I received an email today from Eyal Sela, the author of the productivity and Internet blog ProductiveWise. He is a freelance Internet and social-media project manager.
Eyal took a look at our community's wiki of social media marketing examples, which is now up to 968 entries. Here's what he found...(click on either image for a larger view)
Thanks Eyal!
That was fun.
You may have heard about the P&G Digital Night and how it will might change the world. Hopefully we will, but probably not in the way it's been hyped in the media.
Over the weekend, I created a framework to port A List of Social Media Marketing Examples into a wiki. I also invited the 166 people who've left comments on that post to become the initial collaborators in the new effort. (At least I tried to...Google Sites seems to have had a delivery problem. If you think you should have a login, try your existing email address - it may already be setup.)
One of the benefits of doing so manifests in the framework, which allows users to sort information by different categories. In an early experiment, I had created an alphabetical directory by company name, with 26 pages. Continuing with that approach would've meant replicating efforts to relist examples by channel, industry, or geography.
There is one correct approach to calculate ROI. The result is a financial ratio.
And so the Emperor set off under the high canopy, at the head of the great procession. It was a great success. All the people standing by and at the windows cheered and cried, "Oh, how splendid are the Emperor's new clothes. What a magnificent train! How well the clothes fit!" No one dared to admit that he couldn't see anything, for who would want it to be known that he was either stupid or unfit for his post?
Since starting a list of social media marketing examples, I've seen some great work to frame content for specific uses:
It seems like a new ego trap gets sprung every month. This time, it's social media ranking tools.
What's an ego trap? In a nutshell, social technologies use game mechanics to get users hooked on participation. People often get addicted to ego-stroking system feedback, until they can temper their usage (addiction?) in terms of utility vs. serendipity. Self-promotion lies at the root of ego traps.
I don't think ego traps are inherently "bad." However, I believe that individuals should be fully aware of the implications when participating - particularly what they're trying to accomplish and why. Honesty with one's own ego is the key.
Some people are panicking after submitting their Twitter username and password to a site called Twitterank, which will "determine how worthy of a person you are in Twitterverse," while potentially stealing your password in the process. Clearly an ego trap in action. Why?
Influence: like Plinko?
I've typically thought of influence tactics as uni-directional, in a downward direction. I imagine that the traditional approach of getting a message widely disseminated consists of targeting a beacon and letting your message bounce down a pyramid of nodes, like Plinko.
A "good" beacon exhibits wide reach, in the media sense. Traditional media fit the bill quite nicely here. The better the beacon, the more widely your message will travel. The more beacons you seed, the more pyramids you'll sow.
Tom O'Brien's comment on influence has got me thinking about how beacons operate in social media. They get used in two ways:
No doubt, social media has democratized influence and both of these approaches work.
What if we turn the board upside-down?
But I wonder if there's another more surgical approach to outreach that doesn't assume a uni-directional downward message dispersion. What happens when you connect to beacons that will transmit upwards instead? Doesn't it follow that what goes up, must come down?
For example, I was recently emailed by an author who said that a certain trade publication wouldn't review a new book. I know the book has been sent out and been reviewed by some well-read bloggers, i.e. quality beacons. But wouldn't this have been more effective by targeting "influencers" who would be able to connect directly with traditional media? I know journalists participate in pyramids like everyone else - but I'm pretty sure no one wants to write a story two weeks after it's been kicked around in the blogosphere.
Maybe this is what professionals already do...
Maybe this is just PR 101 and I don't know it. I've never had any formal outreach training, which you can probably tell...so if I've offended the PR professionals who read this blog, I apologize - please enlighten me!
From the outside, it seems like today's blogger outreach should be happening at step two, preceded by a step one of more precise and surgical targeting of upward-facing influencers - and rarely, if ever make a noise within the echo chamber, let alone in public.
