E-mail is singular and not plural

If you send e-mail to a bunch of people, it's read individually, not together by a group, right? So use a singular salutation and not a plural one — a name, preferably. (Remember mail-merge?)

I'm not offended when I see "Hey, Everybody!" but as a marketer, I'm disappointed by the failure to communicate one-to-one.

Personal is always more immediate and powerful.

Easy to Be Hard

Is it easy to do business with you? Is your website clear? Are the contact points obvious?

A posting on Craigslist for a site inviting "creatives" (designers and copywriters) to sign up for freelance assignments and jobs attracted my interest. But when I clicked through, I couldn't find the "register" link. (It's called "apply" here. Oh.) And I was turned off by the terminology, referring to "artists" — and not designers, art directors or (gasp!) copywriters. I poked around for a few minutes more and then split.

Yesterday, I saw a link for a discount coupon for soy milk. Clicked through and was asked to sign up for a coupon. I reluctantly entered my name, gender, date of birth, e-mail address and a password (twice), then clicked OK. The next screen was another form, asking for even more personal info, plus my mailing address.

Fuggeddaboutit! Not worth 55¢ to give up all that.

In this economy — and always — make it easy for your customers to get what they want. That's the goal, isn't it?

If you want me to sign up for something, my e-mail address and maybe a password should suffice. If the relationship continues and you want more info, fine. I'll give you my date of birth and gender, perhaps. But make it worth my while.

Same thing with a recruitment site or any other service or product. Make it simple, speak in the language of your customers and help them.

Ease of use and simplicity rule on the Net. And in stores, offices and everywhere else that commerce and human interactions occur.

Duh!

Screw Black Friday!

I just saw a TV spot urging people to set their alarm clocks and go shopping at 4 AM to get great deals on... stuff. Jewelry, in particular. Ooh! Shiny things!

To hell with that!

The economy is pretty crappy right now so if retail stores want to attract customers, make it easy for them to buy, not more difficult. No games.

Get up early and go to your store at 4 AM? How about never? Is never good for you?

When I see a store that rejects this fascist Black Friday crap, they'll get my business. To hell with the ones who don't!

The world is fat

Love Ricky Gervais. Discovered his podcasts and old XFM (London) radio shows, picked up the DVDs of The Office, which he co-created (with Stephen Merchant) and Extras, the finale of which was one of the darkest "comedies" ever shown on TV.

Really wanted to see him on his American tour but no dates nearby. Also wanted the tour video, Fame, but it's not been released in the U.S.

But I want it. Why can't I have it? It's a global market. This guy has been on Alias and The Simpsons, in A Night at the Museum and For Your Consideration, and has two or three other movies in (as they say) various stages of production.

So I watched Fame last night and will have the live videos, Animals and Politics shortly. BitTorrent, but I would have gladly purchased them, as I did with everything else, even the podcasts through Audible.com.

The world is flat? Piracy is killing your business?

Get a clue.

Still sucking

Marketing is tough. Primary goal is to elicit interest and action. Overcoming a bad image or experience is tough, too, and you rarely get a second chance.

CompUSA had a crappy reputation, shut down and re-launched under new ownership, Tiger Direct, who also has a poor image. They kept a bunch of stores closed but reopened several in South Florida, where they’re based.

A couple of weeks ago, I visited one and was unimpressed: not a lot of stock, uninteresting displays, few customers, and employees standing around talking to each other.

Saw a CompUSA ad in the newspaper earlier this week with a coupon for a bluetooth cell phone earpiece for $9.99. What the heck, it might be cheap, but for ten bucks, I’d give it a shot. The coupon was in Thursday’s paper, but the fine print said that it was only good on Friday and Saturday. It also had space for my name, address and e-mail. Smart! A loss leader to attract new customers and capture their contact info for future promo.

So I strolled into CompUSA a little after noon on Friday: a few customers but not many. In addition to the Bluetooth device, I intended to buy some blank DVDs. After a few minutes of searching, I went to the customer service desk. I was ignored for a couple of minutes but managed to interrupt the pair of chatting workers to ask where the DVDs were. One jerked a thumb to the right, but didn’t offer specifics. Undaunted, I flashed the bluetooth coupon.

“Oh, we’re sold out of those.”

“But they just went on sale today. How can that be?”

“We’ve been open for three hours,” he shrugged.

So that was that. I tossed the coupon, forgot about the DVDs and will forget about CompUSA. They still suck.

Ticketbastards

E-mail yesterday from Ticketmaster; Steely Dan would be performing at a nearby venue in a month and a half. Yay!

So I clicked on the link; tickets on sale the next day. Argh!

Not acceptable. Noticed a box for a presale code. Hmm...

Several seconds later online, I found a code, returned to Ticketmaster and bought a pair of not-so cheap seats.

Another wonderful, unsatisfying transaction with one of the worst companies on the face of the earth.