Monday, August 11, 2008

Breaking through consumer inertia

How often do consumers feel like their brands are offering them new, fresh and highly exciting new beginnings? Beginnings that put a huge smile on their faces and make them delighted at the thought of spending more time with your brand.

Think about the times in your life that you've experienced a new beginning, big or small; be it a new job, new car, new outfit, new partner, new hairstyle, new holiday destination, new mobile phone or new home. Life felt exciting again, didn't it? You were buzzing inside. You wanted to share your excitement... even celebrate?

Now how often do you make your users feel like that?

We can't always be on the heightened level of excitement, but we DO need to experience it intermittently as we go through our lives... otherwise we'd get bored with the sameness of it all. It's a shame that we can all too easily forget that our brands are an intrinsic part of peoples' lives - and more often than not, are contributing to the sameness that fosters inertia. It time for a new revolution in marketing - one that gets consumers blood pumping, excitement levels jumping and useage rates going through the roof.

Agree? Then take a look at your planned sales promotions, tweaks to site navigational headers or bright new labels ... and ask yourself: is that an exciting enough new beginning? Does it get you excited at the very thought of executing it? Does it have the potential to blow your targets through the roof?

It's an old cliche, but it really does take as much energy to do something ordinary as it does to do something exceptional.

Bon courage