When I started Concep 5 years ago we decided to target Marketing Directors within B2B, if we ever heard the words “IT Director” it would send shivers down our spines and a common question to us would be: “Can we avoid IT?”.
Is this still the case?
Like Marketing Directors, historically IT Directors and CIOs were not strategic roles within the corporate structure and neither were involved in developing the organizations business strategy. However, it does seem that this is where both their roles are heading as they strive for their seats on the board.
One of the most insightful comments from a fortune 100 CIO I met recently was his encouragement to colleagues “not to fall in love with the technology”. He was talking about individuals who fought any new ideas because they had signed off on technology, which had now become outdated and no longer delivered the functionality that the business needed. Consequently, there is a fear of a black mark against someone’s name and rather than look at new technologies, they fight for reasons to keep the current solutions in place. More often than not this scenario exists where something was developed internally so the emotional tie-in is even stronger.
The IT Directors role is admittedly being made more difficult by the masses of legislations which are being forced on organisations and IT are being seen as the guardians, or dare I say, watch dogs, to ensure this legislation is being implemented in an automated way. This, however, needs to be balanced with how marketing want to deliver their business goals.
Personally and from experience, when Marketing and IT are collaborating at the beginning of a project, projects tend to run smoother and get implemented quicker. When IT and Marketing don’t get along we continue to see projects being snuck through the back door and/or delays on critical marketing opportunities.
So there I was attempting to enjoy a cappuccinolattemoccacoffee at the Landmark in Marylebone. I say ‘attempting’ because the ordering process was a little arduous and left me somewhat flustered. The Landmark is a great venue for off-site casual business meetings and the breakfast and mezzanine areas were being used extensively for exactly that purpose when I arrived to meet clients. The waitress arrived promptly and I asked for coffee. Not unreasonable, surely? I’m in business. I’m having a business meeting with other business people to talk about business things in a businesslike manner so I’d like some business coffee. Please. Well, no. There followed an elaborate and extensive coffee selection process that left me confused and feeling a bit like an arse in front of clients who were smiling smugly as they had clearly just been through the same ordeal prior to my arrival. I explained that I didn’t speak Starbucks and could I please just have some coffee?
I can’t even begin to describe the horror of the cappuccinolattemoccacoffee that arrived just as I was launching into the crux of the meeting subject. I like to think I’m in touch with my feminine side in a sensitive caring way, but this coffee was gay. No offence intended – but there’s no other adequate word. It was presented in a fluted pilsner-type glass with a wire frame and impossible to hold handle. The whole world could see the two-thirds milky coffee topped with one-third whippofroth and sprinkled with chocolate hundreds and thousands. If they’d stuck a bleedin’ parasol in it I’d have stood up and left. Coffee – in a glass. With sprinkles.
I scanned the room in alarm to see who might be watching and realised that there was a room full of business people all struggling to come to terms with the same refreshment dilemma – drink it and look like a twat, or pretend it isn’t yours.
The Landmark was trying to be different. It succeeded. But perhaps it had lost sight of the needs of its business audience. Differentiation can be good – but context is everything. Learning when to step over the line and how far are salutary lessons. He said as he lifted his glass, stuck out his little pinkie and wiped the chocolate froth from his chin.
A fine addition to the list of great British Ideas that didn’t quite work on day one, which currently includes the Millennium Bridge, the River of Fire and the Princess Diana fountain. Not to mention Portsmouth’s Spinnaker Tower, which opened five years late and promptly celebrated by trapping the project manager 100 feet up for an hour.
Back in 2007, a press release stated that the ‘highly sophisticated T5 baggage system had been designed for performance and reliability… there would be minimal queuing at every stage’. Which turned out to be quite an overclaim.
B2C, of course, is rife with promises that aren’t lived up to. Take the case of a March ASA adjudication; a shopping channel overstated product details, pricing and technical facts (pretty much a full house of errors, I’d have thought).
B2B, however, is relatively clean, as a quick check back through the annals of the ASA shows. The only semi-B2B ad in the annual top ten complaints since 1994 was a mono printer whose features included a nude woman.
But clean though we are, we’re going to have to be even more careful in future. The new Business Protection from Misleading Marketing and Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading regulations may be little more than a consolidation of existing law, but they’ll have an impact on what we can and can’t say about our products and services. No more ‘offer applies while stocks last’ if the product’s unlimited. No more product descriptions which include things we legally have to offer. Maybe even no more advertorials.
In short, from now on, the onus will be on us to be spot on. Hard facts, not weasel words are now the order of the day. And unlike Heathrow, no more flights of fancy.
For example, I recently had a long conversation about it with my girlfriend’s sister, who is a big fan, but as a university undergraduate has a lifestyle and interests that are very different to mine. The Apprentice, however, is something we could both relate to, and discuss and dissect with impassioned glee.
So it’s all brilliant and a televisual masterpiece? Well, almost, but not quite. I have a bit of a problem with The Apprentice: it’s the ultimate triumph of sales over marketing.
To a greater or lesser extent, all the contestants are sales people and the majority of tasks succeed or fail on a sales pitch – either to businesses, or to selected individuals. The planning, analysis, insight and strategy are at best rushed and ill-considered; at worst absent altogether. And of course, there is absolutely no time for relationship building, which is critical in B2B. Marketing is simply not on the agenda.
I suspect this is because it is generally salespeople who have sufficient bravado to enter as contestants, therefore the show is naturally biased towards them. But The Apprentice is effectively airbrushing marketing out of the picture of business that it presents, a picture that is all-too influential. This is bad for both marketing, and for business generally.
So well done BBC for creating something so compelling, but as with any good soap opera, the reality is a little more complex.
I wouldn’t go as far as saying ‘stick to Eastenders’ but in the name of public service broadcasting perhaps the corporation could be asked to produce something which redresses the balance.