by Anne Garber There's a radio ad on the air these days and every time I hear it, I burst out laughing. And it isn't meant to be funny, either. It's an ad for some kind of lawn seed and fertilizer, and the copy starts with something like this: "Remember: Your lawn will be under a layer of ice and snow for the next seven months, so what you do for it now will affect the kind of lawn you have come next spring…"
Have these lawn care guys ever been to the West Coast? This ad may play just fine in Edmonton or Minneapolis, but out here on the Coast…? I can't believe they are spending good money on these ads, because radio advertising is expensive, folks. And when you hear the opener, you're so distracted by the faux pas that you don't even notice what product they are pushing. See? I didn't (I'll bet you didn't, either).
Besides enjoying the most temperate climate in Canada, the Vancouver and Lower Mainland basin is well known in North America as an excellent place to field test new products before launching them across the U.S. and Canada. We had Schwepps raspberry ginger ale out here for a couple of years before the product rolled out nationally (Portland, OR-Vancouver, WA ranks at 44th, and Seattle-Bellevue-Everett, WA ranks at 112th.)
Interestingly, Albany, NY ranks number-one in the U.S., according to a recent survey:
One system that places each U.S. household into one of 70 segments based on its consumer and demographic characteristics such as newly married, new parents, change of residence and retirement. The 70 clusters have descriptive names including thrifty elders, savvy singles, early parents, married sophisticates, rural parents, first mortgage and so on.
The survey analyzed a consumer database of 111 million American households. The market research outfit involved created the list with the number-one city bearing the greatest likeness to the overall U.S. population. With a correlation score of .90904, Albany was the closest to a score of 1, which would signify a perfect match.
"Traditionally the adage has been, 'if it plays in Peoria it will play anywhere,' but what I think is reflected by Albany as No. 1 is changes in the U.S. consumer landscape," said Tiffany Weatherly, product leader at Acxiom Corp., Little Rock, AR. "You can't always go by the old rule of thumb."
Peoria, IL, ranked 37th on the list.
As a microcosm of the United States, Albany lets a marketer do a broad stroke test to learn which clusters their products appeal to, Weatherly said. The segments that work could be rolled out nationwide for marketing efforts.
So an essential rule-of-thumb for advertisers trying to win over stingy consumers like me, is "Know Your Market."
Today, we received a catalogue from the NHL. Now, I'm not going to get into their current public relations problems, so you needn't brace yourself for a rant. Instead, cudos to the clever marketing people who haven't missed a trick. I didn't notice it -- but my husband, John Keyes, sure did: Check out the back of this catalogue; they've been clever enough to put John's name onto back of the hockey sweater in the photo. So if you're a reluctant spender -- but the NHL in its wisdom has helped you visualize the sweater on you -- well, what more of a prompt do you need to make you buy? I don't know this for sure, but I'm betting that this is a very successful way to sell hockey sweaters -- and someone at the NHL catalogue office is in for a raise and promotion!
Smart selling is all about knowing your consumers and what they want. And we're not idiots, so we never want to be talked-down to. We like advertising that enlightens or amuses or entertains. We don't like watching people do stupid things, or do smart things that are "too smart for their own good" -- and consequently make us feel stupid.
One of advertising's greatest possibilities is to bring new products out and present them to an audience of consumers in a way that solves problems for us. A simple case in point is Proctor & Gamble's new Mr. Clean Magic Eraser. I reviewed it elsewhere on evalu8.org, but suffice it to say here that this is a product that lives up to its claims: It does exactly what it promises.
And the internet is one of the great ways to find products that appear to be gone from your market. Dozens of sites and message boards exist to allow consumers to gripe about obsolete and discontinued products they loved but can no longer find. And every single day, I get feedback from consumers seeking the hard-to-find or elusive, recently disappeared product.
Consumers should check eBay first. If you cannot find your missing product there, try Google. If you have a wrapper or package from the obscure item, check it for a contact number, web address, customer support number or the like. Or Google the company name to check for results. Whether it's replacement brakes for your favourite in-line skates by a company that is defunct, or it's Kleen-Glo (a wonderful, but very hard-to-locate cleaning product), believe me, those products are out there. And if all else fails, please write evalu8.org at: feedback@evalu8.org, and let us take a shot at finding it for you.
Garber on Business: Advertisers, Know Your Market - To learn more about this author, visit Anne Garber's Website.
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Anne Garber
(Visit Anne's Website)
Anne Garber's media career spans 42 years
in both print and electronic media, as
author, publisher, photographer,
columnist, broadcaster and the mother of
two -- and evalu8.org's Managing Director.
She has written 14 best-selling books and
-- with editor John T.D. Keyes (who is
also her husband) -- writes food, business
and travel features worldwide; she
contributes online to travellady.com and
chocolate-atlas.com. The couple writes a
travel column for the Culver City News and
co-authored Victoria's Best Bargains,
Exploring Ethnic Vancouver and Cheap Eats
Vancouver.
Ms. Garber has worked as both publishers'
and authors' agent, and is known as the
'go-to' person in the book, magazine and
newspaper publishing industries for legal
opinion on North American trademark and
copyright issues. A practicum in San Diego
as Environmental Practice Group paralegal
was followed by a return to the Pacific
Northwest, where she is currently
considered a leading expert on internet
copyright infringement actions and online
fraud investigations. Anne Garber divides
her time between Vancouver, BC, Seattle,
WA, Toronto, ON and Paris, France.
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