Whatever happened to trust?

Am I alone in lamenting the state of the world?

Is it because I am of ‘a certain age’ that my observations on a whole range of issues are seen, by some, as the ramblings of a ‘grumpy old man’?

Or is it because I am of a certain age, that I can remember a time, not so many years ago, when business transactions were carried out on the basis of trust, where the needs of customers were paramount and doing the job to the best of one’s ability was a matter of pride?

Things started to go wrong in the 1970’s when Mission Statements became the vogue. In these missives, normally placed in a prominent position on each office wall, companies trumpeted their beliefs on one hand stating that people were important, whilst making wholesale redundancies with the other.

The Thatcher years promoted the entrepreneurial spirit. People were deified for money making one minute, only to be disgraced for fraud the next.

The New Labour, New Britain has not materialised.

Indeed things appear to have gone steadily down hill.

Sleaze has been replaced by cronyism. Truth is indistinguishable from untruths. People are pushed out of office for protesting decisions they disagree with and promoted for seemingly agreeing to acquiesce.

This method of operation is now prevalent in all levels of government and in the plethora of quango’s that have been set up in recent years.

But are businessmen any different from politicians?

I think not!

In the early days of my business life, the used car salesman was regarded, often unjustly, as the epitome of business malpractice.

The worst excesses of the used car trade pale into insignificance against what happens today in some multinational board rooms. Management excesses and incompetence was once rewarded with the sack. The shame and the stigma of failure to live up to expectations became a millstone for ever.

Today, failure on a grand scale is rewarded with ‘golden parachute’ payments and massive pension payment top ups.

Failures, encouraged by their ‘success’ then move on to other organisations to repeat their failures on an even grander scale.

Is it any wonder, therefore, that a culture of greed flourishes?

Success can no longer be guaranteed through ability to do a good job.

It is now determined by ability the scramble to the pinnacle over the bodies, and at the expense, of more able colleagues.

Team working is supposed to be the mantra for business success. But what is the value of team to those obsessed with greed and self?

A Senior Executive of a company I was acquainted with put it succinctly.

“I want to develop a winning team. Team players are important to me. As long as they do what I say and what I want, they can be a member of my team.”

I recently attended a high powered marketing seminar at one of our most prestigious business schools. The subject was New Marketing.

As far as I could ascertain, the attendees, some of the countries best young business brains, had concluded that acting in an ethical manner and telling the truth was the new mantra for best business practice and an added value marketing benefit.

How far have we come! What has happened to trust?

The advent of the Information Revolution has removed many businesses from direct contact with their customers. Anyone dealing with a call centre will have experienced the frustration of dealing with a recorded message, being faced with a range of choice decisions (rarely the choice you really want), and the long void, filled with classical music (there was a time when I loved Vivaldi!), whilst waiting to speak to a real person.

By the time contact is made, the mode is nearly always one of confrontation. Something that exponents of customer service theory tell us should be avoided at all costs.

The situation is not helped when the ‘voice’ displays little knowledge of the facts of your case, have no real knowledge of the company they purport to work for and hide behind the Data Protection Act when you ask them for the name of somebody else in their organisation who might be better equipped to answer the query.

That they apparently care little about you as a customer is probably down to the fact that they are often rewarded by the number of calls that they field rather than by the quality of the information they give.

The move offshore by many large companies, including financial institutions and utilities, makes potential problems more likely and demonstrates just how important the needs of their customers really are to them.

Financial institutions, once the pillar of respectability, are now often some of the worst offenders.

Some of us can remember the time when the bank manager was held in high esteem. They cast a benevolent eye over our well being. Made us feel our business was important to them. As a result, their advice was highly regarded and their relationship with us coveted. Their wrath was to be avoided!

What do we have now?

Branches are closing. Managers are being put out to pasture. Local first hand knowledge is being replaced by Relationship Managers who are rarely seen in person, make important decisions on the basis of statistical information supplied by strangers in a distant office.

All this in the name of progress and to provide a better service for their customers.

The cynical amongst us might argue that it is simply a mechanism to save costs and boost profits.

The business customer is being penalised for bad marketing decisions made many years ago. Free banking was offered to non-business account holders who kept their current accounts in the black.

We ‘old timers’ have always believed that there is no such thing as a free lunch.

In this case, the cost of free banking is being funded by the exorbitant, often unfathomable charges levied against business account holders.

Little wonder that surveys carried out by business associations demonstrate that little brand loyalty exists between the banks and their customers and that high bank charges are perceived as one of the biggest burdens on the business community.

Of course, 2008 might be the turning point. The year when the world returned to the old values that we ‘grumpy old men’ and ‘grumpy old women’ remember nostalgically.

