What do you think the billboard pictured below in Wellington, New Zealand’s capital city, is ‘selling’?
You certainly can’t tell from its tagline – defined at About.com as “a slogan or phrase that visually conveys the most important product attribute or benefit that the advertiser wishes to convey”.
Well, if “Delivering exceptional customer experiences since 1975” is what CallActive wishes to convey, it is missing a heck of an opportunity to tell or remind people what it does, or promises.
Now, CallActive is a Melbourne, Australia headquartered business, with an offshoot lured to New Zealand by a then Wellington city-councillor in 2013.
John Morrison, a former test cricketer as it also happens, is now CallActive’s business development manager.
As he was quoted by writer Dave Burgess in a 17 September 2014 business section piece in the local Dominion Post newspaper, the confusion about CallActive’s offer seems to be pretty widespread.
(Apologies here, I can’t find an internet link to the actual article, and went to the local library to find the quote below in its online collection).
The past year has been a strong one for contact centre CallActive, New Zealand business development manager John Morrison says.
“We are a service company doing all sorts of things, from Facebook and Twitter to technical support. People think we just sit here and answer phones. That couldn’t be further from the truth. We even have a couple of teams that do door-to-door.”
Considering that thousands of people a day either drive or walk past its prime Victoria St location, and that such billboard advertising costs at least $3000 – $5000 a month, wouldn’t it be a clever thing to get the tagline right?
Not that would be easy to craft the two, three, four, five or six words that would crystallise its message – but it certainly would be better than wasting money on a meaningless term.
Just a thought CallActive, and John.
To use a cricketing analogy, it would be a bit like using John Morrison’s superior batting skills by putting him in at #11 (the last one to bat for those who don’t know anything about the game)!
In other words, a wasted opportunity.