Slightly Askew

Vague is the taxi that’s always “a few minutes away”.
Vague is the crashed computer that tells you “an error occurred”.
Vague is the supermarket website that informs you “delivery may be more than the price quoted”.
Vague is the restaurant menu that “may contain nuts”.

Vague is annoying, useless and surefire way to piss your customers off.

Accurate is the automated email that tells you “I’m automated, but if you need to reply, use this address”.
Accurate is the pricing structure that explains “there is no postage discount for multiple orders because shipping is automated”.
Accurate is the restaurant that tells you “we are not a fast food joint so you will have to wait”.
Accurate is the sign that informs you “occupancy by more than 499 persons is dangerous and unlawful”.

Accurate is sometimes annoying, but often useful because it requires attention and honesty.

If you have the need to explain yourself, I think it’s best to be accurate.

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Lots of clients these days want brand engagement.

“I want people to engage with our brand!” they say, all enthusiastically. At this point, I like to smile, nod and say things that you should say in meetings. Things like “absolutely”. This shows that you are 110% engaged with their idea of brand engagement.

Brand engagement is the marketing industry’s clever term for what mere mortals call ‘quite liking a company’. I quite like Ocado because they’re part of Waitrose (which makes me feel posh), they have an iPhone app (even though I’ve never used it), they text you the name of your delivery driver, call their delivery vans silly names, and bring your shopping straight into your kitchen.

Hardly ground breaking stuff. But they do it. And that makes me like them. So I use them again.

Now, of course, I am engaged.

But engaging little old me isn’t enough; we need mass engagement. So it’s time to measure all these people who are engaged in the brand.

Why? Well, numbers make people happy. Brand managers, marketing directors, online consultants – all of them need numbers. Numbers can be dressed up into KPIs or whored out as pounds and pence. But they’re still numbers.

Numbers fit nicely into spreadsheets. You can plot graphs with numbers. Numbers make performance reviews easier. If your numbers fit, you get numbers added to your salary. No one can question your pay rise – you’ve got the numbers to prove you’re worth it.

“How many people are on your client’s email list?” I was asked a few days ago.
“Just over 3,000.” I replied.
“That’s not very many, is it.” (That sentence shouldn’t have a question mark on the end of it because it was said very much as a statement. This person wanted no further dialogue – he wanted more email addresses.)

Permission marketing isn’t a new idea. But when the industry still ignores it, it feels like it might just be a lost one.

When you next hear a marketer tell you he or she has 150,000 email addresses, don’t think of how many people might read the email, click through and buy your product. Think of how many people don’t want to receive your email. Think of all the people whose trust you’re shattering with a few dollops of HTML.

Engaging people – if that’s what you really must call it – is difficult. Disengaging people is much easier.

Sometimes it’s the numbers you don’t count that are the important ones.

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The butcher’s in Southwold is a regular haunt in my daily quest for lunch.

Not because I like to eat raw chunks of meat you must understand. But because the butcher’s is also home to perhaps the best value for money delicatessen in this charming but often laughably overpriced coastal town.

Proof: This footlong BLT took just £1.90 of my wages. And it didn’t taste like the transparent, processed shit you might find in an Underground Tunnel Used By Pedestrians.

When I popped in the other day, one of the butchers was on the phone. It became apparent he was battling an unsolicited sales call.

“Are we a new business? Well, we’ve been here sixty years. So I guess not.”

Sixty years!

So here’s the deal: The butcher’s doesn’t have a logo or a website or a media budget or a fucking Twitter account. They sell sausages and sirloin steaks and rather tasty baguettes with your choice of filling for £1.90. They don’t need SEO or Google Adwords or brand guidelines.

The butcher’s have won by outlasting the competition. They’ve undoubtedly had difficult periods in those sixty years, but they’ve stuck it out. Kept Calm And Carried On.

Perhaps it’s not the most flamboyant of marketing strategies, but outlasting the competition isn’t a bad one.

Just ask former employees of MFI, Zavvi and Woolworths.

