It's Not The Weather

“Twenty years ago this used to be so easy,” he said. “When sales were slow we’d put up the big tent, put a bunch of boats in the tent, set up a prize registration box, grill some hotdogs, and invite a radio station. We’d sell half a dozen boats easily.

“Ten years ago it didn’t work so well. Today it doesn’t work at all. I don’t know what to do. Our sales are way off this year. I’m hoping it’s the weather.”

I might not have even remembered that conversation if I hadn’t had the same one with a swimming pool dealer on the other side of the country later the same week. The conversation was nearly word-for-word identical.

When the swimming pool guy said “Our sales are way off this year, I’m hoping it’s the weather” I realized what was happening.

It’s not the weather.

It’s the message.

Let’s recap something I’ve already told you. There are only two shopping modes.

Transactional shoppers believe that they already know everything necessary to make an informed decision. Transactional shoppers are only interested in price.

Relational shoppers, on the other hand, are well aware that they don’t know enough to make an informed decision. They are shopping for an advisor they can trust not to take advantage of them.

Three critical points:

1. First, we all shop in both modes, depending on what we’re buying. And whatever you’re selling, your customers are about half and half. Roughly fifty percent are shopping price, and roughly fifty percent just want someone they can trust to offer advice on what’s best for them.

2. Second point: transactional shoppers will cheerfully play one supplier against another in an endless game of “can you top this?” Transactional shoppers consistently provide lower closing ratios, smaller gross sales, and thinner profit margins.

3. And finally, the right thing to say to one is exactly the wrong thing to say to the other. Doesn’t this make sense? Why would a relational shopper, who fears not knowing enough to make the right decision, react positively to “Save $1,000 if you buy today?”

I was reminded of those two conversations earlier today when I heard an ad for a swimming pool manufacturer.

“The perfect day to buy the pool and spa of your dreams is this Saturday. Speak to the experts at our one day sale event, see our custom 3-D pool design system, and save up to six thousand dollars on the purchase of a new pool. Come celebrate with free hot dogs and soft drinks, prize giveaways, and face painting for the kids.”

Which shopping mode do you predict will react positively to the implied pressure of this ad? Save six thousand dollars if you buy this Saturday? This one is definitely a transactional appeal.

But, will this ad pull in ANY qualified buyers, regardless of their preferred shopping mode?

Let me predict what’s going to happen at this big one-day sales event. The radio station broadcasting the event will be pressured to produce a crowd. They’ll pull out the stops, pour on the hype, and pump up the giveaways.

The pool company is advertising free hot dogs and prizes – oh, and free face painting. They’re going to attract people who want free hotdogs and free prizes. How many of them will be qualified to purchase a $60,000 pool?

Come Monday, the pool company is going to count the number of pools sold on Saturday. If they are at all disappointed (and aren’t they always?) they’ll turn to the radio station and say “You brought in the wrong people.”

No kidding.

Advertising seeks its own audience. Every ad will appeal to some shoppers and not appeal to others. When, like all of your competitors, you’re screaming “We will not be undersold,” all of the transactional shoppers will come see you, then take your price to your competitor to “grind him down.”

It’s not the weather causing your lackluster sales. It’s your message.

As a business owner your first decision should be to which shoppers you want your ads to appeal.

Suppose that instead of a big one-day sale, our pool builder had run a different ad?

“As hot as it’s been, you’ve probably been thinking it would be nice to have a pool in your own backyard. We know that a pool is a major investment for a homeowner like you, and there are a lot of things to consider. That’s why we’ve brought in the experts to answer your questions in a casual, no pressure setting. Bring the measurements of your backyard, and we’ll show you on our custom 3D design system just what to expect, the range of costs for the amenities important to you, and we’ll even explain your financing options What we won’t do is pressure you to buy.”

Of course, it’s going to take guts for Mr. Pool Builder to try to attract perhaps only four qualified buyers and making them comfortable buying, instead of attracting a couple hundred non-buyers who are there for the hot dogs, and hoping for the best.

Oh, and hoping for good weather.

It’s not the weather.

It’s that you, and all of your competitors, are screaming the same message: “Get excited. Make an impulsive buy. We’ll save you money.”

You’re all fighting for the same low profit, highly fickle transactional buyers. Any relational shoppers in your show room are there because they wanted what you offer so badly that they’re prepared to endure what they perceive to be your high-pressure sales tactics to get it.

