The most pathetic software(ish) marketing of 2023
And the McKinsey sitcom that wasn't...
Hello Gobbledeers,
I’ve been trying to think of an example of where a company has used a social issue as a marketing strategy and had it work out well.
The Toms “buy one pair of shoes and we’ll give away a pair of shoes” was heralded as a pioneering social good program (until it wasn’t…). But for every Toms there was a Pepsi/Kendall Jenner fiasco (if you missed that, you are in for such a treat. I just went back and re-watched the ad where Jenner goes to a protest march and gives a cop a Pepsi and racism is solved, and Oh wow. It’s even better now. Like 3-day-old chili. Just the flavors marinade and wow.
I know so much was written about this when it came out, but it really didn’t capture how literally every single part of it is so so so deeply wrong. But how can something so wrong be so right? And also so wrong…)
Please. Even if you’ve seen it…and even if you watched it 100 times in 2017 when it came out. Please watch it. It’s amazing.
Where was I? Oh yes, mashing capitalism and social action can be bad.
But that sure-as-shit ain’t gonna stop people!
Especially in tech.
(Sorry, I just went back and watched it again. I can’t not watch it. In 40 years - assuming movie theaters exist, they’ll show that in midnight screenings where people dress up like characters in it and yell things (JOIN THE CONVERSATION!!!!) and everyone will have a grand time.)
I’m back.
…Especially in tech.
And the winner for the saddest attempt to glom on to a civil rights movement goes to…
Most of the time when I talk about gobbledy, it’s long-winded nonsense. But today’s gobbledy is just one hashtag long.
SaaStr is a SaaS-focused event and education company that produces one of the biggest (the biggest?) SaaS events each year.
This is their homepage right now:
Gobbledy has obtained an exclusive copy of a recording of the meeting where they discussed the SaaStr #blacklivesmatter initiative.
Person 1: Oh crap, it’s almost February.
Person 2: Ooh, I love Groundhog Day.
Person 1: The movie or the holiday?
Person 2: What movie?
Person 1: Groundhog Day.
Person 2: That was a movie?
Person 1: Yes. If Groundhog Day is your favorite holiday, how did you not know about the movie?
Person 2: Is Denzel Washington in it?
Person 1: No, that’s Training Day.
Person 2: Hm. Was it that woman who played Laurie Partridge on the Partridge Family?
Person 1: No, that’s Susan Dey. And it’s spelled D-E-Y. I think we’ve forgotten what we were talking about.
Person 2: Oh, February is coming up and we need to do something for Black History Month.
Person 1: Right! But, like, I’m pretty busy. What’s maybe the absolute least we can do?
Person 2: We could do a webinar about Black leaders in tech?
Person 1: Yeah, we coulllllld. But maybe, what’s less than that? I don’t want to do nothing, obviously. This is super important to us. But, what’s, y’know, less? Much less.
Person 2: What if we - hear me out - what if we put #blacklivesmatter on our homepage. That’s something, but less than almost anything, while being more than nothing.
Person 1: I think we’re almost there. Maybe that’s too little. What if we - and we’ll need to see if Johnson on the design team has time in his next sprint - what if we put that hashtag, because it’s a great idea. But what if we also put a line above that hashtag so it’s, y’know, separated from the text above it.
Person 2: You are brilliant!
Person 1: I really am.
So there’s two ways this can go.
1) SaaStr as an organization is deeply, deeply committed to causes supporting African Americans and addressing the complicated, troubling history our country has lived over the past 200+ years. This would be an audacious undertaking, obviously. But backed by many of the incredibly wealthy tech founders who are part of the SaaStr community, they can - in their own way, and flush with cash - begin to make a dent in starting to reverse hundreds of years of painful history. I mean, these are the companies that made is possible to order a Quarter Pounder and have it delivered to your door in 20 minutes, so…
Or.
2) They can write #blacklivesmatter on their homepage.
