If you ask people “Do you like surprises?” a fair percentage will say “No, I hate surprises!”
They’re wrong.
They don’t really hate surprises.
They just hate unexpected bad things happening to them.
No-one likes that.
If I surprise someone, who says they hate surprises, with the news they’ve just won $10 million in the lotto, you can bet your bottom dollar they bloody love surprises now!
Same with marketing.
I’ve been marketing businesses for twenty-five years or so and when I tell people I own an Advertising Agency, they’ll say either:
“Oh, advertising doesn’t work on me.”
Or
“I hate all marketing.”
They’re lying on both counts. They don’t realise they are, but they almost certainly (99.99999% sure) are.
You see, advertising and marketing can both work incredibly well.
The great engagement ring swindle
Example number one is engagement rings.
Of your one-hundred closest female friends and relatives, I’d guess every single one has a diamond engagement ring.
Every single one.
The reason they have a fairly expensive diamond engagement ring is because of one of the most brilliant advertising campaigns the world has ever seen.
Read all about the way they completely manipulated how people perceive diamonds here.
This includes:
- Diamonds are a gift of love
- The bigger the diamond, the more he loves you
- The earliest use of influencers
- Making a diamond the traditional engagement ring
- The utter genius of “Diamonds are forever”
- Creation of the quasi-authority “Diamond Information Centre”
Then we come to your cat
I think it was Aussie adman David Droga who said:
“Everyone hates marketing until they lose their cat.”
When Kitty gets lost, that’s when the cat lover LOVES marketing.
And they’re good at it.
Within an hour they’ll have identified their target market – residents within a 500 metre radius of their house.
They’ll have brainstormed and created their key marketing message:
“My very loved Kitty needs her medication, she’ll be fretting, we miss her greatly…..”
Strong Call-To-Action
They’ll have developed a strong Call-To-Action:
“Call 5555 5555 if found. Reward!”
The creative will have been completed – and those posters have been taped to every pole in that 500 metre radius.
A social media marketing campaign will have been developed and launched within minutes into the local Facebook and Missing Pets groups.
Direct approaches to the target market will have been made:
Knock Knock …..”Have you seen my Kitty??”
Kitty Kat’s mum doesn’t hate marketing now.
Now she loves it.
Because marketing works. Works for Kitty Kats and the rest of us.
Cheers
