CharlieMoger.com

Marketing and advertising advice for owner-operated businesses

There’s a sucker at every table

If you’re not sure who the sucker is, it’s probably you. That old poker maxim can easily be applied to the game of advertising.  For instance, could your ads be stacking the deck against you? There’s one way to find out.

Let’s say your ads don’t play out as expected. Was it the ad guy? Maybe. The product? Possibly. Most often, though, advertising failures are the result of weak offers; ones that push what you wish customers were thinking instead of speaking to what’s really in their head.Continue Reading

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Be reliable
Do what you say as you say every time

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It seems a little thing on the surface. After ringing up your purchase at My Fit Foods, the person behind the counter carries your purchase to the door, many times even to the car. It’s surprising because it’s a level of service you don’t expect. That’s customer delight.

In this age of self-serve everything, encountering service once taken for granted is delightful. What’s equally remarkable is the consistency of this customer experience at every My Fit Foods location I’ve visited. “It’s something we’re known for,” says Store Manager Jason Smith.

Advertising brings in prospects. Service creates customers. Customer delight builds loyalty. Does your team reliably delight customers? That’s why reliability is one The Ten BE’s of Better Branding.

Never argue with a drunk

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People will teach you a lot, if you let them. One such life lesson, dealing with difficult people,  came my way decades ago in that building behind me; our family restaurant at the time, Grandma’s Kitchen in Whitefield, New Hampshire. It’s a lesson worth sharing because advertising will bring the occasional knucklehead through your door too.Continue Reading


Be Unpredictable
Customers love delightful surprises

Giving away Lady Gaga’s Born This Way album for 99-cents was a generous offer by Amazon. Daring carries risks. In this case it generated bad customer experiences when extreme demand crashed Amazon’s servers. What no one could have predicted was what happened next.

After scaling up their server capability, Amazon  repeated the offer two days later. Bad feelings were washed away by their making it right. The offer was incredibly generous: the do-over cost Amazon an estimated $3 million dollars. Because it was so unpredictable, the entire episode generated many more times that in publicity.

What else would you expect from a double-dip of the Ten Be’s of Better Branding?

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