The other day I attended an excellent webinar by Grant Leboff named What the Sex Pistols Can Teach You About Marketing. That’s right – The Sex Pistols. Johnny Rotten, Steve Jones, Paul Cook, Glen Matlock, and his replacement Sid Vicious. As a fan of the group, whenever “Anarchy in the UK” is on the airwaves I test my car stereo’s volume limits. And with such an intriguing title to a webinar, I just had to join!

Marketing lessons from bands always pique my curiosity. I wrote a  blog post to express my thoughts on the excellent book Marketing Lessons From The Grateful Dead, and was positively stoked to attend this webinar. San Francisco’s jam-happy Dead can be considered the antithesis to London’s loud and fast Pistols. But both bands have much to teach marketers.

Consider the Sex Pistols. The group was put together by Malcolm McLaren, a British entrepreneur who had advised punk progenitors The New York Dolls. McLaren also owned a clothing store in London, and the band members were habitues of the store. Although the band was of limited musical competence, their career lasted less than three years, and their catalog consisted of one proper album, we are still talking about them more than 35 years after they disbanded during a disastrous US tour.

Why? Mr. Leboff offers a few lessons. First, it is not about the music. Steve Jones of the Sex Pistols responded to a critic during their late 1970s heyday: It has nothing to do with about music at all, you silly cow! Looking back, they were about the total experience of music, fashion, and attitude.

Lessons learned:

• Marketing is not a means to an end. It has to have value. Don’t just market your product or service because you have to; make it a true value to your business.
• Find your influencers. McLaren had connections, and he knew how to open doors. His guidance provided access to the mainstream British media and the underground press that was championing the punk movement.
• Marketing is not about products and services. Marketing is about people. Your customers are more than just account numbers; make your customers your heroes. The Sex Pistols made their fans the hero, which predated social media by decades.
• Marketing is about building communities. Fans of the Sex Pistols were known as the Bromley Contingent (many of the early ones were denizens of this London neighborhood). Fans were eager to spread the word about the band. They gave their time, which is as important as giving of their wallets.
• Capture imagination with an ethos behind your business. What’s your ethos? Back in 1975 (when the Sex Pistols were getting started), Microsoft had the ethos of “a computer on every desk top.” Back then the phrase was two words, and Microsoft helped make the phrase synonymous with the computer. Your ethos informs your value proposition. Steve Jones described the Sex Pistols’ ethos as “we aren’t into music, we’re into chaos.” Disruption, anyone?
• Context is everything. How did a band with very little output, that repeatedly dropped F bombs on live television, and turned sneering into a spectator sport, become so popular? They were disruptive and manipulated the media by thinking like them.

Marketing professionals, think like the media. Make your customer the hero. Don’t be afraid to be disruptive. Perhaps you too can be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (the Pistols were inducted in 2006).