The first way would require a massive effort, where, using the financial and social advantages that they enjoy, the company would begin to make a generational shift, where the industry of which they’re a part makes a sea change where black founders are able to access capital in the same way their white counterparts are able to. They can then hire black students to work there, maybe out of HBCUs (where there’s no shortage of black graduates), which would lead to a whole new way that tech companies get funded and who they hire. Change, as they say, starts at home, and given the connections they have, SaaStr works tirelessly to make that change.
The second way would require writing #blacklivesmatter on their homepage.
As I mentioned, SaaStr has a huge event called SaaStr Annual every September (which I’m guessing I will not be getting an invite for), and I wanted to share the roster of folks who spoke at that event last year.
Here’s who spoke on the last day:
You may notice something about that group. One thing, is that they’re an illustrious cadre of SaaS executives. Congrats to each and every one of you!
The second is that there are almost as many dogs pictured in those photos as there are black speakers at SaaStr (bravo, Vinay Bhagat for bringing your dog to the photo shoot).
I should mention here that I’m a wackadoodle lefty New York City Upper West Sider, so you may be able to guess my politics.
But this has nothing at all to do with politics.
And everything to do with trying to associate your brand with something where there is absolutely no connection. And then made worse when trying to use that to take some sort of moral high ground.
(BTW - in case you were wondering, SaaStr has an investment fund. 9 companies they’ve invested in are listed on Crunchbase. None of them have black founders.)
Again - to be very clear - SaaStr and every other for-profit company have no obligation to align themselves with any social issue. We’re capitalists! You have a duty to your shareholders. I have zero issue with that.
Bad marketing is annoying. Bad marketing couched as righteousness is pathetic.
McKinsey Isn’t the Funniest Consulting Firm
Last year I wrote a column about giving a shit, and kinda blaming the current state of marketing copy on the thought that maybe most tech executives don’t care about great writing and aren’t actually willing to invest in what it would take to make it even passable.
Not to quote myself, but to quote myself - “Making something OK is pretty easy...but giving a shit is hard.”
My wife and I saw Jerry Seinfeld perform a few weeks back, and one of the striking things about him is that he does jokes that he did 35 years ago. But that’s not what this is about. The other striking thing about him is that it’s clear how much work he’s put in to crafting every. single. word.
After the show I went down the Seinfeld interview rabbit hole, and I found this Harvard Business Review (?) interview with him, where he talks about that concept:
You and Larry David wrote Seinfeld together, without a traditional writers’ room, and burnout was one reason you stopped. Was there a more sustainable way to do it? Could McKinsey or someone have helped you find a better model?
Who’s McKinsey?
It’s a consulting firm.
Are they funny?
No.
Then I don’t need them. If you’re efficient, you’re doing it the wrong way. The right way is the hard way. The show was successful because I micromanaged it—every word, every line, every take, every edit, every casting. That’s my way of life.
First - I love that he doesn’t know who McKinsey is. It’s a good reminder that just because you think something is important or impressive or whatever, there are other people who have no idea what you’re talking about, or why you’d care about them. Are they funny? No.
Second - is there anything more wrong than the idea that if you paid six 28-year olds from McKinsey $1.5 million, that they would come up with a way to make Seinfeld funnier?
Third - That’s a show!
Fourth - I think people who write (and that includes those of us in the software content racket) have to embrace the inefficiency of it. Making good things IS inefficient. And time consuming. And requires micromanaging.
And all of those are traits that companies work very hard to eliminate (often with the help of McKinsey, funny enough.). Isn’t that the foundation of the whole struggle against gobbledy? Writing well requires exactly the opposite of what it takes to run a business well.
As a wise man once said, good luck with all THAT.
As always, thanks for reading. If you’re looking to overhaul your messaging, my 1 1/2 day workshop will do the trick. Want to learn more about how I work with software companies to help them tell their stories? I’m at jared@sagelett.com.
You know, I am looking to overhaul my messaging. Do you have a course for me?