Confessions of a Direct Marketing Chauvinist Pig 2
Two, real life case histories that prove
only savvy marketers are fit
to run growth-oriented companies
Dear Business-Builder,
It’s so predictable, you can set your watch by it …
Armed with only a skeleton staff, meager resources and big dreams, an eager young entrepreneur slaves 60, 80, and often 100 hours every week for years to grow his business.
He does everything right: He develops or acquires top-notch products. Watches overhead like a hawk. Reinvests every penny of profit. Becomes a student of great marketing and sales copy strategies – and a past master at implementing winning campaigns.
When it comes to sales copy, he never pulls a punch. He goes for the jugular – as far as the law and his ethics will allow – demonstrating the value his products bring to customers’ lives with edgy, can’t-put-‘em-down promotions:
- Sales copy that grabs prospects by the eyeballs …
- That ruthlessly differentiates his company, lifting it head and shoulders above the competition …
- That positions the owner and/or spokespeople as honest advocates for customers and against those who use and abuse them …
- And that super-glues customers to the company in ways that have them spending more and more with him, each passing month.
Armed with these edgy, un-ignorable, in-your-face promotions, the owner’s dreams of success soon become reality.
Suddenly, tens of thousands, then hundreds of thousands of new, paying customers are flocking to the company. Products fly off the shelves faster than pickaxes and rotgut in an Old West gold rush. Millions of dollars cascade into the company’s coffers every week.
And that’s when “it” happens …
The owner, eager to continue or even accelerate his company’s growth rate – and at the same time cut his own workweek down to a more reasonable size – begins recruiting what he mistakenly believes is a “better class” of top executives.
Maybe it’s a new President to lighten his workload … or perhaps a Chief Financial Officer to keep an eagle eye on expenses and manage the company’s rapidly growing cash reserves …
But typically, there’s a problem: Typically, these hired guns don’t know one goldarn thing about the company – let alone about its business: Direct Marketing. And typically, they won’t lift a finger to learn.
After all: They’re here to be teachers – not students!
They’re the experts. They’re the ones who read all the right business books. They’re the ones with fancy-schmancy degrees and six-figure salaries.
Their job isn’t to learn – it’s to teach the poor, dumb business owner and his poor, dumb staff how to do it right!
And so, these private sector bureaucrats go to work …
- People who have never risked their own money or chunks of their lives to build a successful business of their own are suddenly in control of an entrepreneurial enterprise still in its growth phase …
- Neophytes who have never created a successful direct response promotion in their lives are lording it over veteran marketers who previously thrashed the competition with industry-beating promotions …
- And worst of all, these talentless functionaries who are genetically bred and scholastically brainwashed to focus on reducing risk rather than nurturing and accelerating growth … and on cutting costs instead of investing in the future … begin running the show.
Now, I’ll give you three guesses at what happens next – and I seriously doubt you’ll need all three …
Bingo: Revenue growth slows, then stops. New customers become as rare as hen’s teeth and old customers stampede for the exits. As profits dwindle to zero – and then to less than zero – the company’s hard-won cash reserves quickly evaporate.
Finally, after the company’s best employees have either been laid off or have quit in disgust – the self-important gas bags who precipitated the crisis … and who still don’t have a clue as to why the company self-destructed (but waste no time pointing their fingers at everyone who helped grow the business just fine before the bureaucrats showed up) – are unceremoniously fired.
And suddenly, the business owner finds himself right back at Square One:
Armed with only a skeleton staff and meager resources, the older but hopefully wiser entrepreneur sadly licks his wounds and goes back to work – 60, 80, even 100 hours a week – in a desperate attempt to return his company to its former glory …
This cycle is repeated hundreds, perhaps thousands of times in America every day: The bell-shaped curve that rises from modest growth … to explosive growth … and then to the plateau and plunge into near-oblivion that inevitably follows “The Experts” arrival on the scene.
How do I know? Well, for one thing, I’ve seen it happen more than once among my own clients. And for another, I deal with companies who are making the very same mistake every day – both in my professional and personal life.
And since like me, you’re a business builder – whether building our own businesses, or as a marketing pro or copywriter building both your own and your clients’ businesses – I figured today would be a good day to be reminded of one of the dumbest things smart business owners like us do: Subjugate marketers to these drooling morons.
NOTE: These stories are true. However, in our first case history, the names have been changed to protect the innocent – namely, ME – from getting drawn into a public pissing contest with the guilty.
Case History #1:
“Big, Gay Al”
and His Office of Business Prevention
OK – so his name wasn’t really Al. And the fact is, I have no idea what sexual team he plays for – nor do I care in the slightest.
But dammit, he just reminds me so much of South Park’s “Big, Gay Al,” I couldn’t resist.
