2006 April

Red rules and blue rules

By John Foust, Raleigh, NC

Neal is an ad manager who is always looking for ways to help his paper’s advertisers.

He told me about the time he talked to another ad manager at a publishing convention. “She described her paper’s accounting department as ‘the sales prevention department,’ and told me about nearly losing several advertisers because of a long list of tedious procedures that had to be followed.

“That conversation made me think about the rules and regulations at our paper,” he explained. “Are we making things easier for our advertisers? Or are we making things more difficult? Advertisers have more media choices than ever before. So customer service is a must, not an option.

“Not all rules are created equal,” he said. “I’ve heard that medical organizations have what they call red rules and blue rules. Red rules are set in stone, and can’t be changed. A lot of safety regulations, including pre-surgery procedures, fall into this category. Then there are blue rules, which have built-in flexibility. For example, don’t make a lady in labor fill out paperwork.”

There’s often a direct connection between paperwork and customer service. I once heard about a lady who took 17 disposable cameras to the photo lab at her local drugstore. She told the teenage clerk behind the counter that the cameras had been placed on tables at her wedding reception – so guests could document the occasion from their own perspectives.

The clerk had a golden opportunity to thank her for trusting his store to develop those important photographs. But what did he do with that opportunity? He made her fill out an envelope for each camera – 17 envelopes, all with the same name, address, phone number, number of prints requested and type of finish (glossy or matte). When she asked if she could fill out one envelope, instead of 17, he said, “No, it’s a rule.”

Not a pretty picture, is it? It didn’t occur to the clerk to make an exception, or to ask his boss if the one-envelope-per-roll rule could be waived. And although the bride was obviously irritated as she filled out the envelopes, he didn’t consider the possibility that she could take her future business elsewhere – and tell her friends to do the same.

According to Neal, the publishing industry could benefit from having two sets of rules – red and blue. “At our paper, we even invite advertisers to participate in brainstorming sessions. We analyze procedures that impact them, and ask how we can make things easier. Their input is important, because something that seems minor to us may be a huge headache for them. We can’t afford to be perceived as being out of touch. Especially when we’re facing so much competition from other media.”

Business consultant Peter Drucker said, “Quality in a service or product is not what you put into it. It’s what the client or customer gets out of it.”

Customer service. Sometimes it’s as simple as the difference between red and blue.

(c) Copyright 2006 by John Foust. All rights reserved.

John Foust conducts on-site and video training for newspaper advertising departments. His three new video programs are designed to help ad managers conduct in-house training for their sales teams. For information, contact: John Foust, PO Box 97606, Raleigh, NC 27624 USA, E-mail: jfoust@mindspring.com, Phone 919-848-2401.