Where to invest your marketing money, free audio series, IBM suggests where NOT to buy software, and meaningless promises

A few people take the trouble to write to me and comment or suggest things, which I do appreciate.

Today my main challenge is to make a chili to poison the guests at my son Phil and his wife Megan’s annual Christmas bash, but Robert Currey wrote to me about a (very good) blog by photographer Trey Ratcliff and asked what I thought.

Trey decided to measure the performance of his advertising in magazines – a blindingly obvious idea ignored by the fools in big firms who think marketing means just spraying money around at random with no regard to the results.

He concluded that print is now a waste of time. and we should throw everything on-line. Robert asked me if I agree. Here are some thoughts for you.

1. In the days back when I compared the ROI on advertising in trade mags with direct mail a couple of times. Direct mail did four times better. One reason, I think, is that most trade mags are tripe.

2. However, most advertising in mags is as bad as the editorial, so good ads work, as they shine out like good deeds in a naughty world.

3. Most people who use the internet haven’t a clue and can’t be bothered to study. It is NOT easy to understand. The water is muddied by thieving rogues who tell you all you need is either a) traffic b) good traffic c) be at the top of the Google rankings d) “my secret super launch formula” – that’s made me a fortune out of mugs like you.

4. You must attract the right people – thousands of them; you must get them to give their details; you must follow them up with an endless series of messages – on auto-responder and otherwise – that are interesting, relevant and helpful enough to make them buy eventually. You must use all available channels (this one for example). A whole lot easier said than done when so few people can think clearly, write well, or even take the trouble to bloody count.


5. Direct mail is not dead. As more and more are lured on-line, it is still doing O.K. despite insanely high postal rates. So is door to door distribution.

6. Your prospects do not confine themselves to one medium. Nor should you. I am currently working on a worryingly wide range of stuff in many countries. Two clients sell new thinking to big business, another sells a home service, a fourth sells to collectors and investors, a fifth sells to people who want to improve themselves, a sixth sells to international travellers and a seventh sells to hobbyists, mostly ladies.

7. In no case are we using one medium, We are using SEO, auto-responder conversion techniques, video, direct mail and advertising, email, landing pages, advertising in trade and national press, co-operative deals and even van sides. All to multiple decision makers inside and outside the clients’ firms.

I feel tired, which reminds me: a week or two back I offered a free cure for insomnia: a 10 part audio series on how to do decent marketing. I have been waiting for a decent mike to do it – time to start seeming vaguely professional.

The utterly useless twats in England who had one were taking over a month to deliver, so screw them. Be warned: they are (ha ha, very droll) a business partner of IBM called www.zoom4u.co.uk. IBM should be ashamed of themselves.

Don’t go near them. Their idea of service includes the brilliant wheeze of having no phone number. I’m buying a mike here in New York and will do the recordings next week.

***

Politicians all over the world are crooks – but local ones are often worse than most. Here in New York one crook who has clearly had his hands in the till, big time, has managed to get off.

Back in the old U.K. with a quiet chortle, I read that Ken Livingstone, former mayor of London “pledges” to bring down London public transport fares by 7% if he is re-elected.

The chortle was the second of the day as far as he’s concerned. He’s written an autobiography that’s promoted in posters as the man who tells it to you straight. What a comedian.

I don’t know who is worse – him with all the crooked cronies he had around him – or Boris Johnson who in his first two years pissed away £9 million on “consultants”. But I do know that every time I read the words “vow” or “pledge” a lie is not far behind.


***

Here’s the blog I mentioned at the start http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpTYWNbXKzA

About the Author

In 2003, the Chartered Institute of Marketing named Drayton one of 50 living individuals who have shaped today’s marketing.

He has worked in 55 countries with many of the world’s greatest brands. These include American Express, Audi, Bentley, British Airways, Cisco, Columbia Business School, Deutsche Post, Ford, IBM, McKinsey, Mercedes, Microsoft, Nestle, Philips, Procter & Gamble, Toyota, Unilever, Visa and Volkswagen.

Drayton has helped sell everything from Airbus planes to Peppa Pig. His book, Commonsense Direct and Digital Marketing, out in 17 languages, has been the UK’s best seller on the subject every year since 1982. He has also run his own businesses in the U.K., Portugal and Malaysia.

He was a main board member of the Ogilvy Group, a founding member of the Superbrands Organisation, one of the first eight Honorary Fellows of the Institute of Direct Marketing and one of the first three people named to the Hall of Fame of the Direct Marketing Association of India. He has also been given Lifetime Achievement Awards by the Caples Organisation in New York and Early To Rise in Florida.

6 Comments

  1. Robert Currey

    Hi, thanks for analysing the question. I did notice that in the video Trey's ad barely has a tweet's worth of information.
    He might have done better if the advert contained more of the compelling stories from his blog. The magazine medium seems to have pushed him into watering down what Trey has to say to a slight and boring message. Presumably because we think magazine advertising is supposed to look like that.
    It was damning that he got little attention and service from the people selling him the space in the mags.

    Reply
  2. Grace Rivac

    I had fun reading your post. I have found more interesting facts about this and I think that I can use this as as one of my marketing tools. I am using online video marketing as an effective tool, and I have found a website as well in which I can share with you. http://www.mojovideomarketing.com/. Thanks.

    Reply
  3. Drayton

     11 December 2011 18:25It is extraordinary that people who themselves feel strongly, believe in and think deeply about what they sell have little or no faith in it – to the point that they say very little about it in print.There is also a rather odd assumption that people reading magazines leave their attention spans behind. In the 1980's McGraw-Hill analysed the readership of their Business Week ads. Those with more than 1,000 words got substantially higher readership than those with less.That is interesting; but not as interesting as the fact that as they were longer they could make a fuller sales argument – and thus get more sales.I could go on – but on the matter of people who sell space, they tend to be no more sensible than the people they sell to. Fools of a feather flock together.

    Reply
  4. Denis Thornton

    hi Drayton – this microphone (the audio technica AT2020) is great – I have one and the sound quality is superb.  plugs into a PC via USB – on Amazon here: http://goo.gl/W3G0D

    Reply
  5. Drayton

    I got one in New York which I hope/believe will work – if I (or rather Chloe) can learn how to work it:-)

    Reply
  6. Drayton

    Michael is utterly right. 

    1. Anyone who blithely spends money like that without testing and analysing the responses has more money than sense.

    2. As Hopkins pointed out nigh on 80 years ago, there is only one answer to every advertising question: conduct a test. 

    3 The things that matter most in marketing are, in order: a) Product and positioning; b) Research and testing c) Targeting d) Incentive d) creative.

    I have not looked closely at what this gentleman did but I gather he ignored b) and d) since I am told the copy was very brief. Whether he offered an incentive I don't know 

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *