Organizations are constantly trying to come up with new ways to disrupt, interrupt and annoy in the name of advertising. We are surrounded by millions of little voices all shouting in our ears about how wonderful they are and how much we need their products and services.
The old school Marketer is trained to think like a circus trainer. The circus animal is the customer and needs to be made do what the organization wants it to, it doesn’t work so well on the Web. Online marketing and communication is about helping people do things.
To succeed on the Web we need to change our mentality from seeing ourselves as a circus trainer to being the apprentice. The customer is not just king the customer is the boss and we need to learn about what they need to do right now, and help them do that. The web customer is purposeful, directed and action-oriented. Each time we browse the web for information we set out to complete a task and as online marketers and organizations we need first and foremost to help them get to their destination. Then and only then to we gain the trust and a chance of introducing them the idea of a new journey.
