A 1960s magazine ad for the Avis car rental company featured this wonderfully candid opener: “I write Avis ads for a living. But that doesn’t make me a paid liar.” The author went on to tell of renting a car from Avis and finding, contrary to what he wrote in an earlier ad, a filthy ashtray. His closing lines: “So if I’m going to continue writing these ads, Avis had better live up to them. Or they can get themselves a new boy. They’ll probably never run this ad.”

Were the author of the Red Robin menu to order the Sautéed ’Shroom Burger — at least from the location I visited this afternoon — he or she might feel much the same way. Seduced by the promise of “fresh, plump, sautéed mushrooms,” I ordered my own ’Shroom Burger. Eagerly biting in, what did I find? Canned mushrooms. Canned. And as far as I could tell, no one had done any sautéing. All I could detect was the fresh taste of the inside of an aluminum can.

I defend advertisers against silly accusations — we don’t know how to make people act against their own will — but I am unabashed about decrying advertisers who lie. 

To be fair, perhaps it’s only an oversight. They happen. Either way, a menu is an in-store advertisement. Please, Red Robin, deliver what you promise. Otherwise, you are helping give my profession a bad name. Almost if not more egregious, about an hour ago you sorely disappointed my poor tastebuds.

—Steve Cuno

So much for “sex sells”

In a recent multivariate test, Cosmopolitan magazine found that increasing the focus on sex in a promotion drove sales down by 22 percent.

This bears out my own experience. I was once in charge of marketing advertising space to the trucking industry. My predecessor, convinced that all truckers were male and straight with but one thing on their mind, created a campaign showing a not particularly clad woman over the woefully classless headline, “I’m ad-vailable.”

(It was interesting to hear the company’s leaders, self-professed religious icons, rationalize having let him do it. Especially when they told me that the buxom model in the photos was 15.)

My first official act was to nix the sexually oriented ads and create new ones that talked about — how’s this for a breakthrough concept? — salient features and benefits. Arguably less sexy, both figuratively and literally, the new campaign doubled sales overnight.

Unlike my erst employer, Cosmo at least had an excuse, as they were marketing a product with sexual content. Still, as they discovered, there is such a thing as overdoing it in a promotion. 

If your product has nothing to do with sex, infusing ads with sex won’t help. In fact, it may drive sales down. As you arguably deserve.

—Steve Cuno

Color Consciousness
Originally posted November 2, 2009
 
I just received a direct mail flyer from a local dentist. It is laden with photos of smiling people with lovely teeth. 

Every person in every photo is white. 

Note to dentists: Even in Sandy, Utah, not everyone is caucasian. Not even if you weed out the toothless.

I suppose one could argue that the dentist’s objective is not to promote racial equality, but to acquire new patients. Moreover, 89% of Utah is white, so one could argue that the dentist is appealing to the greater market.

From a pure marketing view, I can't argue against those points. But I can as a marketer who also happens to be a human being. Advertising has a powerful opportunity to depict the human family as more than one ethnicity, without (except in rare cases) compromising other objectives. Given the human tendency to separate into “us” and “them,” it’s an opportunity we shouldn’t waste.

I doubt that the dentist intended any slight. This is the kind of oversight that’s easy to make. Which is exactly why we all need an occasional reminder. I hope this one serves.

—Steve Cuno

A résumé is an ad, and you’re the product
My note to a young hopeful who had no better sense 
than to ask me for feedback on a résumé

You’ve done a good job of creating a résumé in the format most schools suggest. Therein lies the problem. Employers are deluged with résumés that look like what most schools suggest. The result is that each résumé your prospective employer sees, including yours, is a clone of the one before and the one before that.

So my first suggestion is to put some thought into making your résumé stand out, that is, making YOU stand out. Make your unique abilities and personality leap from the page. The less effort it takes an employer to see what makes you great and unusual, the better off you are.

Your résumé is an advertisement, and you are the product. It is a sales pitch, your one shot at getting an employer to take a second, serious look at you. Yet the average résumé is typically laid out like a form. Think like a marketer. If taking a liberty with the form here or there helps you sell, take the liberty.

Re “Objective”: They all say pretty much the same thing, which is pretty much nothing. No rule says you need an objective. If you must have one, at least dispense with the flatulence. Spare us the tired clichés like “to utilize my skills,” “challenging position” and “personal growth.” Try something refreshingly honest. Here is the best objective that ever crossed my desk: “To be the most productive and profitable account executive in the history of the RESPONSE Agency.” I hired her and she became our highest-paid employee, counting me.

Don’t believe anyone who says to keep your résumé to one page. Take the space you need to sell yourself. No less. Just make sure that every word is needed. People will read a long résumé if it’s long for a reason, that is, packed with fascinating, relevant stuff about you. No one will read anything, long or short, that merely rambles. I last updated my résumé 18 years ago. It ran five pages.

Use white space, like double returns between paragraphs, liberally. It will increase readership. Especially if your resume runs long.

