01 7:45

And you just saw this like skyrocket in commercial truck sales, but it you wouldn't make that connection. Like, you know, it was more of a stunt, but it was emotional. You remembered it, it was entertaining. And I think a lot of that has become undervalued now because we're so like metric obsessed. Like we can measure this, we can measure this, therefore it's the it's the way to go.

SPEAKER_00 8:08

Yeah. So, you know me, I like a good practical episode. So I want to give you guys examples of what future demand marketing could be, and then you know, examples of what like your existing demand or like the performance, you know, marketing looks like. So performance marketing is exactly what it sounds like, right? So Google ads, like meta ads, chat GPT ads, whatever you're looking at, retargeting campaigns, promotional emails, like buy now type of email, sales calls, like actually selling and closing, the book now posts on social media, or you know, click here, blah, blah, blah, all that stuff, lead magnets, but like lead magnets in the sense of somebody's like actually getting something that they're looking for immediately in that moment, not like a lead magnet to like a newsletter or something like that. So that's really what those like like actual right now people are buying. This is what we are marketing with. When we look at future demand examples, this is like podcast episodes. Okay. It's that idea of thought leadership and content around thought leadership, whether that's blog posts or email content or again, podcast episodes or social content, founder stories, like the storytelling aspect, the emotional component to the brand, I guess, like what's the word I'm looking for? Like the brand like evolution, right? Educational content. Like a lot of times, you know, we say like we can't just post educational content. Like there has to be a mix of all of this, but the educational content, if it's truly actually a value, it's actually teaching something, it's something tangible they can take away with if you're like a service provider, then this is for your future buyers. Yeah, right. Community building, like what are you doing out in your communities? Like a lot of times, you know, people meet companies like at events or as vendors or whatever it is, and they may not buy on the spot, but they possibly actually just remember how kind you were or how informative you were, how helpful you were, and then it leads them to come back to your brand because you left a lasting impression on them.

SPEAKER_01 10:26

Okay. So I I know that this is a quote that gets uh misattributed to, but it it's basically people won't remember exactly what you say to them, but they'll remember the way you made them feel. I swear that was on one of his opening slides. And I can never remember who it's actually attributed to.

SPEAKER_00 10:45

I think it's Maya Angelou.

SPEAKER_01 10:48

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 10:49

Can we just look it up?

SPEAKER_01 10:50

You want to do it right now?

SPEAKER_00 10:50

Yeah, I'm gonna keep talking. I'm gonna Google.

SPEAKER_01 10:53

Right. Well, should I count down how many seconds it takes to confirm this? But the point being, you know, we're yeah, Maya Angelou.

SPEAKER_00 11:01

Okay. I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

SPEAKER_01 11:05

It's true, and that that's why advertising that is like hilarious or like you know, it tugs at heartstrings, like it it sits with you because you respond to it and that feeling comes flooding back.

SPEAKER_00 11:16

It also goes the opposite way when you leave somebody feeling like shit, they're not going to want to recommend you or come back to you and like leave you. Yeah, so like you know, it goes both ways. But yes, yeah, a hundred percent. So it's like, you know, how like the more examples, right? Is like content that is memorable. How is it memorable though, right? Like, how did you connect with the audience? How did you make them feel? How did they leave with that piece? And then on top of that, like can we use our customer stories to also weave that in so that maybe they don't remember your story? Maybe your story isn't unique. Sometimes founder stories, I mean, I think all founder stories are interesting. Everybody has a story to tell. But maybe you don't think that you have like this like amazing story. Maybe it is just like, I don't know, I just had an idea, it was successful overnight, and here we are. So if that's the case and it's not interesting, or you're not good on camera, or you're not willing to share certain things. Maybe it's very private and personal and you're not ready to do that. Use your customer stories. Like a lot of times, you know, if you're selling a product specifically or a service that is changing people's lives, tell the stories of the life changes. Like that's what resonates with people. That's what connects people, that vulnerability piece. And that's the real like future demand stuff, right? It's the thing that's just like that ping, oh yeah, there was that company that sold the thing that made this person. Did you hear the story of this or that? And like it's really going back to like day old age of just sharing stories and sharing experiences that we forget about. And it's, you know, it's even talking about that that girl, I forget her name. I think it's Jenny Jean or whatever. I think by the time this airs, this will already be like a fart in the wind, and nobody will be talking about it anymore. But she did, yeah, you like that one, right? The fart in the wind. I saw your face. It's a poof. It's she, you know, she did a $1.2 million launch in 13 days.

SPEAKER_01 13:12

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

And there's two camps right now, right? There's the camp of like this is amazing, and da-da-da-da, and like everybody dissecting what she did. And then there's the other camp of like, like, oh, it's just like another person online, like people shitting on her, which is awful. Like, those people, I'm like, you're just jealous you didn't have the fucking idea. I'm like, you're just jealous you didn't have the idea first, or the balls to do it. And really, all she did was she took, which is really interesting. She she just she did the thing that she's gonna teach others to do. It's like the I think it's called something yap, like the yap challenge or something. So all she did was talk to camera for months on end and then realized, oh, this is something I could teach. Oh, this is something I could be profitable off of. And she didn't wait to like make everything perfect. She had all of her things in place, and then she basically did wait list. She was she was doing this content for months. She waited to see, like, okay, is there demand here? So she tested that. And again, that wasn't like buy instantly. I think she started her wait list like three months before it actually went live.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

W which I mean it's still very fast.

