2009 September | Wendistry

Will.i.am and the Continuous Marketing Campaign

2009

I do believe that Will.i.am should be considered the marketer of 2009.

Of course, marketing begins with product, and we could certainly question the quality of the Black Eyed Peas’ music, but here’s what I know… Will.i.am, Fergie and MCs, Apl.de.ap and Taboo deliver something that people want. The Peas have been at the top of Billboard Hot 100 for over 24 weeks, by far the longest No. 1 run in the chart’s 51-year history.

What they with music is best described by Jody Rosen in Rolling Stone magazine, “They have made a kind of spiritual practice of recording dumb songs- a total aesthetic commitment that extends from their garish wardrobes to their United Colors of Benetton worldview.” But, beyond the product, and at the same time inseparable from it, is Will.i.am’s understanding of today’s social-marketing world.

Most brands are still grappling like junior high kids on a first date with the most fundamental shift of the last decade… from marketer as message-pusher to marketer as creator of stuff that consumers will actually pull toward them. The Black Eyed Peas, having mastered that shift, are showing an understanding of perhaps the second-most important change: from campaign to continuous conversation.

Consumers don’t switch on and off, and products don’t sell for two weeks and then disappear from retail channels. But, most marketers still do the vast majority of their work in sporadic bursts, often going whole quarters, if not years between one one-way push and the next. However, the Peas do it differently. Their 2009 album, “The END,” was not only a nice sales gimmick (playing off the rumors that Fergie is going entirely solo and thus making “whirled peas”), but also a brand statement. “The END” stands for The Energy Never Dies and the idea is that it’s a live, evolving, co-created piece of work. A conversation with fans.

“It’s a diary… of music that at any given time, depending on the inspiration, you can add to it,” Will.i.am told Billboard.com. “When it comes out, there’ll be 12 songs on it, but the next day there could be 100 songs, 50 sketches, 1,000 blogs all (online) around ‘The END,’ so the energy really, truly never dies. I’m trying to break away from the concept of ALBUM. What is an album when you put 12 songs on iTunes and people can pick at it like scabs? That’s not an album. There is no album anymore.”

Exactly… there’s collaboration and conversation and content creation.

Excerpted from Jonah Bloom’s column in September 21, 2009 issue of Advertising Age.

Filed Under: Branding, Marketing, Social Media

Why Your Advertising Isn’t Working

2009

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Of all the ads you see in a typical day, how many engage your attention? According to an AdweekMedia poll of LinkedIn members, two-thirds of respondents said “a small minority of them.” Another quarter answered “none of them.” Together, that’s a whopping 91%. Only 1 in 100 respondents said “most of them.” (Probably a marketing executive)

If you’re smart, you already know that the vast majority of ads don’t register with consumers. Your own advertising may fall into this category. If you find yourself nodding your head and wringing your hands right now, keep in mind this simple business axiom: Companies get the advertising they deserve. Here are 7 straight-up reasons why your message probably isn’t getting through.