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Photography by zachstern

You go into town to buy a nice new jumper. You don’t know exactly what you want, but you’ve got an idea of what it looks like in your head. (A red wine kind of colour, tight fitting, a nice thin wool.) You’ve got money in your pocket and time to look around. You’re looking forward to buying that nice new jumper and wearing it to what’s-her-name’s party tonight.

Except you can’t find one you like. Not anywhere.

So you walk home empty-handed and, just when you’re about to turn into your road, some guy walks past with a really smart shirt that’s much better than the jumper that’s still tumbling around your imagination. And you wish you’d looked for that shirt instead.

And this is the problem with digital marketing.

Are you desperate to be found? Or happy being discovered?

And that means making a decision.

Because unless you or the company you’re working for has a cowshed full of fivers to dip into, you’ve got to make a big “impact” (everybody uses that word nowadays – and I get a little bit of sick in my mouth every time they do) on a limited budget.

Do you do search marketing? Or relationship marketing?

They’re both pretty simple concepts as far as I’m concerned.

Search means SEO and AdWords. You start with a million potential customers, get the attention of one percent and make your pitch, and then hope that one percent of them buy your product.

From one million, you get one hundred. And then you put the data into a spreadsheet and work out cost per acquisition and a plethora of similar ratios.

Relationship marketing is quite the opposite. You start with one customer. Do a bloody brilliant job and hope one becomes ten. And then hope ten becomes one hundred. All by word of mouth.

Of course, you can create catalysts for spreading the word: nice websites with blogs so you can feel more involved, well-written opt-in emails, maybe even a Twitter account. (Note: this isn’t social media marketing. If you’ve got nothing worth talking about, a Facebook page isn’t going to make a sliver of difference.)

The battle lies where the two meet.

Does search marketing happily sit alongside relationship marketing?

Is there any joy in giving attention to someone who’s been desperately seeking it anyway?

Can you start with one and one million?

I don’t know, and it’s something I’ve been wrestling with all day.

Any thoughts?

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I got them from Moo. 50 of them in fact, and for a very reasonable price.

And Moo, bless them, describe business cards as greetings for meetings. Which I think is quite wonderful.

If I had any gripes, it would be that the quality of the printing on the front isn’t great. As you might be able to see, it looks slightly tired around the edges.

According to Stephen (who knows about these things) it’s because they use digital printing. Indeed, Wikipedia’s entry for digital printing tells us that:

The Ink or Toner does not absorb into the substrate, as does conventional ink, but forms a layer on the surface and may be fused to the substrate by using an inline fuser fluid with heat process(toner) or UV curing process(ink). 

So because the ink doesn’t absord into the card (or substrate, for you jargoneers) it can flake when the cards are cut.

Or something like that.

I don’t actually mind the effect. Each card looks like a well-read book. Which can’t be a bad thing for a writer.

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It was a sunny weekday lunchtime. Any self-respecting male not at work would’ve done exactly the same thing. Surely.

Pint of Stella please.

It came quickly. And with a smile. I was quickly falling in love with this restaurant. Love blossomed when my rump steak burger with handcut chips arrived.

Good lord above, please open one in Ipswich.

Another Stella. A little more sunshine. Smiles all round.

Then the bill arrived: £12.45 for two Stellas and a tasty meal. An absolute bargain. I got out my Maestro and was all set to pay £15 and reward the friendly waitresses £2.55 for their wonderful service.

And my card sat there untouched for twenty minutes. Twenty bloody minutes. My food had arrived in half that time.

So when I finally did get the chance to pay, I paid £12.45 exactly.

Because one bad thing can undo the work of so many good ones.

Marketing isn’t an event. It isn’t an advert, an email, or a website. It’s a process. You’re marketing when you hire and you’re marketing when you fire. When some idiot dials the wrong number and calls you instead of the local tyre kickers, that’s right, you’re marketing. It continues when you’re not looking.

And the problems start when you’re not looking.

But solving the problem isn’t impossible.

So when I walked out of that restaurant, a little grumpy and £2.55 better off, I was annoyed. Let down maybe. But I needed to get the tram. And I had no idea where from.

So I asked the waitresses. And they told me - with the same friendly smile that I’d received in every contact I’d had with them. I got my tram, and my happy face returned.

