Perspectives

Buying on Emotion

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 21:39:54 GMT

Buying on Emotion

A while back I published a story about my view of marketing as a form of behavior modification, and that its main function is to inspire desired actions in the intended audiences. Since buying in some form (voting, donating, purchasing) is a behavior, we need to understand how people come to those decisions.

As Zig Ziglar, a legend in the advertising world, has said, “People buy on emotion and justify with logic.” Emotion plays a central role in making choices, and it kicks in way before logic. By the time our conscious minds are engaged, opinions have been formed and justification begins.

To reach the level of engagement where sales happen, we have to dig down to the emotions that drive buying behavior.

This is where design kicks in. Thoughtful, well-executed design creates reactions at the emotional level well before the words are read and sets up readers to respond in specific ways. Words supported by pictures will reinforce your verbal messages at your customers’ unconscious levels. That is why the effective integration of words and imagery is so important.

This approach explains your value in a way that is meaningful to your market. When marketing is done well, it helps make buyers aware of the best options for their lives and businesses. Marketing done poorly is pushy, dishonest and spammy. No one wants to buy when they feel manipulated and pressured, which are all negative emotions.

Other marketing gurus have weighed in this idea:

David Ogilvy - “The trouble with market research is that people don’t think what they feel, they don’t say what they think and they don’t do what they say.”

Steve Jobs - “It's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them.”

Gerald Zaltman - “Ninety-five percent of thought, emotion, and learning occur in the unconscious mind - that is, without our awareness.”

And here’s the rationale for the above from behavioral economist Daniel Kahneman: “Thinking is to humans as swimming is to cats; they can do it but they’d prefer not to.”

To increase your chances of getting the buying decisions you want, understanding what inspires your market to form positive emotional responses is vital. Based on that understanding, words and pictures designed together will result in message integration that gives you your best shot at generating the outcomes you want.

And that’s what I do for my clients. If you need some input on a project you have in mind, take advantage of my free 30-minute consultation to discuss how I can help you make your case to your market . Contact me and let’s talk!

Why Designers Don't Provide Concepts Before They're Hired

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 21:19:20 GMT

Why Designers Don’t Provide Design Concepts Before They’re Hired

This article was inspired as I worked on a response to a Request for Proposal (RFP) from a small nonprofit in my state. They were looking for a refresh of their current logo, a style guide, some templates for business collateral and an evaluation of their current web site. One of the requirements for inclusion in proposals was a selection of ideas for the logo refresh.

I am sure I am not the only respondent who broke out in hives when I read that. It is often included in RFPs from entities inexperienced in buying creative services. During the Zoom Q&A for RFP respondents, I brought the requirement up and explained why it was not a good idea. To their credit, the non-profit staff got it and removed the requirement. Here’s what I shared:

Creating or updating a logo is a team effort, the team being the client and the designer. The designer brings creative skills and experience to the project, but just as important, the client brings the organization’s mission, goals and an understanding of their audience. The designer can’t know that crucial information without input from the client, and it is key to creating a successful design.

Since a logo is primarily a tool that represents your brand to your audience, it stands to reason that this tool must meet the requirements of its job. You can have the world’s fanciest table saw, but if the job at hand is to hammer nails, the table saw is useless.

So creating concepts with no client input serves neither the designer nor the client. The client is essentially asking the designer to create in a vacuum. The designer is wasting time working on something with no basis for knowing if it fits the needs of the client.

Over the years, I have developed preliminary worksheets for various communications and design projects. These explain the purpose of the piece, how the piece should function, the process I use for developing the project, and a list of questions for the client to answer to provide a starting point.

These worksheets make the whole project process clear in front so that everyone is on the same page. The client knows not only what the process is, but why it is important.

So the next time you have a creative project, be ready to give your designer the necessary information about you and your organization so they can do the best possible job at creating the tools you need. The outcome will be well worth it. The most expensive tools are the ones that don’t work.