I've been reading the reactions to Pepsi's recent influencer outreach program, PR for The Pepsi Cooler. Have been thinking about it in the perspective of other outreach campaigns, like Nikon, Vista, HP.
"There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about." - Oscar Wilde
Times are tough, for sure - but that hasn't reduced the number of gratis opportunities available to learn and network for free. I've noticed more than a few events happening this week, offering free advice and education. Thought I'd pass them along, in case you're interested.
If you have anything to add to the list, please comment below and I'll include above.
I've been thinking about how ego traps operate in social media - which could also be called hero marketing (credit Seth Godin for suggesting the term). Social media focuses on individuals. Self-promotion lies at the root of ego traps, usually inclusive of helping and promoting others.
I don't think ego traps are inherently "bad." However, I believe that individuals should be fully aware of the implications when participating in a hero marketing scheme - particularly what they're trying to accomplish and why. Honesty with one's own ego is the key.
There's some chatter going on about "50 of the most powerful and influential women in social media."
Influencer lists are ego traps in action. Why?
(To Ron Hudson's credit, he comments on the digg story, "...digg this story so that they are discovered by more people. Keep in mind, you will also be contributing to my own popularity as well. With that in mind, digg or digg not.") Other influencer lists include people on Twitter, marketing bloggers, or the Silicon Alley 100.
Influencer lists are great for discovering new voices and recognizing well-done work. Let's just be aware of and honest about what everyone seeks in the process.
Previously - Ego Trap: Industry Awards
I don't like the Wikipedia definition of social media marketing, because it focuses too much on search and does not touch on corporate marketing or integration. So let's try a new definition by thinking through the phrase "social media marketing," backwards:
Producing a definition of social media marketing:
"Interaction between individuals in [digital] delivery channels, exchanging content related to consumer needs and company solutions."
That's theory. In practice, things start to break down and few marketers are operate in the conversational nirvana promised by social media evangelists. Why?
So social media marketing can be more precisely defined as:
"Interaction between a company and individual via [digital] delivery channels, intended to share commercial content that will lead to a sale and/or be passed along to others."
What am I missing here? This sounds pretty much like traditional marketing to me.
A month ago, I published a list of social media marketing examples. At the time, the list started with 131 brands that were involved in social media to some extent. (Sometimes not by their own choice.)
A month later, the list has added over 100 new brands due to the contributions of 81 community members.
Some interesting things happened along the way. Dion Hincliffe from Social Computing Magazine requested permission to republish the list, no problem. Almost 200 other bloggers have found the list helpful and I hope you do as well. Unfortunately, I also stumbled across a few cases of plagiarism - two that were coincidentally blamed on "assistants" blogging whose work had not been checked. (Really? Maybe I need to get a blogging assistant, too. But I'll be sure to equip that person with a copy of the MLA.)
As my way of saying thanks, here's a search engine shout-out to give credit where credit is due to everyone who has contributed to the list (either directly or through prior art):
Jeremiah Owyang, Mashable, Forrester, Mack Collier, Social Brand Index, Gavin Heaton, Philippe Deltenre, zeroinfluencer, Bruce Eric Anderson, Nick Ayres, Jeff Glasson, Luke, Mike, Robin Seidner, Tom Shea, Ed Nicholson, Stefan Halley, Tom Hoehn, Debbie Weil, Marta Kagan, Paull Young, Kevin, Paul Fabretti, Nick Huhn, dominic, Michael Pranikoff, Kyle Flaherty, Ed Terpenning, Chi-chi Ekweozor, Lisa, David Bressler, C.B. Whittemore, Torley, David Jones, Keith De La Rue, Sean Lew, Tom Cummings, Donna Tocci, Adam Singer, Yianni Garcia, Matt Cronin, Stephen Manning, Jim Dietzel, Clayton, Mike, Kira Wampler, Woody Meachum, Lee Aase, Toby Bloomberg, Adam Denison, Colleen Gatlin, Davezilla, Gina, Marcos Fargas, Marianne Richmond, Kevin Barenblat, Dan Entin, Bruce Ertmann, Sean Moffitt, Elana Bowman, Dan, Andrew, James O'Connor, Herve Kabla, Sachin Agarwal, Lou Cuming, Danny Urguia, Kathrin Lohmann, Rafa, John Galpin, Ken Kaplan, Kathy Mandelstein, BJ Cook, John Welsh, Nils Koenig, James Finnen, Miko, Yvonne DiVita, Juny Lee, Massimo Cavazzini, and Gunther Lie.
