Another sigh of disbelief. Why do so many companies fall for these bad marketing spends and programs?  This week’s Marketing Darwin Award goes to Belle Pelle Laser.

Shopping cart advertising is right up there with bus bench advertising as a horrible investment. This is ego marketing at it’s best.

Lets take a look.

Points of Failure

1.       Not targeted – Some ad sales person will argue this is low cost advertising but this is just another form of “pay, spray and pray” broadcast. It’s not targeted to home buyers or sellers

2.       False interrupt – The sexy couple on the beach have nothing to do with smooth skin. This is using sex to sell another product.

3.       Ad is very small – The copy on the ad is hard to read.

4.       No links to social media. One needs to be in multiple streams and let the customer know you are there.

5.       No differentiation – No where in this horrible outdoor display does it teach me how to buy, separate them from their competion?

6.       No connecting with the reticular activator - Most people have been trained to ignore this type of advertising. This ad does nothing to pull me out of my “block out the noise comma” and make me pay attention. Just visual noise.

7.       The ad gets blocked when people put items in the cart. One loaf of bread from being blocked.

8.       Poor location. – When I am in the store shopping for groceries, I am not looking for laser hair removal, a Realtor or Insurance.

10.    Not trackable – Why on earth would you do any kind of marketing these days that does not have a way to measure effectiveness

11.    This is ego marketing. These ads are sold to puff the ego of the name of the business on the sign.

12. Ad selling ad space- This is a huge red flag. If this form of media is working well, there would be a line at the door on a wait list. The simple fact that they are running an ad for buyers should be a giant red flag. Run Forest, run!

Display advertising is a huge waste for the small business. It takes hundreds of thousands of dollars for branding and a shopping cart ad is a complete waste of small business marketing dollars. Belle Pelle laser  should be asking for a refund or looking for someone to help her with marketing in the digital, wireless world.

Be smart. Stay connected.

This week’s Darwin Award goes to Joan Pallone of Metro Brokers for her bus bench advertising.  I cringe when I see small business owners falling trap to this ego based advertising. For the money,  outdoor bus benches are no longer effective. Let’s explore why this is a HUGE waste of money… And this week’s Marketing Darwin Award Winner.

Points of Failure

1.       Not targeted – Some outdoor ad sales person will argue this is low cost advertizing but this is just another form of “pay, spray and pray” broadcast. It’s not targeted to home buyers or sellers

2.       Phone number is spelled in a word -303-466-HOME –  Bad move these days. There are more than 300 different types of  handheld/phone devices on the market  and if you are like the millions of blackberry users ( including me), your phone keypad does not correspond with the 1950’s letter matching to numbers systems. My numbers don’t match (The same holds true for people with phone systems that want you to spell out a name) and I just give up.

3.       No website – Need I say more? Come on, it’s not 1975.

4.       No links to social media. Only one way to connect, the phone. See number three for explanation of that.

5.       No differentiation – No where in this horrible outdoor display does it teach me how to buy, separate Joan from all the other Realtors?

6.       No connecting with the reticular activator - Most people have been trained to ignore this type of advertising. This ad does nothing to pull me out of my “block out the noise comma” and make me pay attention. Just visual noise.

7.       The ad gets blocked when people sit on the bench to wait for the bus.

8.       The bench does not face the line of site for drivers who pass it. The ad  depends on the driver to turn their head to read it.

9.       Poor location. – This bench is on a two lane street  with businesses on one side of the street and homes on the other. The only people who have a great view of this bench are the people who’s homes back up to this street and look out the back windows of their homes. Audience of 4, maybe 5 families and the wonderful people who wait for the bus.

10.    Not trackable – Why on earth would you do any kind of marketing these days that does not have a way to measure effectiveness

11.    This is ego marketing. These ads are sold to puff the ego of the name of the business on the sign.

Outdoor advertising is a huge waste for the small business. It takes hundreds of thousands of dollars for branding and a bus bench is a complete waste of small business marketing dollars. Joan should be asking for a refund or looking for someone to help her with marketing in the digital, wireless world.

Be smart. Stay connected.

I pondered if the should be a Darwin Award winner but quickly decided against it since the business I am referencing has been in business for three decades.  However, with that said, we have recently seen many business like the Rocky Mountain News, one of Denver’s oldest businesses shutter it’s doors 4 months shy of 150 years in business.

Don’t live in the past. If your business is not evolving, you may be one day closer to shutting your doors.

To many of us long for “back in the day”. Human nature is to reflect back with a melancholy view that things were better. Maybe they were, maybe not. One thing for sure, marketing and customer communication has changed.

My almost Darwin winner this week is Papa J’s.

I award them the 1/2 Darwin award for their signage and living in the past. Look at both their website and the signage on the building. The website says they have been in business 32 years, the sign on the front of the building says 31 years in business.  I called to verify and it turns out they have been in business 33 years and nearing their 34th birthday. ( I would never hard code a sign or portion of my website with a date that is expired… marketing 1o1).