Charles Eames Got It Right

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 21:03:43 GMT

Charles Eames Got It Right

Charles and Ray Eames are famous for their ground-breaking furniture design, particularly the classic Eames chair. One of the hallmarks of good design is that it have timeless artistry, remaining fresh and relevant for decades. The Eames husband and wife team designed this iconic chair in 1956 and it is just as admired today as it was then.

As a creative professional, I work hard to try to create work that will stand the test of time. This requires an attention to technique and craftsmanship as well as well as to beauty. There is no place in design for sloppy execution.

I recently came across a quote from Charles Eames that speaks to this: “ The details are not the details, they make the design.” This resonated with me because it reminded me of what a client said years ago.

“Why do you fuss so much about getting everything exactly straight, square and sized? No one notices that stuff.”

That didn’t sound right at the time, and I had to think about why. My a-ha moment was when I realized that people DO notice those details – they just don’t notice them consciously.

So when a design is not lined up correctly, or a photo is slightly out of focus, or a color doesn’t quite match, people notice these things unconsciously and it makes them uncomfortable. But because they don’t understand the source of the discomfort , they ascribe their negative feelings to the subject of the design, thereby assuming there must be something wrong with the product or service the work represents.

Since creative services are all about serving client goals, that is a no-go for any designer of integrity. So I have continued to “fuss” and I believe I am able to deliver much better value because of that.

When you need to evaluate the work of a designer or other creative, pay attention to the level of care and craftsmanship shown in the work: the details. M any otherwise great ideas have failed due to poor execution. And if you want to evaluate my work, please visit here or here.

Marketing as Behavior Modification

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 20:55:15 GMT

Marketing as Behavior Modification

I have looked at many ideas about what the essence of marketing is, and I have learned that at base, marketing is behavior modification. This is because when we reach out to our markets, we are asking them for specific behaviors. In broad terms, the behavior we ask of our markets is one of the following:

1. Do something different than they are now (start using our product/service, or choose it instead of the one they've been using).
2. Keep doing what they’ve been doing (continue to choose our product/service instead of switching to something else).
3. Keep doing what they’ve been doing (choosing us), but choose a new option (an additional product/service or upgrade to the next level).

All marketing efforts are variations on these themes, and they need to be framed in the context of showing that we have what the market wants.

If we're asking for a different behavior, we have to show why switching to our offering is the best value for the client/consumer. In political campaigns, this is the position of the challenger who has to make a case for why change is the voters’ best choice.

If we’re asking for a continued behavior, we have to show why the status quo offers the best benefit. For candidates, this is known as running on your record.

If we’re asking for an upgrade, we have to spell out why the new option is an improvement on the market’s previous choice while retaining the original advantages.

When we use the right ask and combine it with the two questions all marketers must answer (“What’s in it for me? Why should I pick you and not the other guy?”), we have a very good chance of improving our success rates.

With this approach, you focus on the consumer, not on yourself or your organization. It becomes much clearer how to frame your messaging to get the response you want.

Examples of this can be seen on home pages. When we search online to find answers to a problem and get to a page that sounds like it might help, we often get a wall of type that describes at length how wonderful the site owner is, but doesn’t explain how they could address our problem. So we click off the site, never to return. Yikes.

If you’re trying to figure out which approach is the best one for your marketing, it often helps to have an objective opinion to sort these options out. I have experienced that value myself. I would love to provide you with that objective ear. Contact me and let’s talk!

Jargon Kills: Creating an Epic Comms Failure

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 20:33:03 GMT

Jargon Kills:

Creating an Epic Comms Failure

Recently, my friend/web developer Pam Saxon alerted me to a great article on LinkedIn explaining how astoundingly bad communications helped tank Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), and I wanted share it with all of you. Here’s what happened:

When the investments where SVB held depositors’ cash started to go sideways, they sent out an all but incomprehensible press release about it. This monument to jargon was released right after another bank liquidated, so they also blew the timing. It was a case study on how to make a bad situation catastrophic – shortly after publication, a run on the bank began.