It’s boring: Yep, boring. Why do we watch TV, listen to the radio, read the newspaper, or go online? Three reasons: information, entertainment, and engagement. Ads that fail to offer at least two of these three benefits, in a word, flop. Just as nobody reads every story in the newspaper, nobody pays attention to every ad. Be creative… be interesting… be different.
It’s boorish: You shouldn’t think of your advertising as being about your brand. You should think of it as an extension of your brand. If it’s loud, annoying, insulting, offensive, or self-centered, people think the same of your products and services (see “The Cocktail Party Test for Advertising”). The key is the first sentence in the best-selling book, The Purpose Drive Life... “It’s not about you.” If you focus only on what what you can get out of others, you’re not going to get much. What’s true in life is true in advertising.
It’s safe: The first time we all saw a Ford Taurus was quite a shocker. It went on to become the best-selling car in America. If the Taurus had been another in a long line of boxy sedans, it probably would have been just another car. Instead, it turned automotive conventions upside down and made history. Most of us were quite surprised by the Taurus’ curved lines, but it went on to have significant influence on automotive design. While being different isn’t a guarantee of success, being safe is a sure bet for eventual failure.
It’s trying to do too much: The best an ad can do is communicate one single, compelling idea, and in the age of the Internet- when people know they can go online to get all the additional information they need- it’s crazy to try and jam every single message you have into 1 ad. Just because you have a lot to say doesn’t mean anyone will listen.
It hasn’t been given time: You can’t rush water to boil. You can’t hurry a plant to sprout. All you can do is apply the right amount of heat, water, and sunlight and then wait. The same is true of advertising. If you expect too much too soon, you’re sure to be disappointed. Depending on your prospects’ level of interest in the category and frequency of purchase, it could take weeks, months, or even years for your message to sink in.
You like it: Okay, I know… this one hurts, but you simply are not the best judge of your own advertising. You can’t be because you know too much about your brand to be objective. Your advertising is not only about you and your tastes. It isn’t even for you (i.e. you’re already drinking the Kool-Aid). It’s for everybody else who isn’t.
It’s not an advertising problem: A common mistake some companies make is trying to use advertising to fix what in reality is quite another problem…. faulty product design, an uncompetitive cost structure, customer service complaints, legal regulations, sub-par management, on and on. Yes, we all know it’s easier to put on a new coat of paint than it is to fix the foundation that’s causing the building shift and crack. Until you can maintain a solid track record of excellent performance, spend your money on internal improvements… not advertising.

Excerpted from Steve McKee at BusinessWeek Online.

Filed Under: Advertising Tagged With: Advertising, attention

The Power of Pull

2009

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For more than 100 years, marketing has largely operated as a push paradigm. We create messages and funnel them through the media to reach stakeholders.

Push remains a viable option. However, with time on social networking sites and search engines rising, we need new ways to engage and reach people multiple times across different sources. That, according to the Edelman Trust Barometer, is when consumers will trust what we have to say. That’s what the “power of pull” is all about.

The greatest rewards will go to those who create dynamic content at regular intervals (note I didn’t say “daily” necessarily… just a regular schedule that readers can set their clock by)– content that is discussed, remixed and linked to by other high-quality sources online.

Here are three considerations for tapping into the power of pull:

Create resources that inform the conversation: When it comes to information, consumers will increasingly have a general high-level awareness of things they don’t care about. However, they will go deep into their pockets for passionate connections. Brands can stand out and be more engaging by becoming “digital curators” in a given niche… and doing it well.
Adopt rather than invent: Although it offers a lot of reward, creating content is real work. Smart companies are finding digital assets that consumers are already using, remixing it, and/or partnering with its creators to give it further lift.
Write for searchers, not just readers: Most of us still write for readers. But, in the pull economy, we also need to write for searchers. One way to think of it is that Googlers are looking for “how to get rid of roaches,” not necessarily for “bug spray.”

Finally, look at using Google Trends and Twitter Trends to learn how people express themselves, and map your language accordingly. That’s the power of pull.

Excerpted from Steve Rubel’s “On Digital” column in September 7, 2009, edition of Advertising Age

Filed Under: Branding, Online Marketing

Make ‘Em Pay

2009

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“Women do two-thirds of the world’s work. Yet, they earn only one-tenth of the world’s income and own less than one percent of the world’s property. They are among the poorest of the world’s poor.” Barber B. Conable Jr., former president of World Bank

A theme I’ve seen countless times over my years… a theme I myself have fallen victim to in the past: professional women who are complacent about earning far less than the marketplace will bear for their level of skill and expertise. How about this for a mantra?

I DESERVE TO EARN MY WORTH. I WILL TAKE CONTROL OF MY OWN ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT.

