Category illogical

Why Are You Buying That? 0

In some industry’s I would argue brand loyalty does not exist for the vast majority of people. For these products price is the main reason of choice. In the grocery store I have too many options in front of me, so like any other confused male in their twenty’s in a grocery store, I begin to compare prices and inevitably many of my choices are dictated on which is the cheapest. But a product can look good enough that you will pay a premium just because you perceive it to have more value (this happens a lot).  Many products in the grocery store are sold because of implied value, which creates brand loyalty. Marketing has aided this effort for years, making products seem better than they actually are, just so people would buy.

Alright so you buy Kraft over the no name salad dressing, and you buy Bicks because No Name pickles taste funny (when in fact they taste fine).  Marketing has done a great job building trusted brands for us but I don’t agree with buying a name brand products just so a multi-national company can keep marketing it.  Presidents Choice Cola tastes strikingly similar to Coke Cola but you don’t want to be known as the guy who buys PC brand Cola do you?  Well why not?  It’s cheaper and it tastes like the real thing.

One could argue that the more informed shopper will purchase the generic brands more than big name brands because they understand that the extra cost supports marketing efforts not improving the product.

The next time you’re going for groceries ask yourself, “why am I buying the name brand product.”

Defying All Logic 1

Sasktel, one of our local telecommunication companies introduced a new feature they called ebill.   I’m sure you already took a stab at what “ebill” is, an online way to look at your monthly statements thus saving postage, paper and the company money in the long term.  Great idea right?

It was a great idea until two months down the road my ebill account had been deactivated.  Deactivated?  Why?  What reasoning did they go through to come to the conclusion that after 35 days of access to this online account they would need to deactivate it?

The first time I gave them the benefit of the doubt, maybe it was a security issue.  I called and asked for them to reactivate my ebill account, they did and when I checked, it said “Expires in 35 days”.  WHY?  This defies all logic.  Researching further I found that I need an “activation” code to activate my account, an activation code? I just got off the phone with the help desk guy and he didn’t think to tip me off about this activation code I’m going to need?  I know it’s not his fault, someone has made a process that defies all logic.

I really would like to understand why they deactivate accounts after 35 days because as of now they give me no option but to assume that this protocol defies simple human logic.  So I guess we’ll just add another one to Seth’s list.

Seth Godin talked about things that are broken a few years back that you must watch to understand why these things happen in our world.  If anyone finds the answer to this ebill conundrum please do share, I don’t want to have to call Sasktel every 36 days to reactivate my ebill account.

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