The article's key takeaway: “Corporate comms isn’t about positioning and buzzwords, it’s about stories. When you don’t control your own story, you risk everything.” In this case, they didn’t just lose control of their messaging – they actively threw it overboard. Here’s the link .

Who's the Audience?
Equally important, it was also a failure to consider the nature of the audience they wanted to reach. A vital part of controlling our stories is to understand to whom we’re talking. “You are not your audience” is one of my favorite mantras. In reading the press release, I found it hard to believe that it even came out of the bank’s comms department. It read like a CFO writing it for other CFOs, not for depositor lay people.

As it says in the LinkedIn article, “Humans are storytelling animals” because “stories are how we understand our world.” If you’re only telling the story to yourself, even unconsciously, you’ve set up the potential for a big fail. It may not result in a meltdown like SVB, but missing the mark to any degree is never good.

It is essential to get into your customer’s mind-set and out of your own. Otherwise, fails at all levels of awful can happen.

When “Free” Isn’t: The Downside of Using Free Online Content

Thu, 19 Jun 2025 04:03:41 GMT

When “Free” Isn’t:

The Downside of Using Free Online Content

All organizations work to maximize their resources, especially staff time and capital. So using materials found on the web can seem like a real windfall, especially with the advent of artificial intelligence. Compared to doing the hard and possibly expensive work of creating content specific to you, downloading material from the web can seem like a godsend. But there can be real and serious issues around downloading “free” stuff. Here’s a list (probably incomplete) of the pitfalls and their possible consequences.

Pitfall: Copyright infringement. Many free resources aren’t free for commercial use and may require licensing. This is a big one.
Consequences: Possible fines or lawsuits resulting in legal fees, fines, and the cost of replacing unlicensed materials. So one way or the other, not free.

Pitfall: Quality and Reliability. Free material often lacks the quality and professionalism needed to protect your brand image.
Consequences: Reputational damage to your organization’s credibility and professional image. This is hard to come back from.

Pitfall: Lack of originality. Many others may be using the same material because hey, it’s free.
Consequences: Your content will look/sound like many others, possibly your competitors, making it unmemorable and generic. There goes your branding.

Pitfall: Security risks. Free apps or software can sometimes contain malware or be vulnerable to security breaches, putting your data and systems at risk.
Consequences: Security breaches or malware from free apps can cause major disruptions to your operations, including data loss and downtime. Yikes.

Pitfall: Inconsistent branding. Using free, generic content can weaken your brand identity and recognition, lowering your market’s perception of your professionalism .
Consequences: Missed opportunities stemming from decreased marketing and communications effectiveness. This is essentially a unforced error.

Professionally created design and communications may seem expensive, but when done well, they are vital assets that bring significant returns to their owners. An initial, thoughtful investment ensures they will deliver value over time.

Investing in quality will pay off far better in the long run. “Free” may have major consequences that will cause headaches down the road and wind up being very expensive. I have helped clients develop their branding assets for many years. If you’re ready to create or upgrade your brand, contact me and let’s talk.

Small is the New Big

Thu, 19 Jun 2025 03:49:13 GMT

Small Is the New Big

As an independent creative, I work as a solo professional, which defines me as a small business. Having been in business for quite a while, I have worked with many start-ups and small/ medium enterprises (SMEs) and they are my main client base.

In recent years, the opportunities for SMEs have expanded as awareness has grown of their collective power to innovate, fuel the economy and create jobs. However, there has been a lag between the expanded capabilities of SMEs and how some markets perceive them. Many of us are unfavorably compared to large enterprises due to assumptions about their supposed greater benefits.

Big companies project images of greater power, sophistication and resources. They also try to convey a sense of status seldom associated with small firms. Scale has its place, but in many cases doing business with small organizations has a number of advantages.

Bigger isn't always better, but it's often more expensive.
Large staffs have to be paid regularly and many that aren’t completely remote require large facilities with all the necessary support. Maintaining a large company with a massive overhead is a monster that has to be fed constantly. Small firms have a lower cost of doing business and their rates often reflect that.