What would happen if you made it easy for them? What if you wrote ads that targeted the highly-profitable and intensely loyal relational shoppers?

Your ads would automatically shine like a beacon in the darkness. Your ads would capture the attention of every qualified buyer who doesn’t trust your slick, fast talking, high-pressure competitors.

You’d get the attention of those shoppers who, frankly, don’t trust you the way you are.

It’s not the weather that’s keeping people from buying, it’s your strategy.

Who do your ads target?

Are those the customers you really want?

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Ask About the Failures

Marketing consultants love to tell you their success stories. Listen to them long enough and you’ll believe they never make mistakes.

Ask them about their failures.

Oh, we all have them. They’re universally embarrassing. The good consultants have fallen on their collective butts often. The great consultants have spectacular failures hidden deep in their client files.

Ask them about their failures. Nobody really learns anything by succeeding. Its failure that makes the cost of experience so great. It’s failure that makes experience so valuable.

In the spirit of disclosure, I shall now share one of mine.

It was 1971. I was a college freshman who worked for a man named Howard in his electronics shop after class.

FM radio had replaced AM as the band most people listened to.

Stereo had replaced “Hi Fi” as the operative word for quality sound. Quad had been available for about three years, but no one was sure whether SQ was really better than QS. Descrete quadraphonic sound? We only dreamed about it.

Howard had started his own television and CB radio repair business half a dozen years earlier. Over the years he added a second technician, then a third. He started selling a few television sets. Picked up the Sylvania line. The Sylvania wholesaler sent him a dozen television sets and half a dozen stereo systems.

My job? Keep the place clean. Make deliveries. Run to the parts house. Take care of customers when there was no one else to deal with them.

One day a man in a suit swaggered into the shop. This was an oddity in itself, since no one wore suits into our place. We didn’t even wear suits into our place.

But the other oddity was his lack of necktie. After all, if a man was going to dress for business, wouldn’t he wear a tie with his suit? Instead of a tie, this guy left the top three buttons on his shirt unfastened.

As I said, he swaggered in with the attitude that he was indeed Sum Buddy.

“Young fella,” he said, “where’s the boss?”

Howard came out of the shop at just that time to ask Mr. Buddy if he needed help.

Mr. Buddy explained his incredible offer: 8-track cartridges, in their own theft-proof space-age plastic bubble display case. Pick a hundred from the wide selection he had in his car. Buy ‘em outright for only two bucks each. Sell ‘em for six bucks each. Make a fortune.

Howard didn’t appear particularly interested. “Ehhh,” he said. “What do I know about music?”

Sum Buddy turned to me. “Hey, young fella. You know popular music?”

“Sure,” I told ‘em. I then watched as I became one of the selling points as Mr. Buddy continued his pitch.

“You’ve got a man here who knows music. I’ve got the product. Pick out a hundred titles, and I’ll sell you the display at half price. You’ve got the stereo record players with 8-track decks. How can you be a real stereo store if people can’t buy music here, too?”

Twenty minutes of serious negotiation later and I, the “man here who knows music” was selecting 30 titles, which we put in the free theft-proof space-age plastic bubble display case. Howard counted out $50 from the till. Mr. Buddy was off to offer his tapes to another entrepreneur down another road.

I had chosen Elton John, ABBA, America, Blue Oyster Cult, the Georgie Baker Selection, Black Sabbath, and several that are simply too painful to remember.

Howard looked at me, the “man here who knows music,” and asked “How are we going to sell these?”

“Well,” I said, thoughtfully, “I think we should advertise in the college newspaper.”

I put together an ad, negotiated with the student paper’s student sales staff, and scheduled it to run in their second December issue - the one closest to Christmas. An 8-track of a great album would make a great last-minute Christmas gift was my reasoning. The paper was published every other week. There would be an issue on roughly December 7th, and another roughly the 21st. Our ad came out in the December 21st issue.

We waited for the last-minute gift rush.

We waited.

We waited more.

Howard was fairly patient, until January rolled around and he noted that we hadn’t sold a single tape. At that point he wondered aloud if a campus beer party might have fried too many of my limited brain cells.

Howard suggested that I personally find 30 friends who would give him $1.67 each for these tapes so he could at least break even on this venture.

