Paul Giamatti is a funny guy. If you haven’t seen Sideways, don’t worry, I won’t ruin it for you (I can’t stand when people do that to me :-).

Here’s a bare bones summary: two men go on a wine tour through Napa Valley, Giamatti as Miles and Thomas Haden Church as Jack.

Giamatti’s character is a neurotic writer anxiously awaiting news from a publisher. He’s so preoccupied that he flips out when asked to drink Merlot. He gives a pretty memorable rant as to why.

At any rate, Sideways exposed the fineries of California wineries (!) to the general public. People saw the movie because it got great reviews, and they walked away knowing just enough about wine to realize they didn’t know anything about it at all. People who had never dabbled in wine culture began to try their hand at it.

And guess what.

They didn’t drink Merlot.

According to one wine shop owner, sales of Merlot fell as much as twenty percent after the movie got popular. Seasoned oenophiles turned up their proverbial noses at this previously popular wine. It became the “faux pas” of the wine world.

On the one hand, people fresh out of the theaters were afraid to make a mistake. And the “experts” insisted that they had given up Merlot months ago. But the end was the same: a drastic drop in sales.

I’ve got two observations about this situation. Often, first-time customers new to a particular industry (especially one as stuffy and proper as wine) try hard not to make beginner mistakes.

To hear an expert say that he’s leaving the table if anyone orders Merlot is very influential. For the new customers, it’s better to err on the safe side and order a glass of chardonnay.

On the other hand, at any time your product can, for reasons impossible to predict, become extremely “uncool.” Some wineries had made killings for years selling Merlot, only to have their business snatched out from under them by a couple words from a fussy fictional writer.

If your business is overly dependent on one product, you’d better get a backup plan.

I’ve never tried merlot, and I’m not about to start now.

How about you?

I sat at my desk the other day brainstorming new strategies to get VQC’s name out there. A bunch of really wacky and creative ideas crossed my mind, but I rejected the lot of them. (For example: taking a video camera to an after-hours at the Chamber, sponsoring a businessperson “field day”, etc.) In the end I ended up pitching a relatively normal marketing tactic to Q.

I got to thinking, why am I (and so many other local marketers) so afraid to go out on a limb and propose something innovative and a little crazy? I mean really, what is there to be afraid of?

I think the hesitancy to stepping outside the “system” is due to the issue of blame. If you use the system and the results are less than spectacular, you have the system to fall back on. (”No new leads. The billboard salesman lied.”)

If you innovate, create and propose an entirely new idea that fails, the blame rests solely on you. (”Who ordered this twelve foot chicken anyway?”)

On the other hand, who gets the credit if a run-of-the-mill campaign succeeds? The system. (”We met 7 new contacts at the mixer last night. That membership finally paid off!”)

But…

If you innovate and create the twelve foot chicken that blows the lid off your sales and succeeds spectacularly, you’re the genius taking the credit.

So yeah, you and I can hide behind convention and maybe even make a decent buck or two. But when it comes to innovation, the rewards are so much greater if you take that risk.

We are a full-service _____ company. We offer custom solutions to ensure all your _____ needs are met.

This kind of writing is unengaging, relatively meaningless, and horribly bland. So why do companies consistently insist on using it?

I have a theory. Most businesses start by doing one thing: making chairs, selling books, making websites.

Over the years (or months if you’re lucky) these same companies add staff, knowledge, and resources allowing them to expand to new services or products. The people in charge are proud of that fact, and want cover all their bases to attract as many customers as possible.

That’s all great.

But your customers don’t care.

Yes, you do everything. So does everyone else. What makes you, PC Printing Solutions, a better graphic designer than Sleek Design and Graphics? Or Sleek Design and Graphics, why would I not let PC Printing Solutions do my printing, even though you do it in-house?

When customers come to you for the first time, they have one specific need that they need you to meet. And your marketing should focus on your core competency: the thing that you are known for.

