Married at First Sight Doesn’t Work

Have you watched Lifetime Network’s “Married at First Sight?” If you’re unfamiliar, the premise is singles yearning for a life-long partnership agree to a provocative proposal and get legally married to a stranger the moment they first meet. The couples don’t meet until they walk down the aisle and see each other face-to-face, for the first time, at the altar. No courtship, no romance, just like the days of pre-arranged weddings between families, usually with a shotgun involved.

Spiker Insights

Marketers, think about this. No second meeting to see if the other party truly meets your needs as an agency partner or a customer you want living right next door to you. Just because they have the money, doesn’t mean they are right for your project and being your next-door neighbor. Would you really go next door to borrow a cup of sugar from someone you don’t know?

Sales is meant to be done the old fashioned way — with courtship, wooing and discovering if you are a match, so you both can move forward in developing a mutually benefiting relationship.

Agencies have the pedigree, and the pretty pictures, but what marketer is going to agree to the provocative idea of conducting one conversation and then being contractually hitched? Just because they are a great brand doesn’t mean it all falls together after the first meeting. Play the field. It’s amazing what you may find out there.