I discovered that I didn’t have thirty friends.

I did have six friends who collectively purchased seven tapes. The other 23 tapes hung around that store until summer when Howard sold ‘em for $0.50 each that during a sidewalk sale. We kept the theft-proof space-age plastic bubble display case in the storeroom for a while, but it was hard to stack things on it because of that big plastic bubble. We finally tossed it out.

My first experience as a marketing authority was a total failure. But, as I said, we don’t learn much from our successes. It’s failure that makes experience so valuable.

This particular episode of Chuck history has delivered four valuable lessons.

Point Number One: a single ad in isolation isn’t going to accomplish much of anything. Ads work best when their message gets repeated, again and again, until people know that message by heart.

Lesson Number One: Never bet the farm on a single ad.


Point Number Two: some markets are seasonal. Some are ridiculously seasonal. In the case of a college student body, they tend to start leaving for home about eight days before Christmas, which would be the 17th. By the 21st (when our ad was published) the campus was empty.

Lesson Number Two: Learn the seasonality of your market.


Point Number Three: not all of the students left town for Christmas break. 30% of them lived in town. They bought gifts between the 21st and the 24th. Many of them bought music as gifts. None of them bought that music at a television repair shop.

And why would they?

It takes a lot of time, effort, and resources to establish any image in the minds of your prospective customers. If you should be successful at planting an image, any image, advertising a different image is worse than starting over. You have to try to first kill the old image before you can establish a new one.

Lesson Number Three: don’t change your name unless you also change your products. Don’t radically change your products without changing your name. Don't do either unless you're forced to by rapidly declining sales.


Point Number Four: my tastes in music are not, nor will they ever be, anything close to “normal.” Yours aren’t either. In fact, any personal opinion you have, when applied to the preferences of your market, is worthless. Don’t ever make a decision because your tastes, those of your friends, or your wife’s tastes are consulted. (And NEVER listen to anyone who says “I’m in the demo. My opinion is the only one that counts.”

Lesson Number Four: Survey your market. Stop guessing. Learn what they want to buy.

One incident. Four valuable lessons.

Everyone benefits from this story except Howard.

Your marketing consultant didn’t become an authority by always being right. The good consultants have fallen on their collective butts often. The great consultants have spectacular failures hidden deep in their client files.

Ask them about their failures.

And learn from them.

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Marketing as a School of Art

A good art instructor takes her students through a number of different “schools” of painting in the course of their education. Does she do this to give them a broader appreciation of art? No. That’s a side benefit.

She does it so that they can learn specific techniques developed by the masters of the various schools.

They’ll study Rubens for his use of grand dramatic figures; Rembrandt’s attention to shadow; Cézanne's use of small repeated brushstrokes; Picasso’s study of geometric shapes.

The students will attempt to duplicate the masters in order to learn the underlying techniques. Some of those techniques will feel “natural” to the budding artist, who will add them to his own art techniques "toolbox."

Over a period of time the savvy student takes a bit of Raphael, a smidge of Vermeer, a touch of Monet, until he’s recognized as having developed his own style. This will be the beginning of commercial success for our artist.

Marketers should study successful marketers the way painters study influential artists.

Some markets respond better to direct response techniques while others respond better to branding. Some markets react to a free gift with purchase, while others tend to identify with a particular image.

Successful marketers must be ready to change tactics as dictated by the market.

I once witnessed an argument between a sales representative and the sales manager of a North Florida radio station.

The rep said: “Are you under the impression that I work for you? I work for Buck Bay Marine. I work for Menarro’s Restaurant. And if I didn’t have your radio station to deliver their messages I’d use outdoor, or wear sandwich boards or pass out Rubik’s Cubes with their names on ‘em.”

I applaud his attitude.

Unfortunately it’s easier to find a good art instructor than an experienced marketer well versed in all of the ways to communicate with customers. Successful marketers, much like successful artists, specialize in one particular school of marketing philosophy.

My suggestion? Study them all. Attempt to duplicate the masters. Learn the underlying techniques. Some of them will feel “natural” to you. Add them to your own marketing techniques toolbox.

Over a period of time you’ll incorporate a bit of Hopkins, a smidge of Kennedy, a touch of Ogilvy, until you know with certainty that these are all just different ways of delivering your message.

