Marketing Muse

My Blackberry is an essential pack item for holidays

I returned to work on Tuesday. In the past that would have meant a lot of stress as I got back up to speed with issues and actions over the past two weeks. But not this time. It was stress free.

As a relatively recent convert to the blackberry revolution, it was the first long vacation where I had my phone with me. My team knew that if they needed help they should put urgent in front of the email or the sms. There were none.

I checked in every couple of days and scanned down the list of new emails. Took about 15 min but meant I had a good idea what was going on, and what issues would need my attention. Reduced stress, made me more relaxed. I also listened to voicemail in that time. Never felt the need to call anyone, and forcing people to make their own decisions was extremely successful.

So, contrary to received wisdom, an email device is now an important part of my vacation plans. I know it works, I know how to manage it for me, and I feel better coming back to work on day one. Thaks RIM and Orange. You made it a great holiday and a great return to work.

Beken of Cowes - do you know this brand?

Beken are an extremely famous name to a relatively small group of people. If you own a boat and have raced your yacht in the Solent, you may well have a picture in their archive.

A few weekends ago we were sailing off the Isle of Wight and their boat was nearby. The  photographer took a number of photos.

To cut a long story short, we ended up buying an electronic image for an astounding sum of money. But do you know how difficult it is to take a picture of your own boat with you sailing it? How much is that worth? Well for us, quite a lot and Beken have priced their keepsake beautifully. A great example of how to serve a niche market very well. They have been based on the Isle of Wight for years and have a fabulous collection of boat photos in action. Check them out.

Royal Academy does it again

I do really need to learn. Miró, Calder, Giacometti, Braque: Aimé Maeght and His Artists is an interesting exhibition with too much stuff crammed into the small display space at the top of the Royal Academy. It is also an interesting look at pieces that the Maeght family have bought from their favourite artists. I have some quibbles about the way that the layout works, particularly the inability to see some lovely Miro paintings through a hugh Calder piece.

But yet again, the money grubbers at the Royal Academy have sold too many tickets for the space. The result is miserable for the audience. £10 to peer around, through and over too many people competing to see the art on display. We went at 3 pm on a Friday. Heaven only knows how many people there would be on a weekend. Enough to probably break their fire regulations. New Year's Resolution - avoid the Royal Academy like the plague. Expensive and over crowded, with too much space given over to selling stuff and not enough on displaying art and managing people movement through their galleries. Shame.

Some things change, but the emotional resonance of photography is still powerful

  Today I have been going through some of the pictures that I have taken since getting my new digital SLR. I count as a very occasional photographer. I like the idea, and sometimes the muse strikes. And photos do make the strangest connections sometimes.

In reviewing this photo of a park bench, for example, I was taken back to my high school days and my role as team member, sub editor and then editor of the yearbook. Its something I haven't thought about for years, yet really was a formative experience.

Digital photography has changed the picture experience. First, the possibility to edit and post process the image really changes and makes plastic the experience. Second, the way that the internet has changed the publishing environment makes some really great photos and photographers available. I want searching for a couple of extra photos for a website recently and came across a real treasure trove of photos that had been taken by really talented people and made available. Third, it has changed the way people can make use of content and repackage photos for their own purposes. If you are trying to make a living out of photography, all these amateurs publishing their stuff makes it more difficult. But it also shows how much talent there is out there.

But what hasn't changed is the power of pictures to really create an emotional context for both memory of events, but also evoking something to people who weren't there. And now the publishing platforms mean that you can see all the talent out there. Some great photographers, some great emotions. I aspire to be a fraction as good some day.

Smart and Functional - iRobot

  Every now and then, a new product shows up that really intrigues me. Here is the iRobot Roomba. It sits in a recharger until you press the button or the preprogrammed time arrives, then zooms around cleaning your rugs, carpets and floors. At first I couldn't figure out why it appealed.

