All You Need Is A Good Idea!

Content

The Wall Street Journal, March 28, had an interesting article on Mark Thompson, the British Broadcasting Corporation's chief executive. Since it is taxpayer-financed, the BBC needn't worry about delivering results to Wall Street, and since it owns most of its own shows, it can control how they appear. So Mr. Thompson can concentrate on the most pressing problem: keeping viewers in the Internet age.

In an interview, he said, "It's not about TV. It's about content."

Sound familiar? Well, it will, when my book comes out in mid-May. In it there is a lengthy, (by my standards), discussion that points out it is rarely/never about the mechanics, whether it is  for an ad, brochure, blog or commercial. It is always about the content; what good idea you put on the page, on the internet, or the airwaves.

Knowing that you should put "###" at the end of your press release, or try to keep it to one page is helpful.  But it is what you put in the release, the headline, the content, that will make it get the attention you are aiming for.

So don't be content with your content (gotta love our English language) till you are not only sure your communication says what you want to say, but says it in a manner that will compel your audience to notice it.

Sorry, Your Store Card Won't Help

So I went into the world's largest store, Macy's, today. Wanted to purchase a cocktail table that I saw on sale. Regularly very expensive,  reduced to just expensive, now on sale. Sounded good, because I have a Macy's charge card, which usually gets me an additional 10% discount from the sale price on furniture.

But not this time.

The saleslady said that with this particular sale, the sale price listed was for everyone and there would not be a further discount.

Now I realize the ad did not actually say there would be a further discount for card holders. But if that has been a store's usual and customary practice, I do not think I was out of line to expect this to be the case today.

We are all somewhat accepting of the exclusions on the back of store coupons, listing the various and multiple purchases which don't qualify for the offer broadly proclaimed on the front of the coupon. But we shouldn't be.

More important, stores have to break this pattern; it is bad marketing. It is bad for their image, bad for their customers, bad for their reputation. The cliché that "the headline giveth and the fine print taketh away" has an unspoken "and the customer will eventually walketh away also."

If you have to use an asterisk or fine print to limit the extent of your offer and/or keep your lawyers happy, think of a way to make your exclusions minimal, your tone customer-friendly, your reasons for the exclusions reasonable.

We can't all promise, "Guaranteed. Period." But it is something we can all aim for.

Do You Have an RSS Feed?

Do you have a blog or website for your company? You might be interested in this surprising fact  I saw today, at Small Business SEM, regarding RSS Feeds.

(According to Wikipedia, RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is a family of Web feed formats used to publish frequently updated content. RSS makes it possible for people to keep up with web sites in an automated manner.)

 The question was, how many blogs have RSS feeds. The answer...well, that's why there is a link.

The answer surprised me, and the good idea is to make certain you have an RSS Feed on your blog. Of course, if you are not frequently updating your content, you may not need or want an RSS Feed.

But if your blog is designed to build your business, sell something or otherwise call attention to your product, then why aren't you updating it on a regular basis? If content is King, then keeping the content updated, fresh and interesting is, what, Emperor?

Good Vs Perfect

My book/blog is named All You Need is a Good Idea! NOT All You Need is a Great idea!

Many reasons, but the main reason is that I believe you can spend an eternity looking for that one great, phenomenal marketing idea,  believing that none are perfect enough. So you end up doing nothing, allowing page after page of good ideas to sit on your computer, instead of having them go out and do their thing in the marketplace.

If, for one small but relevant example, I hesitated posting a new page until I felt it was perfect in content, grammar and philosophy, I would still be agonizing over the look of my banner, rather than moving ahead.

I will explain this in more detail in a future post, but for now go to Getting To Good Enough and see a nicely written similar point of view.

The Envelope Please

Received an envelope yesterday; a mailing from a business publication. On the outside, in red type, it had a large SECOND NOTICE, in a style that made it look as if it had been rubber stamped onto the envelope. It looked very official.

When you opened the envelope, you found out that it was literally correct. It was indeed a second notice. But not a notice of a past due billing problem. It was their second notice that they were trying to get you to become a subscriber.

