NOT GOOD ENOUGH! I WANT MORE THAN JUST ANOTHER BLOODY RELATIONSHIP
NOT GOOD ENOUGH! I WANT MORE THAN JUST ANOTHER BLOODY RELATIONSHIP
Monday, 15 October 2007 07:12
By Mark Di Somma
I love direct marketing. Direct is the Stealth bomber of marketing. Done well, it runs its course virtually undetected by those who are not in its sights, hits its targets with pinpoint accuracy and is gone before anyone is even sure that it's been there.
Back at base, the client is taking the responses and counting the money, while the agency takes itself to lunch and the competition licks its wounds and tries to work out why membership/sales/enquiries/renewal rates have suddenly nosedived.
There is something beguiling about the sheer power of being able to build a robust, silent, enduring relationship based on insightful understanding and offers of immense relevance. As a delegate at a conference once told me, 'I got this cool offer the other day, and I was blown away ... It's like they already knew what I wanted'. Which of course they did, thanks to good databasing.
While you were out, the world changed.
Wow! it sounds fantastic. So what's the beef? Well, sadly I'm becoming increasingly disillusioned with much of the thinking behind too many of the campaigns. It's all starting to ring a little hollow. The formulas have become that. And the reason, for want of a better word, is dimension. Sadly, too many direct marketers are out of touch. News: the world's changed, the bar's raised, and guess what guys, it's time to look a little wider, work a little harder and think a little deeper.
I'm absolutely convinced there are two kinds of people in this world: those who recognise implications and move first; and those that hop the shifting sands and take the ride with everyone else. It's easy to recognise the latter. They're the ones with a mouthful of buzzwords and a head full of press release theory.
Right now, the direct marketing world is packed with self-aggrandising e-marketers: post-domcommers with a bewildering vocab, on a mission to wire you business and track 'real results in real time'. Move over everything that's gone before. This is the big one!
Don't get me wrong. I've no problems with the channel. But let's see it for that - a media mode, not the next great relationship marketing hope.
What most of them have ignored, or at best paid lip service to, is the most important development of all, a development that has huge implications and which significantly affects the relationship between consumers and products: the fact that we now live in a vitally branded world.
there are two kinds of people in this world: those who recognise implications and move first; and those that hop the shifting sands and take the ride with everyone else.
Forget marketing, think recognition
As competition increases, and parity rushes in to bury natural advantage, brand - with all its implications for how we relate to consumers - has become the single most compelling weapon in every marketer's arsenal.
In a globally-sourced economy, where we can order almost anything from almost anywhere, branding is far more than a logotype. Branding provides recognition. It enables consumers to literally put a name and a company to the product or service. But it's more than that. Brand reinforces the value of that product or service to the nth degree by providing qualities that graphics alone don't buy: reassurance and trust. It aligns expectation and entity. And in a world where you can't be different, at least you can stand for something different.
Today's savvy consumer buys because they identify. They render loyalty to a brand because they glean from it ideas that appeal to them more than another brand's ideas - because that idea grabs them, or it turns them on or it intrigues them.
The concept itself is not new. Cosmetic makers and fashion designers have been doing it for years. Coco realised decades ago that when women dabbed on No. 5, they weren't just doing so to smell sweet, they were applying a feeling to their lives. Parisian chic, style and attitude - bottled, scented and suddenly, wonderfully, available. A powerful brand says things to a consumer, but equally, it lets the consumer say powerful things to other consumers. Wearing a powerful brand, driving a powerful brand, using a powerful brand gives the consumer a whole range of messages to transmit to others.
The corollary of course is that brands will fail when consumers stop identifying with them - because they lose touch, or the ideas they stand for have no spark, or they're just not cool any more or they betray themselves.
A brand is now the marque of a much bigger idea than its logotype. A brand is now what the company concerned promises to deliver, the idea it owns, the thought it has that captivates consumers. Yes, brands are about retaining loyalty and adding value and premium, but first and foremost, they are about recognition. The most powerful brands in the world work because they are instantly recognised, and because, in their behaviours and attitudes, they recognise and work hard to meet the changing needs and attitudes of ever more discerning customers. And they do this through ideas; ideas that their consumers relate to and identify with.
