What you do matters much more than what you say.
This hit home this morning when I had a coffee at Starbucks. After negotiating the arrogant feeling advertising poster by the door, I grabbed a coffee and took a seat. On the napkin was a note stating that they’d just removed all trans fats and high fructose corn syrup from their food - and that they hoped I’d enjoy it.
I couldn’t help but look from the napkin to the poster and wonder. How could the same brand annoy me on the one hand, and yet impress me on the other?
Beyond the simple fact that tonally the napkin was helpful rather than arrogant, I think the answer is that the napkin provided me with informational value about something they’d done to improve the experience. By telling me in tangible terms how the food had been made better, I now felt better (particularly as I had a half eaten sandwich in my hand at the time)
The advertising on the other hand simply represented the kind of clever copywriting fluff that has little meaning. Exactly the type of thing that we consumers have come to largely ignore in our daily lives.
If I put my professional hat on, this becomes quite interesting. With the current state of the internet, we have the ability to instantly find out in tremendous detail anything we want about a product, service or brand. And as such, I think we’re becoming increasingly intolerant of communications that get in the way of this, or which fail to have purpose. Exactly what the Starbucks poster and much advertising like it represent.
If true, the implications of this observation are huge. It means that meaningful innovation and experience improvement aren’t just crucial from the standpoint of differentiation and revenue enhancement, but may also be the only thing consumers are prepared to pay attention to.
So please Starbucks, keep innovating and telling me through the napkins. They’re so much more important than your advertising.
(Paul Worthington)