Tuesday, 13 January 2009

Ferrit, proof that advertising is the cost for not being remarkable


AdMedia's David Gapes started the year by asking his subscribers what they thought of Ferrit's demise.

Here's what I said:

Ferrit ... nobody I talked to was much surprised about the demise of Ferrit. A couple of reasons why:

  • Site wasn't that usable or easy to navigate (that's hearsay from me, I don't think I ever visited there)
  • Price premium when compared with retail, which makes sense for the
    business, but sure as hell doesn't make a compelling argument for the
    customer
  • Not the knitting that Telecom should have been sticking to
  • A big corporation trying to run what was essentially a startup ...
    hmmm. Culture clash? (that's a guess, but I'd hazard it's pretty
    accurate)
But my biggest pick on why Ferrit didn't work is:


  • Who's it for? It seemed to be all things to all people, and
    therefore nothing to anyone. The ads were kind of cool, but they always
    seemed to be just a money-spending exercise.
Which again
comes back to a corporate not thinking like a startup. As Seth Godin or
someone else said, advertising is the price you pay for having an
unremarkable product. And as the chaos and noise gets louder, even the
well-funded will go under.


Here's what everyone else said, and why at least one person thinks there's life in the old dog yet!

(image filched from Ben.geek.nz)

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