Are blogs changing PR?

An interview carried by iMedia Connection – ‘Steve Rubel on how blogs are changing the face of PR’ - brings forward a debate of the technical possibilities versus their relevance to the target market and the interest, uptake and commitment of clients to participate. The figures seem compelling. According to emarketer “Once a haven for techies, there are now blogs for everything from celebrity gossip to political commentary to the most mundane personal minutiae. By 2012, more than 145 million people - or 67% of the US Internet population - will be reading blogs at least once per month.” They reckon 12% of US internet users, some 25 million write blogs. Surprisingly more than 100 million internet users, more than 50% are also blog readers. Big numbers then. Consider now some unofficial statistics from our own research in PR activity in the UK industrial market. Whilst the most active portal web sites carry news free of charge and archive thousands of stories, a sampling revealed that the vast majority were generated by relatively few companies or their PR agencies. The larger group of companies submitted very few stories. Some just one token story before presumably losing interest or running out of news. Talking to other PR people confirmed that news output from their clients was hardly prolific. Most needed quite a good portfolio of clients to make their PR business work. In our experience many clients don’t even think they have any news and a key task of a PR professional is teasing out stories in the first place. Then few have any people in-house that can write anything about their business sufficient to interest and editor, let alone a reader. But blogs demand a far bigger commitment by company personnel as there is both an immediacy and inside knowledge that the traditional PR practitioners will find difficult to embrace. For example not just getting the story, but getting client approval introduces a delaying factor. The blog is more of a personal view and works against the secrecy culture many clients have. Only recently a PR professional was lamenting a decision by a client to stop all case studies and third party endorsement stories as they did not want their competitors to know. We all have clients like that – great stories are blocked because the credibility associated with their blue chip customer cannot be mentioned. So the challenge is getting not only the commitment to write a blog, even if ghost written by an agency but also the openness to actually reveal the sort of compelling inside news content people want to read.

Niche markets can offer opportunity during recession and build a sustainable future

For the UK manufacturing sector the current economic crisis comes not after years of boom that banking, retail and housing enjoyed, but after decades of a shrinking manufacturing base. Once the manufacturer for the world Britain as the first to enjoy an industrial revolution, that situation has long since changed culminating in recent times with the big shakeout of the 1980s seeing a major erosion of the once mighty industrial base. As other nations became major low cost suppliers volume manufacture largely moved offshore with China just the most recent of supplier nations. Meanwhile not only has British industry been addressing niche markets, but also redefining what is a niche market. Once seen as uninteresting due to low volumes today’s niche markets are not just about providing manufactured goods, but a package that includes consultancy and service support both adding value for the customer and contributing margin to the provider’s balance sheet. There is also the benefit of an on-going partnership between manufacturer and customer - a distinct advantage compared to products that would only be sold every 20 or 30 years. The combination of consultancy, manufacture and service changes the traditional demarcations and is leading to greater innovation, design flexibility and customization. The customer experience provides direct market research input and builds in loyalty and of course can lead to new opportunities. Meanwhile the beleaguered retail sector resorts to deeper and more frequent discounting. This seems an unsustainable strategy when they neither control the cost of products or design and at some stage the discount approach must run out of headroom. Likewise banks who have to some extent misused marketing methods to sell money they either did not have or was unsecured, might be forced to reappraise whether service might be more valued than selling so called financial products. Just as the manufacturing sector has reinvented itself, so may the retail and banking sector need to rethink service and support, not to mention prudence to the mix and give customers reasons to return loyalty. So niche marketing should no longer be viewed as a back water but perhaps the future. At Technical Marketing we have long espoused a similar philosophy. In short we build relationships with clients that includes advice, but also many deliverables and yes a degree of service support too.

Content marketing - a new specialism?

