How Does Your Marketing Stack Up?

 How Does Your Marketing Stack Up?

Standing out in a crowded marketplace is actually very simple.

If you know what to do. And if you actually make a point to do it.

I was reminded of this over the holidays as I was browsing through my “Old-Fashioned Ideas” Library that sits above my desk on THE SHELF. The books and tapes that make it to THE SHELF have to earn their way by virtue of the fact that they offer timeless truths.

Too often, as marketers, we find ourselves distracted by The Next Shiny Thing. Some guru pontificating about how he/she has discovered a new way to …whatever.

Bottom line: The basics never change. And if you put them in place, you will see the results you want – as this little story points out.

I was reading Ultimate Marketing Plan by Dan Kennedy, one of my old-fashioned (and extremely wealthy) mentors.

He tells the story about a trip to Montreal where he stayed at a hotel called The Lord Berri. (I know exactly where it is too because I grew up in Montreal.)

Next to the hotel is a parking lot. There’s nothing distinctive about it. And it’s not the kind of place where you’d expect anything above minimal service.

One evening, Dan and some associates decided to go out for dinner and went to the lot to get their rental car to go out in search of a good restaurant.

On the stool, leaning against a hut: an overweight guy with a beer, wearing a T-shirt. The Parking Lot Guy.

Nothing distinctive about him either. In fact, the kinda guy you might run into in any North American parking lot.

But this Parking Lot Guy is an exciting reminder that you dare not judge all books by their covers.

As they approached the attendant, he said, “Where do you gentlemen want to go with your car tonight?” Kennedy and his associates explained they were headed for an Italian restaurant they’d found advertised in a magazine.

“No,” he told them, “you do not want to go there. There are much better Italian restaurants much closer, even within walking distance.”

When’s the last time YOU had this kind of interest from someone. (Important point to remember here: The Parking Lot Guy already had their business.)

A 15-minute conversation ensued during which The Parking Lot Guy asked about the group’s preferences, he got out a telephone directory and called several restaurants to determine how late they were serving, what their specials were, even what wine they had in stock. Once the group decided on a restaurant, he drew them a map and gave them directions.

The Parking Lot Guy – for $7 a day – was taking better care of the group than the staffs at most of the hotels they stayed in at $100, $150 or even $200 a day! (This event took place 15 years ago but think about how timeless his response below is when the group thanked him for being so polite, concerned, friendly and knowledgeable.)

He said:

That’s my business; that’s what I sell. I’m in the service business. If I can help a person or make friends with a person when he brings his car here for the first time, then the next time he has to park his car downtown, he’ll remember me and my place. He may even tell somebody else to park their car here. If he comes back a number of times, then I’m building a stable business. Then he’s not worth a few dollars to me, he may be worth a hundred dollars to me in a year. In my lifetime, he could pay to send one of my kids to college for a year. If I have enough of that kind of customer, then I have a truly valuable business. You can’t do that just by parking cars. There are hundreds of car lots. They’ve all got parking spaces. We have to give service.

The Parking Lot Guy gives us a solid foundation around which to build our marketing stories.

Gerry Black is a Marketing Writer based in Toronto, Canada
and serving clients in the U.S. and Canada.