What my son's teacher can teach all of us
27 September 2009
A week ago I had to rush my 9-year-old son to hospital... Accident & Emergency. He'd been running in the playground, tripped, and split his head open on a wall.There was lots of blood. Almost immediately his shirt was crimson with it.
But I never saw that. By the time my wife and I got there his teachers had bandaged his head and changed him into his PE shirt. Our job was to get him to hospital fast.
So I never saw the blood, and I never saw the crimson shirt. I never saw it because that night his teacher took it home and washed it.
Let me say that again. She took his shirt home and washed it!
I find that extraordinary. I find that inspiring. I find myself thinking (not for the first time) how much better we could and should treat these extraordinary people.
Footnote: My boy is fine. They literally glued him back together!
Posted by Nick Warren at 6:43 PM
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How to keep a Client for 10 years!
14 September 2009
A while ago I escaped to London for a weekend. It was great... all except the hotel.Don't misunderstand me. It was beautiful to look at. Inside the revolving doors was a lovely, lofty foyer... replete with doormen, concierges & potted plants. Everything was pretty much perfect, right up to the point where they took my money.
As I left the foyer things changed. The lifts were slow, the carpets threadbare... the corridor walls water-damaged! The beds were lumpy.
I'd been sold a dud and of course I'll never go back. Would you?
Question: When is a hotel foyer not just a hotel foyer?
Answer: When it's marketing.
I use that hotel sometimes when I'm explaining the "Semantic" difference. We don't have a flashy foyer... if anything our "packing" is low key and understated.
So the question is how can we possibly compete with those other guys? How do we survive against agencies who are bigger, flashier, smarter and yes... more attractive than we are?
You know the answer. We focus on the relationship... or to put it another way... on the rooms and corridors behind the foyer. Business shouldn't be that simple, but it turns out it mostly is.
Something to be proud of
Right now we are designing a new site for an international Client. That's cool, but the really cool thing is that we first began working with them over ten years ago. Ten years!
Think about that. Ten years ago they came through Semantic's "foyer" and took a room. Since then they've come back time and time and again.
That's something we are hugely proud of. That's why we focus on the room, not the foyer.
Posted by Nick Warren at 1:16 PM
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