The Internet is probably currently responsible for creating more specialist jobs than any other business sector. Today there are niche specialities – SEO, usability testing, hosting, CMS software, social media consultants and now content marketing specialists. Ten to fifteen years ago our task then was explaining to clients that the Internet could provide a useful addition to their marketing communications programme. Many SMEs countered with the response that none of their competitors had a web site and their customers had never asked for one anyway. Back then there was an education job to do while building a web site was a collaboration between designers and programmers. In fact a typical approach was for a designer to produce the ‘look’ for the home page and how it should be applied to inside pages before the programmer coded, built and tested the site. As an Account Director it was immediately obvious that before these functional aspects could be addressed there was a need to plan the site architecture and most importantly create the content. The first was quite easy – the content however was usually a major challenge. A typical company web site is basically a distillation of what the company is about – what it does, who they are, what they sell, how to buy – but at that time the businesses I dealt with typically only had some sales leaflets and not much else. It often required meetings to identify basic facts about the company and cause them in turn to rethink what they were actually doing. It should have been amazing how little most executives understood about their business when it came to key facts, but experience showed it was commonplace. Even products were a challenge, for example one company marketed a range of floor cleaning machines that used cleaning fluids. In theory a lucrative range of consumables that could easily be sold online, but at the time relied on a storeman simply sending out stock only if asked in whatever container was to hand. There was no real process in place, no part numbers, no pricing and no packaged product so an important business opportunity was largely missed. Of course developing a web site while at the same time creating content that in turn requires creating business structures and systems can be a lengthy process. And of course adding emerging content as it became available was a poor way to deliver web sites on budget and on time. Clients simply do not understand that their lack of information is relevant. Although we tried to create and get signed off all content before starting to build a web site, the theory was always better than the reality as material persistently came through in bits and pieces. Returning to the spawning of web site specialisms the term ‘content marketing’ as noted at the beginning of this piece has now entered the lists of expert consultants. One blog talks about creating ‘remarkable content’.

Brian Halligan, CEO and co-founder of HubSpot says,

“

To be a successful marketer in today's society, you need to be half publisher and half traditional marketer. So your next hire, you might think, could be a writer, or a video producer, or a music producer, something like that, and you need to start creating remarkable content. You look at the people who really win on the internet, and who really win on Google, who rank very high on Google, its sites with lots and lots of pages inside of Google's index. So Google sort of looks at a website as, every page on a website is a unique little website that can rank for different keywords. So the key is, how do you get as much stuff in Google's index that's remarkable, that people are looking into it, that you can move up the rankings. So, we really encourage our customers to start creating remarkable content. And remarkable content spreads wildly on the internet. If you're creating boring content, it doesn't spread at all.

”

It echoes a theme we at Technical Marketing have long been espousing in less florid language, that interesting, relevant and helpful content is an important part of the marketing mix. Most companies simply do not have the time, or skills to produce their own content, so maybe it is the time of the Content Marketing Expert then.

Marketing through the credit crunch

Just as governments seem uncertain how to stop the descent into a global recession, so does the retail sector seem to be resorting to some strange marketing tactics. A ‘20% off ‘ sale a month before Christmas seems a desperate measure with the underlying suggestion that margins must have been more substantial than might have been previously inferred. The most curious promotion this week was a double whammy offer on Christmas Tree lights. Signage suggested that there were savings of up to 50% while the actual product was marked with far smaller cash savings. We picked up a box priced at around 10 pounds also marked with a previous price of a couple pound more. As it is still November one wonders when they were on sale at the higher price anyway. But stuck on each box was also a label for insurance. Although I thought it odd to advertise insurance on a ten pound box of lights, I was really surprised when a member of staff sidled up and pointed out what a great deal this was. For just 3 pounds we could insure the lights and get free replacement in event of later failure. My wife pointed out that she expected them to work and so did consumer laws. So the actual cost of purchase with insurance would have been more than the promised savings on previously displayed price. Marketing should be based on firmer foundations not flimsy gimmicks, but then hindsight is showing that the three great drivers of the British economy – retail, finance and housing – have all been based on overvalued propositions.

World economy in meltdown?