But seriously...234. Do you think that's it?
I've been thinking about how ego traps operate in social media - which could also be called hero marketing (credit Seth Godin for suggesting the term). Essentially, social media focuses on individuals and ego traps help promote individuals, not necessarily at the expense of helping/promoting others.
I don't think ego traps are inherently "bad." However, I believe that individuals should be fully aware of the implications when participating in a hero marketing scheme - particularly what they're trying to accomplish and why. Honesty with one's own ego is the key. (Or is it the id that's really the problem?)
Jeremiah has started a list of social media marketing awards. Self-submitted industry award competitions are ego traps in action. Why?
Award competitions work well when executed properly (i.e. focused topic, large sample of competition, critical judgment process), because they can be a quintuple-win situation for the participants: clients, agencies, judges, hosts, and observers. Let's just be aware of and honest about what everyone seeks in the process.
Last week, I shared a list of about 120 companies using and/or being used by social media marketing. Less than a week later, that list has almost doubled solely based on community contributions. Thank you for sharing.
The list seems big enough to support some analysis. What do you think about these three major criticisms?
1. Big companies are lagging indicators.
2. Are these examples really social?
3. Stuff is missing.
Your thoughts, reactions, and observations are appreciated.
Last week, I shared a list of about 120 companies using and/or being used by social media marketing. Less than a week later, that list has almost doubled solely based on community contributions. Thank you for sharing.
The list seems big enough to support some analysis. What do you think about this graphic?
(You can create your own at wordle.net.)
Thoughts?
Hello - if you're here's for social media examples, you've come to the right place.
Here are some related resources you might find helpful:
If you find this information useful, you can stumble, bookmark, or digg this page.
Background on why I originally did this:
I've been thinking about how social media works. For example, applying game mechanics to understand participation, thinking about users vs. customers, and deconstructing ego traps in PR campaigns. This analysis makes me wonder if social media marketing matters and if so, does it scale.
I thought you might benefit from some of my background research on these topics. And I'd appreciate your help in curating this list by providing more details and submitting additional cases.
>> Last update: 23 November 2008
>> Total brands: 324
Examples of companies using and being used by social media marketing:
[Notice anything missing? Leave a link and description in the comments below. I'll add to the main list on a periodic basis.]
