Tag: marketing

Non Products

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Today I noticed an outdoor advertisement for the local lotto here in Australia.

Their New Years Eve lotto draw: 31 Million Megadraw. Cleverly placed on the 31st of December.

It got me thinking about what people are really buying. I don’t think it is the chance to win. I don’t even think people are buying into hope. I think people are outsourcing their worries – they are buying the right to imagine what it could be like.

There are a lot of what I call non-products that people buy. Products and services which have no ‘real utility’. In this instance, lotto, they have bought some time to imagine the possibilities. But in some ways we could do this without the ticket… because the reality is we are not going to win.

I wonder what other Non Products fit into this category?

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The future is less

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

You’ve heard this:

If all you ever do, is all you’ve every done. Then you can only expect all you’ve ever got.

It’s changed slightly, actually it has changed radically:

If all you ever do, is all you’ve ever done. Then you can expect much much less than you used to get.

This is because there are a nearly 2 billion people in the BRIC nations who are prepared to do what you do for around 10% of your price. And in a ‘web everywhere’ world people can find them. Yes this includes nearly all of us – Architects, Engineers, Accountants, Lawyers, Graphic Designers, Coders, Developers, Journalists  – every single task that can be done remotely, and even some that can’t be.

For them 10% of your pay is a 50% pay rise. A pretty good deal from where they sit.

What to do – do more with the stuff that lives around the edges. Make meaning from the seemingly disparate. Add a creative edge by mashing things up in a new and interesting way.  And demand the people near you take notice of your ideas. If they don’t, then find a better place to share your creativity.

The trick to the future is to organise the factors of production, not be them.

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Living in the past – Nixon

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

To: [email protected]
Subject: Order on line

I am trying to buy a wallet on line – but there is no way to add item to shopping basket.

Please help/

Steve.

——————–

To: “Sammartino, Steve”
Subject: RE: Order on line

Hi Steve,

Our online store currently offers watches and audio product only. For a larger range of our clothing and accessories please visit our preferred online retailer here:

www.surfstitch.com/brand/nixon

Kind regards,

——————–

To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: re: Order on line

Hmm – that’s pretty 1996 don’t you think?

Surfstitch.com.au don’t have the item I want… ?????

Can I order over the phone and pay via credit card and get sent to me that way?

Let me know,
Steve.

——————–

I’m yet to hear back from these guys yet. Although they did give their initial response within 30 minutes. I’m still waiting for the second response. A person with credit card in hand, ready to buy.

Ignoring the fact that it is totally ridiculous to sell some things on line and not others, it is more ridiculous to not call me back (they have my number), take my order, take my money, go down to the warehouse and grab the item and put it in an express post or fed ex bag.

When it comes to selling on-line, being half committed is often worse than not being involved at all.

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Instagram is my new twitter

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Lately I’ve found myself checking my instagram feed more often than my twitter feed. I didn’t realise it at first. But I noticed it only when a few of my twitter friends commented on my lack of tweeting. Clearly I’m still using both, but increasingly instagram is what I give my small doses of available attention to. I remember the time when this happened to facebook, the time when I slowly started coming back to facebook less often, and starting giving my attention to twitter. And it is happening all over again for me.

It really does feel like there are only a few channels I can invest in at one time. Maybe it is Dunbar’s number is at work again?

If I had to understand why this is happening I’d just put it down to noise. When there are a lot of voices shouting at once, it is very difficult to hear what anyone is saying – the conversation is replaced with a hum of city noise, interspersed with the occasional siren or loud car horn. Instagram feels more intimate at the moment. It feels like twitter did when I first got there. I have so few people in my feed I can see everything. A few crew who have organically organised themselves to share some of their life. I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything, and it feels like I have a greater sense of control that my other feeds. Sure, I have to take a photo of all my thoughts – but most thoughts we have can be augmented with a pic quite easily. In addition, this need for a picture reduces the amount of banal posts I see in my feed.

Increasingly I am convinced of one thing – as soon as ‘everyone’ arrives at a party, it’s time to find somewhere more interesting. And what this means for entrepreneurs, is that if your party is cool enough, people will eventually seek you out.

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Amazing Aviation Facts

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

I recently did an Ignite talk on Amazing Aviation. People were blown away with some of the facts I presented. Many of them are very surprising. Here’s some of the doozies in a top 10 list!

  1. Only 5% of the worlds population have ever been on an airplane.
  2. Flight is not the safest form of travel. The bus is on all measures. The motorcycle is the most dangerous on all measures.
  3. The airline industry has currently made a net loss of $31 billion dollars since 1940.
  4. The average profit per seat on a 1 hour flight is $2.20.
  5. In 1940 to fly London – New York it cost 1 years wages. Today it costs the wage of working only Monday & Tuesday.
  6. The average age of commercial aircraft is 19 years. (How safe is a 19 year old car?)
  7. Tom Stuker is the worlds most frequent flyer. He has traveled over 10 million miles.
  8. There are over 14,000 commercial flights in the air at any one time.
  9. There are over 3 million people in the air on planes at any one time.
  10. The worlds first flying car arrives in 2012. Called the Terrafugia it costs $194,000

Statistics are fun, Love Stevie.

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My dad's chevy

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Every now and again a brand crosses the chasm. A brand goes from being a thing, to being an emotional ingredient. These moments are usually personal, they are hard to capture and share. But occasionally it is captured, and it takes us to an entire new understanding of what is possible when we create things with the end user in mind. In this instance, the car was first created with driver in mind. And then, the acquisition was created with a dad in mind.

Another example of great narrative that would not be possible in the limited media of yesteryear. What a beautiful brand story to share – Kudos to all involved.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bz-nO6WvOYw]

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