The news is dominated by failing banks, falling stock markets, falling real estate values, government rescues with multi-billion dollar sums that have little or no effect on stopping the downward dive to oblivion. Some marketing bloggs are starting to ask will it affect us, are we burying our heads in the sand? Those of us in marketing for several decades have witnessed business cycles of boom and bust, worked in high inflation environments, low inflation, high interest rates and low – but nothing like this. Who would have thought so much of British investment was in Icelandic banks for goodness sake? As the value of our savings disappears you can’t help but wonder what is next? We are at a stage of financial planning right now – what assumptions should we, indeed can we make? And yet, businesses are carrying on. Enquiries are still coming in product being shipped and paid for, so why are companies being so devalued on the stock market? The risk is that the total loss of confidence will start undermining otherwise healthy businesses if people hoard cash. But in the b-2-b sector nobody is yet talking of cutting budgets, broadly it is business as normal. Conventional wisdom advocates investing in more marketing, not less. Of course marketing is a soft target to trim or cut in recessionary times. Not a good plan. Businesses that market their way through difficult times generally emerge as the winners. Time will tell once the history of these strange times comes to be written.

Saving the planet

After many years working in the lighting industry and involvement with the electrical contracting world a visit to a wholesaler trade counter is always an interesting experience. Someone once remarked that all the best politicians are busy driving cabs and cutting hair. To these we could add ‘sparks’. The trade counter format has not noticeably changed over the years. Usually a poky place with electrical equipment manufacturers vying for the limited poster and display space. While waiting their turn contractors read the Sun, drink free coffee and express their views on the world in general. It is the ultimate word of mouth environment if your target audience is electrical installers and a great place for vox pop market research. These guys will have little hesitation in telling you what they think of your product. Today I was buying some special size fluorescent tubes and had taken in the failed lamp to make sure I got the right size. At one time the old tube would then be simply thrown away but due to new environmental regulations there is now a charge of ten pounds – to cover the licence and paper work gov you know. The new tube cost just over three pounds. Looking up from reading the Sun the next electrician in line took a deep breath and quipped – we’re saving the planet mate!

Photo: Our pond freezes over.

Movies and viral marketing

A business-to-business company Eppendorf has sparked considerable praise with their viral marketing campaign in the form of a pop band style video. It has achieved fulsome praise indeed and yet somehow it didn’t work for me. Worse I couldn’t make much sense of it first time around or feel inspired to pass it on to a viral network. Not being in the particular sector of the industrial market or familiar with the brand probably didn’t help either. Maybe it is a generation thing, or maybe it was the band. Humorous movies such as Hamlet cigars with the short clip ending with their famous music as a cigar is lit made me laugh, but a song about a product sung as a ballad was puzzling.

Servitisation

According to E&T journal ‘servitisation’ is a term originally coined in the ‘Harvard Business Review’ in 1988. In the same issue as its ‘Are you being served article?’ which discusses the reinvention of product companies as service companies is a major series to co-incide with the sixtieth anniversary of publication of George Orwells’ book ‘1984’. The journal looks at how far his scenario has been realised at least in terms of technology. Of course as with science fiction - Arthur C Clarke’s ‘2001 Space Odessy’ serves to illustrate that to imagine a future is very different from putting a realistic date on when it might happen. Both 1984 and 2001 are already history and some predicted technology inspired products have indeed become commonplace while some have come and gone. I am not sure whether much was predicted about outsourcing or off shoring sixty years ago, but today as a country the UK has outsourced production, call centres, software development, service support and arguably politics and law making. In previous blogs I have noted the problems facing one client where the traditional sales support model through development into volume production is no longer relevant. I have recently received their instructions for the launch of a new product. There is nothing new about the product except that it is produced in China and no doubt costs a whole lot less than making the same item in Birmingham. So while some companies are transforming into service organisations, keeping very close to the customer by consulting during the development phase and putting themselves into a better position to then supply product for volume manufacture others like our client are using low cost sourcing to stay in the game. I suspect the service route will prove more sustainable