--
1 Jeremiah Owyang's A Chronology of Brands that Got Punk'd by Social Media
2 Mashable's 35+ Examples of Corporate Social Media in Action
3 Forrester's Groundswell Awards, 2007 and 2008
4 Mack Collier's Company Blog Checkup Series
5 Social Brand Index - Twitter
6 Credit: Gavin Heaton
7 Credit: Philippe Deltenre
8 Credit: zeroinfluencer, David Bausola
9 Credit: Bruce Eric Anderson
10 Credit: Nick Ayres
11 Credit: Jeff Glasson
12 Credit: Luke
13 Credit: Mike
14 Credit: Robin Seidner
15 Credit: Tom Shea
16 Credit: Ed Nicholson
17 Credit: Stefan Halley
18 Credit: Tom Hoehn
19 Credit: Debbie Weil and her list of 67+ Big Brand Corporate Blogs
20 Credit: Marta Kagan
21 Credit: Paull Young
22 Credit: Kevin
23 Credit: Paul Fabretti
24 Credit: Nick Huhn
25 Credit: dominic
26 Credit: Michael Pranikoff
27 Credit: Kyle Flaherty
28 Credit: Ed Terpenning
29 Credit: Chi-chi Ekweozor
30 Credit: Lisa
31 Credit: David Bressler
32 Credit: C.B. Whittemore
33 Credit: Torley
34 Credit: David Jones
35 Credit: Keith De La Rue
36 Credit: Sean Lew
37 Credit: Tom Cummings
38 Credit: Donna Tocci
39 Credit: Adam Singer
40 Credit: Yianni Garcia
41 Credit: Matt Cronin
42 Credit: Stephen Manning
43 Credit: Jim Dietzel
44 Credit: Clayton
45 Credit: Mike
46 Credit: Kira Wampler
47 Credit: Woody Meachum
48 Credit: Lee Aase
49 Credit: Toby Bloomberg
50 Credit: Adam Denison
51 Credit: Colleen Gatlin
52 Credit: Davezilla
53 Credit: Gina
54 Credit: Marcos Fargas
55 Credit: Marianne Richmond
56 Credit: Kevin Barenblat
57 Credit: Dan Entin
58 Credit: Bruce Ertmann
59 Credit: Sean Moffitt
60 Credit: Elana Bowman
61 Credit: Dan
62 Credit: Andrew
63 Credit: James O'Connor
64 Credit: Herve Kabla
65 Credit: Sachin Agarwal
66 Credit: Lou Cuming
67 Credit: Danny Urguia
68 Credit: Kathrin Lohmann
69 Credit: Rafa
70 Credit: John Galpin
71 Credit: Ken Kaplan
72 Credit: Kathy Mandelstein
73 Credit: BJ Cook
74 Credit: John Welsh and list of UK SMM examples
75 Credit: Nils Koenig
76 Credit: James Finnen
77 Credit: Miko
78 Credit: Yvonne DiVita
79 Credit: Juny Lee
80 Credit: Massimo Cavazzini
81 Credit: Gunther Lie
82 Credit: Alan Edgett
83 Credit: Kelly
84 Credit: Søren Storm Hansen
85 Credit: dlafont
86 Credit: Greg Weinger
87 Credit: Katie Mingo
88 Credit: Patricia Romeo
89 Credit: Kate Elzer-Peters
90 Credit: Jason
91 Credit: Penny Schouten
92 Credit: Gillian
93 Credit: Valorie Luther
94 Credit: Shannon Swenson
95 Credit: Rachel Happe's Social Media Examples via @MadLid
96 Credit: vidarbrekke
97 Credit: Kylie Lewis
98 Credit: Guy Kawasaki
99 Credit: Mikael Lindecrantz
100 Credit: Alex
101 Credit: Steve Radick
102 Credit: NewTarget Web
103 Credit: Jason Dojc
104 Credit: Chrissie Hsu
105 Credit: Aki Spicer
106 Credit: Liza Hausman
107 Credit: Eric Hoffman
108 Credit: Kami W Huyse
109 Credit: Sean Hudson
110 Credit: Eric
111 Credit: Matt
112 Credit: Larry Gee
113 Credit: Urs
114 Credit: Harry Gold
Hi - since I left Forrester about six weeks ago, people have been telling me that this blog has gotten a lot more interesting. I hope you agree.
The main reason for this is an expansion of my thinking while building a new company. What I'm working on is reflected in part by what you read here.
I've been having a lot of fun with the conversations that have been playing out here as well. There have been many thoughtful comments and I wanted to say thanks for sharing and participating.
Over the next week or so, I’ll be digging deeper into some recent posts to learn more about what we agree and disagree on. I intend to highlight the insights that resolve critical points and others that open new questions. (Related to something I learned from this thoughtful piece on commentary from bond art + science.)
One last comment to you - thanks.
Seth Godin comments that words matter.
