Read the following excerpt from a review of “The Break-Up” to see what people really want these days:
“When Harry met Sally on movie-theater screens in the late 1980s, the result was wedded bliss. But when boy meets girl in the movies these days, the outcome is more likely to be hurt feelings, vicious cutdowns and no guarantees for the future.
Such is the case with “The Break-Up,” a $52 million romantic comedy that Universal Pictures is set to release on Friday next week. Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn star as a warring couple who share a Chicago apartment in the weeks after a messy split. Packed with searing insults and tearful confrontations, “The Break-Up” is as heavy on drama as it is on humor, creating a portrait of a doomed relationship that is as gritty as the romantic-comedy genre has seen in years.
A far cry from the Katharine Hepburn-Spencer Tracy pictures of the 1940s and the feel-good Meg Ryan-Tom Hanks vehicles of the 1990s, the modern romantic comedy has moved past sexism, ambition and long-distance relationships. Now romantic characters are dealing with phobias, infidelity and anger-management issues. With the recent success of edgy relationship movies such as “Wedding Crashers” and “The 40-Year-Old Virgin,” two of the best domestic box-office performers of last summer, the tide of cynical date flicks isn’t likely to ebb soon.”
It’s everywhere. Harsh Reality. And people are paying for it. We don’t even want to escape at the movies anymore. We want to see our lives, amplified and with a hint of glitz. What stories are you telling people? Is your product or service going to solve the world’s problems and let people live “Happily Ever After”? If that’s what you’re telling people in sales and advertising, or even relationships, for that matter, I bring grave news; the world is on to you. They no longer want fake expectations and disappointments. Just say what you do, have some humility, and do what you say. Chances are, people will pay to see you, too.
According to today’s Wall Street Journal, “Two venture-capital firms are investing a total of $47.5 million for more than 50% of IAG Research, a firm that measures viewers’ response to TV ads and product placements.”
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Radio’s days of running ads with no accountability are numbered. Say goodbye to “Getting your name out there.” Say hello to pay per inquiry. People may disagree with certain advertisers that cannot find adequate tracking systems (ie. Pepsi). But with most advertisers, online pay per click search has changed everything and accountability is king. The wise content provider will learn to sell less “branding campaigns” which produce unquantifiable results. Instead, they will be well suited to teach their sales staff to be marketers. Then the results will speak for themselves, and the results will produce greater revenue for the content provider, because they will finally be rewarded fairly for over-delivering. Does that make you scared or excited?
I’m the kind of shopper that I hate to sell to. I’m transactional. I research what I want and then grind vendors down for the lowest price. I do it because I assume most salespeople are like car dealers and mortgage brokers. With these business models, it’s just a question of how bad they’re going to screw you. Typically, their pay is determined by what you let them get away with.
So I was shopping for a reverse osmosis system to give my wife for Mother’s day. I called up some vendors and found out they had some similar systems. Eventually, I found a company in my area that seemed to have the system I wanted for a reasonable price. Then I asked the standard transactional buying question. ”I’d like to work with you on this, but I think I can get it cheaper from one of your competitors. How much room do you have on the price?” His response stopped me dead in my tracks. “Unfortunately, we set up are business so that we don’t have any room to negotiate. I don’t believe you can get this same equipment from anyone else for less money. But if there’s anything else I can do to get your business, please let me know.” Needless to say, he got my business. It wasn’t rocket science. And it wasn’t painful. Painful is when we go back and forth playing guessing games about how much money he could help me save, but isn’t.
In my business, I get a flat percentage of what and advertiser spends. There is no need to negotiate for higher rates if I want a long-term client. It suits me to give my clients the lowest rate possible, so they will have a greater chance of achieving the success. If we define success as a 200% ROI, and my spots are twice as expensive as they need to be, I’m half as likely to get you to continue your advertising with me. It actually behooves me to sell more spots for a lower rate, and increase my likelihood for success. This, to me, is a much more fair way to charge for a service because it puts the buyer and seller on the same side.
If you want your customers to trust you, don’t play games. And don’t make them guess what you’re really charging. The devil you know is better than the devil you don’t. On the rare occasions that clients ask me about my commission structure, I tell them. I make a lot of money and they are ok with it. As long as I’m doing my job for them, they don’t complain. Transparency is also a great way to differentiate your self. Give it a try some time.