SMBs have a responsiveness advantage.
Large staffs also mean layers of management to deal with that don’t exist in a smaller firm. Because of their size, large firms tend to be less agile than smaller ones. This can be a problem given the rate at which business changes. Fewer people mean less bureaucracy and more ability to be responsive. It also means you will be more likely to work with senior staff, who have greater experience and expertise than more junior staff.

Big companies no longer have a technology advantage.
The competitive advantage big companies once had in technology resources has been erased by online tools available to firms of any size. Tech has made the monopoly big firms used to have a thing of the past, especially with the advent of AI.

Responsiveness, flexibility, working with senior staff, less bureaucracy, far lower overhead and a level technology playing field mean that SMBs can offer seriously competitive advantages over larger competitors.

When it’s time for your next creative project, go small.

For Those Who Think Marketing Is Gross

Wed, 18 Jun 2025 23:04:44 GMT

For Those Who Think Marketing is Gross

I have recently noticed comments on various platforms decrying marketing as misleading at best. Or slimy and dishonest. Or sleazy. Or a pack of lies. Here’s an example.

I think the answer to the question of whether marketing is a good thing or a bad thing is - yes.

Over time I have come to view marketing as innately neutral and value free, like wind, fire or water. Water can either cure your thirst or drown you. Fire can either keep you warm or burn down your house. Wind can either fly your kite or destroy your town in a hurricane.

And marketing can be done in a way to promote the common good, or be subverted for short-term profit. It all depends on intention.

If the main intention is to sell products or services with no concern for buyers after the sale closes, that’s the marketing equivalent of burning down your house. You would obviously feel warmed in the moment, but you’ve lost your house (your credibility) and possibly any future ability to sell anything to anyone else.

If the main intention is to help people by telling them how your products or services will make their lives better, then a sale becomes the equivalent of sitting by a fireplace in the depths of winter, or a life ring thrown to a person trying to stay afloat in deep water.

Marketing done badly, i.e. with no consideration for the best outcome for the customer, is a con.
Done correctly, marketing is a SERVICE.

As consumers, we can hold all sales pitches to this standard. As marketers, we must explain our products and services so that our customers have no doubt that they will benefit from our offerings.

One way or the other, we can use marketing to make a difference.
The choice is up to us.

When Your Client is a Nine-Headed Hydra

Wed, 14 May 2025 00:57:43 GMT

When Your Client is a

 Nine-Headed Hydra

Those in the trenches of professional services, like me, often have clients who consist of a group of people such as a board of directors, a committee, or a set of department leads. All groups have their own dynamics based on the meshing (or not) of the group members, and this can work (or not) to the benefit of the project’s success.

I have found that working on creative projects with a group of no more than four or five is ideal for both the client and me. Our conversations can be focused and differences of opinion can be debated, and most important, every group member has a chance to be heard. The process becomes even more productive when a facilitator is designated who will keep everyone moving forward and on task. Rabbit holes can be bypassed (such as arguing about font size) and communication with the service provider is more likely to be accurate and streamlined.

When I was asked to create a logo for a nonprofit with a 24-member board, I requested that a subcommittee be designated to manage the logo development process and a subcommittee chair assigned to guide it. This committee was given the authority to identify directions, review concepts and approve the final two design drafts.

When the logo designs were presented to the entire board, they were tasked with choosing one of the two designs in an up or down vote. Discussion ensued and inevitably, one attendee announced that she wanted to see the drafts with different typestyles. The subcommittee chair informed her that variations had already been explored by the subcommittee and the board moved on to making their choice.

When there are a dozen or more participants, each with an equal voice, the process can quickly bog down and become an exercise in trying to please everyone. In the creative industry, this is known as “design by committee” which results in bland, ineffective, “safe” outcomes — often a fail.

