Is your business marketing-proof?
Apple is not “Apple” anymore.
Let that sink in for a second.
One of the most successful brands in the world (allegedly) isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. They report earnings that stretch from here to Saturn and back – with stops at Starbucks, bathroom breaks and day trips to the galaxy’s biggest ball of yarn – yet they fall short of expectations.
You are not Apple
It’s my reply to a ton of would-be FAQs. You dream of ‘failing’ so well. No brand is infallible, above reproach or the slings and arrows of a tough economy or negative customer feedback. And yet, some businesses seem to be.
Netflix. Before they flip flopped on Quikster, they got a lot of crap by alienating customers and investors with confusing strategy and bad PR. Yes they lost subscribers, but 1) it wasn’t as mass an exodus as the hype made it seem and 2) they stood to make more money in the long run.
Dry Cleaners. Liquor Stores. Restaurants. One of my local cleaners is crap, but they have the location so it doesn’t matter. One of my favorite wine stores is on a busy corner, doing fine without even a website to pimp their libations.
- Friend: “Grr…this place always messes up my order, takes too long, whah whine gripe.”
- You: “Then why do you keep coming here?”
- Friend: “It’s close/convenient/cheap.”
Uverse. See also, almost any utility that provides phone or cable or power. The service they provide might be nice, but when they don’t work, their so-called support is an insult to customer disservice abominations.
What does it take to be marketing proof?
- You’re made of Teflon. No amount of bad press, angry tweets or ranty Facebook posts seem to stick. Angry customers don’t scare you, even if they talk more.
- What down economy? You and your ‘too big to fail’ banker are laughing together, as you’re raking in the cash no matter what.
- Is that a problem? No ‘PR crisis‘ – real or imagined – lasts in stakeholders memories more than a nanosecond.
- You’re the only game in town. You’re where customer service goes to die, be reanimated via some hoo doo rituals, tortured then killed again. But there are no alternatives, no Pepsi to your Coke.
- You’re oxygen. You sell toilet paper, food, gas, utilities – the stuff everyone HAS to have; customers are a given.
- You’ve cornered location. “No one beyond a 30-mile radius probably knows [you] exist, and [you're] happy that way,” says Shakirah Dawud on web-proof SMBs who can ignore Yelp and Google.
- You’re the BIG BOX BRAND. Everyone will assume bigger is better, even if it’s not. You might lose one customer with your terrible customer service – and they may tell all their friends – but there’s plenty more where they came from.
No matter what you do or don’t, what’s said or not, your phone is always ringing, your website always clicking, a line of paying customers waiting outside your door. Is this your business? I probably doubt it.
Thoughts on a marketing-proof business, real or mythical?
You’re doing it wrong
“There is no right or wrong way in social media.”
Every so often I see it. I hear it. And my eyeballs roll back in my head, I drink of the wine and sigh.
Madness. Poppycock. Piffle.
- If there was no wrong, there would be no posts about the pitballs of crappy corporate blogging and funny lists of why we don’t follow lame social media gurus. *
- There wouldn’t be an ocean hot water for folks to parboil Kenneth Cole, Groupon, Nestle and a host of others.
- If there was no wrong way, none of us would have jobs. (Maybe I could tweet for Ashton Kutcher, since he’s now doing it wrong – the other way.)
- If there were no bad examples or excellent case studies of the right ways, a lot of gurus, pundits and other leaders wouldn’t be able to sell some books.
Puh-lease. I think some of my bestest, more funnier posts have been rants on the crap people are doing wrong.
It’s me.
I’ll sing you a chorus of “TEHO and we all have different goals, reasons, ambitions for being social.” Fine, whatever moves your furniture. But there are limits, there are many wrongs, including:
- Stealing other peoples work, copying blog posts.
- Taking credit for what’s not yours, i.e. retweeting without attribution.
- Spam link bait crap sucks and I still believe Auto-DMs are of the Devil.
- IMO small businesses need websites, but will grant there are exceptions. It’s wrong to say you must “do” social, have a Facebook page, Twitter or a blog. “Too boring to blog” is b.s., but of course there’s no shortage of poorly written, dull content out there.
FWIW you can flout conventional wisdom and break the Twitter rules, yet still achieve success. But when I see your company’s tweet stream is nothing but “we sell widgets, come see our widgets, which are totally for sale” tweets, then – unless you can come back at me with proof positive of your profitable sales - that’s the wrong way to do it.
If I were to write “my passions,” whatever I wanted – say, make every other blog post a Vampire Diaries recap – I’m sure many would say wrong strategy, bad move for my professional goals. And they’d be right. Unless of course, I was seeking to abandon PR and become a TV critic.
What’s right for me may not be wrong for you. Or something like that. Feel free to tell me I’m wrong.
*ETA: I really thought this list was good, funny; not calling the writer lame or guru. Apologies.
If it’s too loud, I’m too old
Background music is supposed to be that, in the background. But everyone who wants to ‘entertain’ me – ball games, restaurants, cruises, etc. – blares it too loud for my taste.
Guess I am old
I’ve hit the point when I watch games on mute because the sounds of the stadium are too loud. I can’t hear the commentary or really follow the game. You’d think TV producers would learn to turn down the ‘ambient’ background mics when their pundits are blathering.
