A Day in the Life of a Persuasion Architect

AdAge on Viral Campaigns...

Scott Donaton's latest article over at AdAge touches on something I wrote a while back, after the Agency.com fiasco.  He astutely writes (emphasis is added):

As with ads in any medium, those that work are those that start with an insight, show an understanding of their target audience, and have an authentic, relevant connection to the brand. Those that don't smack of having been produced because someone wanted to do a viral video to please himself, his boss or his board. They're the commercial equivalent of YouTube videos of kids falling off skateboards.

I couldn't agree more.  Too bad the insight part is the key, and plucking those off trees isn't exactly a viable strategy in 2007. 

Utterings of the Truly Desperate

From USA Today "Product Placement - You Can't Escape It"....

"Marketers are saying, 'We must be more innovative — to zig when others zag,' " says Richard Notarianni, executive creative director of media at ad firm Euro RSCG.

"The industry is desperate to find clever ways to reach people, whether or not it has any legitimate value. ... When someone says, 'Let's put advertising in bathroom stalls,' another says 'That's great. It's a captive audience.' "

More...

No space is too odd. US Airways (LCC) is in talks to sell ads on airsickness bags, spokeswoman Valerie Wunder says. It already makes about $10 million a year from ads on tray tables and napkins, she says.

"The game has become one of finding the next blank space that hasn't been covered," says Yankelovich's Smith.

And more...

"I've never seen things changing as much as they are now," says Rance Crain, editor-in-chief of trade magazine Advertising Age and a 40-plus-year observer of marketing. "Advertisers will not be satisfied until they put their mark on every blade of grass."

And finally...

The more consumers ignore ads, the more ads marketers spew back at them, says Max Kalehoff of marketing research firm Nielsen BuzzMetrics. "It's like a drug addiction. Advertisers just keep buying more and more just to try to achieve prior levels of impact. In other words, they're hooked."

This year, marketers will spend a record $175 billion on ads in major media, such as TV, radio, print, outdoor, movie theaters and the Internet, says ad-buying firm ZenithOptimedia. That's up 5% over 2005. Add direct mail and other direct-response ads, and the total will hit $269 billion.

Advertisers are becoming that loud mouth annoying guy at the bar who's flashing his expensive watch, bragging about his job, and buying every prospective girl a drink.  Sorry bud, buying even more drinks, or putting your picture up in a lady's stall isn't gonna increase your chances, you are probably going home alone...again.

$269 billion can buy you alot of stuff, but it can no longer buy you a desirable magnetic personality that people want to buy.  It won't buy you a barking cat.  If you think it will, then I have a 41,723 blades of grass in my front lawn that I will be happy to whore out to a desperate advertiser. 

Buy one blade get one free, captive audience for canines and occasional jack rabbits, 25% more traffic in growing subdivision,  this offer won't last long, call now.

 

The Future of Consumer Research

No sooner than Jeffrey Eisenberg posts his rant about the state of consumer surveys do we get another authorative glimpse into the future of research from our brilliant strategic partner Michele Miller.  Check out what she writes over at Inc.

Companies like Yahoo (NASDAQ:YHOO), Pepsi (NYSE:PBG), and Best Buy (NYSE:BBY)  now realize the methods they used to mine  for information in the past were often unproductive and inefficient. The pressure-cooker atmosphere of a group of strangers in an unfamiliar setting, combined with questions skewed to obtain answers favorable toward a product, is often a dangerous (if not deadly) concoction. Over the years, countless products that should never have been introduced made it to market, and vice-versa.

Today, major advancements in science, technology, and human-behavior studies offer new tools for studying consumers that are more natural and provide greater insight into what a customer wants. What techniques should you consider?  Read the entire article.

Survey Takers: Do They Have An Agenda Or Just Too Much Time?

We're not usually big fans of marketing data collected from surveys. We've written about it several times. We often find the methodologies flawed, the questions suspect and the respondents even more suspect.

AdAge just published an article that confirms what we've been saying. Jack Neff wrote about it in "Consumers Rebel Against Marketers' Endless Surveys: 30 Top Industry Execs Gather to Discuss 'Opinion Fatigue' Crisis". The article is disturbing especially the following:

"VNU's Nielsen Media Research has actually seen respondent rates rise from 36% to 45% the past five years, said Paul Donato, chief research officer. That's largely because it pays respondents handsomely for their two-year commitments -- so handsomely that Mr. Donato acknowledged that some on the Media Research Council think it may bias results -- allowing panelists to buy cable subscriptions and DVRs.

Ironically, no one in a roomful of market researchers suggested researching what might best persuade nonrespondents to participate, though Dennis Murphy, VP of the technology practice at Directions Research, said it's time to find out how different nonresponders really are from responders -- something largely neglected since the 1970s."

Large Agencies Take It On The Chin

Persuasion Architect Holly Buchanan wrote a post titled "Do We Need More Women and Minority Hiring in Advertising?" on her blog. She takes on the subject without regard to political correctness. I'll give you an excerpt below. You decide if it is worth reading the rest.

"One - if you're talented, you're in advertising, and you're a minority - go the big agency route if you want - but also look at the smaller shops that are doing amazing things and blowing away the competition with their insight and successful track records. 

Two - I want to hear from you - what do you think about the whole minority in advertising debate?   Good or bad - bring it on.   Do you think the whole thing is just a misguided "affirmative action" for advertising that will force agencies to lower their standards in order to hire minorities?    Is the attitude of Neil French one that is actually held by many advertising executives - that women are too busy with mommy responsibilities to work as hard as their midnight oil burning male counterparts - is this a view that is more widely held than we think?   Is the glass ceiling still firmly in place for women and minorities?  Is that why so much advertising aimed at women doesn't work?  because too many white men are making the decisions and doing the creative - creating ads that they like?   

