Posts Tagged ‘Advertising’

I don’t know about you, but I don’t know anyone that lives their life entirely online. Each day we’re all exposed to a variety of media and marketing messages. So why do some marketers feel that they have to choose between online and traditional advertising?

Social media doesn’t have to mean writing a blog or creating a widget. When a viewer repeats the tag line from a TV spot, spontaneously sings a jingle they heard, tells a friend about their experience with a certain brand, or posts reviews online—they’re engaging in a form of social media too. Whether a brand sets out to create a social media campaign that starts people talking or something else causes lots of people to begin chatting up the brand, that public buzz, for better or worse, is social media.

You can’t control social media
Many companies have shied away from social media marketing because they’re concerned about loosing control of the message and fear what their brand message might become in the hands of the public.  By integrating traditional advertising and marketing—tactics where you can control the message, with the influence and reach of Social Media, marketers can guide the message instead of control it.  Marketers remain in control of crafting the strategy and executing the “official” version of the message; all of which sets the stage for customers to base their opinions on—opinions they may choose to share.

Defining what that brand experience ultimately means to the customer is neither the job or privilege of the marketer. It’s up to your customers. The more your brand means to them, the more they connect with it. That in turn determines their purchase decision, their loyalty, and whether they feel strongly enough to advocate for the brand in the future.

When marketers control what is said about their product, as in the case of an ad, people view it as biased and self-serving. When a third party, like a customer writes an online review of a product, it’s viewed as honest and credible, and THAT is the secret to the power of social media. In a 2009 online survey by Forrester Research showed that “people trusted the purchase advice of strangers online more than TV or print ads.”

Traditional marketing clarifies Social Media
While social media marketing can be great for spreading your message, it has a significant short fall: people don’t necessarily spread the same message you would like them to. While its authentic and honest, it may not be a message that fits your strategy and may even be detrimental. Traditional marketing can help to create the foundation of information and guide the brand message as it is passed throughout the social community. By cross promoting the contents of one marketing effort, for example TV with another like social media you increase the “volume” of the message, focus the accuracy and add frequency—thereby maximizing the effectiveness of both efforts.

In a 2008 study by Yankelovich and Sequent Partners called “When Advertising Works,” it was found that “ads that make an impression in traditional media were more likely to stimulate word of mouth than ads that make an impression in digital media.

Social media amplifies traditional marketing
Balancing the free-form messaging of social media with the control, consistency and mass reach of traditional media can offer the best of both worlds. Today the focus needs to be on building an opt-in audience in order to create community, foster loyalty and generate conversations.

A great example of this is a recent promotion by Estée Lauder. They took a free makeover promotion to an entirely new level when they used social media to drive women to participate and later bring awareness to this in-store event.  In order to attract digitally savvy women to the makeup counters at leading department stores, Estée used social media and online PR to offer free makeovers and free professional headshots. After each makeover, women would have a glamour photo taken of them (including of course an Estée Lauder logo in the background) and upload the image as their social profile photo before ever leaving the counter. By uploading the glamorous photo with the logo, the customer introduces her entire social network to the brand, a personalized example of it’s benefits and hopefully even spark a few conversations along the way.

Testimonials: the mother load of social media
In a full-page print ad in USA today, Trident made social media the focus of their ad by sharing unsolicited tweets it had received from customers (with their permission) who authentically and passionately tweeted about their new product, Trident Layers. Using testimonials to sell a product is nothing new, but highlighting  the  enthusiastic and unsolicited statements in a nationwide mass marketing print publication reinforces the shift toward integrated marketing strategies.

In each of these cases, marketers integrated traditional marketing with social media to allow the audience to communicate with the brand and with one another, generating more involvement and interest. As markets fragment, an integrated marketing strategy is quickly becoming the essential method to coordinate and focus efforts for greater marketing success.

What do you think?

While a sale is always the ultimate conversion, generating a lead is the next best thing. By creating an “intermediate conversion” measurable opportunities are created that didn’t exist before.

An “intermediate conversion” is simply offering an opportunity for a prospect to request more info, discounts, membership into a community, survey info, opting-in to a list or in some other method to indicate interest.

Offers must provide real value to the customer and have little or no barrier to entry — which includes the amount of information that prospects must provide in order to receive whatever it is they are requesting. 