Consider the following text, edited from an earlier post:
Dave Balter is a word-of-mouth guru. He founded the word-of-mouth media network BzzAgent and has written two books on the subject of word-of-mouth marketing. Dave launched a great hero marketing campaign recently to promote his second book, The Word of Mouth Manual: Volume II. Dave reached out to a network of big thinkers and asked them to show some generosity in promoting the book. Who did Dave a favor? Seth Godin. Jackie Huba. Chris Brogan. John Moore. Greg Verdino. And 15 others. If you look at the related posts, almost all of these bloggers are promoting Dave's book out of generosity to a fellow big thinker.
So why did it work? The offer was limited. It was relevant to the bloggers and their readers. And it was a motorcade of generosity, from the bloggers to Dave and on to their readers.
Do you learn as much from a "hero marketing" example as an explanation of an "ego trap?" Do these words matter to you?
Let me give you something else to consider:
On July 29th, an invitation was extended to the readers of a prominent blogger to join a "members-only tribe." It's invitation only until this blogger's new book publishes in October and early members get "privileges and bragging rights" including "a chance to contribute to a new jointly-authored ebook, with full credit and links to the contributors." To join this tribe, you must pre-order the author's book three months in advance for about US$11 - but this isn't about selling more books; it's intended to filter out the tire-kickers from more serious community members.
Does this sound like hero marketing or an ego trap to you?
Know thyself, then you can create heroes and set traps, or decide to follow a hero or step into a trap - for whatever reasons make sense in your story, not someone else's.
Let's step outside of the echo chamber for a minute.
Does social media marketing matter?
What I want to know is, how does this stuff impact the bottom line? As a consumer (and apologies, biased towards the US - with our weak currency, these examples carry less efficacy when everything looks like it's discounted 30 - 50%), I'm curious to know if you have ever done any of the following. (Partial credit on examples to Mashable and Jeremiah.)
Add up points as you go:
+3 points:
+2 points:
+1 point:
-2 points for any of the following:
So how'd you score?
I think most people will score zero...which is why I asked the initial question. How did you score?
Have you ever eaten at wagamama? They've expanded quite a bit since I first ate there in Leicester Square and have even expanded into the US, with two Boston locations. I'm a fan of the restaurant/brand (yes, they have a Facebook group). They may know how to run a good kitchen, but their email marketing needs some work.
You probably know that I don't research email for a living - I've only managed campaigns as a client-side marketer. But I know enough to be dangerous, or at least to write a decent blog post about how to improve email marketing.
So here's the body of the message:
Forrester's analyst Julie Katz does this for a living and is worth contacting if you're responsible for this type of marketing. As for me, I think I'll go unsubscribe from the list now.
Are you a luxury shopper? I first gained insight into this world working at PUMA, supporting our collaborations with Christy Turlington, Neil Barrett, and Philippe Starck. One time I walked into a business meeting in Tokyo and was mistaken for Mihara Yasuhiro (long story). As global head of online marketing, I was responsible for bringing these partnerships to life online. Unlike competing with the massive budgets of Nike and adidas, it was easy to crush the competition here - most luxury brands weren't paying much attention to their web sites. For example, the Prada site was simply a logo and small picture for years. (If anyone complained about one of my sites, I could always say "at least it's better than Prada.")
Working to market these designers revealed a disconnect to me. Luxury goods consumers have more money to spend on goods than most - e.g. they are the ones who first owned the Nokia 8800, remodeled into a Bulthaup kitchen, bought Bugaboos before they deflected falling masonry, etc. But the marketing tactics used to reach these consumers are resoundingly old-school. Luxury marketers are often synonymous with their consumer, spending a lot of time online and owning the latest technology - but tend to ignore these facts when deciding where and how to spend their marketing dollars.
I was at the Luxury Interactive Summit last year and this existence of this disconnect was constantly reaffirmed by the luxury marketers I met. Whether it was watches, cosmetics, automobiles, or apparel, many marketers were frustrated that their brands' management refused to invest in their websites and simple digital marketing campaigns.
