Okay… there are several possible answers, all legitimate, depending on how you perceived the question. While not exactly a trick question, it was definitely tricky, and it reveals a common booby trap that small business advertisers fall into with predictable regularity.
If you chose ANY remedy at all, regardless of your reason for choosing it, you made this fundamental mistake… how can we know if a remedy will be effective or not if we don’t yet know what we’re trying to cure?
In the medical profession, it’s illegal to prescribe a remedy without first diagnosing the problem. You can go to jail! The same isn’t quite true of small business advertising… instead, you just pay heavy penalties in the form of wasted time, effort and money.
If you were clever, and chose none of the remedies for this reason (that you didn’t yet know what the problem was that you were trying to cure), you missed an equally valid point… the operative word in the question is FEEL. You were NOT asked which one you THINK offers the most effective cure!
Remember the third point to be kept in mind? "Attitude and perception are emotional.”
This question was about emotional response, not rational response. The truth is, most people — small business advertisers and their customers and prospects included — buy for emotional reasons, not rational ones. Instead, they rationalise their emotional choices to minimise any emotional risk involved! (Example – the guy who buys a Porsche because “my accountant told me it will appreciate in value over the next two years!” Yeah… right. That’s why he’ll never drive it in case it suddenly and dramatically depreciates in value! Pigs might fly, too.)
The secret here is to understand why people buy (and why they don’t), and to use that understanding with intelligence and integrity, so that you help your prospect do the right thing (buy from you, at your price) for the right reason (emotional and rational).
If you ignore this pivotal issue in planning your advertising, your risk of failure is almost 100%.
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Test Number Three |
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This page updated 23 August 2002.