A brilliant observation and a perfect example

As I was writing my previous post and glancing at my Ma.Gnolia bookmarks, it occurred to me that two items I’ve bookmarked recently are related in an interesting way.

The first is a piece by Doc Searls with a title that I have already repeated to at least three people: There is no demand for messages.

Here’s a great quote that just about sums up Doc’s argument:

Let me see a show of hands: who here wants a message? Right: none. And who wants to shield themselves from messages they don't want? Exactly: everybody.

Further down the link roll is another post that illustrates Doc’s point quite nicely. David at Ironic Sans has written a brilliant piece about his ridiculously huge K-mart receipt. He only bought 2 items and the receipt was 21 inches long!

A quote:

Only the top 6 inches of the receipt contains information relevant to the purchase: the date, items purchased, price, store number, etc. The remaining 15 inches contains ads for things I could have purchased if I’d known about them before I went to the register, and also a list of store hours. I don’t know about you, but when I want to know a store’s hours or what they sell, I never dig out old receipts to find the answer.

You’re absolutely right, David. No one digs out old receipts. No one reads them even when they’re new, at least not those bottom 15 inches.

So why are those extra 15 inches there? Simple. Because K-Mart’s got a message for David and his fellow customers. In fact they’ve got a whole slew of them. They’ve got more messages than they know what do with.

But as David’s post makes abundantly clear, there is no demand for these messages. None at all. Zilch. Zero. But there is demand for something else—environmental accountability. As David puts it:

How many miles of paper must K-Mart waste every day?

Amen.

Here’s a scan of the actual receipt to drive the point home:

Tags: docsearls, messages, customerpower, cluetrain