TNG Blog

About political correctness, small business, marketing and a better humankind

Growing up in Europe, I must admit that I wasn’t very familiar with the term ‘political correctness’ (PC). Somehow, we just became numb to such things; the diversity of a relatively small continent with nearly 50 countries and more than 20 languages (plus hundreds of local and regional dialects), where after centuries of wars and animosity, we finally found a way to live together and become more accepting of one another and our differences. We joined our free spirits from the south…warm, spicy, and hot-blooded people, who hug and kiss and share their food unselfishly with new acquaintances over a glass of wine, where topless beaches are viewed not as ‘girls gone wild’ but as a normal alternative option that is not a big deal, whether you choose it or not…and the north…where brownies are made with love and another ‘special’ ingredient, where some adult shops do have windows and merchandise displayed to the public. Now that you have an idea regarding what I’m talking about, imagine some of us foreigners coming to a place where being PC is a must…a way of business and everyday life.

I wouldn’t even have written about this topic had I not observed a couple of bothersome PC / non-PC situations in recent professional matters. As business owners, our biggest dream is to attract as many prospects as possible and to convert them into customers, that is, into profit. Right? For a small business, this process of evolving from “have you heard about the new neighborhood business” to “OMG, they were part of the 4th of July parade” to “they donated money for making a new basketball court in an underprivileged part of town” to “they have environmentally friendly uniforms” to “I will shop there regularly because I like who they are, what they stand for, and how they do business” is challenging; I’ve found that we’ve become over-sensitive and that, for every politically correct action, someone is likely to find a politically incorrect perspective.

However, it is generally very simple. A business owner wants to send the world a positive message about his or her business; a message that will motivate interest and ensure favorable standing; a message that will not leave a stain on the business, business name, or brand; a message that the business is not prejudiced and is open for everyone; a message that everyone’s money is more than welcome. Or maybe not that simple???

The Holiday Season

The time right around the holidays is always key for political correctness. Yes, you know that time of sending out greeting cards to your current and prospective clients and vendors. When I was first exposed to this, I just didn’t understand the drama about colors! “No, we can’t use red. No, not green, that’s also a Christmas color. No, not blue, that’s only for Hanukkah.” I still remember one of my former employers forcing that one big snowflake on the card. That seemed safe. A few years later, with a different employer, I remember the same color issue around the end of the year; we ended up using purple and avoiding any potential PC issues.

Should I even mention Happy Christ-Hanu-Wanza being replaced by ‘Season’s Greetings’ (of course)? I guess that humans just want to complicate things. We are afraid of simple, because simple has to mean losing something. Could we proclaim one color as the official holiday season color and just simply use it during the season? Aren’t you sometimes tired of being PC from late November through early January; people seem to lose sight of what’s important, that someone has thought of them and wished them a greeting of joy, luck, and happiness? Isn’t that actually what’s most important?

Pictures and Illustrations

I mean, the picture (e.g., advertisement, brochure) has to have a Caucasian, an African American, a Hispanic/Latino, an Asian, a homosexual, a female and a male representative, right? Else, someone will feel forgotten. Overseen? Unimportant? Untargeted? I mean, seriously. I am ok if a female is not represented in the commercial of a product that I’m considering. I don’t care if they use a Martian as a spokesperson for McDonald’s, I will still indulge in eating junk food…sometimes. Why do people find themselves called out or forgotten so easily and so often nowadays? Why is the sensitivity level so high and self-awareness so low that it has to be proven all the time?

So, what advice can I give to a small business owner concerning this whole PC / non-PC debacle? I guess that shifting attention to Valentine’s Day and welcoming Spring seem like good ‘neutral’ ideas and safe ground. You don’t want to get on the bad side of the community that you work in; you don’t want to be the rooster that crows before time and gets his head guillotined…to set an example for the other roosters. Or, to lose your customers because you wished them a happy ‘wrong’ holiday – you can’t afford that financially. But! PC was brought about by people in a moment when society felt the need for it. Many people feel that it’s time to overcome this forced ‘respect’ and censoring of free speech. Many business owners would act more freely if PC weren’t directly or indirectly enforced. The fact is that marketers continue to point out that PC kills good marketing and restricts creativity. However, PC continues to remain in our society. Yet, who wants to be the lone rooster that crows before the break of dawn?