Or is this just more political posturing by those damn minorities and feminists with nothing better to do than whine and complain.

Speak up!"

I'm not a big fan of large agencies.  They're not competitors, they're mostly in a parallel business to Future Now. The ones who do online marketing are usually good for a laugh. Take a look at Jonah Bloom's column in AdAge if you want his take on large agencies and why they have become caricatures of themselves.

Is Your Service In The Toilet?

Seth Godin took a couple of pictures that tell a bigger story about customer service, customer expectations and customer experience. Read his post and think about how you can improve your customer's experience.

Quotes to Ponder: Best Practices

”Imitation is the sincerest form of collective stupidity.”
—W. Carroll (Bill) Munro, marketing director, PepsiCo

"Don't give me best practices, they are yesterday's news. Give me emerging practices, they are tomorrow's news."
- paraphrased from Barry Diller (I believe).


Can anyone help validate who said the second one?

3 simple steps to create a viral campaign...

1. Get yourself a YouTube, Digg, Flikr, del.icio.us, furl.net, or __________ (insert your favorite online popularity tool here) account.
2. Get out your handicam, pen, digital camera, blogging software, word processor, or __________ (insert your favorite communication tool here)
3. Find something to say that's relevant, salient, and transparent to such a mass audience, it overcomes each visitor, infects them (er, eh, like a virus ;) in such a way they can't quite articulate, at their core they just have to pay it forward.

I'm sorry, did my title lead you to believe this would be easy? (Ya, fancy little lists give that impression. It's no wonder why the business section of your local Barnes & Noble is littered with them.)  Not only is it not easy, but more to the point (and sarcasm aside now), it's also not possible to create a viral campaign in advance.  A campaign becomes viral due to the energy the campaign consumes in the wild.  It becomes viral due to factors outside of its control.  You simply don't set out to create a viral campaign.  I'll say it again, only louder (and with the sarcasm switch turned on again):

You don't create a viral campaign, simply because you wish your campaign would be viral. 

Likewise, you don't ascend to the homepage of Digg, simply because you've written something you wrote simply to get there. 

If you swing for the fences, you're much more likely to strikeout than you are to hit a homerun.  But if you aim to make contact, you just may hit one out of the park.  When planning your marketing communication strategy, please do remember to keep your eye on the ball.

Care to share your thoughts on the topic?

PS - Care to know what the driving point for this little rant was?  Contrast the following links from AdAge. 

The first, being yet another story around the Agency.com Subway pitch (the irony here is that the industry at large created the viral effects, not the campaign itself.  Had this video been a campaign for a mom and pop shop, trying to win the business of the largest car dealer in Bismarck, North Dakota, the blogosphere would have never heard of it). 

The second, being yet another story around the pure viral steamroller that is Snakes On A Plane. Never will a movie make more with less, and they've all but acknowledged publicly, they certainly didn't greenlight the film with this in mind.  Have they capitalized on the CGM efforts- absolutely (and all indications are, they'll continue doing so) but to suggest they planned it this way is laughable.  Enjoy, and safe flying ;)

Do no evil, Google?

It's not every day a client sends a FW: my way which causes me to literally laugh out loud (and clog other's inbox as well), but today's the day.  Apparently, our constant ranting about technology rarely being the solution to a Marketer's problem is seeping into to those who listen to us most often (and who's the worst offender of the "world domination through technology).  Take a look at what had me rolling, the official See-no-evil-hear-no-evil-and-certainly-do-no-evil Monkeys:

For the record, our exact quote is what Sergey and Larry have done best is create a technological solution so easy, any monkey could use it.  That does not, however, explain why people play their game.  Why, in the wake of ever present traffic cost inflation, do business owners look to continually blame Google for their own marketing ineptness (ineptness is likely to harsh, poor strategy and poorer execution is more likely) ?

Despite the recent brewhaha over Google and Relevance the key to seemless contextual advertising is just that: relevance- providing consistent scent of information, from the search term to the adword (driving point), and the adword to the landing page (funnel point).  It's about understanding that search terms are laden with intent, and intent is an action based on a motivation.  Recall the third question we continually ask and answer during Persuasion Architecture engagements- what information would our audience need to feel comfortable and confident taking the action you've laid out for them- search terms hold your first clue.

We joke about Google around the office, because their notion of "doing no evil" is comical when with the advent of Gbuy they'll now potentially know every piece of personally identifiable information about you, save two (Driver's license and passport).  But truth be told, Eric Schmidt's quote about charging advertisers more for PPC ads is not evil, it's capitalism.  It's not Google's fault many Marketer's take the lazy way out.  It's not their fault Conversion Rates industry wide continue to fall. 

It is their fault however that people are misled into believing technology holds the cure to that which hasn't been planned properly in the first place (and proper planning of a contextual visitor experiece my friends, is a Persuasion challenge not a technological one).  It's also one of the reasons we asked Yahoo, and specifically brand marketing legend Murray Gaylord to partner with us and write the forward for Waiting for Your Cat to Bark.

Digg it?

Stray cats barking throughout the office!

