StrategicText - Marketing strategy blog

The times, they are a-changing

2009-06-28T14:36:00.005-04:00

I haven't posted in a while, and this is why. I've had some pretty monumental changes in my life recently. (New work situations, new city, heck new province all together.) And along with that came the big question: Who am I now?

I won't answer that question here. In part because it's personal, but also because unless you know me really well, the answer likely wouldn't interest you.

All of this is to say: I'm discontinuing StrategicText. It doesn't suit my life as it is now. If you've come to love posts about copywriting, I highly recommend following Copyblogger. If you like online marketing strategy, Mitch Joel is still, in my opinion, one of the very best to follow.

As for me, I've started something new. It's entirely aimed at Sudbury, Ontario based businesses. It's called Impact! The Sudbury Marketing Report. If marketing in Northern Ontario is of interest to you, I hope you'll check it out.

Thanks for coming. To everyone who's ever commented or linked to anything I wrote, an even bigger thank you.

Cheers,

Mario Parisé

Persuasion is like energy

2009-04-24T10:56:00.002-04:00

You can't make energy. No one can. It simply exists. But that doesn't stop physicists and engineers from harnessing energy wherever they can find it and using it to build earth shaking technologies that completely change the course of history.

Persuasion is similar.

You can't persuade people into buying something. No one can. People either have desire or they don't. Marketers, however, have the interesting job of taking desire and shaping it so that people express those desires by buying whatever it is we're selling.

This is an important distinction. If people don't desire what you're selling, you don't stand a chance.

However, people also don't know what they want. None of us do. No one knew they wanted an iPod until Apple made them so damn sexy. But we did want more convenient access to our music, we wanted the status and coolness that an iPod offered, we wanted to tell ourselves a story that we were hip music lovers who could afford to splurge on a tiny device that played music. We just didn't know it.

That's why persuasion is so tricky. You can't ask people what they want, because no one really knows what they want until it shows up, and by that point someone else has cornered the market. You can't just wrap slick marketing around something no one wants, because fundamentally people aren't that stupid. But when you discover an unfulfilled desire and produce a product that meets that desire, even indirectly (like an mp3 player that makes people feel cool), magic happens.

You can't create new markets. You can't persuade people to buy a damn thing. But like a physicist, you can discover new markets and harness desire in a way that makes it seem like you created sales out of thin air.

Ethics and Trust

2009-04-20T21:44:00.003-04:00

Ghostwriting: If you hire someone else to take your brilliance, your insights, your experiences, and create written work that you then take sole credit for, that's ok. The writer simply gave you a voice. If you hire someone to do all the research, develop all the insight, use their own experiences, and you still take sole credit, that's not ok. You're lying. More to the point, people won't trust you when you get caught.

User tracking: When users opt-in to your services and you clearly explain that you will track their information for some type of use, that's ok. If you hide it in fine print, sneakily load cookies on their systems, or otherwise avoid asking for explicit permission, it's wrong. More to the point, when the user finds out they won't trust you anymore (if they ever did).

Advertising: There's absolutely nothing wrong with advertising, unless you use nefarious user tracking to better target the ads, intentionally disrupt the user's experience with the ads, or otherwise try to trick the user into being more receptive. When you do any of those things, you lose trust.

Selling to kids: Don't. Sell to their parents. There are laws about this stuff for a reason; don't try to find the loop holes. Seriously. It's wrong and, you guessed it, you'll lose trust.

I could go on, but I'm sure you see the pattern. In everything you do as a business, in every touch point you make with your customers and prospects, ask yourself: Am I earning trust, or abusing it? You can't get away with abusing trust anymore. You might win the law suits, but you'll lose the sales.

It's 10:34 a.m. Do you know where your ad dollars are going?

2009-04-11T10:56:00.005-04:00

Measurement. Return on Investment. Cost effectiveness. These are jargon words that business people use to ask one simple question: What am I getting for my money?

In this day and age, where money is tight and consumers are wary, it should be a sin to not be tracking your advertising spending. Do you know where it's going? What works? What doesn't? How much each new sale is costing you in advertising dollars? Do you know where your customers are coming from? What convinced them to buy from you?

There are many ways to find out. If you're advertising online, you can track every click and understand exactly where you're losing them - and fix it.

If you're selling through direct mail, you can measure what geographical locations respond best, you can test different headlines, pictures, and copy - and optimize them based on results.

Similar tests can be done in print, in radio, on TV, in person, and any other form your communication takes. It's simply a matter of identifying all the variables that you have some control over, and testing them.

Is there any excuse for not doing this? Any justification for shooting in the dark, for spending money and just hoping time and time again that it will be effective?

What are you getting for your advertising money? Isn't it time you found out?

Science or Art?

2009-03-12T22:16:00.007-04:00

Fact or fiction? Faith or logic? These questions are implicit in everything a marketer does. Did you know that? And for the most part, there is no easy answer.

Just take a look at advertising's biggest names. David Ogilvy and Claude C. Hopkins are both legends. So are Bill Bernbach, Mary Wells Lawrence, and more recently Alex Bogusky. And yet these two groups are completely different.