This is one of those ideologies that begs for a relatively mature society, which has already overcome trivial issues; unfortunately, at this time, it seems possible only if we as humankind are threatened by aliens, or robots, or who knows what else; only then will be united and not feel threatened or disrespected by one another. Until our society grows to the level of self awareness and mutual self-respect that doesn’t need to be ‘regulated’ by PC guidelines, we can all try to make small improvements by talking about what bothers us, trying to explain ourselves, accepting and respecting one another.

Or we can keep making commercials like this. No one insulted, right?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cEFrVdyV9w&feature=related

P.S. Kudos for creativity! The ‘pipe’ people really reinforce the message of the product while not being politically incorrect.

Last year, I wrote a case study about wasted advertising money in the corporate world. This month, to no surprise, I have once again come across a similar situation. Call me a typical woman, but at least a few times a year I have to buy Vogue, as opposed to just flipping through it at one of the bookstores. So this month, I was perusing through the pages of the December issue of the iconic Vogue, described by book critic Caroline Weber in The New York Times in December 2006 as “the world’s most influential fashion magazine.” Weber points that the magazine I was reading had “long functioned as a bible for anyone worshiping at the altar of luxury, celebrity and style.” Yet she is not alone, as many others have pointed to its fame for images of high fashion and high society. And as I continue to skim the pages, as any good marketer, I find myself wondering about the magazine’s brand identity and the marketing activities of various fashion and lifestyle brands that advertise in this premier publication.

Let’s look at this from a few sides.

First, from the lens of Vogue, which – as mentioned above – has long held the reputation of luxury, high society, and high fashion. If one has enough nerves to flip through to page 246, where an uninterrupted 67 pages of content actually reside, one could see an 8-page spread on Tom Ford, 8- and 10-page layouts of the latest high fashion trends, 6 pages of cover girl Angelina Jolie, and a random assortment of additional stories on modern art, landscaping, and…Spider Man, the Rock Musical. Now if we move beyond the fact that less than 40% of the magazine’s 330-pages are actually devoted to content – other than advertisements and random empty pages like the Table of Contents – one can clearly see that the magazine still holds on to some glimpse of being the “world’s most influential fashion magazine.”

When one accounts for the fact that more than 90% of the magazine’s advertisements focus on some realm of fashion, style, and beauty (see chart below), one might even venture that, through the collective influence of moderate content and a barrage of advertisements, the magazine remains truly dedicated to fashion and style. But that is not my concern. Rather, I question whether Vogue remains true to its reputation as a beacon for “high fashion and high society.”

Part of the issue arises from the fact that, since taking over in 1988, current editor Anna Wintour has aimed to create a Vogue that is focused on new and more affordable ideas of fashion for a wider audience, in order to maintain circulation of the magazine. But something still does not feel right. You flip through the 120+ pages of content discussed above and you see a Balenciaga bikini for over $1k, a leather iPad case for $4k, and $200 Gucci sandals for the little one. As you continue through the content, all you see are high end items. There is nothing that is affordable for the masses. So, Vogue is still holding true to its reputation.

Or is it?

I begin to see a disparity in the brand – the content is truly a “bible for anyone worshiping at the altar of luxury, celebrity and style” yet the advertisements are a mishmash of sponsors that would pay. Are the same women praying for a Louis Vuitton life by the coast (p.8), a Chanel dress (p.22), and a diamond enriched Omega watch (p.26), the same ones that worship Gap (p.48-59), Target (p.82), and JC Penney (p.207), and drive a Chevrolet (p.136)? I think not. In fact, there is so much disparity that it does not make sense. After performing an in-depth analysis of the issue, I find that only about one-third (see chart below) of the advertising pages are dedicated to what I consider to be true luxury brands (e.g., Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Burberry, Rolex, etc).

