I am increasingly asked to work with marketing departments and run workshops for them on social media or “digital”. This despite making no claims to expertise in the “profession”. Listening to the conversations about their day jobs I am frequently surprised at the degree to which process takes over and thinking stops.
A senior group or individual in a corporation decides on a new branding exercise or new angle on a product which may, or may not, be based on the interests of the customer. This then ripples down through the ranks until someone commissions an agency to tick this particular box. The agency process then kicks in, unleashing their “creatives” on the world, and too often the end result is the bewilderingly inappropriate crap we have thrust at us while trying to go about our daily lives. If they stopped to think many, maybe most, of the people in the chain know that it is crap.
I have no problem with being better informed, in a timely and appropriate fashion, about products or services I might be interested in. I am going to buy stuff, I might as well make better informed decisions about it. But this isn’t the intent of most marketing which appears to be about shouting at me about stuff I don’t want while I am trying to do something else.
Intent matters. Think about it.
The Obvious? 