Easy peasy lemon squeezy

Salvete, amici.

I bring you exciting news this week. Amazingly Cicero has learnt something new. Cicero is well and truly confounded, stunned and amazed at this bombshell. And I am sure you are too.

For despite Cicero’s intimacy with his native tongue, it has been pointed out that in the vernacular, Cicero means ‘chick pea’. Now hands up if you knew that.

And on that bombshell of a start, let’s get back to business.

It is an enduring marketing rule of mine that the marketer’s role in any business is to make it is as easy as possible for the customer to do business. And in my book this rule applies whether you are marketing in the private, public or third sector. As you might imagine I am having many interesting debates on this issue at present within my top secret state bunker or TSSB as I have affectionately come to it.

Now what does this mean in reality? For me there are three broad levels at which this applies.

At one level customers have the ability to do business with you at a time and place convenient to them. Be there or be square is always a good principle to apply here. Dependent on your business and whether online or offline, it is always a good idea that your brand can be seen where the customer traffic is or can be easily found in directories, search engines and the like. When was the last time you googled your business or checked its listing in phone books or directories? Go on. Do it now. And report back with the results. Can your customers find you?

It is also a good idea to check when you are open for business and when people can reach you on the phone. Again are you there when your customers want you to be there? If customers want to do business with you on a Sunday afternoon and your call centre is only open Monday-Friday, 9-5, how much good business are you losing? Be there or be square. Do you know when your customers want to get hold of you? Most businesses in the private sector are getting this message, though there are exceptions, but there is still a very long way to go in the public sector where 8-6 is considered radical.

If the first level is about physical accessibility, the second level is about linguistic accessibility. Do your customers know what you are talking about? Cicero has spoken before about the need to talk in a straightforward, adult-adult way, free from jargon and technical speak. And yet too often the copy we produce and send out is filled with a language that is as dense as treacle, in a font size which is illegible for those with ageing eyes and replete with footnotes, caveats and exclusions that look as if we are trying to hide something and all done in a language which talks down to me and treats me as a kid. As a customer talk to me straight, talk to me in English and talk to me as you would any other normal sentient and sapient being. I promise you I can take it.

And so to the third level. And this level is often the domain of the operational folks, reluctant to allow mere marketing mortals into their fiefdom. But boldly go we must if we truly want our businesses and organisations to be easy peasy to deal with.

Do our processes make it easy for the customers to do business with us? Or do we give them an excuse, a reason, an interference, to walk on by or to come us to another time? How easy is it to fill in application forms? What information is required to do with business you? Do you really need all that information? How many times do you need to visit to get the goods or services? How can it be made easier? And so on and so on and so on. Look at what your customer has to do to do business with you from inside their skin with a critical eye and then ruthlessly scythe your way through everything that gets in the way.

Engaging with any business should be easy peasy, lemon squeezy, but too often it is not. And nor will it be easy peasy for us marketing mortals to engineer our businesses to get there. But it is the marketer’s burden to boldly go, or as is more grammatically correct, to go boldly, where others fear to tread and to make every effort, to strain every sinew, and never to rest, until our businesses have been transformed. No one said marketing was easy but doing business with your business must be.

Is it only me?

I recently bought some new white goods to help make my life easier and to give me more time to write my weekly drivel, as one correspondent so unkindly called my words of wisdom last week. Now when buying any kind of white good there is not a lot of variables from which to choose. It is not as if you can have a blue white good, is it? And unlike a car which comes with lots and lots of optional extras, I have not heard of automatic white goods or a diesel white good appliance or even one with in-built sat-nav.

No, it all boils down to price and trying to get the Saturday boy to explain to you why it is worth paying more for one model over another which is always an embarrassing affair. It is not as if white good emporia employ the most technically proficient sales people but they are very good at reading the words off the little card in front of any particular model. Almost as good as me, in fact. In any event price is always justified on basis of reliability and efficiency.

And then comes the punch line. Now it might only be me but I always find it a bit of a giggle when, having spent at least the previous 10 minutes extolling the efficiency and reliability of Japanese or German or French, note, anything but British, manufacturers of white goods equipment, they then try to flog you an insurance policy by pointing out just how inefficient and unreliable such products can be and why warranty insurance is required. The irony is brilliant. And in any event I always rely on the efficiency and reliability sales pitch. It’s cheaper.

By the way, and I know you are interested, all lifts in TSSB been in full working order for 48 hours now. Progress report next week.

Have a great week.

Sit felix. Et sit fortunatus.