A small, focused group can produce great work when the creative review process is well-managed. As Tom Fishburne, of marketoonist.com , recently said, “ Everyone should have a voice — not everyone should have a vote.”

Many of you sit on boards and committees. The next time your group has a branding, communications or marketing challenge, I would love to be part of the team that develops the project. An intelligent group process is your best hope for a successful outcome.

Understanding Your Target Market (Hint: They're Not You.)

Wed, 14 May 2025 00:00:37 GMT

Understanding Your Target Market:
(Hint: They're Not You.)

It is a principal of marketing that in order to be successful, you must understand the characteristics and demographics of your market.

And that means knowing more than their name, rank and serial number. You also have to know what motivates them, identify their pain points and be clear as to why they should buy from you. Otherwise you will not be able to present your product or service in a way that will mean anything to them.

Every organization, large or small, needs to understand what its value is from the customer’s point of view. The first step is to understand that you are not your customer.

But I am like my customer, you say. We like the same things and have the same needs – that’s what I’ve based my business on. What appeals to me is what will appeal to them. We’re on the same wavelength!

Well, surprise ― you’re not them. What they value about your business is not what you value about it. The biggest difference: y ou want to make a living from it and they want to solve their problem.

These two points of view are very different .

Example: You want to sell Russian nesting dolls and they want to find a unique gift for Aunt Martha. It’s up to you to find the connection between these two unrelated problems and make a compelling case for solving it. Your customer is not going to get there on her own.

O ne way to figure this out is to take on the persona of your customers and look at your business from their viewpoints. In other words, become Aunt Martha.

All too often, a business's web site’s content is entirely about how great they are and not about how they can solve their customer's problem. We’ve all had the experience of going to a site looking for a specific solution, only to be met by a wall of self-congratulatory text, to be slogged through to find any answers.

It is essential to get into the customers' mindset and out of your own . This is challenging when you’re immersed in all the day-to-day details of running a business, but well worth the effort. In customer mode, you'll be able to see your business strategy more clearly. Playing the role of your customer will help you identify problems and build on your strengths.

Understanding how people experience your enterprise is a matter of business survival. Since we tend to be blind to what’s constantly around us, the trick is to cultivate fresh eyes and ears so you can understand how your customer perceives your product or service. It’s a free source of important information.

Rebranding: When to Consider It (Or Not)

Tue, 13 May 2025 12:46:03 GMT

Rebranding:

When to Consider It (Or Not)

We often see stories in various media about the importance and process of branding, but it’s rare to see as much attention given to RE -branding.

Most organizations know that it’s a smart investment to spend resources defining and communicating their brand to their markets. It’s how enterprises explain why prospects should buy from them instead of going elsewhere.

But businesses and organizations grow and evolve, and at some point it’s likely that the original brand doesn’t reflect who they are and what their value is . Then their brand becomes a liability because it no longer represents them authentically.

Here are some reasons to consider a rebrand:
1. Your organization has grown beyond its original identity. This could include a change or expansion of products/services, or a greater geographical reach.

2. Your offer to your market has changed. Perhaps your enterprise began by focusing on one or two products but has added others over time. That means that your definition of your ideal customer has changed as well, so your branding needs to address that.

3. It’s gotten harder to stand out in your market. You may have a lot more competition than when you first started. A greater effort to stand out and communicate your value is crucial to keeping and growing market share. This often indicates the need for a rebrand.

4. Your marketing and communications look dated. Example: if you’re selling cutting edge broadband services and your identity looks like a throwback to dial-up days, that’s a deal breaker.

5. Your product/services mix has changed. This is a no-brainer: if your offers have changed, so has your market, and your current brand may not reflect these changes. Consequently your outreach won’t land.

Here are some reasons to NOT consider a rebrand.
1. You’re tired of your current identity. Just because you’re tired of it doesn’t mean that your audience is. Your identity may bore you because you’ve been looking at it every day for the past umpteen years, but your market doesn’t pay the same attention to it that you do. Familiarity breeds confidence and comfort in your clients, and signals stability. Change for the sake of change is rarely a good idea.