Papa J’s has excellent food and good service.  Both of these qualities have weathered the test of time. Yesterday’s success and more than 3 decades is a great achievement but this is no assurance for future success.  Change is here and no longer can we expect to rest on our heals of what worked yesterday.  Dont think for one minute that you will be able to attrack and maintain the attention of your customers for life if you are marketing the way you did just even 12 months ago, let alone, 5, 10 , 20 or 30 years ago (31, 32, 33 or what ever the real number is).

Google and the other also ran search engines, change their algorithms on a regular basis. Twelve months ago, how many in the mainstream had ever heard of Facebook or Twitter? Let’s be honest, not many.

Twitter has been offered over a billion dollars for their company that has been in existence for 3 years.  Why? Because Twitter and the other social medias companies now have the attention of the consumer. This is the method they have chosen to stay connected.

The question for business owners and marketing managers is ” are you keeping up?”

Here are a few recommendations we all should be observing.

1. Be nimble in your approach to marketing. Nothing is constant but change.
2. Stay connected with those who are in the eye of the tornado when it comes to marketing and communications.
3. Get a centralized database and CRM System. – Methods of communication may change, but being able to track your customers and how THEY prefer to communicate is critical. We highly recommend Infusionsoft.
4. Done hard code anything ( check out Papa js’ outdated sign and website).
5. Put yourself out there, be in the streams where the fish are. ( see my posts on grizzlies in the stream.

Everything has changed. Don’t be the next Rocky Mountain News.

To get attention, you must pay attention.

Sometimes I think to myself “what were they thinking when they did that?”

This week’s Marketing Darwin award winner goes to the “dancing painter”.  (I cant even tell you the name of the company because the young man waving the sign was dancing and gyrating so much, that one could not make out the sign. I was in a hurry and could not stop but hope to return today snap a photo.)

I live the the Denver metro area and a “thing” which has become popular is companies hiring someone to stand on the corner and hold a sign, wave to traffic, in hopes that someone will stop in and see their RETAIL establishment. OK, maybe entertaining and cute but it’s horrible marketing.

I am not sure of the name of the chain of tax services who got the wheel rolling with this concept, but they would go the extra step of dressing the waving sign holder in a Statue of Liberty costume. Now you see on many corners a person standing or in this case dancing on the corner dressed in all kinds of garb, trying to get attention.

Here is why the dancing painter wins the award saved for those companies spending money and working their way to extinction.

Dancing on the corner, while cute, and possibly mildly entertaining, is a false interrupt. It may get the attention of a few people but  it does not hit the reticular activator of those who need their house painted. Since the young man was gyrating so much, I could not even read the same of the painting company. Sort of defeats the purpose.

Let’s pile on the rest of contributing factors that make this a winner:

1. False interrupt – if I am looking for a painter, am I searching the corners of the intersections in my town for a resource? Nope.
2. Does a dancing spokesperson teach me how to buy from this company? Hardly.
3. Not sustainable -If by some miracle this did get my attention, I have no way of reestablishing the connection to this company. Since they are not a local retail operation located next to the where the young man was dancing, I cant just pop in.
4. No follow on education – If i needed to know more, I can  rest assured the young man dancing knows nothing about painting, so stopping and asking him questions gets me no where.
5. No differentiation – the dancing, while unique, does not teach me the consumer why this painting company is better than the rest. No education of benefit or value.
6. Hardly scalable. Yes, unemployment is high but it’s unlikely that you could hire enough dancing sign wavers to grow the business at predictive pace.

I sure hope I can find this company again as it would be nice to help them realize this form of marketing could be one of the worst spends in marketing history.

Goes to show you, there is a marketing sucker born every day.

For the week of June 1st, here is the winner ( in our terms, the winner is actually a loser). Picking a weekly winner is hard because there are so many to choose from.

Take a look at this banner ad that is currently running on the front page of the online version of the Denver Post.

Its a banner ad promoting the Denver Museum of Natural Science’s new exhibit. The banner ad takes the award home because it:

1. Has no interrupt – there is no headline to hit the reticular activator.
2. No engaging follow on
3. No education
4. No offer or call to action
5. Is located at the foot of an online page, about the worst position possible.

Whom ever created this ad should turn in their marketing badge and go mow lawns. Whom ever bought the position, a footer banner, should be taken out back and given a few lashes.Why would you listen to the sales rep and buy into this placement? Bottom of a page, you must be kidding!

It’s rare that an ad breaks all five rules, but this one does it in style. Creative dollars flushed down the toilet, ad placement dollars also flushed.

Good thing school field trips keep the museum in business because if they had to rely on this ad, its time to close the doors. keep up marketing like this and your on your way out of business. True culling of the herd.

Want effective marketing that converts? You must hit the reticular activator, engage the target audience, educate and offer.

Need to know more?

Connect with us and we can show you how.