No logo? More like no connect.
That's why Naomi Klein and her ilk are so wrong. They brutally underestimate the ability of today's consumer to see through charade. Today, buyers have more choice than ever before. They're smarter, better informed and more empowered than they have ever been. Brand is not about dress-ups; it's about companies being forced to work a lot harder and a lot smarter to achieve 'fit' with increasingly cynical and marketing-aware consumers. It's now the consumers calling the shots, not the other way around. Today's marketplace member has more choice, more sophistication and more control than ever before. And brother! if you don't represent an idea that appeals and fits with them, then someone else, with a product or service that's just as good, probably does.
As products converge, emotional connection has replaced technical advancement as the long term marketing advantage. In the face of no tangible difference, the only meaningful option is intangible difference. 'What do you offer that I identify with?'
Big problem for direct marketers!
If tangible difference is now a bygone, it also follows that the iterative 'compelling offer' as the basis for the lifetime relationship is now an also-ran. It's matchable or beatable. And if that is the sole basis for the decision to buy, then there is no real long-term relationship opportunity because there is no real emotional connection.
'Don't just make me an offer I can't refuse - package it in a way and with the idea that I identify with you.' Not a concept. Not a creative expression. The brand idea. The big idea. The thing that makes you you. Because if you don't - the consumer has no reason to link. And in the absence of affinity, buyers today will buy because you offered, and only because you offered ... until the next offer, when they will move on. They feel nothing for you as a company, they have no affinity with your brand. They're haggling. Best bargain gets the business ... Next!
Take the guy at the conference. He didn't really give a toot where the offer came from, he felt nothing for the brand behind the offer. He just wanted the offer. He was impressed by the fact that the company knew he wanted it ... but that was as deep as it went.
Addicted to tactic
And that's what I mean by a lack of dimension. As far as too many direct marketers are concerned, a relationship is still characterised by an offer, followed by another offer, followed by another offer ... perhaps with some fluffy corporate stuff thrown in with the bill to tell the customer what a great relationship they have, or how well the company sports team did last Tuesday. There is no long term relationship - only repeated opportunism and self congratulation.
These marketers have failed the implication test. Here's the brutal truth. Today's market is no longer about what you, the company, want to tell me, the consumer. It's only about what I, the consumer, want to hear.
Direct marketing is a business that congratulates itself on being steeped in the power of the relationship: the clarion call of 'one to one'. So why do so many direct marketers fail to reconcile the relationship of their work with that of brand? Because most of them sadly still live and work in a tactical world. They remain accountable to the response and not to the brand. And because of this, they jeopardise the branded relationship between product/service and consumer in order to get the tactical gain. It's like they just haven't chosen to open their eyes to the implications of marketing in a branded world. They seem to fail to connect that what the brand stands for is something that every piece of work they produce has to stand up to scrutiny against. Not just because it meets the corporate guidelines, but because it salutes and adds to the compelling spirit of the brand, the long term relationship maker.
They seem to fail to connect that what the brand stands for is something that every piece of work they produce has to stand up to scrutiny against.
The deep irony of all this is that oftentimes, self styled relationship marketers cut across one of the most fundamental opportunities to cement the relationship. They ignore the implications of the brand as the basis for the relationship and in so doing undermine one of the most enduring emotional bonds it is possible to build - a relationship based on the power of affinity - preferring instead to opt for initiatives based solely around a list and a premium.
End result: at best, an audience response based solely around momentary opportunism. At worst, siloed communication that directly contradicts the very basis of the competitive brand promise.
What's the point in using the Stealth bomber if you're busy killing off all the hard earned yards with 'friendly fire'?
Thinking like the customer ... no, today's customer
And that's the thing isn't it? My beef. Too much direct marketing today is about slick technique, and not about seriously thinking through how each piece, every communication sits within the wider, branded context. Direct marketers have become victims of technique and formula, at the expense of relevance ...