SPEAKER_00 14:17

Like, yeah, but for some people, like that, like when I when I try and do like recommend people like do a wait list, they're very against wait lists. And I'm like, oh, okay, that's they want to know now.

SPEAKER_01 14:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:28

So that's fine. But this person did a wait list, and then she created that demand, that future demand. Like they weren't buying then, they were buying three months from then, and then she opened up her cart and she only had 13 days. She created scarcity of like, this is like it's gonna close. Like, you can't just keep buying this. This is a challenge for a week, and and it worked. It was, I would consider it a low-ticket offer. I think she sold it for under 300. And I'm like, and it worked, and she made 1.2 fucking million dollars. Good for her life changing. But what she did there was she did the thing that she was teaching, she showed people how it was done. She literally lived it, breathed it, did it, and wasn't like apologizing for showing up poorly or well. She, I think I watched a video of her where she just said I like she just gave herself permission to suck online. And I was like, what a beautiful way of saying that, right? Like, I'm just gonna give myself permission to suck. And it's a lot of what we tell people like, listen, it's never gonna be perfect. Yeah, and if you're waiting for it to be perfect, then you know your payday is never gonna come.

SPEAKER_01 15:29

I saw, yeah, what was this quote I saw last week? It it's cringe until you're smashing million dollar months.

SPEAKER_00 15:35

Of course it is, of course it's it's it's fucking it's cringe. Sometimes I have to like re-watch my stories because like the load time is stupid, and I have to listen to myself and I'm like, oh my god. But then like those are the stories where I get so many DMs from it, and I get like all this feedback, and great, and I use it for future content and all the things, and it's great. But yeah, of course it's gonna be cringy, and and people are gonna judge you.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

Yeah, I mean, that's anything, and and it is what it is.

SPEAKER_00 16:03

So the the lesson from this girl and and this woman is that just do the thing, create the future demand, see what people are needing, listen to your people and start posting about that, start running ads against that if you have if you want to. I don't even think you need ads, to be honest, half the time, depending on the the type of company. But you have to be willing to put that brand awareness like future demand marketing content in whatever like medium it is for you out there, because if you don't, don't expect to see any return. Because there's something to be said about only showing up when you're selling something.

SPEAKER_01 16:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:45

Right. And so a lot of people will be out there marketing that like you don't need to show up every day, you don't need to post everywhere. Yes and no, right? Like you cannot show up for a couple of weeks, but if you're only showing up to sell, if you're only showing up to promote something for yourself, you're not giving anything back. That's not community building, that's just selling. Like, so and and and then what ends up happening in that situation is then your performance marketing also suffers because you're not doing enough of the other. So, just like you said with the research, we have to have an equal balance of that brand building marketing and then the performance-based marketing. If you don't do that, then one side will suffer. So the brand's gonna suffer overall because there's not gonna be any trust there, or your performance is gonna suffer because there isn't any trust there.

SPEAKER_01 17:39

Yeah, you can't you can't continuously be harvesting. You have to be investing in other areas. Yeah. And it seems so obvious to us, but we're just, I feel like there's this false expectation that we're like, oh well, performance marketing will do all the jobs. Yes. And and I mean, we talked about the role of of different types of marketing, and performance has, you know, one very specific role. It's not gonna do everything for you.

SPEAKER_00 18:03

Exactly. Okay, so some action items today. We're keeping it short for you. So action items are go and analyze all the places where you have marketing. So if it's email, social, ads, your website, all the things. And I want you to take a look and and make a little tally. How much of this is performance, how much of this is for my future customer?

SPEAKER_01 18:24

Column A, column B.

SPEAKER_00 18:25

Column A, column B, and write it down and then look at what is the split, right? And if one is weighing heavier than the other, how can we make you know changes towards making a little bit more content that isn't performance, or maybe you're actually lacking in the performance content. And by content, I mean anything, right? It could be any way in which you are marketing yourself. So I think do that first. Do that first, come back, listen to a couple more episodes. We're gonna be talking more about email and you know, Q4 planning and what to do and how to do that in the next couple of episodes over the summer. So stay tuned. But number one, audit your shit. You nobody does this enough.

SPEAKER_01 19:03

Constantly audit.

SPEAKER_00 19:04

Because your answer to all of your problems is in that audit. Promise that. All right.

SPEAKER_01 19:10

I agree.

SPEAKER_00 19:10

Is that it?

SPEAKER_01 19:11

That's it.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

Okay. Until next time. Thanks for listening. Thanks for watching, wherever you are in the Marketing Sucks Land, and we'll see you next week. Bye.

SPEAKER_01 19:20

Bye.