Turn features into benefits. Why do I care that you had a four-year scholarship as a Collegiate Softball Athlete? If it indicates something about your character and sense of commitment or willingness to work hard and succeed against all odds, don’t expect me to infer it. Point it out, succinctly. As for all those community events you participated in, what skills or character traits that I’ll find useful did they help you develop? 

Until more résumés say, “I prefer hanging with disease-carrying rodents,” saying “I love to work with people” will fail to impress. On the other hand, if you show me (note: not tell me) how you work with people, you might score points. Show me that you’re skilled at conflict resolution, you can adapt to a variety of working conditions, you can coach and inspire people without putting them on the defensive, you can take advice without feeling personally attacked ... or something. Again, show don’t tell, and establish benefits not just features. 

STAND OUT. In a positive way, of course. Wearing a clown suit to a fine restaurant will make you stand out, but it won’t get you a table. Build your résumé so that what makes you unique, invaluable and indispensable bonks even the drowsiest prospective employer paying only half-attention over the head.

—Steve Cuno

Advertising and Pushing Pink

It is human to question. Unfortunately, it is also human to jump to uninformed conclusions, and to pounce on those who dare bring up evidence or its lack. Not even skeptics, who pride themselves on critical thinking, are immune. It is especially tempting and easy to succumb when the field in question is fashionable to hate. 

Advertising presents just such a sitting duck. Objecting to a product often goes hand-in-hand with demonizing the advertising industry for “pushing,” “tricking,” “hypnotizing,” etc. The gist is that we manipulate the masses into buying stuff against their will, under their conscious radar. (Tellingly, the accusers often exempt themselves. They aren’t subject to our wiles. It’s everyone else — that is, all those lesser minds out there — that they’re worried about.)

The accusation du jour, catalyzed by a viral video of an irresistible, outraged little girl, is that evil advertisers trick girls into wanting pink-colored products and boys into wanting action figures.

The accusation is utter nonsense. 

There is only one reason that marketers produce pink stuff for girls. It is that people buy pink stuff for girls. If people started buying green instead, marketers would dump pink for green without hesitation. There is an admitted bit of vicious circle going on here, but the circle always begins — and ends — with what the market embraces. When buyers refuse to embrace a product, and/or demand another in its place, and/or change their mind about what they want, marketers adapt or go out of business. 

If advertisers really can control the masses against their will, surely the world’s largest and most experienced advertisers should be masters of the craft. Yet, somehow, the Coca-Cola Company was powerless to trick the market into wanting New Coke. Clever headlines, retouched photos and glib text failed to trick people into wolfing down Colgate brand frozen dinners. Women didn’t give up silk for Bic brand disposable panties. No one wanted anything to do with Gerber brand pureed food for adults, McDonald’s brand kids’ clothing, or Harley-Davidson brand cologne. For that matter, perhaps you noticed that not too many people own an Edsel, nor ever did, despite its enjoying six decades of top-of-mind name recognition. 

Pretty poor showing for an industry that allegedly controls minds.

Far from hypnotizing or tricking, what we marketers really do is try things and see what happens. When we score a hit, we repeat it. Should we notice a technique that tends to score more hits than others — like say, putting a photo at the top of an ad with the headline right under it instead of vice-versa — we use it more often. 

Intra-industry myths are partly to blame for the accusations hurled at advertisers. For instance, a common ad industry myth goes something like this: “If an ad is truly creative, it will sell.” The claim unabashedly smacks of mind control. It also happens to be demonstrably false. Trouble is, most ad people buy into and spread it. Who could blame the public for believing the alleged experts?

We do our best to entice. That’s our job. But we are powerless to make you act against your will. If we could, I would be rich. Note: I am not rich. 

In the end, Dear Reader, it is you who decides to buy or not to buy.

If you bought something you neither need nor even want at a price you cannot afford, do not blame a marketer. We cannot create desire. Peers, circumstances, genes and who-know-what else can, but we can’t. All we can do is hold up a mirror to your desires and make acting on them as easy for you as possible. Yet at some point, you and you alone make the choice as to whether or not to pull out your wallet.

Now, there is one trick that most marketers in my experience do not use, but that many unscrupulous ones do. It’s called lying. Sadly, advertising that lies is in many cases legal. For a readily-available example, scrutinize the advertising of so-called organic foods and so-called nutritional supplements, much if not most of which flagrantly misleads yet rests entirely within the law. There is no proven health benefit to organic foods (most of which are organic only in a legal, not practical, sense), and most supplements disclaim in the small type what they scream in the large.

If you want to rail against advertisers, may I suggest you quit titling at the mind-control windmill and go after the liars. I shall join with you.

—Steve Cuno

Early, Expensive Typo

Into every copywriter’s life a few typos must fall. Heaven knows I have committed my share. Typos, however, are nothing new. In 1631, British royal printers Robert Barker and Martin Lewis omitted a word from their new edition of the Bible. The omission, presumably an accident, liberalized the Seventh Commandment by rendering it thus: “Thou shalt commit adultery.” Despite the new version’s potential appeal, the printers lost their license and were slapped with a £300 fine.

