Ikea have switched from using the classic font Futura to using Verdana in their catalogues. This bright idea has been put into practice by someone who doesn’t fully understand fonts. Verdana looks okay on screen but really isn’t great on paper. There are lots of wonderful fonts that look much better. Ikea are sacrificing their [...]
September 2nd, 2009
Change the font, change the world.
August 26th, 2009
Online sales grew in July
The UK Press Association reports that “Shoppers spent £4.2 billion online in July, 15.7% more than was spent in June and 16.8% more than July 2008.”
The report goes on to say that: “Clothing retailers have also been effective in turning more visits to their websites into final purchases in July, due to more [...]
August 12th, 2009
The product is worth the price
People can do without luxury items. They don’t like going without premium products. Even whilst moaning about the credit crunch shoppers are still splashing out on things they can justify to themselves as “worth it”. Discounter supermarkets were all the rage in 2008 but in 2009 their growth has slowed dramatically. Conversely the premium store [...]
August 5th, 2009
This book is free AND worth having
Chris Anderson’s books are worth reading so when I saw that his new book was being advertised as a free eBook I jumped at the chance to claim my copy. I was truly excited, feeling that I had stumbled upon a great and generous offer. I had a window open to Facebook ready to post [...]
July 29th, 2009
The look of the thing
I love being able to buy books in Tesco and I am grateful that I can get a paperback for the same price as a magazine. It means that I get to read all the best sellers once they’ve been made popular by other people. I’ve even read the whole of the much derided Twilight [...]
July 8th, 2009
Customers have all the power
“The customer is always right” is a terrible phrase that haunts those in retail. Anyone who has ever worked retail (or hospitality or in fact anywhere that is public-facint) knows that the customer can be not just wrong but downright unreasonable.
What is important however is that you resolve as many customer issues as possible. Nowadays [...]
July 1st, 2009
Making direct mail about the product
A good marketer understands that when sending unsolicited direct mail you’re trying to get people’s attention. Presentation is important, but the most important thing is to be generous, and to be generous without strings. “Free” is great. “Free – if you sign a two-year contract” isn’t being generous. It’s an incentive but it’s not generosity. [...]