The nine most terrible words any marketing
manager can possibly utter ...
... and how you can avoid the need ever to use them.
 It’s a conversation I’ve had time and time
again.
JR-M: Does that advertising campaign work?
Marketing manager: It’s a little hard to say.
JR-M: How do you mean?
Marketing manager: Well, the phone doesn’t ring,
but at
least we’re getting our name out there.
There they are, those nine terrible words: but at least we’re
getting our name out there.
Conventional advertising wisdom holds that there are two kinds of
advertisements: direct response advertisements – which are designed to
stimulate immediate sales; and brand advertisements – which are designed to
build brand equity, and indirectly stimulate sales.
Those advertisements that simply get your name out there belong in
a category all of their own.
They are not direct response advertisements, because people rarely
respond to them. And they are not brand advertisements, because they, typically, do
nothing to increase brand equity – and, accordingly, have no measurable impact on
sales.
If we accept that the objective of advertising is to increase sales
(either directly or indirectly) then advertisements that manage only to get your name
out there are simply bad advertisements!
And a marketing manager who uses those nine terrible words is making
either an excuse for an unsuccessful advertising campaign, or an admission that the
campaign was run without an objective in the first place – hardly the mark of a good
manager!
The promotion of your company name in
and of itself is not branding
But isn’t branding about getting my name out there?
I was hoping you’d ask!
Certainly, branding does involve getting your name out there, but
the promotion of your company name in and of itself is not branding.
What’s important is not your company (or product) name, but the
meaning that’s attached to this name. After all, without meaning, a name is just a word
– an empty vessel!
‘Branding’ is the science of adding meaning to this empty
vessel. A successful brand is a word (and its associated mark) that communicates a
product’s ‘unique selling proposition’ to its intended audience.
Whatever your marketing method, my arguement is that it’s the
responsibility of a good manager to ensure that all critical business functions are
measurable. After all, as the popular saying goes, If you can’t measure it, you
can’t manage it.
If you regard advertising as a critical business function, my advice is
simple: either figure out a way to manage it effectively, or don’t do it at all.
In my opinion, money spent just getting your name out there would
be better spent improving some other critical business function.
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