Welcome to the Escape Blog

Over on The Escapee Blog, Chris Pearson from Channel Advantage laid down a bit of a challenge:

"I suggest ‘the Escape’ you show us your skills and list out 10 areas
the post office went wrong and maybe a few ideas to get them started."

We like a challenge so here goes (please bear in mind I don’t know about the regulations that surround Royal Mail so these may not be implementable in the real world). Also, I always like to look forward, not back, so won’t dwell on where they may have gone wrong.

1. Rural Deliveries: It seems that one of the bug bears of RM is that they have to deliver to the less profitable rural ares. Why not also introduce deliveries of different items, not just post. If this is not feasible, why not partner with a third party who could do this. Also, why not offer a collection service as well for Free? Groceries, dry cleaning, banking, etc.
2. Advertising: People love freebies and don’t mind if advertising is involved. Why not reduce the cost of some postage by introducing a second service (advertising class), against allowing advertising on the envelope. This would obviously only work with personal mail but there is still a market. You also know that all local post ends up going through a local sorting office - so the advertising could be localised.
3. Free Business Collections: £500 per year to collect my business post - no thanks, I’d rather send an email.
4. Scrap 2nd class post: It’s all second class these days and it confuses people.
5. Flexible Stamp Prices: You buy one first class stamp, it costs 32p. You buy 100, they cost 32p each. Why no discount?
6. Free Postage For the over 65’s: (not sure how you’d manage it though)
7. Two-Way Stamps: Two-part device for stamps to encourage a reply. Like a return ticket on a train.
8. Online Postage: On the same lines as Chris’s idea - there must be massive scope for an online community. They also have the idea vehicle to advertise - on the envelopes of the millions of bits of post every day. This could also include ISP services.
9. Online e-mail marketing services seems like a good extension to their current services offering - extendable to text messaging also.
10. Hire a better PR firm. They always seem to be taking a battering in the press - they need to sort it.

Probably could come up with some other better ones but it’s Good Friday and it’s me in my kitchen on my own (saddo). So much better in a team- At The Escape we love nothing like a good brain storm - it’s how we come up with our best ideas.

If you are a company, small or large, that are looking for some creative solutions - why not challenge us with your business. Some of the ideas may take you outside a comfort zone but these are challenging times for business. And long may it continue…

Other reading:

• Funky Business
• All Marketers Are Liars
• Tipping Point
• Purple Cow