Advice for gardeners and those in search of customers.
I caught him out of the corner of my eye as I was scouring the boulevard for wayward weeds – an older gentleman out for a run on a beautiful August day.
He slowed as he approached and came to a stop.
I looked up.
“When we have friends visiting from out of town, we bring them here to see Lake Inferior.”
“Do you have a minute to talk?” he asked with a degree of seriousness that worried me.
“I do,” I hesitantly replied, wondering what I might have done wrong to precipitate this encounter.
A pause.
“Your garden,” he began, pointing to the perennial flower bed that grows out of the front corner of my small front yard in Duluth, Minn.
Another pause.
(Oh, no. What did I do? Did he get drenched by my homemade ‘DeerBlaster’ – a motion-detecting sprinkler used to protect my beloved plants from the neighborhood herd?)
He continued.
“It brings us so much delight. Thank you.”
(A sigh of relief.)
“When we have friends visiting from out of town, we bring them here to see Lake Inferior,” he shared referring to my aptly named pond – a drop of water in contrast to the Great Lake that is just a few blocks down the hill from this spot.
Success. My goal was achieved.
This delight is not singular. This 10’ x 20’ plot of magic has brought much joy to me and my audience. It slowed them down and brought them to a stop. It inspired them to return for more. It compelled them to comment and share.
The neighborhood kids all know where the fish food is stored so they can participate in the feeding. And, there is “human food” in the form of suckers and a container of dog treats, too.
Two boys have a “ship-building” enterprise next to Lake Inferior – storing their supplies behind a hosta and launching their creative results into the pond.
And, now an admission: I hid a motion-detecting camera in a birdhouse so that I can spy on my audience and share in their delight. (I’ve included samples below for your viewing.)
Digging into Marketing
This garden becomes a metaphor for successful promotion. You will never be positioned to inform and persuade if you don’t first entice the intended audience to take notice.
Marketers expend wheelbarrows full of resources in attempts to inform and persuade. Their promotional materials (like their front yards) are neat and tidy and just as expected – emails, advertisements, direct mail. A pretty picture. A catchy slogan. A billboard announcing that visitors are welcome. A sure-to-succeed sales pitch. All are nicely manicured like the front yards up and down endless miles of boulevards.
A successful promotional campaign informs and persuades only if it first engages and captivates.
I work in higher education marketing and annually secret shop a few dozen colleges. I also have a 17-year-old daughter who is deep into her college search. The print and email pieces are pouring in. They might get a glance. Envelopes very rarely get opened. Email is ignored. The crate and the inbox are overflowing. Billboards are left unread. Social ads are scrolled by. The slogans and catchy taglines do nothing. Colleges with no brand recognition from hundreds of miles away send the same bland promotional material to thousands of students and get no response. “Apply today!”
Yet, we all keep mowing our lawns, adding tidy edging, trimming the shrubs, buying a better lawn mower, adding a leaf blower to our collection, and looking over our yards with satisfaction.
In our professional career, we dabble in new media, look to SEM and SEO, upgrade to a better CRM, redesign our website, take a stab at customized printing, change our color palette, do another photoshoot, and debate over words buried deep within long text blocks, add some infographics, explore geotargeting, scour the data, unveil a new campaign.
This approach is perfectly fine for your yard. And, I don’t intend to completely dismiss these more mundane chores. I mow my lawn. I have identification tags sprouting up next to my flowers. I even have maps of all my gardens.
Similarly, I have undertaken all the promotional activities listed above … and more.
I happen to love creating and tinkering and pondering new possibilities, and my small plot of land has become my challenge. I don’t pass judgment upon the multitudes of homeowners who are less obsessed than I am and who don’t aspire to the same “yard nirvana.” They have other activities to occupy their days.
However, when it comes to your promotional efforts, this approach won’t get your product or service noticed. You checked all the boxes. Followed all the guidelines. You met the requirements of the neighborhood covenant. You have pages of data. And you got no results. Your audience walks right on by.
A “marketing consultant” once stood in front of a leadership team holding up one of my creations and stated with authority, “Publications do one of three things: inform, persuade or entertain. This piece merely entertains.”
I sighed. A deep sigh. Of course, a successful promotional campaign entertains/captivates AND informs AND persuades. And, this publication did all three.
You need to always be asking: “How will we stand out in a crowded marketplace?” The persuading and information sharing follow in step. They are important. But, they won’t matter a bit if you don’t first pique the interest of your prospective customer.
Much of my thinking follows the advice of Made to Stick, a brilliant book by Chip and Nick Heath (one a marketer and another a college professor). Through research and case studies, they provide strong evidence as to what messages resonate (and stick) with audiences – in marketing and elsewhere: Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, Stories = SUCCESS. This delight of which I write intertwines with the Heath brothers’ unexpected, emotional and stories – all three captivating and moving.
It’s not easy. My little garden is 16 years in the making. I’ve been working in marketing for longer than that. I’ve had some missteps in the garden and in my promotional work. There will be disagreement. There will be pushback. It will involve risk taking. You’ll need to convince the naysayers and track down like-minded creative souls. You’ll lose some and win some. There are some who will just never get it.
Test your messages. Try new things. Keep tending to the project. Take the small idea and nurture it. Go big or stay home.
Notes
I got to chatting with a chap who has a green thumb for marketing recommended that I emphasize that I am writing about promotion, which is the visible result of the extensive work of marketing. Gardening is not a flower. Instead, it is the planning and research and sowing and nurturing and getting your fingers dirty and so much more. Likewise, marketing is strategizing and data analysis, planning, and so much more. Good promotion “stems” from this activity. However, you can correctly tend to all aspects of your gardening marketing work and still fail to meet your intended result if you aren’t able to stand out in a crowded marketplace. Marketing is a science and an art.
Obviously, delight (or, at least, as we might typically define it) doesn’t work the same for every product and service. Whimsical is not the right approach if you are promoting a funeral home.
LOOK WHAT I DISCOVERED A related article in Forbes.
FOR GARDENERS Photos from the garden
CAUGHT ON CANDID CAMERA A few fun videos of the audience via the Gnome Cam
A FUN NOTE A note from a frequent garden visitor
Additional Explorations in Delight
RaftU Postcards, posters, multimedia, digital and social ads. (Retired campaign)
Explore more: College on a Raft
Red Desk How about we paint a desk red and send it around the campus, the country and the world to showcase the learning experiences of our students? (Retired campaign)
Explore more: Red Desk Viewbook
Big Red Box Kicking up the acceptance letter just a bit. Give your audience a reason to talk.
Explore more: The Brochure and The Box
Responses from the Audience
Minnesota Public Radio Story (Early drone video work.)