Reading through LinkedIn posts, it appears that everyone these days is a “marketer” or derivative thereof. (That’s bypassing all the “storytellers” by the way).
But if my experiences of the last few days show anything, in all this clamour to be a “marketer”, many companies and individuals inside those companies, have forgotten why they are there.
No, it’s not to “market”, it is to serve the public who buy your widgets, and therefore indirectly, pay your wages.
There is absolutely no point in putting together a brilliant marketing plan if your front line lets you down and you have disgruntled customers.
By way of example, in the last few days I have needed a specific sort of widget, quite commonly used in the video and audio trade.
Now I am the first to admit that I am not based in a state capital, instead being in a region, that is nonetheless, the 2nd biggest city in this state and with a few exceptions, everything you need is right here; as long as it’s not Pizza Hut anyway. But yes, there is Hardly Normal, the Good Guys, Retravision, Bunnings (x2), JB HiFi and so forth and so on.
A phone call to a store that the website of the maker of said widget said stocked the item (and this is a major company in the home appliance, music and computer trade) simply rang out.
Twice.
So I tried another store and was put on hold. And left on hold. For 10 minutes. So I hung up.
Try retailer # 1 again. This time it answered and the person on t’other end said, “I’ll put you through to the right person”. And again I was left on hold, after which 5 minutes time this time I hung up.
Ring #1 back again, “Sorry,” said the cheery person at the other end, “I’ll get them to call you straight back”. Two days later and still no call.
The 3rd store I rang had slightly better results in that someone answered straight away, and I was transferred to the right person, who it turned out didn’t answer. After a minute, I ended up back at the switch, who apologised and said she’d try again. Rinse repeat.
She again apologised, said she would check out what was going on and after a minute said “Very sorry, but he is very, very busy. Can you call back?”
That’ll be a no then.
Hmmm…. I wonder why Amazon, Temu, AliBaba and so on are so attractive?