Would you buy from someone who couldn’t spell their company’s name?
After all, the company’s name is your brand and identity. It connects to your website, collateral, social media, press and everything else.
Someone not knowing your company name can’t buy from you…and you’ll be out of business pretty quickly.
In the middle of Falmouth, Massachusetts, is a day spa called Tanorama. On the pitched roof over the front window is a sign spelling Tanarama. Below it is another sign spelling the name correctly.
Anyone who read my column about bracketing your domain to account for clientele who can’t spell would immediately say, “They obviously own both tanarama.com and tanorama.com, pointing them both to their website, right?”
While this would be a logical conclusion, you’d be mistaken. They don’t own tanarama.com.
Oops!
According to their website, Tanorama has been in business since 1999, so there’s no excuse for this erroneous signage. And while I’m willing to blame the problem on the sign maker, I can’t wrap my head around why management didn’t catch the problem and allowed the misspelled sign to be hung up.
Because as Harry Truman famously said: “The buck stops here.” Meaning even if the sign maker screwed up, the blame falls on the company’s CEO or manager for allowing the sign to be hung and for not insisting the sign be remade.
After all, I neither know nor care about the sign maker if I’m doing business with Tanorama. But this very obvious mistake makes me wonder about their overall quality control.
Admittedly, and regardless of what you sell, mistakes are going to happen. Business cards will get printed with old tag lines, social media will publish incorrect information, and websites will contain dead links.
It’s the nature of the beast. Just admit you made the mistake, fix it and move on with your life.
But blaming someone else or ignoring what the entire world can see is wrong makes you look foolish. After all, if you can’t get your own company name right, your clientele will be totally justified in asking what else you’re mishandling in the products and services you deliver.
Then remember Walt Disney’s advice: “The past can hurt. But the way I see it, you can either run from it or learn from it.”
With that said, I wish you a week of profitable marketing.
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