Pyramid schemes. Cold-callers. Make cold-calls yourself. Wait for Ups. Wait for referrals. There is no good way to sell radio.
This guy only sells 52 week schedules!
I don’t own a cat. I don’t particularly care to. But if I did, I’d probably buy them Purina. I’ve been hearing these endorsers I trust talk about how Purina is really the healthy and tasty choice for cats. Who ever thought that much about what they feed their cat? Wait, don’t answer that.
But if these guys like it, I guess that’s ok for me. They are really good spots. The hosts talk about how their cats absolutely thrive on the stuff, or how they’ve gone from big lazy beasts to healthy, active felines. But they almost all start by sharing some personal story about their cat, and because I listen to everything these guys talk about, I’m hooked in and interested in their story.
And they took sixty seconds out of their day to tell me about it. I might try some Purina myself.
So when Howard Stern goes from terrestrial radio to Sirius, it’s a huge, huge deal. And satellite radio, like TiVo, is supposed to strike fear into the hearts of advertisers and ad agencies because they lose the ability to reach all these music listeners.
Well, guess what. Howard Stern still does endorsements, and more and more people are listening to his show again every day.
It’s all about the content. The technology changes, but the technology still needs good content. That’s why, though I’m usually paranoid, I’m not scared about the loss of endorsement radio as part of our media mix. Especially with talk radio. As long as people are listening to talkers, the talkers and their producers are going to figure out a way to talk about their advertisers, and make bling bling kaching wing ding a ling a wing wong. That means money.
One of our best endorsers, Handel, could go to satellite, TV, holographic smoke signals…and he’ll figure out a way to monetize the dead air.
I finally buckled down and got TiVo. Yes, it’s a amazing and no, I don’t know what I did without it. (By the way, that’s a great idea for a side blog…before getting any new technolgy where people say “i don’t know what I did without it”, write about what you’re doing without it. For example, before the microwave – and assuming the internet as we know it was around then – you could say “today i wanted to warm up a slice of pizza. i heated the oven for five minutes at 350 degrees, put the slice in there, let sit for 5 minutes, took it out and ate”. Or “i wanted some tea, so I took out the kettle and…”. Then it’s all recorded and you can say “wanna see what I did before the cellphone?”).
All that for this: like the hypocrite I am, I immediately started to zip through commercials. But I keep finding myself stopping and going back on certain ads because something caught my eye. More often than not, it’s a celebrity. Why? Because I’m familiar with them, have enjoyed their work, and want to see what they have to say. Like these new beer commercials with Burt Reynolds…I can’t just zip past those. Anything with Shatner I’m going to watch. God help me if Harrison Ford starts doing commercials.
That’s endorsement radio. While the mind zips through produced ad after ad, you stop and listen to the guy/gal that you hear ever day. Your attention level immediately piques and, even if the product has no relevance to you, you want to hear what he’s talking about (especially in political talk radio). So maybe it’s the case that a celebrity endorsement means even more? I’m not so sure about that. I think you need the visual. In radio, it’s the voices and the guys you DON’T see that are the stars. And your mind takes it all in. That’s the case with me, and apparently, with our customers.
My daughter is pretty cute. Before you dismiss this information, I acknowledge that I cannot accurately access her cuteness based on my own observation. Fatherhood disqualifies me from objectivity on the subject. But I have some good reasons to believe that she’s cute, just based on the way strangers react when they see her. It’s like hanging out with an A List celebrity. Everybody stops and stares. I don’t really like going places like the mall or the grocery store, because I know I’m going to have to get into a discussion with someone about what beautiful blue eyes she has, that will always ends with the doom and gloom prediction that she will “grow up way too fast.”
This raises an interesting question: What’s so bad about grown ups? Let’s explore, shall we? Grown ups have opinions. Worst of all, they believe their opinions are right. Then they have egos. They have health problems, and they like to tell you about them. If they don’t use deodorant, they get B.O. The bottom line is they just aren’t cute. Cute only works with adults in the honeymoon period of a relationship. After that, it’s just obnoxious.
