If you’re a marketing wonk like me, you’ve seen Chip and Dan Heath, the brothers/authors of Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die in every business magazine known to man. By sheer volume of mentions on the internets, they’re publicity heroes, but they definitely have some sage advice for marketers.
This month’s entry in Fast Company is about companies that successfully give customers something to talk about…like voodoo doll shaped doughnuts that bleed raspberry jelly or smoothies that come with little cozies knitted by actual grannies. 
So what happens when your marketing creativity is diluted by group-think/committee decisions, or your point of differentiation comes from how your service is delivered? The Brothers Heath address some of that in the article:
There is a certain wackiness to Voodoo Doughnuts and Innocent Drinks that is probably unattainable for, say, an accounting firm or an equipment retailer. But wackiness isn’t the only recipe for generating conversation. Take Zipcar, the Boston-based rental-car company designed to serve non-car-owners in big cities. It sprinkles cars around a city so that, with a reservation, you can walk right up to a car on the street, wave your card key at the windshield, and be driving toward the grocery store seconds later. Zipcar customers talk about, of all things, its policies and pricing. The company charges a low hourly rental rate that–gasp!–includes gas and insurance. Zipcar has, honorably, opted out of the Collison Damage Waiver extortion racket. (“Initial here to acknowledge that you’ll go bankrupt if you get in an accident.”)
I never get tired of this type of BS-cutting bravery in marketing. More examples please?
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