Listen... Analysing for success

I have read many books and listened to radio programs on advertising and many times people are praised for their "brilliant" work or their slick strategy. Many times reality hits somewhere else. If you have ever watched Dragon's Den or Shark Tank TV shows you will see many great idea's that don't have success and other so-so ideas that do. I don't think the winners are any less brilliant than the losers, in fact, some who are unsuccessful are more brilliant. Some say it's timing? Easy to say, much harder to replicate. We've also seen in a recent general election in Canada, a cocktail waitress and university students elected to parliament. Did they run a brilliant campaign? I am fairly certain at least one other candidate was smarter and more qualified. One of them even had a trip to Vegas during the campaign. So why do some get so much media attention, while others don't? Why are some ads more effective than others?

So what is the magic bullet? The great elixir? The magic idea that will shoot your business into the stratosphere? I have been recently been convinced it's listening. Listen to your suppliers, your staff, and especially your customers and potential ones. Listen close, don't pay lip service, actually listen. Listening will give you all the answers you need to run a successful business and market it into the stratosphere. The key to listening and why most of us don't do it well, is to be able to listen to someone who doesn't agree with you. Someone who may tell you the honest truth. The Truth is what you want to hear, NOT your opinion coming back to you. If you were on the way to a television interview or an event full of 20,000 people, wouldn't you want someone to tell you your hair was a mess? Most won't. The Truth will help your business to succeed. Lip service will not. Once you have listened, make adjustments to your marketing and advertising plans. make a firm comitmnet to what others are telling you. Change your products if you have to. If customers are telling you they want a green version of the same product you carry, ask them how much more they would be willing to spend and bring it in for them. If you are loyal to them, they will be loyal to you.

If you look over the history of business you will see that it is not the business convincing the public to buy their product, but the product filling a need in the marketplace that makes a business successful. Sure marketing will help you keep your sales high, but no bad product, well other than the pet rock, has been successful without listening to the marketplace before launching the marketing campaign. Until next week, I am Larry "The Ad Man"