AIN’T WE WONDERFUL!
AIN’T WE WONDERFUL!
It may come as a surprise to you to discover that customers
don’t buy your products or services because they feel that you
have a right to make a profit. In other words, their motive for
doing business with you is not to help you buy the latest Jaguar
or put your children through college. You think this is a joke?
Recent research shows that something like 60% of businesspeople
place more importance on what they will get from a transaction
than on what their customers will benefit.
In essence, their profitability is more crucial to them than is
customer satisfaction. And it shows.
If you are in any doubt about this, cast your eyes over the
myriad of ads, brochures, websites and so on that major on the
successfulness of their organisation, as opposed to the benefit
their products or services might be to the customer.
Certainly, they pay lip-service to customer satisfaction, but
beneath this thin veneer of eye-shine is the belief, probably
implanted at birth, that their bottom line takes precedence over
everything.
Oddly, advertising agencies are among the worst offenders in
this respect. Their promotional material illustrates what great
work they have done, and states how many millions they billed in
the last financial year, but none (and I mean none) tell you how
much product their efforts have helped shift. To put it another
way, none bother to demonstrate what benefit their services have
been to clients.
While I am on the subject, there’s something else just as
puzzling which may have escaped your notice. I refer to the
ubiquitous advertising awards handed out to agencies by various
advertising organisations around the world. These awards are
given, without fail, to campaigns that are outstandingly funny,
or technically slick, or wonderfully realistic. Rarely, and I
mean never, are these awards made on the strength of how much
product a given campaign has sold. They don’t even take into
account response rates or conversion rates generated by a
campaign.
Such figures, I agree, would involve a little trouble to
collate, and there would no doubt be quite a bit of trickery in
the shape of false returns to overcome. But I feel that a
yardstick of this kind would be far more worthy - and more
relevant - than one which considered only the creativity or the
cutting-edge techniques involved in a piece of work
Over the years, I have won dozens of awards for my clients; and
very grateful I have been for them. A copywriter who can tote a
portfolio or a showreel filled with award-winning material is
guaranteed work for life. Likewise, the ad agency that employs
him will see its equity rise and rise. And the client? Well, who
gives a damn about the client. His products and services are
merely vehicles upon which an agency can ride to glory.
The moral is clear. Rather than thinking what your customers can
do for you, think what you can do for your customers. With this
kind of philosophy, your profits will take care of themselves.
Patrick Quinn is an award winning copywriter with 40 years’
experience of the advertising business in London, Miami, Dublin
and Edinburgh. He publishes a FREE monthly newsletter,
AdBriefing. Subscriptions are available at:
http://www.adbriefing.com