So, Vogue is aiming to broaden its user base by soliciting advertisements from a variety of brands, yet the content that they provide truly focuses almost exclusively on the high end fashion and lifestyle domain. The reader, or the customer, ultimately ends up flipping through 200 pages of advertisements, perhaps reads an article or two, and maybe gets some ideas about fashion but might not be able to afford it. And then there are the brands that advertise in Vogue hoping to reach their target market.

Some of these companies should ask themselves several strategic questions:

• Are they reaching their target market?
• Is this an effective approach to reaching their target market?
• Are there better alternatives for marketing spend?

It is difficult to fully estimate the value of these advertisements, but I would certainly suggest that there are probably several companies whose marketing budget might be better spent elsewhere…Chevrolet and Gap included.

Idiot’s Advice for Small Business Owners: Small business owners and entrepreneurs that don’t have the luxury of wasting resources or time on a variety of marketing vehicles must choose wisely. Make sure that you thoroughly study your options and select those channels or vehicles within a channel that will most effectively allow you to reach and influence your target audience.

Picture this … it’s dinner time, after a tough day at work, you and your family finally get together for a nice meal and some quality family time. There is laughter, stories, and the smell of a freshly cooked meal…ideal. The telephone rings.  You are caught off guard and an enthusiastic marketer from the other side asks for only five minutes of your time, to answer some questions. How do you react:

1) You enthusiastically answer the questions

2) You grudgingly agree to 5 minutes of your precious time, answering questions while your hands begin to sweat and you feel your heart start to race

3) You politely apologize that you don’t have 5 minutes and hang up the phone

4) You pick up and angrily tell him that you are already on the Do Not Call Registry and that he shouldn’t call you at all, while irately hanging up the phone

5) You pick up, listen briefly, and hang up the phone without saying anything

6) #6 is not the case here – since you already picked up the phone – but you could just simply not pick up

Recently, I was personally targeted by a similar telemarketing campaign. I believe that I’m the worst kind of target: curious, answering questions with questions, and myself a marketer.  I found it a particularly interesting social phenomenon that I was being engaged during dinner time and was curious enough not to hang up. Even though I actively listened for a few minutes, I cannot remember the exact objective of the marketer (obviously a good indication of the effectiveness of the call), but I do recall that the marketer lacked the appropriate educational level and communication skills to even remotely interest me for his product, service, or other objective. In fact, I recall deeply considering the inadequacies of the telemarketing strategy of this company, a poorly written script that was given to a bad actor, and of course very poor timing – dinner time.  Consider that there are many other alternatives techniques and you will ask yourself why a company would choose to continue with a somewhat outdated marketing method. For example, why would this same company not invest in pay-per-click advertising or some form of Social Media marketing that would allow a target customer to alone determine when, at a more appropriate time, he or she would go to the internet, respond to an advertisement, and convert into a lead without the active influence of a marketer. Below is my quick analysis of the pros and cons of both approaches and why one might choose one over the other.

Isn’t ‘tradeoff’ the first word that comes to your mind, right after ‘wow’? Isn’t this the most typical dilemma that the business world is facing today: efficiency vs. effectiveness? We are all aware that various social media services are experiencing dramatic growth, not only for the purpose of maintaining our friendships and professional relationships, but also for building new relationships, whether mutual partnerships, employment opportunities, or business development opportunities. One can venture to say that it is even becoming the leading venue for marketing and sales generation among certain niche markets or customer segments. Nevertheless, it seems that quite a few for-profit companies and not-for-profit initiatives continue to avoid these platforms in favor of more archaic methodologies, such as telemarketing. In a time when each person wants to be in greater control of what they will do and when, and when a random mistimed telephone call is obviously annoying, it is time to let go of some old fashioned techniques and invest in a social media expert rather than an offshore telemarketer.