Well forgive the shameless plug, but we're finally 100% publicly shipping our latest book Waiting for Your Cat to Bark: Persuading Customers When They Ignore Marketing.  Amazon, BN and Sam's Club jumped the gun a bit, but we forgive their exhuberance.  After all, there's probably no better time to start shipping than when a book is recommended in the Sunday edition of the New York Times.  We couldn't be more proud of it, and the reception we've received thus far.  There's been far too much feedback to share here, but a random sampling shows podcasts, newspapers, tv & radio stations, and online reviews getting into the mix.  Here's a few of our personal fav's: (feel free to add your own ;)

• Craig Danuloff from Commerce360, leads an insightful chapter by chapter discussion of the book.
• Mike Grehan recently podcasted his fireside chat with Jeffrey & Bryan, and wrote about it on ClickZ
• The good folks behind 800-CEO-READ offer their thoughts (and free books)
• WonderBranding's own Michele Miller donating her own charitable dollars to inspire future readers
• Chuck McKay, of Advertising Made Simple, offers the Small Biz take on the value of Cat

There's been plenty of pub for the release, I gave you five, and in a variety of formats.  I hope there's something in there for everyone.  Our heartfelt thanks to everyone who's enjoyed the Waiting for Your Cat to Bark experience, and to those of you who haven't... what are you waiting for?!

Your agency sucks!

"Push your agency out of the way," insisted John Nardone, chief client officer at MMA, in the day's most controversial statement. "They're your single biggest barrier to measurement."

And I thought we were harsh in our Ad:tech 1mpact presentations!  Talk about impactful quotes.  How about this one as well:

"I don't need to hear from you," snapped Dr. Don E. Schultz, professor emeritus-in-service of Integrated Communications at Northwestern University. Speaking in an ad-barraged consumer's voice, Dr. Schultz continued, "If I need something, I'll go get it."

"It's a radically different marketplace," Schultz continued. "The supply chain has changed to a demand chain."

It's no surprise to hear these stories coming from yesterday's Yahoo Summit- we've spent a lot of time with Yahoo over the last year, as they've been very involved in promoting Waiting For Your Cat to Bark (not to mention supplying a $50 incentive to search marketers who purchase the book).  They definitely have a clearer vision of the new consumer landscape.  It was perhaps a tad surprising to hear so many voices echoing the sentiments we've offered in this space, and at conferences all over the world, this past year.  What can I say, it's a good time to be a Persuasion Architect. 

These stories were just a few of the many though.  I'd highly recommend popping over to ClickZ and letting the fabulous Rebecca Lieb tell you more about it. 

Of course, it being Friday, you may want to read this while you're there too...

Sex in the city?

I awoke at 7:15 this morning, exhausted from yet another weekend juggling family & friends in town, squeezing out the last 15 hours of the work week that couldn't be fit into 5 workdays, and barely sitting down long enough to catch the Sopranos.  The first thing greeting me in my inbox was the same as it is each week, Roy's Monday Morning Memo.  Talk about salience:

"Men think about it every seven seconds or so. Women romanticize it. Teenagers yearn for the weekends, when they might get a little of it... Sleep is the new sex." – Susan A. Nielsen, journalist for The Oregonian

The National Sleep Foundation has confirmed what you've long suspected: Americans aren't getting enough sleep.

The culprits are:

Email: It just won't let us unplug from the grid. We stay up late, tapping out messages lest someone be offended by our lack of response.

Caffeine: Our shortage of sleep has deepened in lockstep with the rising popularity of gourmet coffee. Coffee goes up. Sleep goes down. Surprised?

Alcohol: A little wine may help put us to sleep, but it also keeps us from sleeping deeply. Alcohol robs us of much-needed rest during the night.

Lack of exercise: Our bodies need physical exertion. The more we sweat, the better we sleep. But few of us are getting any real exercise.

Overcommitment: We're taking care of our jobs, our children, and our parents, then trying to squeeze out a few droplets of me-time. Too much to do in too few hours is keeping our motors revving at redline.

Instant Gratification: We want what we want and we want it now. We make purchases the moment we can qualify for the payments because acquiring things is how we keep score, right? Then, Impending Financial Doom keeps us anxious and chases sleep from the room. So we take a pill. Doctors prescribed drugs to 42 million of us last year who said we couldn't sleep. Two billion dollars is what we spent for sleeping pills in 2005. But the 300 million spent by pharmaceutical companies to advertise sleep-inducing drugs had nothing to do with that, right? You and I aren't affected by advertising.

And I thought it was just New Yorkers who spent their days this crazy but apparently it's an epidemic.  If you're not a subscriber, you can read the rest of the memo and see what returns 5 minutes a week can bring you.  You won't be disappointed.

If you fail to plan success in advance, how do you know when you've arrived?

Chief Marketer has an eye-opening for some, sad for others, (but hardly surprising from this corner) article on many CMOs utter lack of ability to measure what they must- marketing ROI, specifically that of the online variety.  We're getting tired of speaking over the dull roar of today's online successes, regaling tales of traffic cost inflation (btw, Piper Jaffray reports Online Advertising to top $55 billion by 2010), but if the shoe fits...

Citing WebTrends 2006 CMO Web-Smart Report, they report 84% of the CMOs surveyed rated their organization's ability to measure web marketing performance as having room for improvement, weak or non-existent.

“The challenge is due to a lack of consistent, goal-based metrics to measure reach, frequency, and conversion across all online campaigns,” said a spokesman for Web trends.

Another cause is “the inability to target customers with relevant marketing and messages due to siloed analysis; tools that only provide aggregated data such as page views and visits,” he continued.

Uhh, sorry, no.  Consistent, goal-based metrics?  Who's goals?  Report jockeys going to start creating more canned reports that measure my goal-based metrics?  Forgive me for being skeptical, but it's not often good things are found in a can. 

If that's not enough, they go on to blame the... tools?  Many web analytics vendors have created fabulous tools for reporting and measuring the data collected by the medium.  What other medium provides such ready access to a wealth of statistics?  Those who heard me speak last week at Ad:tech 1mpact heard the line often, clicks are people, links are decisions. 

