Man George: entry

Every day we sit back and hypothesize about the effect of advertising on the general public. We develop concepts and ideas on how to best reach our target audience and convince them to act in a manner we so desire. One thing that each and every one of you should do is take a few moments every day and be the audience, be the client, be the consumer you are speaking to. Be the person who sees these ads and react as you would if you were them.

I believe that we often analyze advertising from am marketer’s point of view. Quite rarely we react from the consumer’s point of view - so my advice for all you marketers out there is to take some time out of your busy schedules and react to the media as your target audience. It doesn’t matter how you achieve this - you can browse the web, read a magazine, watch some TV, listen to the radio - just be a regular member of the public.

Let me tell you this experience will be eye-opening, close to a real epiphany. As marketers we are training our creative brains to be in tune with the message we are conveying to the target audience, but this process desynchronizes us from the average consumer that tends to ignore most of the ads we throw at him every day. There isn’t much that can be done - this is just a “natural” defense mechanism of the human mind. The consumer is “attacked” every day by more than 3000 advertising messages- so, by trying to maintain a healthy level of sanity, the brain blocks a high amount of those messages - just imagine if we were to positively react to all that advertising. It is easier to block a message rather than interpret it and come up with a reaction.

That will bring you to a better understanding of 2008’s post-modern consumer. He is a person - not a target, do not market to him - communicate. Stop spamming his email, wearing out his name and stop calling him your “friend” - he is not (you don’t even know him). A consumer doesn’t buy from a company - he buys from a person; if you stop keeping your marketing communication to a personal level, he will not buy from you. If you keep bragging about your success as a company, he will dislike you - just like he dislikes a bragging person.

If you truly want to change how the consumer buys your products or services you must first change the way you market. His trust is not for sale, you must earn it. Marketing is conversation. As long as you provide your consumer with real choice, you will communicate with him successfully and you will earn his trust - that is my definition of permission marketing. A real choice for the consumer means that:

• he is marketed (talked to) in his own communication style (pos, phone, tv, e-mail, etc.);
• he is able to choose companies that deal with him fairly and equitably;
• he is given all the necessary information to make a buying decision;
• he is able to opt in/out, purchase or return easily.

These are the strong points, us marketers need to remind ourselves - it is so easy to get carried away in all this excitement that is marketing and forget the utter most important thing - our consumer.