Good Marketing is not evil!

Bill Hicks has been saying that marketers are evil. As a comedian that is his job. As Dharmesh Shah points out this is becausemarketers are linked in people’s minds with intrusive advertising. Retail media should not be intrusive. A good advertisement has a purpose. As one Marketing Consultancy and Services company says “Customers are not stolen, they walk”. The corollary to this is that one cannot capture customers, just help them to decide which way they should walk.

A marketer who realises they are in the business of putting maps and signposts along the customer journey to help them to get where they want to go has moved away from intrusive advertising. The products that retail media are used to advertise need to make sure that the experience that provided is a destination people will want to reach; It is important that and that once customers arrive there they are warm and comfortable and so are happy to stay there. To extend the analogy, with most products, whether they are they are consumables or not-infinitely-durables, the experience is a moving feast and the customer has to keep walking in order simply to stay with in the same place. This means we, as marketers, need to make sure that the customers do not stray on the journey from one touch-point to the next. Again this requires not only having the right experience as the destination, but clear signs and maps all the way.

Anyone who has been on two different subway systems will appreciate the importance of consistent branding. The classic example of this is a New Yorker in London.

On the London Tube system where a train is going is defined by the line that train is going on. The maps that show which stops a platform will go to are put out at each major branch point along the way. Each map is branded with the colour associated with that line, so that a Piccadilly line map will have a sign with the clear dark blue of the Piccadilly line. As well as the branding there will be a clear heading saying which line it is and which direction trains will be going. Thus there will be a “Piccadilly line, Southbound” in the heading and the map in the right colour below. The sign will probably have a top bar in the brand colour as well to allow easy recognition from a distance whilst walking in a hurry. Where there are too many lines to be represented and insufficient space for the full map there is a guiding sign with the same blue, the name of the line and the direction that trains are going along that line. Learning the system is simple and the learning time is therefore short. Once a traveller is used to the colours and layout the most complicated tunnel system ceases to be intimidating, and the only way of going wrong is by walking without thinking.

Despite this new people (our Hypothetical New Yorker for instance) find the system intimidating and harder to use than their home systems. This is because they are not familiar with the brands and the related brand messages. Southbound is a jargon term; the meaning is fairly clear, but it is jargon that a new user must become accustomed to. Piccadilly line is another jargon term, along with each of the other lines. There are 12 lines and a pair of directions for each. It is a tribute to the system that an underground that has a fairly good claim to being the largest in the world is as clear and easy as it is. The person who designed this system would make a good retail media marketer and we should look to emulate them. Ensure that when in a supermarket your color scheme for an offer matches the local scheme. Ensure that your packaging does not look out of place with their premium brands. Ensure that your brand understands and reflects the local ideas map so that the consumer can spot your signposts and find their way to your product.

So to add emphasis, you need to make sure your marketing is based around the sort of things you would like to see if you were the customer and not just about what you would like the customer to see. Doing this will allow you to become the customer’s friend. The good fairy of marketing rather than the Nick Naylor style demon of Mr Hicks’ rather less than funny diatribe.

Rufus Evison