I recently gave a talk at the New England Greenhouse Conference in Worcester, MA. It was an interesting day. I gave two talks separated by about five hours. It was great because it gave me a chance to sit in on another talk. It is helpful to gain perspective when you have the chance to observe. It was another marketing presentation. A professor from Purdue gave a very good talk on market segmentation. Upon completion they opened the floor up for questions.
There was one exchange that left me scratching my head. It wasn’t so much a question as an observation from an audience member. The subject was how to attract that ever elusive X and Y shopper. With an aging clientele many retailers are struggling to come to some sort of understanding of this target market.
Her concern (point) was that those consumers were attracted to places like Home Depot by the strength of their marketing message and the fact that it was ‘cool’. This point eluded me a bit. Was it that the store was cool, or just the advertising and marketing? I have to think it was the advertising. Anyway, it got me thinking.
My original thought was how could someone get it so wrong. Kind of a harsh thought so I kept it to myself (until now, of course). With props to Gump’s Mom, ‘Cool is as Cool does’.
You can’t fake cool; for that matter you can’t even manufacture cool. It either is, or it isn’t; and if you are concerning yourself with the ‘cool’ effect you are way off track (especially if you are a garden center).
This thought has stuck in my head - let’s call them the XerWhysers - aren’t so much defined by external forces, but rather how they see themselves. They are curious. They like to explore and discover stuff. They are relentless researchers, (read web-serfers), and are, for the most part, educated and smart - at least those I know.
More than any other consumer base they have a real snout for the good, the bad and the ugly. As it relates to garden center stuff they are kind of a non-starter. They are never going to become ‘gardeners’ in the sense that their parents might have been. They are into other things; landscaping and home improvement will come when they become, well, home owners.
So, as I do when I am interested in getting to the heart of things I e-mailed my daughter Erin. I find that I can lob an idea her way and she’ll cut right to the point. So, I told her about the ‘cool’ Depot story.
I had the answer in about an hour:
“you’re exactly right. it’s not the advertising that makes it cool, it’s the sense of discovery that gets people hooked. when i get a “cute shirt” comment, it kind of even feels better to say that you got it for $4.99 at the gap on super sale.
i don’t think things are as dramatic as “as quickly as they spot something great they will turn something bad” but i do know that my generation is super fickle, and i’m not sure there’s been much success in advertising to us.
i can honestly tell you that home depot is NOT geared towards my demographic. a ton of us don’t own homes, let alone gardens that we can work on. we’re more fixated on contributing to our 401k, getting ahead at work and dressing ourselves. and what, pray tell, is cool about the home depot ads?? they show young families ripping up carpets and painting their kid’s rooms. god she was off.
the whole thing here is that we are constantly trying to define what is our own self-image. what our style is. what music we listen to. how we keep house. what kind of foods we like and what our morning routine is.
information moves FAST. by the time the today show or CNN reports on something, it’s usually passe. and they have 24 hour news!”
Thanks Erin.
So, with that said, I think we should table the whole XerWisers (or, is it XerWhyers; we’ll see if that sticks) thing. I don’t think anyone has figured that one out anyway, at least with the traditional media mix.
Back to the seminar. Well, the q and a session ended and I got ready for my final presentation. At the risk of falling back into ad-speak, I tried to sum up a strategy for those souls out there trying to make sense of it all. They deserved something, after all, at least they were committed enough to attend a marketing talk.
The answer is to be ‘remarkable’. I think I said it about three times more - you have to be ‘remarkable’; ‘remarkable’ (that ought to do it). A business will (usually) rise and fall on merit. If you have a great product, great service or superior staff people will find you. Word does get out. Of course effective marketing will help, but you can only do so much if you can’t deliver the goods. (Was there something about a pig and lipstick?).
The point is to concentrate on your customers; look to understand their needs and connect with a genuine message that clearly states your value proposition. The world is spinning faster than ever. Believe it or not, many will (re)discover the peace and feeling of accomplishment that come with planting a tree or feeding the birds. Keep on point with your message and always look to improve.
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