These fabulous tools we have at our disposal measure the decisions our people/visitors/customers make when they engage with our persuasive system, or rather, our advertising, marketing, and website.  They're limited in that by definition, they cannot come preloaded with our customers' motivations included- after all, they're our customers.  We're responsible (by we, of course, I mean marketing not simply IT) to plan the experience each of our customer segments would prefer to engage in online.  What questions they would ask?  What information they would require?   How would they prefer to interact with our site?

In short, we're planning what a successful scenario looks like because it's amazing how much less of the problem these analysis tools magically become when we feed them the plan we built in advance.

Overlooked Gem on Word of Mouth

How To Buy Word Of Mouth is worth reading and then rereading if you are interested in WOM. This is not a throwaway, Roy Williams doesn't do throwaways. Every instance of WOM that I can come up with falls into the  three categories he defined. What can you do with this information in your business?

Science of Stupidities

Bryan Eisenberg just sent me a link to Eric Weaver's blog Ad-Verse.

I immediately subscribed. 

Today's post, entitled Direct Marketing: A Science of Stupidities stole my little marketing heart.  Here is just one tasty morsel.

It's time to stop talking about relevance and start practicing it. Time to stop intruding and start attracting. Time to spell out a clear value proposition. Stop patting yourselves on the back that your unwanted communication got maybe a 5% clickthrough rate. FIVE PERCENT. And consider, just for a moment, the 95% that want you to go to hell.

Maybe direct marketers don't get the whole relationship thing because they don't really know what that word means. Read the whole post.

Warning:  if you can't handle raw, in your face, no holdin' back truth then please don't read the above post. It is not for the weak of mind and heart.

Does your product solve my problem?

Reading last week on Working Knowledge @ Harvard I came across a gem of an article from quite a collection of minds- the uber-smart author of the Innovator's Dilemma, the co-founder of Intuit, and the Chief Strategy Officer of the Advertising Research Federation.  What drew me in was this editor's note:

Marketers have lost the forest for the trees, focusing too much on creating products for narrow demographic segments rather than satisfying needs.

Naturally, this being a Harvard pub, the editor referenced the legendary HBS marketing mind credited with popularizing the notion that people don't want to buy drills, they want to make holes.  Anyone who's heard us speak can attest to how much we agree, and how often we've used his metaphor.  But I was still stuck on the note, and as I continued the article, my disagreement with their collective contention grew.  While I would never question their academic (and corporate) intellect, I have to challenge a few assumptions.

Are marketers responsible for creating products?

Is polling demographic subsets of a customer base the same as understanding one's customers?

The article ultimately leads to a conclusion I'd agree with emphatically (although I find the metaphor of problem/solution more effective than their choice of job/employee)- to sell more products, marketers must better understand the needs of their customers, and how their products resolve these needs. 

But the notion that understanding the customer is secondary to understanding the product is fallible- understanding the product is understanding the customer.  Putting together groups of "target demographics" has no value toward understanding the customer.  Considering the "typical customer" provides no insights into who the real customers are.

A marketer's job is not to re-create and re-design the product; that's Product Development and Engineering's responsibility.  A marketer's first job is to:

• understand the customers whose problems are solved by their product, not those whose could be 
• to consider all the various angles of approach these potential customers can take toward the product, and all the various handles of information they can use to consider their purchase 
• to allow the potential customer to control the experience, and plan the communication that answers their questions, empathizes with their situation (their context), and demonstrates how their needs are met

To understand the product is to understand the needs of the customer.

I'm Just Browsing

(what's this?)

Walking around Manhattan, the crowds are just too much for me. That’s why I’m trying to buy most of my presents online. I like to browse the stores for presents and the easiest way for me to browse around sites is using the navigation. Stores usually are laid out with different departments that display specific styles. Websites have to use navigation to accomplish this. They forget that they have to speak to the visitor in their language to help guide them with the buying process. This language helps guide the visitor to find what they look for by using specific categories provided by the navigation.

Many visitors immediately are baffled by the navigation titles on websites. The navigation is only useful if it can be understood. For example Sephora.com has a category named “smile”. What kind of product is a “smile”? Bloomingdales.com has a section named “beauty” and Fossil.com has a category named “watch bar”. Can I get some drinks after work at your watch bar?

Visitors use their own trigger words to describe their search.  If navigation is the means by which we get around a site, and the business owners use their own terms, or terms with little meaning in the context of the search, navigation (and momentum) ceases. Don’t you think the customers would appreciate it if you spoke to them in their own terms?

Customer Disservice

 

(what's this?)

The holidays came early for me this year when my desktop at home literally started smoking, so I need to get a replacement fast. I find what I need at Tiger Direct, and decide to break the bank for 2^nd day air shipping. My order goes through, and then I receive a cryptic email saying something about my order may require something from the Credit Department prior to shipping, for security  reasons. On the email there is a link to check the order.  A day after their email, the order has still yet to begin processing.

 

I call them and the customer service agent tells me if I can’t get my credit information verified within a half hour my order won’t get shipped today. Why do I need my credit verified, I’m not financing this PC?  I’m less than thrilled, but I’m transferred to a credit agent who exclaims they haven’t begun to process my credit card order. When I placed the order online, there were none of these issues. After a long and involved process, I was told my computer was finally being shipped. Excellent.

 

I asked her to transfer me to a customer service manager because I wasn’t informed of the delays.  I asked the manager for my extra shipping costs to be refunded because there won’t be anything expedited about my shipping. He told me they sent an automated email about the credit problem and I was supposed to contact them, except the email explicitly stated I should wait to be contacted.  He then acknowledges the computer is on backorder and it will be shipped until the 15^th.   Now I’m very upset.