Well,it appeals as a great toy to the gadget freaks in the household, and surely has to appeal to the lazy, busy household. And perhaps even to offices, factories, shops as a good way to make sure that cleaning schedules are always maintained. Even better, although it is really an unattended vacuum cleaner, it really doesn't fit in the vacuum cleaner aisle.

It is one example of a bunch of new products that will continue to roll out that combine intelligence and functionality. I like the idea of buying smarter products, but also ones that are incredibly easy to use. I think the iRobot concept is smart and functional. And that's why it appeals. Now I have to save my cash to buy one.

Do travel agents have a future?

Recently I have been planning a holiday in Australia. Fairly complex, lots of options, but tons of opportunity for a travel agent to show that they really know their stuff. What we wanted to do was visit friends in Sydney and Gold Coast, do some liveaboard diving on the great barrier reef, and then see whatever else fitted in with the trip.

One Oz specialist kept trying to put us in places with a 3 day or a 5 day minimum which we didn't want. Another UK long haul agent did a reasonable job on flights but insisted on using Quantas so missed out on better deals from Singapore. They really blew it when they told me inaccurately that the dive boat we wanted was full - I later ordered it online. Presumably they got a better commission from the other boat they offered instead. Instead of selling the positives of the new offer, they tried to tell me that my choice wasn't available. Silly people.

So I ordered the trip online a la carte from a bunch of suppliers. Am I better off? Well, as my partner says, planning the trip is a big part of the thrill. So I guess I am pretty thrilled already. Would I have liked to find a travel agent who would have done the legwork and earned a commission. Yes, but I didn't find one who earned it. What this tells me is that to survive in the travel business today, you had better be very clear what your value is, and make sure you sell it hard to every prospect. I never got a clear message from either travel agent about why they were better than what I could do online myself.

A tale of two sailing suppliers - part 1

My wife and I own a 28ft (8.6M) sailing yacht which is about 20 years old. So she is increasingly in need of attention for various bits and pieces. Recently we had two very different experiences from two local suppliers.

First, we decided to add a new piece of navigation gear. We looked up their website, phoned all their dealers one Saturday in the East Coast of England and none of them had the product in stock. So we phoned the manufacturer and ordered it direct. They delivered it to our dockyard the next day. So far so good. We then installed it and started to use it. The instruction manual was poorly photocopied and confusingly referred to two different products with different instructions for actions for each. The practice chart that was supposed to be included was not. We tried using it on the first set of charts and all was well. We then tried using it on a second set of charts, those for Solent waters. This area has the highest concentration of sailing enthusiasts in the UK. The charts were not pre-entered.

We sent an email query to the manufacturer over the weekend, but hadn't heard anything by Tuesday afternoon. So I called them. The person who read those emails was on holiday so no one had read the query. It turns out that for our needs we have to have a plastic cover for the charts, cost about 10% of the unit extra. We would also need a software update kit to enable us to update the electronics when charts change. Cost about 25% extra. So our cost of ownership suddenly jumped 35%.

At the time of writing we have agreed with the manufacturer to return the unit and get our money back. Their customer service did not seem very friendly. When I questioned why they didn't have an answering machine for out of hours calls, they said that they expected people to call back during their business hours. I suggested that their website could use a little updating so people understood what the proposition was. This was met coldly. I also told them that I had tried to buy it from every retailer on their list. Not much reaction.

The bottom line - the equipment was designed to speed up navigation while underway (and if you have ever bounced around in a strong sea in a small boat, you will know how important that is). As shipped it would take a lot of work to get all the charts we would use in, and they would not be sequenced in a user friendly way. Only by spending 35% more could one achieve something close. It also didn't make clear how the chart updating service/software would work and how essential that is for successful use. And their customer service attitude was typical of the 1950s in Russia. You are lucky to have us sell you this. Sorry, but no. For that price I am almost in chartplotter territory with additional bells and whistles.

Deconstructing Risk

Malcolm McDonald, Emeritus Professor, Cranfield University School of Management wrote a little article called "Getting Marketing back into the Boardroom". At the heart of the article is the idea that marketers need to be able to deconstruct business risk into three components and then develop strategies that account for each of these risks. 

