The Power of Simple

Okay, it’s been a while.  I haven’t posted in months.  It’s not for a lack of thought, but rather wanting to make sure that what I think (and share) is actually of relevance.  And that’s the topic for today.  Relevance.  A few weeks back I saw an old movie called “He’s Just Not That Into You”.  Not a great movie but a really cold reminder that if your lover doesn’t call you/call you back, he or she probably doesn’t love you that much. You are just not relevant enough. The economic downturn has turned the heat up on business relevance.   In good economic times, “interesting” can suffice as relevant. Companies and consumers will buy your products or services because they can afford to, because what you offer is interesting, mildly helpful, feels good, whatever. A great example of that are research expenditures.  Big brands spend gobs of money on interesting research.  They don’t actually do anything with the research, it doesn’t guide decision making, there’s no “return” expected, it’s just interesting.  But when the economy softens, the definition of relevance hardens.  It shifts from “interesting” to “influencing”, i.e. the investment has got to connect in some, even if indirect, way to an action or benefit.  Management starts asking the question, what are we getting for this?  The consumer begins contemplating what life will be life without that pair of shoes.  But even then, there’s some latitude on how consumers and businesses assess the return, on how relevant the relevance is.  Now, serve up an economic setback like the one we  experienced in the last year, and the definition of relevance becomes rock hard.  Relevance = Essential.  Essential = our business cannot operate without the benefit of this product, service (or employee). Essential = my personal life will suffer in tangible forms if I don’t buy this thing (or call my girlfriend back).  The definition of relevance as essential puts intense pressure on all of us but I think it’s a healthy pressure.  Good economies delude us.  They make us think that the value equation (and relationship) is solid and secure when in fact it is not.  Our capacity to grow as individuals and companies, through good times and bad, is purely predicated on our ability to be essential to whomever we serve (or love).  So I encourage you to ask yourself the tough question: Are they returning your phone call?  And if not, you know what to do.

Twitter is going to replace TV.

Hunh?

Yup. Our industry in all its wisdom is pushing the platitude that social media is going to make traditional media obsolete. That the “medium” is the most cost effective way to reach and engage your marketplace and that you’re crazy if you don’t invest a ton of money and effort in making that happen.

I beg to differ. Or at least I beg to ask people to think about the situation a little differently. And to not make it about social media versus traditional media but rather make it about the “context of media”. My belief is that different media have different contexts of engagement. And depending on the context the specific media can or cannot accomplish different communications objectives. As example, at a macro level I have long held that the context of the online world does not lend itself to efficient demand creation. That the context of engagement is about finding what you want (Search, Search, and Search). And that when one is in focused finding mode our capacity to receive unsolicited and unrelated information is virtually nil. That’s why spending on online display is plummeting, and why the social media sites cannot figure out how to monetize their content delivery models. It’s also why SEM works so well. It helps us find what we’re looking for.  

Consider the following “contextual” media map, that while unsubstantiated or supported with any facts, is at least plausible.  

Out of Home (e.g. billboards)

- I seek and expect nothing  - I am active – I am unintentionally open

Broadcast and Print Advertising

- I seek entertainment and expect (and at times seek) intrusion – Intrusion is a part of the entertainment – I am sedentary – I understand the economics (pay for content) – I am intentionally open

Online

- I seek specific information and entertainment – Intrusion is not acceptable – I am active, sedentary – I do not accept the economics – I am intentionally closed

Different media, different contexts, different opportunities to engage with (and advertise to) the consumer.  It also points to why the monetization of the social media sites (and other content sites) is so challenging.  If consumers are not willing to pay for the content, and their eyeballs are not “open” to advertising, who’s going to pick up the tab?   And that when the online and television interfaces finally merge we better get the context right.  Because context really is everything.