I just kinda hate ‘noise.’
I turn down the TV during action moments when the sound effects for punches, explosions, car crashes are at eardrum bursting levels. (Then there’s the dialogue I can barely hear and I’m tempted to turn on the closed captioning.)
The “Serenity” deck on the lovely Carnival Dream was anything but. Designed to be outside the spa, alas it is also adjacent to the open lido deck pool and water park. Science lesson: sound travels, even over ‘noise-reducing’ earbuds. This adult only retreat is better on older refurbed ships, where it’s more isolated. And I can hear my music – or nothing except the water and the slurping of my frosty beverage.
WTH does this have to do with marketing or PR?
Many business are too noisy with their marketing and sloppy social media: endless tweet streams, Facebook alerts that never shut up; sinful public relations that hypes the wrong messages or sends off-target pitches shotgun-style; emails polluting our inboxes with spam; and my personal peeve, automated sound or music when I get to the website.
It’s noise pretending to be of value, faking it as ‘content.’
Would you notice if the marketing volume was turned down? Would it make a difference?
Tis the Marketing Season
It’s always the Season for Shopping. That was a good one from the Wall Street Journal, and it’s true: retailers have carved up the year into approximately 13 to 349 buying seasons.
Basically you and your MasterCard get Tax Day and Groundhog Day off from the retailing mania.
Christmas decorations before Halloween?! 
Seriously, that’s bullshit and really annoys me when I hit the stores; see also, playing the music of holiday cheer NON STOP before Thanksgiving. Not to mention as a small business or retailer, you could be leaving money on the table by thinking too far ahead.
Look at your marketing schedule and the promotional calendars to come up with your e-commerce strategies and do what fits you best.
If you sell outdoor living, have fun with Arbor day. For one client, I’ve done tie ins to other events like Super Bowl or Oscar watch. For another, it’s showing how their product is not just a summer item but has year-around uses.
More importantly, think hard about your products, your customers, your business.
Think beyond the holidays.
What can you do ‘THIS’ time that’s different from ‘THAT’ time?
That’s the question to answer as you decide what promotions to run for back-to-school or Christmas or Spring Break. Or forget the usual suspects, create your own seasons.
Your PR is built around relationships with stakeholders and target audiences; what’s beneficial to them is helpful to you. Don’t wait until your customers have a question or problem, reach out and solve it now. Fire up the old CRM goodwill generators and get some value out there.
- If it’s the slow season, offer quicker turnaround at no extra charge.
- If it’s a busy time of year, give a “patience esta une virtue” discount for those willing to wait.
- If you’re going after the B2B crowd, think of their spending schedules, look at the fiscal year and when budgets may be most flexible. When are your customers’ customers most demanding? That’s when you can step up, offer more support when they need it most.
And if you’ve waited this long, don’t jump on the first Johnny-come-Groupon that knocks on your email. Look at what you want now, what you can do later, and remember, the next ‘holiday’ season starts tom… -er, now.
Thoughts on holiday marketing, besides the crass commercialization of it all?
Photo credit: Funny comic by Pittsburgh Tribune Review cartoonist Randy Bish.
Raising the bar on expectations, one customer at a time
Since I’ve been on a tear the last few posts, time to switch gears. Central theme, customer service expectations blown out of water.
Chick-fil-A 
Not too long ago, I tweeted that “Chick-fil-A is the Disney of fast food.” Because they are.
One busy Saturday morning I waited for my chicken minis. Which really, they need to make available all day b/c they’d be my #1 all time favorite snack, right there with the Checkers fries. Ahem.
I hadn’t complained, wasn’t put out by the wait. Without blinking the manager handed me a card for a free chicken biscuit for my next visit as she handed me my food.
Atlanta Bread Company
One of my favorite coffice joints with the yummy soups and free WiFi is ABC. I had joined another woman at a big table – because all the small ones were full.
A while later a manager asked if we would mind moving, since they had a group meeting coming up and needed the big table. We said sure, happily got up to back up our tech toys as there were now open tables. Without hesitation, she gave us each tickets for free lunch on next visit.
My dentist and mechanic
Not sure the names are important, they’re not major brands or anything, but my dentist and mechanic get customer service, online and off. My mechanic has WiFi in the waiting room. The dentist offered use of Bose headphones for my iPod, to cancel out the noise during the wisdom teeth extraction. Both use email, other e-tools to stay in touch with their customers. I mean, I ‘liked’ my mechanic on Facebook the other day, so happy was I with their service.
What do you expect, anyway?
Maybe it’s the Gerber Baby Syndrome or ‘champagne taste, beer budget’ thing but consumers do feel more entitled to exceptional service at outlandishly low prices. Could be more Groupon backlash, everyone hunting the next BBD? I don’t know.
What I DO know is this, this is what you want: people talking about your company, praising what you do. This is what growing small businesses need, positive word of mouth. What you don’t want is to hear someone to say ‘you are the Uverse of your industry’ – that’s bad. FWIW.
In a world when Apple can’t even outdo Apple, how do you raise the bar on expectations?