People do feelings more than they would like to admit

Patsy and I were talking the other night. I love the fact I have a friend called Patsy. I have yet to see her falling down the stairs, Bolly- soaked and beehive akimbo, but somehow I just know she has it in her. Buried under her self-confessed Volvo-style behaviour is a MaseratiGhibli just screaming to get out. Anyhoo, talking to Patsy made me think of a new client I’m working with.

I restrict myself to five clients with a couple bubbling under the surface waiting for lift-off. I am what they call ‘sector-neutral’. In other words, I will work with anyone. I long since abandoned the idea that deep sector knowledge was essential. I don’t even think it’s useful much of the time so long as the team know their stuff. I like asking the dumb questions. I like not knowing things. It makes life so much more interesting.

Anyway, this new client is so far out of my range of experience as to be from a different planet. Think cool; hip; edgy; experiential. I had to look that last bit up.

Now I know I’m not cool. I like to think I might be edgy but then I see my kids and realise I am, well, not. But aspiring to engines matters to me. It matters to lots of us. And the new project appealed because the client is in the business of making un-cool things become cool by making the customers’ experience of them cool. Like, say, washing machines.

Now, for those of you humming with your fingers in your ears and muttering, ‘the emperor’s got no clothes on’ – let me explain. Firstly, I think most marketing is bullshit. Sorry, marketing peeps the world over. You can take your plimsolls and sunnies and slink off into the sunset with your absinthe. But, for anyone who sat through the Olympics – the genius, passion, emotion – the Opening and Closing ceremonies were, George Michael aside, cool.

They were Britain at its bonkers, idiosyncratic, irreverent, dramatic, creative best. We loved it. We got it. And getting something cool made us feel good, and it helped us buy into the glorious Olympic games that followed.

We are a nation of inventors, creators and innovators. Napoleon’sslur about us being a nation of shopkeepers was sheer jealousy. Shopkeepers make, buy and sell things. Things that people don’t just want or need; things that people covet.

The more your customers love what you sell and the way that you sell it, the more they buy. Because we don’t buy because we NEED stuff. We buy because we WANT stuff. We want to feel the way that stuff will make us feel. And before you dismiss this as capitalist propaganda, helping people feel good is good. If what we buy – goods, services, whatever (I always wanted to just say ‘whatever’) makes us feel good, not just in the moment but long term, it’s a good thing all round.

Which is why both Patsy and I have Smeg cookers. Bought independently, years apart. Neither is our first Smeg cooker. For her, it’s her fourth, for me my second. Her first, second and third were all, if not shit, pretty rubbish. But we love them because they look and feel cool and buying and owning them makes us feel good too.

I have also escalated to a Smeg dishwasher, which is so achingly gorgeous in my kitchen that I don’t care that it leaves the dishes a tad iffy. Instead, I stroke its smooth rounded edges and caress its retro finish and purr happily at the sheer joy of owning it.

Now I’m not suggesting you start making inferior products or delivering inferior services. What I am saying is focus on making and delivering gob-smackingly good, creative solutions and make your customers’ experience of them and you g-o-o-d. Then they’ll keep coming back and start telling people all about you. What makes you stand out could be how you talk to them on the phone; who you connect them with; the total WOW factor of your responsiveness; a piece of market research they didn’t know. It will be something that differentiates you and gives you the edge over others.

Because people buy feelings. They just don’t know it.