Jilted

Without so much as a parting word, they walked out on us. No emotional farewells. No longing, final glances. They didn’t even bother to leave a note sealed with a kiss, on the crumpled pillow. We thought we had a good, solid thing going here. We’d been in bed with them for quite a while. And we’ve been loyal to the bitter end. Call us romantic, but if it was to ever happen, we imagined it playing out kind of like this…

We’ll always have Paris? Not quite. We were quickly faced with the cold, painful truth. They’d been seduced by a rich, trendy, shiny boy toy who happens to use a first-person, singular pronoun for a name.* And, to add insult to injury, they’d already moved in to i’s swanky, new pad.

But, “Hey, this is business!”, you might be thinking about the Agency 5’s decision to sever their ties with us, and to shut us out of all their titles, in order to make them available on Apple’s iPad. That’s right, it is business! And the way we conduct our business, here at Diesel, is to lovingly nurture our partnerships – whether they’re with distributors, publishers or customers. And, at the risk of being naïve, we expect the same in return – thank you very much.

Look, we’re human. Sometimes, we forget to do the dishes or take out the trash. But the point is that we really wish more companies out there behaved with some level of integrity where it counts – in their business relationships. But, noooo. Too many of them are still not realizing that this is a brave new plugged-in, “social” world in which the old ways of doing cut-throat deals are going out the window with yesterday’s business ethics models (see our last post for more on this topic). Yes, the moral codices for business and personal interaction are becoming inexorably intertwined. Haven’t you heard? Where the hell have you been, dude? The traditional one-way marketing conversation has become a, truthful two-way dialogue. And not soon enough.

What was once accepted as normal, “institutionalized” predatory behavior in the name of just making a buck, is out…period! Double period!! Hello? If you don’t get that Mr. Macmillan, Mr. S. A. Schuster, Monsieur Hachette, et al, you’re in for a rude awakening, eventually. Information is being shared by your customers, prospects and competitors every day through all the new social media channels. Relationships are being forged, brands are being made and strengthened, and potential new customers are being engaged. With an exponential number of eyeballs accessible to you, are you really willing to keep going down that path? You’ve already taken a rather salient and bold move by discarding us – the retailers and their customer base – like a worn out book jacket cover. Think long and hard. What will your next one be? We sincerely hope it’s a move that speaks to the angels of our (and your) better nature.

And if it’s not, at least have the decency to whisper sweet nothings in our ears while you’re f*@$#^%g us. Oh, and some chocolates would be nice, too.

*(Please Note: Genders roles are interchangeable, here. We’ve always been kind of confused that way, anyway.)