How to make your customers pay for your advertising

Interesting isn’t it how as consumers we accept a role similar to the sandwich board man when we shop in the high street or shopping mall of carrying branded bags around proclaiming the names of stores we have patronised. Of course it wasn’t always like this. At one time purchases would be discretely wrapped in brown paper packages tied up with string, or smaller items in plain brown paper bags, or vegetable sold loose and tipped into our own bag or basket. But this was all a long time ago in the days when shop assistants brought out the product, before we had to do it ourselves and present our selections at a check-out. Taking your own shopping bag into a store suddenly became suspicious and to avoid accusation of shop lifting we accepted that our purchases would be shoved into a store bag that also served as a form of receipt. You also needed the bag should you return goods as some sort of proof of purchase. Before long supermarkets had piles of flimsy plastic bags at the till and you simply helped yourself to as many as you wanted. But wait, these same stores are now telling us that their plastic bags, the ones we didn’t ask for in the first place by the way, are destroying the planet. Marks & Spencer has even taken the step of charging 5 pence for every bag you accept as some sort of fine. I have refrained from shopping in their store, but should I be asked to pay I feel inclined to ask for a plain bag – or else present a rate card for my advertising fees.

Rapidly changing technologies?

A friend e-mailed a scanned clipping from a newspaper – in itself an indication of change, he would have posted it at one time – which listed a range of skills for dealing with technologies that are no longer needed. For example, changing the ribbon on a typewriter, winding a watch, getting up to change a TV channel, using the choke in a car … and plenty more. Newspapers love lists almost as much as market research into human behaviour, but it indicates the challenge facing new product development. OK so a number of these little wrinkles for using yesterday’s technology are obsolete, but on the other hand it still seems to take an age for new technologies to get into general use. Take the case of compact fluorescent lamps – CFLs – I was involved in their launch in 1980. Nearly 30 years on they are much more widespread but still way short of being universally used to replace Swan’s and Edison’s 19th century invention. Another lighting example is the promotion and take up of new dimming technologies that have been available for a decade or more but still in a tiny minority of total dimmers sold. In fact what the list actually demonstrates is not so much the advance of new technologies but easier use of the old concepts, improvement and evolution rather than invention and revolution. An iPod plays music same as a wind-up gramophone, just better; today’s motor car bristles with modern technology but most of the roads we drive it on were laid out by the Romans or ramble round ancient fields and river crossings established by the Anglo Saxons. So actions like filling a fountain pen, lowering a stylus (or needle) on to a vinyl record and using carbon paper may all be lost skills, but the tasks of writing, playing music and copying are still relevant. We just have better ways on doing things now. So the NPD marketing executive would do well to revisit the tasks his customers are needing to accomplish, to evaluate how new technologies can help in improving achieving the task and then figure out how to embody that into a product that can be successfully solved profitably. Not much to ask really!

Charging for design advice

In a recent blog – The China Syndrome – I discussed a problem that a client had identified of customer development support. The problem being encountered is that traditionally working with a customer on prototype development had been an essential part of the marketing plan; using expertise and knowledge to provide a solution through using their products. Once the product had been demonstrated at a test level then volume sales could follow thanks to this earlier specification work. It is or was a familiar business model using technical sales activity to build a specification so that boxed goods products could then be supplied for the volume production needs through distribution networks. Of course holding ‘spec’ has always been an issue, but now with the massive price difference between product produced in China and in home based factories not only are buyers switching, but the price and margins are destroyed. It leaves companies like our client with the knowledge but without a means of charging for this expertise. I return to this subject because another client, this time operating in the building services sector, has a similar problem. Here prospects might recognise they have a problem but need help in identifying its exact nature before selecting and installing products that will provide a solution. The design support required does not stand the cost of a specialist consultant but typically calls for a site visit leading to a report and recommendation for supply and fix. The real issue they have to confront is that the design advice is essential to a successful outcome, but not traditionally chargeable as it is part of the quotation process. The question now is can this be made chargeable. This is where marketing to build trust in the brand can create an environment where the relationship created in the specification phase carries over to the implementation where a price premium for the safe option can be traded against the risk of using a remote low cost supplier. It only takes a container to go over board in the South China Sea and suddenly the supply line comes to an abrupt halt and what does that do for reputation of a carefully nurtured brand?