Ogilvy and Hopkins would tell you to measure everything and use facts, data, and logic to drive your work. Never guess. Never do anything unless it's in order to improve your bottom line.

Berbach, Lawrence, and Bogusky would all tell you to let your inner passion and creativity wrestle for the attention of your prospects, grabbing hold of it and doing whatever you can to not let go.

I'm oversimplifying of course, and chances are none of them would use the exact words I have, but the point remains: Do you let careful measurement and optimization drive your work, or are you guided by pure creativity and instinct?

Is advertising primarily salesmanship, or entertainment with a purpose?

In that spirit, two pieces for you to consider. The first, Scientific Advertising by the above mentioned Claude C. Hopkins. Turns out you can read it for free.

The second, a video from the opening of the 2007 Hatch Awards (hat tip Ari and Holden), which arguably demonstrates a certain lunacy involved in over measurement and testing.

If you could have any of the people above in your court, who would you choose? Would you want the rational scientists, or the brilliant creatives?

Photo credit: csicop.org

Does your brand have a mythology?

2009-02-06T12:10:00.001-05:00

When the pilot episode of the hit show Lost first aired on September 22, 2004, it appeared to be a show about a group of survivors of a plane crash. For the most part, the story surrounded their efforts to survive the first few days on an a seemingly uninhabited island. Oh, and an unseen monster mauled the pilot to death.

Since that time, every episode has allowed the mystery surrounding the island to increase just a little bit. It's become evident that the miracle of surviving a plane crash of such a magnitude might just be the least interesting thing about the show. As the mystery continues to develop, loyal fans are dragged into a never ending spiral of mysticism, myth, and magic.

Which is exactly why the show is such a success.

Before writing a single episode, creators J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindelof wrote a sort of bible that described the mythology of the show for a span of 5 to 6 seasons. From day one, they knew what the next several years were going to look like and wove an intricate story that would keep fans wanting more.

What would happen if you did the same with your brand? What if every touch point, every interaction, every product sold, and every ad displayed, offered just a hint of myth? What if, one morsel at a time, your brand's story developed into a grand mystery? Would people talk about it? Debare it? Try to predict your next move? What if the grand idea wasn't fully revealed for years, if ever?

The old adage in entertainment is to keep them wanting more. When's the last time your brand did that?

Write what's not there

2009-02-01T23:25:00.005-05:00

"Don't play what's there, play what's not there." - Miles Davis

The other day, I was watching a documentary called Helvetica. It's a great watch for any typography nuts out there.

At one point, they're interviewing typography designers and someone says that when you're designing a letter, it's not about what you put in. It's not about the shape of the letter at all, but rather the shape of the white space around it. It's the emptiness that gives the letter its beauty, its grace, its structure. Anyone can draw a letter; it takes greatness to draw what's not there.

This is when the Miles Davis quote above came roaring back with sudden clarity. Anyone can make noise, and with practice anyone can hit notes and strum chords and even keep a beat. Great musicians though play what isn't there. The emptiness around your notes, the stuff you're not doing, is what transforms noise into music. This is why amateur musicians are obsessed with learning grand solos and rock anthems, where as the greats keep it simple. It's not what you put in, it's what you leave out.

The same holds true in writing.

Imagine if those Volkswagen ads had read, "Our cars are small, ugly, but well made and well priced." It's straight forward enough, arguably gets the point across, but it's nowhere near as good as "Think Small." It's the words that aren't there that make the line so powerful.

What we don't say, the words and syllables left out, are more important than the ones we put in. Carefully choosing what not to say brings clarity, meaning, and power to the words we keep.

When did being crass become clever?

2009-01-28T12:41:00.010-05:00

I'm continuously amazed at the kinds of ads that get high praise. Take the above ad from Veet, for example. It's a bad pun using a slang term for pubic hair to very loudly and rudely tell the previous U.S. president to bugger off. When I saw this, my immediate thought was this was completely tasteless. Public opinion, though, as judged by blogs and newsletters, seems to disagree with me on this point.

Here's another example surrounding the inauguration: During Obama's speech, I was completely taken aback by how easily he attacked the previous administration. Here's a ceremony where all living presidents are marched in, the outgoing president has to face a crowd of people all too pleased to see him leave, and then sit there and listen to his replacement talk about how much better things are going to be now. It's an awkward situation. The polite thing to do would be to not discuss the previous administration at all. Yet, Obama did not hesitate to take jabs at Mr. Bush.

How did we get this way? How is it that our leaders (both in politics and in business) can be so crass, so rude, so lacking of good taste, and still be applauded for it? Why don't we hold them up to higher standards?

"Goodbye Bush" might have been worth a chuckle amongst college students, but it's hardly appropriate on the world stage. I'm as critical of the man as anyone else (probably more so), but there's a time and place. As creators of culture, we should be holding ourselves up to a higher standard.

Settle all writing style disputes with Google Fight

2009-01-22T15:14:00.005-05:00

Visualise or Visualize? Should I write "text message" or "txt msg"? These are questions that plague writers every day.

If you're writing a thesis, your best bet is to pick up a style guide and see what the rule is. But if you're writing copy, job #1 is being colloquial. Which is to say, writing in the way people write.

