Target Audience | Copy Unlimited blog

Four things I’ve learned

…from Starbucks, Eurostar, Tesco and play.com

Four things Ive learned | marketing language advertising | copywriter

Four things happened to me this week.

OK, more than four things, but since you haven’t got all day, I’ll give you the short version.

Extra strong – with wings

First, I hung out at Starbucks, which is better than any serviced office I’ve ever seen. You can stretch one cup out all afternoon, as you huddle over your laptop.

But this time, I decided to leave my comfort zone. No, not my favourite armchair by the window. But my coffee.

You see, I normally opt for a grande, skinny, decaf, sugar-free hazelnut, extra-hot latte - enough to give any barista RSI as they scramble to tick all the boxes.

But this time, I decided to change. A regular coffee seemed an appropriate departure, so I consulted the board. Americano, I thought. That’ll do the trick.

But wait…what about Freshly Brewed Coffee? It was much cheaper, and that was enough to tip the balance.

So that’s what I ordered. And instantly regretted it.

Americano is basically a diluted espresso, made on the spot from achingly fresh coffee beans. Whereas Freshly Brewed Coffee is, well, not really fresh.

The barista pivoted round, flipped the tap on a big silver urn, and filled the cup with tired old dregs.

So that would be Freshly Stewed Coffee.

Lesson 1: don’t stretch language beyond its limits.

Next stop Paris

From there, where else could the week go? Upwards was the only way, and yesterday, Eurostar put a smile on my face.

I live in Cambridge, and every week, like it or not, the local freesheet newspaper lands on my mat. Usually, it goes straight in to the recycle bin.

But not this time.

Paris – An all hours guide, the cover (which wasn’t really the cover, but a advert wrap) said. Pull out. Fold up. Pocket it.

The inside is crammed full of useful listings – places to eat, relax, and boogie on down. The back has a handy map. There are even Cambridge-Paris train times (via King’s Cross/St Pancras).

And coolest of all, a handy origami-style diagram showing you how to fold it all into a pocket map.

Brilliant. Just brilliant. Why?

It’s targeted, it’s personal and it’s useful. Even if I don’t want to go to Paris tomorrow, I’ll keep it for when I do.

And so Eurostar has achieved the Holy Grail – an advert I’ll never throw away.

Lesson 2: think smart, think targeted, think like a reader.

Bag for life (not)

Tesco delivered my internet shopping this week, all neatly packed in carrier bags. Re-use this carrier bag and collect Green Clubcard Points, each bag cried out at me.

If only I could.

At least half of the bags had the handles knotted – double-knotted. And they’d been lifted into the crate at the store, then out of the crate on to my doorstep, then again to my kitchen.

Each time the knot got a little tighter. In the end, the only way I could open them was with scissors.

You see the green problem.

When I pointed it out to Tesco customer service, they said they’d put a note on my account.

But what about all the other shopping packed at that store? In fact, at every store countrywide? How many bags were being wasted, I wondered. Surely they could feed it back to somebody who could change things?

Silence. Then they said they’d put a note on my account.

So I dropped it. Some battles you can’t win.

Lesson 3: make sure everybody in your company shares your values.

Game over

This week I ordered a DVD – La Vie en Rose (it’s known as La Môme in France).

It’s the fourth French film I’ve ordered in as many weeks, so play.com have a pretty good idea of my tastes. Perfect for marketing purposes.

Or so you’d think.

On the invoice that came with the DVD, they’d conveniently printed a list of other bestselling and upcoming titles.

Clever. But also not so clever.

For their titles included Knocked Up: Extended and Unprotected Special Edition, along with Hellboy and Superbad. Oh, and Death Note: Limited Edition.

It would have been a simple bit of database programming to pull out the upcoming French titles.

Lesson 4: try selling what your customers are buying. You’ll be pleasantly surprised.

The power of You

The little word that makes a big difference

The power of You | language copywriting | copywriter

Want people to read what you write? Of course you do.

Then talk to them directly. You may not know their name, but they all have one thing in common: they’re all called ‘you’.

Recently, I saw this sign at a local supermarket. It stopped me in my tracks. I’ve probably seen thousands of fire-exit signs in my life, but I’ve never given them much attention.

Until now.

This one made me pull out my phone-that’s-really-a-camera and take a picture.

One day, I thought, it might be me trapped inside that burning building, scrambling to get past a woman with a trolley filled with Coke and thick-crust pizzas, and a man arguing about money-off coupons while thick, acrid smoke billowed around us.

You. It’s such an obvious tactic to use, that we often overlook it.

At my gym, there’s a list of 10 ‘rules and regulations’ (what’s the difference, exactly?).

One says: the male members shall wear a training top.

Quite apart from the unintended innuendo, there’s the imperious use of ‘shall’. I’m tempted to strip off just to see what happens.

The notice is signed (inevitably) ‘The Management’.

And here’s the thing: never once does it say you. So the tone is cold, distant, and bossy. I’m likely to make a note of the rules simply to remember to break them as often as possible.

If you want people to take notice, try these three things:

Keep it simple.
Be direct.
Use ‘you’.

By order,
The Management

Turn away customers and get more business

Target a niche and you’ll never go hungry

Turn away customers and get more business | marketing communication | copywriter Imagine for a moment you’re a small business. Maybe you don’t have to, because you are one.

But imagine anyway.

You’re looking for an accountant. First, you ask friends, but they say their accountants are all right, but not so great they’d recommend them.

So you decide to search online.