 

1. Market risk: the risk that the market is not as good as you think it is

2. Share risk: the risk the strategy won't develop the share it promises

3. Profit risk: the risk the profit pool won't allow you to make the margins you promised.

 

I hadn't seen this before and really like it because the implications and actions arising from each are very different. My current employer actually faces a combination of all three. The mobile phone category is largely saturated so switching to a replacement market, the company is reworking it product porfolio to develop its share position, but the economics of the business and the cost of customising for individual markets make it very difficult to drive marginal profits from marginal markets.

Insure your new iPhone

Lots of comment on the new iPhone, especially about the more consumer friendly pricing. The 3G/WiFi combination works for me. Some complaints that some features like videoconference make it less attractive to the myspace/facebook fans, but that misses the point. Its not a swiss army knife, its a chef's knife, perfectly balanced for its intended use. Its a music and mobile browsing device with a telephone attached.

But if you do go out and get one, make sure you insure it. There is likely to be at least $300 worth of subsidy being applied by the network operators when you "buy" yours, and if you lose it or get it stolen you will quickly discover just how expensive a device it is. I'd much rather buy the device and then pay a cheaper rate for calls, but that's not how the business model works in most Western countries. Western consumers have an addiction to "free" phones and only discover the real cost when they have to replace a lost or stolen "free" phone.

When is an express not an express?

I recently had to take a flight from Terminal 4 at Heathrow and took the premium priced Heathrow Express. Well, express it is not. They claim a 15 minute journey time from Central London. Their own web site admits that you now need to change trains at T123 and that "the frequency of the shuttle services between Terminal 4 and Terminals 1, 2, 3 is every 10-20 minutes".

My 15 minute journey actually took 45 minutes. The reason given is that because BA haven't moved their flights from T4 over to T5 there are more people wanting to go to T4. I am sure that the airlines scheduled to move to T4 will bve thrilled to know that their customers will have a slower journey. BAA want to move more flights to T4 and T5 so that they can refurbish the oldest terminals at Heathrow.

Heathrow Express have decided to go to T123, then to T5. Previously they went to T4 directly, so there is no reason that they couldn't today. But they decided not to. Instead they ask you to change to their competitor, Heathrow Connect.

All of this could have been avoided if the route had been planned properly and a nice circular route created between the terminals. But for whatever reason, this was not done.

The right answer is to recommend that anyone going to T4 should use Heathrow Connect from the start. You don't have to change, and the journey time is slower, but less hassle for people carrying baggage. Why isn't that advice given impartially to travellers? Also why haven't they increased frequency of service to reflect the increased need?

Doom and gloom or a business opportunity?

House prices are down 1% from April 2007 according to a BBC story. That doesn't sound like a lot to me. The fact that house prices have been rising for four of the last five years is buried in the story. So now instead of being 10% above last year, they are now 1% below last year. But the graph looks much more dramatic.

It does say something that the BBC, on the whole known for balanced reporting, is using language like "sixth monthly decline in a row" and "steep decline". This is after property prices have RISEN 45% in the last 5 years.

So we are talking ourselves into a significant drop in house prices. The question really is - who is going to be really hurt? Anyone who has bought recently and not benefited from the rises. Anyone who remortgaged and spent the cash and now is sitting on a possible deficit. First time buyers because cheap and easy 100% mortgages have disappeared in the UK.

Well, first time buyers are going to be hit, but previously they were being squeezed out because prices were much too high a multiple of their earnings. Now they need a decent deposit to get a mortgage. Well, that doesn't seem unreasonable to me.

There is definitely a market opportunity here for housing that is affordable, and properly targetted at the people who are having difficulty getting on the housing ladder. Perhaps a mixture of owners and renters in professionally mainted properties with proper ongoing funding for maintenance. More commonhold properties would be a good idea. Why haven't we seen more of this in the UK. Well one important reason is that it eliminates ground rent as a source of income for developers and other sources of income from premiums for extending leases, etc. Perhaps a tax break to help encourage this important and cost effective type of housing?