The Disclaimer: Yes, I know this method could have alot of problems if taken too literally. Use your good judgment. If you were writing about post-it notes, "txt msg" wouldn't make any sense.

For the past few months, whenever I've debated what the best way to write something was, I've relied more and more on Google Fight.

It's pretty simple. Type in two terms, click "Fight!", and see who comes out victorious. The victor is the most popular usage between the two.

Your college professor might not like it, but if you're getting paid to write ads or other marketing material, you can't afford not to do testing like this. Especially when "txt msg" is 610% more popular than "text message".

Dear Andy Nulman

2009-01-21T11:58:00.007-05:00

Your blog, Pow! Right Between The Eyes!, is a great read. A fantastic read. A surprisingly powerful read.

Your new book is probably just as good.

Which is why I can't help but ask for a free copy of it, and recommend that anyone reading StrategicText do the same.

If I've managed to make it in on the list, please send it on over to Mario Parise, c/o Twist Image, 49 Spadina Avenue, Suite 507, Toronto, Ontario M5V 2J1.

Dear reader of StrategicText

If you have a blog, you too can get a free copy of Andy's new book. Head on over to this post to get all the details.

"If Sex Sells, Humour Sells Way More"

2009-01-16T13:54:00.007-05:00

That was the title of a new release from Advertising week, discussing a finding from a survey of all Canadians.

The survey asked Canadians what factors they felt were the most persuasive in advertising. It found that 67% of respondents found that humour is "the secret ingredient that makes an advertisement more persuasive," compared to only 7% for the persuasiveness of sex.

You should ignore this survey.

Not because I think sex should be used in all ads or because I'm opposed to humor in advertising, but because the premise of the survey is ridiculous.

For starters, since when does anyone know what makes them tick? One of the most interesting things you learn in psychology studies is that we don't know half as much about ourselves as we think we do. If we did, slapping a logo a product would not dramatically increase its retail value. If we did, there wouldn't be a disparity between the incomes of women and the incomes of men. If we did, politicians kissing babies wouldn't improve their popularity. And yet all of those are realities. We're a silly, silly species.

More to the point though, sex doesn't sell. Nor does humor. Nor cute babies. What they do is they grab your attention, hopefully for long enough that advertisers can convey their message. Jerry Seinfeld didn't convince me to buy Microsoft products, but he did get me to pay attention. Two silly guys pretending to be computers didn't get me to buy a mac, but they, too, got me to pay attention.

What does get people to buy is emotionally and intellectually stimulating arguments. When an advertiser splashes a pair of boobs across the screen, they also have to make the argument for their product. No one buys a new car simply because there was an attractive woman standing beside it. The attractive woman got the buyer to notice the car, though. It's a foot in the door, nothing more.

P.S. ~~At the time of publication, comments are down on this here blog. I hope to have them back up shortly.~~ Comments are back up.

Photo credit: Taken without permission from baseballforum.com

Not All Traffic is Created Equal

2008-12-24T00:24:00.005-05:00

Google Analytics rocks. Just today, I was taking a look at traffic sources to StrategicText and noticed an amazing difference in bounce rates, depending on where the traffic came from.

The bounce rate, just so you know, is how many visitors never bother to click on anything on the page. As Avinash likes to say, they came, they saw, they puked.

What I noticed, and what seems perfectly obvious now, is that not all traffic is created equal. While I do get most of my traffic from organic search results, they also have the highest bounce rate. This makes sense: people were searching for something, maybe they found what they were looking for (maybe not), then moved on. They weren't looking to engage with the blog, they were just looking for info.

This is when I realized my priorities have been all wrong. Like most bloggers and other webmasters, I've been seeking more and more traffic. My primary efforts have been focused on search engine optimization. And yet according to my analytics, search engine traffic represents the least interested, least committed, and least valuable form of traffic there is. People come and go without really doing anything.

What are the sources of traffic with the lowest bounce rates? My LinkedIn profile, Facebook, comments left on other blogs, and articles I've written for other sites all top the list. Again, this makes perfect sense as well. These sources of traffic are primarily interested in learning what I'm all about, not just seeking a piece of information and leaving.

Do you run Analytics on your website? Have you taken a look to see which sources of traffic have the lowest bounce rates? You might just find that, like me, you've been chasing the wrong crowd. If so, how will you adjust your copywriting strategy?

Which came first? The brand or the sale?

2008-12-18T13:36:00.006-05:00

A hot topic lately has been the value of branding. Some argue passionately that in order to sell something, you need to build a brand first. Others argue that the only way to build a brand is to sell something first.

To be clear, if you're a copywriter, the question is whether or not your ads (or other marketing endeavors) should focus on brand attributes like hipness, youth, intelligence, etc., or on product attributes like price, quality, effectiveness, etc.

This question misses the point. It's about as productive of a question as pondering whether it's the chicken or the egg that comes first. They go hand in hand.

You should always be building your brand, and you should always be selling. It's not either/or. If you're not selling, you'll go out of business long before your brand has any real equity behind it in the minds of consumers. If you're not building a brand, selling will always be an uphill battle.