There’s a deli around the corner from my office.  Open for breakfast and lunch. One of our employees ran over to pick up a late lunch one day only to find the place closed and the counter person locking the door.  She asked what time they closed and the middle aged woman replied,”We close at two, but if you ever need a sandwich, just knock on the door. We’re here to give people food.”  Wow.  Imagine if every business (and employee)  in America had such clarity of purpose, and with that clarity the willingness (and ability) to bend the “rules” or simply do whatever it takes to deliver on the purpose.   Now theoretically mission statements and job descriptions are the standard clarifiers of purpose, for a company and its employees.  The problem is that both tend to contain so much that they contain nothing at all.  And part of the reason they contain so much is because companies aren’t really clear why they exist (other than to make money) and aren’t really clear what they want from their employees (other than work).  So they just load up the list of expectations creating a muddy mess of impossible accomplishment and in doing so create a lovely accountability exit strategy for everyone.  Because if we’re not clear why we (or you) exist and/or the list of reasons is impossibly long, no one can hold us to it.  Perfect!

Perhaps in our quest to create more value for our employers and more value for the customers of our companies we need to begin with the simple question of “Why do we exist?”.  And we need to answer it in as few words as possible.  For my company and my business partner and I, I think the answer is the same:  ”To help people”.  For our clients we provide the help of honest partnership, of effective communications, of objective counsel, of resources that are available to solve any problem.  For our employees we provide the help of an environment that allows them to be true to themselves, to learn, to grow, to share, to laugh and cry.  For our suppliers we provide them with the help of appreciation, of context, and of the clarity of expectations and communication that lets them know how well they are doing meeting them.  For our community, we provide the help of support, leadership, and creativity.

So as we move forward as a nation, as companies, as families and as individuals looking to repair ourselves, to regain our strength and momentum, perhaps we should first ask the question “why do we exist?”. And once answered we should do whatever we can to deliver on that purpose.

We’re here to give people food.

Years ago I was speaking at a marketing conference and somebody in the audience asked me what the biggest challenge facing marketers was.  I said “a lack of rigor”.  Yup.  Not the challenge of measuring return on investment, or positioning the brand, or convincing leadership to spend more money. Instead, just simply “rigor”.  Marketing is an industry that is particularly representative of the intellectual and physical laziness that has befallen us all.  We are an industry of ill-trained professionals who have the profound responsibility to guide our clients in their investment of billions of dollars in order to motivate consumers and businesses to spend billions of dollars, which it turns out is the primary act that drives the growth of our Gross Domestic Product.  So effectively ill-trained people are in charge of our economy.  Yikes.

The marketing industry is one of the few if only professional service industries that lacks any form of accreditation.  Anybody can dispense marketing advice.  And they do.  To make matters worse many of the people that enter our business do so because they perceive it to be “fun”; they enter it without any relevant academic pedigree, and they enter it viewing the task of “ongoing study” and “intellectual rigor” as anathema.

The result of all this is an industry that has plummeted in perceived value; an industry that has lost the trust of the clients it serves; an industry that is the first to go when a recession appears and the last to come back when good times return.  The result is a terrible track record of bandwagons that went bust.  The industry declaring new approaches, new media, new tactics as the panacea of all ills, and doing so without any clear understanding of how any of it works, how any of it applies to their specific clients.  Why?  Because of a lack of rigor.

As example, the last few years have brought the declaration that traditional media no longer works and that the online milieu does, or works better.  The flaw with that platitude is that no one ever knew whether traditional media worked(s).  So what are we comparing online media too?  And even in the online realm there are a dearth of quantitative cases to show how it delivers tangibly better performance and/or performance that is scalable.  The entire topic and our industry’s ability to declare anything “for sure” about it is thwarted by a gaping lack of analytical and intellectual rigor, made worse by a gaping hole of data.

If we are to deliver real value (see prior posts) we have to have real insight.  And real (and applicable) insight only comes from study and controlled experimentation.  Einstein’s theories were not the result of immaculate conception.  They were the result of heavy and painful pondering which yielded hypotheses that then were tested in some form or another.  If we are to turn around our economy we have to get consumers buying again.  If we are to get consumers buying again we have to be better at motivating them to do so, which means being better at understanding exactly how to do that.  And that understanding can only come from one thing: relentless intellectual pursuit, from rigor.