It’s a simple step that many forget about or choose to ignore in the rush to closing a deal. Marketers can not only generate more leads, but can also learn a great deal about their prospects and what their interests are. It provides the opportunity to open a conversation with their prospects and find out what’s really on their minds. Understanding why a prospect chooses NOT to become a customer can often be more valuable to a marketer than why they do.

Additionally, allowing prospects to self-select into specific segments and areas of interest they are indicating which topics might interest them for follow up contacts. In short, it provides another opportunity for the marketer to get to know their prospects better, begin a relationship and can potentially fill a pipeline with new prospects that might otherwise have been lost.

Interim conversions are a basic, measurable, knowledge gathering, customer-centric marketing practice that’s a win-win for everyone — but it’s a sometimes overlooked solution. 

Let us know what you think.

Online marketing, just like all traditional B2B and consumer advertising, should be focused on the customer. While we’re all psyched about the ability to calculate and compare statistics down to the smallest detail, the true measure of marketing success is still in the minds of the customer.

Many online marketers have lost sight of marketing basics. With technology moving so fast, many of us have gotten caught up in the latest and greatest digital gizmo or gadget. Having the ability to track and target people more precisely or better understand their buying habits is certainly an asset to the marketing process, but it still can’t replace or even become the strategy.

I was with a client yesterday discussing the cause of their slumping conversion rates on their B2B web site. Despite having a excellent product, a terrific sales team and outstanding customer service, they didn’t understand why their inbound marketing efforts were sagging.

One look at their ads, web site, and landing pages told the entire story. Since they are a technology company, I can understand how these guys view their business through an analytical prism. The problem is that their customers don’t. Their marketing sounds like it’s talking to their management team, not to their customers. And while they’re doing a great job measuring the results, the adjustments they’re making to the creative make the numbers may move slightly, but don’t get to the root of the problem, and that shows in the bottom line. These guys have lost the forest and are stuck in the technical trees.

The focus now seems to be on who can be the first to leverage the newest mobile platform or how fast you can utilize a certain new software. Digital marketing, whether your using social media marketing, pre-roll ads or just PPC is still about the end user and what is important to them. The metrics will come. Marketing must still be about the value of the message and the content first — and less about how it’s delivered.

Ask yourself this: in a year from now when the technology you are using today becomes common place, will your message your sending still resonate? Channel selection is and must always be a result of where your customers are, not just what happens to be the hottest technology today.

With markets being so fragmented these days, and media always changing, why do some folks want to stick to the same old solutions?

As marketers, we sometimes make simple assumptions about how something should be done, where we should advertise, tactics that should be used, or targets that should be targeted simply because it was done that way before. Not only does this usually end up with an uninspired result, but it frustrates the people working on the project and the outcome is often less than predicted. This overly structured method eliminates any possibility of doing something better. Something unexpected. Or something that might be off the beaten path and could make a big impact just by being a little different.

I recently read an article on a blog called Leading Creatives written by Nigel Collin where he made a very interesting point that when you tell a creative person HOW to do something, the thinking and creativity stops and all your likely to end up with is an execution. And not a bit more than that. No passion, no dedication, no enthusiasm, and no creative solutions. Just execution.

Guidance, direction and suggestions are always great, just leave the door open to new possible solutions. Nigel suggested that the next time you have a marketing goal, don’t tell your team or agency HOW TO DO it, tell them WHAT YOU NEED TO ACCOMPLISH and you’ll get back more than you expected.

Claude Hopkins

They say, “if you wait long enough, everything old is new again”. That’s certainly true of Social Marketing.

People are talking about Social Media Marketing as though it’s brand new. It seems that SMM and Inbound Marketing in it’s purist sense, dates back almost to the beginning of the study of advertising itself. In 1923, Claude Hopkins wrote “Scientific Advertising”, a highly regarded advertising how-to described by advertising notables like David Ogilvy and Gary Halbert as a “must read”.

So what’s the connection? While reading through “Scientific Advertising” I came across several stories of circa 1920′s salesmen and their door-to-door marketing tactics. They offered housewives free samples, gadgets and advice — and would not take any payment. That same salesman might visit again days later to ask the housewife about what she thought of the sample he left — still not selling anything or asking for payment, just being helpful.