On the other hand, the last twenty years might just have been a dream. During 2008, I might just wake up to a new world where truth, trust and the needs of customers remain the real driving force in our lives and where greed, untruths and failure to take responsibility for our actions, have no place in our society.

ROBIN DILLEY

Published by: admin on January 31st, 2008 | Filed under The Marketing Group
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Internet marketing a myth or a reality

I read a piece in the marketing trade press calling on marketing professionals to wake up to the power of the web.

Apparently the annual survey on web use by Ofcom shattered the long held myth in some quarters that the internet is a medium for young people and computer nerds. People of all ages are using it for all manner of things the report concluded. Indeed the UK has the most active internet population in the world.

This report and its findings seem to be at odds with research into the use of the internet as a business marketing tool, especially amongst the small and medium business community. Apparently, large numbers still do not have broadband connection and many that do still do not regularly open or reply to business emails they receive.

Why is it that we will spend hours on the internet at home and use it as a resource for booking our rail tickets, searching out the best holiday travel deals, buying the latest book from Amazon, researching our ancestry and hunting down long lost school friends but feel somewhat reluctant to use it as a tool to help us increase the efficiency and profitability of our businesses?

It is possible that increased home use of the internet as come about because it has replaced television as a major vehicle to fill our leisure time and that the phenomenon is directly related to the poor quality of output from the TV companies?

It must be good news for business that consumers are turning to the internet in their droves and that the thought of online trading is no longer a turn off for millions of people.

But is it really surprising that busy business executives have failed to realise the true marketing potential of the Internet when marketing professionals have to be reminded of its potency?

Published by: admin on September 3rd, 2007 | Filed under The Marketing Group
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How green is your marketing?

In the 1960s saving the planet was the preserve of the flower people. Going back to nature was considered off the wall and weird. Now everybody seems to be climbing on to the bandwagon! The sceptics argue that the whole science of global warming, and particularly our part in its cause, is not proven. The cynics see it as a commercial ploy to tap into our collective environmental guilt and our pockets. Whatever view you take, it is clear that something strange is happening to the planet and there can be no doubt that there are people out there who are exploiting the situation for commercial gain. But who should really pay the bill for mankinds abuse of nature over a prolonged period of time? Governments place the blame on the electorate and see green taxes as the way to curb our excesses. Big business sees carbon offsetting as the means of passing on their responsibilities. Who appears to be the big loser in all this? The consumer of course! But are we all really to blame for the over packaging of nearly every consumer item? Is it our fault that major retailers foist plastic bags upon us so that we can take the items we have purchased from them away from their shops? Not only will we soon be taxed for the privileged, we are now being asked to clear up the mess, sort out our rubbish, reduce the amount of non recyclable waste or face punitive fines. Everyone needs to take their share of the responsibility for cleaning up our act. Governments need to legislate to stop wholesale pollution by the large conglomerates. Marketers need to focus attention on greening up their act and think of new, more environmentally friendly ways of producing and marketing their products - without increasing the price! Research and development should be geared to finding ways of cleaning up transport, making our existing, and future, housing stock more ecologically friendly and our power sources emission free. What is needed is an acceptance of our collective responsibility for the position we now find ourselves in. We then all need to work together to provide solutions that will ease, and then hopefully eliminate, the problems in the short, medium and long term. That is the real challenge facing us all. The reward should not be pounds in our pockets today, but a future for all mankind tomorrow!

Published by: admin on July 17th, 2007 | Filed under The Marketing Group
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Why do marketers continually try to reinvent the marketing process?

I read all the marketing trade press and receive lots of direct mail from marketing practitioners offering their services. Every week someone is telling me that their new approach will help me to improve the quality of my out of the box thinking and produce amazingly effective results for me in the market place.

All good marketers need to clearly differentiate their product or service offering but is offering a new form of marketing the way to do it?

When I started my communications career, many moons ago, I was told by a wise old sage that there was no such thing a new idea. There are however many different ways to present an old idea that can rejuvenate it and change the perception of how it is seen by existing and new customers.

The danger of prefixing the world new, in front of an established concept, was illustrated in the mid 1980s. The Coke wars were in full swing as Coca Cola was fighting hard to hold off an aggressive challenge to their market supremacy from arch rivals Pepsi. For over 100 years the Coke secret formula had been at the heart of the brands success. Moreover, the product was the bench mark by which all rivals were judged.

Inexplicably, Coke changed the formula and launched New Coke, a move that is still regarded as one of the biggest marketing blunders of the 20th Century.

American consumers, weaned on the original, did not like the new formula and turned away from Coke to its biggest rival Pepsi. As a result of the change, it is generally regarded that Pepsi won the Cola Wars and Coca-Cola faced a humiliating climb-down and an even greater fight to regain the supremacy they had lost.

