THE SIMPLE PHYSICS OF CREATIVE LEVERAGE
The value strong creative brings to effective marketing communications
Gordon Bailey & Associates, Inc. The Business Generation Company ®

It multiplies impact | It benefits everyone | What really matters |Listen to your customers | When it works - stick to it


It multiplies impact
It's one of the first lessons learned in high school physics: For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Push against a sturdy wall, and the wall will push back with exactly the same amount of force.

It's a simple law of physics that applies equally to all of us. It even applies to business. Here's how.

Let's say that you are expending a certain amount of marketing effort in an attempt to sell widgets to your customer base. Like the aforementioned wall, the customer will resist your actions with equal force while your offer is considered. If the customer decides that your widget is the right one to purchase, his dwindling resistance is replaced by another equally powerful force -- money. With the ensuing transaction, the equation balances out.

When you factor in cut-throat competition, rising manufacturing costs and sluggish economic conditions, the equation gets a bit more complicated. To close a sale under these circumstances, your company must now overcome those opposing forces as well as the considerable reluctance potential customers typically exert.

Naturally, your company needs as much energy working for it as it can possibly muster. And that means focusing marketing strategies, reducing operating costs, increasing the effectiveness of your sales force and getting the most value for your marketing communications dollar.

In business to business advertising, increased value means attracting greater attention to your trade publication advertisements, escalating readership scores, raising awareness of your branded products, prompting a larger number of inquiries, building real preference among your target audience and, ultimately, increasing sales.
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It benefits everyone
...creative leverage is the force you and your marketing firm can bring to a marketing communication piece that multiplies its impact on the reader.
A sure way to increase the value of your marketing communication dollar is through the force of creative leverage.

Like simple levers studied in high school physics, creative leverage multiplies the effects of available power to compel action upon another object. In other words, creative leverage is the force you and your marketin firm can bring to a marketing communication piece that multiplies its impact on the reader. Creative leverage is a combination of many different processes.

Their net cumulative effect is a marketing communications piece that:

  • speaks your customers' language
  • treats your customers with respect
  • speaks volumes about your company's integrity
  • shares your customers' fears
  • shares your customers' sense of humor
  • creates a fertile selling environment

    Let's say that two ads featuring widgets that perform identical tasks run in a particular trade publication. One ad uses a fresh, engaging and relevant creative concept (all elements of creative leverage) to sell the widget, the other uses a predictable headline and a straight-on beauty shot. Odds are that the reader will read, remember and show a preference for the first ad.

    Creative leverage benefits everyone: the advertiser, its agency and the end-user. For advertisers with small budgets, it's the great equalizer. Without it, the heavy hitters will kill you with huge budgets.

    Unfortunately, there is precious little creative leverage being exercised in business-to-business advertising today. And as long as that remains so, companies that utilize creative leverage -- or those with incredibly large marketing communication budgets -- will continue to succeed where others fail.
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    What really matters
    Creative leverage benefits everyone: the advertiser, its agency and the end-user. For advertisers with small budgets, it's the great equalizer.
    Though certainly important, there's much more to putting the power of creative leverage to work for you than hiring an advertising agency adept at using it. Creative leverage is the product of a challenging process that involves a true commitment from every single player on the agency and client sides of the relationship.

    Here is a six-step process you and your agency must follow before the power of creative leverage can be put to work for you.

    1. Demand the best.
    In this business, there's no substitute for talent. Make sure that the agency working for you is staffed with the brightest and best people available. Creative awards are a good indicator of an agency's creative merit, but they are by no means the only measure.

    Look into the agency's track record. How well have their marketing communications performed in the past? Do ads for their clients' products consistently out-perform those of the competition? If an agency's track record doesn't speak for itself, there are many other agencies that would like you to hear about their track records.

    2. Establish a close working relationship with the creative department.
    Ad agencies that wield creative leverage include the client in the creative process. This not only gives the people who are actually creating the product a chance to tap into your expertise, it reduces the chances of miscommunication.

