Wow, who would have thought something as seemingly trivial as a font change could unleash a torrent of complaints.  But that’s exactly what happened to Swedish furniture maker IKEA.

Unlike most large companies with either indifferent or down right hostile customers IKEA has fans.  So many fans in fact, they have an online community with forums where users can talk about their furniture, products, stores, and share ideas.

According to IKEA they have the most frequently printed catalog in the world.  Previously IKEA used the font Futura in their catalog, BUT someone in the company decided to change the font to Verdana.

Now at the risk of setting off a fire storm I’d like to at least put in a good word for the poor person behind the decision.  Verdana is a preferred font choice for text that will be viewed on line because most viewers find it easier to read than many other fonts.

However, what was overlooked was how this seemingly itsy bitsy teensy weensy change would impact IKEA’s beloved fans.  They love the company so much and feel so much ownership they felt insulted when the company to decided to change their experience without asking them.  Uh-oh!

Now the rest of us would be jumping up and down doing the happy dance if we had such a fan club.  What we can learn from this example is the power of relationship marketing and why it’s so important to think relationships first sales second in our marketing efforts.

We want our clients to feel a part of our business too.  Even it that means they get mad at us for changing something seemingly insignificant in our business.  If we can generate that kind of emotion over a little change then we know we’ve done the best job we could do developing a relationship with our clients.

Kudos to IKEA I admire what you’ve been able to accomplishment.  I’ve no doubt you’ll get yourself out of this sticky wicket all the better for it.

For the rest of us I wonder what about our business creates a feeling of relationship with us… And more importantly what could we do to better create relationships?

Any examples that particularly stand out for you of a business doing a good job developing relationships with their clients and potential clients?

photo credit: MShades

The short answer is there should be no difference whatsoever.  The confusion comes from what you experience and what you may be hearing now.  So let’s sort this all out.

Most business owners, entrepreneurs, and SOHO’s aren’t clear about what marketing is supposed to do.  Marketing has one objective.  That objective is to create relationships.  Boy do I wish I had understood that from the beginning.

Marketing is really about making friends.  Therefore, all good marketing is relationship marketing.  You read the “good” part didn’t you?

Just like when most people hear the word “salesperson” they immediately think about the worst of the worst… the same is true when it comes to how many business owners think about marketing.  You immediately think of the examples of marketing communications that do little more than scream you need to buy and you need to buy now.

The world is not made up of zombies haunting the streets in search of what you sell.  Even the people who do want to buy your stuff will not respond to in-your-face marketing tactics and techniques.  Instead most people are either looking for INFORMATION, or they are open to information about something that could be of interest to them.

Bottom line when it comes to marketing you want to evaluate the way you approach creating those relationships through your marketing communications.

Think about why you develop relationships with some people and not others.  Do you share a common interest or desire?  Do you have a common goal or challenge?  Probably.

You’ve also probably met a lot of people in your life that could have developed into relationships yet they didn’t go anywhere.  Did you do anything beyond the introduction to sustain the relationship?  Were there opportunities for interaction and engagement?  Hmmm, pretty obvious why things just kind of went nowhere.

So, if the purpose of marketing is to create relationships then our marketing must:

• Focus on what the other person wants to hear
• Provide a way to get information about that
• Allow the other person to gain a sense of who you are and what you are about
• Nurture the relationship by continuing to add value
• Provide opportunities for interaction and engagement

And above all don’t take yourself so seriously.  Some of the worst marketing efforts I’ve ever seen were created by business owners who wanted to create the illusion they were a big company when they weren’t… who insisted on using incomprehensible “corporatese” when a simple message would have worked so much better.  No matter what… people buy from people.  The people you market to need to know you are a real person who really cares about what they think… who really wants to help them.

A less than perfect sincere marketing message is a thousand times more powerful than a perfect impersonal one.

Can you think of a really bad marketing communication you’ve gotten lately?  What could the sender have changed to make the message work for you?

photo credit: pjf@cpan