Assuming that digital doesn't fit into the marketing mix for a luxury brand is a bad idea. Yet new research from a Forrester colleague Victoria Bracewell Lewis in London shows that many luxury retailers are still skeptical about digital. Today's FT runs a story that includes data from Victoria's latest research drawn from a survey of 178 luxury executives and interviews with 20 brands including Emporio Armani, Harrods, and Louis Vuitton. 43% of respondents doubt that more of their products will be sold online than in store 10 years from now. Only 22% of those not selling online (2/3 of the sector) plan on launching e-commerce next year. I mean, people are buying big ticket items like diamonds and cars online. Right now. Why would someone not want to buy your silk scarf as well?
My favorite quote from the FT piece: "Finally, e-commerce aside, few luxury companies grasp what may one day prove to be the greatest of the web’s benefits – the opportunity to interact with and listen to customers. This shows how far the industry has drifted from a consumer-centric point of view."
That's what I'll be speaking about at this year's Luxury Interactive summit - the intersection of social media and luxury brands. Because the smart marketers are the ones who realize luxury always was and always will be about the relationships - the tools have evolved and our marketing strategy needs to get contemporary as well.
If you'll be around the event and want to catch up in person, let me know!
Close your eyes and think back to last Christmas.
Actually, open them again so you can read the rest of this post.
Do you remember the piles of catalogs you receive every holiday season? For window treatments, electronic gadgets, preppy clothes? Ever get the sense that all that mistargeted mail was bad for the environment? Well, you're not alone - once again, consumers are ahead of brands, agencies, and institutions in thought and deed...
New research from my colleagues Dave Frankland and Sarah Glass illustrate the "green-ness" of today's direct marketing practices. And the results aren't good news for the ozone layer. Some marketers are taking steps in the right direction (see picture above) - but we've got a long way to go.
Forrester clients can access the entire "Direct Marketing Needs A Green Wake-Up Call" and everyone can read highlights and commentary in Ad Age.
I'm at Forrester's Marketing Forum in Los Angeles today. And again, I'm up at 4 am local - is this technically jet lag? I won't be doing a lot of blogging or tweeting because my schedule's full. However, you can get updates from a variety of sources:
- Forrester's Marketing Blog, which has an embedded Meebo chat
- Twitter - not just me, but also Jeremiah, Charlene, Josh, Adam, Amy, Rodney, Nick, Michelle, Barbara, Jeremy, and others
- Blogs: Jeremy Pepper, Rodney Rumford, Jennifer Jones, Marianne Richmond
- Photos on Flickr
If you're here and see me around, please say hi! I'll be doing Q&A this morning after Brian's keynote speech on engagement, doing intro and Q&A for Emmanuel Brown from Nike Jordan Brand, and running a track session this afternoon with BzzAgent's Dave Balter and JD Power/Umbria's Janet Eden-Harris.
And if you're here...what kind of attendee are you?
If you have a second, please tell me more about yourself.
Last week, Omniture invited me to speak at their Summit 08 in Salt Lake City. As it turns out, I was given the chance to address an audience of over 2,000 interactive marketers about what's going on in the industry.
When it comes to interactive marketing technologies, all signs point in one direction: The Online Marketing Suite. My Forrester colleagues Suresh Vittal and Shar VanBoskirk have written on this idea that you should become familiar with:
"Forrester believes that the time is right for the online marketing suite to emerge. This suite, underpinned by a central hub, is the eventual destiny for all online marketing technology and will enable a single view of the customer across channels, provide process tools to support collaboration, centralize optimization, and support a partner ecosystem."
The Online Marketing Suite may not be as sexy as social media, but it's how business gets done...if you haven't heard about this concept, you may want to keep an eye out for it in the future.
