Company Blog

Hype Expectations vs Reality

by Adam Zack — October 13, 2021

We often see excellent retailers developing incredible marketing materials and then nailing their execution.

When I was 17 my best friend Bob and I heard a lot about this new movie that had come out called Chariots of Fire. It was supposedly action packed, fast paced, critically acclaimed and a great sports story. All things that were right in our wheelhouse. We went on a Friday to the theater at the mall to see it, our expectations very high. Also, at 17 we thought we knew a lot, but like pretty much all 17 year olds, we didn’t know squat. So we get to the theater, popcorn and Cokes in hand, and the movie starts. First, it is very British. And in our limited world exposure, that meant boring. Second, track and field is boring, especially to 17 year olds. And third, it was long and slooowwwwwww. We left thinking it was the worst film we had ever seen and how our high expectations had not been even close to being fulfilled.

We generate high expectations for our customers when we plan exciting and interesting promotions and ramp up to them with spot on marketing, word of mouth and thorough communication and education of just what the promotion will deliver. The key, and the hardest part is execution of meeting (and ideally exceeding) expectations is to seamlessly deliver what will ultimately blow the customer away, leaving them anticipating your next promotion. We often see excellent retailers developing incredible marketing materials (with DW Green help, of course!) and then nailing their execution. Unfortunately, too often a Chariots of Fire is the result, and the promotion misses the mark badly, with poor communication and the failure of leadership to educate and motivate the team until they just shrug and say “I don’t know”, tainting future great promotion ideas with memories of delivering a dud the time before.