Marketing-Fix: 100-Words-On

Who’d market a product that:
“Tastes lousy! And is more filling!”?

It’s dating ourselves, but maybe Orson Wells for Paul Masson was right:  “Sell no wine before it’s time.”

What’s the obsession about rushing products to market before they’re ready?

Experts suggest: you’ve got to grab first mover advantage, defend market share or leverage an installed base.

All rationales provided for the Blackberry PlayBook – just one of many Apple iPad ‘clones.’  Universally, it’s been panned as: slower, heavier, clunkier and more limited than the iPad.

Another “Blackberry dud” many have called it.  They then lament continuing lose of share to Android devices, no new Blackberry operating system and a ‘losing management team’. OUCH!

It’s not true that all publicity is good. Recovering from a fumble is much harder than catching the leader with a better mousetrap.

Do yourself and your customers a favor – take the time to do it right!

We’ve quoted it often:

“Give them what they want and when they want it.  That’s how you keep them satisfied.”
—Waller and Schell

Facebook, Twitter and similar social sites focus on community and connecting. So, many worry that selling here risks violating a social contract that says: we’re just ‘friends.’

Still, many of us ponder how to make direct marketing work in these environments.

Quidsi’s – soap.com / diapers.com – Facebook app offers a brilliantly simple solution:

Current customers can purchase directly from their ‘My List’ without leaving Facebook. And wouldn’t many soap.com purchases be ‘re-fills?’

Seems real simple and widely applicable. Why not start with:

• What do you most want from your customers?

• What do they most want and expect from you?

• What do you do to deliver on their expectations – simply, quickly and cost-effectively?

There’s no need to make things complicated – or grab every sale.  Why build a jet fighter if a kite will do the job?

“Whoever is winning
at that moment
will always seem invincible”
-George Orwell

Business coach and sage, Roy Friedman re-introduced us to Appreciative Inquiry.  This encourages success by looking at strengths and maximizing them, instead of ‘fixing’ problems. This reminded us to:

Look inward: Nordstrom leveraged their great service tradition and now offers customers real-time access to inventory across all channels.

Look outward: Apple surveyed the failed tablet computer landscape and believed in the potential.  Applying their unmatched skill at intuitive user-interfaces—voila, the i-Pad!

Look out: while Google stumbled with the Google phone, by making the Android operating system available to all, they’ve surpassed both Apple and RIM/Blackberry in ‘smart phone’ market share—in six months.

There’s never time rest on your laurels.

When the going gets tough—innovate.  But why wait?

First, New Coke

Then, New Tropicana

Now, the New O, The Oprah Magazine

Business people tire of our products and marketing campaigns long before the consumer does. It’s natural—we live with them everyday.

There’s an urge to shake things up—or start over—at the slightest hint of staleness.

We’d suggest: proceed with caution. And, ask a few pointed questions:

• What do we represent to our customers? Have we really ‘drifted’ from delivering what we do best for them—or not?

• Do our product offerings remain relevant? There’s no need to ‘retire’ things before their time.  Remember, many people resist change.

• Does our marketing reinforce our brand image? To us, BMW delivering ‘the ultimate driving machine’ will always trump BMW ‘delivering joy.’

• Do our changes make sense—or just make work? Years later KFC is still just Kentucky Fried Chicken with a shorter name.

“Not even our friends wanted to come and watch us dance.”
–Rasta Thomas,
classically trained dancer

In under three years Rasta Thomas has done ‘the impossible’: creating an internationally-acclaimed, self-supporting dance company revered by 18-34 year olds.

Yes fellow marketers, 18-34 year olds into dance theater.  How?

Mozart—out                U2—in
Tights—out                 Tee-shirts—in
Scenery—out               Multimedia—in

Most importantly:

Willowy girls—out       Humpy boys—in

As Rasta explains: women love dance.  They want to see guys.  They’ll drag their boyfriends.

So, does this apply to the ‘real world’?

Absolutely:

Identify your customers and what they want—before writing that 16 page product description.

Create differences that benefit target customers—give ‘em what they want and when they want it.

Deliver in ways that delight and exceed expectations—who wouldn’t want to see: The Bad Boys of Dance?

“Wow–customer ratings in real-time.”