 

The manager tells me they can offer me a similar system with the same specs for the same price.  Upon checking the site, we find a machine, but the manager now tells me they can only give me a machine at their cost, which is $200 more than I spent.

 

Is paying online with a credit card too difficult to process in real-time? Is it to much to “assume” when shopping online that stock indicators will be provided at the Point of Action? Is it too much to ask that communication be accurate and timely when unforeseen errors arise?  Sadly, this is level of customer service, and online experience is out there, and on sites who truly should know better. What happens in this brave new world of customer empowerment? Well, I think you just read about it…

More Corporate Underpants

Long time readers of this space will recall our friend Tamara Adlin, contributing to both GrokDotCom and Call to Action her stance that an organization should never be caught with their corporate underpants showing.  I couldn't help but think of her while I started my morning, and my afternoon too, at FedexKinkos.  FedexKinkos has a wonderful service known "simply" as "File, Print, FedexKinkos".  I'm putting the final stamp of approval on a Conversion Assessment, and in one click, it's off to the printer to be professionally printed, bound, and then shipped direct to the client.  Sounds like a snap, right? 

It is, just don't assume you can use your corporate Kinkos account to pay for the shipping, and don't try that Fedex code to cover the printing either- they're much too savvy for that.  The counter girl politely explains, to get a new Kinkos account I should call them, and they'll help me.  Them?  I'm confused, aren't you... them?  Yes, she kindly offers, but they can only access Fedex accounts, because they previously were a Fedex brick and mortar.  Thanks, that helps.

I move past the payment issue and ask to see the document before it's shipped out.  My new friend takes my phone number and disappears only to return back 10 minutes later.  Do I recall who I dropped the document off with, she asks.  I explain, through the wonders of FPFK (can't you just see the branding "wizards" who came up with this?), I "dropped it off" from the office.  She begins to laugh, "those come in through our other network, I'll go check and be right back".  "Right back" was a bit of dramatic license I suppose, because 45 minutes later she returns asking if I could give them the document again. 

It seems FPFK couldn't access the document, but don't worry, she assures me, you were charged for it at the time of order, so they will still print it for me.  Somehow, I'm supposed to feel relieved at hearing this.  Imagine, the incredible value proposition of company who charges you for a product, then stands by their underwhelming customer service ability to... actually deliver the product.  Joy.

An Associate Manager returns some time after with my printed, bounded report.  He kindly explains to me, next time I should consider simply coming into the store, because it's much easier for them to print things out on time that way.  As I left the store, I thought about sending Tamara's Conversion Tip off to the FedexKinkos corporate HQ, I just wasn't sure if I should send it to Dallas c/o Kinkos, or Memphis c/o Fedex ;)

Remarkably Talented Cows Displayed on MSN Homepage

Can you create a great ad? Seth Godin has announced a high profile competition that could feature your talent on the homepage of MSN.com. We're bovinely inclined to help Seth; we like him, we like the book (The Big Moo: Stop Trying To Be Perfect And Start Being Remarkable) and we especially like that it's all for charity.

If you have the talent, here is your chance to shine. If not, don't worry about it, you might still enjoy the book.

More SPAM please!

I must admit, this SHOCKS me.  With all the ongoing commentary regarding the fragmentation of media, and the need to create a whole new experience where the customer's content is king (or atleast queen), I thought we were all on board for the new paradigm.  I thought the shift from push (direct) marketing to pull (visitors as volunteers) was clear as crystal. 

Apparently not, because some college kid just raised HALF A MILLION BUCKS in just under two months.  Selling what, you ask?  Sp*m.  You read that right-  HALF. A. MILLION. BUCKS.  Selling Sp*m.

I give him plenty of credit for ingenuity, and for obviously understanding the Wizard's first rule.  If you're intrigued by his plan, and have yet to see it in action, surf on over to the Million Dollar Homepage, (and if you've ever weeded through your Junk folder, you're going to recognize quite a few of those logos)

If anyone needs me in the next few minutes, I'll be signing up for free hosting, while playing Texas Hold'em, and earning a quick graduate degree in the background while I wait for some "free movies" to finish downloading. 

Unreal.  Honestly, when will we ever learn?

Suprising Broca is great... but please remember to have something relevant to say!!

Did Prilosec "Purple Day" come and go, and I missed it?  Did anyone grab a screenshot? 

I must admit, when I first read this article on ClickZ News about Proctor & Gamble taking over Yahoo, ESPN and a few other major homepages for the day, I was intrigued.  Mostly for the audaciousness of it all, but also because we happen to know a few smart cats over at P&G, and they've been known to make the right calls time and time again.  However, without seeing the execution, I'm incredibly skeptical. 

Let's take a listen to the VP of Media for the agency producing the campaign:

"The units are going to be very visual, and will definitely break through the clutter"

He's talking about suprising Broca, right?  So far, so good.  Here comes the train wreck:

"The goal is to put people in the right mindset to get them ready to buy.  This event is unlike any other form of communication because we instantly capture the consumer's attention -- and as a result, the brand will receive an immediate response."

Now he's talking about framing the context, and the participatory nature of the online medium versus all those push mediums that existed in the past.  Sounds like I should be thanking him for putting several of our principles on a national stage.   Not so fast.  Were they ever going to consider what goal the visitor had in mind before she visited Yahoo.com and was invaded by a page popping in purple?  Doesn't the context I came to the site with have some bearing on my relevance?  Is it possible someone is just a tad stuck within their own bottle?

