Categorizing Categories

Based on the table below, we can categories our categories into three groups.

• Givers.
• Neutral.
• Takers.

You want Givers/Neutral categories. You want to de-emphasize Takers.

Here's the table.

There are ten obvious Giver categories.

• 2 / 3 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 12 / 13 / 14 / 17.

There are a handful of Neutral categories.

• 0 / 4 / 10 / 14.

There are a few Taker categories.

• 1 / 5 / 11 / 16 with 11 being an egregious Taker!

The email marketer tells stories about anything not in the Taker category.

The social marketer can do "something" with Taker categories, but not much. If you have to promote Taker categories, do so with channels that have essentially no variable cost ... like oraganic social.

The search marketer adjusts spend based on Giver / Neutral / Taker ... spending more on Giver categories, spending less on Taker categories.

The catalog marketer? You won't do this, but you cannot put Neutral / Taker categories in your catalog. Maybe just the winning items in those categories, that's enough. Those pages are TOO DARN EXPENSIVE to cause harm to your existing customer base. If you disagree (and you will disagree), talk to the paper / printing / postage / boutique agency folks and demand they align the expense structure of the discipline back to 2006 levels.

Alright, I'm off the soapbox.

Next week, we'll put all of this category stuff into perspective.