Tag: Consumers

Southwest Airlines – customer service

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Here’s a nice piece of personal input from a staff member at Southwest Airlines. Although they do have a reputation of doing things a little different, the thing that really matters is the fact that they let staff ‘add value’ and be real people.

I like it…. I’d be interested to know if you do, or if you’d find it annoying?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0KbDUUt63M]

For startups, simple service innovations and staff input cost almost nothing. If you’re lucky, 25,000 people will see it on the internet!

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Mind your language – Hyperbole

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Light, Low fat, no fat, fat free, rain forest alliance, low carb, high protein, calcium enriched, fair trade, retail partnership, heart foundation approved, recycled packing, reduced packing, no msg, low salt, low sodium, 5 star energy rating, green energy, eco, carbon offset, carbon free, carbon neutral, low sugar, no sugar, no trans fat, recycled materials, as seen on TV, television first, world premier, made for TV, made fresh, frozen fresh, real, all natural, nothing artificial, easy opening, 25% off, 10% extra, free, no added colors or flavours, diet, bite size, king size, sugar free, caffeine free, may contain nuts, dolphin safe, premium, value, gluten free, Low GI, lowers cholesterol, imported, made locally, no added sugar, made locally from imported ingredients, Australian owned, vitamin enriched, concentrated, biodegradable, recommended daily intake, enjoy responsibly….

Enough.

We’ve all read this oxymoronic language. But when we are using any of these words in our marketing we should step back and ask why?

Are we trying to ‘clean up’ our stuff?

Turns out most times people use these words to sell stuff, they are trying to ‘de-bad’ (from the startup blog dictionary) something. A banana doesn’t need any descriptors – we already know it’s biodegradable, easy opening, no artificial colors and isn’t passed it’s used by date just by looking at it. The point for startups is this – if we are using language of this ilk, we must ensure it is authentic.  If not, people will see right through it and will spread the ‘truth’ for us.

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Digital Footprints – the power of

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Recently I took a photo in New York of something I thought to be particularly interesting. I uploaded it to twitpic and posted it on my twitter page. The net result was approx 100 views of the image. Here it is below:

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Fast forward 2 months and the image is ‘re-tweeted’ back to me from someone else after it has made the rounds and it now has more than 38,000 views. Holy Wow. (You can click the image to see the current view count)

How did it get 38,000+ views after only 100 people cared when I first posted it? Well the answer is simple, it’s digital, which means its footprint stays forever – the digital footprint. And when someone more influential on the web than me share’s it, it spreads in a compound fashion. Sure it got shared, call it viral, call it what you please. But the thing of true power here is the digital footprint. It wasn’t an instant in market reaction. The spreading happened 2 months after the launch. Not the day it went to air, like a TV advertisement.

The lesson for startups and marketers is simple. The real power of digital media is the footprint it leaves, the permanency, and the ability for people to catch up. This is something traditional media (newspapers, radio, billboards, Tv) just don’t have.

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No 1 reason being an employee sucks

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

The number one reason being an employee sucks is this:

You can’t sell your job.

No matter how good you are at what you do,

–    you don’t own your output
–    you are building other peoples brands and empire
–    you are at the risk of hierarchy
–    you are not servant to customers, but wage earners (the fundamental issue)

What this means is that as an employee you are not serving those who actually pay your wages – your consumers. Instead you become servant to people who are best at ‘internal politics’. So for you to succeed in this environment, you too must excel at internal politics. Which takes you always for important real world skills entrepreneurs develop. And then the final reality is that at some point in your ’employee career’ someone will not like you, and dispose of you. At this point you instantly lose any good will or employee equity which was built. Even if you are a stock holder, you still have no decision making authority.

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The point is, if you want to build assets, being an employee makes it difficult because you lack control. If you want control, then you must have the courage to build something independently, like entrepreneurs do.

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New York Series – Coke is ‘not’ it

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

All cultures differ in terms of what is acceptable commercial behaviour. It’s become clear to me that the US has a stronger lassie-fare attitude when it comes to consumer goods and product claims.

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Coke with Vitamins!

The government allows this folly, and then wonders why there is an obesity crisis. More like an Intelligence crisis.

Startups – Don’t just make stuff people will buy, make stuff you can be proud.

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New York Series: Magnolia Bakery – In content is rad.

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Still got a few New York stories up my sleeve.

If anyone had any doubt that mainstream media is ‘still’ the most powerful communication tool, here’s some proof. While in New York we just had to check out the famous ‘Magnolia Bakery’.

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The only way I had ever heard of this infamous business was via the TV show ‘Sex in the city’. It wasn’t advertised during the program, but in content. That is, discussed during the show, part of the story. This only ever happens when we have a ‘worthy business’, something worth talking about because it is so cool.On many occasions during my stay the line to get in was all the way down the street. And the cupcakes were tremendously yummy.

And so it proves a few things:

  1. Mainstream media ain’t dead yet.
  2. In content is way more powerful than paid for advertising
  3. Only ‘cool’ stuff ever gets talked about.

Startups,  go make some cool stuff.

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New York Series: Bloomingdales – You’re Welcome, really.

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

The historically significant department store Bloomingdales do some pretty cool stuff. This includes the ‘Visitor discount’ they provide:

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Yep, if you’re from another country you automatically receive an 11% discount on everything you buy. Now, this isn’t one of those trick promotions, impossible to get, with 100 other conditions. You simply go to the visitor center pictured above and show them your passport, or overseas license and that is it.  And the discount is real, even if an item is on promotion or already discounted, you get the 11% on top of that. I was fortunate enough to get an incredible winter jacket which was already half price (end of winter discount, even though it was actually snowing outside) with an additional 11%. I was pretty happy. They also have a gift incentive if you spend over $200, and yep, I got my gift…

It get’s better, they also have personal shopping assistants, Multi-lingual assistants to take your around store and free hotel delivery for purchases greater that $250. You can read more about it here.

Sure, discounting isn’t always the path to profitability, but when you are taking one time customers, making them feel special, with ‘money to spend’,  under your wing, it’s pretty clear that they are ‘inventing revenue’.

What does your startup do to ‘invent revenue’?

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