Why YOU Are A Lousy Focus Group

We've all done it. We've pigeon-holed agencies and their work. (I'm even recorded doing it on episodes of The BeanCast.) We say, "I could have done better," or "I can't stand those ads." We relegate whole shops to the waste can on the value of what we perceive to be a bad campaign and wish, "They would just stop running those god-awful ads."

But here's a dirty little secret: You weren't in the briefings. Neither was I. And maybe — just maybe — the agency actually doing the work knows what they're doing better than a guy running a marketing podcast or you sitting in your office.

Take Wal-Mart for instance. It's easy to dismiss the new creative work from Martin. It's not cool. It's not sexy. It's not press-worthy. It certainly isn't going to win any awards.

But Wal-Mart is kicking butt and taking names. True, part of this is due to an economy that is driving customers to discount shopping. But there's a lot of competition in the discount space these days. And Wal-Mart isn't just doing well with it's core audience. They are actually growing their audience.

Martin is not initiating a radical shift in the Wal-Mart strategy. But they have softened the edges just enough to allow the big blue box to be a little greener and a little more mainstream. And you can scoff at the new logo, but frankly, it's perfectly suited for the changes listed above.

We in this industry have a penchant for thinking we know what's best. We take our own design-based and advertising-press-influenced perspectives and thinks we have the answers to marketing problems. And usually those answers are quantum changes that push the envelope in every conceivable way. But sometimes things are working well and just need small movements in order to assure continued growth. And I say, kudos to The Martin Agency for recognizing this.

I bring all this up for a few reason.

• First and foremost, understand that we make fun of "focus-groups-of-one" for a reason. Even if we think we understand our audience and have been "doing this for twenty years," the market will always surprise us. Engage with your customers and prospects on an ongoing basis. Find out what they think. And don't just throw ads in front of them and ask them to react. That's the worst possible way to run a focus group. Find out what they want first and allow that to guide your strategy from the beginning.
• Second, understand the value of small moves. Just like we shouldn't throw out an entire image to do something "cooler," neither should we throw out things that build our brand in order to promote quick-hit sales volume. Let's face it, "lower-prices" which was Wal-Mart's last campaign should theoretically be a better message to move sales in a down market. But instead, the Martin campaign infuses a message that helps middle America envision themselves in the store. It's counter-intuitive, but it's proving the power of sticking to a branding effort that's in touch with your target-customer's lifestyle.
• Finally, be brave enough to do what's right. Just because a shop isn't going to win an ad club award for the work, doesn't make it the wrong thing to do. Agencies take a lot of heat over the VERY subjective matter of creative. Look past it toward the thinking. As a client of mine once said when coming to a choice over creative, "My picker is broken, so let's go back to the brief and see which achieves our objectives." Once he did this, more often than not he didn't choose the one he like best, but rather the one that worked hardest. Your "picker" is broken too. Accept it and move on.

Advertising is a business of ideas. Sometimes those ideas are creative. Sometimes they are pure strategy. Other times it's about math. And it's the blend of all three that makes the biggest differences in the business world.