Anyways, when “Al” assumed a top position with one of my clients, he immediately began filling the owner’s head with horror stories about how, out of literally hundreds of direct competitors, two (including his former employer) had been slammed by one of the U.S. government’s regulatory agencies.
- Nevermind that those two errant companies comprised less than one-half of one percent of our industry …
- Nevermind that they had blatantly lied in their promotions, openly thumbed their noses at regulators and/or shamelessly ripped off their customers …
- Nevermind that our products were above reproach and that every fact and figure in our promotions was scrupulously substantiated …
… Al filled my client’s head with images of the public humiliation and financial ruin that would surely follow if and when the regulators attacked.
The solution, said Al, was to hire a full-time employee – a compliance officer – to gut our sales copy, kill response, obliterate our stellar growth and push the company to the brink of bankruptcy.
Wait – that’s not quite right. What Al actually said when I screamed bloody murder was, “Don’t be silly. You’re just over-reacting. It’ll be fine. These changes won’t affect response one iota.”
So, Al established what quickly became known (behind his back, of course) as “The Office of Business Prevention.”
And from that moment on, all sales copy was subjected to excruciating scrutiny and all kinds of gross indignities …
-
Our products were instantly neutered: Unlike our competitors’ products which actually did wonderful things and promised real benefits, The Office of Business Prevention made sure we never claimed our products would really do anything specific for our prospects.
Instead, our products could only “aim” to do things or “strive” to do things or “shoot for” a particular benefit.
And of course, every vague, unspecific benefit that slipped through was hedged six ways from sundown: Every “will” was changed to “could” … “should” … “may” … or “might.”
Deprived of any real benefits to sell, we became a company whose only product was a pocketfull of good intentions.
- Any implication of a benefit claim that somehow slipped through was quickly DISclaimed: Just in case The Office of Business Prevention somehow accidentally allowed the copy to imply a benefit, they made sure that every promotion prominently presented an ominous reminder of the catastrophic worst-case scenario that would follow if the product failed.
… And of course, the return on investment our promotions produced promptly plummeted more than 30 percent.
Predictably, the company stopped growing and started shrinking. Cash reserves began evaporating faster than water in the Sahara sun. Good employees quit in disgust. And the company that had once been the fastest-growing in its industry began slouching towards bankruptcy.
Now, all this would have been bad enough if these changes had been necessary.
If Al could have pointed to one, single competitor who had been nailed by a regulator because he said “will” instead of “could” … or because he failed to follow every promised benefit with a vivid and disturbing word-picture of the worst-case scenario.
But he couldn’t. Nobody could – and for one, simple reason: There wasn’t – and still isn’t – a single precedent where this kind of thing had happened in the entire 100-plus-year history of my client’s industry.
“Big, Gay Al” was no marketer. He couldn’t point to a single success in his career that came close to approaching the sales and growth miracles we had been producing before he showed up.
Worse, by putting his Office of Business Prevention in a position above the marketing pros who had built the company, he changed the businesses’ entire focus: From an obsession with ethical growth to an obsession for risk avoidance at all costs.
And so, after the dust settled, and armed with only a skeleton staff and meager resources, the older but hopefully wiser entrepreneur had no choice but to lick his wounds and go back to work – 60, 80, even 100 hours a week – in a desperate attempt to return his company to its former glory …
THE MORAL(S) OF THE STORY:
Lesson #1: If rapid growth is your objective, never, EVER put anyone but a super-savvy marketer at the helm of any entrepreneurial company.
Oh – and talk is cheap. Make sure it’s a marketer who actually has decades of spectacularly successful same- or similar-industry promotions under his or her belt.
Instead of appointing a marketing imbecile – or worse: A marketing imbecile like Al who is also a hopeless bureaucrat – you’d be better off to just quit the business while the quitting’s good. Take your money off the table and enjoy life.
And if you’re a marketing consultant or copywriter and you’re approached by a company with a marketing imbecile like Al running things, do yourself a favor: Be “too busy” to accept the assignment.
Lesson #2: Play the odds. In a vain attempt to avoid the possibility of a regulatory nightmare that had befallen only one-half of one percent of our competitors – and only the most blatantly dishonest .5% – Al doomed our already-highly ethical company to the 100% certainty of a sales disaster.
He did it by putting marketing under the thumb of a compliance officer (a very nice person whom I personally like and respect very much). And this nice person was given a very clear-cut but impossible-to-fulfill mandate: “Your job is to make absolutely sure this company is never, EVER questioned by a regulator or sued by a customer.”
And so, the Office of Business Prevention kicked itself into high gear, applying far more restrictive standards to our marketing than any – and I do mean ANY direct competitor – did to theirs. Far more restrictive, even, than the U.S. Federal Trade Commission had ever applied to any of our competitors.
And unsurprisingly, the result was a huge competitive disadvantage, plummeting response rates, dwindling cash reserves, massive layoffs and all the rest.
I say there’s a better way to go.