“Whoa–it’s $20 cheaper at Amazon.com”

Integrating physical stores–and places like hotels and museums–with web-based information via smart phones is being presented as a “revolution” for retailers as diverse as Target and Norma Kamali.

We see the appeal.  Customers can access information, locate products or purchase instantly.  Retailers get deep analytics and improved customer-service relationships, cost-effectively.

Does this change everything–or is it just a new “cool tool”?

The best retailers–from Anthropologie to Zara–work overtime creating unique, multi-dimensional experiences that customers love, identify with and return to repeatedly.

Beyond obvious downsides–including privacy issues, and electronic glitches, remember: the same technology also lets us point, click and possibly find the same product at a better price elsewhere (check out RedLaser.com).  Then, we’re outta there.

We suggest: differentiating, differentiating and then differentiating some more.

$500,000
is the New
$1,000,000

-Lisa Spellman
303 Gallery

Extreme, but this did make us wonder, particularly as consumer confidence dips to a 28 year low:

How do businesses adapt to seismic changes without diluting their brand’s DNA?

Embracing one “big” idea appeals. But pitfalls abound with popular strategies:

Slashing prices to improve short-term results. What happens after customers experience “luxury for less”?  Once Lucky’s $200 “premium denim” is $98, “luxury” may lack credibility there indefinitely.

Rushing “me-too” products to protect market share or exploit hot niches. Tried-and-true, but prone to backfiring if features or functionality are missing—think of Microsoft’s Zune music player.

Increasing marketing to buy share. Bold, but alienating if efforts don’t synch with the times.  Chanel advertising logo-emblazoned $4,500 boots, cringe-making.

Less sexy, but addressing and adapting all business aspects surgically can produce results without gutting your brand. Examples from H-P to Lululemon seem apt.

Stores–RIP 2000

Mail—RIP 2005

Phones—RIP 2008

Jumping on new technologies, embracing the demise of existing marketing choices and pronouncing them dead when they’re very much alive makes a great sound bite.

This can lead to overlooking opportunities to integrate existing sales channels with new ones and optimize business. It’s not sexy, but it works.  Consider these examples:

This fall will see more temporary “pop-up” retail stores than ever—with brands from Gap to Gucci using them for buzz.

J. Crew, Williams-Sonoma and others are returning to catalogues getting and engaging customers cost-effectively, while still driving sale to web or retail.

Say Now has tweaked voicemail, yes voicemail, to enable celebrities to interact “personally” with over 10 million fans per month.

Maybe it’s not too late to consider: calling, clicking and visiting.

Call
Click
Visit

Whenever we have a marginal customer experience–and it’s still often–we wonder:  Does this company truly want my business?  Is management seeing things through customers eyes?  Has anyone called, clicked or visited lately–unannounced?

Calling: Is automated routing the right way to start?  Cost-effective, but most of us hate it.  Where are better customers routed–best reps, randomly, to overflow call centers?   Do you have to give the same information multiple times?  Kudos to United for pre-empting the process with reverse look-up and Delta for bringing call centers back on shore.

Clicking: Does your navigation make intuitive sense?  Does your help or search function return meaningful results?  Do you ask customers for information you don’t really need before checkout?  Even Apple’s help for i-Life suite could use improvement.

Visiting:  How does the facility look–fresh, neat, bright?  Start with the parking lot.  You’d never enter K Mart based on exterior maintenance.  Do associates greet you–and how?  How are stock levels–from literature to merchandise?  Consider Target and Wal-Mart.  Target may win for style but to know that the product’s in stock head to Wal-Mart.

It seems basic, but executing on the front line builds loyalty, which is a good investment in bad times.

“I ordered teal, not turquoise–twice.

“Non-refundable?  No one told me.”

“These apples don’t taste organic.”

Let’s admit it: we probably don’t want 5% of our customers.

They abuse returns, contest charges, waste associates’ time and so on.

It’s tempting to focus on punishing these “bad apples” to try to improve short-term results.

Don’t do it!  You’re putting good customers last, and encouraging the 95% to look elsewhere.

Instead, why not learn from the bad and innovate to improve good customer relationships?

We’d consider using better service, low-cost perks, targeted messages and increased contacts as retention tactics.

Increasing customer retention by a few points can augment profits 25% to 95%, which helps make those bad apples less rotten.