According to a recent article in The Economist, Basildon is the most average place in the UK, based on several factors like employment, incomes, house prices and ethnic make-up.

So, why isn’t it awash with marketeers testing their products or talking with the local population to see what they need or how they should be talked to?

Is it because people don’t know it’s the most average place? Or is it because, in the real-world, average often misses the majority of real people?

BPL believe, as marketeers, that we need to focus on specific target audiences – not averages – and understand who they are, what they do, what they believe and what they want. Then we can deliver compelling messages in an engaging way.

We call this Powerful Simplicity.

Now that’s not to say that there aren’t some averages that might be helpful, as a general rule of thumb. In British Law, an “average consumer” is defined as “reasonably observant”, “reasonably well informed” and “reasonably circumspect”. Maybe these are the traits that we should consider when talking to customers, treating them with a little respect for their “reasonably” well-informed view, rather than just pushing propaganda at them.

So, what’s the take away here?

Don’t let your brand go the way of the apocryphal statistician who drowned crossing a river in deep water – even through he worked out that the average depth of water was 3 feet!

If you’d like a second opinion on your marketing, or you want to hear some examples of Powerful Simplicity, get in touch today because we’d love to hear from you.