Mouthwatering marketing in Shoreditch

January 24, 2012

The past few weeks, I’ve been working in The Tea Building, the former Lipton Tea warehouse, in Shoreditch, E1, an interesting, edgy area: a mixture of dilapidation and gentrification.

There are quite a few new businesses here, but no central gathering place where everyone goes to shop and eat.

So the retailers in the Box Park across the way – literally a shopping centre made out of shipping containers – have a big challenge to attract customers.

Last week Crussh Juice Bars showed them how it’s done. The takeaway food chain, which sells fresh juice, smoothies, wraps and soups, recently opened a new outlet in the park.

Now, what do most food outlets do when they set up? They usually just hand out flyers for special introductory offers, or have staff standing outside offering samples to passersby.

Crussh took a different, bold and, to my mind, very smart approach. It arranged with the agency where I’m freelancing (BD Network) to come in and serve free lunch to all the staff. There must be at least 150 people working at BD Network, and all could sample a wide selection of Crussh’s delicious products.

Marketing doesn’t get more direct than that. And it explains why Crussh is expanding so quickly around London. I wish them luck in Shoreditch.

 

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Don’t make Waterstones’ mistake with your posters

January 18, 2012

The UK bookseller Waterstones [sic] has been doing some odd things lately.

Last week, much to the horror of grammarians, the store announced it was dropping its apostrophe.

Waterstone's poster, London December 2011 - click to expand

This is not the first instance of the company’s strange behaviour though.

Just before Christmas I spotted one of its posters, shown on the left.

So, what’s wrong with it? Well, it contains about 100 words. And it was sited on a busy pavement where pedestrians rarely stop. And it was in a scrolling light box fixture that displays a series of posters on a loop. For about 3 seconds each.

3 seconds to read 100 words?

Unless you’re the world’s fastest reader, there was no way you’d get what the advertiser was trying to say.

Maybe there’s an opportunity to advertise a speed reading course?

I had to be quick just to capture the poster on my camera, before it scrolled up into the innards of the lightbox.

Waterstones is one of many advertisers who aren’t thinking about the context of their ads.

If you go around London with a critical eye you’ll notice quite a few posters you haven’t been noticing.

Sometimes the problem is that the poster lacks graphic impact, so it doesn’t catch your eye.

But more often it’s a matter of there being simply too many words for you to take in at a glance.

In cases like these it’s clear that the creative team and the media buyer or planner didn’t talk with each other beforehand.

If they’d done so, they wouldn’t have created and placed posters that people couldn’t read. Ads that wasted the advertisers’ money.

Think about where your poster will appear

If you’re creating a poster, imagine how long it would take you to read it in situ. And consider, realistically, if you’d have enough time to take it in.

If it’s facing a busy road, I’d recommend using not more than 4 words.

Last year I saw a poster next to the M4 motorway that had at least 30.

Ideally run a concept that uses only a visual and logo without a headline.

Of course there are places for long-copy posters. They’re spots where people have “dwell time”. Inside bus shelters and on train platforms, for example.

I love the cross-track poster medium in the London Underground. It gives you an excellent opportunity to seduce your customers with a long read – as long as you make it an entertaining and informative read.

Maybe Waterstones should have run their posters as cross-tracks?

 

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How to ruin your new campaign without realising it

December 13, 2011

An error marketers sometimes make when
judging creative work.

The other day an agency asked me to do something odd.

They wanted me to rewrite the endline of a new campaign that was at concept stage.

It was strange because I reckoned the existing one was very good.

So did they.

Unfortunately their client didn’t.

He said he liked the campaign, but not its endline.

So he wanted new words to go on the end.

Now here’s the thing that non-creative people, like that client, need to understand about endlines:

The best ones are often the cornerstones of great campaigns.

The campaign ideas – the ads – are built on them.

Think of “Just do it”, “Australians wouldn’t give a XXXX for any other beer” or .“Peperami. It’s a bit of an animal.”

To replace those lines would be like replacing the foundations of a completely built house.

The campaigns would fall apart.

Along with other copywriters, I tried to rewrite the endline of the new campaign mentioned above.

But nothing we came up with worked with the campaign ideas as well as the line the client didn’t like – the line that gave birth to the campaign.

So, the lesson is, if you want to change an endline, watch out.

Because, chances are, you’ll need to create a new campaign as well.

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How to be more original with less

December 1, 2011

Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi doesn’t have 10 fingers. He lost the ends of two of them in an accident. Since then he’s had to play in an unusual style, which has helped give his band its distinctive sound. In Iran, there is widespread censorship. To find ways around it, film makers there have to [...]

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Improve your marketing in 60 seconds

November 24, 2011

Imagine you have to stand up in front of a crowd and tell them about your business. You have 60 seconds to explain what you do. And why people should buy your product or use your service. You need to be persuasive. And make your audience remember you. So what are you going to say? [...]

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Choosing a name for your brand

September 15, 2011

A long time ago a businessman came to me for advice. He was starting a men’s clothing store and wanted to know what to call it. I asked him his surname. “George.” “That’s a great name,” I said. “George. The name of kings.” I didn’t tell him it was also my dog’s name. He shook [...]

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What hasn’t changed in 350 years of advertising?

September 8, 2011

Modern marketing seems so different from older forms, doesn’t it? With things like social media and content marketing, it’s easy to believe that advertising has changed fundamentally. But has it really? On the left is something interesting I stumbled across the other day. You can enlarge it by clicking here. It looks like an old [...]

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The new business opportunities right in front of you

August 18, 2011

Do you spend too much time trying to get new customers, when you could use it more effectively winning it from existing ones? Some years ago I was freelancing at a big, famous agency. I noticed they never seemed to pitch and I thought perhaps they’d lost their edge and were failing to get on [...]

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5 examples of packaging copy I wish I’d written

August 3, 2011

According to research, shoppers make an average of 70% of their purchasing decisions at the point of sale.* That gives marketers a brilliant opportunity to turn those people into customers in the store. The trouble is, retailers won’t always let you advertise on in-store posters or shelf wobblers. So what can you do? Look at [...]

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Four tips to help you avoid producing junk mail

July 20, 2011

No one should write, produce or have to receive junk mail. It wastes marketing budgets, not to mention precious natural resources. And it annoys vast numbers of recipients who aren’t interested in what’s on offer. The following is an account of an experience I had. I hope it will help you prevent your direct mail [...]

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