Lies, dammed lies and statistics …

The advent of Google Analytics has ushered in a new era of web site accountability. Suddenly the colourful Webalizer charts have given way to the free to use but rather dour monochrome displays offered by Google. Now there is a heap of data that can be sifted by activity and time frame to reveal a wealth of statistics. What it doesn’t actually offer is information - that requires interpretation of the statistics. OK so we know that the bounce rate is 50% for example, but what does that mean? That half the visitors find your web site of no use to them, or half the visitors are not your prospects, or they went there by mistake, or are stupid, or just surfing anything hopefully? The problem with this data is it begs the questions of why? And what does it all mean? Then there is the mismatch between what Google says happens and what the accounts package says was actually ordered and you have to wonder whether it is most useful to indicate trends rather than give an absolute measure. Then there are some recent top-level statistics from BRMB that provide interesting statistics on the use of the Internet. Still top at 73% is e-mail followed by online research at 48% and online banking at 35%. Top sites are Travel at 48%, Weather forecasts (38%), cinema listings/events (35%), Music/mp3 (32%), Sport (27%), Jobs (26%) and News (24%). It is curious that weather sites should rate so highly – perhaps a weather forecast should feature on all sites. But as with all statistics there will be flaws in the validity of how they are collected, how they are interpreted and how they are used and this is where solid marketing experience comes into play and basic common sense. It can be useful to stand back and ask the question – does it make sense? Of course the data can be used as a guide to make changes and observe the results, but some things will remain constant. With ‘General Research’ being the second most popular use of the Internet after e-mail, first make sure people can find your web site when searching for sources of supply for their specific need. Then ensure that they can find the information they need and finally they can contact you to enquire further or place an order. And once they have found you, use means that give them a reason to return and become a loyal customer.

Driven by innovation or customer experience?

In a recent article it was suggested that the order in which things are invented has an impact on their use and acceptance. Developments in technology are not necessarily a sequential expansion of capability or benefits. An early popular use of the telegraph was the telegram. Messages had to be written on a form, using an economy of words, for an operator to key in and send and be printed out for a telegram boy to deliver. Messages were of economic necessity brief but had the advantage of speed over post. Voice communication came later with the telephone and offered instant two-way communication, but still in the early days a caution of keeping calls brief due to cost. It was a long time before first, long distance and later international calls became common place. Then came wireless telephony and mobile phones. You could now talk from anywhere without the restrictions of fixed line systems. Then oddly texting became arguably the most popular use of mobile telephony. Back to the telegram – an economy of words, indeed a language that evolved for the purpose, not dissimilar to the abbreviated business language once used for telex. But what if texting had been the only method of communicating on mobiles – would voice have been seen as a big step forward? In new product development writing a specification for a new product often calls for all the features of the one that is being replaced, plus a whole host more to match every competitor all at a lower cost. If invited to contribute to the product development process sales people will naturally want every feature they have ever been asked for, simply to remove sales objections. The result is what in effect are redundant features never or rarely used because they are not actually needed or too difficult to understand or operate. Did product developers expect the success of SMS, or was it a user driven uptake based on simplicity? Perhaps if texting had come first and voice later it would have gone the way of the telegram by now. In marketing product development requires not only an ability to profitably harness evolving technologies and an understanding of actual and perceived user needs but also inspiration.

