If there happen to be any agency folks reading this, I need a small favor from you. You see, I’m trying to buy some stuff and you’re not making it easy for me. In fact, according to the eminent neuroscientist Richard Restack, you’re actually making it more difficult.
I only need a couple of things—a flat screen TV and a new computer. I’m interested in products that will last. I’m interested in a higher level of customer service. And I’m interested in making the proverbial “smart choice.” Price is a factor, of course, but I won’t be angling for the lowest price at the expense of those other things I want. All of this means I’m not yet ready to make a specific product decision; I’m still at a brand-decision level.
My experience is not unique. In fact, right now, I’m like most other consumers out there. Much like those other consumers, I started my research online. And, much like them, I was familiar with some brands, but didn’t know much about the products. So, naturally enough, I was hoping that those brands’ Web sites would help me. They didn’t.
In his book Mozart’s Brain and the Fighter Pilot, Restack explains that too much conscious attention—thinking too hard, if you will—actually decreases accuracy and efficiency in decision making. And in this sea of sameness we call today’s marketplace, thinking too hard is generally the only option we have.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. Marketers have the power to help us simplify decisions. They can help reduce the need to think too hard by communicating the core beliefs of a brand so that we can just let the emotional parts of our brains guide our decisions. I figured, I’d just find a brand with which I connected emotionally and then I’d simply pick which of its products I wanted. That would have worked if the marketing did it’s job properly.
I started with the computers. I went to the home pages of four major PC manufacturers, but all I found were the same, empty pitches: “Weekend savings,” “Slim, sleek design,” and “save up to 15%” What did any of these tell me about what the brand stood for or believed in? My brain starting to hurt. Without so much as an inspiring tagline, I moved on to the TVs.
Sadly, it didn’t get much better. Sony assured me that it had Sony Style—whatever that is. Samsung invited me to “imagine living in the world of tomorrow now.” You mean the world in which marketing makes life simpler? Then came Philips whose “sense and simplicity” message was appealing for obvious reasons. That was until I got a little further down the page to a little tutorial designed to help me: “Two sheets of polarized transparent material, one with a special polymer coating that holds liquid crystals, are adhered together. Electric current is passed through individual crystals, which interpret the information from the broadcast signal to allow or disallow light through them to create an image.” Thanks Philips, that was simple…if I had a PhD in electrical engineering.
None the wiser, I abandoned my search and decided, instead, to look into why modern ad agencies are forcing everybody to think too hard. Ironically, this answer was easy to find. All I had to do was hit the agencies’ Web sites.
Ogilvy said it was a firm “defined by their devotion to brands.” (As opposed to other firms, I suppose, that are not devoted to brands.) JWT “creates ideas for [their] clients that people want to spend time with”—a noble idea, even if a complete grammatical abortion. “We’re a factory,” said Crispin Porter + Bogusky. “A factory that makes advertising.” (Which actually sums up the problem of advertising today – it’s all the same). EuroRSCG’s site wasn’t working at all—unless, that is, a white screen with “Directory Listing Denied…” was meant to help differentiate them.
To make intelligent product choices, consumers want to know what a brand stands for. But brands have little hope conveying that message if the agencies they have to choose from can’t convey what they stand for. So, as I said, if any agency people are reading this, I need a favor—and it’s the same favor that consumers need, too: Up the quality of your game, so you can help your clients better serve their customers.
P.S.—I bought a Mac.
This piece was originally published in the April 28th, 2008 issue of BrandWeek.
