Marketing executives often look to books written by military strategists when it comes to describing how to win in the marketplace. It’s a rare CMO who has not heard of Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” or Karl von Clausewitz’s “On War” and quotes from these authors often are used to rally the marketing team in the face of tough competition. But military warfare has changed considerably since those works were written.

Don’t rely on conventional weapons to fight insurgents.

“Capabilities required for conventional success . . . may be of limited utility or even counterproductive in [counterinsurgency] operations.”

After two restaurant employees posted a damaging video online in April 2009, Domino’s could have tried to shut down all employees’ use of social media. Instead, during its busiest sales season in December 2009, it launched a reformulated pizza recipe and marketing campaign — fueled primarily by social media, including feeds sharing what consumers thought of the new pizza. A video documentary, “The Pizza Turnaround,” starring Domino’s employees, was featured prominently on its website and in aggressive media outreach efforts. By mid-2011, the campaign proved to yield sales increases for Domino’s that significantly exceeded those of its major competitors. Because Domino’s countered a social-media gaffe with an organizational strategic change, it fought insurgency to the benefit of its customers and its bottom line.

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