Lesson of the day: Always be branding. Always be selling.

Should you kill your blog?

2008-12-17T16:09:00.009-05:00

Once upon a time, I had a blog called Happy Pixels. It did rather well, and got decent traffic. Despite this, I killed it.

I think a lot of blogs should be killed. Perhaps most of them.

Why?

With Happy Pixels, I realized that the only reason I read it was because I was the one writing it. Does this sound familiar?

If you don't love your own blog, then why should anyone else? If you can't even convince yourself that what you're doing is of value, why bother doing it at all?

Since killing Happy Pixels, I've forced myself to stay focused. I also avoid talking too much about myself (though this post seems to be an exception). Every day, I sit down and I try to write something that I think would be of value to you, the person interested copywriting.

Most days, I fail and those posts never get published. This is true for about 75% of my writing. The other 25%, though, are the ones I feel are both relevant and good. Those are the posts you see here on StrategicText.

The moral of the story: Sit down to write every day. Make it as good as you can. Then ask yourself if you would read it. Is it a worthwhile investment of your reader's time? Don't hit Publish until you're satisfied, and don't be afraid to leave it on the cutting room floor.

Photo credit: clix

The Web is a Direct Response medium

2008-12-12T15:05:00.009-05:00

Online marketing isn't complicated. In contrast to print, tv, and radio, the web is pretty simple. It's all about Direct Response.

Direct Response lets you know if your advertising dollars are being well spent. In traditional advertising, you ask people to call a number or send a letter with a specific promotional coupon, and then measure how many responses you get and how many of those lead to sales. Most big brands don't do this, however, because it feels cheap.

On the other end of the advertising spectrum, you have $30 million branding campaigns where you never know with any certainty if you're getting a good return on your investment. Did the ads lead to people buying more? We'll never know for sure.

The great thing about the Web is that everything can be held accountable. There's no need to guess as to whether your marketing is working. When done properly, there's good data for everything you do.

Let's say you're trying to sell a 2008 Cadillac STS for $70K+. There are multiple steps involved in convincing someone to spend that kind of cash on a car. To measure your marketing's effectiveness, you simply need to define your sales funnel.

Let's break it down:

Your goal is to sell this luxury car. What needs to happen for someone to do this?
Well, no one buys a car online. People have to go to a dealer. How do you get people to go to the dealer?
There are many ways, but on the online side of things your website is the ultimate tool for convincing people to go see a dealer. What does your website need to do to get people to go to a dealer?
Information. They need to be able to learn anything and everything. There needs to be great pictures. It needs to be beautiful and easy to use. And at all times, the user should be able to quickly find a dealer and, more importantly, book a test drive. They may also need some time to be persuaded, so offering a high-quality and relevant email newsletter is a great way to stay top of mind. When they sign up, they've given you permission to market to them. But how do get people to go to your website to begin with?
By showing up in organic search results; by using paid search; by working with journalists and bloggers to have articles writing about - and linking to - your products; by sponsoring content; by engaging in affiliate programs; by blogging, podcasting, and otherwise participating in social media; etc.

For each and every step, analytical data can measure your success:

What's generating the most traffic?
When users land on your site, are they booking test drives? Are they signing up for the newsletter? Of those that sign up for the newsletter, how many remain engaged (by opening the emails, clicking the links, continuing to browse the site)? How many of them then go on to book a test drive?
Of those who book test drives, how many actually show up?
Of those who show up, how many end up making a purchase? Which sales people are making the most sales? And now for the most crucial step...
Optimize! What paths led to the most sales? Which marketing efforts in steps 1-4 made you the most money? Focus on those, cut out the poor performers, and keep experimenting to see what works best.

Direct Response: Best of both worlds

Not every sale can be directly traced to specific marketing efforts, but that doesn't mean marketing wasn't influential in purchasing decisions. Advertising works in many other ways, of course. Someone may go to your site, read about the Cadillac, and then just drop in for a test drive, without booking online. What's great about the web is that branding and awareness campaigns can also be Direct Response campaigns. It's not either/or, it's both.

Photo credit: Blitz USA

How to run a Huffington-like website

2008-12-08T12:05:00.005-05:00

With the big news that the The Huffington Post is now valuated at $100 million, and alongside the rapid demise of print newspapers, I think we're on the brink of a rise in independently run "internet newspapers".

First, a definition. The Huffington Post is, in a sense, a blog. Some articles are written by them, but most of it is just links. How they differentiate themselves, though, is by having their information organized much like a newspaper site. They have many topics, the home page is displayed in such a way that you can get an overview of all the big news for the day, and you click through to see the rest. Often, they break the news. Other times, they're the first to link to it.

This model is proving very successful. The Drudge Report does a similar thing and, although not as successful as Huffington, seems to generate enough advertising revenue to provide a very comfortable income, which is more than can be said about even most successful blogs.