I'm heading back down to Charlottesville to speak again at the Online Marketing executive education course. I was down there in October 2007 and judging from the feedback that organizer and search guru Alan Rimm-Kaufman received, it went pretty well.
I earned my MBA from Darden back in 2000 and have used what I learned every day of my career since. If you have ever wanted a good excuse to visit a beautiful campus and get smart, this is it.
By the way, the famous (infamous?) Foxfields will be held the weekend before the course. If you make it down, let's hit the Corner and get a gusburger. Just don't expect me to stay out with you until 3 a.m. (!)
I've just returned from CES 2008, my first time attending the largest consumer electronics trade show in the world. My primary goal in attending was to get smart on technologies related to my new Forrester coverage area, mobile marketing. My overall takeaway: it was a world of paradox.
I was overwhelmed by the sheer size of the convention, yet underwhelmed by the dearth of 'aha' stuff on display. You can get a quick recap of the good in c|net's Best of CES; you can also find out more about the bad and ugly in Engadget and Gizmodo. Walking the floor, you'll find well-produced booths like Intel, Nokia, and Sony but transition quickly into what seems like a super-sized Best Buy, then into sections that seem like they took everything for sale on the long tail of eBay and put it on display.
The general storyline in play was paradoxically "more AND less." More capacity. Less physical space. More processing power. Less energy consumption. More functionality. Less environmental impact. But what was missing was the breakthrough innovation I've associated with CES in the past - the most relevant announcement to me was Yahoo's Go 3.0 and open mobile apps platform.
Here are some of the lessons I learned as a CES n00b:
I've got three days in pictures up on Flickr; would love to hear your lessons as well.
While things are still slow at work, why not take an hour today and opt-out of directories where you don't want your personal information to be public?
Here are some links you might find useful, from the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. You might find it insightful to run a search on these sites for yourself first to see what pops up.
Being smart in social media means you show what you want to show.
Lester Wunderman, speaking at MIT:
"We are living in an age of repersonalization and individualization. People, products and services are all seeking an individual identity. Taste, desire, ambition and lifestyle have made shopping once again a form of personal expression. A computer can know and remember as much marketing detail about 200,000,000 consumers as did the owner of a crossroads general store about his handful of customers. It can know an select such personal details as who prefers strong coffee, imported beer, new fashions, bright colors. Who just bought a home, freezer, camera, automobile. Who had a new baby, is overweight, got married, owns a pet, likes romantic novels, serious reading, listens to Bach or the Beatles. New marketing forms which will link these facts to advertising and selling must evolve - where advertising and buying become a single action."
I was speaking to David Sable of Wunderman last week and he mentioned this speech vis-a-vis some research I'm currently working on. The quote is from November 29, 1967. Many people trace the birth of direct marketing to this speech. Speaking of forward looking, perhaps being a good left-brain marketer is to be a bit of Nostradamus...?
Forty years later, you can apply the same insight to advertisers and agencies today to explain why social computing matters.
Forrester's CMO Group publishes some of the best CMO-focused research that even most Forrester clients will never see. Why? Because access to member-only research is one of the benefits of joining the group.
However, CMO Group analyst Cindy Commander recently completed a report in conjunction with executive search firm Heidrick & Struggles focusing on "The Evolved CMO." And both firms have decided to distribute it gratis.
The report is based on a survey of 132 marketing leaders from companies >$100M. Some of the key findings from the report: CMOs need to spend more time on personal development, averaging less than 10% of their time on the activity. CMOs aren't seizing the opportunity to lead their organizations to customer-centricity.
Most surprising to me: CMOs rate engagement-related tactics like customer-driven design, social computing/web 2.0, and user-generated content as least important to success - but most important to learn about (!).
Read the full report here (registration required).
I'm not so great with French, but I thought I'd share some tips on marketing and advertising words from other languages...
Then again, English is my native language so what do I know? Help me out here or offer tips on your own favorites.