    The account executive's time is wasted playing the messenger, constantly ferrying between you and the creative department. At the beginning stages of the project, the creative team should hear about the project directly from you, with all of your overt and subtle concerns. Conversely, when concepts are being presented, it should be done so by the creative team -- so you can hear the creative rationale with all its subtle and overt nuances directly from the people who created it.
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    Listen to your customers
    Creative awards are a good indicator of an agency's creative merit, but they are by no means the only measure.
    3. Base your tactics on decisive, long-term strategies.
    When the creative team sits down to concept solutions to individual communications problems, the creative work plan they're working from must be written in support of a real, hard-nosed strategy. According to Woody Wiedenhofer, former defensive coordinator of the champion Pittsburgh Steelers, a good strategy is one that buttons up the chin straps and levels the other guy.

    The strategy should establish a strong, clearly definable position. If the customer can't identify with that position, the product or service will never sell. Make sure that your strategy places your product in a unique light. All subsequent marketing communication pieces should help establish or reinforce that position. Anything to the contrary is a misguided waste of time, effort and money.

    4. Listen to your customers.
    Think about this for a minute. In today's ultra-competitive marketplace, what matters to your customers is all that should matter to you. Why is that so? Because customers are only loyal to products and services as long as those products and services perform as needed, are reasonably priced and are available when needed.

    The only way to find out what your customers need in a product or service is to ask them. And then keep asking them because, like your needs, the needs of your customers are in a constant state of flux. Focus groups, round table discussions and one-on-one interviews are excellent steps toward keeping your finger on the pulse of your customer base.

    At Gordon Bailey & Associates, Inc., we've developed a process called Customer-Driven Communications that helps our clients stay in touch with their customers' ever-changing needs. Designed to work in harmony with the total quality initiatives of our clients, Customer-Driven Communications identifies who the customer is (a task that is not always as cut and dried as it may seem), determines what his needs are and communicates with him in a manner which best addresses those needs.
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    In today's ultra-competitive marketplace, what matters to your customers is all that should matter to you.
    5. Drop your guard.
    A common roadblock to creative leverage often lies in the path of companies that are too concerned about what people, other than their customers, might say about their marketing communications. Decision makers at these companies invariably insist that their marketing communications take a more conservative path. As a result, customers tend to perceive these ads to be self-serving, predictable and, worst of all, totally unconvincing. Many times, conservative ads say too much about the company and not enough about the customer, sometimes by speaking down to the customer by over-using words like "we" and "our" -- instead of relating to the customer with words like "you" and "your."

    There are plenty of opportunities for conservative companies to utilize creative leverage to its fullest potential and still maintain their corporate identity. Take ultra-conservative IBM, for example. Over the years, creative leverage has helped IBM maintain its position as the undisputed leader in mid-range and high-end computer hardware markets. Time after time, IBM's ad campaigns directly address the core issues facing their customers. And do so without getting hung up in IBM's conservative corporate culture.
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    When it works - stick to it
    It's the effective use of creative leverage that drives people to flip through trade publications, looking for your company's logo.
    6. When something works, stick with it.
    Continuity is key. Your customers expect your products and services to be consistently good. And once they learn to appreciate the quality of your marketing communications, they'll expect the same from them too. Don't let them down! It's the effective use of creative leverage that prompts people to flip through trade publications, looking for your company's logo.

    If you look at all the great, successful advertising campaigns, you'll find one constant: they're all human. Yours should be no different. Copy and visuals should always be human -- written as people speak, designed using human situations.

    And stick with your successful campaigns. All too often, advertisers and advertising agencies alike scrap perfectly good campaigns while they're still relevant to the customer. Whenever possible, extend a successful campaign and build on its achievements while you still have the customer's full and undivided attention.

    With each passing day, more and more companies are discovering the valuable advantages of creative leverage: apply force here, get two, five, ten times the work there. This simple principle of physics, applied with the support of a sound strategy, could very well provide the push your company needs to keep a leg up on the competition and meet your long-term marketing goals.
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    Gordon Bailey & Associates Inc., The Business Generation Company® is an intergrated marketing consulting and full-service business-to-business marketing communications firm celebrating 25 years of success.
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