If you're tempted to duplicate this model, here are a few things to consider:

Focus. Huffington and Drudge are doing well as generalists because they had first mover advantage. I would not recommend taking them on. There's still tonnes of room, though, for slightly more focused topics. Instead of doing general national/international news, try focusing on an industry. Like, say, advertising.
Realize why this is valuable. "Internet newspapers" like this are great because they do the work for you. You don't have to follow a millions news sites, because they're bringing the best of the web to you. And unlike a simple link list like delicious.com, they communicate what's most important at this very minute by using newspaper conventions for organizing information.
Get organized. I believe you need 2 people, at a minimum, to do this well. One person needs to be finding the stories to link to. They need to be constantly tuned in. The other person needs to take those stories and organize them on the site. One person can't effectively do both, because while you're busy formatting and organizing the news, you're missing the breaking news. Your value decreases dramatically if people can't count on you to be on the ball.
How to get organized. I would recommend Google Reader. Subscribe to every site related to your topic (so, for advertising, subscribe to every significant advertising site and blog out there). Person A works as fast as possible to process these stories and decide which should be featured. When a story is to be featured, they "share" it. Person B is subscribed to that shared feed, and tries their best to keep up with updating the site. If Person A sees a story that should be THE headliner for the day, they can "star" it. You can also add labels to a story or share notes.

That's about all there is to it in my opinion. Like all things in life, nothing is guaranteed. Some people will naturally be better at this than others. Design and writing principles apply, and will also contribute to your success. That being said, if I had the time, I would be doing this right now for the advertising/marketing world. I don't have the time, unfortunately, so please feel free to take this idea and run with it. If you do it, you can become THE place to go for industry news, since you'll be constantly highlighting the best of the best from around the web.

Can ads be more exciting than content?

2008-12-05T12:05:00.007-05:00

The effectiveness of ads are, evidently, going down rapidly. Nothing new there. There are many theories about it. I, for one, think it's because humans naturally avoid things that suck.

Every now and then, though, we see an ad that doesn't suck. Sometimes, an ad is down right riveting. This is rare, but when it happens, people pay attention.

From this simple insight, we can deduce two things:

Your ads need to be exciting. Yes, they also need to make a damn good sales pitch. But if the ads are boring, no one will pay attention and your pitch will go unheard.
Wherever possible, run your ads alongside content that is less interesting than the ads themselves. Direct response marketers have known for a long time that commercials are more effective when viewers are bored than when they are riveted. That's why you don't see alot of direct response commercials while watching Heroes, but you can't find anything other than "paid programming" at 2am. Conveniently, it's also cheaper.

In short, your biggest competitors in advertising aren't other advertisers. It's the very content producers you're paying to run your ad. This is true in print, on television, on the radio, and yes, on the web. People are more likely to notice and pay attention to your stuff when everything else being displayed bores them.

(Of course, if everything else is too boring, they might just leave. This is especially true on the web. The "trick" is to make your ad exciting enough that it can still effectively run alongside great content.)

Photo credit: GfxSally

To survive - and thrive - during this recession, you're going to have to kill traditional media

2008-12-03T12:05:00.006-05:00

I'm not an old media hater. I love magazines, newspapers, television, and yes, even radio. During these somewhat insane economical times, though, we can't afford to be sentimental. Kill the beast before it kills you.

If you want your marketing budget to really have an impact, to really grow your business, you have to go digital. Not tomorrow; today. Don't dip your toe in the water; dive in. Don't just start to shift some more budget towards the web; declare your entire marketing budget to be digital.

Reasons Why

It's cheap. Just take a look at how much a digital agency's annual billings are in comparison to traditional media agencies. The simple fact is that traditional media is expensive. I'm not suggesting that price should be the determining factor. Obviously if a $300 million investment manages to generate $600 million in profits (not revenue, profits), then that's a good investment. Is that really happening though? If not, it's time to reconsider where that money's going.
It's accountable. If you run an ad on TV, you have no way of really knowing how many people paid attention. And unless your ad is direct response (where viewers are asked to "Call Now!"), you have no idea what each individual ad is generating. In contrast, if you run an ad on the web, you can know exactly how many impressions are being generated, how many people are clicking through, how many click-throughs lead to sales, exactly what point in the sales funnel that you're losing people, which sites are under performing, what day and times are most lucrative, and you can easily do A B testing on different ad variations to see which ones work best.
Targeting is almost ridiculous. With traditional media, you have a rough idea of the demographics and you try to find a channel that best matches your target demographic. On the web, there are niche websites targeting almost every unique demographic imaginable. Why pay to advertise to business people in general when what you really want is purchasing managers looking for copper piping?
Total Control. Feeling the need to crunch your budget a little bit? It's as simple as clicking a mouse. Is there a special event going on today that you'd like to leverage? Your ad copy can be tweaked and frequency temporarily ramped up in the span of 10 minutes.

