When your brand has been around for 50 years and even your grandparents recognize your company s name, marketing isn t just about getting the word out. Dropping a cool mil for 30 seconds of Super Bowl fame would not put a dent in our recognition numbers and, unfortunately, wouldn t help me with the back-end issues that impede many of our best online marketing plans. I cannot reveal the name of my company, but let s just say you ve probably worn our shoes or our clothes at some point in your life. We were one of the first non-tech companies to launch a Web site, way back in 1996, when Netscape was king of the browsers.
Many people think marketing is a lot of smoke and mirrors, with a dash of research thrown in.
In reality, we ve found that when it comes to running a Web site, much less an online store, smoke and mirrors are the least of our worries. Both of us are willing to invest seemingly endless piles of money to solve our respective problems. And what, you ask, are my problems. Customers on our site are like ghosts running around in my living room. I only see them when they bump into something.