Why great products fail and mediocre ones become Bn dollar brands 🤔

In partnership with

Here's something that'll mess with your head: The best product rarely wins. The one with the strongest gravitational pull does.

Today, we're breaking down a theory that explains why some average products become massive successes while brilliant ones die in obscurity. Get ready to rethink everything you know about building brands.

The Marketing Funnel is Dead 💀

You've seen that classic marketing funnel diagram a million times - customers enter at the top, some drop out, others become buyers. There's just one tiny problem:

That's not how anyone actually buys anything 🤐 

The Glossier Gravitational Field

Remember when we talked about Glossier's rise (Read the full story here)? We know when they launched in 2014, there were hundreds of better-established beauty brands with better distribution. But Glossier understood digital gravity.

Instead of fighting for shelf space, they:

• Built a community through Into The Gloss blog

• Created constant social media presence via compelling content

• Turned customers into content creators (UGC over everything!)

• Made their products impossible to ignore online

Result? $200M in revenue without traditional advertising. Not because their products were revolutionary, but because their gravitational pull was impossible to escape.

The Oatly Effect

Remember when Oatly entered the U.S. market? They weren't the first oat milk. They weren't even the best. But their distribution strategy was genius:

• Started in coffee shops, not grocery stores (that’s smart, you see)

• Created viral billboards that sparked discussions

• Built relationships with baristas who became evangelists

• Maintained constant, quirky social media presence

They went from unknown to a $10Bn IPO not because they invented oat milk, but because they made it impossible to not think about oat milk.

The Three Laws of Digital Gravity ⚖️ 

👉️ Surface Area Beats Quality

• A decent product everywhere outperforms a perfect product nowhere

• Volume of touch points matters more than perfection

• Presence creates pressure

👉️ Momentum Compounds

• Each piece of content adds to your gravitational force

• The more mass you have, the easier it becomes to attract more

• Start small, but start everywhere

👉️ Orbit Before Purchase

• No one buys on first contact

• Let them circle your brand naturally

• Focus on building paths back to you

Your 2025 Distribution Playbook 🔖 

1. Be Everywhere That Matters

   Not everywhere possible, just everywhere your customer already is. Remember: Consistency over perfection!

2. Create Return Paths

   Every piece of content should lead somewhere and there have to be multiple ways back to your brand. Make it impossible to forget you.

3. Build Digital Mass

   Start with one platform; Add another every quarter. Let momentum compound.

Until next week..

P.S. Next time you find yourself obsessing over product features, remember: Gravity doesn't care how perfect your product is. It cares how impossible you are to ignore.