Brainwave that made elevators safe

Elevators (lifts) are complex devices. But the fundamental safety device is incredibly simple. Electromagnetic brakes are held open while there is electric current. In the event of an electricity failure, the brakes are released and the elevator comes to a stop. What a great idea. Simple, positive. I love the thought that the absence of electricity triggers the safety mechanism. Its the inverse of what one might expect. Elisha Otis patented it and created the "safety elevator". How might thinking about the inverse of something create a new product or business opportunity today?

A new career as a groqiteer?

The groquit allows you to scan all your stuff, so when you go shopping you can check and make sure you don't have whatever you are thinking of buying. Oh dear.

For $95 you can have a device and run around scanning your cds, dvds, books, etc etc and then see if there is a match for your barcode when you get ready to hand over your mastercard in the shop.

My problem with this is that the amount of effort to get all the data into the device isn't worth it. Its a solution looking for a problem. And in most civilised countries all you have to do once you realise you have purchased a duplicate is take it back. Most retailers are very cooperative that way. After all its no skin off their nose. The manufacturer usually pays.

So would I groquit? (rhymes with rocket apparently) Thanks, but even if I lose my job I can't imagine putting the effort in to scanning my collections. I'd rather rely on my fallible memory - and the good will of my favourite retailer.

How old is your airplane?

American Airlines apparently has jets with an average age of 18 years old. Now given that they get maintained and rebuilt a bunch of time during their career, does the age of your airplane matter?

An interesting coalition of groups including the Teamsters and the Business Travel Coalition, have a real bee in their bonnet about where aircraft are maintained. They don't seem to like the fact that it is being done in Korea. Now I understand that the Teamsters worry more about domestic jobs, but why would people who represent corporate travel departments care? After all, many of their companies are busy outsourcing large chunks of work to low cost environments.

We seem to have great difficulty understanding that  price does have an effect and that services do cost money. In this case, how much was paid for the ticket and how old is your airplane are related. I find this ironic - after all my corporate travel policy forces me to choose these carriers. They do so because the "discount" price they get off the "retail" fare means that I get to pay more as an individual when I fly so that the corporate travel folk can save money. But now they are surprised when the airlines do what they can to squeeze cost out of the equation so that they can offer "discounts" to "corporate customers".

But will it change our behaviour, let alone those of our corporate travel departments? Or in fact are we behaving like rational economic animals. After all, technical failure is only responsible for 20% of accidents and only 37.28% of accidents are commercial flights. 2007 was one of the safest years on record.

So if you are of nervous disposition - fly in Europe, fly on a jet. North America accounts for 32% of crashes. Hmm. Maybe the Teamsters have something after all.

Look Ma, no tip!

5 An intriguing new restaurant called Baggers has opened in Germany. You order your food using a touch screen, the order is picked up and cooked in the kitchen upstairs, then the food is automatically sent to your seat using technology.  The presenter makes a big deal about not having to leave a tip, even though on continental Europe it is not the custom to leave a tip.

What it doesn't show is how the mess left by the diners is cleared. The idea has novelty but does it have longetivity?

Perhaps a better example of how to innovate in the restaurant business is Benihana. The marketing for the chain calls it luxury dining. Well, if you haven't been, here is what happens. You arrive, and they stack you in in the bar until a full table has been assembled from arrivals. Then you get to share a table with a group of strangers. Benihana make it attractive by creating a show with a chef while your fast food is cooked and delivered across the griddle to your plate. Then once the show is over and you have your food, the chef cleans up and leaves. This helps to push you out the door so they can do it all over again. If the preceding paragraph makes you think me unduly negative, then try it for yourself. It is a great entertainment concept with a bit of easy to prepare, fast food attached, at premium prices.

My quibble is with the positioning. Just don't believe either of them when they tell you that they offer luxury dining. They are good entertainment experiences with food attached. Why mess with that?