I do agree on that last point though- the brand will certainly receive an immediate response.  I wonder though, how will they track the negative Word of Mouth campaign they'll potentially unleash on the 'net?

 

I-N-T-E-G-R-I-T-Y In Marketing?

Customers, B2C and B2B, are demanding more transparency and accountability. If you want to understand why companies are not always forthcoming; it may have to do with what is truly in their heart. I'm sure there are exceptions and some companies simply don't understand what the needs of their customers are or how opaque they seem to customers. Nevertheless, how can customers understand the brand or the core values of companies that don't truly have any?

The fish always stinks from the head down!

The latest Fast Track Leadership survey by IMD MBA and Egon Zehnder International finds many feel those qualities are in short supply in the executive suite. While 95 percent believe a CEOs ethical behavior plays a meaningful role in business, only 28 percent say CEOs have integrity. You can read more about it the September 2005 edition of Fast Company - Integrity Matters".

How do you get companies' marketing to stand for something when their CEO can only spell I-N-T-E-G-R-I-T-Y ?

DIY Online Marketing: The End of Media Buyers?

In her ClickZ.com column today Tessa Wegert wrote:

Media buyers and planners are again in high demand. According to  TalentZoo, the number of media jobs now available is about three times greater than last year. And recruiting industry insiders say demand is high for those with online experience. Things are looking up.

Or are they?

Media buyers may no longer want for work, but another phenomenon now threatens to obstruct our progress: do-it-yourself media campaigns.

Her column is worth reading. It has me thinking.

 

Could you overcome "new coke"?

Honestly, I doubt it.  Let's face it, Coca-Cola did what most of us could only dream about- unleash a monster NEGATIVE word of mouth campaign, and live to tell about it.  Ironically, they even did one better- they profited so much from their failed campaign, the Chicago Tribune actually credited them with planning the entire strategy in advance.  Nice try, but even the executives acknowledged their flaws.

So what do we do as marketers today?  What do we learn from our past transgressions?  Apparently, we've learned nothing.  We continually hide our customers concerns beneath corporate double-talk and ad-speak in our messaging.  We shy away from actually trying to anticipate, and respond to, our customers fears and issues.  We sell them features, when what they really want is benefits.  We make them false promises, when what they really want is empathy.  We build our sales process around our business goals, rather than around the customer's buying process, and meeting their needs. 

These examples are everywhere, and not the least bit challenging to uncover.    But here's a positive example, someone out there doing something notable, from which we can all learn.  I've been critical of JetBlue in the past, because they still fail miserably at providing intuitive scent trails for us to follow when buying tickets, but today they did something impressive.  I was booking my ticket to Shop.org Annual when they popped the following message:

Imagine that?  Reminding me I'd be flying on a date that may not make me feel comfortable, and providing an alternate context with which I could choose to think about.  Of course, this also comes before I've confirmed my payment, so I could easily switch to another date, if I so chose.  Might it be an irrational fear for a flier to have?  Maybe, maybe not, but that's not the point.  They've recognized some fliers may feel this way, and they envisioned the negative onslaught they'd receive if and when they charged $75 change fee for people who just realized the date, and were no longer comfortable flying. 

Don't be afraid of creating fear in the mind of your visitor, be afraid of what happens when you fail to address the fear she's already experiencing.

Pssst...Spread The Word

Don't miss out on WOMMA's Word of Mouth vs. Advertising event. To make us look good with our friends; Andy Sernowitz who always takes care of friends and friends of friends; WOMMA arranged for us to offer a $50 discount code , it is: futurenowisawesome

Flying Blind On The Web?

Will someone help me understand?

Coming from an OFFLINE marketing background this article has got me scratching my skull.

Only one in five respondents indicated they have a complete handle on their conversion, marketing ROI, and revenue metrics. Twenty-three percent reported they don't currently have any metrics, and 29 percent rely on clickthrough rates alone. Read the entire article at ClickZ Stats.

When I worked in the offline marketing world, every business I consulted was obsessed with marketing effeciency and measuring and optimizing their advertising efforts for ROI. 

With web analytics, we now have access to better and more relevant customer data that many offline marketers could  only dream of as little as 5 years ago.  So why are so many lax, and ill equipped to milk their  site metrics for better conversion, ROI, etc...?

Is it ignorance? 

Are companies afraid of what they will learn?

If you just don't know what do with your web analytics, well, that is an easy problem to fix.

Rethinking Mass Marketing

Mass marketing, a product centric approach, in this increasingly fragmented media market is  showing even more evidence of becoming like pushing on a rope.

Here's what I read in the NY Times (requires registration) this morning:

At Anheuser-Busch, which sells roughly half of all the beer in the United States, executives acknowledge they need to do a better job of making a "personal connection" with the customer.

 "It's no longer good enough to be a mass media brand," said Bob Lachky, executive vice president of global industry development for Anheuser-Busch. "We have to learn how to sell small."

Any Persuasion Architect could have explained why you always have to sell small. No matter how large your audience you still sell one unit to one person at a time. Mass marketing may have worked only a few years ago; people still bought based on their own motivations but had less choices. People are no longer satisfied with the one-size-fits-all messaging for generic products with a diluted brand promise (more investment in the ads than in delivering the brand experience that creates personal connection) since they have an ever increasing variety of alternatives. 

Marketers should all embrace the fragmenatation, the transparency and the increased interactivity because it's not going away.

Gap's WatchMeChange viral campaign - spreading the virus

Seen CPB's new viral campaign for the Gap yet?

