By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
When Greg Rich was a kid he got lessons in math, history, and civics from “Schoolhouse Rock.” Now the BGSU professor of marketing and a singer-songwriter, Rich is using his own songs to teach the basics of marketing to college students. The result is the CD “The 4 P’s of Marketing.”
Rich, who is also a singer-songwriter, has over the years occasionally interjected songs into his classes. “For a long time, I had the idea of writing a set of marketing songs. I didn’t really tackle it until last spring.”
He was teaching an Introduction to Marketing virtually. Online courses, he said, can be “boring,” watching a video gets dry after a while. So, he set for himself the task of writing a song a week to go along with each chapter. Two, “Benefits of Branding” and “Bases of Segmentation,” were already composed.
For others he’d find himself bumping up against a deadline to get that week’s song done. “There’s something about a looming deadline that motivates you in mysterious ways,” Rich said.
In spring, he would just pick up his guitar and perform the song.
“It’s a fun thing and I’m hoping students become more engaged in the content,” Rich said. People learn in a variety of ways – many find it easy to memorize lyrics.
Students, he said, reacted “very positively.”
In summer, Rich traveled to Nashville to record the marketing anthems. He worked with Mark Robinson who produced the album and contributed guitar, banjo, steel guitar and other instruments. Also on the session were Nashville studio musicians Josh McEwen on percussion and Daniel Seymour on bass.
Robinson and Rich have known each other for a long time. Robinson was Rich’s first guitar teacher when they were both living in Indiana.
That was about the time Rich started playing guitar and writing songs. When he was a sophomore at the University of Indiana in Bloomington, he got a guitar of a present. He was inspired by his older brother to start on guitar. Previously he’d played saxophone in school band.
He’s been writing songs since then. “It’s just a hobby,” he said.
“The 4 P’s of Marketing” is his third collection. “I like writing songs that hang together,” Rich said. His first “Winds of Bowling Green,” was about raising his family here. His second was “Cancer Survivor” about, well, surviving cancer.
Over the course of 15 songs, Rich and the Nashville musicians mixed up the colors and grooves. The most distinctive he said is “Loss Leader Now,” done as they were wrapping up the recording. It’s based on a Bob Dylan song from Blood on the Tracks,” in terms of the chord progression and structure of the lyric.
The song was inspired by a trip to the grocery store to buy one item, and instead busting his budget.
Other songs deal with the marketing principles – product, promotion, product, and price.
One song, “Objections Should be Welcome,” about people who it hard to sell to and “Loyal Customers’ explain the value of both kind of people. “The Promotion Mix” features the saxophone sound of Mike Williams, a former student. While getting his MBA, Williams was a student in a course taught by Rich.
Rich is teaching the class again this semester, the first time face-to-face, and plans to have a video of each of the songs. Most are already posted on his YouTube channel Greg Rich Music.
And given the importance of social media in marketing, he’ll get students in the act and ask them to post TikTok videos on those marketing principles.
Rich is part of a vibrant songwriting scene in Bowling Green. He’s performed at various venues around town, including playing the marketing songs at this year’s Black Swamp Arts Festival.
He praised Tim Concannon’s efforts at Hump Day Revue, Wednesdays at Stone’s Throw in downtown Bowling Green, for providing a showcase and gathering place for local songwriters where they can share their work with others. “He brought it out of the woodwork.”
Rich loves the process of songwriting. “It’s still a thrill when a song comes together.”
