Are You Are Wasting Money On Direct Mail

A lot of houses have sold in my neighborhood. Evident from the flyers stuffed in my box from real estate agents who have told me so. Some are printed on some decent stock paper but most on normal paper that you would find in a photocopier.

Some have their pictures on them, some have all their qualifications, their million dollar clubs etc..

One in particular highlighted Bank rates, gift ideas, color schemes and selling your house over the Christmas season. It was more of newsletter. I get it. Stand out from the rest.

Waste of money.

The rationale for using direct mail is that it costs peanuts and one sale will more than cover the costs for years to come.

Your direct mail piece makes no connection with me.

And to the "one hour" company that thinks by hand writing my name and address, with their return address only and an actual stamp is going to work, guess again.

The first time you did get me to open it. Fool me once shame on you.

No fooling the second time and it went right into the garbage.

And as for a referral, don't hold your breath.


Tony Mariani

3 Things I Don't Understand About Retail

1. Why you will only open two registers when you have five and the lineup for the two registers is almost out the door.

2. That your employees have not been versed on the flyer you sent out.

3. You want me to join your frequent customer club, then make sure all your franchise stores are linked to the one main data base. I went into a different location than I normally shop at and was told by the cashier that each store has their own data base. I didn't have time to give all the information all over again just to get my 15% discount.

Tony Mariani

Why Retail Can Be Hard

A quick 6 pack of my experience to buy a car charger for my cell phone.

1. Your staff member grunted at me instead of hello.
2. Your staff member had to ask me to repeat myself twice busy he was to busy talking and laughing with a co-worker.
3. Your staff member then grunted and pointed to the back wall where the car charger I needed was instead of going over and getting it for me.
4. I had to wait to pay because your employee was to busy trying to call into a radio station to win a contest.
5. I then got the rolling of the eyes when I asked if I could get my purchase bagged.
6. And lastly. Tell your employees the only phone your employees should be answering is yours, NOT their cell phone!

Tony Mariani

What Do Your Ads Say

Platitudes in ads. There are some beauties out there, but topping the chart has to be, "qualified and knowledgeable staff".

Its a wild assumption, but chances are that quite a few of your customers have used the internet and are pretty knowledgeable themselves.

Qualified and knowledgeable staff, 25 years in business, lots of free parking gives the consumer not one good reason to shop at your store.

Ask your customers why they shop at your store and see if you can find a theme. Use that information to craft an ad you can shout about.


Tony Mariani

You Know Your Customer Service Sucks When...

This is an Air Canada customer service response to a customer's complaint after the customer was bumped from four straight flights.

"We regret that you were dissatisfied with our response and our gesture of goodwill(the goodwill was 25% discount on the customer's next base fare flight)...while we understand that you are disappointed, we must remain consistent with our handling of similar requests for all customers".

Translation of last line: "We aren't going to do anything for you".

Here is what you should have done Air Canada.

Put the customer up in your Air Canada Lounge.

Buy them dinner and some beverages.

Upgrade them to business class when you finally put them on a flight.

If they are a frequent flyer bonus their account with miles for the inconvenience you caused them.

Offer them a free flight.

And to the tall foreheads at Air Canada, who wrote your customer service policy?

You don't ask a paying customer whom you have left a bad taste in their mouth to spend more money with you by offering a 25% discount on a full fare flight! That's not a gesture of goodwill, its an insult!

Tony Mariani

Pay Attention To Warranty Cards

Warranties. I often wonder if they are the biggest scam in the world. That little card when you buy a toaster, microwave or radio. I have even found one in a book shelf I bought. It warrantied the special screws.

Not that this is a a legitimate survey, but I asked 10 friends and co-workers if they have ever filled one of these warranty cards out. Zilch, zip, zero.

Take roof shingles. You can buy 10, 15, 20 and even 45 year shingles. But if you don't have the invoice for the shingles or fill out the warranty card, those shingles can be 100 year shingles, you are out of luck.

Have a look at this roof. These shingles are IKO 20 year shingles.



These shingles were put on 10 years ago.



This is the south side which gets most of the sun. Now look at the this picture of the north side of the house.



The warranty specialist at IKO who manufactured this shingles said, it looks like two different roofs.

This is my roof and no I did not install the shingles 10 years ago. When we bought the house, the shingles had been done the year before. No we do not have the bill and the previous owner was unable to find his records of the project.

I wasn't looking for them to give me free shingles to fix the south side just a break in the price to replace them. Pleading with the warranty specialist at IKO it looked like there was a glimmer of hope for a great deal on the shingles.

After a long pause came the question, "Are your soffits vented", asked the specialist. No my soffits are not vented but I do have three roof vents and a front to back airway in house peaks.

"Given your roof size you need at least 4 roof vents and the soffits need to also have venting. Your problem is you are getting to much hot air trapped in your attic and its causing your shingles to bake. Your problem is a venting issue not a manufacturing issue".

Which brings me back to the warranty. These shingles could have been 19 years old and I could have had the invoice and the crew's bill who installed them and that warranty would all mean bumpkiss. You see right in their FAQ section under Roof Types and Designs, how much ventilation do I need, there is a link to the CASMA site which goes on to explain how much you need, blah blah blah..

Now science was not my strong point in school and I did miss a lot of shops classes. But with all the hot air trapped in my roof wouldn't you think that the north side of my roof would have some "baking" to the shingles considering there are NO vents on my north side?

"Warranties, what are they good for, absolutely nothing"

I am thinking the warranty specialist at IKO might be full of hot air.

Tony Mariani

Pay Me Now United Airlines Or Pay Me Later

Dave Carroll's story is going to cause United Airlines nothing but headaches. In a nutshell, Carroll is aboard a United Airlines flight waiting to take off and witnesses the baggage handlers break his guitar.

United will not acknowledge the incident nor pay the $3500 to replace the instrument. So Carroll has created the first of three videos about the incident. You tube reports almost 2.5 million people have watched the funny music video.

You would think that someone at United would have handled this thing by now. Can you say Domino's Pizza and the public relations nightmare they went through earlier this year.

Hey United, get thee to some social media classes. This is going to leave a huge mark!





Tony Mariani