Now, I am definitely no lawyer, but I am a pretty darned good at business-building – and here’s how I see it …
The compliance officer’s mandate is impossible to fulfill. There is simply no way to make any company impervious to regulatory or legal hassles.
You can tell the truth, do your dead-level best to ensure you sales copy doesn’t mislead or give prospects or customers the wrong impression and do your best to follow all the other applicable laws and regulations …
… But there are gray areas and loopholes in those regulations and laws big enough to fly the space shuttle through – and 99.99% of all businesses LIVE in those gray areas.
And that means any regulator or customer can cost you a king’s ransom in legal fees any time they damn well feel like it.
A thoroughly honest compliance officer charged with the impossible responsibility to ensure zero legal hassles would immediately tell his or her boss, “There is only one way to make absolutely sure you are never questioned by a regulator or sued by a customer: Never promote, sell or ship anything.”
“Just quit. Go out of business, and I personally guarantee you won’t be bothered about anything you do from now on (DISCLAIMER: This guarantee does not apply to past promotions or previously sold products.)”
Not ready to hang it up? Well, if your top priority is to stay in business – and if you’re more afraid of the legal risks than the risk of total business failure – your next step would be to do what Al and his Office of Business Prevention did:
Impose greater restrictions on marketing copy than the law requires. You probably won’t go broke right away – and when you do, at least you’ll have a fighting chance of going to the poorhouse with a clean legal and regulatory record.
Still not good enough for you? Then there’s only one solution: Change the compliance officer’s job description.
Instead of “Responsible for ensuring the company avoids all legal hassles,” give the legal beagles a share of responsibility in the company’s continued success: change it to …
“Help the marketing department ensure the company’s continued growth while complying with directly relevant regulations, laws and ethical standards.”
In short, tell the ambulance-chasers, “Figure out ways for marketing to say what it must to grow this company without getting us in hot water.”
A special word to marketing consultants and copywriters: If a client’s lawyers have the final word on your copy, raise your fees. I’d recommend a flat fee of, say $300,000 for a direct mail package, ‘cause you sure as heck won’t be earning any royalties!
Better yet, be “too busy” to accept assignments from clients who won’t allow you to work “with” the compliance people – instead of “for” them.
POSTSCRIPT: After nearly destroying my client’s company, Al was righteously and unceremoniously canned.
… But the Web is a magic place where even abject failures like Al can reinvent themselves as instant gurus.
All you need is a website – and Al’s got a nice one. It offers – get this – “GROWTH SOLUTIONS” for businesses!
Well, he’s got me there. Truth in advertising: Al certainly “solved” our growth – by ENDING it!
Can’t help but notice, Al, you forgot to include any disclaimers on your website. There’s not a breath of how you nearly bankrupted my client’s company. No weasel words in your promises of spectacular growth for your clients.
I mean – didn’t you run this website through COMPLIANCE?
Priceless.
So fair warning: If you ever come across a business-building website … notice a spokesperson who bears a striking resemblance to “Big, Gay Al” … and if you click the “Presentation” button and hear a big, booming voice saying something like, “HELLO! I’m Big Gay Al – WELCOME to …”
… do yourself a huge favor: Just have a good laugh and move on.
Case History #2:
“Bob”, “Skip” and “John” – and FortuneCity.Com’s
Customer DISservice Department
About two weeks ago, I jumped on the web to see what you all were saying on our blog.
It wasn’t there.
Alarmed, I pointed my browser at The Profit Center™ website.
It was gone, too!
“WENDYYYY! Someone wiped our website right off of the Internet!”
“F-F¬-FUDGECAKES!” remarks The Redhead, “I’ll call FortuneCity’s customer service number and see what’s up”.
So, she dials the 800 number and gets a recorded message telling her to dial a bunch of other numbers in order to connect with the proper person. She does, and is promptly exiled to on-hold music hell.
After an eternity or two, a perfectly nice guy with a thick accent – we’re guessing Indian or Pakistani – and a tenuous (at best) grasp of the English language appears on the line.
“My name is Bob. How may I be of service to you?”
“Well, ‘Bob,’” says The Redhead (wondering how many Indian and Pakistani babies are being named “BOB” these days), “my website seems to have disappeared from the Internet. I’m calling to find out why, and what we can do to get it back up right away.”
“One moment, please” says “Bob.” And before she can reply, Wendy’s once again impatiently tapping her toes to truly horrendous Muzak.
After what seems like a millenium, “Bob” is back with an announcement: “Your website should be back up in a few hours.”
Tremendously relieved, The Redhead thanked him very much and hung up. And for the next few hours or so, we both repeatedly checked. No luck: The website was still down.
So Wendy calls FortuneCity’s customer disservice number again, punches in all the extra numbers and spends the obligatory amount of time in on-hold Purgatory, yearning all the while for the assuring sound of a live, human voice – even “Bob’s”.
