Know Your References

R ecently (April 2000) TeleCheck paid for a twelve-page advertorial in STORES magazine, titled “Electronic Checks: The Payment Solution for an Electronic Age.” I hope that you all saw this piece on electronic checks, and I’m sure that TeleCheck does as well, given that this type of ad has a price tag of about $29,500.

If you saw the ad, you probably recognized a good deal of the opening information, as well as about half of page three, as it is material from The Green Sheet, Inc.’s book, Checks at the end of the 20th Century. Page three also has two charts from The Green Sheet, although this is not the reason that I am pointing out this story to you. The advertorial (I love this word) talks about electronic checks in both the physical and virtual retail environment, and two-thirds of page five talks about a TeleCheck customer, DesignersDirect.com.

In a quote from the STORES magazine story, Errol Getner, Chief Executive Officer of DesignerDirect.com notes, “If I can’t offer my customers the convenience of paying the way they want to pay for purchases, they’re just a few mouse-clicks away from a competitor who will.” Well, after thousands of dollars in advertising, and only one customer in the ad, it appears that DesignerDirect.com was just a few mouse clicks away from bellying-up, announcing that they were done, just days after the TeleCheck ad appeared.

Now, I am not taking shots at TeleCheck. I liked their ad, and loved that they used some of my stuff, but it does allow me to point out that we all must watch who we use as customer names in our advertising. Frankly, it’s embarrassing to have a customer you mention be unhappy with you after you name them, or, as in this case, not survive the shelf life of the ad in which they are mentioned. So think about it with the next marketing materials you write. It can happen to the best of us, so watch out and know your advertising references.

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The Green Sheet, Inc.