Because the salesman had begun a relationship, and the housewife had the opportunity to develop some level of trust with the salesman, these prospects began ASKING to buy products and sales dramatically increased. As a matter of fact, Hopkins cites at least 3 examples of similar tactics where he says “such offers were reistless, and about nine in ten of the trials led to sales”.

Let me repeat that, “9 in 10 trials lead to sales”!

This 90% conversion rate is not nearly as surprising to me as the fact that these are the exact same basic principles that make Inbound Marketing so powerful today. By engaging with prospects in order to develop a simple relationship, the marketer was able to first create a level of trust, and create an interest or need where one may not have existed before, so when the prospect was ready to buy, there was no question about WHO she would buy from. The purchase decision was not about price, but about the relationship.

Now I ask you to imagine that story again, but now add in amazing reach and effectiveness of today’s social internet so your talking to thousands of these prospects at once, and combine it with the low cost of entry — like offering simple helpful information instead of actual free samples, and I think you’ll see why I was impressed.

I think the similarity to Inbound Marketing is unmistakable. It’s fascinating that while this proven marketing practice dates back to 1923, some marketers still think Social Media Marketing is a fad and deny it’s value as an effective marketing tactic.

1. Traditional advertising can only talk. SM can talk, ask questions, and most importantly, listen.

2. People are likely to be more loyal to a brand when they can interact with it. According to a study by Anderson Analytics, 52% of social network users
had become a fan or follower of a company or brand.

3. Companies learn a great deal from the direct feedback they get from their customers.

4. Audiences are increasingly more fragmented making it harder to cost effectively reach them.

5. People are tired of being interrupted by ads and are largely ignoring or avoiding mass advertising

6. New ideas can quickly and inexpensively be tested before committing to expensive mass advertising production.

7. Traditional advertising is a time limited event. When it’s done, it’s done. Social media is ongoing and often takes on a life of it’s own.

8. SMM can address negative word-of-mouth before it becomes a rebellion or destructive to your brand.

9. Traditional marketing ROI can be difficult to measure. Lessons learned from social marketing can be used to guide traditional efforts.

10. It’s hard to get a sense of belonging from a TV screen or magazine page.

Now tell me what you think.

1. Not everyone is online and involved in social media.

2. Traditional media spreads brand awareness with a broader brush.

3. Traditional media has guaranteed placement. Social marketing messages may or may not catch on.

4. Some messages such as product specs need to be controlled and not left to a third party.

5. Without some traditional branding, it’s very hard to gain significant recognition.

6. Social media marketing should never try to sell. Traditional media gets to ask for the sale.

7. Traditional media can deliver a message to the most receptive part of your market faster.

8. Traditional media offers structure and consistency that social media can reference.

9. Traditional marketing builds awareness, social marketing builds trust.

10. Traditional marketing can be very effective at driving traffic to engage with a brand socially.

Now tell me what you think.

A quick glance at any of the recent marketing forecasts will show that more and more advertising budgets are allocating a bigger slice of the pie for online.

The assumption has been that online marketing offers better metrics, the ability for marketers to respond faster and is a more cost effective marketing solution. But are we as marketers being self centered again? Are we looking at this from the wrong angle? Most professionals are talking about how online marketing benefits the marketer, but shouldn’t we be talking about is how it helps the consumer, and how marketers can join in.

The way I look at it, the change in marketing is not as much from offline to online, but rather from outbound marketing tactics to inbound. And in my opinion, the change is not being driven by marketers, but by consumers themselves.

We have seen consumers who were fed up with being interrupted during dinner by telemarketers legally strike back at an entire industry. People who wanted to relax in front of their TV but felt berated with annoying self-serving commercials, gladly fork over hundred of dollars for a Tivo just so they could fast forward through the ads. And folks that were once easily targeted with drive time radio now are listening to their downloaded MP3s so they have more control over what they hear.

When running a direct mail campaign, most advertisers would be pleased with anything over a 2% response rate. How many marketers have given any real thought to the 98% of recipients that are not interested and are now asked to make that daily trip to the trash to dispose of the handful of unwanted envelopes and catalogs that arrived with their name on it?

