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In the autobiography of Fred Pohl (SF writer), he talks about his stint
working in mail-out advertising after WWII. Someone had the idea to
print ads using scented ink. They sprayed some of the postcards with a
cheap but pleasant perfume and found that this test batch had about
double the usual response rate. Of course they couldn't spray a full run
by hand, so they sent gallon bottles of the perfume to the printer to
mix with the ink. When it came back the ink and scent had undergone some
sort of unhappy chemical reaction and the result smelled very strange
and not at all pleasant ("a little like rotting hibiscus").
Rather than waste the batch they sent the cards out. They didn't achieve
the double response rate but they still outsold the original, unscented
cards.
So that's an example of a screwy marketing ploy that worked. For those
of us who work on software projects, it's probably also a lesson in the
difference between testing a prototype and testing the real thing once
it's been through the full production process.
Stuart
Gene Kim-Eng wrote:
> As someone who started out working as an engineer and then moved
> over into this field and who has always been more or less "technical,"
> the two things that have always mystified me about marketing are
> (1) how anybody could think that some of the screwy things marketing
> people always want to say and do could possibly work to attract
> customers, and (2) that so many of them seem to work.
>
> Gene Kim-Eng
>
>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stuart Burnfield" <slb -at- westnet -dot- com -dot- au>
>
>> What I doubt has ever happened in the history of the world is that
>> someone was persuaded to buy a product because the first page of the
>> manual congratulated them on their purchase, or lauded the product as
>> being simple, powerful, advanced, popular, user friendly, industry
>> leading, blah blah zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
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