The China syndrome

The early part of my career was concerned with new product development. As a product manager I conducted the whole process from initial concepts and market research, through design and development, into manufacture and eventually a product launch. Our b-2-b marketing clients today generally do not have a product development process. Either they are providing a service or marketing products where the design decision is taken remotely – typically in another country. As a consequence our marketing role has become far more focused on communications, so it came as something of a surprise when one client mentioned that the source of a top selling product was ceasing manufacture and supplies would soon be exhausted. Interestingly another client had rapidly withdrawn a product for a similar reason, in their case the basic component that made the thing work was no longer available. It caused me to stop and think. When was the last time we had included anything about new product development in a marketing plan for a client? Not because we forgot to ask, but because they had no plans. My thoughts soon strayed to another client inspired remark made to me about 6 or 7 years ago concerning a meeting in China. To his amazement he was shown products used for scientific purposes similar to those produced by his own company, which subject to testing (subsequently confirmed by independent laboratories as very accurate) appeared their equal. His USP was based on years of research, materials selection, manufacturing development, quality controls and skills of the work force. Volumes were not high so cost and price reflected this and such a device cost maybe $200 to manufacture. When asked for a price the Chinese contact seemed not to know the cost and suggested $3 would suffice. Why tell this story? Firstly it is not an isolated example, secondly the whole economics, new product development and marketing rationale were stood on their head. From a position of semi exclusivity, expertise and a ‘black art’ process that produced these devices, suddenly they were available to anyone at give away prices. Soon there were importers entering the market which still commanded a price premium, but what the importers could not offer was input into the application development. But here our client faced another problem. In order to get a product specified the company had traditionally worked with engineers working on a prototype so that when the product entered production their device would automatically be specified. But now buyers substitute the cheapest alternative, or production is offshore and sourced locally, so the development process rather than a marketing cost should really be a chargeable activity. It is possibly the only charge or sale the company will be able to make. Our client has yet to fully make this transition but a major rethink seems inevitable. When product development becomes product sourcing much is lost in the understanding of what the market needs. The other big issue to my mind is cost. As a product manager producing a product at a cost commensurate with a price that we judged the market would stand and achieve returns on investment and earn good gross margins was always a challenge. The low cost of Chinese products that does not truly reflect materials and other costs in the example my client cited cannot be sustainable in the long run. Already China is forcing up world commodity prices due to the sheer volume of world production whilst contributing to pollution on a heroic scale which prompts the question, is building a business on extremely low cost imports viable longer term. And what happens to that accumulated knowledge and black art if people like our client should completely opt out of manufacture?

Putting lipstick on a pig

The sub prime mortgage crisis seems to have been the catalyst for the huge losses recently incurred by banks, the first run on a British bank for a hundred and fifty years or so , collapse of a major US financial institution and the prospect of worse to come. How much of this I speculate is due to an inappropriate application of marketing techniques. I have long been dubious about the idea of promoting financial services as products, but this concept has also been accompanied by, or perhaps even led to, a major change in financial institutions transforming them into businesses that sell products like grocers. In fact the major grocery chains of supermarkets have got in on the act themselves in selling financial products. Although much of what people see of marketing is the advertising and other market communications, like the proverbial iceberg below the surface should be something substantial. We look first to understand the business model and test this before developing marketing plans for a client or prospect. Sometimes the business model is hard to define, or as in the case of one notable potential client back in the ‘dot com era’ – non-existent. Swept up in the enthusiasm of the time this ‘dot com king’ was busy buying other ailing dot coms for ridiculous amounts and raising funds on a stock market aided by investment banks that had collectively lost touch with the fundamentals of business. The financial institutions by transforming themselves into aggressive sales driven businesses abandoned financial prudence so devaluing the product. Banking staff steeped in a long understanding of finance have largely been replaced by sales staff, incentivised by selling products and often recruited from high street retailers. In fact banks actually talk about their retail business. Think for a moment about the marketing process starting with the product. In the traditional model a company would research the market or uncover an unsatisfied need, design or improve a product and add value to the manufacturing process transforming raw materials and components into a product to satisfy an identified or perceived marketing need. Now look at the sub prime business model. Loans made to people on welfare cheques in the American Budweiser belt at 5 or 6 times imagined income were the unpromising raw material that was diced and divided to emerge without any actual added value, as triple A quality investment products. The products backed by the credibility of a major financial institution then traded on global financial markets. What anyone selling goods could have told them is that quality control is also a critical ingredient – as one American colleague once remarked it is no good putting lipstick on a pig. You cannot successfully market an inferior product without some backlash. Of course a brand carefully nurtured over a couple of centuries like a major bank builds goodwill and trust – customers with scant knowledge of financial services believe in the products because of this trust. It is the credibility of the bank that is being leveraged and their professional advice. Bankers trade on their perceived professional status, customers accept their advice the same as they would from doctors or lawyers, in general they are not buying a product at all but simply following investment advice. But breach this implicit contract between buyer and seller and customers soon take their business elsewhere. What is amazing is that the financial institutions thought they could get away with such a devious scheme. Once lost trust is hard if not near impossible to rebuild. The marketing lesson is clear - the product, the business model and marketing message must be credible and sustainable to achieve long term success. Short term views cannot prevail in the long run. If banks had taken an imprudent approach to financial matters they would not have built up a solid reputation in the past.

