Just finished watching the original Ghostbusters movie with my 14-year old.
She turns to me and says:
“Dad, how can that be a comedy if it doesn’t make you laugh?”
Me: 😑 …
“Maybe it’s because you’ve got NO sense of humour!”
Well… I wanted to say that…
Instead: Bench-clamped my tongue. Not wanting to risk future prospects of a movie night with my youngest.
I did mention how I chuckled a couple of dozen times… even though I’d seen it at least 10 times. So it lived up to its promise for me.
I can’t quite remember. But eight-year-old me may even have even seen it at the movies when it came out in 1984.
(It’s funny we had a movie-related email yesterday. That one was planned. Not today’s)
Thinking of my daughter’s comment…
It reminded me of how important it is to know your audience when marketing.
And what worked like gangbusters in the past… might not work so well today.
I mean, Ghostbusters was a hit. And had wide appeal.
But it’s dated. Special effects definitely. And behaviour. It’s certainly not a film that Hollywood would make nowadays.
Although they did the 2016 reboot. Which I found insipid.
But again… I’m not the market for that.
Knowing your clients’ market is super-important as a freelancer. So you can hit the mark with deliverables.
Might be most obvious with writing and design. But any sort of creative work for clients has to meet the needs of whoever it’s targeted at.
There’s plenty of ways to get the info you need on this. Easiest — of course — if your client hands you a brand guide with it spelled out.
But poking around in places like…
Amazon reviews
Youtube comments
…can give insights.
Especially if it’s places where people talk freely and let their guard down. And really speak their minds about what problems they have and what they think could help.
Customer surveys and focus groups are often used to get this kind of understanding. But people tend to be guarded. I take them with a grain of salt.
It’s always a great idea to be working on our market research game.
So here’s our girl, Alex Cattoni, with her juiciest tips:
And… to end with a John Carlton rip-off:
Stay frosty!
P.S. Happy Groundhog Day! (If that’s something you celebrate). Hoping that’s an appropriate greeting?!?
There’s a nice, coincidental, Bill Murray connection to my email theme: he starred in Groundhog Day and Ghostbusters.
Fun fact:
Punxsutawney Phil, the groundhog in the movie, has a 40% success rate for predicting whether there’ll be 6 more weeks of winter or not.
However, Staten Island Chuck leaves him in the dust, with a staggering 80%!
Use that information wisely.
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Chris Milham