Deliberate Confusion
Have you heard of this Dr. Oz guy? Supposedly he's the newest diet guru and can help you live longer, healthier, and so on. One of his tips is that there are five key ingredients to avoid in your diet. Let me paint a rather silly but scary picture for you. Imagine for a second that he introduces his own line of foods but doesn't list any of the ingredients on the label. Actually, let's take all the nutritional information off the label too. Now, let's also throw in there that literally 50% of the items stocked in the grocery store are those created by Dr. Oz and have absolutely no information to help consumers make informed decisions. One would think a consumer revolt would be brewing.
Of course the real life example of this is Google's AdWords, the PPC product which allows advertisers to list their web site in a sponsored listing area with the hopes of being noticed more frequently than if their site was solely listed in the organic search listing area. Google has approximately 50% of the search market share and gives little to no information about how to get the best results for your business as an AdWords customer. Have a question for Google? They don't want you calling 866-2-GOOGLE since they don't publish it on their site. Want to know who you're speaking with once you do call the number? You'll get a first name and last initial. At least they don't use symbols like the artist formerly known as Prince.
Ever since my first day at my first job out of college I've been in some sort of customer service role, whether it be serving internal or external clients. I've learned that the best way to create repeat customers is to make it easy for your customers to spend money with you. It's not only hard to spend as much money as possible with Google, spending that money supports a company who appears as if they don't want your money in the first place.
Compounding the problem is that this model is spreading, not shrinking. Right Media has built a phenomenal product that allows for 100% self-managed online advertising campaigns to run on thousands of sites at wonderfully reasonable prices. The problem is that "it" is incredibly intelligent, but "it" never passes any of "its" knowledge onto you. "It" is Yield Manager, the Right Media serving platform that has supposedly great capabilities but you'd never know since you have no idea what those great capabilities actually are. "It's proprietary" is their response. So is Coke's recipe, but they still list the ingredients and it's never hurt them a bit.
This doesn't mean that you should avoid these businesses or their platforms. This commentary simply offers a perspective from a buying customer's point of view. My clients expect transparency and that expectation is passed on from my customers to my vendors. However, whether or not we agree with a vendor's business model, all of our decisions are indeed purely business and are made to ensure the greatest success for our clients. For now, time will be the only judge. It'll be interesting to see how this one plays out.
Of course the real life example of this is Google's AdWords, the PPC product which allows advertisers to list their web site in a sponsored listing area with the hopes of being noticed more frequently than if their site was solely listed in the organic search listing area. Google has approximately 50% of the search market share and gives little to no information about how to get the best results for your business as an AdWords customer. Have a question for Google? They don't want you calling 866-2-GOOGLE since they don't publish it on their site. Want to know who you're speaking with once you do call the number? You'll get a first name and last initial. At least they don't use symbols like the artist formerly known as Prince.
Ever since my first day at my first job out of college I've been in some sort of customer service role, whether it be serving internal or external clients. I've learned that the best way to create repeat customers is to make it easy for your customers to spend money with you. It's not only hard to spend as much money as possible with Google, spending that money supports a company who appears as if they don't want your money in the first place.
Compounding the problem is that this model is spreading, not shrinking. Right Media has built a phenomenal product that allows for 100% self-managed online advertising campaigns to run on thousands of sites at wonderfully reasonable prices. The problem is that "it" is incredibly intelligent, but "it" never passes any of "its" knowledge onto you. "It" is Yield Manager, the Right Media serving platform that has supposedly great capabilities but you'd never know since you have no idea what those great capabilities actually are. "It's proprietary" is their response. So is Coke's recipe, but they still list the ingredients and it's never hurt them a bit.
This doesn't mean that you should avoid these businesses or their platforms. This commentary simply offers a perspective from a buying customer's point of view. My clients expect transparency and that expectation is passed on from my customers to my vendors. However, whether or not we agree with a vendor's business model, all of our decisions are indeed purely business and are made to ensure the greatest success for our clients. For now, time will be the only judge. It'll be interesting to see how this one plays out.
posted by Jay Friedman - Goodway 2.0 @ 8:54 PM
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