The clients pay the bills. We work for them. But our objective is to get their message across, and that's just not going to happen if we don't properly facilitate the experience, that is, work from the customer's point of view.
How do we balance the wants of the customer with the needs of the client? Bait and switch is a tactic used by disreputable retailers, but the bait and annoy technique we often use isn't much better. The bargain is simple - want Mr Rourke to reveal what happened to Zsa Zsa and Liberace after they got off Fantasy Island? Coming right up, just stay tuned for a word from our sponsors. Got something really distasteful to sell? Then maybe we'll put it on the evening news, just before we finally reveal that hidden menace in your sock drawer.
As everyone knows by know, those days are over (thanks again, TiVo, I owe ya). But before we lament the passing of the interrupting spot, you have to wonder, did they ever really work? Certain delivery mechanisms are more inherently annoying than others (I'm looking at you, Netflix pop-up) but at the end of the day irrelevant messages are always unwelcome, no matter how politely they're presented. Conversely, sometimes people really are looking for information! Provide it, and they might just pay attention.
So, am I saying that Mr Rourke never sold any peanut butter, toilet paper, or even Chrysler Cordobas? Of course not, but one has to wonder, did the captive delivery mechanism facilitate those sales, or inhibit them? Don't forget that in the pre-DVR days, the start of that first commercial message was often the cue to go make yourself a sandwich. Now, as you fast-forward by, perhaps something catches your interest -- an ad for a new movie you've heard about, a new product you're looking forward to buying, maybe even an ad campaign that you enjoy for its own sake.
Entertaining users is great, but matching a client's unique sales proposition to a consumer's unique purchasing requirements - what could be more user-centered than that?
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The central question is: can you get users to "drink your milkshake"? Do users even exist? Do websites exist in an ontological sense in that they are both web-ish and site-ish. Bob Newhart hates pull-downs, we all know that. WWDJF do? (what would Dr. Johhny Fever do)
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