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In my opinion, these are some of the best books ever written on the topics of marketing and advertising. They are arranged alphabetically. Please don't consider this to be any kind of ranking.

Call to Action - Bryan Eisenberg and Jeffery Eisenberg

Confessions of an Advertising Man – David Ogilvy

Guerilla Marketing – Jay Conrad Levinson

How to Advertise – Kenneth Roman and Jane Maas

Magical Worlds of the Wizard of Ads – Roy H. Williams

My Life In Advertising – Claude Hopkins

Ogilvy on Advertising – David Ogilvy

Permission Marketing – Seth Godin

Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind - Al Ries and Jack Trout

Reality in Advertising – Rosser Reeves

Scientific Advertising – Claude Hopkins

Secret Formulas of the Wizard of Ads – Roy H. Williams

Tested Advertising Methods – John Caples

The 33 Ruthless Rules of Local Advertising - Michael Corbett

The Fall of Advertising and the Rise of PR - Al Ries and Laura Ries

Waiting For Your Cat to Bark – Bryan Eisenberg and Jeffery Eisenberg with Lisa T. Davis

Wizard of Ads – Roy H. Williams

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Why I Don’t Care For Co-Op Advertising

Sounds like such a great idea, doesn’t it? You’re a retailer – say a hardware store owner. Your store carries Ajax Widgets. You want to advertise in your local market to get customers into your store, but the cost is high. Ajax wants people to buy Ajax brand widgets, but the cost of advertising in every local market is exceptionally high.

Ajax problem: spreading the word to people who can’t purchase from them (those who live in a community without a store which carries the Ajax brand, for instance) is a waste of money.

Ajax solution? They will team up with you to share the cost of advertising to your market, as long as you promote Ajax Widgets in those ads, too. You're trying to reach the same people, aren't you? Why not share the cost? What a great deal for both of you.

You simply use the Ajax Widget pre-approved script, and submit the appropriate media documentation to Ajax. They will reimburse you for part of the cost of the ads.

Fifty percent is the most common plan, but I’ve seen ‘em go up as high as one hundred percent. And all cooperative advertising programs “cap” the amount of advertising dollars you’re allowed to spend at a percentage of dollar volume of the product you’ve purchased from the manufacturer.

A great deal. Or is it?

You’re trying to build an image for your hardware store. Every ad you run should re-enforce that image. Perhaps your desired image is “The store that has everything you need in stock.”

What’s Ajax’ image? “The most dependable widget money can buy.”

How does it benefit your hardware store’s image to have a fifty-second message about Ajax dependable widgets, followed by an effectively different message: “Ajax Widgets are available at fine retailers like Your Hardware Store?” (Don't kid your self. It's not a continuation of the same ad. It is a completely different message).

Then, there’s the equity issue. Ajax dictates the radio or television script, fifty seconds of which is dedicated to Ajax and their widgets. You get the ten second “tag” at the end. They provide the newspaper or magazine layout. You get the small white space at the bottom to drop in your logo and location.

At the end of the advertising schedule the medium sends you the invoice, and a notarized "affidavit of performance." You pay for the ad. You send the required documentation to Ajax, who reimburses you for half the cost.

Let me repeat: you got only ten of the sixty seconds. You got only three of the 15 column inches. And yet, you paid for half.

Anyway you look at it, you’re paying way too much for ads, and worse yet, those ads deliver the wrong message.

I don't care for co-op advertising.

At least, most of the time.

Some co-op programs will let you write you own ad and still claim reimbursement under the terms of their co-op program, provided that you mention their brand and product a minimum number of times.

One of my clients has an annual sale one time each year. For fifty weeks a year his store advertising reinforces the benefits of purchasing from him. For those fifty weeks co-op doesn't help him to meet his goals.

But for the two weeks of the sale, he uses every accrued co-op dollar to fund the promotion of an event. It's a completely different message presented in a completely different style. The sale event message is delivered with enough frequency to effectively reach most of the community. For those two weeks you can't turn a radio to a local station or open a local newspaper without being exposed to his ads.

Then, event over, it's back to business as usual.

If you're going to use cooperative advertising in the promotion of your business, plan it's use carefully. Don’t kid yourself, though, that co-op funds can replace any portion of your ad budget for the year. Run co-op ads IN ADDITION to your regular ads, not in place of any of them.

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