“No One Goes There Anymore, It’s Too Crowded…”
I came across this snippet from Roy Hollister Williams and it resonated with me. Enjoy!
Some statements make no sense at all but are accepted as gospel anyway. A good example is the title of this essay (blog), a comment purportedly made by Yogi Berra, whose command of the absurd is legendary.
Yogi often displays and insight into the obvious:
“You can observe a lot by watching.”
“When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”
“If you can’t imitate him, don’t copy him.”
“A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.”
“Business is fabulous but my customers complain they hear my ads too much.”
Okay, that last one was not Yogi. It was a client of mine, and he wasn’t trying to be funny. Actually, a lot of my clients hear complaints about their ads from their customers. As you might expect, it’s always the most successful clients.
Isn’t it strange that although people complain bitterly that they hear an ad too often, no one ever complains of reading an ad too often? I commonly recommend radio and television, but rarely newspaper: “You can close your eyes but you can’t close your ears.”
You hear even when you’re not listening, but you don’t see unless you’re watching. This is why you can sing hundreds of songs that you never intended to learn, but you can’t name the color of the car that sits in the driveway just five houses down the street from your home, even though you drive past it several times a week.
There are only two kinds of ads: echoic (sound) and iconic (sight). Echoic ads are far more intrusive than Iconic ads. It is because of the intrusive nature of sound that people often complain about ads on the radio, but never those in print.
The problem with using sound is that echoic ads require intense repetition to be effective. The reader of an iconic (print) ad can choose to study the fine print or read an ad multiple times, but she can also choose not to read at all. The listener to an echoic ad is not allowed this control. She cannot hear your ad a second, third or fourth time unless you decide she should.
To gain the miraculous results that echoic advertising offers, you must repeat your ads relentlessly. As Yogi says “If people aren’t complaining about your ads, you must be doing something wrong.” (Okay-I lied about it being Yogi Berra. But it’s true anyway.)
Enjoy the start of Summer!
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Liz In Detroit | Neighborhood Realty
3100 Woodward Ave. Ste. 102 Detroit, MI 48201
313.617.2699 Cell