Every day I get – and I bet you get – this sort of guff. It’s a mystery. Why don’t the perpetrators learn just a smidgeon about a) how to write and b) marketing?
This came today. Maybe you got it. If so, please accept my condolences. I know how you feel
Hi Drayton,
My name is XXXXXXX and I am the founder and CEO of YYYYYY Partnership.
I am trying to establish who would be best to initiate dialogue with regarding your personalised, cross-channel marketing automation strategy for 2014 – please could you suggest an appropriate colleague unless it’s yourself Drayton?
I’d like to offer Drayton Bird Associates a complimentary half-day workshop at your offices to discuss your 2014 marketing vision and create a road map that could lead to you integrating disparate marketing systems into a single automated, fully accountable, personalised brand experience. We can significantly increase your ROI by delivering the right message, to the right person, at the right time via the channel of their choice (including print).
We are a unique team of creative technology problem-solvers that work with international brands and agencies to build complex, volume, highly creative and bespoke marketing production solutions. We reduce operational costs, drive income and control the local and global delivery of brands worldwide.
Please see my LinkedIn profile for some more background on me ZZZZZZZZZZZZ.
If you are the best contact I’d be grateful if would you send me a number to call you on along with any availability you have next week, my PA will follow up with a calendar invitation to discuss this.
Kind regards,
XXXXXXXXX
CEO
After the first sentence – which was of no interest as the world is full of “CEOs” and I never heard of this one – I was lost and couldn’t be bothered to hire a translator. Rather than spend half a day with someone who talked like that I began to consider the merits of emigration
But that was not enough. I was then told that
YYYYYYY are personalised, cross-channel marketing automation specialists. Our clients seek to increase loyalty and drive sales by engaging their customers in more personalised and relevant two-way relationships across ALL channels via one consolidated system. Our cloud-based digital storyboard uniquely brings clients together with planners and designers to collaboratively plan, build, test and deploy highly creative, complex cross-channel campaign strategies.
Our sophisticated automation engine empowers you to:
– Increase customer loyalty and drive sales – by making content more personalised, relevant and highly creative
– Reduce operating costs – by automating volume and complexity
– Measure marketing ROI in realtime – consolidated across all media channels
– Be fully integrated – by extending existing CRM solutions
– Be highly responsive – via 2-way customer dialog
– Be highly creative – creating all personalised and dynamic content in Adobe CC
– Drive sales process automation – triggered by customer behavior
– Be completely localised – Deploying campaigns locally or globally in any language
– Require no capital or IT support – delivered as SAAS solution
– Be highly flexible – enabling data, design or business logic to change independently at any time
– Be more consistent – deploying content across email, web, video, images and PDF to print or screen
– Deliver without compromise – often a problem in packaged solutions
This email is a business to business marketing communication. You are receiving this email as we thought it might be of interest. If you don’t wish to receive further email communication, please let me know.
XXXXXXXXXXX
CEO
I am a bit stupid – I often count this as my secret weapon, since many customers are too – but I couldn’t discern from that torrent of flatulent jargon what the hell exactly this man was on about.
Don’t you, like me, want to know precisely – with precise details of proven results, preferably involving money – what someone is going to do for you?
By the way, if you know anyone who suffers from this virulent form of corporate diarrhoea, tell them to take How to Write and Persuade until cured.
This is typical corporate-speak. It’ll work on a few corporate marketing people who spout and pretend to understand such drivel.
It won’t work on the majority of corporate types, because they already know everything there is to know about marketing.
And if you ever get those thousands of corporate marketers to buy your book, you’ll be a very happy author.
Drayton,
The way you write and the way you explain, is so wonderfully simple, smart, and funny. It is the reason why you are one of the few marketing teachers who I pay attention to.
I recently read a few of the first sales letters that I ever attempted to write, and I had to cringe. They sound a LOT like Mr. CEO’s email above. If I never discovered your website, I may still be writing the same type of useless fluff.
Thanks for the insights. Your teachings are invaluable.