So many packs are by the book, instead of at the heart. Letter, brochure, offer, return form and envelope, for instance ... yadda, yadda, yadda. All the elements I'd expect. Tick, tick, tick, yawn. As a piece of direct marketing, there is little to fault any of them technically. But as an expression of the company's powerful branded idea, and as communications that really work for today's cynical customer, they fail. And they do so because they are accountable to the response they have to achieve, and based on the techniques that everyone feels comfortable with, but they are not accountable to the brand that gave them credibility in the first place.
Direct marketing relationships now are all about databases - number crunching and processing - but they have become that way at the expense of a sense of 'fit' with the individual minds of consumers. Relationships today are about serial offers. But there's no stickability - for all the reasons I've already outlined. And have you noticed that the language is all the same too - either sell, sell, sell or schmooze? It's not genuine. It's seldom if ever in the spirit of the brand. They don't mean it. They're selling me. And as a consumer, I simply don't believe them. I'm not drawn to them. I don't choose to include them in my life in a meaningful way.
They've sacrificed the most powerful attraction they have - what the brand stands for - to make room for the sale, because they thought it got in the way, or they chose to ignore it, or it didn't even make it into the consideration zone. Problem: the brand stuff is just not that expendable.
Consumer reaction: If this is the depth of our relationship - if you only value me as deep as this offer - then I don't want a bloody relationship with you, thank you very much. You have no place in my life, so I'll take your offer if it suits me (and only if it suits me) and then I'm outta here.
By not getting it right, direct marketers actually do more harm than good. The collateral damage doesn't just extend to the campaign, it actually goes all the way to the credibility of the brand.
Direct marketers have become victims of technique and formula, at the expense of relevance...
Don't be dazzled, be branded
Big take-out. When companies fail to communicate in the way that people have been led to expect they will, it cuts across the consumer's understanding of what they're about. It confuses the recognition. It changes what the consumer understands you stand for, and so fundamentally underlines credibility. If you don't know what you are and why I should believe in you, then goodbye. You can use all the cleverest techniques in the world, have the greatest offers and the snazziest creative, but if your direct marketing is not a continuation of an irrestible branded spirit, you're in trouble.
I'm not suggesting for one moment that most consumers think about this consciously. I doubt whether many of them love direct marketing as much as I do. But - that is no reason to assume that they won't be confused by contradictions - intended or otherwise. As consumers, we are more wary and cynical than we have ever been. Marketing that fails to continue to ring true with us, starts to ring false frighteningly quickly.
Banging the old drums
So how has this happened? Why have direct marketers failed to wake up and smell the power of brand? It's because direct marketing has always pounded three drums - the offer, timing and the list, to the exclusion of virtually anything else. (Today, with e-marketing, the trendy idealogues are banging away at channel - but that still doesn't get them anywhere near compelling brand alignment.) Segmentation, that database technician's wet dream, has only accentuated the problem, because it has further splintered communication, without tying it back to the single big idea that makes brand so competitive.
And sadly, I think it's fair to say that far too many direct marketing people still regard 'brand' as one of those design company things that graphics people do to justify their stuff and that doesn't really concern them. They're here to get a response. Their thinking extends as deep as the creative idea to do that. Which is nowhere near deep enough.
Results: no consistent sense of the big brand idea across the campaigns of too many companies. Different tone and manners, different look and feels, little or no tie-in to the competitive brand values. And for the consumer, a confusing barrage of campaign notions and thoughts that might get them to the phone once in a while, but won't get them in the heart long term.
oftentimes, self styled relationship marketers cut across one of the most fundamental opportunities to cement the relationship. They ignore the implications of the brand as the basis for the relationship and in so doing undermine one of the most enduring emotional bonds it is possible to build - a relationship based on the power of affinity
Not only, but also...
