Category Archives: Helpful Hints

May 29, 2013 · 9:08 am

Death Or Chichi?

There is an old joke about three missionaries who are captured by a warrior tribe.  The chief gives the first two missionaries a choice – death or chichi.  Not wanting to die, each chooses chichi which involves all kinds of physical abuse.  The third missionary chooses death.  The chief smiles and says “DEATH!  But first, chichi!”

Harris Interactive

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I thought of this when I read a piece in the Marketing Daily about a recent Harris study:

According to a recent Harris poll of more than 2,000 adults, nearly two-thirds (63%) said they would prefer to sit next to a crying baby than a smelly adult.

“It’s not like either is preferable,” Regina Corso, senior vice president at Harris, tells Marketing Daily. “No one likes the crying baby, but you can understand it’s not the baby’s fault.”

Like the missionaries, neither choice is a particularly good one.  However, there is a lesson in the study and it’s really not about the fact that the baby isn’t at fault.  It’s about the consumer being in control.  The sound of a noisy baby is easy to deal with – noise-cancelling headphones and a little music can fix the issue pretty quickly. A smelly adult is out of your control and is not something you’re going to mask.  Spraying air-freshener on a plane isn’t really an option (assuming you carry air freshener) and is possibly just as disruptive to your neighbors as the stench is to you.

Let’s visit the thought again.  Consumers want to be in control almost more than any other demand they make of your business.   They already control the brand image via social and other media and are comfortable with less than optimal choices as long as they are the ones making the decision.  The days of imposing your will on consumers are long gone.  You with me?

 

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May 17, 2013 · 9:32 am

Smoked Salmon Vodka

For our Foodie Friday Fun this week, let’s start with a movie. Oh sure, there have been plenty of foodie movies over the years (Big Night is my favorite) but I want to start with the 1982 Michael Keaton classic Night Shift. I know – not really a foodie movie but in it Keaton offers up a food-oriented line that I thought of yesterday:

What if you mix the mayonnaise in the can, WITH the tunafish? Or… hold it! Chuck! I got it! Take LIVE tuna fish, and FEED ’em mayonnaise! Oh this is great.

What prompted the thought was someone mentioning that they’d recently tried smoked salmon vodka.  My immediate response probably mirrored yours: YECH!  Then I thought about it for a second.  How often have you gone to a nice wedding or similar function and there’s been chilled vodka put out alongside the platter of salmon?  The two really do go together when you step back and think about it.  Or take the idea of making doughnuts in a muffin tin.  They’re not muffins and they’re certainly not doughnuts  but is there a way to get the texture and flavor of a donut in the easier to make form of a muffin?  There is, and someone figured out exactly how.  Which is the business point.

Tuna and mayonnaise, salmon and vodka – normal combinations presented in a different way of thinking (I’d tweak the tuna notion a bit but he’s on the right track).  Often in business we’re presented with ideas that seem ridiculous on the first pass but when you stop thinking “bad idea” and start thinking “interesting notion – what does it need to be a great idea” you just might end up with a better mousetrap.

Pushing ourselves to think differently is the only way we grow our businesses   People get bored quickly these days and if you’re not innovating you get left behind.  While I’m not sure that smoked salmon vodka is going to be my drink of choice, the thinking behind it is very much what I like to order up.  You?

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May 14, 2013 · 10:07 am

Questioning The Questioners

Today is one of those screeds in which I point out a problem but don’t offer a real solution. I apologize in advance. Maybe just ringing the alarm bell a bit is enough of a help but you’ll be the judge.

The questionnaire we used to select patients.

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Like you, I read a lot articles published in trades. Most of what I see comes to me in the form of emailed articles and/or newsletters. There’s a lot of research cited in these pieces and many of them offer opinions with respect to a good course of action one should take to avoid a problem or improve performance. What I find interesting is how often I’ll finish the piece, look at the author’s bio, and realize that I just spent a couple of minutes reading a self-serving puff piece. For example, a nice article citing research on how content marketing can drive sales was offered by a guy who runs a content marketing company, which also commissioned the research.  Funny how often the research conducted by “independent” firms says great things about the company that commissioned it, isn’t it?

That’s the problem I offer up today.  It’s hard to know how meaningful research is when those who pay to have it done have a vested interest in the outcome.  We saw this during the last political season.  There were “Republican” polls that showed the presidential race one way, “Democratic” polls that had it the other way, and “independent” polls that were a mixed bag.  Usually, the party-sponsored polls had their guy winning, and you’re probably familiar that the only entity that called the race almost perfectly was Nate Silver of The New York Times who uses a “poll of polls” methodology that wiped out the inherent biases.

We need to question those who ask the questions.  That doesn’t mean ignore or even discount the research.  What it does mean is to think about what vested interest the sponsor of any research has in the outcome and look for places where a question can be phrased in such a way as to twist the outcome.  All reputable research will show you how the question was asked.  It’s up to you to consider the inherent bias before taking anything as gospel.  Even the blather put out in this space!

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