How you market your products will determine how successful they are. It’s a sad fact, but the quality of the product is often irrelevant, or at least significantly less important than the quality and effectiveness of the marketing strategies used to promote it. We have seen this employed hundreds of thousands of times (anyone remember the “Swiffer”, which was little more than a glorified duster).

When it comes down to promotion, there are dozens of different marketing strategies and promotional techniques that can be used to get your product the attention of the buying public. The Rich Jerk used one type of marketing, anti-marketing, to amazing results. For nearly two years just about every popular website had a Rich Jerk advertisement on it, and they were easy to point out.
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Before I get into the core of this article, I’d like to point out that I am in no way affiliated with the Rich Jerk. In fact, I’m not even going to link to the Rich Jerk’s websites, and I’m not going to place a hoplink either.

As well, I’m not going to get into the ethical questions regarding the Rich Jerk’s products, as that’s not the purpose of this case study. Instead, I’m going to focus on the brand and the marketing behind it.

I’m going to refer to the Rich Jerk’s owners and umbrella company as simply “the Rich Jerk” for simplicty’s sake.

Intrduction
Marketing a product to a level where it attains god-like status isn’t easy. Though there have been many products that have accomplished this (Microsoft Windows), the method of getting there is often wrought with challenges and tribulations. It isn’t easy, but it can be rewarding in both a financial and professional sense.
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