Tweet

Simple Pictures Are Best

Written by: Sandy Schussel

Article Overview: The "simple pictures" rule tells us that if you have a business or practice and are looking to market it, the simplest marketing picture is probably the best.

Simple Pictures Are Best

When my daughters were little, I used to love to read them a book that appears now to be out of print, Simple Pictures Are Best, by Nancy Willard.

It was a story of a farmer and his wife who decided to buy each other a photo session with a professional photographer for their anniversary. The fun begins when the photographer comes and the couple can't decide what to wear, where to sit or what to include in the picture. The farmer ends up wearing his new shoes on his feet while showing off his old shoes on his ears with arms full of farm produce. His wife wears both of her hats and brings out all of her pets, and her kitchen and gardening utensils.

Each time the couple decides to add something to the picture, the photographer warns, "Simple pictures are best." But the couple continues to ignore him and assembles everything they can think of for the photograph. Finally, the commotion causes the bull to charge at the photographer and the only picture taken that day is of the bull.

Recently, I worked with Ryan, a client whose company provides computer graphics services to financial services businesses. Ryan was running two huge, expensive half-page ads weekly in a local paper with a broad-based, mostly business readership.

"How much business do these ads generate?" I asked him.

"I don't know," was his reply.

It turned out that he had been running these ads for years, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars over time, but had never asked his new clients how they found out about his company and had never asked existing clients whether they had even seen the ads.

"If you don't know whether there's any benefit to running these ads," I asked him, "Why do you keep running them?"

His answer took several minutes. He told me about how he started these ad campaigns along with several other very broad marketing efforts years before. He also disclosed that he was still paying for a lot of other advertising and marketing efforts without knowing whether they were working or not.

I thought of the farmer with the shoes on his ears and his feet and arms full of produce.

"Simple pictures are best," I said to Ryan.

Scientists will tell you about Occam's Razor, a theory that says, essentially, "all things being equal, the simplest of all possible solutions is the best." Used another way, it tells us that when there are several possible explanations for something, the simplest explanation is probably the right one.

The "simple pictures" rule tells us that if you have a business or practice and are looking to market it, the simplest marketing picture is probably the best:

1. Be very clear on your target
2. Choose strategies that are designed to reach that very clear target
3. Test to see whether and to what extent those strategies are working
4. Keep using the ones that work until you have the kind of business or practice you want.

Related Articles
  Rule #14: Every Picture Demands a Caption
  5 Tips For Visual Impact In Marketing Presentations
  Securing Car Insurance After An Accident
  How to Restore Lost Photos from Virus Infected Storage Devices?
  #1 Reason for Network Marketing Success - Part Four

Article Tags: ad campaigns, commotion, computer graphics services, ears, financial services businesses, half page, hats, hundreds of thousands, marketing efforts, nancy willard, new shoes, old shoes, page ads, photo session, photograph, professional photographer, readership, reply, thousands of dollars, utensils



Related Forum Posts
Re: New Infographic: Top Ten Reasons to Partner with Someone - I like it. Simple yet informative. I also RT'd it for you.
Re: Is being too connected pushing your business forward or back - Good advice, Terrycan! Simple but necessary.
Men don't wear ties (necktie: US) like before! - Hi there, What is it, that hi class people just wear a suit without a tie. Have ties gone out of fashion? Is it mainly the younger generation or have we become more lazy to dress properly? Bill Gates. I cannot remember seen him a lot wearing a tie, but I checked it out on Google Pictures. It reveals, occasionaly he wears a tie. What does a business wear look like in five years time? Is it important to wear a tie these days? Who does like to wear a tie and why and who does not like to wear a tie and why? Kindest Regards Beat "Unlock People's Potentials!"
Boosting Self Confidence - Thanks Barbara! That is great advice. It goes to removing Toxic people and situations from your life. I like to remind people that they were born - thus granting them worthy to exist. No one can take away or add to your self worth. Simple but true. If you woke up this morning - you deserve to exist. J
What makes you keep coming back for more? - I am researching on personal preferences that keeps the visitors coming back to a web site. What would be great is if people would list out their preferences of what keeps them interested to keep visiting a website in order or importance. For me it is:- 1. Content – Value, Depth and Recency of Information provided 2. User Friendliness – Easy Navigation, Simple graphic design etc. 3. Service – download time, contactability etc.


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

9 Steps to Improve Performance

Live To Work Or Work To Live?

The Biggest Domain Name Myth

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.