If, like us, you have no time for obfuscation and love a spot of verbal profanation, this will be right up your alley.
We effin’ love funnels and swearing, and so does Mark Ritson. So we enjoyed his recent webinar on the all-time top ten examples of marketing bullsh*t.
Spoiler alert – in at number 6 on the Marketing BS Index was Sinek’s ‘Ask Why’.
We say marketing strategy should start with purpose, so that one hurt. We’re not slavish Ritsonites but it prompted some thinking – should we jettison purpose?
There’s sh*tloads of companies doing the wrong thing and making a lot of cash. And there’s a lot of companies doing the right thing and making no money at all. This belief that there’s some causality between these two things is nonsensical. We should do the right thing, because it’s the right thing.
Mark Ritson, April 2021
Purpose is a form of positioning. And like any positioning, if you’re going to position a brand, you have to pass the three C’s: Does my customer want it? Can I deliver on it? And can I do it better or different than the competition? … But … the reason why the Golden Circle and ‘ask why’ is bullsht, is because it makes brands think they’re more important than they are. Brands are portrayed here as big things where people care about the purpose of the company. And that’s more often than not, not the case. Brands are little things that customers don’t give a f*ck about.
Mark Ritson, April 2021
We kinda agree. You don’t need purpose to survive. You can be evil and profitable. But why not at least TRY to be good? Plus, maybe being the best you can in your line of business, solving customer problems and creating jobs is purpose enough. People are increasingly keen to see that the companies they buy from do the right thing. There’s enough harm caused by corporates in the world.
Even if convenience sometimes trumps ethics.
Speaking of which, if we haven’t upset you yet with the swearing, how about some underpants?
Richard DeDominici is a performance artist. He visited the Stock Exchange in his underpants to mark Deliveroo’s over-hyped and over-valued IPO. He wanted to call attention to Deliveroo’s employment practices. Like forcing its drivers to buy their own uniforms.
Talking of hype, here’s something to look forward to.
The much anticipated documentary “WeWork: Or The Making and Breaking of a $47 Billion Unicorn” will be worth a watch when it comes to the UK. It’s the story of the overinflated valuation of tech unicorn WeWork and its charismatic cult like leader – Adam Neumann. Another spin on the tale of greed and extraordinary hype and another entry in Ritson’s BS list. Check out a good review here.
So when you’re navigating the hype and hysteria of a bubble, how do you keep your head and find the right path to growth?
Over-hyped is a good phrase for the investment atmosphere right now. Everyone is speculating that we’re heading into a bubble. The more they speculate, the more excited everyone gets. That’s how it goes. Everybody knows.
Our new digital due diligence tool ‘D3’ helps. It delivers real world validation of digital markets and marketing opportunities to guide investment decisions. It helps investors:
– Validates your target’s Ideal Customer Profiles (ICP).
– Size the addressable online market.
– Calculates cost and speed of ICP acquisition.
The go-to-market opportunities we reveal inform audience targeting, engagement strategies and KPI setting. D3 complements traditional commercial due diligence services. It delivers real behavioural evidence to inform and ground investment decisions. An essential guiding tool in the febrile atmosphere of bubble hype. Let us know if you’d like to hear more.
And finally, like you needed convincing, here’s Stephen Fry on why swearing is so cloffing great (sic)
