Apply the Forces of Physics to Your Marketing

At first glance, physics may seem like the last field of study that would have parallels in marketing, but former Google marketing director Dan Cobley sees the similarities.

Now operating his own financial technology start-up, Cobley’s first degree was in physics, and his 2010 TED talk explained how four physics concepts directly apply to the field of marketing.

Learn how:

• A brand's "mass" determines the amount of force needed to change direction,

• Observation changes the very thing being observed (in our case, consumer behavior),

• It takes only one point of data to disprove a hypothesis (or disaster to destroy a brand), and

• Disorder of a system will always increase...including loss of control of your brand.

What do you think? Is marketing more art or science? Tell us about lessons you’ve learned from other fields that have influenced your approach to marketing.

One way of applying science to marketing is to test marketing elements and analyze the results. Download our Introduction to A/B Testing ebook for a primer on using split test to improve results.