Don’t sell what’s in your head
I’ve mentioned Dave Trott’s CST blog before, but why not throw out another mention.
Dave is approaching one of those legendary ‘ad men’ statuses, perhaps. The tales he recalls and weaves on his blogs entertain, educate and provide decades of insight into the complex business of advertising, marketing and client relations. I wouldn’t be surprised if in 20 years time he’ll be recalled amongst the Ogilvys and Ardens of this world.
In a recent article, he talks about how you should sell the client what they want to hear, as opposed to telling them what to do. At least with regards to winning pitches.
This ties in a little with an article I wrote a while back on designing with empathy. My point is that although we, as design/marketing/advertising professionals, think we know best as this is our business. We don’t. Not all the time.
Jimi Hendrix (I believe) once said “Knowledge speaks, Wisdom listens”.
There’s the key.
Listening.
Jon Steel’s brilliant book Perfect Pitch opens with a chapter on presentation crimes; a fundamental overview of mistakes made when pitching or presenting. In this chapter he looks at how so many agencies, even the top dogs, sometimes fail to understand the needs of the audience.
The objective is not to impress clients with your intelligence, to make them feel stupid or belittle their business strategies.
The aim of the game is to get inside their heads and prove that you can provide them with what they need, with what they want.
This requires 3 things above all else.
The ability to listen. The ability to empathise. The ability to communicate your ideas effectively.
Personally, if you can’t do the above, you’re in the wrong business.
From Perfect Pitch:
Your every word, your every action, will pass through the filter of their [the client] experience, expectations, prejudices, hopes and fears. It’s thus not what you say that is important. It’s how they will receive it. And how they will process it.
We consider ourselves a creative agency. We get a real buzz out of coming up with ideas and crafting infectious visuals. And we have short attention spans.
Clients don’t always care about creative, or new, or original.
Sometimes they want safety, or affordability, speed or just want to look like the competition.
They don’t care what we like or what we want to do.
But it’s our job to care what they want.
Otherwise we don’t get paid. And that’s no fun for anyone.
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ad said:
Agreed that it’s the creative agency’s job to figure the client out empathetically, work out what it is they need and advise accordingly. But “just want[ing] to look like the competition” is a shit goal and never what any business actually needs.
What they want and what they need rarely tally, so when the agency’s hired to consult (and if they weren’t, they’d just be a web shop/mac operators), the client needs to be told!
Nathan said:
That’s a good point Adam, although it’s important to try and get into the mind of the client and provide what’s best for them; there can be a fine line between empathy and being a sycophant.
Professional SEO Company said:
Adam.. Very good post. And I m 100% agree with you. I have personally gone through many times that we try to give extra creativity to our client but at that time he was looking for simplicity.. So at that time there will be know value of creativity.. no matter how much you work hard for creativity..
From such incidents I learn that we can give some extra to our clients is good but after fulfilling his core requirements.
Reno Web Design said:
Great post. Too often we find ourselves suggesting additions to client website projects that, we know would be great for their business, but they simply don’t want it. I can count a number of projects in the past where we have gone the extra mile, and the client didn’t understand the reason why, nor the effort behind it. Thanks for the great tips!
Nathan said:
Thanks Reno.
Sometimes it’s a case of educating the client, sometimes there’s no point going the extra mile if you’ll never get anything back for it. But that shouldn’t stop you, eh?!
Cha said:
‘The ability to listen. The ability to empathise. The ability to communicate your ideas effectively.”
This is so true and so hard.
No matter how creative you are having all the magnificent, colorful, fantastic designs but if you don’t know how to listen, empathize their needs and requirements. It’s a big waste of time and energy.
Sadly, some of the clients want the similar design with their direct competitors instead of something original. That’s so uncool.