The appearance of social media has brought a revolution both in business and our private lives. Each of us, whether we wanted to or not, has become a part of that machinery in some fashion. On one side, there are those who are complete opponents to the revolution and continue to refuse assimilation because they ‘do not have time’ or ‘do not want to share information and news with anyone’ or ‘do not want to be victims of the greatest conspiracy theory in history’ or ‘already have an established position in the market and their old fashioned methods are proven’.

Then, there are those who are just opening their first account on the most secure platform that they could find and contemplating each status / update / info before sharing. These rookies would rather communicate with their friends and acquaintances live, and clearly have no interest in what is being read or what meetings are being attended by people they don’t know. Even when they try to become more involved, these users hold a meeting with a handful of colleagues to even approve anything that should be posted…and to debate whether or not to add a disclaimer for each post.

And, of course, there is that third and final category of individuals that have already mastered (some have even doctored) a novel shorthand language for more effective communication with limited space. These power-users swear upon their ‘home page’ as a bona fide news source, and without thought share with the whole world each and every occurrence from their work and personal lives.

This entire revolution brings a mound of experts that devote themselves to researching the ‘to share or not to share’ phenomenon, as well as the eternal topic of privacy…in fact, what does privacy even mean today? Social media has redefined the meaning of privacy in a society that was built upon family as a pillar where that which happens within a family sphere stays in the family and where issues and problems were solved within the family…that used to be privacy. Now, that same family structure is no longer needed, as each individual has an opportunity to find someone ‘out there’ on some social media network that better understands them, approves of their actions, and / or gives better advice than a family member ever could. Social media is also redefining privacy in the business world. While a once distant corporate atmosphere used to look at business as simply doing business, strictly formal and defined without delving into emotions or topics not directly related to business, it is now beginning to show care and opening discussion forums for employees and other stakeholders through social media platforms. Wow! What a major shift, whether we accept it or not.

For me, over time, it has become quite interesting to follow the activities of those around me more and more as a social experiment. What is important enough for someone to ‘tweet’ about, or to publish as a ‘status’, or to announce in some other public way? Is that which is published done so without reason, is it simply straightforward information, or is it perhaps a means to transmit something between the lines? The trouble lies in finding the true meaning and decoding each ‘say it loud and say it proud’. Here are three examples of posts / status updates that I’ve had a difficult time decoding.

It’s a wonderful world

The most harmless post is one related to the weather; for example, “it’s a beautiful day”. When used for personal reasons, it is positive…a signal that someone is in a good mood and a “let’s get together” call for action. However, it also very frequently used in the business world, where it leads to confusion as most people wouldn’t understand the logic…why would anybody waste space and write about weather on business platforms? In my opinion, it is almost a human touch to doing business, showcasing a regular person who wants to go out for lunch in the park…and maybe talk business. More importantly, it is a simple reminder that you are in someone’s network, ensuring that your name pops up before others and perhaps encouraging them to show interest and begin clicking away…on your name, website, blog – the key destinations you wish to direct these ‘incidental visitors’.

Show me the money

“I love my work” although I always love to see that someone is satisfied with his or her work, I am often suspicious of statuses like this. Such comments could be interpreted in a number of ways…someone could like his or her job because he or she really enjoys the work, has the flexibility to leave work early, makes a lot of money, or because he or she has a hot boss…or secretary. Don’t you find yourself wanting to click and learn more about that person, where he or she works, his or her position, and job description? Of course! This leads us again to a ‘yes, please click on’ result because this post is only here to encourage this action. Rarely does your clicking lead you to truly understand why this person loves his or her work.

“We heart [love] our customers” is another frequent comment that I seem to run into more than I would like. It seems like the worst way to say to customers that they are loved and their loyalty appreciated. Aren’t there more sophisticated and more effective ways to communicate gratitude and sincerity to valuable customers in today’s world? Do you think that your customers would continue to click further after reading such a simple and meaningless post? Some customers might be even insulted and start thinking about what you have really done to thank them for their loyalty. Think twice before sharing, as different people could read differently between the lines of your post.