If I go to buy a new phone, I don’t care that the phone store is “full-service telecom provider.” I came to get a new phone. (Notice I called it the “phone store” and not the “full-service telecom” store.)

Try and narrow your focus in your marketing. It will create an association in your customers mind (Oh you need a baseball glove Timmy? Go to Jim’s Baseball Building!). Nobody’s going to refer a kid to Donna’s Full-Service Leather Depot to buy a mitt.

PS: You can (and should!) bring out the “full service” artillery after you form a relationship with a client. Then, if she’s pleased with your performance and trusts you, she’ll be willing to turn over more of her operations to your company.

The best part: you’ve done it without advertising. It’s all been word of mouth and sales calls. Now that you have some extra dinero you’re looking to get into the advertising market.

Unless you’re an übertalented marketer-by-nature, you’re probably not an expert at converting a budget line into a brand new customer base. You know the world of office furniture or computer networks or custom knives much better than you know advertising.

Many people jumping into the local ad pool for the first time think that billboards, yellow pages, and eventually TV and radio spots are the ticket to success, mostly because when you think of “advertising,” those mediums immediately come to mind.

If you have the funds and drive to launch a full-spectrum assault on the local market, a combination of the three or four mediums could work for you.

But if you do it even a little wrong you’re bound to fail. And it’s not necessarily your fault, or even the fault of the mediums: more often than not it’s the ads themselves that are ill-conceived.

Each individual piece of advertising has a different purpose. Here are the three general categories of advertisements, what their purpose is, and the pitfalls of choosing incorrectly:

Direct Response Advertising

Direct response advertising has one goal, and one goal only: to make you take action right now! “Yeah! You! Get up and call! Now!” or “My three-step Webimizer will quintuple your traffic in 15 minutes! Sign up! Don’t think!” Like

· Infomercials

· QVC and HSN

· Local car dealership commercials

They’re not interested in your perception of their company; their only objective is making you take a specific course of action. Direct Response advertisements use a few classic sales tactics:

· Time sensitivity (Call within the next 5 minutes and you’ll get another amazing _____ absolutely free!)

· Testimonials to build credibility (”Well my husband and I just love our new _____!”)

· Very loud voices (OR BIG TEXT!!!)

Although these advertisements get annoying, they are extremely effective at doing what they’re designed to do: sell things. QVC’s website has one of the highest conversion rates on the internet, and I’ll bet you own at least one useless gadget you saw on an infomercial or a shopping network and couldn’t live without.

Brand Building Advertising

Although Direct Response ads work at making consumers take action, most smaller businesses prefer image-laden, cool-looking advertising.

Mostly because that’s what they are most accustomed to seeing in magazines, in the paper, on billboards, etc. That, or they don’t want to annoy their customers and be “that kind of business” that puts out direct response advertising.

But the fact remains, (and I’ve witnessed it firsthand) that a few brand-building advertisementss here and there don’t work.

You need to flood the market and really pound home the association in the customer’s mind that Kevin’s Karpet Kleaners Klean Karpets Kwickly (or whatever association you’re going for).

One TV commercial that airs once a day, or one billboard, even in a high-traffic area, doesn’t have the necessary firepower to reach enough people to bridge the gap in the consumer’s mind and convert her into a customer.

Viral Advertising

The internet has created a new kind of advertisement - viral advertisements. They’re usually brand-building ads made for TV or publicity stunts that are just so cool that people need to tell their friends and family about them. A couple examples:

· The Sony Bravia Bouncy Ball ad

· Honda Accord Rube Goldberg ad

· Lego Man on a Danish beach

· Most of the advertisements on this site

Their design oozes creativity; you feel good after looking at them and want your friends to feel the same way too.

Every small business would benefit from having a viral advertisement circulating around the internet. Alas, the funds to employ a world-class film director, or spend the time and money to completely disassemble your product and make a Rube Goldberg machine usually aren’t available to the average entrepreneur.

But you might have a truly novel idea, and once put in media form it can create huge buzz, and maybe even land you a spot on Letterman.