[thechat] Love Thread: Beer!

[Martin Burns]

On Thu, 29 Aug 2002, javier velasco wrote:

>
>
> Martin Burns wrote:
>
> > I'm a bit biased towards Guinness, though, having worked on their site for
> > most of last year.
>
> Really? Is it just me that ends up biased *against* companies after
> working for them and knowing how the actually do things? >:-)

Depends on the companies, and what they do. I had an opportunity earlier
this year to do 6 months' work for a company who I have ethical issues
with. Fortunately, someone else was better fitted to the role, so I didn't
have to do it. Although to be fair, I wasn't going to be working in the
part of the company that does the bad stuff.

Guinness' approach is pretty good - "How can we find people who *adore*
our product?" and "Of people who just like our product a bit, how can we
infect them with our love of our product?" (Infect in a good way - like
infectious enthusiasm). You'd have to be much less of a cynic than me to
actually be an employee, but Guinness is one of the few brands that I'm
comfortable about identifying with.

And like all good direct marketeers, their approach is one of "Concentrate
on the people who are most likely to buy, and save money by disregarding
everyone who aren't interested"" rather than "spam everyone"

Cheers
Martin
(who has just heard that he's got his diploma in direct marketing)
---------------------------
"Names, once they are in common use, quickly
 become mere sounds, their etymology being
 buried, like so many of the earth's marvels,
 beneath the dust of habit." - Salman Rushdie