Really Direct Marketing

 Bikes, Swine  2 Responses »
Jan 162012
 

Let’s talk about really direct marketing. Sure, I’ve been exercising an unhealthy obsession with guerrilla e-commerce lately, working to convince small shop owners to start using the almighty Internet for something more than just a Google map to your location and (God forbid) printable coupons. It’s possible–or rather, let’s go with “super necessary” for small businesses to dip a toe into online sales, but all that will have to wait.

Why? Because the bike industry is witnessing a masterful education in the fine art of public relations self-destruction and brand anti-marketing that we’d be fools to ignore. Over the weekend, Specialized got their ass handed to them by Volagi, and then things got interesting.

Turns out Specialized spent about $1.5-million on their soul-killing, heavy-handed intimidation tactic/wild goosechase–an absolutely disgusting amount of money to piss away under any circumstances, and even more so right now, when John Q. Public is hyper-sensitive to wasteful, inappropriate behavior of the part of big companies. Almost every word that’s been printed regarding this entire sad episode has done damage to Specialized, and the facts haven’t done them any favors, either. The revelation that this much money was wasted in the service of stifling innovation and intimidating competition won’t do much to reverse the public perception of Specialized as a giant, out-of-touch, monopolistic, evil-doing gaggle of douchebags. Not to worry, though, because, once again, somebody let Specialized founder Mike Sinyard communicate with the public.

This lawsuit was a matter of principle and about protecting our culture of trust and innovation. We respect the ruling of the court in our favor. We are very satisfied with the outcome and the damages set at $1.00. We really want to put all our passion and time into growing the sport of cycling.”

Clearly, Sinyard and Rupert Murdoch have the same “magic touch” when it comes to understanding their public.

Read that quote again, if you think you’re up to it. The first sentence sets a good tone, and then, well . . . it makes you wonder if anyone at Specialized realizes the mic is on. Really, guys? You’re really “very satisfied” to’ve spent a million and a half bucks getting a dollar in return? If you’re trying to tell us you’re glad this didn’t have a destructive effect on Volagi, you’re sure not sounding that way, which means you’re–miraculously–sounding both disingenuous and unconcerned that you just wasted so much cash on a half-assed attempt at evil. And, even if that’s the case–even if you are sort of pissed off and dazed still, you realize, right, that you’re not supposed to let everyone know that’s where you are with this? It begs the question, do these guys have a PR department? Apparently, Specialized can spend $1.5-million on trying to stifle competition, but there’s nobody even making $10 an hour to give the main man’s missives a once-over to ensure they’re not repulsively demeaning and logically adrift.

Turns out I have some free time right now, and sounds like The Big S could use some pro bono help, so here’s my free rewrite of how anyone with even a small amount of respect for his customers would have written that letter:

“This lawsuit was a matter of principle and about protecting our culture of trust and innovation. At Specialized, we really do believe in our products more than anything, and that passion sometimes leads us to protect them at all costs. We’re making bikes because we believe in the positive things that a bicycle can do, and that’s a love we share with Volagi and every other brand. While we feel strongly enough about our reputation and our innovative products to take the steps we took in this matter, we sincerely respect and admire the desire Robert and Barley have shown to distinguish their product, and we hope they, and all those with a desire to make cycling better, continue to share our passion for making great bikes.”

Or some such shit. (I’m available for freelance work, by the way, for press releases, writing wedding invitations, really bitchin’ grocery lists, etc..)

There is a way to communicate to the public while still side-stepping legal landmines, but it involves seeming human and actually relating to your customers, instead of poking rifle barrels out of your ivory tower and doubling down on the draconian bullshit.

But, anyway, this is good for us–good for anyone studying how not to communicate with the public. Pop quiz: guess which company, Specialized or Volagi, better understands how to use social media? Here’s a hint: contrast Sinyard’s statement way above, with this tweet from Volagi:

Best dollar we ever spent.”

The thing some companies still don’t seem to get about social media is that they’re participating in it whether they want to be or not. You’re always marketing directly to your consumers. When you’re announcing a hot new product, or when you’re suing somebody. There’s a level of transparency to today’s businesses that some CEOs just don’t seem to understand.

Some, on the other hand, seem to understand it all too well. Maybe Sinyard should take a cue from “International Grand Confrerie Sommelier,” wine consultant to Costco, and maestro of social media, “Krunch,” who prefers to engage his social critics more directly. Disgruntled by a woman’s bad review of his business on Yelp, “Krunch” apparently took it upon himself to create a fake blog in the woman’s name and use it to describe her as a drug addict and prostitute, emailing her a link to the blog and writing, “Now every time a company for a job or someone searches YOU on google they will read my side of the story.”

Well played, sir. You are, indeed, ready to “serve world leaders, heads of state and Fortune 100 members.” Now, to complete their public relations self-destruction masterpiece, all Specialized has to do is personally attack everyone who thought their lawsuit was a horrible idea. Given how they’ve handled things to this point, nothing would surprise me.

