Introduction
You may not have given much thought to what companies can learn from philosophers. You may be tempted to think that philosophers raise far more questions than they answer with their seemingly endless logic. To some extent, the criticism has merit. However, there is a principle of ethics known as the golden rule that I must introduce that companies can learn from.
You will have heard of the golden rule. You will find it mentioned in many cultures; among other places, you will find it in Confucius; you will find it in Islam; you will find it in Western philosophy, and you will find, perhaps, its best-known version in Christian ethics. The golden rule is something like this: “do to others what you would like them to do to you”. Here’s Kaitlin Roig DeBellis on the golden rule:
“We all learned it in kindergarten: the golden rule. Treat others the way you want to be treated. As five-year-olds, we are given many concrete examples of what this means and what it looks like. As adults, It seems that this rule can often be forgotten.”
So what does this have to do with running a business?
Marketing and the golden rule
Let’s take a little trip into the world of marketing. Let’s be brutally honest here: Marketing doesn’t always get good press. In fact, there was a time, and not too long ago, when marketers had a reputation that was only marginally on the bright side of the reputation enjoyed today by dubious car dealers, take-back cold callers. of PPI and politicians.
Marketers thought (and sadly some still do) that their job was to make sure their company’s goods and services sold, no matter what. If achieving the profit target meant cheating customers, leaving customers dissatisfied, and making sure those customers never dealt with your companies again, well, that was all part of the sales-focused marketing ethos.
You may well be thinking that surely what I have described above is the work of those involved in marketing. And I wouldn’t disagree for a moment that marketers have a job to ensure that their company’s goods and services are promoted and sold—but not at all costs. That’s the point: not at all costs. The sales-focused orientation was largely a hangover from the industrial revolution, and marketers today still live with the tarnish it has had on their reputation.
How would you define marketing? There are quite a few definitions. The one I like the most is the one that talks about satisfying customer requirements in a profitable way. The reason I like this is because it makes it clear that companies are there to make a profit in the first place. If they don’t, they go bankrupt and no one benefits from that.
Second, it emphasizes that the profits companies make must come from satisfying customer requirements. Satisfied customers are good for business. There is no doubt that some companies still take the sales-focused approach; however, today’s enlightened marketers realize that the customer is at the center of the marketing universe.
What marketers of the past were doing, to put it very simply, was ignoring the golden rule. In fact, they were happily doing the complete opposite of what the golden rule requires. They were more than happy to treat customers one way, but would never accept the same type of treatment.
Enlightened marketing and the golden rule
Have you seen the movie Miracle on 34th Street? If so, you may recall the scene where Kris Kringle (played by Edmund Gwenn in the 1947 version) who works as Santa Claus in a department store begins advising customers where to go to find the toys that his store doesn’t. has. It seems that the store has hired someone who not only believes that he really is Santa Claus, but is also helping to scare away the store’s customers by advising them to go elsewhere.
However, it turns out that what Kris does is a very successful part of the company’s public relations. The store is seen as a company that can be trusted and that has the best interest of its customers at the center of its business activities. Store sales increase all thanks to Kris. Granted, this is part of a fairy tale, but the principle behind what Kris does is what today we would call an example of Enlightened Marketing and an example of the Golden Rule in action.
Kris Kringle may have been acting out of naivety or innocence. Then again, she may have realized that a customer is for life, not just for Christmas. (Don’t Santa’s customers come back again and again?) He may have decided to do the marketing for the store and take the long view of things.
If companies treat their customers as they would like to be treated, they are more likely to retain their hard-earned customers. Satisfied customers are more likely to deal with companies over and over again. Satisfied customers are more likely to recommend businesses that have met their needs to others. This is certainly not a fairy tale. The golden rule is a very simple principle. It is a principle that seems as close to universal as a principle can be. It is a principle that enlightened companies will adopt.