Me, me, me

Every now and then I see some self-proclaimed ultra-professional sharing posts like “your profile has been viewed by 187 people in the last day…yesterday, you appeared in search results 538 times” via a business platform. This ‘ode to self’ and self-praise could be a double-edged sword. Yes, such a post may help generate many clicks from curious users wanting to know who is the man or woman behind the update. At the same time, this kind of self-representation could indicate an insecure and amateur braggart attempting to market oneself and his or her business...”see how popular I am” or “everyone wants to be my friend” or “everyone views my profile”. Different users could read different meanings between the lines, a risk that everyone must consider.

These are just a few examples of how social media and networking via this channel are still young and contain rules / guidelines that are open to interpretation and not well defined. The early adopters are the ones who are paying the price of following this trend, so be careful not to overpay. Ok. Think again. Yes, now you can ‘share’!

P.S. What are some of your ‘favorite’ statuses / posts where you’ve read something between the lines?

When Customers Listen but Companies Don’t Send a Clear Message!

How many times has it happened to you that you see a commercial on television and immediately start thinking, “why did they spend money on this crap?” This situation seems to happen quite often to me. As a mutant consumer – one who has a background in business / marketing – it is very difficult for me to bite on the pure message that corporations want me to swallow…“buy this product because your life will be miserable without it”. Did they not plan on people like me or am I simply a standard deviation that has been forecasted in the business plan not to bite at the bait? If they had thoroughly planned their marketing campaigns and spent millions of dollars on advertising, shouldn’t I have been hooked on the bait as well…at least during my first encounter?

Unfortunately, it appears that some corporations have already begun to forget who it is that is supposed to hear / watch their messages and understand them (at this point I’m not even thinking about mutant consumers like me). Some corporations still think that it is enough to have a cute and memorable (or annoying yet recognizable) jingle – ala NuvaRing’s “Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, everydayyyy” – that will drive sales or increase market awareness about a new product. I personally prefer the You Tube variation with Beyonce’s ‘Single Ladies’, but I am just a mutated mind and not mainstream. This first NuvaRing commercial is one of the examples that I always share with my small business clients, suggesting that they always ask themselves, “who are my listeners and am I ensuring that they are hearing what I want them to hear”.

My internal alarm sounded off the very moment I saw the second NuvaRing commercial and heard one of the actresses say “I’m not even sure what it is,” referring to NuvaRing. Boom! Mistake admitted. After a few months and millions of dollars spent, it seems that someone in marketing apparently realized (or perhaps heard from a well-intentioned friend that was confused about NuvaRing) that the response to the ‘thoroughly planned marketing campaign’ was not as expected and that the majority of targeted customers did not understand the product or how it functioned. Beep! One more emergency meeting. One more critical decision. One more costly commercial (I prefer referring to it as damage control). One additional minute on national television clarifying NuvaRing, who it is best suited for, and why YOU definitely have to buy it. Ta-da! Problem solved. Now company sales HAVE TO grow.

In my weird logic of understanding the corporate world (one which I have not had the fortune of working in), a poorly written scenario and a bad marketing campaign are not as disastrous for a large corporation as they would be for a small business. For big business, such ‘challenges’ feel like they are simply one more item on a balance sheet, under ‘Marketing Expenses’, category ‘Other’. God bless the flexibility of GAAP and unlimited resources in the corporate world.

But, many of us live in a completely different world. Small business owners are not as familiar with the ‘Other’ category in their balance sheets. We work on tight budgets, where our annual ski trip will be traded for our marketing budget. We want to know who is out there listening and seeing our product or service and what they need to understand about our offering. I always highlight to my clients the importance of well done research and stepping into the shoes of their customers before going out and spending their entire vacation budget. Even for minor marketing expenses, such as attending local networking events, small businesses should diligently do their homework and identify value before spending their tight resources…which, alternatively, could be the latest shoes of the season.

In my opinion, a wisely spent dollar has to have the power to communicate a clear message to an audience, without leaving any space to perverse marketing minds to twist it. For small businesses, to set aside funds for damage control is a luxury that we cannot afford. All available resources have to be laid out into the open and invested in the right projects – mistakes are not allowed. We have to know who is listening to us and what they need to hear.