It’s not like they’d have to work very hard to intimidate some members of the cycling press, who fall all over themselves to self-redactedit anything meaningful anyway. In the dying embers of this train wreck, we find this article on Velonews, which features a slightly more intriguing editorial preamble than most:

At the author’s request, the editorial notes at the bottom of this story were rewritten. They did not reflect the opinions of VeloNews.com.”

Is it just me, or does the editorial quote above read a hell of a lot like, “After having a gun barrel pressed to his forehead (no easy task to do to a man who’s, like, 8-feet tall), Mr. Zinn would like to reconsider those things he initially said and meant but might’ve seriously pissed off one of the largest advertisers in our industry.” Say, does anyone have a screen grab of how Lennard Zinn’s original article read? I’d really like to see that, Velonews. Anyone?

Lou Reed Collaboration with Mavic

 Bikes  Comments Off on Lou Reed Collaboration with Mavic
Oct 032011
 

Earlier today, I read this review of Mavic’s Ksyrium SLR Exalith wheelset, and I think I can sum up the between-the-lines part of the review pretty succinctly: Mavic is bringing back CD hard coating, and it still squeals.

To be fair, they did come up with a new name for it: “Exalith” (pronounced like a small child with a horrible cold trying to say the word “excellent”). So the marketing department did their turn at the front, but at the end of the day, there’s nothing new under the neon yellow sun.

I don’t know exactly what’s going on at Mavic these days, and to be fair to Mavic, there’s no shortage of hyped up, modernized, and soulless versions of old ideas forever getting rehashed out there, but in the early ’90s, a lot of the bicycle business was Mavic’s to lose, and it’s pretty clear to everyone now that they’ve figured out some pretty spectacular ways to lose it.

I have no idea how the company’s doing. Industry rags tend to pass on data more than research it, meaning corporate governance in these matters is largely unavailable, and usually a company goes from “reporting record sales” to disappearing in the span of a few months. Everyone except the employees act shocked, and then we all go back to playing Angry Birds and participating in Our Lifestyle. But ever since Mavic as a corporation chose to neither assassinate a guy named Stan Koziatek, nor purchase his outstanding company outright, the wheels have really seemed to come off (pun intended).

Mavic is a company that was founded in 1889. Back then, they did some innovative things that worked. More recently they did some innovative things that didn’t work so well, but made a great market for others, and things that completely didn’t work, but were still innovative. When it comes to the Exalith rim coating, it seems like they’ve figured out how to create fresh performance problems without really inventing anything new.

The sad thing is that there’s a genuine problem with the braking surfaces on carbon fiber road rims for which we could really use a solution. In a world of competing carbon fiber rims with slippery and sometimes unreliable braking surfaces, there is a genuine need for something innovative.

How obvious is the need? Caley Fretz, the author of the VeloNews review, begins by basically addressing this issue–one that the product being reviewed doesn’t actually address:

Let’s be honest: most of us would love to roll around on carbon hoops every day, if not for the various impracticalities doing so would provoke. They’re light, sprightly, and look damn cool — the latter being more important than we’d care to admit. The problem is that carbon is ridiculously expensive to buy and replace, has a tendency to crack, and doesn’t brake particularly well. Not a solid recipe for an everyday wheelset.

Mavic has an answer for those who have come to terms with their cycling vanity, accepting their lust for things black and carbon-looking as an untenable but utterly unavoidable force of nature. They even add a nice little performance boost to the equation. It’s called Exalith, and it can be found on Mavic’s Ksyrium SLR (tested here), Comete disc, Cosmic Carbone SLR, Cosmic Carbone SLE, and R-Sys SLR.

This reads a hell of a lot like Mavic had invented a brake track coating for carbon rims. In fact, at least one very smart guy I know of read it that way, too, largely because that’s what the words tell you. To “come to terms with your vanity” for carbon fiber “as an untenable but utterly unavoidable force of nature” means to give in to crabon carbon.

It reads that way because writers hoping to write crap people will read tend to automatically veer toward the relevant, and a durable brake track coating for a carbon fiber rim is what people want. What people don’t give as much of a shit about is a coating that makes your aluminum rims last longer, but generates Bieberesque squeals. And costs $1800.

Yes. Ask for a more durable brake track for carbon wheels, and Mavic offers to sell you carbon-colored aluminum rims for only a few hundred dollars more than some genuine carbon wheelsets. Or maybe you’re fine with aluminum rims, except that they only seem to last ten years (or 293 Mavic hubs), and you’re sick of trying to find replacement rims for your decade old wheelset. Seriously, is “Unhappy With Lifespan of Aluminum Rim” still a demographic? For a 700c rim? And, according to the article, Mavic says no cyclocross allowed on these, so that limits things to, what? Those of us in need of a really expensive sub-1500g touring rim with spokes no shop stocks? That squeals every time the brakes are applied?

I still believe Mavic is capable of once again becoming the best wheelset manufacturer in the world, but the first step toward recovery is admitting you have a problem. That’s always been a tough one for any organization trying to recover lost glory. Mavic plus Exalith is McTallica plus Lou Reed. In the immortal/Facebook-stored/government archived words of Stevil Kinevil, “This is the result of 20 years of not being told you suck.”

The View by Lou Reed & Metallica

The Sound of Exalith