A Few Opportunities

Search Engine Marketing. Do a search for your product categories online. What ads show up? Chances are, you'll see either a bunch of low-quality ads for small time competitors, or maybe even nothing at all. Try, for example, a Google search for Angels & Demons, the best-selling novel by Dan Brown, which is the sequel to the Da Vinci Code and has been made into a movie. No ads show up whatsoever. If you were a book store, movie chain, or even the publisher themselves, you should be ashamed. What an opportunity! Thousands, if not millions, of people will be searching for this exact title and no one seems to be paying for their attention. At least not to Canadian Google users. You should be running ads on every product you own. You only pay if people click the ads anyway.
Partnerships. Why not experiment with partnering? Let's say you find a site targeted at exactly who you want to sell to. Give them a call. Tell them you'd like to officially sponsor their content, or have a microsite created uniquely for their audience. Run a sweepstakes only for them. Here's the big secret: Almost all web publishers are desperate for this stuff. Content is hard to come by, and writers are expensive. If you can provide high-quality content or some type of offer that would excite their users, they'll jump at the chance to work with you. The smaller (and more targeted) the site, the better. It increases the value to you and decreases the investment.
Go social. Blogs and podcasts aren't for everyone. But ask yourself this: do you have something to say that would excite your most loyal customers? If you're in the copper piping business, for example, can you think of something really important to talk about every week that would draw in all those purchasing managers? If not, stay away. If you can, though, this is a ridiculously cost-effective way to build a community around your products. You'll be able to connect with your target audience in a way never before possible. Plus, you stand a damn good chance of getting great search engine ranking on the very terms you would have otherwise had to pay to advertise on.
Go social-lite. So let's say you really can't find a way to build an exciting blog. It's just not in the cards. Don't give up! At a minimum, set up some Google Alerts on all of your brand names and for terms related to your product categories. Every day, you'll get an email informing you of anyone mentioning those terms online. If those happen to be blogs or forums, you can choose to then participate in those discussions, answer questions, and otherwise interact with the very people you'd like to sell to. (Warning: This can backfire if you don't respect users and the community. You're a guest in their home, act accordingly.)

What are you waiting for?

I've really just outlined the basics here. There are of course many other opportunities out there. The point is that your time and money is better spent engaging prospects online, where you can control your spending, rapidly test and modify your approach, and experience a level of accountability that's always been lacking with traditional advertising. This recession doesn't have to mean an end to your marketing. It might just be the wake up call we've all been needing to start doing things better.

Photo Credit: straymuse

"Seeking long term relationship with that special media planner"

2008-12-01T12:46:00.008-05:00

I admit it. I'm a sucker for any ad that manages to grab my attention. Even more so when it peaks my curiosity enough to read all the copy. If that then leads me to click through, wow.

This ad from Casale Media did all of the above:

I know, I know: it's just a semi clever ad trying to grab attention in an old-school advertising kind of way. But you know what? I think it's great. Let me count the ways...

1. It's out of place

This is pretty straight forward, but one of the best ways to grab people's attention is to make your ad seem out of place. Clearly, a torn out classifieds ad being pasted on a digital screen is out of place. Bam! You have curiosity and even a touch of story appeal.

2. It's all about love

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the best advertisers tell love stories. In this case, they're telling a love story in a pretty direct way. They're not just looking to sell you something, they're looking for longterm commitment. They're looking for the kind of love that happens when two businesses meet and find a connection. Hokey? Of course! But then, so is bringing your wife flowers. The gesture is still appreciated.

3. It's a clever spin

I'm not talking about that kind of cleverness that screams out from the roof tops "Look how original I am! I'm a genius!" I'm talking about the kind of cleverness that sells. It's entertaining, it's touching, it puts a boring idea into an attractive context. It's easy to read. It's engaging.

4. The call-to-action begs to be clicked

The call-to-action is simple: View Profile. Now my curiosity is peaked. What will I see when I click that button? Will the story continue? Will I keep learning about how perfect of a match we are?

Then it all falls apart on the follow-through

Unfortunately, when you click on the ad you're brought directly to a sign up form. The story doesn't continue. All that momentum they had going in the ad and getting me to click-through is lost when I get there, because instead of continuing this enjoyable experience, I'm dumped onto some administrative garbage trying to get my information.

This was so close to being a great campaign. I bet you the click-through rates are phenomenal (or at least, above-average), but that the sign-ups are dismal.

Lesson of the day: The job doesn't end when you've peaked my curiosity. You have to court me through the entire process. Even the best banner ads can't save a poor landing page.

How to get users to fill out their profiles

2008-11-18T19:00:00.009-05:00

With so many companies out there trying to get information from users, it's shocking how dreadful most profiles are. It's no wonder most profiles are left blank or filled with false information.

To we get users to voluntarily - and accurately - fill out their profiles, make it valuable to them.

Step 1: Offer a Public Profile

Many of the biggest sites out there offer public profiles. The profiles aren't necessarily great, but they exist.

By giving every user a public profile, you've given them a home on the web.

It's a start.

Step 2: Make it obvious

For the sake of privacy, don't automatically activate the public profile. But make it obvious. I would go so far as to include it in your primary user navigation, like this:

Hi, Mario! (Turn on your profile)

Step 3: Make it useful

This is where it gets interesting. For starters, let users put in whatever information they'd like. If they want to write an entire book about their cats, let them.

But also empower them. Make any of your apps available to them in some kind of widget. Taking Yahoo as the example, if they use Flickr, offer a widget that lets them embed their photos right on the page. If they use Groups, make a widget that shows their latest activities. Don't be afraid to get into gray areas either. You'd be surprised how many people might like to display their email stats - as long as they opt-in for that.

