Can One-on-One Marketing Go Too Far?

By Jacqueline Kolek, PepperDigital

On a recent Saturday afternoon I stopped in my local Patagonia shop to pick up a few t-shirts.  I happened to be wearing a shirt a colleague had brought me back from the Sundance Film Festival.  The sales clerk asked me if I'd been to the festival and we got talking about renewable energy and algal oils (note: Peppercom client Solazyme is developing renewable fuels from algae).  So, I dropped a couple of hundred dollars on T-shirts (I can't seem to escape that store for less) and went on my way.

A few days later, I received a personal note in the mail from my sales clerk.  In the note, he said how much he enjoyed talking to me, thanked me for coming in and included some stickers for my kids.  My first reaction? Creepy.  I don't know why, but for some reason the fact that he took the time to look up my address and send a personal letter struck me as slightly stalker-ish.   I am sure this note was part of an overall customer service effort designed to encourage loyalty and add a personal touch. I guess it was nice of them to make the extra effort and to show some appreciation for buying their $50 T-shirts.  But still, I felt a little uncomfortable about this guy going into their database and looking up my home address. 

Now, had he emailed me?  Cool.  Sent me a link to their shore clean day program?  Would have loved it.  Perhaps we've just become so accustomed to digital communication that anything that actually take a traditional and personalized approached seems wrong. 

What do you think?   

Comments

[Sam Ford]

I certainly see how this could conjure up One Hour Photo, as some of the team was discussing here earlier this week. That’s probably one of my favorite films of the last several years, creepy because it points out that there’s a fine line between the type of personalized rapport you theoretically want with people you interact with as a consumer and the type of intimacy that moves across a threshold in terms of personal privacy.

I know this person was just doing their job, and there might be ways this could be framed that would seem thoughtful instead of strange, but this proves that, just as you need to be sensitive to not paying the customer enough attention, you likewise need to be careful not to pay too much attention, either.

[Khush Gill]

Hi Jacqueline:
Very interesting take on 'one-on-one marketing'. I feel that though the personal touch was not that bad an idea, it does come across as intrusive. We do live in strange world today - a place which is a very edgy combination of the the public and the private. And I think its going to take some time to sort things out and get more comfortable.

[MattP]

The idea of true one-to-one marketing is to interact with the customer in the method most appropriate for the customer and his/her needs. What you experienced is one-to-one marketing gone horribly wrong.

I, too, would be very creeped out. In fact, I'd call the store manager and ask if this is Patagonia policy. Wondering if you would feel differently if the sales clerk were a woman.

[MattP]

The idea of true one-to-one marketing is to interact with the customer in the method most appropriate for the customer and his/her needs. What you experienced is one-to-one marketing gone horribly wrong.

I, too, would be very creeped out. In fact, I'd call the store manager and ask if this is Patagonia policy. Wondering if you would feel differently if the sales clerk were a woman.

[MHB]

i agree with all the above thoughts on creepy vs. not and the vagaries of Patagonia's execution. That said, if they can work the kinks out (maybe make it less personal (feels odd to advocate that)),
it could be strong. Snail mail is rare, and from it comes this blog post/conversation/mindshare, so they've got something going on.