Enjoy the end of December

It’s almost that time of year again. The time when we wind up our work and take a well earned break.

I’m talking of course about Christmas. But maybe I shouldn’t.

Recently I had the tricky task of writing about the Christmas break without using the word Christmas. After ‘festive season’ and ‘holiday break’ I ran out of synonyms.

Despite my best efforts the written piece had a strange ‘beat around the bush’ tone to it. Not surprising really when the subject I was writing about could not be written.

The reason I couldn’t write the C word is still a bit unclear to me. The client was an American company. Apparently in the US some people are concerned that saying Christmas at Christmas time will offend non-Christians.

It’s an interesting concept. And one I thought was confined to the US, until yesterday when an unnamed NSW bureaucrat gave directions on Christmas office decorations. She issued an email saying, ''Be respectful of other cultures and religious beliefs. Do not select religious decorations such as nativity scenes.''

As a child living in Singapore I can assure you I was never offended by alternative religious holidays. I gladly took the day off school for Hari Raya Aidilfitri, Deepavali and Chinese New Year. I had no idea what they all meant. I just enjoyed the dangerous fireworks and bean flavoured lollies.

My (Aussie) mate Troy who resides in Shanghai has chosen not to take holidays at Christmas, preferring to take off Chinese New Year with the rest of the office. I’m pretty sure he isn’t offended either.

And while I was shooting in Japan, progress was slowed by the annual ‘ride your bicycle into Tokyo’ holiday. We weren’t insulted at all. Delayed, yes. Perplexed, yes. Offended, no.

To quote consultant Alan Weiss, “You don’t have to “believe” in anything other than good will to others to have a happy and renewing time during the holidays.”

I think that’s the best advice of all.

So, I wish all AdNotes readers a wonderful and relaxing festive, occasion, season, break, holiday … um… thingy.

If you have a creative advertising problem call Tony Richardson on (02) 9929 0588 or visit Tony Richardson Advertising or TacticalTV.com.au

You are welcome to reprint any AdNotes article on your website and in your e-newsletters for FREE. All I ask is that you attribute me, Tony Richardson and include a link to http://www.TonyRichardson.com.au

Free Rolls Royce with every purchase

Who doesn’t love a GWP or ‘Gift with purchase’ - a free pair of socks with your cold tablets, a free cookbook with your cream cheese?

The good old GWP took an interesting turn recently when Stuart Ashton started thinking creatively.

You probably haven’t heard of Stuart, but he’d give a lot of professional marketers a run for their money.

Stuart and his wife Jean were selling their Mosman home and they thought it would be a good idea to throw in a little incentive, or GWP as we marketers call it.

The gift? A Rolls Royce car!

A free Rolls Royce sounds fantastic. RR has done a sterling job of attaching a luxury image to what is a very old-fashioned gas-guzzler. We don’t say ‘the Toyota of lawn mowers’ for example, we say ‘the Rolls Royce of lawn mowers’.

I wondered what this gold plated GWP was actually worth. A quick trip online told me his 1979 Rolls Royce was worth about $20 thousand. Not bad but hardly what you might expect to pay for true automotive luxury. And selling such a car on the open market could take months or even years.

The next stage in Stuart’s marketing campaign is a PR one. The free Roller story earned him a half page of free publicity on page 6 of the Mosman Daily where his regular house for sale ads were appearing. The synergies are almost too complete! Of course the story appeared online as well and I believe gained a little radio coverage too.

Stuart created a very neat marketing campaign on a very tight budget.

He provided a GWP that had the perfect balance of appearing to be very valuable while in fact not costing the marketer that much at all.

This appearance of value created an interesting PR opportunity that was followed in the very publication in which his target market was browsing.

Good media coverage, sure, but with all this ‘conversation’ did the house actually sell?

Yes.

Stuart and Jean not only sold the house, they got $150,000 above their reserve. A very good result in what is currently a flat housing market.

The final price was $2.25 million. So the cost of Stuart’s GWP and associated buzz represented only 0.008% of the total sale.

Maybe some of the big promotions agencies should give Stuart a call.

If you have a creative advertising problem call Tony Richardson on (02) 9929 0588 or visit Tony Richardson Advertising or TacticalTV.com.au

You are welcome to reprint any AdNotes article on your website and in your e-newsletters for FREE. All I ask is that you attribute me, Tony Richardson and include a link to http://www.TonyRichardson.com.au

It's all about You

I was writing a headline for a lawn care company a few years ago. It wasn’t exactly award winning but it got straight to the point. As I wrote “XXX repairs your damaged lawn”, I wondered if how long the ‘your’ would last. Sure enough the client came back with “XXX repairs damaged lawns”

In sweep of the red pen we had moved from a conversation between XXX and a person with lawn problems, to an announcement by the mighty XXX corporation about lawns in general, directed to the entire universe. I’m sure the line made the executives at XXX feel more important but I’m equally sure it sold fewer bags of XXX Lawn Repair.

Consumers are people. And people are pretty self-absorbed. People don’t care about ‘lawns’ they care about ‘their lawn’. Sure, they can make the mental jump from a marketers demographic to themselves, but why make them jump at all?