Finally – in just slightly less time than it took for the Earth to cool – a customer service rep answers: “Hello? My name is Skip." “How is it that I may help you today?"
“My website is still down,” says The Redhead. “I just talked to someone supposedly named ‘Bob’ about it and he said it should be ‘OK’ by now – but it’s not. It’s still down!”
“One moment, please,” says “Skip.” CLICK! More lousy music. I know that look: The Redhead, she’s getting ready to do a Vesuvius.
Skip eventually returns: “Looks like your website has been completely deleted from the server. One of your employees probably sabotaged the site. We’ll have you back up within 24 hours.”
Now, it’s Saturday night – 24 hours later – still no website.
Once again, Wendy dials FortuneCity’s customer disservice number. Once again, she clicks in all the other numbers. Once again, she endures that horriffic music.
“Hello? This is John. How may I help you?”
“Look. My website disappeared from the Internet Friday night. First, you guys said it would take one hour to fix it. Then, you told me it would take another 24 hours. It’s still not up. What in the bloody HELL is going on?”
“One moment, please,” says “John.” There’s that maddening music again.
Finally, “John” returns: “We don’t know why your site is down. We don’t have access to that information. You probably didn’t pay your bill. They only do this when you don’t pay your bill. You’ll have to call accounting on Monday.”
The Redhead – who had paid for a full year’s web hosting just three months ago – has reached her limit. “AAARRRGGHH!” she replies, and slams the phone down so hard even folks in India who weren’t on the line probably heard it.
Long story short: After two, long, weekend days on pins and needles, Wendy calls FortuneCity’s New York office first thing Monday morning.
The good news is, the folks she talks to this time are fluent in the only language Wendy knows: English.
The bad news? They’re just as clueless as to why our website is down as their customer disservice people were. They do promise, however, to call as soon as they get it sorted out.
The minutes turn into hours. Still no word from FortuneCity. Finally, in mid-afternoon – some 68 hours after our website first disappeared – I call and get a nice lady who promises to call me right back with answers.
She does: Our account is paid in full. Our website was NOT sabotaged externally. It was FortuneCity’s fault: An internal screw up.
What’s more, they really are fixing the problem now, and our site will be back on their server in an hour or so.
That’s the good news.
The bad news is, it will take ANOTHER 48 to 72 hours for our site to replicate across the Web. It could be Thursday night before our subscribers can access it!
That’s the final straw for me. My faith in FortuneCity’s ability to do anything right has been unalterably shattered.
“Heck,” I figure – “Since we were going to be down anyway, why not just tell FortuneCity to ‘shove it’ and move our site to a better host?"
Certainly,” I posed, “there must be a web host that a) will refrain from obliterating our website, b) that offers customer service reps who actually know what’s going on, c) that has reps who can explain problems to us in English, and d) that has reps who actually have been given the tools fix it quickly.”
So we called GoDaddy.Com, established that their customer service speak our native tongue and have the resources to help us immediately in the event of a similar disaster – and signed a one-year contract that costs us ONE-THIRD of what we were paying FortuneCity.Com.
THE MORAL OF THE STORY: FortuneCity.Com is a big company. On its website, it boasts that it has hosted more than 1.7 million sites since 1997.
But at some point, FortuneCity’s top executives evidentally decided they’re so successful, they could afford to treat their customers like crap. And so they exported their customer service to people who barely speak their customers’ language, but who’ll work for slave wages on the other side of the globe.
And if that isn’t bad enough – unless “Bob,” “Skip” and “John” are bald-faced liars, FortuneCity even failed to give them the tools required to give customers straight answers when things go wrong over a weekend – let alone FIX THEM.
You can bet your bottom dollar that no marketing person – or anyone else charged with maximizing revenues or extending customer lifetime value – made that idiotic, insulting decision.
I’m betting that decision was made by a bean counter – probably a Chief Financial Officer – whose only responsibility is cutting costs.
Now, do you think that FortuneCity even cares that they lost us as a customer?
Heck no.
But then – how could they possibly know I’d tell thousands of business owners and entrepreneurs who read The Total Package™ every Monday how poorly FortuneCity treats its customers when things go wrong?
And how could their bean counters possibly calculate how much business they’ll lose as you guys avoid FortuneCity like the plague – and go with a web host like GoDaddy.Com that offers solid customer service AT ONE-THIRD THE PRICE?
So once again, the lesson is clear: If you’re a business owner, don’t make a move without your marketing people. Better yet, let them – not your bean counters and certainly not guys like “Big, Gay Al” – run the show.
And once again, if you’re a marketing consultant or copywriter working for a company run by accountants, it’ll pay you handsomely to find a better class of client.
Hope this helps …
Yours for Bigger Winners, More Often,
Clayton Makepeace
Publisher & Editor
THE TOTAL PACKAGE
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