Quote of the Day

“The world is changing very fast. Big will not beat small anymore. It will be the fast beating the slow.”

-Rupert Murdoch

 

Awesome quote from a wise 77 year old global media/Internet mogul who makes business moves with the heart and vision of a 24 year old cowboy.

Don’t send mixed messages

I’ve been all over the place this past month and just settled back home in Connecticut for about a month.  I absolutely love sports and I find working out a fantastic form of stress relief, which means one of the first things I made sure to do was get a gym membership when I got to Connecticut.

Well the other week I noticed something at my new gym/family health center — they have a Dunkin’ Donuts smack dab in the middle of the place.  I’m not really sure who, what, when, why, where, or how this happened, but I think it’s absolutely incredible that someone signed off on such a thing.  When I think of health, fitness, and exercise, Dunkin’ Donuts just doesn’t come close to appearing in my mental cloud.  There should be no reason why I have to breathe in the smell of donuts after a hard workout.  There should be no reason why little kids learn to associate Dunkin’ Donuts with exercise.  A place like a gym/fitness center should only have 1 message: improving your health (or some variation of that message).  And that applies across products/services.

So this leads me to the idea of marketing in general: don’t send mixed messages.  It’s counter productive and ruins the trust you create with people.  The whole energy and congruence behind whatever you are building is lost on the consumer when you send them mixed messages.