BECOMING CARY GRANT
By Jim Carey, Core Strategies
Years go; I read an essay by Jay Cheat, the great adman, about Cary Grant. Jay wrote that Cary Grant actually started life as Archie Leach, a poor cockney actor. But through the years, through consistent effort, he actually became indistinguishable from his incredibly debonair alter ego. He became Cary Grant. Cheat concluded that, "You become what you say you will become." There's lot to that.
One of the benefits of being involved in the CADM, as well as my consulting and teaching gigs, is that I get to think about the future of our business, about what we will become. And I think about where direct marketing is going. Where is the CADM going? What future do we want?
The World's Best Tacticians
It's funny, because those questions aren't the sort of thing that we direct marketers typically address. We're much more comfortable with, "How do we do it?" than "What do we do?"
It's both a blessing and a curse. "How do we do it?" is a tactical question. And we're the world's best tacticians. That's great because tactical execution transforms an idea into money. We're better than anyone in marketing at getting from point A to point B.
But now, we face getting to point Z. "What do we do? Where do we want to go?" Those are strategic questions. And I hate to say it, but the ad guys are much better at it than we are. I take heart knowing that we've all mastered so many difficult challenges, that we can certainly handle this. So let's choose the shape of our future.
Choosing Sure Things
There's a Chinese curse, "May you live in interesting times." That's certainly true for us. There is huge uncertainty, and huge opportunity, Very interesting.
What can we be sure of in "interesting times?" There are a few sure things that will help us in any possible future. Let's build on these three:
- Winning the Strategy Game - It's kind of embarrassing now, but when I read Jay Cheat’s column, I decided to be a "strategist." Except that I had no idea what it meant. Over time, I came to realize that it had to do with the problems I chose to address, the questions I asked myself, and how I focused my thinking. What investments will have the greatest impact? How can we grow by an order of magnitude? What can we leverage to get from where we are into a position of dominance? The process isn't harder than our typical issues, but it is different.
- Winning the Finance Game - In most big organizations, it's the finance guys who make the real policy calls. Most marketing has been positioned as a cost center. If that's the case, we lose. To win, we need to learn the language of the board room as well as the mail room. Think of it as positioning benefits to a niche audience. In addition to "cost per sale," we need to know "incremental earning per share." We need to know how to "decrease the SG&A %," as well as we know how to "increase response rates." (The good news is that they're essentially the same thing, just stated different ways.)
- Winning the Positioning Game - The issue for direct marketers isn't competence Ñ we're good at what we do. Its relevance Ñ we haven't positioned ourselves properly. DM'ers knows how to build profitable relationships, and how to work with niche audiences. We're comfortable with new technology, we understand knowledge management and data warehousing. We have a natural affinity for interactive communications and e-commerce. The toughest issues organizations face are home games for us. Let's make sure the world knows that.
How The CADM Can Help You Face The Future
All these are the issues that the CADM is trying to help you address. Our goal remains to make you more valuable to your company and to yourself. That's why our programming focuses on user case studies about what's working now in e-commerce, database marketing, and effective message strategies.
So what will the future be like when we get there? If our direction is right, we'll be in a better place. We can move ourselves, our companies and our association to being recognized as the key to profitable relationships with customers.
Remember, there was no Cary Grant when Archie Leach started. But he got there. Amazingly, if we focus, we can be Cary Grant, too.
It's a challenge worthy of our collective talents. Let's do it.