Last week we took the dog for his daily walk.
About halfway round his usual circuit we passed a traffic warden putting a ticket on a van. This was the fourth he’d issued.. leaving a visible line of yellow stickers on vehicles down the street.
Astonished at his hit rate, we asked him why people parked illegally with such gay abandon. Especially the tradesman’s vans.
His answer was that it was cheaper to pay the fine than to pay parking charges. And the paid parking was also very inconveniently placed for access to this part of town.
In other words, these drivers felt that non-compliance (in this case doing something illegal) was simply a cost of doing business. Ethics and being a responsible citizen had flown out of the window in favour of a transactional judgement.
Take that notion into the business context.
We all know that this is a common phenomenon in the financial sector. Constantly, banks and finance providers bend or ignore the rules (and the spirit of the rules) in order to grasp a commercial opportunity. The Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) scandal was just one example amongst many.
Sure they often get fined later on. But you get the feeling that this is internally categorised as just another ‘cost of doing business’.
The relevance to marketing professionals is that, whether in-house or agency, often find ourselves the filter of last resort, playing the unpopular message back to the business that the claims being made for a product or service are exaggerated or even sometimes untrue.
And do you know what? We’re pretty fed up with being the fall-guys for the unpopularity of this feedback. It should never be the case that marketing ends up being the guardian of ethicality at the end of an essentially misconstrued commercial process.
The answer? Involve marketing earlier in the commercial development. And give us a voice!
We all know the massive commercial pressures that companies are under at the moment. Many are privately saying that the global economic downturn hasn’t really hit us yet – wherever you are in the world. Many firms are quietly tightening their belts in anticipation.
But that’s not an excuse for commercial myopia. If the proposition doesn’t look that competitive, then don’t try and paper over the cracks with overblown product claims! You’ll get found out in the end.
Harness those marketing brains from the concept stage onwards to make the value proposition more attractive – productising better, adding value with a better service package, creating customer communities, and much more.
That’s the route to long-term success.
I hope you find these bulletins entertaining. I’m happy to discuss all relevant engagements – from customer community creation, to directorial mentoring, to strategy development, to thought-leadership content development, to full campaign structuring and management, and more.
Do get in touch!
