THINKing

Could You At Least Help Out A Little?

I just saw something that reminded me of this old joke: a man prayed every day for weeks to win the lottery. No luck. Finally, God said to the man, “could you help me a little? Try buying a lottery ticket!”

What brought this to mind? A post to MarketingProfs Know How Exchange from a cruise line member who wants a new tagline. That was the extent of the information. Nothing about their business, what makes them different or who they are trying to reach.

Too often clients or prospects of ad agencies don’t want to do any of the lifting – heavy or otherwise. Not my clients, of course. But when you ask some clients or prospects about their business, target audience or uniqueness, they look at you in wide-eyed wonder.

If you want good work from your agency, you need to provide a solid audience definition, at the very least. The audience definition is never “all carbon-based units.” If you want to really make your marketing efforts pay off, try developing a positioning statement, or be willing to work with your agency to develop one.

Otherwise you’ll be like so many other lame businesses out there which wonder why their marketing efforts never pay off.

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