I am an ardent advocate of strategic marketing and have assisted 100s of companies to improve the effectiveness of their approach to business development as a result. This has been done, not by offering a new form of marketing, but by changing the perceptions of the process within the organisations I have worked with.

One thing I have observed is that outside academia very few people understand what marketing is. Some do not believe claims made by practitioners that it can be a panacea for success. Others see it as a magic formula that will cure all ills.

Over a long career, I have noticed that every company I visit is different. Each has its own idea of what marketing is and what they are looking for marketing to do for them. I have not yet stumbled upon the secret formula that will work for everyone. If I had, I would be a very rich man.

On the other hand, I have been able to help companies see the light by guiding them through the old and trusted marketing principles. In nearly every case, this has involved an examination of all the elements of the marketing mix, identifying which are right for the individual organisation and then working with them to develop the right measure of the chosen ingredients to produce an individual formula for success.

Published by: admin on May 14th, 2007 | Filed under The Marketing Group
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Marketing and the Older Consumer

The marketing industry is aware that the over 50’s represent and important opportunity. After all, there are 20 million of them in the UK at the present time and the market is still growing. More importantly, this segment of the population holds 80% of the nations wealth.

But do marketers really know how to reach this market, appeal to the people in it and maximise the potential that exists?

If a recent survey carried out by Age Concern is to be believed, the answer is a resounding NO.

The vast majority of the ‘grey’ consumers polled, stated that they did not relate to the marketing messages they received and the stereotypes used to portray them in advertising.

Could this be because the vast majority of todays marketing departments and advertising agencies are populated by the under 35’s?

If my own experience is anything to go by, age does not diminish the ability of a ‘grey’ to appreciate creativity in the media, laugh at the new genre of comedians and comediennes or baulk about trying out something new. Younger marketers need to realise that advancing years does not necessarily equate to cerebral melt down. On the contrary, older people are more likely to try something new and invest in something different - because they can!

Even the most ageist marketing practitioner will appreciate that there is no subsitute for experience. Today’s marketing guru’s are all of a certain age and are listened to and respected because they have seen it all, done it all and bought the teeshirt.

The marketing challenges facing me and my peers through the 60’s and 70’s were just as great as the challenges we and every other marketer faces today. Some of the tools available to us are more advanced but the fundemental principles remain the same.

If marketing departments and agencies want to really understand what makes the ‘grey’ market tick, they can call on the experience of a rich vein of ‘grey’ marketers willing and able to take a back seat whilst being used as a professional sounding board by tomorrow’s rising young stars.

Robin Dilley

Published by: admin on April 16th, 2007 | Filed under The Marketing Group
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The Apprentice great entertainment or good business practice?

There can be no doubt that the last series of the Apprentice made compelling TV viewing. The first episode of the new series, was no exception.

The 16 contestants, 8 men and 8 women, had been selected from over 10,000 applicants. Entrepreneur Sir Alan Sugar says that the candidates for this new series are superb. A real cross-section of the young talent that the UK is able to offer.

At the end of the series, the winner will be offered a 6 figure salary to work in one of Sir Alans companies.

We are obviously in for a real treat as the series continues. Each week the contestants are split into two teams to compete against each other to achieve success in a specific project. The winners are suitably rewarded whilst the losers are called back to the boardroom where one of them is fired.

Initially the teams in last nights programme were boys versus girls. The first task required the teams to select a team name and appoint a project manager. This proved easier for the girls who selected the name Stealth and Financial Adviser Jadine Johnson as Project Manager. The boys were more devious. Originally they choose the name Certus offered by Tre. This was changed this to Eclipse after Sir Alan informed them that Certus was the name of a company that Tre had previously worked for. Andy Jackson, a Leeds born car salesman working in Scotland was manoeuvred into accepting the Project Manager role. He had been clearly set up to take a fall.

The teams were advised that their task was to sell coffee on the streets of Islington. The team making the most money would be declared the winner. As a last twist, the Project Managers were switched with Andy taking responsibility for Stealth and Jadine for Eclipse.

Anyone expecting a case study of effective business planning would have been sorely disappointed by what they saw. The four Ps of marketing. Product, Place, Price and Promotion took a back seat as team members haggled about who would do what. Playing to the camera seemed more imported than working as a team to come up with a winning strategy to beat their rivals.

The boys team, who had obviously selected Andy as Project Manager so that he could be a fall guy for possible failure, found that Jadine was a different proposition. She would not be pushed around. The girls on the other hand found themselves without a driver as Andy proved to be a real pussycat

The result, proved to be a real frustration for the business purist. Nearly every rule of business best practice was broken by both teams. Eclipse finally came out on top - but more by good luck than good management!