Don't stop with just your own apps either. Make it easy for people to plug in their Twitter accounts and the like. The goal is to let users do whatever they need to do in order to consider this their home on the web. If someone else does it better, they'll go there.

Step 4: Make it beautiful

Offer a series of drop-dead gorgeous templates for them to use. Get a real variety. Don't do like Blogger and have the same few designers create them all. Variety is the spice of life.

That being said, let users customize to their heart's content. It's their profile, after all.

Oh, and don't brand my profile. It's about me. If all I see is your brand all over my profile, I'll puke and go somewhere else. At most, you can get away with a small logo and navigation bar at the top. That's it.

Step 5: Make it easy

I'm not going to go into all of the principles of usability, but suffice it to say that the easier it is for something to be accomplished, the higher the likelihood that people will do it.

Step 6: Give it an awesome URL

How cool would it be to have yourname.yahoo.com as your URL? Or www.google.com/yourname?

Make this URL super simple to find too. Ideally, when I'm editing or viewing my profile, I should already be on the right URL. Don't make me hunt it down.

Why should you go through all of this trouble?

When users fill out their profiles, everyone wins:

Advertisers are better able to narrow down who they're targeting, and write ads that work for that specific audience.
You're able to offer more relevant services and offerings, thereby increasing your conversion rates.
Users get an experience finely tuned to their unique personalities and get a kick-ass home on the web.

Basic gist: User profiles are probably your biggest opportunity to get valuable information from your users. Treat the profile as a feature and you'll get better results.

Photo Credit: danzo08

Ridicule your own work

2008-11-10T14:45:00.004-05:00

Ridicule is big business, especially in the marketing and advertising world. Sites like AdRants, AdFreak, Tribble, AgencySpy and so many others are built around mocking other people's work. Sure, they do other stuff too. Sometimes, they even praise. But more often than not, we ad folk are a malicious group.

Take, for example, Ogilvy Athen's rather bizaar tribute to David Ogilvy. It's hard not to ask yourself what they've been spiking their coffee with. We pat ourselves on the back, knowing we would never do anything like that. Or would we?

We all have terrible ideas. I have them all the time. The fear that I have - and which I think is healthy to have - is that one day I won't realize an idea was terrible and actually go ahead with production on it. Hey, it happens to the best of us. I guarentee you the people of Ogilvy Athens are actually damn good at what they do; they just somehow didn't notice that this song wasn't one of their great moments.

There is a fail-safe mechanism though that can save you from yourself. Prior to committing to an idea, ridicule it. If the idea belonged to someone else, someone you hated, what could you say to belittle it? To mock it? To make the idea and person bearing it look like complete fools? If you can take that criticism and still like your idea, you're probably on solid ground. If the mockery hits a little too close to home, you might want to move on to something else.

11 Ways to Get Ideas

2008-11-08T18:09:00.007-05:00

In Richard St. John's book Stupid, Ugly, Unlucky, and Rich, he discusses the top factors that successful people have told him helped them achieve success. It's a great read, and I'd like to share with you a summary of one section, called 11 Ways to Get Ideas.

1. Have a problem - Ideas are solutions to problems

"I demystified the creative process. I just saw it as an exercise in problem solving. I went at every single job as a problem to be solved." Matt Groening, creator of The Simpsons

Once you have a problem, your mind can get set on the work of finding the solution. Problems give our work context and should be viewed as the building blocks of great ideas.

2. Ideas come from looking around

The world is full of things to be inspired from, and it's usually in the form of mundane every day objects, actions and events. By simply paying attention, you might find ideas falling on your lap (or on your head, in the case of Newton's apple).

3. Keep listening - Ears are antennas for ideas

People are always saying interesting things, whether they mean to or not. Richard shares the story about how the Beatles' song A Hard Day's Night was inspired by Ringo simply mixing up his words by mistake. Robert Munsch got many of the ideas for his books by listening to kids when he worked in daycare.

4. Being curious leads to ideas

"A big trait is curiosity. If you see something that's interesting, investigate it. Try and learn about it." Don Tapscott, technology consultant and author

The value of curiosity is hard to measure. Often, we'll look into something with no immediately obvious benefit. And yet, Steve Jobs' curiosity in typography - seemingly of no value at the time - led to very first fonts on the Mac. Don't be afraid to run down some dead-ends, because every now and then you discover something great.

5. Asking questions leads to ideas

"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers." Pablo Picasso

Like problems, asking questions puts the brain into creativity mode. Once you ask a question, you need to find an answer. More often than not, that answer turns out to be a pretty good idea.

6. Borrow an idea, then build it into a new idea

Steal, borrow, expand upon... whatever you want to call it, greatness often lies in taking other people's ideas and running with it. You should probably give credit where it's due, though.

7. Make connections between different things

The vast majority of scientific discovery occurs when people combine things in new ways. As Richard says in the book, 1 and 1 doesn't only equal 2; more often than not, it leads to something entirely different. (It's also popular with punk rockers looking for attention-grabbing contrast.)

