This is slightly twisted and turned, but if you think about it...it kind of makes sense: In any business/sector with a direct or indirect service component, great advertising can actually work against you.
Take Citi's whole identity theft campaign. It's breakthrough and award-winning, but at the end of the day, it's a bank that - when last I checked - acted like a bank.
Or how about American Express. You don't get more aspirational than "My Life. My Card" or how about their "OPEN: for small business" value proposition/promise. We understand you and your business is a great selling point, provided of course there's any semblance of authenticity. There's also Visa's "Life Takes" thrust, which is as open-armed and amorphous as can be. But does Life also take hold times, reenter your card number and 15 direct mailers in your box?
Here's where great advertising is akin to running a marathon with your laces untied - you might see the finish line in sight, but you also might slip and break your neck. When a consumer sets foot into your store/bank/site and/or dials your 800-number, do you they encounter they same aspirational high-ground? Do you they get their frustations solved and solutions "Delivered"?
I guess my point is this - if your follow-through; your customer service; your after-sale support is anything less than the advertising which sets it up, then you're being set up for failure.
Perhaps you should find an agency capable of delivering truly mediocre advertising solutions (thankfully, these are the norm nowadays as opposed to the exception) or manage your customers' expectations accordingly by setting the bar incredibly low.
'cos investing in your CRM/RM side of the business isn't exactly going to send you to Cannes, now is it?
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