by Bryan Boettger, Chief Creative Officer

Anyone that knows me knows I’m a big Clint Eastwood fan. By far, a favorite movie quote of mine is from Magnum Force: “A man’s got to know his limitations.” It’s an important quote in marketing because a brand has to both stretch its potential and also know its limitations. I love to push clients to try new things and take a chance, but you also have to be realistic about who/what your brand is, who your clients are and the perception equation between the two.

As an example, iTunes has the soundtrack for The Hangover (Yes, the quality movie where Ed Helms loses his tooth and a baby is found in a closet) available for sale — But, only for sale as a complete album. Consumers cannot purchase individual songs.

Apple knows the limitations of this soundtrack. Frankly, it’s not that good. But, it has some quality tracks on it from the movie. Songs custom from the movie that you can’t get anywhere else. Chances are fans of the movie will go ahead and drop the $9.99 to get the full album. However, if the individual tracks were available, it’s virtually guaranteed those same fans would only buy a couple tracks.

That’s smart marketing due to knowing the limitations of the product. Ideally, if you recognize the limitations, you try to better the product. If that’s not an option though, a business needs to make the best with what they have and not fool themselves by putting on blinders about their product(s). In the end, working with your limitations is always better than ignoring them.

Bryan Boettger Bryan is Chief Creative Officer at The Buddy Group. He enjoys hikes along the shoreline, discussions about photo composition and holding hands with his favorite font (which he can't tell you or else the other fonts will get jealous). Follow him on Twitter @bboettger.

This post is the author's opinion and not necessarily that of The Buddy Group™ (unless it's about ice cream - they never disagree about that).