Car salesmen were once cited as ruthless individuals who would do anything to get a sale. Andy is obviously the exception because he was mercilessly exploited by both teams and deservedly fired in the final boardroom showdown.

It can be argued that the format and the clever editing provide excellent television. The cynics might argue that the contestants were chosen not so much for their business acumen but more for their potential to be excellent performers on a large stage.

The danger of the Apprentice format is that young business people seeking peer examples of best business practice might be seduce into the belief that talking is more important than listening, that bad language can obscure a lack of vision and creativity, that winning at all cost is a good long term strategy for success and that truth has no place in the development of sustainable businesses.

This view is counterbalanced by Sir Alans Boardroom team. His eyes and ears are Margaret Mountford, his most trusted adviser, and Nick Haver his ex PR adviser and close confident. Sir Alan is successful because of his undoubted drive but also his ability to surround himself with people whose opinions he can trust.

To sum up, The Apprentice should be seen for what it is, great television.

Perhaps it also mirrors the problems that exist in some struggling businesses by highlighting the obvious difficulties of managing people in todays complex and changing market environments and the need for business managers to work together, in harmony, to achieve long term, sustainable success.

Robin Dilley

Published by: admin on March 29th, 2007 | Filed under General
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Marketing an Innovative Product or Service

Robin M Dilley MCIM (Chartered Marketer), MIPR

We ought not to be over-anxious to encourage innovation in cases of doubtful improvement, for an old system must ever have two advantages over a new one; it is established and it is understood.
Charles Caleb Colton, Writer (1780 1832)

Understanding innovation

Throughout my career, I have visited many organisations who are seeking advice on how to market product or services that they claim are innovative. In many cases these innovative ideas are simply developments of items already well established in the marketplace. They lack the necessary differentiating and added value factors that will encourage the market to change from the product or service already available through the distribution chain.

Often the ideas have progressed through to expensive prototypes and, in some cases, even packaging design, branding and marketing concept before it has been established whether a market exists at all.

Whilst it is recognised that product innovators are protective of their ideas, it is recommended that a bona fide marketing expert is called in at an early stage. The marketing professional is used to working under confidentiality agreements and can provide reliable advice and a valuable sounding board before too much investment has been committed.

Having said that, there is no easy formula for success. The vison of an unknown inventor is not always shared by the distribution chain or the end user.

Key Characteristics of an Innovative Product or Service

The Marketing Improvements Group at Cranfield University carried out some research amongst some of the UKs fastest growing companies. This provided some pointers that the innovator should consider as part of the marketing planning process.

True innovation is defined as something that is either unique (very rare), or sufficiently different from the offerings currently available to the targeted consumer, to make it a viable and potentially profitable alternative.

Having determined that a potential market exists, the same criteria apply in constructing a marketing action plan as for any other product. Areas to consider include pricing, distribution, fixed costs, profit expectations, distribution chain identification, marketing message, sales approach to be employed and competitive activity.

Developing the Marketing Action Plan

Inevitably the management style of the organisation or individual responsible for product innovation is visionary. This visionary zeal will not always be sufficient to convince potential buyers that they should risk their reputations by putting their heads on the line for something that is new and untried. But visionary zeal backed up by even limited research, and a well constructed plan, can be make a tremendous difference.

An outline plan should be developed, with outside assistance, at an early stage of the development process. It is a cost, but a well thought through plan can save a lot of money and heartache later!

The planning process should rigorously challenge the credentials of the proposed product or service. This process will identify the end user, potential competitive products currently in the market and the possible chain of distribution to be employed.

A sales argument should be developed that explains the added value benefits afforded and the differentiating factors that make the new product or service truly innovative.

The length of the distribution chain can seriously affect profit expectations.

The shorter the chain the higher the profit potential!

It is worth remembering that the end purchaser will pay a premium for something that is truly new and innovative. There is always a cache in been amongst the first to own something that is really different. These early adopters, as they are called, will extol the virtues of their new toy and spread the word to other potential purchasers.

Many companies with innovative products fail to amortise the high cost of product development into the price charged to the first link of the distribution chain. In consequence, they provide profit for the rest of the chain without cashing in on their vision as they should.

It is worth looking at ways of reaching the early adopters directly through mail order or e-marketing during the initial distribution phase. This might limit unit sales initially but will maximise the profit potential and attract the volume distributors..

Protecting the Investment

If the marketing plan is robust, it will pinpoint the potential and highlight the risks. It then becomes a judgment call as to whether the potential outweighs the risk. Having made the decision to move forward, organisations exist to assist and reduce the high cost of prototyping, the potential minefield of packing and product legislation and the benefits of copyright patent or intellectual property protection.

Published by: admin on December 16th, 2004 | Filed under The Marketing Group
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