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Shooting At The Wrong Target Means Your Marketing Will Miss
Seth Godin introduces me to a story from the Washington Post that I had not yet heard. From Seth’s blog…
[World-class violinist plays for hours in a subway station, almost no one stops to listen]. The experiment just proved what we already know about context, permission and worldview. If your worldview is that music in the subway isn’t worth your time, you’re not going to notice when the music is better than usual (or when a famous violinist is playing). It doesn’t match the story you tell yourself, so you ignore it. Without permission to get through to you, the marketer/violinist is invisible.
If you didn’t read the story, a “world-class” violinist played in the subway and nobody noticed. Seth’s argument makes sense, except for one flaw in the experiment that devalues the analysis, and that is…
The majority of Americans (especially those in a hurry in a subway) don’t know the difference between a hack violinist and a virtuoso. They simply don’t have the “culture” that many Europeans have.
Put an Anna Nichole impersonater next to the real Anna Nichole and we’d be able to tell you which one was real or not.
Seriously, have you watched TV here in the USA? It’s not the BBC people. But I digress…
But I get Seth’s point, and I think it’s valid to apply it to cultural differences. Marketing is about knowing your audience and giving them what they require, and testing is a big part of that equation.
This marketing test failed from the moment it was conceived. Wrong target, wasted effort. But I get the point.
I agree that shooting at the wrong target means your marketing will miss.
I’ll take it a step further: shooting at every target also means your marketing will miss.
Failing to segment your target (say, male/female, etc.) and trying to hit everyone who might be receptive to your offering with the same bullet means you won’t hit anyone effectively.
Marketing is, among other things, about crafting the message to speak to specific consumer segments, such that they’ll feel as if you’re speaking directly to them.
One of the most common mistakes I see is companies trying to craft a “universal” message, because they’re afraid of “leaving out” whole groups of consumers who should want what they offer.
This kind of “every man and his dog who might want to buy my thing” approach usually produces terrible, or at least dissapointing, results.
No, actually the results are pretty much always terrible.