A handful of years ago, I had a boss who I thought of less as a supervisor and more of a professor. She taught me almost everything I know about marketing fundamentals. I’ve learned many lessons from her, but two things she used to always say have stayed with me throughout my career:
Josh, stop using “conversate” – it’s not a word and it makes you sound dumb.
Perception is reality.
We know as a society that the loudest voice tends to create a “perceived reality” when it comes to anything related to marketing, but this perception is often extremely skewed. Think about it:
Let’s say consumers were asked to rate which banks they believed were the most financially secure and the majority of them indicated that it was Bank X. However, let’s also say financial bigwigs undertook an analysis of the various banks, they found that Bank X is not the most secure, it is actually Bank Y.
Does it really matter that Bank Y is truly the most financially secure? Nope, not in the least. Bank X is generally thought of as the best, therefore they get to reap the benefits of all the added customers who want a secure bank. The truth is the truth only matters if the right people know it.
How to change your company’s perception:
Know your company’s perception. The good, the bad and the ugly - know it. Not what you think it is, because your opinion doesn’t really matter.
Craft campaigns around the truth. In the above case, Bank Y needs to take the truth to the people. Get the word out to the masses, that the perception is wrong and you have to the proof to back it up. There’s no better example of this than the recent Verizon commercials – where they fight the false claims from T-Mobile and Sprint.
Manage further perceptions. Think your job is done? Nope. Monitor, track and scrutinize what your customers think. They have the only opinion that matters.
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