There has been a change not just in consumer behavior, but in consumer thinking. Consumers have discovered that their free time and attention are both limited and valuable. And just like money, they want to use it wisely, not just give it away. I think it’s consumers that have changed and now marketing is trying to catch up.

Traditional outbound marketing theory presumes that by spending money on media where people are focusing their attention, a marketers message will get through as well. If that message is repeated enough times and has some connection to the viewer, a small percentage might remember or consider the message.

Inbound marketing on the other hand is based on the idea that people’s time and attention has value. By offering something of value in return with no strings attached, such as information or entertainment in an honest and personal way, people will be willing to listen. More importantly, they sometimes engage and influence others. But it’s on their terms, not yours.

So the next time you get an un-requested credit card application, have to sift through unsolicited email or have to wait to hear the weather on the news because that Sham-wow guy is back, think about what your time and attention are worth.

Do you agree?

I just had a rather shocking phone call.

I accepted a cold call from a possible service provider that eventually requested my email address to send his promotional materials. While I wasn’t looking for his services at this time, I liked what he said and I thought I might have need for his services in the future and so I agreed that he could send me his info. Congratulations, he got to first base.

I did not however want to give out my email, as I have been overwhelmed with too many unwanted solicitations. Instead I requested that he mail me his material so that I could keep it on file. (Yes, some of us do still use paper from time to time, and I find it easier for this sort of thing). His response completely floored me! “Well, if you can’t provide me with your email, then your not the kind of client we want”, he said very abruptly.

What could possibly have been a new client for this vendor, resulted in a dead end and bad feelings about his company. While marketers cannot possibly customize their delivery vehicle for each and every customer, you cannot expect everyone to be open to just one method of communication.

Just as children learn in different ways, people vary in how receptive they are to new ideas from different media sources and marketers need to realize this. Some consumers see a commercial on TV, research it online and then buy in a brick and mortar store. Others will zap all commercials, but will rip ads from magazines that they read while relaxing and then buy online. Still others rely solely on social and digital media.

Each consumer has their own buying process and that same consumer usually doesn’t shop the same way all of the time. Most marketers know how important it is to reach customers repetitively to truly be effective. What is often missed is that within one demographic there are many shopping types. Cross marketing with a variety of media provides opportunities for marketers to reach their audience in a way that is most comfortable for the audience, not the marketer.

By integrating online, print, collateral, experiential and brand marketing, you can reach each consumer in a way that they are most receptive and allows them to respond in a way that is most comfortable for them.

Since electronic media is such a cost effective method to keep your brand message “pulling” customers in, do we still to need to “push” with traditional advertising?

These days, when consumers are looking for specific information, they often go online. That’s when pulling your audience in to your site through SEO, PPC, and Social Marketing shine. It’s a perfect opportunity to find a self-described interested audience that’s ready and willing to listen with an open mind to a message tailored just for them.

While customers are mentally prepared to absorb the details of your offerings, they may also be prepared to compare them mercilessly to your competition or be distracted by checking email, downloading other some other multi-tasking effort. Basically, many online consumers go on “information-gathering expeditions”. For that reason online information must always be easily accessible, quick and to the point.

So is there still a need for traditional advertising? Much of the public still has a love for magazines. First, there’s the portability and leisurely aspect traditionally associated with periodicals. Readers expect longer, more detailed articles then they usually find online so they can delve deeply into a subject. Folks read magazines because they’re interested in the subject and they have time to relax a bit. It gives them a chance to discover things they weren’t specifically looking for. Television, Radio and Out-of-Home marketing have a similar logic. Consumers exposed to traditional push advertising have a very different mindset than consumers online where research is usually the goal. Reading a magazine or watching TV is less about searching for specific information, brands or products and more about discovery.

Since the mental state of a viewer is different from online to print, it’s necessary to maintain a presence in both mediums. Whether you call it “Convergence Marketing” or “Integrated Marketing”, building a joint online and offline marketing campaign is not just a matter of adapting the message to the medium. It also requires adapting the message to the mindset. And while the specifics of the content change, the basic strategy, positioning and overall image should remain consistent to compliment and support one another. A well executed integrated push-pull marketing campaign is ultimately more effective than the sum of it’s parts.