If not, you should definitely pop over their site, and prepare for quite a laugh.  The campaign is a spin-off of the popular online retailing "Virtual Me" 3D technology.  It's not exactly well tied to Gap's inventory or catalog, and actually provides nothing more than a few links to Gap.com, and a few appearances of the Gap logo.  Then again, it's designed to be a viral campaign, not to aid in the selling process. 

Here's the interesting part- you'll notice word is spreading, but certainly not like it could or should be.  Why not?  Take a peak at this screenshot- it's the end of the ad.  See anything missing?  Like, say, something quite vital to all online word of mouth plays?  Yup, for some reason, at the apex in momentum, while you and your co-workers are still belly-aching, there's no ability to pass your virtual dancer (or even just the url) along to your other friends.  Oops. 

The crazy thing is, they actually do provide static urls that point to your designed GapGirl or Boy, they simply bungled the execution.  Where's the tipping point in a viral campaign?  I doubt it's before you get to the good parts...

Does your messaging really matter?

A quick anecdote from my walk to the office this morning. 

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Carroll Gardens section of Brooklyn, there's approximately 326 excellent Italian Patisseries per square block.  Luckily for each of them, on this seemingly 100 degree morning, there were no shortage of customers in need of cold drinks, and a cool place to read the morning paper.  Cafe after cafe I walked past in search of my morning Iced Coffee, and each one had a line longer than the next, until I found just what I had been looking for- an empty cafe.  Inside I went, had my cocktail poured in no time, and was on my way out the door when I noticed something pretty interesting... 

The sidewalk sign they had out front read "Hot Cinnamon Buns, fresh from the oven"

The Sun Will Come Up Tomorrow; doh!

ClickZ.com stats is reporting the obvious: Wireless Users Want Local Content

Advertising On Its Deathbed

Anthony helped Bryan write an exceptional ClickZ.com column this week titled Advertising Is Dying:

"If traditional advertising still works for you, I bet you aren't really advertising. You're persuading.

Before I explain, let me pose a question: What's the difference between advertising/marketing and sales?

Truth is, they're almost identical. Or they should be. The only true difference between the two is the ability to accurately measure cause and effect. It's easier to fire an ineffective salesman than an ineffective ad firm. At least, it used to be.

Ineffective advertising has finally been exposed, and, like a vampire, it's withering away under the rays of sunlight."

Read more about the death of advertising

What Will Make Your Cork Pop?

How will you measure success? It's a simple but powerful question every potential client must answer.

The certain sign of a potential client's failure is when they can't define their objectives clearly; turn their business away or live to regret it. Those owner/ managers won't stick to a strategy because are incapable of buying in. The Cheshire Cat explained their condition: "when you don't know where you are headed any road will do".

Tim Miles, our friend and Wizard of Ads Partner, has a wonderful post in his blog: What Will Your Mom Say?. I recommend you read it.

If you like what Tim Miles has to say why don't you come meet him and Bryan and me at our Call To Action Workshop in Austin, TX September 8-9.

Judge Sentences Spammer to Nine Years

You can read the article for yourself. I'm not sure if 9 years is a just sentence. However, I wonder if it will deter spammers. I bet he won't be sending spam from prison.

I'm not pro-death penalty but a friend had an interesting angle on it. While discussing a criminal on death row he asserted that the death penalty would deter crime. When he was challenged to present evidence for that statement he responded cofidently that death would certainly deter that criminal. It stopped the discussion.

Do you ever wonder why people hate spam more than junk mail?

Words: One of Your Better Investments

Feedback, yes we get feedback. Some articles get more than others. This last GrokDotCom article about the value of words generated LOTS of feedback.   It's interesting to see what kind of content will get people to respond.

Have you read the article yet?

Marketing in 2005 and Beyond

Our Strategic Partner Roy H. Williams, the Wizard of Ads gives us his insight and suggestions on the cultural shifts taking place all around us.

Marketing in 2005 and Beyond

The Age of the Baby Boomer ended in 2003. The torch has been handed to a new generation with new ideas and values. Sure, we Boomers still hold the power at the top, but the prevailing worldview that drives our nation is completely other than the one we grew up with. Businesses that don’t get in step with the new world order are going to find it increasingly difficult to succeed. Being a Baby Boomer isn’t about when you were born.

It’s about how you see the world.

Baby Boomers were idealists who worshipped heroes, perfect icons of beauty and success. Today these icons are seen as phony, posed and laughable. Our cool as ice, suave lady’s man James Bond has become the comic poser Austin Powers or the tragically flawed and vulnerable Jason Bourne of The Bourne Identity. That’s the essence of the new worldview; the rejection of delusion, a quiet demand for gritty truth. We’re seeing it reflected in our movies, our television shows and our music.

Baby Boomers swayed back and forth to the lyrics of a 1971 Coke commercial featuring teenagers from around the world singing, “I'd like to buy the world a home and furnish it with love, grow apple trees and honeybees and snow white turtle doves. I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, I'd like to buy the world a Coke and keep it company...” The idea was pure and wholesome, but it required no action other than belief. Today’s generation would retch if that ad were aired, saying, “What has Coke actually done to promote world peace? Nothing. They’re a bunch of phony posers.” Consider the lyrics to the Grammy-winning, Record of the Year for 2004 by Coldplay: “Come out upon my seas, cursed missed opportunities. Am I a part of the cure? Or am I part of the disease?”

Baby Boomers believed in big dreams, reaching for the stars, personal freedom, “be all that you can be.” Today’s generation believes in small actions, getting your head out of the clouds, social obligation, “do your part.”

A Baby Boomer anchored his or her identity in their career. The emerging generation sees his or her job only as a job.

Baby Boomers were diplomatic and sought the approval of others. The emerging generation feels it’s more honest to be blunt, and they really don’t care if you approve or not.