So if you read my first post you know that I believe that many of us have lost our way and forgotten that to have a job we must be relentless in our pursuit of creating value; and that in order to create value we must be laser focused on what constitutes value in the mind and heart of the customer (or employer).  So… many companies are struggling right now and Starbucks is one of them.  Closing stores, changing merchandising strategies, contemplating new products (instant coffee?) and getting creative with pricing (bundling coffee and a danish?) all an effort to right the profit ship and get back those customers who recently decided that a $4 latte was just too much.    Starbucks apparently believes that creating more value, for the consumer and the shareholder, lies in changing the product, reducing the price, and fixing the distribution.  I believe they are missing the point.  When difficult economic times appear consumers are far more discerning about which brands they stick with and which ones they walk away from.  And the stickiness motivators can be very tangible (Target is crushing Macy’s right now) or in some cases intangible (my neighbor hardware store are nice people so I am not going to Home Depot to save five bucks).  Which raises the question, is Starbucks in the goods or services business, selling the tangible or the intangible?   Coffee is the number one commodity in the world.  It’s tangible.  But the experience is actually what defines the Starbucks brand.  The intangible.  How you feel when you walk in the store, the gestalt of the environment, the people in the store, the coffee smell, the way you’re served…which brings me to the value issue and their opportunity.  I have been going to the same Starbucks for 2 years.  Every day, same time, same order:  “A large Vente Bold please.”  And pretty much the same servers behind the counter.  And every day I get pretty much the same blank stares, the same no attempt to acknowledge that I am a customer, let alone a gold card customer.  They make no effort to suggest that they know me, that they remember what I want, and that they are happy to help me start my day.  A couple of months ago I was in the store and the door to the store room was open.  I could see a white board which had scrawled on it the following: ” The latest customer surveys are in and we ranked last for satisfaction among our group.  We need to be nicer.”  Need to be nicer?  Yup.  But you don’t get there with whiteboards.  You get there with hiring people who care about their jobs, their company and their fellow man.  People who want to serve, who are relentless about creating value.  People who know that “Room for cream?” is not the way to say “It’s good to have you back”.

How do we create jobs?  By creating value.  How do we create value?  By offering a good or service that is as good or better than someone else, at an equal or better price.  How do we do that?  By being really good at the business of business.  How do we do that?  We focus on the market, we identify the need and /or value gap, we create the product or service to fill that gap, and then we build an organization to deliver on that product or service. And we build that organization in a way that the organization itself represents distinct value:  it is focused, its employees love and I mean love to work there,  they are clear on their tasks, they are held accountable not just to task delivery but to learning and growing their skills to add more value to the organization and the customers they serve.  It is an organization relentlessly focused on delivering value to the customer, made up of employees relentlessly focused on delivering value to their employer.  It’s that simple.  But wait. It’s not.  Why not. Because I think many Americans have lost their ability to be relentless.  Most people I know are not driven to learn, driven to grow, driven to create value.  They are passive.  They are waiting to be instructed, waiting to be told, waiting to be led.  The relentless drive that brought our forefathers to this country, that spurred the innovation and collaboration that created the biggest economy in the world appears to have largely disappeared.  My generation has suffered from the lack of a defining moment.  A moment that set them back, that said to them if you don’t drive, you don’t grow, you don’t try, you die.  We never had a world war.  Or a civil war.  Or a depression.  Well now we do.  This economic calamity is our defining moment.  And the question is how many people in a position to be relentless are relentless.  How many people will look at their jobs, their companies, their opportunities, and say I can do more?  I can learn more.  I can think more.  I can create more value, for my company, my customers, my community, my family,  and my country.   Perhaps it’s that simple.