Whilst doing some research for a workshop (branding
a Town actually!) my interest was piqued by a paragraph concerning place marketing and changing social attitudes viz:
“This is accompanied
by an equally significant shift from the work ethic to the play ethic”
This got me thinking about how “unbuttoned” businesses have
become – literally in terms of dress down Friday - which now seems to be dress
down Monday to Fridays. In step with this, marketing is increasingly both playful and
humorous.
Hi Jane
ReplyDeleteWe have always taken a lighter touch with marketing ourselves even though we work with some pretty "serious" organisations. Paul and my podcasting takes it a step further again. We are, most of the time, downright daft.
It has served us very well over the years but you have to be prepared for the odd bad reaction.
For example, the podcast was used by one member of a client team (who didn't want to work with us) to try and discredit us to senior staff. Even though the senior staff loved what we delivered in the initial project, there were enough seeds of doubt sown that we ended up not winning the main project. Nice.
So, my message is to be careful I guess.
Cheers
Marcus (Headscape)
Hi Marcus,
ReplyDeleteNice to hear from you. Funnily enough this subject came up in a workshop I delivered earlier in the week. I think a good guide is to aim for levity rather than humour of the "geddit geddit" variety.
Whilst the loss of a project is never good I do think having clients on your wavelength makes for a much smoother working relationship - so it may have been a blessing in disguise!