“Call me, maybe…” – Every Advertiser’s Ill-defined Plea?

September 10, 2015 by Impact

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The plaintive 2012 hit by Carly Rae Jepsen is the one-sided story of a personal marketing campaign, the results of which are entirely in doubt at the end of the song.  It seems the character, despite being pursued by many other boys, has no idea whether the object of her affection will respond.
In a recent blog post, my colleague, Josh Miller, provided the statistical analysis for one scenario of the probability of her crush actually calling.  However, in romance and marketing there are many variables in play simultaneously.  Determining which variables have the greatest impact on achieving the desired outcome and what needs to be done to improve the odds of success are what marketing management, if not romance, is all about.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/3″][mk_image src=”http://www.impactconnects.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Carly.jpg” image_width=”1000″ image_height=”1000″ crop=”false” lightbox=”false” frame_style=”simple” target=”_blank” caption_location=”inside-image” align=”center” margin_bottom=”10″ link=”http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/carlyraejepsen/callmemaybe.html”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″]
The girl’s situation is common to many advertisers:

1. Will the prospects respond?
2. Does past experience fairly predict future response?
3. Would some other message/offer/media work better?
4. Is the message going to the right prospect?

The girl in the song has no idea she is asking these questions… and no prediction of what will happen.  Marketers who don’t have a way of linking sales to advertising are in the same sorry situation.  Sometimes they get a response and sometimes they don’t.  But one experience doesn’t help them improve their chances of getting the response they want the next time.
If the girl only knew what would work to get this kind of guy’s attention, she could reduce her anxiety and act with greater confidence to get what she wants.
In direct marketing the opportunity exists to link market segments, messaging elements, and responses to get response rates, confidence intervals, and rate of return.  Perhaps it is hard for a girl to look at a fellow and know what will work, but in business where sales attempts are happening constantly, the statistics are lying all around waiting to be used.
So how would the song change if the girl knew that the kind of boy she was targeting responded to girls who looked or acted a certain way?  If she was already positioned in terms of the attributes important to this sort of fellow, she would change nothing and be direct, confident the boy would call.  She would have power, relative to the boy.  If she was not already naturally appealing to her target market, how much would she change to get attention and would it be worth the effort in the long run?  The boy would be in the power position.  The low-key “Call me maybe” appeal would yield nothing.
Businesses face this dilemma, too.  Every business has to start with an idea of a market segment whose needs it wants to profitably serve.  Targeting the specific needs of segments works so much better than the generic, “Here it is,” approach.  It is not without cause that marketers and advertisers use the language of romance when describing how they woo people into customer relationships.
Identify the market segments.  Track response rates by market segment.  Monitor the variation in response to message, offer, and media, not just in terms of gross sales, but in terms of prospects reached and cost expended to do it.  How much needs to be changed to get what you want?  A business or a girl can always do better.  If knowledge is used, it creates power.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

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