As a companion piece to my last blog (Time to Address the Relationship Disconnect), I’ve written a handy ‘how not to do customer service’ checklist. Poor customer service is now so commonplace in the UK that comedians build entire routines out of it; the curse of the unexpected item in the bagging area, the endless ‘your call is important to us’ messages while they leave you sat on hold and the never-ending IVR menus. (“Press [...]
So here we are again. Time for the annual ‘retailers post disappointing Xmas trading results’ headlines. This year, I’m not looking at the correlation between their results and their ad campaigns, I’m having a think about the relationship between their results and the in-store experience. With retail sales overall up 5.3%, and some brands delivering up to 20-30% growth online, it shows just how badly the poor performers have done. Over at M&S (down 2.1%), [...]
My December blog took a look at the big retailer's Christmas ads and came to the conclusion that the ones that misfired did so because they didn't correctly connect with women. Not surprisingly, as women are the major organisers - and spenders - at Christmas, this almost directly correlated to those who subsequently posted poor trading results. This topic is high on my agenda at the moment as I’m working with a brand that is [...]
'Tis the season to be jolly, so this month - in the great tradition of Campaign’s ‘Private View’ – the MarketingMog has been reviewing the annual crop of retailer Christmas adverts and wondering if any themes have emerged in this depth-of-recession year… First up, John Lewis. The MarketingMog is pretty cynical about these annual schmaltz-fests from a team that seem a little too interested in their own PR, but ‘The Snowman's Journey’ is a definite improvement on last year’s ‘Seven’ inspired [...]
Back in February, I wrote a piece entitled ‘Time for Some Moral Marketing’. My hope was that 2012 would provide the antidote to the widespread corporate, political and social immorality of 2011 (expenses-fiddling politicians, corrupt bankers, phone hacking, abuse in ‘care’ homes, riots…). We were all hopeful that the Jubilee and Olympics/Paralympics would provide the feel good factor we were desperate for. Sadly, the Jubilee was an over-long washout but our athletes did us proud, [...]
Marketing Week’s Mark Ritson was at his provocative best last week in a piece entitled ‘Why Marketers Are Socially Stupid’, following Waitrose’s recent #Reasons campaign on Twitter. He makes a lot of valid points, although I strongly disagree that their “middle class shoppers will feel a little less enthusiastic about entering the store now, and store traffic will decline”. This was a storm in a teacup, which poked fun at what Waitrose is already known [...]
Much has been written about the incredible success of Groupon; named by Forbes magazine as “the fastest growing company, ever”, and valued at $13bn with 83m subscribers in 43 countries. Eye-watering numbers achieved in just 3 years, for sure – although not without acres of accompanying column inches bemoaning the shoddy way Groupon treats some of its suppliers, and the shoddy way some suppliers treat their customers (without any recourse from Groupon). But putting all [...]
Can I have a word about John Lewis? I know much has already been written about their new ‘Always a Woman’ 91 second brand film (that extra second makes all the difference), but it’s really bugging me. Now, I love Johnny Lewis. Shop there all the time, watched the documentary on BBC2 etc etc. But this just makes me depressed. For lots of reasons. First off is the ‘one minute you’re a happy little girl [...]