I’ve never met a demographic. I hope I never do. They sound large, crowded and homogeneous. But I’ve met a lot of people. People are interested in their roof, their kids education, their overflowing toilet ....

Even Qantas uses the line ‘It’s all about you.’ It’s perfect for business class travel, which should be all about the customer. Earlier Qantas advertising was much more from the ‘We’ve bought 5 new planes’ school of communication. To which most business class passengers would rightly reply, ‘Who cares?’

Being ‘All about you’ shouldn’t stop at prestige brands or luxury services. I can’t think of any product or service that can’t be better sold by honing in on the individual and solving his or her problem.

Dale Carnegie in his book ‘How to win friends and influence people’, said the sound of a persons name is the sweetest sound of all to them. Advertising can’t refer to people by name, but it can say ‘you’ or ‘your’ and get much closer to people’s hearts. And best of all, most of your competitors (see, I’m doing it now) either don’t know or don’t care that they are speaking to a demographic rather than a person.

What a simple way to make your customers feel better about your brand.

If you have a creative advertising problem call Tony Richardson on (02) 9929 0588 or visit Tony Richardson Advertising or TacticalTV.com.au

You are welcome to reprint any AdNotes article on your website and in your e-newsletters for FREE. All I ask is that you attribute me, Tony Richardson and include a link to http://www.TonyRichardson.com.au

Worn out words

A few months ago I railed against clichés (the story was picked up by the marketing section of The Australian newspaper. Mention in the ‘real’ media! Quite a proud moment for AdNotes).

Little did I know a federal election was around the corner (oops a cliché!) It’s been an opportunity for both sides of politics to join up lots of clichés and call it a campaign.

But more irritating, to me anyway, are individual words that just get used too often. These are not strictly speaking Cliches, just words that suddenly seem to appear in every sentence or conversation.

There’s one that seems to be everywhere at the moment.

This little word has seen active service for centuries and used to evoke images of knights in armour battling dragons.

But recently it has evolved into a monster itself: a kind of irradiated moth from a sixties Japanese movie.

News-readers use it. Politicians use it. My 14 year old uses it. I try not to use it but it comes out anyway.

This overworked word is … challenge.

It can stand for anything from an ‘almost impossible task’ like plugging an oil leak in the US, to a ‘chore’ like peeling a potato on Masterchef.

But, I knew 'challenge' had lost all value when I picked up a flyer at St George Bank. The flyer invited me to ‘Challenge us for a better home loan deal.”

Poor ‘challenge’ now means nothing more than 'to ask’.

Like printing too many Zimbabwean dollars, overusing a word devalues it to the point where it has no worth or particular meaning.

If you have a creative advertising problem call Tony Richardson on (02) 9929 0588 or visit Tony Richardson Advertising or TacticalTV.com.au

You are welcome to reprint any AdNotes article on your website and in your e-newsletters for FREE. All I ask is that you attribute me, Tony Richardson and include a link to http://www.TonyRichardson.com.au

Masterchef - More research for smart marketers

I've written a story for Mumbrella. It's the second instalment on MasterChef and how the show is a great piece of market research for all marketers. Click here to check it out.

More bitching about pitching

Here's some thoughts from veteran Ad man, Drayton Bird, on pitching, why it's a waste of money and what to do instead. Good advice I reckon.

http://drayton-bird-droppings.blogspot.com/2010/07/you-dont-have-to-hunt-andrew-but-you.html#disqus_thread

Making powerpoint have a point

I was asked to give a talk to a group of potential clients the other day. They reckon public speaking is a fear worse than death for many people. The thought of speaking didn’t faze me. It was the accompanying powerpoint I had to create that had me worried.

I recalled, with a shiver, a drug education presentation at my kids’ school. This wasn’t death by powerpoint, it was genocide by powerpoint.

Dozens of text heavy pages rolled on as the plastic chair dug further into my back. In desperation I started following the powerpoint page numbers … 69, 70 …blah blah blah. I couldn’t walk out. My reputation as a caring parent would be ruined … 78, 79. Finally it was over. I couldn’t wait to get home and open a bottle of wine. Ironic, eh?

It was the worst use of powerpoint I’ve ever seen and I’ve seen some stinkers. Naturally, I wanted my talk to be better than the drug one.

Most powerpoint presentations aren’t that bad, but they aren’t that good either. They’re just there: the speaker’s notes writ large and stuck on the wall. Yawn.

Then I remembered another powerpoint presentation that couldn’t have been more different. It was given by my great mate Troy. Troy is a copywriter, but one with a strong visual sense. He took the usual powerpoint and turned it on it’s head.

He didn’t want people gazing at his notes, he wanted people listening to his words.

He decided that the big screen would show mostly pictures to add a counterpoint to what was being said. He spent hours finding just the right shots to fill the screen. The images were big and arresting. They added to what was being said. They broke the talk into digestible chunks.

Text would be as rare as a diamond rather than as common as gravel. It would act as chapter headings to remind the audience what the focus of each section was about.

I’m sure you’ve guessed that Troy’s presentation was a triumph. It was the best powerpoint most of us had ever seen.

So I just stole Troy’s technique.

My presentation took a long time to plan, write, find shots, practise and memorise. But it worked. It worked as a delivery of facts and more importantly it worked as a memorable piece of communication.

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