2. Your new CEO wants a new logo because __________. This happens more often than you might think. Case in point: the 2010 Pepsi rebrand fiasco. The new CEO wanted a new logo, the company went through an ill-considered rebranding process, and the result cost Pepsi market share for years. This horror story lives on in creative services lore as a cautionary tale of brand overreach and disconnect.

3. Your competition’s identity looks cooler than yours. This is a good reason for a rebrand only if your market is the 12-26 cohort for whom “cool” is often a top priority. Your most valuable prospects are going to be looking at your value, not how you come off on TikTok.

Next Steps
My service focus has moved to branding and creating the applications and communications to promote and express brands across different platforms. If you’ve been contemplating a rebrand, contact me – I’d love to be part of your journey.

Cheap Creative Services Are Expensive

Thu, 20 Jun 2024 21:59:10 GMT

Cheap Creative Services Are Expensive

I was once contacted by a business owner who wanted to place an ad in a magazine with a looming deadline. He wanted me to resize an old ad and wasn’t interested in making any changes. Upon further questioning, it appeared that the old ad had not been effective, but since another publication had put it together for him for free, he felt he could get more mileage out of it.

I tried to explain that putting little thought into the content and look of an expensive display ad would make the ad basically useless, but he wasn’t having any of it. He insisted that the important thing was to have a presence in the magazine and that the ad’s message was adequate.

He seemed to think that readers would just somehow “get” what his business was all about and that they would know what to do (even though the ad had no call to action). He felt that spending money on the content and appearance of the ad was a waste, and I should just resize it and be done. Since I have an allergy to selling people useless stuff, I passed on the job.

This experience is not unique. Everyone who has ever been in business has had to deal with customers who are overly focused on price, and creative services are no different. And in an ailing economy, customers tend to focus on the bottom line because it feels like they live and die by it.

But it is a mistake to bring a short-term focus to a long-term challenge, and that is what happens when make-do patches are applied to communications tools.

Re-using something that didn’t work the first time wastes resources that would be better used to find a real solution that supports long term business goals.

And other businesses have their versions of this. If you are an accountant, it’s “Cheap accounting is expensive,” and if you are a mechanic, it’s “Cheap repairs are expensive.”

Your investment in expensive ad space, printing and web development will be wasted if budget resources are not first used for developing message and design. Get your strategic content in place, and you will receive a much better return on those investments.

Perspectives

Buying on Emotion

Buying on Emotion

Why Designers Don't Provide Concepts Before They're Hired

Why Designers Don’t Provide Design Concepts Before They’re Hired

Charles Eames Got It Right

Charles Eames Got It Right

Marketing as Behavior Modification

Marketing as Behavior Modification

Jargon Kills: Creating an Epic Comms Failure

Creating an Epic Comms Failure

When “Free” Isn’t: The Downside of Using Free Online Content

When “Free” Isn’t:

Small is the New Big

For Those Who Think Marketing Is Gross

When Your Client is a Nine-Headed Hydra

Many of you sit on boards and committees. The next time your group has a branding, communications or marketing challenge, I would love to be part of the team that develops the project. An intelligent group process is your best hope for a successful outcome.

Understanding Your Target Market (Hint: They're Not You.)

It is a principal of marketing that in order to be successful, you must understand the characteristics and demographics of your market.

﻿

And that means knowing more than their name, rank and serial number. You also have to know what motivates them, identify their pain points and be clear as to why they should buy from you. Otherwise you will not be able to present your product or service in a way that will mean anything to them.

Rebranding: When to Consider It (Or Not)

Cheap Creative Services Are Expensive

Cheap Creative Services Are Expensive

Re-using something that didn’t work the first time wastes resources that would be better used to find a real solution that supports long term business goals.

And other businesses have their versions of this. If you are an accountant, it’s “Cheap accounting is expensive,” and if you are a mechanic, it’s “Cheap repairs are expensive.”