I’m more worried that you’re confusing trends in design aesthetics rather than really having a pulse on marketing. Chipotle (and I assume you’re speaking of the burrito joint) is nothing more that a burrito stand that utilizes new fads in design – rather than do anything unique. If a blind person were to go to Chipotle, vs., say, El Pollo Loco – would there be that significant of a difference in experience?

I would argue that business is at a significant juncture in terms of marketing and how the bureaucracy interfaces with the human. I think we’re on the verge of changing the sales cycle of any good to equal the life cycle of the product in general. New Marketing will be governed by the following equation in my mind:

external marketing + 2(product lifecycle experience) + 2(New PR (fostering word of mouth)) = success

Where success in product lifecycle experience is:

good product + 4(pr towards unhappy customers)

In other words, your marketing is twice as less as important as the sum of all user experience, which is as important as your relationship to your customer community.

The reason for this change is that customer evangelism, thanks to increase in the ability of the average consumer to communicate to a very large audience, will be of foremost important in the future of marketing. In fact, in some respects, we’re already there. My 65 year old Mother-in-Law regularly checks “word of mouth” on Amazon.com for products before she purchases, even if she’s going to drive to Sears to make the actual acquisition.

A fantastic example of this is the recent mp3 player market, with very important lessons to be learned by the releases of the Dell Diddy and iPod Nano.

The failure of the Diddy launch is best related by John Gruber at Daringfireball.com. I won’t repeat his work, only suggest that for the reasons he mentions – Apple’s external marketing beat the living daylights out of Dell’s. Ten years from now everyone will remember the iPod Shuffle or Nano, but very few will fondly recall their Dell Diddy.

However, Apple is very close to screwing it up. There has been a large vocal contingent online expressing dissatisfaction with the robustness of the display on the Nano. The Nano got off to very positive independent review. It seems fairly indestructible, first independent tests by Ars Technica made out the Nano to be indestructible, it continued to play even when run over (twice) by a car. But the display of the Nano seems less incredible. Apple’s response to the issue was to “acknowledge” an issue that affects a very small percentage of their user population. Basically, even if Apple is understating the Nano issue by a factor of 4 – the “defects” are well within traditional metrics. In fact, “Google” (if you allow me to use that word as a verb) iPod Nano. Nevermind that the sales and buzz have made the product a remarkable success. The screen issue that Apple states effects 1/10 of 1% of purchases is all over. The Nano product will no longer conquer the world – even once Apple changes the product to have a new, indestructible screen, the consumer’s mind will be made up. People will remember the iPod Nano, but maybe in the way that they remember the Newton.

The most successful marketing of the next 10 years will be executed by those who harness the new consumer democracy. If there’s any “Internet Theory” that anthropology can make at this point – it’s that there’s always going to be some freak who will tie his time and effort to something, no matter how obscure or inconsequential (don’t take this negatively, but this blog could be an example). This will be of no small consequence to branding…

Customer Evangelists, getting everyone to drink the Kool-aid, will begin to contribute more significantly to sales than many other traditional marketing concepts, like “impressions”.

To their (dis)credit Microsoft is already trying to “Astroturf” this New PR.

Business, in my mind, must find a way to rapidly, effectively handle public opinion or else suffer obscurity or scorn.

One of my maxims is: No special skills or insights are required to lower prices, so competition on price is evidence of a failure of marketing.