Dec 1, 2007 12:00 PM, Grant A. Johnson

As Marketers, we make all kinds of mistakes. We may not care to admit it, but on average even the best measurable marketers are right only about a third of the time.

Some of the best advertising campaigns in recent years have come out of fortuitous mistakes…. so-called errors created by thinking out of the box.

You remember the Taco Bell Chihuahua who kept telling us “Yo Quiero Taco Bell!” Or Burt Reynolds and friends in Miller Lite's “Man Law” campaign? And who doesn't remember Coca-Cola's Mean Joe Greene ads? They all seemed like good ideas at the time. They all had one thing in common.

They didn't work.

The best marketing often involves the willingness to take chances. And that can mean making mistakes, but it's okay to fail, as long as you learn from that failure.

In 2000, the Martin Agency in Richmond, VA, faced a problem regarding an important client, Geico Insurance. Geico needed new television advertising, but an actors' strike seemed to make that impossible. If you recall, this was the time that Budweiser's frogs and lizards were “hot,” so someone bright at Martin decided that since people often confused the name “Geico” with “Gecko, ” ads could be developed using a little gecko as a placeholder until real actors could be hired. Martin then violated one of the standard rules of direct response television marketing by foregoing 60-second ads and instead using 10-second spots.

Marketing history was made. That little gecko may well be the most recognized icon of modern-day marketing, right up there with past marketing “stars” like Tony the Tiger and the Jolly Green Giant. The folks at Martin blew us all away with their genius! Importantly, they didn't do what everyone else was doing.

Let's not forget that the “promotional offer” is often overlooked in too much advertising and that's one important reason for Geico's success: “15 minutes can save you 15% or more on….” What's in it for me, the prospect is answered immediately — possible savings of 15% or more.

Geico's tale is not unlike the story of the Aflac duck, a great little brand symbol created from fortuitous mistakes and a willingness to take a risk.

As described in the book “Bang,” co-written by Linda Kaplan Thayer and Robin Koval, Aflac wanted top-level name recognition. They wanted us to know who they were every time we heard the name “Aflac.” Obviously, they knew that we weren't likely to jump at something called “American Family Life Assurance Corp.” There was only one problem.

About 30 minutes before meeting with Aflac, Thayer's creative team had nothing. Nada. Up until this time, similar supplemental or gap insurers had used emotional advertising messages, knowing that emotion generally outsells logic. But Thayer's group had to consider if Aflac should go into the marketplace with a “Me, too” approach or find something new.

It didn't make much difference because nobody had anything they felt confident in presenting to their client. That is, until one member of Thayer's team blurted out in sheer frustration: “Aflac? Sounds just like a duck for goodness sakes!”

Writing in his book, “How to Think like Leonard Da Vinci,” Michael Gelb hit it on the head when he said “Innovation comes when we shift our focus away from ‘the right answer’ and toward asking ‘Is this the right question?’ and ‘What are some different ways at looking at this problem?’”

Thinking outside the box for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Wisconsin we tested a self-mailer as opposed to a traditional envelope package (all experts say this is a mistake). My thought was that ROI would increase at the expense of response, as it is so much cheaper to produce self-mailers in large quantities, even with a dip in response the ROI would increase. What happened? Not only did production costs decrease, response rate doubled.

The double-whammy with this fortuitous mistake: when we downgraded paper stock (by mistake) to on-gloss we saw another lift in response rates.

John W. Holt, Jr., said “If you're not making mistakes, you're not taking risks, and that means you're not going anywhere. The key is to make errors faster than the competition, so you have more chances to learn and win.”

Grant A. Johnson is the owner and CEO of Johnson Direct. He can be reached at grantj@johnsondirect.com.

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