So you're having problems connecting your product to your market. Everything you try doesn't quite seem to make the link, what's wrong with you?
Well the problem I'm afraid, is not you. It's the market. Or the diffuse nature of it.
Remember all the stuff I talk about generation this and generation that? And how you have to alter your message, and the medium, accordingly? Well if you think it's complicated - yes it is. It's not just a matter of one approach for the kids and one for the adults; one for the men, one for the women; one for the affluent, one for the battlers.
Once you could control things. By the TV station or newspaper you chose to broadcast in. Then along came the internet which carved up what used to be predictable "linear" time: any night of the week you knew which programs were coming and whether they would appeal to your market. Well that simplicity has long gone.
Google and Facebook have carved up a great quantity of this time too. Generation Xs are not so easily caught by TV, but you can find them on the social media. But wait a minute - "the Millennials" have arrived, those born a couple of years before and after 2000 and they have already moved on. You'll find them on Instagram, Snapchat or now Periscope. And they are totally different to their older siblings. (Not to mention their parents - they're not even visible over the horizon.)
They dress more exotically, eat more adventurously, shop by their phones as much as the shops, treat life as a moving feast. Just wait till they grow some more and start having real spending power, then you will see movement.
The smart marketers are already starting to accommodate their exotic tastes. Brands like H & M and Zara turn over their stock fast. If you don't grab it this week, probably next week it won't be there. But nor will the customer. They are used to instant action and if they don't get it, they will just turn away and call up your competitor on the mobile that lives in their hand.
Our Millennials have a new set of heroes. Some months ago I wrote about "vloggers". Well these stars of YouTube and Blogger are the touchstone of this generation. Their influence is very strong but if you can link through them, the effect is exponential. Through their constant social interaction, there is no such thing as telling just one person. If they like it, the news is broadcast to their wide circle of friends. But of course, it can also work the other way round - bad news also travels fast.
Sorry to make life harder for you, but if you want to be successful you'll have to keep up with your fast-moving, ever-changing customers.
1 comment:
Hi Ray,
This so rings home for me.
I've had my Paris apartment on ownersdirect.co.uk for years, but then trip advisor started going ballistic and I had very few bookings through ownersdirect. The clincher was when they insisted that every time I changed my password, I couldn't use the same or similar as I'd previously had. This meant I was even less likely to remember it, so the number of times I forgot it accelerated exponentially. Even paypal lets you use the same password twice! Why do booking sites need to be so careful about phishing. They can't steal the flat! I wrote to ownersdirect and told them how fatal this decision was for my resubscribing but they took no notice, in fact became belligerantly self-righteous about their right to protect ME! From what? Protect their own market more likely, from others trying to steal their customers. I get most of my bookings now through vrbo (Vacation Renters by Owner) and Trip Advisor's flipkey site.
Then I started using airbnb. But so did everyone else. Just three months ago, my bookings went down by 50% on the previous April. This april I didn't get a single booking. Almost everyone I know rents a room on airbnb or goes to 'visit' mum and dad for the weekend while they rent out their home. This has meant prices have dropped dramatically but so have occupancy rates. Putting power in consumers hands to also be vendors has it up and down side.
The advertising environment changes so quickly if you don't keep on top of it you can find your 'product' (my 3 flats) slips down the occupancy rate scale before you can blink, as you say in this article.
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