Trust me?

Written by Carol Jones
Director, Interface Pty Ltd
Designers & Makers Since 1994

What do you do when your ironing board cover scrunches up?

That’s simple.

Get one that doesn’t.

What do you do when you have a headache? Take a pain reliever.

Want to lose weight? Go on a diet.

And get fit? Buy a pedometer and start walking.

Your children have trouble reading? Sign them up for after hours coaching.

Want to kick start your day? Have a healthy breakfast.

There seems to be a solution for just about every problem. And most of the solutions appear to be pretty simple, don’t they? But do you know what the biggest problem of all is?

Which solution can you trust?

The world of marketing is full of spin. Insinuation, innuendoes and half truths flourish.

Half truths create confusion. Julie-Ann Davies points this out in her article, Spoiled For Choice, in The Bulletin’s July 11th edition. She comments on the new regulations for food, which allows food to be marketed for its health benefits.

If a food manufacturer in Australia puts additives in their food, they can label it as a health benefit and lull you into the false supposition that what you’re buying is 100% healthy.

Julie-Anne uses Kellogg’s Coco Pops as an example of ‘insinuation’. They add calcium, B vitamins and iron to their cereal and market it as a healthy cereal.

What don’t they reveal? It’s low in fibre and 30% sugar.

Rosemary Stanton, one of Australia’s leading health nutritionists, “assumed that a product loaded with sugar, but with some nutrient added, would be barred from making a health claim.”

But it’s not.

So, eating breakfast isn’t so simple after all, is it?

Neither is choosing a pain reliever that doesn’t give you side affects; or finding a diet that offers you healthy, lifelong changes to your eating habits; even pedometers have faults: - cheap ones add steps when you go over bumps; and which coach will really improve your child’s ability to read?

Here’s one more example of marketing spin, posted in the Guerrilla Marketing Association’s GMA Insider report for June 2006.

An interoffice softball game was held every year between the marketing department and support staff of one company. The support staff beat the marketing department soundly. The next day, the marketing department posted this notice on the company’s bulletin board.

“The Marketing Department is pleased to announce that for the recently completed softball season, we came in second place, having lost but one game all year. The Support Department, however, had a rather dismal season, as they won only one game all season.”

Marketing spin at its most alluring.

If you can no longer completely trust the most basic of purchases, your daily food, how do you know you can trust other products you buy or the business you’re dealing with?

It isn’t easy. But there are some simple ground rules.

Ask yourself why you’re buying this product.

Is it to solve a real problem, or is it just of novelty value? How long do you expect it to last?

If it’s to solve a problem, find out if it really does. Ask the manufacturer or retailer to back up their claims. To give you proof the product works. Then assess their response.

If they don’t get back to you quickly or can’t answer your question with anything more than a vague answer, look for another brand or another retailer.

If it’s a small business, they should be able to give you examples of customers who have used this product and how long it should last. They should be able to impart a feeling of confidence and knowledge about the product.

Have you heard of this product before? If you have, what do other people say about it?

If you haven’t, can you find out more information?

Is there a product brochure available with technical information? How much information does it contain? Minimal? Or so much, you feel confident this is the product for you?

Is there a website that specifically tells you about this product? Does it have technical information? Does it have customer testimonials? Does it have good contact information, like addresses, telephone numbers and personal names in case you have a problem or want to know more and prefer to talk to a person rather than send an email?

Let’s get back to my first question. 80% of Australian homes have an ironing board topped by a flimsy cover. So what do you do when your ironing board cover always scrunches up?

Get one that doesn't.

Our cover, The Fitz Like A Glove™ Ironing Board Cover, never rides up, wrinkles or creases. It gives you thousands of hours of easy, trouble free ironing And that’s unconditionally guaranteed. It really is a simple solution to a difficult and irritating problem.

But you’ve never come across a cover that doesn’t scrunch up.

So why should you trust what we say?

I really wanted to know the answer to that question.

So I asked first time customers who ordered online. Because the internet is considered to be the most risky form of purchase. Here are 4 points of view.

Maree Green of Lindfield NSW. “It’s the effort you put into your website. The photographs of every facet of the cover and felt, the volume of information you provided, plus your guarantees, gave me comfort and reassurance that this was a good purchase.” This is only Maree’s 2nd online purchase.

Norma Ives of Yowie Bay NSW. “I see your regular advertisements in Australian Stitches magazine and looked you up. The wording and photographs were so well presented, they gave me confidence.” This was a first for Norma. She normally doesn’t buy things she can’t see, and has never bought on the internet before. She’s 85 years old.

Claire Milson of Edgecliff NSW. “I like the fact you are a rural business. And that your product is made by men and women who have a disability. The product looked good, so I had no hesitation in buying what I saw.”

Mary Kingsford, Textile Artist, of Idalia Qld. “The presentation of your website, your secure online payment facilities, your testimonials and the good photographs of each product from many angles plus your guarantees sold me. You replied to my email questions quickly and returned my phone message within a few minutes. I felt you were a well run business.”

There you have it. Trust is subjective and different for each person.

But it’s always about safety.

It’s when you feel secure and that little voice inside you says, yes, it’s OK, go ahead.

It’s a privilege to be trusted and to discover why our customers trust us. These are some of their reasons.

• We go out of our way to help you. Quick replies to phone calls and emails matter.
  
• We give you information that isn’t a veneer. It has substance and depth. The more we tell you, the more confident you are about our products.
  
• Testimonials do count. They’re 3rd party endorsements and give you some idea of who else uses our products and how we do business.
  
• Our 4 guarantees mean we back up our claims.

That we choose to have our products made with love and care in rural Australia by men and women who have a disability shows we care about more than money.

There are 75,000 users world wide who trust The Fitz Like A Glove™ Ironing Board Cover. And growing daily. I want you to be next.

My marketing spin?
You’ll never know how great it is until you try it!
Not a half truth, but a whole truth.

Visit our website at www.interfaceaustralia.com to discover for yourself the details and the photographs.

While there, click on Finer Points. The blog on the left is The Ironing Board Cover Lady. It’s the continuing story of how our accidental business began on the dining room table of our rural property. No hype, no sales talk. Just a warm hearted, down home tale of 2 people starting a business on ‘L’ plates without an instructor.

Then let’s meet again. Online, by mail or on the phone.


Take care,

CAROL

Carol Jones
Director
Interface Pty Ltd
Ilford NSW 2850 AUSTRALIA

Tel: +612 63 58 85 11
Fax: +612 63 58 85 10