In his book, 'the big idea', Robert Jones alludes to a strategy that has the potential to fundamentally change the way direct marketing is done:
'people are returning to the old idea of value-for-money ... it's good to get a bargain and to be seen to get a bargain ... This new culture plays into the hands of airlines like Go and Southwest. It drives the sales of fashionable small cars like the Smart car or the Ford Ka. It works for financial service firms that offer better interest rates or lower fees ... But this isn't the same as old-fashioned value for money. People will buy these lower-cost products and services only if the emotions are right too ... It's not 'if the price is right, I'll buy, it's 'if the product or service is right, I'm happy to take advantage of the lower price too.''
Exponentiate that concept to direct marketing, and there is a significant pointer. The offer is far from dead - everybody still loves to get something for nothing - but by itself it's no longer enough.
The future for direct marketing is in campaigns that feed and nourish long term affinity at the same time as they elicit short term response. That requires direct marketing executives and creative teams not just to think of a compelling offer and a noticeable creative vehicle, but to frame all that in such a way that it directly references and reinforces the compelling brand idea.
The new challenge facing relationship marketers is to reach cynical consumers by forging meaningful, truthful campaigns with compelling offers. Campaigns that tug at the wallet and at the heart simultaneously. A broader accountability than ever before to both outcome and outtake.
Is this hard? You bet, it's hard. It often requires a complete break from traditional ways of thinking. It demands that direct marketing people get inside the hearts and heads of customers to an astonishing degree. It calls for new, and genuine ways of communicating that extend way beyond just getting the response that everyone insists on. It holds direct marketing executives and creative teams accountable to ideas that are often way outside their frames of reference and their training. It won't be easy ... but increasingly it will be vital.
The new challenge facing relationship marketers is... [developing] campaigns that tug at the wallet and at the heart simultaneously.
So how do you make it happen?
First of all, most important of all - you need to be very, very clear about two things simultaneously. The single huge idea the brand stands for, and the singular objective of the campaign.
Everything a company does - every piece of communication - must reinforce the huge brand idea. Not sure you have that idea? Then find a brand strategist that can find it for you - and push them like mad to arrive at a single irrestible thought that is exciting, competitive and incontrovertibly you.
Once you have that idea - hold every piece of communication up to its light. I often suggest to clients that they ask themselves a really simple question: 'What's so us about this?' Be hard on yourselves - because you'll never be as hard as consumers are. And if the communication doesn't work to the spirit of the brand, then demand a rework until it does.
Apply 'pincer' thinking to every piece of direct marketing you do. Long term affinity; short term response - both together, both at once. Most direct marketers will squirm - 'we can't do this/ it will compromise the creativity/ we won't get the response we need/ there isn't enough room'. Look them square in the eye and tell them to get over it.
Give the direct marketing company a realistic budget to do that level of thinking. And if you can't afford that, then don't do the campaign. If you haven't got enough money or time or whatever to do it right, then you're actually better off not doing it. There is nothing more frustrating on this planet than being told by some marketing executive that they can't afford to do the project properly, but they absolutely have to do it. Message: You couldn't be more wrong. And - you have just jeopardised the brand. That should be worth more than your job!
Make the direct marketing agency rationalise their work back against the brand spirit as part of their creative presentation. Not the look and feel. Not the corporate guidelines. But the big idea that everything you are doing is pushing towards.
Appoint a Brand Champion, whose sole job is to judge whether the work promotes and adds to consumers' understanding of your brand - not the offer, the brand. (I think we can safely assume that most direct marketers know how to pitch an offer.) I always advocate this should be a person outside the agency and the company - someone who's not going to be seduced by politics, agendas, petty budgeteering or the agency's lunching policy!
Finally, play baseball. And by that, I mean three strikes and they're out. If your direct marketing agency don't get it, can't get it, aren't going to get it - then fire them, for the sake of your relationship with your customers - and find an agency that does. In today's business world, sadly there's just no room and no tolerance for yesterday's thinking.
Copyright 2006 Mark Di Somma, The Audacity Group. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission. You can meet Mark and read more of his articles at www.markdisomma.com
