Flat Cat Marketing - The 10 Flat Cat Rules

The 10 Flat Cat Rules

1. Fruit ain't apples

Apples maybe fruit but that doesn't mean fruit is apples. It's a common misconception, but advertising is only one small part of the marketing process. You can have marketing without advertising but you should never have advertising without marketing. You can't expect to make fruit salad with only apples.

2. Stick to the facts

In business, you can't afford to take things for granted. Business success depends on making the right decisions and the best decisions are based on the best information. Innovation comes from questioning established beliefs that are not founded on facts. When you know your information is fact, you can have confidence in your solutions.

3. You are no one - you know nothing.

Business owners think they know what staff want. Staff think they know what the business owner wants. Both think they know what customers want. But very few ask questions. It doesn't matter how much experience you have in the industry or how well you know the business. Sometimes you just have to accept the fact that you will only get the right answers when you ask the right people the right questions.

4. Everything matters

Never assume that something won't make a difference. Anything can make a difference. The question you need to ask is whether it is more likely to make a good difference or a bad difference. The "butterfly effect" (from chaos theory) suggests a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil could cause a tornado in Texas. The idea is that a tiny difference in initial conditions could have a drastic effect on long-term outcomes.

5. Money talks

Don't bother asking staff what customers want. Don't bother asking colleagues, advisors, or marketing gurus. Customers are the ones putting up the money so they are the best ones to tell you what the strengths of your business are.

6. Treat the cause

Diagnosing the real cause of a problem may be harder, but the end result is far more effective. Remember, a problem doesn't have to be a "problem". We view "increasing sales" as a problem that needs solving. But if you view the problem in the short term, you end up treating the symptom - like buying some product yourself. The same problem will be back tomorrow. By taking a longer view of the problem, you can find out what causes people to buy more product. Then you can have thousands of people buying product every day.

7. Marketing is relationship management

Marketing is not as simple as "increasing sales" or "advertising". It's about how customers relate to the product and how the product relates to customers. Public Relations is about a wider relationship, including stakeholders other than customers and the general public.

8. Believe in the numbers

Eventually, the numbers always win. A marketing strategy that gives you a slight advantage may not appear to do so straight away. But, eventually, anomalies fade into statistical insignificance. The inverse also is true. We know that poker machines and casinos hold a slight advantage and will, therefore, always win. You may make some money in the short term, but eventually the numbers will tell. The longer you play, the more guaranteed you are of going broke.

9. Perception is reality

I know it's good quality, you know it's good quality. But if the customer thinks it's cheap and nasty, then in the customer's reality, it is cheap and nasty. Unfortunately, the decision to buy is made in the customer's reality. As much as it may hurt to admit - saying "people think that but it's not true" is a waste of oxygen. You can't just make a product better quality and value, you have to make people believe it is better quality and value.

10. We're not selling to you

If you don't like your new slogan or logo or new advertisement, that's fine. We're not selling to you. We're selling to your customers. If your customers don't like it, then we have a problem. Business owners and managers are often not part of the target market so they have to remove their opinions from the decision-making process and focus on the real target.