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Extreme Marketing

© Bert Markgraf

It used to be said that a good salesman could sell a freezer to an Eskimo (please be assured that all references in this article to gender or ethnic background are used in a purely historical and non-judgmental context and that I am opposed to discrimination in all of its many forms). Today, of course, a good marketing person can convince the Eskimo that he needs the particular freezer being offered. And tomorrow, thanks to "interactive marketing", a good marketer will know what kind of freezer the Eskimo has, what he liked and disliked about it, when it is likely to wear out and how much he will want to pay for a new one.

Depending on your attitude to the intrusion of technology into your life, your reaction to this bit of news is likely to be disbelief, dismay or acceptance. For a positive slant along with some more information on how this will work, try this page from Grey Communications. But, before you do, make sure your browser is set to give you a message before accepting a cookie. In Netscape look under Options, Network Preferences, Protocols and in Internet Explorer look under View, Options, Advanced. If you haven't been getting these cookie messages before, you'll be surprised at how many there are. Cookies help track what you do on the Internet. Been looking at any freezers lately?

It might be nice to be offered exactly the kind of car you want at a price you can afford just when you're thinking that you have to buy a new one. Still, the thought of a multi-megabyte database entry with your name and lots of partially incorrect personal information in it is definitely intimidating. The privacy aspect of this issue has received a lot of attention and there is likely to be ineffectual legislation. But don't forget that you're the source of a lot of this data. If you don't want to cooperate you can fight it. Refuse cookies, use aliases, give outrageous answers to questions etc.

What's the small business angle on this? It is that small businesses can and often have been doing this kind of marketing for a long time in a non-intrusive way. The distributor of freezers in the far north will be much more successful if he delivers and installs the freezers and keeps track of each customer. Perhaps a note asking how they liked the freezer and a call or a questionnaire asking which features they liked and disliked would be appropriate. Then, he can send follow-ups when there are repairs and news on new models when the old one is obsolete. Of course, I hope your small business is not a freezer dealership in Inuvik. I hope that it's a service that is needed repeatedly or a product that needs repeated attention, replacement, or one that is used up. Then your chances at success with this kind of intensive marketing are very good.