Now, they did get me to open the envelope, which I assume was their intent. But they also got me to promise myself I would never order a magazine that used such a sneaky way of getting my attention. (Did the magazine actually create the mailing piece? I don't know. Did they approve it? Absolutely yes.)

Sure, it's a little thing. A few words on the outside of an envelope. But  by choosing the wrong words, it  succeeded in creating a negative image of the magazine for me. Certainly not their intent.

I know that comments will come in, or at least they will when people actually start reading this blog, that the mailing had probably been tested and this SECOND NOTICE approach had outscored others that were tested. I agree that they may get a better response rate. But how do you measure ill will?


It is usually good to put some words on the outside of your mailing piece. Make them relevant, make them attention-getting, make them provocative. But do not make people feel fooled and foolish if the words induce them to open the piece and discover they have been tricked. 

Break Through the Clutter

There was an article by Nick Bunkley in the New York Times yesterday regarding this week's New York International Auto Show. Seems that Ford intentionally crashed and put on display a 2008 Taurus, to show how well it can withstand a crash.

Art Spinella, from the automotive consulting company CNW Marketing Research, had this to say about the impact (no pun intended) of a display of a damaged car: "You have to break through the clutter and you have to get people to somehow come and look at what you're offering."


"You have to break through the clutter and you have to get people to somehow come and look at what you're offering."

Are your marketing ideas doing that?

Make Your Business WHAT?

Have had a range of opinions regarding the phrase, "Make Your Business Conspicuous."

Some folks think that no one will understand or bother to understand "conspicuous" and skip right over it. Others realize what it is saying and like the sound of the word, especially tied in with the word "business."

Reason I used it in the first place was that I wanted to find a different way of saying "make your business stand out, or be noticed, or get attention." My feeling was—and still is— is that if I have written a book and blog that is supposed to help smaller businesses learn to use the power of a good idea to differentiate themselves, I certainly didn't want to use a cliché to make the point. Yes, there is a risk in using the word "conspicuous." But there is more of a risk in being invisible.

A "tried and true" thought is often another way of saying "trite and boring." Do not take comfort in familiarity; look for a fresher way of expressing your thought, even, and perhaps particularly, if it makes you slightly uncomfortable.

Customer Service Is Part Of Your Marketing

Bought a chair yesterday. Well, actually I canceled my order yesterday. No problem with the chair; leather, swivel, very nice. Problem was the delivery fee and how it was handled. First I was told by the salesman it would be $50. (A lot of money, but this is Manhattan.) I said well, maybe I will pick it up instead. Then decided, nope, it is too much trouble.

Salesman's follow-up phone message said the delivery fee would be $75. When I called back to question the disparity, he said, oh, I meant $55. Though this was a touch higher than he first said, I said Okay. He responded with, let me check and then came back on and said he was told that it would be $75 and that there was nothing he could do.

Now of course there was indeed something he could do. He could have honored the original delivery price he had given me. But rather than going through any more hassle, I simply canceled.

Now, the point is not that the store lost a sale that they could have made. The point is that I will now tell people about the experience and, as opposed to this blog, where I do not feel comfortable giving specific details that can identify the store, with my friends I will indeed name names.

There is a site I like a lot, The Consumerist, that posts daily stories about stores, chains, companies that do not do the right thing by their customers. (They also praise service that sparkles.) It is always interesting to see how little it would take to make things right and gain customer support and loyalty and how rarely it is done.

But you of course will do all it takes to make things right for your customers. And whether you do it because it is the right thing to do, or because it is the smart thing to do, it is a good thing to do!

Fresh Direct, a grocery that delivers food to your home in the New York area, uses a nice group of words: Our food is fresh. Our customers are spoiled.

Good Idea:  Speaking of trade shows, which I was two days ago, next time you go to one, or to a conference or seminar — in fact, every time you go — spend time looking at what your competition is doing. Preferably without judging their efforts. (Those dopes, don’t they know that trend is over, that next year’s  will all be three inches shorter.)

See what their signage is saying, what is different/new in what they are offering and featuring. Pick up copies of all their marketing materials. Get on their mailing list. Introduce yourself to those you don’t know and chat them up. We know you will be smart enough not to reveal anything that shouldn’t be talked about. But we don’t know about them, do we?