Let this be the touchstone message you tell yourself, whether you’re still in high school looking at colleges and career options; whether you’re a young woman in her twenties just starting out in a career or looking for the right career; whether you’re in your 30′s, 40′s, 50′s and beyond; single, married, divorced, widowed, with or without children; in your dream career, between jobs, going back to school for an advanced degree, still figuring out what you want to do when you grow up. Whatever life phase you find yourself in, I want your mind-set always to be: “I deserve to earn my worth and to feel independently in control of my financial situation and security at all stages of my life.”

But, in order to earn our worth, we have to feel entitled to make more money, and we must feel good about it when we do. This is a hard concept for many women to wrap their minds around. Would you answer true or false to the following statements?

You’ve never visualized yourself as being wealthy, financially secure, and fully in control of your money, assets, and investments, no matter if you are single or partnered, and no matter what stage you are in your career.
The idea of earning a lot of money… as much as the highest earners in your industry earn, or maybe more… makes you cringe. It makes you feel greedy, or morally bankrupt, because money is tainted with incorrect values. Or, you feel you aren’t qualified to earn that kind of money.
You don’t know what the highest earners in your industry or profession earn.
You have no clear sense of what the range of total compensation packages is for people with your training and expertise… including performance incentives, stock options, early salary reviews, and signing bonuses. You don’t know how to go about finding this information.

Women constantly tell me they leave money on the table when negotiating, including backpedaling on a demand or point they’ve basically already won, or would have, if they’d kept their mouths shut. That’s if they negotiate at all. They tell me all the time that they accept less money than a man doing an identical job, don’t negotiate salaries, and are afraid to ask for more.

Why is this so? Because women are raised to believe that we’re all equally deserving, and thinking that you’re better than someone else, including that you’ve worked hard and should be paid well for the level of expertise you’ve achieved, is conceited. We want it, but when we get it, we back off out of guilt or fear. We then don’t fully partake in the spoils of success; we don’t hold ourselves out as experts, taking advantage of the publicity, marketing opportunities, and the higher salaries and fees that goes with success and reflect our true worth.

My challenge to women is to recognize where you’re stronger than anyone else and make ‘em pay for it. To paraphrase George Orwell, all people are equal, or should be in certain regards. But, in business, in the marketplace, some are more equal than others. That some includes YOU.

Excerpted from am*BITCH*ous, by Debra Condren, Ph.D.

Filed Under: Revenue Generation, Sidebar Thoughts Tagged With: earning, income, performance, work

Understanding Your Professional Self

2009

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Reading about other people’s fantastically successful lives is all good, but at the end of the day, it’s all about what you’re going to do to move on and up. To that end, here’s a list of questions for you. Most are open-ended; some show some of my own bias. Either way, they’re yours to ponder and answer. Consider them at your leisure… consider them alone… discuss them with friends and colleagues. But, most of all, be honest with yourself.

Jot down what comes to mind first, and see what patterns emerge. This is a worksheet, not a concrete tablet, so don’t be too worked up about it. Use a pencil (with an eraser). Scribble, scratch things, tack on extra pages, erase… there are no wrong answers. And, don’t forget to revisit your thoughts from time to time. Now, let’s get down to business!

What gets you excited about your work?
What did you want to be when you were growing up?
Is there a way to unite these two?
What gets you excited about your life?
What do you do for fun?
Are you proud of the work you do?
Which one of your senses is most important to you? sight; hearing; touch; smell; taste; entitlement; outrage; snow; humor; wonder
Are you proud of the work you do?
Is there something you’d rather be doing?
Who influences you?
How does that influence manifest itself?
Who owns your work?
Are you OK with that?
Name your top five favorite projects? What made them fun?
Name your top five dream projects?
Name five mistakes you won’t repeat.
What scares you professionally? And personally?
Which of these fears are useful to you and why?
Which of these fears would you like to overcome the most?
How much money are you making now?
How much money do you need to earn each year to live comfortably?
What is the bigger luxury to you… A huge TV or saying “no, thanks” to a soul-less assignment?
Imagine yourself at 80. Think back on your choices. What have you done in your life that makes you proud? What did you miss? Why?
If you knew that you only had 6 months to live, what would you do?
You’re in truly deep trouble. Who is the first person you call?
The greatest thing in the world just happened to you. Who is the first person you call?