Boomers were driven, self-reliant and impressed by authority. Emergents are laid back, believe in working as a team, and have less confidence in “the boss.”

Idealistic Boomers had an abundance mentality, believed in a better world, and were opulent in their spending. Emergents see scarcity, believe in doing what it takes to survive, and are more fiscally conservative.

Based solely on the core values of the emerging generation, here’s what I believe we can expect to see beginning to happen during the next 3 to 4 years:

1. A decline among prestige brands such as Rolex, Harley-Davidson and Gucci.
2. The end of “upwardly mobile” as a slang expression.
3. A decline in the effectiveness of traditional advertising.
4. Comparison-shopping to be done increasingly online, though purchasing will remain in brick-and-mortar stores in many product categories.
5. An increase in volunteerism and donor support to socially responsible organizations.
6. A slow increase in the popularity of labor unions.
7. A slight decrease in the divorce rate as couples become increasingly committed to family unity and fall less under the spell of idealistic “true love.”

Read the whole article (PDF Download)

What Kind of Professional…

Clients and employers approach Sales and Marketing professionals wearily because we have a bad reputation. The reputation we’ve acquired has been reinforced by the media. We might remember the stereotypical Hot Shot salesman as the character Alex Baldwin plays in Glengarry Glen Ross, he’s a slick pro who can sell anything to anybody. However, what he does is manipulation not persuasion.

Manipulation - exerting shrewd or devious influence especially for one's own advantage

Persuasion - the act of influencing the mind by arguments or reasons offered, or by anything that moves the mind or passions, or inclines the will to a determination.

As professionals, we often deserve our reputation based on the assignments we take on. Not every product or service is fit to be sold. Not every person is the right person to buy a product or service. Most shocking, especially to Sales Trainers, is that not every objection is simply a question that requires a cunning response. Often, more often than we comfortably admit to, an objection is legitimate and the proper response is a respectful friendly acknowledgement followed by the word - goodbye.

Persuasion takes more work up-front but evolves into the path of least resistance once you’ve done your homework. Take a look at an example of this in this week’s ClickZ column written by Bryan.

If you’re a pro meeting a great deal of resistance with the product / service you offer then you can do your homework and figure out whether or not the service / product you are offering has true value. Then you ask yourself have you become a Marketing Professional or have you become a Professional Liar?

Branding Online

Unaided recall has long been a measure marketers use to gauge the strength of a particular brand. Unaided recall demonstrates that someone remembers your brand, the hope being that when the need for your service or product arises the customer recalls YOU. (Please keep in mind, brand recall is not branding. )

In a world of a million brands and thousands of unsolicited messages posturing for our attention on a daily basis, getting noticed, and then getting your brand implanted into memory is quite an accomplishment.

Being remembered is simply the result of a simple formula that cognitive neuroscience has been aware of for quite sometime.

Salience X Repetition = MEMORY

In old school branding, when salience was lacking, marketers would compensate and buy repetition in mass media. But now mass media is being fragmented at an alarming degree and advertisers are sweating to find efficient offline means to buy frequency (repetition) and reach (number of people exposed to a message). It simply costs too much to reach too few people as often as needed. But repetition isn't the only contributing factor.

Salience X Repetition = MEMORY

In other words, the more we care about something, the more likely we are to remember it.

Great marketers know this instinctively and build salience into their campaigns. But great instinct, does not change the currently brutal offline advertising and marketing landscape mentioned above.

The other option available to marketers is to just sidestep the need for memory altogether. Direct response marketing singularly focuses on selling customers in the market TODAY. The pitfall with that approach is that every day that you wake up you are pushing to persuade an entirely different set of customers to buy. Doesn't sound like much fun does it?

So how does one go about maintaining and building a brand and brand equity into the future?

Kevin Lee writes the following in his most recent ClickZ article...

Brand marketers have long considered the idea of brand lift through search engine marketing (SEM) no more credible than the idea of a real Santa Claus -- a nice concept, but fabricated to change behavior with no evidence to back it up.

This week, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Search Engine Effectiveness Committee published a study on the brand lift of textual paid search results. The results will knock your Christmas stockings off. Search can cause brand lift to soar! Read More.

If you are looking for brand lift don't discount the potential of an online branding strategy. While the entire world has been treating the internet exclusively as a direct response vehicle (and it is a darn good one) Future Now has been successfully deploying these types of online branding strategies with our clients for quite some time.

Salience X Repetition = MEMORY

Each time a customer enters their search terms, or clicks a hyperlink on your site they reveal what is most salient to them, making the internet a natural and efficient means to build 'unaided recall' for your brand.

Wizards First Rule

Below is a real life email exchange between X-Gaming Customer Service (A Future Now Client) and one of their site's visitors...the names have been changed to protect the not-so-innocent.

-----Original Message-----
From: Customer
Sent: Sunday , June 27, 2004 12:08 AM
Subject: Bulletproof?

hi i am just wondering if the x-arcade is really bulletproof

-----Original Message-----
From: Xgaming, Inc
Sent: Monday , June 28, 2004 10:39 AM
Subject: Bulletproof?

Not literally sir, it is made of wood.

Herbert

Customer Service Representative

Roy H. Williams "The Wizard of Ads" explains the above interaction with far greater eloquence than I can. He calls it "The Wizard's First Rule" and teaches it in his Magical Worlds Communications Workshop taught exclusively at Wizard Academy. You should go.

In the same workshop Roy also teaches a communication technique called "Particle Stack" which we used extensively when writing the X-Gaming home page copy. The copy has been live less than a week and we have already seen some nice increases in conversion.