Those twenty minutes were a blip. Everybody has blips. Marketing gives you the opportunity to iron them out. Keep doing things the right way and when you’ll be forgiven for the odd time when things go the wrong way.

And next time you’re in Sheffield, do me a favour would you? Visit Yorkies and tip them that £2.55 I owe.

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Two of my best friends - Danny and Katie - are hairdressers.  Brilliant hairdressers, in fact.

This means two things:

1. Looking this good costs less.
2. I don’t go into salons much.

I went to Katie’s salon today though.  It’s spanking new and pretty swish.  So swish in fact, I could’ve had a glass of cold Budweiser while my barnet was being chopped.

I questioned Katie about how they get around licensing laws.  Turns out that you don’t buy the drink; you rent the glass.  The drink is effectively free.

They don’t make a profit on it either; it’s done for the benefit of the customers.

Which is pretty cool I think.

It demonstrates that not every element of your business should make a profit.  Some elements that only break-even are worth talking about.

So what about if you made a loss?  What if those drinks were absolutely free?  What if I was brought a cold Budweiser without even asking for one?

Cold Budweiser, sir?

Yes please.  I’ll happily drink it, relax during my haircut, and then tell all my mates about your salon.  Never underestimate how much blokes talk about the time I got a free beer.

I know of companies that give away £10 vouchers if you refer your friends to them.  Why not spend £10 giving a service worth talking about?

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Imagine there are twenty-five people in a room.  You’re about to open a great new shoe shop and you want to know what size shoe most people want to buy.  You pass around a piece of a paper and everyone writes what shoe size they want to be stocked.  If you take everyone’s opinion into account and do a bit of maths, you’ll get an average shoe size.

Similarly, you can take an advert for your shoe shop into that room of twenty-five people.  You pass it around, let everyone have their input, and make changes based upon that input.  The result is exactly the same: you get an average advert.

Do you want average?

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I visited McDonald’s today.  I ordered a Big Mac and waited patiently.  A young lady returned with my order and, as she placed it in my hand, said:

You should stop putting fatty foods into your body and get more exercise.  Why do you do it?  You should have more self-respect; a little more care and consideration about what you eat wouldn’t go amiss.

This, of course, didn’t happen.

However, I did go into Next’s town centre store in Ipswich.  It’s a familiar scene: rails and rails of clothes on plastic hangers; greetings cards in cellophane wrappers; and make-up gift sets in clear plastic boxes.

They also had reusable bags with the carrying the slogan ‘dare to care’.

If your company isn’t prepared to put in the effort, why should your customers?

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Seth talks about authenticity.  How much fakery do we accept?  What crosses the line?

When Howies sold out to Timberland (the footwear and clothing company; not the producer du jour), my friend Zoe with an umlaut sent me an email titled:

They all sell out in the end

Does it really matter?  Why?

Well, yes it does matter.  It matters because we care.

If you’re authentic enough, people start to care about your money-making enterprise as much you do.  Give us a warm, fuzzy feeling and something to talk about and we’ll buy more of your products, we’ll read your email newsletters and RSS feeds, and yes, we’d love to come to your village fete in middle of London.

We wear (or otherwise) your products because they align themselves with what we believe in and aspire to.

So - going back to Howies - let’s see what a Timberland’s President and CEO, Jeffrey Swartz, had to say about matters:

“We are excited and inspired by the brand potential we see in Howies and are pleased to welcome them to the Timberland family.  We look to invest in like-minded brands that are focused on innovation, authenticity and integrity, and Howies encompasses all of these core values. Together we will leverage our complementary strengths to bring our brands to new consumers and new markets.”

It is, perhaps, ironic that the only thing jeopardising Howies’ “authenticity and integrity” is Timberland.  Well, that and Mr Swartz’s irksome use of the word ‘leverage’.

Not because Timberland is a bad brand.  But because Howies built one of independence; with two fingers firmly raised towards take-take-take multinationals.

To me, these two companies curdle.  A bit like when I was seven years old and thought that mixing cherryade and milk would produce a sumptuous milkshake.

Zoe said that it made her sick too.

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