Babies (not just my baby) have the ability to be cute. They don’t behave any better than adults; they just look different. They are rude, entirely self-serving, and excrete on themselves. But we forgive them their trespasses because they generally look like miniature versions of Winston Churchill and mispronounce words with in a charming pitch. Somehow, our Creator designed us to have a place in our hearts that receives these creatures as cute and lovable. Functionally, they are no different than an elderly person in the final stages of dementia. They just happen to be cuter. And that’s why we take care of babies and put the elderly in nursing homes and “assisted living communities”.
How does that relate to sales, advertising, and getting people to trust you? If you are a salesperson, or and advertiser competing for the ears of a people who are numb to sales messages, you are like an Alzheimer’s patient whose body is shutting down. People are tired of hearing you repeat the same things over and over again. They don’t want to start another relationship that will leave them cleaning up your excrement. You have to become cute. When my daughter gives me a kiss, there is nothing I won’t give her. The only way for you to have this effect on your prospective client or customer is discover where they have pain in their lives and find a way to eliminate it. This is the new cute. Can you dig it?
Handel does a great job with the LegalZoom.com spot. First, he’s a lawyer, so he knows what he’s talking about when it comes to the law, even though he only offers “marginal legal advice” on his syndicated Saturday show (though from my limited legal knowledge, most of his advice sounds dead-on to me). Handel doesn’t really focus on any specific product of LegalZoom’s. Rather, he explains the concept-I’m paraphrasing: Sometimes you need a lawyer. They get paid a lot of money and they probably deserve it. But there are a lot of times, like when you need to create your will, incorporate your busines, get a trademark, even a divorce where you just need the FORMs. That’s LegalZoom.com. Founded by top attorneys, LegalZoom lets you create legal documents that you need in minutes at a fraction of the price of what an attorney would charge. This is quality stuff. It’s 100% guaranteed. And right now, type “X” in the referral code box at purchase for 10% off your order. For high quality legal documents without the cost of an attorney, go to LegalZoom.com.
It’s a compelling message. The law is in our own hands and we can do it reliably and affordably because this site was created by attorneys, and it’s made affordable, after all, through the automation of technology. Through 30s and 60s, Handel does a great job at conveying this.
Are you a jackass?
There’s a guy who works in my industry. Let’s call him Larry. Larry’s always got concert tickets in the breast pocket of his suit. He loves small talk and has a cliché for any situation. If you pay close attention to during your conversations with Larry, you’ll notice that he laughs at facts. If you’re going through a rough time, Larry will always tell you that everything is going to be fine. Larry is a Jackass. The biggest reason that Larry is a Jackass is because he tells his clients as that soon as they start their radio schedule, all their problems are going to disappear. Their phones will start singing, their profit margins will triple, and they can retire next year. Then when the results fall short of these promises, Larry loses the account and has to find another desperate soul to believe his empty promises.
That’s Larry’s problem, not mine. Right? Wrong, because when I get in front of Larry’s leftovers, they think I’m his cousin.
I remember something a friend of mine told me in high school after she found her boyfriend was cheating on her. “Trust is like a piece of glass. Once you break it, it’s shattered forever, and it will never be the same.” I think that is largely true in business as well as relationships. My job is a lot harder because many prospects think I’m going to Larry them. My new approach is to tell them the worst case scenario before I take their money. If I think a campaign will work, I want the client to believe that their success is likely to be a close call. Is that reverse manipulation? I don’t know. But I also don’t ever know with absolute certainty that a campaign will work. So I prepare for the worst and do everything I can to make it the best, and sometimes, I get to over deliver.
Since you’ve read this far, I’ll tell you a secret. I’ve been Larry to clients, too. Even today, I experience mild relapses from time to time. It wasn’t that I thought I was lying. I just didn’t know any better, so I did the tap dance and hoped for the best. I thought that getting the client excited was my job. I don’t believe that anymore. My job is to give a conservative estimate of how I truly believe I can help their ad dollars perform.
Maybe you’ve been Larry. Maybe you’re Larry still. Take heart; you are not condemned to be Larry forever. You don’t ever have to be Larry again. I’ll tell you one more secret: Since using my new method, I make more money than Larry. Maybe that will give you some hope.