Whispering behind God’s back
Many small firms model their communications on the market leader. But why ape the leader if you’re nowhere near the lead?
“Take this Procter & Gamble product as an example,” a startup’s marketing director told me just last week. “Our message and tone should be similar to theirs.”
Well, let’s take P&G. It’s the gold standard of packaged goods marketers, and its communications don’t always suck. But is the market leader’s ultra-conservative creative approach appropriate for a small company with virtually zero market share?
Issues of creativity aside, P&G’s communications are geared to produce a modest return on investment. It’s a publicly traded company whose share price ranks higher on management’s priority list than how many tubes of Crest they sell. For the most part, P&G communications are about as risk-averse as its managers, who deliver predictable, reliable growth.
But small companies and startups don’t have to play to Wall Street, and usually aren’t satisfied with three percent growth. They want 300 percent. At least. And that kind of growth almost never comes by aping the market leader’s communications. (“Unleash your smile!”)
If you’re reading this, chances are you’re located in one of the Nordic countries. Despite the regional myth of being an IT- and design powerhouse the world can learn from, there’s a major downside: our geography. If you’re behind God’s back (as the Finns sometimes describe their location), you need a pretty compelling message to be heard in the international marketplace. Talking like P&G is only effective if you can match the $18 billion they spend on marketing.
The advertising whisperer
So what can you do? Every company has a variety of ways of describing itself and its products internally. It’s what the employees say to each other over coffee and then purge themselves of before internal meetings because it has too few clichés.
In big companies this description is often unflattering — for example, the US Secret Service’s employees say its motto is “Yesterday’s technology tomorrow.” But in small companies this material is often the best fodder for the creation of messages.
One small company I’m a huge fan of is Finland’s Varusteleka. I’ve got a few writer friends who read their English-language website just for fun. Varusteleka will sell you a surplus Italian army pocket knife by telling you it’s the reason that Italians never won a war (I bought three). Despite the company’s unpronounceable name, they sell the crap out of their products all over the world.
I’m such a fan I’ve personally visited their store at least a half-dozen times, and I can guarantee you there’s nothing fake about them. What you see on the website seems a perfect organic outgrowth of the founder and the people who work there. They’re all freaks in the best possible meaning of the word, and they don’t try to hide it, which is why I love them.
Your sustainable competitive advantage
If you’re having trouble finding the right message and tone for your company, I’ve found that listening to employees talk is about the most accurate source of information available. Usually, what you find on a company’s website is trite, aspirational nonsense, present as much to fuel an internal myth as to actually sell something to consumers.
When I talk to the guys on the front lines, the salesmen, and visit with the design and manufacturing engineers, then I hear a different — often highly salable — story. Those guys can always tell you why people want the product in just a few words.
The job of your creative agency is to take that real information and create a message and tone that are appropriate for the job you want your communications to do. But it’s got to be your message, not one that’s borrowed from the market leader.
If a message is believable and sincere, your writer can put it in sexy terms that you’ll want to shout. And getting your message right is even more important when your marketing budget permits only whispering.