Do you like making lists? Do they spur you to action? If so, here’s your list of “TO DO LISTs.”

Make a list of 10 things you do to avoid working.
Make a list of 10 people you admire.
Make a list of 10 things outside your control that you worry about so much that you can’t even bear to talk about them anymore. Now, try to let them go.
Make a list of 10 people you’d like to talk to over the next 12 months.
Make a list of 10 things you’d love to do if only you could work up the nerve.
Name 5 things that make you feel confident about yourself as a person and as an artist.
Who do you love?
If you knew that you’d live to be 107, what would you do with the next 5 years of your life?

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Filed Under: Personal Branding Tagged With: personal brand, professional brand, professional image

iPhone Apps: Mad Ave, Marketers, & Media Madness

2009

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Wonder why the marketing world is seemingly obsessed with creating apps for the iPhone? Then, take a stroll down the halls of Kraft Foods, Gannett and others who are jumping on the bandwagon. You’ll see a sea of iPhones as the brand makes serious incursions on RIM’s BlackBerry stronghold, the once acknowledged smartphone of choice for corporate America.

In a conference call with Apple Chief Operating Officer, Tim Cook said about 20% of Fortune 100 companies have purchased a total of 10,000 or more iPhones since the handset’s release in 2007, and scores of government agencies and businesses have each purchased more than 25,000 iPhones for their organizations. In many ways, the iconic iPhone is sneaking through the marketers’ corporate back door: Consumers fall for it and decide they want to use it as their business phone, too. The handset’s popularity among corporate smartphone users and its support of the Microsoft Exchange mail server and other enterprise requirements have forced more and more IT departments to support them, landing the iPhone on the list of company-sanctioned phones.

Marketing people who are iPhone enthusiasts are likely to push apps. At Kraft, employees share iPhone best practices, favorite applications and company ringtones. As to be expected at a company that has crafted a much-buzzed-about iPhone application, the iFood Assistant shopping and recipe utility, there’s also a repository of ideas for new-iPhone-application development.

More than 4.500 employees, or about 5% of Kraft’s staff, have iPhones that were party underwritten by the company’s stipend program, which gives eligible employees $100 toward any personal digital assistant they choose. That means Kraft would have to sell more than 450,000 copies of its .99 iFood app to recoup the iPhone stipend. Kraft declined to say how many times iFood has been downloaded, but it is among the top 20 paid apps in the lifestyle section of the App Store.

According to Kraft, the iPhone delivers intangible benefits beyond the productivity gains the company is looking to reap by partially paying for employees’ PDAs. “As a consumer-goods company, we want to be at the forefront in innovation and offering what our consumers are looking for,” said DAvid Diedrich, Kraft’s VP-Information Systems. “Providing our employees with the same tools our consumers have enables us to better engage with them.”

In a nutshell, Apple is making gains on RIM. Worldwide, its share of the smartphone market jumped to 13% last quarter, up from 3% a year ago, according to Gartner. RIM’s global smartphone share last quarter edged up to 19% from 17% a year ago. With a 3% share of the corporate installed base as of last year, the iPhone, however, despite its early success in the corporate world, still has a ways to go in unseating BlackBerry as the dominant enterprise phone. Primarily because the handset remains dogged by the perception that it lacks BlackBerry’s bullet-proof security.

Still… the marketing mayhem continues…

excerpted from Rita Chang’s article in August 24, 2009 issue of Advertising Age

Filed Under: Marketing, Online Marketing Tagged With: BlackBerry, corporate America, iPhone, iPhone apps, smartphone