The Power of Hype
Posted by Jamie Hutson | Filed under Life, advertising, marketing
And why its actually useless.
Last week my (never met him before or interacted with in anyway whatsoever, but read so much of what he thinks that I usually think to myself “what would Seth Godin say about this” whenever I do anything) friend Seth Godin wrote a valuable post about “Grand Openings” and how they are not so grand. I laughed when I read it because I was scheduled to attend the Grand Opening party of an old restaurant that had closed and re-opened under a new owner/management that evening.
It was Saturday when I realized the value of the Hype, the artificial pumping up of events, products and companies. I was at the Belmont, in hopes of witnessing history in the form of the first Triple Crown winner in 30 years.
You had to live in a cave to not know about this event. The trainer was everywhere, the horse was everywhere, a big dollar investment was made and a multinational company purchased a first of its kind endorsement. Big Brown came around the final turn and stopped running. The most heavily favored horse to go off at Belmont Stakes in decades, the sure shot, became the first Triple Crown contender to finish dead last.
More than twice as many people watched the stakes on television this year over last year and over 100k people braved the heat to watch in person. People were excited, then they were disappointed. Massively disappointed.
When things don’t live up to the hype, people remember the bad, the letdown or they don’t remember it at all. Eitherway, all the press, all the hype that was put into the event was a waste of many and probably will hurt the brand/event/promoter in the long term.
Don’t try to live up to the hype, let the hype try to live up to you. Make the hype follow the event, let people talk about how great it was, because if something was really worth all the hype, you won’t need to put all that hype into it before hand.
At 5 o’clock vendors were selling Big Brown tshirts for $20. At 6:30 they were selling those same shirts 3 for $5. Of course, if he had won, those shirts might have been selling for $40. Perhaps the Belmont Stakes is not the best example, but it made me think about what we do in order to hype things up and get people to pay attention. As Mr. Godin commonly puts it, make something remarkable - worth talking about, and people will talk about it.
Speak softly and carry a big stick. Just Do It. Walk the Talk. Moral of the story, instead of talking about doing it, go ahead and buckle in and do it. Because almost never was, and probably never will be.
Its late now, and I’m going to stop hyping this post.