Immediate post sales support

We hadn’t planned to buy new light fittings, or luminaires to give them their correct name, but a visit to a local DIY store of the type that we once called ‘sheds’ hastened a decision that we had apparently been contemplating for some months to upgrade lighting in the home. Beyond the humble lamp shade that most people can manage to install, anything requiring electrical connection presents a real challenge, one I was well aware of from previous experience. Domestic electrical installation it seems, remains largely unchanged since around the turn of the last century. Thomas Edison modelled his electrical distribution on the then standard gas system and today’s system would surely be recognisable to a time traveller from the 1870’s. While most electrical appliances are plug and play and the addition of the plug itself by the unskilled strongly discouraged as nowadays they are not made re-wirable, the typical domestic luminaire has to be connected - that is hard wired to the supply. Of course the packaging makes no reference to this and the display model is attached to a wooden panel. Fixing to a real ceiling is altogether a different matter. I try to look both interested in the choice of luminaire while surreptitiously sneaking a look at the ease, or otherwise of actually installing the purchase, but the packaging usually defeats this attempt. So having got the box home and overcome the not inconsiderable challenge of prising open the vacuum-sealed packaging the reality is revealed. The instruction leaflet carefully avoids showing the actual electrical interface and the collection of looped cables and switch runs to be found in the ceiling rose. A bracket is helpfully enclosed on non-standard fixing centres along with the suggestion to employ an electrician. Do the thousands buying light fittings over the counter really all employ electricians? I seem to recall that in Germany sockets for lights are just as standard as wall sockets for other appliances. In fact years ago when I was a product manager an inventor tried to sell our company a UK ceiling light socket, but it really needs both wiring accessory manufacturers and installers to introduce and of course house builders to specify. Meanwhile fiddling with brackets and wiring while perched up a ladder and holding the unit looks set to continue. Nobody seems prepared to make the quantum change needed in the market, but at least the information could be more practical. In industrial marketing the documentation available to ensure the product is specified is essential. Typically 20 per cent of project time is spent researching and specifying. A pity that hard to install consumer products don’t actually invest a bit more in both design and documentation.

Why do companies continue to exhibit themselves?

Driving away from the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham after a brief visit to a relatively small exhibition with a focus on a niche sector of the industrial components market, I wondered as always, about the marketing value of exhibitions. Just why do companies expend so much resource on exhibitions? Will the web hasten their demise as it seems to be doing with print? Consider the show I attended – 130 exhibitors mostly with shell schemes in a single exhibition hall at the NEC. The visitors almost exclusively male, few younger than 40, in the main wearing well worn suits with ties – typically engineers and probably mostly from the west midlands. Most stands exhibited a seemingly identical collections of stainless steel widgets, unimaginatively presented and with the more adventurous using flat screen monitors running endless loops of amateurishly produced PowerPoint sequences. Engineering types, similarly attired to their visitors, hovered ready to pounce or simply waited sat at tables engrossed in their lap tops or using their mobile phones. Some stands were not even manned! Of course the exhibition organisers with their slick admission systems will claim yet another record year with more overseas visitors when they pitch to sell space for next year. My own observation is that many such exhibitions become a club and travelling circus for the exhibitors themselves. Thee opportunity to travel the country, even the world with a familiar crowd, who are actually competitors, incurring not only the exhibition costs but shipping, travel, accommodation and of course entertaining. A big dent in the marketing budget. So how many of these companies set objectives and measurable targets for an exhibition so the results can be evaluated? How many new customers do they attract and remember all the competitors will have seen them too? Of course there is the unspoken fear of not exhibiting – they will be more noticed by their absence and risk negative speculation by competitors and despite denials, exhibitors kind of like being on show.