Soon, your head hurts. You’ve checked out lots of websites. They all make big promises, and talk about the things they ‘firmly believe in’.

Maybe they even say ‘we pride ourselves on’ a few times. And they all say ‘we’, even if they’re just one person.

But frankly, they all look the same.

Then suddenly, you spot something. A firm of accountants that says we’re small. But that’s not all. They say we’re the small business specialists. Not only do they specialise in small businesses, they say they don’t and don’t want to handle big businesses.

Convinced? I am. I’d use them. Give me their number now.

Go small, think big

If you specialise, people will flock to you. Don’t worry that you’re turning away people – you’re attracting even more.

Once, I fell into conversation with a woman at a party. She was a life coach, she told me. A life coach who specialised in actors. A life coach specialised in actors, and especially gay actors.

“How fascinating,” I said, munching a vol-au-vent and sipping warm chenin blanc.

Secretly, I was wondering whether she’d painted herself into a very tiny corner. So how was business, I asked her.

She knocked back a neat whiskey, and smiled broadly.

“I’m rushed off my feet,” she said. “Never been busier. Since I started specialising, I’ve been inundated. Who would have thought?”

Who indeed.

Three things to make you think

1. The $2bn sales letter

The most successful sales letter ever written had no headline, bullet points or flashy promises. It told a simple story, and generated $2bn in subscriptions for The Wall Street Journal.

This is how it begins:

On a beautiful late spring afternoon, twenty-five years ago, two young men graduated from the same college. They were very much alike, these two young men. Both had been better than average students, both were personable and both – as young college graduates are – were filled with ambitious dreams for the future.

You’re hooked, aren’t you? I was. The letter shows the incredible power of storytelling.

So what’s your story?

2. The Big Idea that nobody wanted

If you use a free webmail service, you probably wonder how you ever did without it. It’s always on, and accessible from anywhere. What could be easier?

It’s such an obvious idea.

But it wasn’t – at least in the mid-90s, when twenty venture-capital firms rejected the idea proposed by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith.

Twenty.

And yet Hotmail went on to become one of the fastest product adoptions of all time. Just two months after launch, it had 100,000 users.

And thanks to the master-sroke of putting ‘Get your free e-mail at Hotmail.com’ at the end of mesages, the system went viral.

Within 18 months, it had 12 million users.

So what’s your Big Idea?

3. These boots were made for walking (all the way to the bank)

Oprah bought 350 pairs for her production crew. Pamela Anderson was a big fan. And no self-respecting Sloane Ranger would wear anything else when they’re strutting their stuff down the King’s Road in London.

And yet until the mid 90s, Ugg boots were virtually unkown – outside of Australia and New Zealand, that is.

They’d been around since the 1920s, and were perfect for the rough terrain of outback. They were also the favoured footwear among swimmers and surfers, being warm and water-repellent.

More function than fashion. So what changed?

Marketing, pure and simple. When Deckers Outdoor Corporation bought Ugg Australia in 1995, they set about making Ugg the must-have fashion item. They sold them in limited quantities through up-market chains like Norsdtrom in the US.

And they seeded them to celebrities. Kate Hudon wore them. So did Kim Cattrall and Jessica Simpson.

And today, the Ugg business turns over hundreds of million of dollars. A far cry from their humble beginnings in the parched vastness of the Aussie outback.

So what could you turn into a global phenomenon?

Find out more:

The $2bn sales letter is reproduced in full on p29 of Drayton Bird’s must-read book How to Write Sales Letters That Sell.
The story of Hotmail and many others are told in Seth Godin’s provocatively titled All Marketers Are Liars.
You can find out more about Pam, Oprah, Kate and Jessica on brandchannel.com – UGG Australia: the good, the bad, and the UGGly.

Don’t know what your clients want? Ask them.

You’ll be surprised – and so will they

Don’t know what your clients want? Ask them. | marketing ideas communication | copywriter Just the other day, this leaflet dropped through the letter box. The local council is thinking about installing these gizmos at bus stops around the county.

So while you’re waiting in the rain with a dozen other bedraggled people, you can see that the number 52 is still 15 minutes away.

To help pass the time, you could press the yellow circle to get community information. Or catch up on the latest police notices, the leaflet tells me. How calming.

The important point here is that they’re asking me what I think before they launch the scheme.

Don’t keep it to yourself

It’s very tempting to wait until you’ve got every angle worked out before presenting an idea to your clients.

Why? Because if you don’t, maybe they’ll think you don’t know what you’re doing. Or worse, that you’re making it up as you go along.

But wait – you are making it up as you go along. With their input.

Many years ago, when I worked for a large software company, we launched a reseller incentive. If salespeople sold X, they got £Y.

But in our enthusiasm, we forgot to consult the resellers on the exact details. And it turned out that our incentive scheme clashed with their internal commission structure and the distributor incentive schemes.

It wasn’t a success.

So the next time round, we brought them all together and got their help to design a scheme that worked for everybody.

Open kimono

Involving clients in important decisions and getting their feedback on your future plans is a great way to make them feel valued. And it saves you the head-scratching frustration of wondering whether you’ve got it right.

But if you are going to ask, make sure you’re doing it for that right reasons – and that you’re approaching it with an open mind.

Somehow, I think the council has already made its mind up about the bus signs. The clue is on the reverse side, where the languge is relentlessly positive:

“Constantly striving to improve…brand-new…always current and up to date…wide variety…match all bus users’ needs…”

After all that, who would dare to tick the ‘No’ box?

Apart from me, that is.

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