The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing: Are they still Immutable?

Here is an interesting quote from a recent Nielsen Global Online Consumer Survey :
"Recommendations by personal acquaintances and opinions posted by consumers online are the most trusted forms of advertising globally. The Nielsen survey shows that 90% of online consumers worldwide trust recommendations from people they know, while 70% trust consumer opinions posted online."

Wow! Trusting recommendations from people you know doesn’t surprise me. However, the percentage of consumers who now trust recommendations from people they don’t know and have never even met is pretty staggering!

I know this may sound like a cliché, but we really DO live in a new world. Brand loyalty and corporate reputations can both be built or destroyed across the globe with the touch of a mouse. Some businesses might look at this an extremely dangerous paradigm. However, to smart businesses, interactive global communications makes goal setting a whole lot easier. Focus on product quality, value, customer service and transparency. Do these well and your odds of succeeding improve substantially. Do these poorly and your reputation will be smeared around the world faster than you can cash an unemployment check.

This morning a colleague shared with me the philosophy of another marketer with whom we do business. He said that good companies cannot succeed with an average product regardless of how much money they invest in marketing. My immediate response was “This is certainly true, but hardly enlightening”. However, his comments led me to go back and reread The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing.  Remember that book by Ries & Trout? For years it served as the marketing bible!

According to the book, the first law of marketing is “Better to be first then to be better”. I found myself reading this law over and over again. After eyeballing the statistics above on consumer recommendations, I couldn’t help but question whether or not law #1 still holds true. In 1993, to be the first to launch a new product meant you were likely to control the market for years to come, regardless of whether a competitor launched a better product just months after you. However, that was before consumers could so easily influence one another so quickly, and in such large quantities, through the internet. Social media, didn’t exist (in digital form anyway) when the 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing was first published sixteen years ago. And I certainly don’t believe the authors could foresee how technology would soon have such an enormous impact on consumer behavior. As a result of these technological innovations, it appears that “first” and “better” may be showing signs of balancing out on the scale of marketing laws.
So in today’s value based economy, combined with instant global communication; is being first still more important than being better?? With just a bit of tentativeness, I have to say “yes”, but certainly “better” is gaining ground.
Anyway, I could go through my opinions on all 22 of Ries & Trout’s Immutable Laws of Marketing, but I’d love to know what you think. Which laws still hold true today? Which ones are outdated? And do you think any new laws should be added to the list?
And for those of you with supervisors who still don’t believe in the power of social media…share the statistics above when you’re developing your next strategic marketing plan. I can’t think of a more powerful argument to support your case.