Devious, insidious, calculating, sly, scheming, and shady. No, for once I’m not talking about the machinations of the Conservative Party and how they have managed to conspire to bring this country to its knees, and now want to bring back Bungling Boris to finish us all off (more of which later).
No, dear Foxy fans, I’m actually talking about the lengths The Drum Awards Team will seemingly go to in their efforts to get you to enter their events.
Now you may recall that last week I was celebrating the launch of the “Awards Season”, where the good, the bad and the ugly of the marketing world are forced to blow smoke up each other’s arses.
As part of that, I had to do some in-depth research – surely you didn’t think I made this shit up did you? – and visited a number of marketing awards websites to see what was on offer.
But, no sooner had I clicked off than in came a call from Glasgow, and I quote: “Hi, I’m calling from The Drum Awards Team and was wondering if you needed any help in entering the Drum Awards for Out of Home or the Drum Awards for Experience? Would you like a deadline extension?”
Of course, some of you might admire this kind of data capture but I was left wondering what sort of system they have in place to get such detail, let alone how the hell they got my name and my mobile phone number. If that’s what direct marketing is about, thank god I don’t write about it too often.
To be fair, the sort of data capture I normally prefer is best summed up by the launch of the IllicitEncounters.com “Infidelity Index”, which uses anonymous data from over one million postcodes to show how many people are having affairs in each area.
All you have to do is type in your local town or city and up pops the number of love rats skulking around your parts. According to the Major Towns Index, Guildford in Surrey comes on top whereas the City Index puts Chester firmly out in front.
Interestingly, in the constituency of Uxbridge, where Boris Johnson – the king of devious, insidious, calculating, sly, scheming and shady – resides, there are 948 people having an affair.
Mind you, it doesn’t say how many are actually having an affair with him. Maybe that level of detail is something that direct marketing – and The Drum Awards Team – could help with, after all, and finally rule him out for good.
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