8. Make many mistakes - Out of garbage comes gold

Just get working! Don't sit in one place trying to come up with the great idea. Start writing. Most of it may be junk. But there's a good chance you'll find some gold nuggets peppered in there, and then you can build on that. David Ogilvy, the world renown ad man, wrote this famous line well over 100 times before getting it right: "At 60 miles an hour the loudest noise in this Rolls-Royce comes from the electric clock."

9. Know when mistakes are good, or bad

Mistakes are great when you're coming up with ideas. Mistakes are bad when executing them. Believe me, even the best idea won't save you if a client finds a typo in your work.

10. Write down ideas, before they fly away

The biggest difference between people known for being creative and everyone else is that creative people write down their ideas right away, no matter where they are. That's why so many napkins have ideas jotted down on them. It's like when you wake up from a vivid dream, remembering every detail, but then forget the whole thing within minutes. If you don't write down your ideas, they will be disappear forever with the emergence of the next thought.

11. Always carry a P.E.N. Personal Economic Notetaker

Just keep a pen handy. You can probably use all sorts of note taking devices, but the simpler and smaller the device, the more likely you'll have it on hand and be able to write down your ideas when inspiration strikes (see #10 above).

Great writing can win a presidency

2008-11-05T09:45:00.005-05:00

Alot of things went into making Barack Obama the first African-American president of the United States of America. I don't pretend to know all of those thing, especially since I'm Canadian and presumably don't know American culture that well.

One thing that was obvious though, right from the start, was that Barack was an amazing communicator. From his speeches to his website to his campaign material, his words were almost poetry in action. I've written about this before.

What amazes me is that every time there is an election in any nation, candidates place their focus on attacking their opponents, into coming up with elaborate promises, and on guilt-tripping people for how they choose to vote (or not). And yet, these things do make for great leaders. Every remarkable political leader has been great with words. Why isn't this front and centre in every campaign?

Abraham Lincoln. John F. Kennedy. Pierre Trudeau. Winston Churchill. Mohatma Gandhi. All very different people, with very different agendas, who were able to lead their nations with great conviction and adoration due to the power of their words.

Last night, President-elect Barack Obama joined their ranks.

Have you discovered your hook yet?

2008-11-03T21:41:00.004-05:00

In music theory, artists talk about the hook.

Almost every song from the Beatles has a hook. Weezer uses them to great effect. Modern hip hop's success can largely be attributed to the hook's alluring power.

A hook is a small, catchy and unique combination of notes that is repeated in some way throughout most of the song. It's what allows a song to be memorable.

Hooks aren't just for fishermen and musicians

A hook is in many ways a promise. In music, it's the promise that if you enjoyed this bit of the song, you'll like the rest of it.

In advertising, the hook typically starts with an enticing headline, continues with some imagery and/or long copy, and, in this digital age, carried beyond the ad and onto a landing page. This hook, the promise you make with your ads, is fulfilled when the consumer purchases your product.

The same is true with articles, blog posts and newsletters. Your hook is introduced in the headline, carries the reader from the first line all the way through to the end, and by the time they've finished reading, your promise should be fulfilled - whether that was to entertain, to provoke debate, to educate, etc.

Making promises - and keeping them - are a great way to build trust

Promises are dangerous things. Making promises and failing to keep them is probably the worst thing you can do for your business. On the other hand, keeping promises shows that you can be trusted. In a world where no one trusts anybody, keeping promises may be the very best thing you can do for your business.

Discovering the hook behind every bit of writing you do will help you to not only gain clarity in your writing, but also gain trust from your readers. Every time you write something with a clear hook, you are making a promise. Every time you deliver on that promise, you earn trust. Little by little, bit by bit, your readers will learn not only to trust your writing, but to trust you as an individual as well.

Photo credit: michelini

Write for just one person

2008-10-28T13:49:00.000-04:00

Almost all marketing advice of the past century tells us to try and be really popular. The goal, it seems, is to have more friends (customers, clients, evangelists) than the competition.

Over the last few years, the importance of focusing on niche markets has become more widely recognized. A market of 2,000 paying customers is better than a market of 2,000,000 non-paying non-customers, after all.

However, this is still too big of a market to try and please. It's great if you can get them all, but you can't practically aim to please that many people. On a planet of 6.5 billion+ individuals, you will not find two individuals (much less 2,000) who are exactly alike. Trying to please everyone becomes a exercise in mediocrity.

Instead, pretend you're only interested in one person. Just one. One is a manageable number. Anything more is asking for trouble.

Which raises the question: Who should you write for? Who is this idea client or customer? Who is this soul-mate who will weather thick and thin to support you and see you succeed?

In this instance, a mirror will come in handy.

Write for you and no one else. Create products and services that you would pay good money for, and then market them to yourself.

The magical thing that happens when you ignore everyone else and just do what feels right to you is that other people take notice. Since you're not trying to be safe, you end up doing things different. Since you aren’t trying to please everyone, your passion shines through. You end up standing out in a crowd of me-too products and companies. You end up leading your market instead of chasing after it.

I heard this great piece of advice recently: Charisma is the courage to be different regardless of what others think. Can you really afford to do business any other way?

Photo credit: svilen001