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Is it time to banish the word 'solutions' from business language? Here is a back issue of Marketing Booster, the email newsletter that Richard Groom writes and sends free every fortnight to subscribers. You can subscribe here or read over 60 back issues using the back issues index page. Something is happening to the world of marketing. Something that doesn't make sense. Something that is getting worse every day. It started out as good idea but now it's out of hand. And it has to stop. It's the obsession that marketers seem to have with the word 'solutions'. It's everywhere. You can't escape it. I suppose it makes sense in one way: marketers want to show that their product or service provides a solution to a problem. But I think it's gone too far now. The UK supermarket chain Tesco used to sell 'ready meals'. We all knew what they were: stick 'em in a microwave and they're ready. But now they call them 'meal solutions'. The breakdown club RAC used to provide 'motoring services' and 'breakdown assistance'. But now they give you 'RAC Solutions'. Computer companies seem to call EVERYTHING 'solutions'. They even seem obsessed with using the word in their company names. I ran a search for 'IT solutions' on Google and in the first three pages of results there were 14 IT companies with "solutions" in their name. Then I searched for 'Peterborough solutions' and there were 11 companies with 'solutions' in their name in the first two pages of results. The Plain English Campaign reports that: "In his book 'Men and Sheds' (New Holland Press), Gordon Thorburn looks at the irritating side of modern language. He reports a case where Angus McTruck Road Haulage, recently renamed Angus McTruck International Logistics, saw their PR agency recommend a new corporate livery based on the legend 'AMIL total supply chain solutions'. Mr McTruck kicked the agency out, saying he had recently seen 'access solutions' on a set of scaffolding, 'interment and cremation solutions' at an undertaker's, and fully expected shortly to see 'solution solutions' on a notice board beside the sewage works." So I want to send out a rallying call to marketers everywhere: Come on people! Let's be imaginative! Let's spend more than two minutes coming up with a name for something that doesn't use the word solutions! Another alarming trend in marketing communications is the use of the phrase 'meets all your needs'. You see statements like 'we meet all your holiday needs' from travel companies. I wonder whether this phrase actually means anything to anyone. A client of mine conducted some research among their potential customers. When they asked people what they wanted from the service in question, only four per cent said 'something that meets my needs'. But 50 per cent said 'something with value for money'. But surely value for money IS about meeting needs, so why the discrepancy? Why didn't everyone say 'something that meets my needs'? Maybe it's because people think specific. I bet you've never said to a friend something like: "I'm going to buy a new washing machine and I will choose something that meets all my washing needs." But I bet you have said something like: "I want a machine that's quieter than my old one." So why do we see so much marketing material that says 'this product will meet all your needs' and leaves it at that? One way out of these traps for marketers is to take the time to really understand people's problems and their needs. Then you can express those problems, those needs, and SPECIFIC information about how you meet their needs in your marketing materials. (Or you could just call everything 'solutions' and hope that works.) Copyright 2003 Richard Groom |