Saturday, April 15, 2006

Seth Godin, dreams, and nightmares

[W]hat people pay for when they buy most anything these days is the anticipation. The feeling of self-satisfaction, the way it feels when you put it in the bag, the dream of how it’s going to make you happier or more attractive tomorrow. When it comes down to using the [product], in practice, it’s way less important. What’s important is the dream.

So says marketer Seth Godin in a profile feature on American Way Magazine. And why does post-purchase service matter so much? Because you’re not just making someone glad they bought your product and encouraging them to buy again; you’re trying not to disturb the dream. Is it any wonder that so many people describe their customer service woes as ‘nightmares’?

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Reenchanting consumption

Thanks to The Consumerist for linking to University of Chicago grad Jesse Friedman’s term paper on how the Southern California-based specialty grocery store chain Trader Joe’s has succeeded (wildly) by offering something other than speed and convenience. It starts like this:

The success of McDonald’s and other large chains characteristic of modern consumer society follows, according to George Ritzer, from an extremely successful business model of rationalization offering enormous benefits to both company and customer. One consequence of such convenience and efficiency, however, is a sense of disenchantment: a lack of human interest or excitement in the consumption process. Some firms in recent years seem, and often purport, to directly counteract the downsides of hyperrationality through reenchanting the consumption process, while still applying modern operational procedures to ensure profitability. Trader Joe’s, a grocery store specializing in high-quality foods at surprising prices, provides one such intriguing, and very successful, reaction to this so-called McDonaldization. This study draws on visits to two locations, the company’s literature, and observations of customers, and uses Ritzer’s work on the disenchantment of rationalization, as well as Daniel Miller’s understanding of thrift within the framework of shopping as love and Colin Campbell’s discussion of the Romantic background of modern hedonistic consumption, as theoretical frameworks. It seeks to show how Trader Joe’s reenchants the consumption process by trusting its demographic base — which has sophisticated tastes yet appreciates value — to be more than mere lemmings.

Dr Adrian Bailey joins Engagement Alliance advisory board

I’m absolutely delighted to announce that notable HR/change management expert Dr Adrian Bailey has joined the advisory board of the Engagement Alliance. Adrian has a wealth of knowledge and experience in how companies can improve their bottom line through the people they employ, and will bring great insight to the EA. Here’s his full bio:

Adrian, founder and director of PeopleFanClub, graduated with a PhD in Communications.  He’s good at getting a point across.

Before PeopleFanClub, Adrian was Director of People, Strategy & Organisational Development for AEGIS plc’s multinational media specialist firm, Carat. His remit also included HR, and his team’s work landed Carat in the Sunday Times Top 100 Best Places To Work - the first in their sector to do so. During Adrian’s time there, Carat also jumped to the Number 1 spot in industry revenue and became a National Business Awards finalist - proof that investing in people and business success can go hand-in-hand.

A strategy and change expert and project manager with KPMG for five years, Adrian led large and successful programmes for Kimberly Clark, HSBC, P&O, GE Capital and others, and an SAP project at Australia Post. Prior to that, he worked in the public sector for five years with NATS, liaising with HM Treasury and the Department for Transport, specialising in human factors and financial investment.

A founder member of the BPS Coaching Psychology Group, qualified professional leadership coach, and an accredited mediator, he’s the man to call in to ‘fix(!)’ your senior team. Adrian succeeded Lord (David) Lipsey as Chair of ITV’s Regional Advisory Board, so is also the man to go to if you want to complain about (or praise) British television programmes.

Previous to his work with organisations, Adrian was a musician who played with the likes of The Clash and The Jam, and then became an honest to goodness rocket scientist. Some say he was just trying to prove that he could be whatever he wanted, while others suspect he was simply indecisive.

CipherTrust: Don't trust them

How not to respond to criticism online, written with the ‘help’ of CipherTrust.

Social media as advertising replacement/supplement

The Center for Media Research has some interesting figures on ad spend on blogs, podcasts, and RSS. Audience fragmentation and demographic fervor are two big drivers for advertisers who are exploring these new areas.

What the research doesn’t address is how many companies are looking beyond the traditional ad placement model and at using social media as a way to reach key audiences without actually advertising. Providing valuable information and services to potential customers and existing customers can be much more effective than merely flashing an ad in front of their faces. (An exception to this, of course, is search engine marketing, where searchers are actively self-identifying themselves as looking for your products and services. The search engine results they receive constitute that valuable information.)

To that end, I see that British tabloid The Sun is now offering RSS feeds of their site content. Are you going to wait for even the white van man to turn into a subscription fiend - podcasts on his iPod, RSS feeds in his Bloglines account - before you start looking into these engaging forms of marketing? (Hint: Many of the white van men already are using social media.)