Web Ink Now

Making stuff up

2009-11-19T06:48:21-05:00

How do you market your company, products, and services?

Are you sitting around your comfortable offices with your colleagues just making stuff up? Or do you really understand your buyer personas and what problems they have that you can solve?

I share my thoughts on making "stuff" up in this short video.

Thanks to Stacy Melillo Spognardi at Cisco for asking the question that prompted this answer. I spoke with Stacy in my office (yes that's my junk you see in the background of the video).

The six-part series resulting from our discussions called “Social Media Marketing for Telcos” will be posted on the Cisco SP360: Service Provider blog over the next several weeks.

Disclosure: I have done work for Cisco including speaking at several Cisco conferences.

A surprisingly fun and interesting B2B ebook from CareerBuilder

2009-11-18T13:09:14-05:00

Video has been available on the Web for years and with YouTube it is simple for anyone to create and post a video online.

However, a legitimate criticism of video (especially from B2B marketers) has been that it is tough to do lead generation. Sure you can have a URL mention at the end of a video or you can embed a video within a landing page with some lead offers, but that's not fully integrated.

My friends at VisibleGains have developed a video application that solves this problem. Here is an example program we created from the four videos I shot at GM a few weeks ago.

The VisibleGains application makes it easy to include links and offers as part of the video experience. Best of all, the links at the bottom of the video player to the Twitter feeds and blogs of me and the GM people speaking in the interviews are non-intrusive and can be ignored if you're not interested.

Did you notice the link near the end that points you to see the complete footage of the interview I had with Fritz Henderson, CEO of GM? These are welcome and valuable ways to offer additional content yet not in any way annoying. And notice how the video pauses when you click on a link.

Of course, these links could easily have gone to offers for lead generation purposes (such as to sign up for a Webinar). Also notice the simple form at the end of the video for people interested in learning more (in this case about VisibleGains services.

Brand Journalism becomes lead generation

I've frequently said how great online video interviews are as brand journalism. They are so darned easy to do. Any organization can shoot an interview with a customer or partner or analyst or author or someone else within a market space and become a thought leader. I use my Flip video to shoot interviews nearly every week and it’s so easy!

Now you can make those videos interactive and use them to generate leads. How cool is that?

Imagine your organization producing a regular interview show that combines brand journalism with lead generation. I'm sure you can think of subjects for shows.

Thanks to VisibleGains for turning nearly an hour of video I shot at General Motors into a compelling 4 minute video and then putting it into their player so I can share it with you.

What do you think?

Are you a marketer using video as brand journalism?

Do you have other ways of generating leads from those videos?

Please share your thoughts.

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UPDATE: Shortly after I posted this, Matt Shaw tweeted and commented that video players similar to the one from VisibleGains have been around for years. I commented back to Matt. I also removed the word "Finally" from the posts title. The original post was called "Finally! Online video as lead generation." Thanks Matt.

Hey B2B marketers: It's okay to have fun!

2009-11-13T10:14:13-05:00

Why is so much business-to-business marketing dreadfully boring?

I think it's because the marketers involved think "business" as in "I am marketing to a business" and this results in an overly serious tone. After all, if you are marketing to, say, technology companies that’s different than consumer marketing, right?

Wrong.

B2B marketers seem to forget that what all marketers need to do is communicate to people. People want to do business with people and the companies that understand that in the B2B world develop a following.

National Instruments is a B2B supplier of measurement and automation equipment used by engineers and scientists. The tried-and-true marketing from companies like National Instruments is to focus on feeds-and-speeds, technical data sheets, specs, and so on. After all its the engineering community, right?

While National Instruments does provide product specs, they also realize that their buyers are human.

"We've always had the motto, both internally and externally, that 'It's OK to have fun," says John M. Graff, VP, Marketing & Customer Operations at National Instruments. That fun-loving attitude has produced many ways to communicate with the technical audience that buys NI products.

For example a video blog done by Todd Sierer, an engineer at NI, called an An Engineering Mind is really great. In the episode I chose below, he talks about the meaning of the word "Marketecture." Direct link here.

"We first debuted these videos two years ago at our annual user conference held in Austin, TX where over 3000 engineers and scientists gather to see and discuss latest technologies for measurement and automation," John says.

"In addition to the usual technical product demonstrations, we also try to have some fun, including inviting an engineer from the Spike TV show, Deadliest Warriors to the stage. We've found that our audience greatly appreciates this approach to communication (as they get plenty of examples of the drab, "speeds and feeds" technical fire hose). We believe it's greatly enhanced our reputation."

Are you a B2B marketer? Are you treating your buyers like humans? Are you having some fun?

Really, it's okay to have some fun. I dare you.

Eugene Mirman is on television, is very nice, and likes seafood

2009-11-09T13:33:47-05:00

"There is no middleman between me and an audience," says Comedian Eugene Mirman, known for his work in Flight of the Choncords, his book of satire The Will to Whatevs: A Guide to Modern Life, and appearances on Comedy Central and Late Night shows.

He has a blog, a Facebook page and is on Twitter.

"I want to be entertaining on the web," he says. "That's what's fun for me. While there is a store on my Web site, the push is to provide things to entertain people."

And entertain he does, Eugene's Twitter bio reads: "I am television's Eugene Mirman. I am very nice and like seafood." Sample tweet: "I started a tortilla fire in my toaster oven. Last time I leave to watch a preview of the new Green Lantern movie." And he even included a link to a photo of the evidence.

Eugene uses Facebook and Twitter as ways to get his information out to multiple audiences very quickly.

For example, immediately after he delivered the 2009 commencement address at Lexington, MA High School, he posted the video on YouTube and then pointed to it from his blog, twitter and Facebook. The video got 100,000 views in just one week.

"I don't obsess with the statistics," Eugene says. "I'd like to think of a funny tweet or blog post, but mostly I am doing a lot of things and seeing what happens. I write things that I think are funny as a tweet, in 140 characters, and then push it out there. I don't think, 'I have to do a blog post today'."

Eugene says that he just writes what's interesting to him at the time and he doesn't worry about his productivity.

"I want to do things are funny and I want a lot of people to see it, but I do what I think is good and funny and then hope that others pass it on," he says. "It's easier for me to do what I like, and if it attracts fans then that's great. And I'm lucky that it has been effective over the years to do it this way. I talk to a lot of people who want to be writers. With social media, you can tell a story. If you have a special interest, like cooking, then you can get an audience."

Alert readers of this blog may recall my metaphor of the web as a city and social media as a cocktail party. Cocktail parties are fun. You go because you want to be there. And while the possibility of meeting someone who could become a customer is a distinct possibility, that’s a by-product of good conversation.

Like Eugene, it is best if you have the right attitude going into social networking sites. While he is a comedian, all sorts of people are interesting company at a cocktail party (including you).

Image credits:
Top: Eugene Mirman
Bottom: Shutterstock / Argunova

To gate or not to gate? Data from an ebook offer

2009-11-05T14:21:58-05:00