—Steve Cuno

Yeah, what Jon Stewart said

I was struggling to write a suitable rant about the religious bigots who pressured advertisers into jerking their spots from “All-American Muslim,” and the fact that Lowe’s and others actually gave in and did so. But Jon Stewart handled the subject so well,  rather than write my own rant, I defer to him — click here. Thanks to Robert Rosenthal of the marketing firm Mothers of Invention, for sharing this link on Facebook, which is how I stumbled upon it.

—Steve Cuno

Ineffective Marketing in 2 Minutes

For its inaugural tablet edition, Deliver Magazine asked Steve Cuno to offer up a two-minute video message for the “Our Last Word” feature. Watch it now by clicking on the “play” arrow above. To download the tablet app, click here. 

Don’t tell anyone we told you, but our very own Steve Cuno wrote the byline-less Leader Column in the new issue of Deliver Magazine. Here is the original, longer version, with some crucial (we feel) content that didn’t fit in the magazine’s allotted space. To read the edited version on the Deliver site, click here.

Four letters, yes. Naughty word? Never.
Why CMOs mustn’t be afraid to tell their staffs to go sell.

Although we at Deliver® are not given to profanity, be advised that today’s column indulges repeated use of the four-letter word “sell,” along with the related terms “sales” and “selling.”

Our apologies if we shocked you. Or, if impressionable children looking over your shoulder happened to see the words. We have no wish to offend. Rather, we wish make a point. We think it’s high time not only to stand up for the above-referenced S-words, but to wear them proudly like the badges of honor that they are. 

Many marketers bend over backward to avoid using the S-words. Asked what we do for a living, not a few of us prefer words like “marketer,” “communication professional,” “representative,” “service provider,” “product consultant” — anything but sales. The trouble is, there’s always someone who can’t quite make sense of the euphemism du jour. When that person presses us, we find ourselves forced to mutter something about, er, um, well, “getting people to buy stuff.”

Come on, admit it. “Getting people to buy stuff” is selling. Think back to the unit on logic you endured in high school, when you learned that if A means B and B means C, then A also means C. If the purpose of your direct mail is to get people to buy from you, and the only way they can buy from you is if you sell to them, then the purpose of your direct mail is to sell.

You may not personally go door-to-door or spend time on a sales floor. Your job may be strategizing, creative-directing, writing, designing, production-managing, data-manipulating, sorting, account-executiving or what-have-you-ing. But the raison d’être of the direct mail you create is to complete a transaction or generate a lead. Which is another way of saying that your job’s raison d’être is to—guess what—sell.

Chin up! There’s no need to be so darned apologetic about the business we’re in. To be sure, we can call ourselves marketers (and so forth) if we want, and there is no harm in it—provided that we avoid slipping into denial about what marketing truly is. When we fail to concede that we are in the business of selling, we risk mistaking the execution for the goal. Prose that would make our English professor proud and design that draws praise from the art community are all well and good, but if they fail to sell, they are not marketing. And when we refuse to acknowledge as much, we are not marketers. 

We are serious about that wearing the S-word like a “badge of honor.” Responsible, customer-oriented selling makes an economy thrive, and making an economy thrive makes society thrive. As any economist will tell you, a sure way to help the world out of a recession, not to mention promote long-term prosperity, is to put money in circulation. Money circulates only when there is buying. And there is buying only when there is selling. 
Which means not only can you admit to selling. You can admit to it with pride.

Why do some marketers seem to avoid use of the S-word? One reason may be the utility in reserving “sales” for what customer-contact people do, and “marketing” for what people locked away in corporate departments do. If so, the delineation is fading. Today it’s not unusual even for people on the sales floor to eschew the S-word. Clothing salesperson? Bite your tongue. The high school student working part time for minimum wage in that trendy mall store is a personal fashion consultant.

Another reason may be the association of “sales” with not altogether underserved negative stereotypes. Indeed, abuses occur in the name of “sales” and, to be fair, in the name of “marketing” as well. So here we must make a distinction between selling and hustling. We are all for selling, and wholly against hustling. There is no honor in pushing people into buying what they don’t want, in fooling them into thinking they must purchase what is in fact wholly optional, or in committing them to spend what they cannot afford. Neither is there honor in making false or exaggerated claims that lure trusting people into shelling out for products that do not perform as promised. 

Responsible, customer-oriented selling consists of presenting relevant products and services to likely prospects, and persuading them with solid benefits. (If you happen to market — sell — by use of direct mail, pat yourself on the back. There is no better medium for pinpointing likely prospects, or for presenting solid benefits in detail.)
What you call your profession is your business. But let’s proudly own selling as the point of what we do, and allow it to drive our work. And, let’s remind the naysayers that responsible selling as described above is both socially beneficial and needful. 

—Steve Cuno