Experience Matters

When Marketing Feels Shallow, Go Deep

Originally published at Ad Age, Digital Next

These days, I find myself in a unique position.  I talk and people listen.  Don’t get me wrong, I get challenged fairly regularly (thankfully), but for whatever reason, people are willing to hear me out.  Sometimes I wonder why.  But then I think about one of the stories I once told during a few of my earlier speaking engagements.  In the movie “The Doctor,” William Hurt plays a smart and capable hospital physician with terrible bedside manners.  Then his world gets turned upside down when he gets terribly sick.  His story unfolds as he undertakes a journey as a patient, seeing and experiencing things from the other side of the bed.  His whole perspective changes once he knows what it feels like to be sick; as his body heals, he contemplates his past actions.  Needless to say, when Hurt’s character returns to full health and begins practicing again, he comes at it with the empathy that one can only have when you’ve experienced something for yourself.

The problem with marketing is that it often doesn’t allow marketers to go deep, to gain an intimate understanding of human behavior.  We’re strapped for time, spread thin and torn between making our clients or bosses happy while trying to do what we think is right.  We’ve got access to the latest trend reports, market segments, personas and metrics.  We’re surrounded by smart, capable people who, like William Hurt’s character, know what they are doing.  But there’s a question we need to ask ourselves.  Are we making the time to walk in the shoes of the people we market to?  Are we willing to swim in the deep end?

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