Author Archives: Jamiec

Not one to beat around the bush, this year will obviously prove challenging for many companies, and out of it I think a lot of `dead wood’ (in the nicest term) will be removed from the equation.  In order to survive the year ahead, companies must now more than ever, put themselves in the shoes of their customers and talk to them in a way that would be welcomed in this economic climate.  Well done for stating the obvious, but what’s my point? To let you into a secret, sometimes on a weekend one of my favourite guilty pleasures is buying a couple of trashy women’s magazines (In Style, Elle etc.) and lying on the sofa with music on in the background taking myself away from real life for a couple of hours.  Reading this month’s array of articles (not for intellectual satisfaction of course) I found myself getting more and more frustrated.  It’s January.  The month of the year when most of us find that we are skint and just to ensure I stay away from the sales we are officially in a recession.  Have the editor’s of these magazines been on another planet?  One article entitled something like “101 quick outfits” or something just as uninspiring, offered to provide ideas on what wardrobe stables I should be searching for.  Not a single one of the solutions presented cost less than £150 per item.  Now I don’t earn as much as I would obviously like to, however I don’t do badly either but do the editors of these magazines really think this is the time when I would consider going out and spending £250 on a jumper for work or that I would really think I need to be buying those £300 Joseph trousers this month.  No!  But it’s not the actual content of the article that offends me as if I had read this 4 months ago say, I probably would have enjoyed it a whole lot more.  It’s the fact that in this instance, the magazine editor seems to be affraid to discuss the issues that we are actually facing.  They are making no effort to show me they understand what I am thinking at this time and empathising with decisions that I may face.

As human beings, we want to feel that we are being talked to by someone who understands us and this must be the same principle that all companies adopt for 2009 if they want to come out the other side unscathed.  If a client were to approach me now with a high priced product to market, and state they feel their `brand’ were enough to convince their audience to buy it, I would have difficulty not to laugh in their face.

We need to take into consideration issues that we may have not necessarily wanted to be associated with in previous campaigns.  People will make their own mind up if they want to buy a product or not, but painting a rosey picture in order to push it is not an option.  We are pretty intelligent really, a notion that appears to be lost on some brands (Elle you can step up here), and by showing us beautiful artistic shots of products we may want but simply cannot consider at this time will in the long run be damaging to your brand as I will remember that you rubbed it in my face.  If you have a high priced product to sell you can still survive in the forthcoming market but you will need to find other messages to show the benefits that people will be getting (low upkeep costs, holds it’s value, additional free items.).

I can understand why some companies will prefer to bury their heads in the sand, but in order to come out the other side unscathed use this as an opportunity to allow people to develop positive associations with your brand, they won’t forget it.  At the end of the day do I want to support a company who shows me they understand my current concerns and talks to me at my level, or one who encourages me to get into debt so I can also look like a airbrushed waif who does not have a care in the world?