Is It Worth It?

I love this quote:

Logic examines. Belief accepts.

It's from an 1970's sci-fi book called The Masters of Solitude. Taken entirely out of context, it applies nicely to my approach to marketing: be as logical, inquisitive, and analytical as possible, but at some point you just have to go with the flow and believe that something is right (or wrong).

The big question, to me, is:
When do you put logic aside and start to believe?

JP examines a couple of recent viral marketing campaigns on his blog.
(One example is the same Honda campaign I linked to in my last post, the other is from T-Mobile in the UK).

In both cases, a pile of money is involved. Maybe not relative to the billions that these particular companies make and spend every year, but it's still a lot of money. I'm sure somebody in Accounting and other departments must have said "Whoa, hold on. Shouldn't we put that cash towards something else? How about some R&D? Or paying off a loan? Or new chairs for the Accounting department?"

Logic says:
Does having a musical road make people any more likely to want a Honda?
Do the thousands of viral video views equate to sales at some point?

What's the cost-per-acquisition for acquiring an incremental wireless subscriber?
What retailer incentives could we put in place for the same cost and effort?

But at some point Belief has to kick in.
Maybe, in the short run, the numbers don't justify staging a stunt.
Maybe, even in the long run, we can't possibly measure the whole emotional impact of doing something fun for our audience.

As professionals, we have a responsibility to ask all the "logic" questions. Fact is, some (I would actually assume most) big, expensive, complicated, creative promo ideas aren't worth the effort or money. We shouldn't do stuff just because somebody's ego thinks it would be a cool idea and might win an award or two.

(Read The End of Marketing As We Know It by Sergio Zyman for plenty of examples of classic campaigns that everyone loves, but could never justify their own existence. )

But, as professionals, we also have a responsibility to recognize that sometimes we don't know all the answers. Sometimes something beautiful is worthwhile simply because it's beautiful. Sometimes, the benefits of a campaign will never clearly and obviously show up in a metrics report, a financial statement, or anywhere else. Sometimes you have to believe that it was worth it.