There are times when breaking the rules can pay some big dividends, but
there are other times when breaking the rules can really break you.
I came across a great illustration yesterday as I was doing some
research on web marketing. The "blogosphere" was a buzz with news of a
new video streaming service that went live yesterday. The company is
called Zediva (http://www.zediva.com/). The company has begun streaming movies
on the web for a buck a piece. They had done a fair amount of PR and
advertising to get the word out.
Being interested in movies and already streaming some of that content, I
figured I'd give them a try and see what all the hype was about. I
entered the web address and was promptly ushered to a screen that told
me due to heavy traffic that they hadn't anticipated, the site had
crashed and was down. I tried again this morning and was told they
wouldn't take any more registrations as is illustrated in the graphic
pictured with this post.
They broke a cardinal marketing rule. Never, ever advertise before you
are ready and can handle the traffic that those ads will generate. They
asked me to do something in their outreach through the media. I did what
I was asked and visited their web site. I was rewarded with a big zero.
I even took the request one step further and went back today and again
was rewarded with nothing. So now, I'm done with them.
What their advertising ended up doing to me was chasing me away because
they are not ready for my business, and I will question whether they
ever will be.
Advertising can do great things for businesses that have their acts
together, but for businesses that don't, it can put you out of business.
I think this is a good rule never to break. Don't invite people to the
store if you aren't ready to deliver. Are you listening Zediva?
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