Around this time, I left the agency. But before leaving, I did something you should always do. I wrote down what I considered to be the factors that made our advertising work.
The washing machine company had been my biggest client. So, based on all the testing I had done, I came up with a specific list of the things that had made the difference between success and failure in our ads for them. I told my successor that if he omitted any one of them, the advertising would not work as well. If he omitted two of them, it would work really badly. And if he omitted three, he might just as well start looking for another job.
Well, the minute I left, everybody decided to get creative with that account. Instead of going back to what had worked, they tried wacky new ideas every week. Within a year, the company was in trouble. In 18 months, it was broke. And the owner of the company - my intelligent, likeable client - killed himself.
This may seem a very extreme example of what can happen as a result of bad marketing, but it did.
People's Lives May Depend on You
If you think I'm exaggerating when I suggest that marketing can be a matter of life and death, consider fundraising.
Every time I see some clever advertising done by a charity - advertising created to make the copywriter and art director pat themselves on the back instead of to raise money - I want to throw up. Their egos are costing lives.
Remember... marketing is a tool - a tool that you can choose to use the right way or the wrong way.
And isn't it nice to know that when you do it right, it's not only ethical... it's profitable?
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