I'm in Barcelona this week for Forrester's Consumer and Finance Forum. I'm already hearing some great examples of how European companies are using social computing.
Most of my updates from the event will be on Twitter, where Jeremiah, Tracy Sullivan, and I will be tweeting.
Longer updates via blog are at Jeremiah's blog and the Forrester marketing blog.
I was walking to lunch earlier this week with Brian Haven and he told me about a simple, clever tactic he uses to manage account logins and email spam.
Background - last time I moved, I changed the name on my magazines to my dogs. Since then, they've gotten various offers in the mail. Most recently, Lucy received a trial membership to a women's fitness club. (She does need to lose a few pounds...)
So Brian mentioned how he's doing this with email. The basic concept is to set up an email address for every account you have that requires a login. So if you own the domain "foo.com" then you'd set up email addresses like amazon@foo.com, ebay@foo.com and gmail@foo.com. This means you:
There are some variations to this (e.g. forwarding, catchalls), but that's the basic concept. If you don't own your own domain name already, you can get a one year *.info at GoDaddy for US$3.19.
I know some people use a free email account for all signups, order confirmations, etc. But sometimes there are account-specific emails that you may want to receive. We may never be able to filter every spam email in the world, but I thought this idea was cool because it's got more than one purpose.
Anybody have refinements to add? Been doing this and found any drawbacks to share?
Back to work tomorrow - unlike David Armano, I have no choice but to live with my Forrester hangover from the Consumer Forum.
This was my 2nd forum and quite a different experience. One reason was Forrester's use of social media. You can see the great posts about and reactions to the content in many places - Jeremiah has the best roundups on days 1 and 2.
Overall, there was less evangelizing and more on making social computing real.
I'm interested to see how things are different in Barcelona next month, as well as Marketing Forum 2008 in Los Angeles...that is, expecting bigger and better things.
"...I am so much older than I can take
And my affection, well it comes and goes
I need direction to perfection, no no no no
Help me out"
[just put up a portfolio of sites I've managed.]
(thanks Autoviewer!)
Let's drive agreement on this - if you do marketing, you are a marketer. Not a "marketeer."
Facebook's momentum can be described as any sort of a number of analogies involving velocity. I've been meaning to write a post but with so much great insight popping up, I'll leave it to aggregation and attribution.
Strategy:
Tactics:
And with all good things comes spam. The malicious-minded can create fake profiles to mine profile data.
I have a lot of respect for Ad Age. Their reporters are smart, their data is valuable, and their features are interesting. Ad Age is an important and influential voice in our industry - and I just can't understand why they still have Al Ries writing columns. Yes, I still read them - to get a perspective on how traditional marketing can't deal with the changes taking place today.
In early 2006, something struck me as odd when Ries declared that Guatemala should rename itself in order to increase tourism. That idea is about as good as starting a war to lower oil prices.
The second was a blatant mistake that BMW had changed its tagline. Wrong.
More recently, Ries tells Ad Age readers why the iPhone will fail. I think generating $250 million in a weekend of sales is pretty much a success.
Now, Ries says that Playboy's move to digital is a bad idea, comparing it to failed product line extensions. Wrong. The world has changed. According to Pew, 47% of all U.S. adults have broadband at home, up from 30% in 2005. Moreover, this shift has been underway at the company for years and the company turned a profit in FY 2006. A quick look at the PLA 10-K shows that while revenue from the publishing business has declined for the past 3 years, while revenue from online subscriptions and e-commerce have grown 30%.
I guess the worst thing you can be is in the middle - it's refreshing to hear a voice that's consistently wrong.
[Matt, how long does that contract run? Have you all lined up someone more in touch, like Seth Godin?]
Here's an idea from Sam Decker:
"The most important aspect to good relationships is open and frequent communication. This requires four things:
Now, are we describing how to make a marriage work? Because it sure sounds like it.
Sam is a M20 blogger and recently contributed to some new Forrester research called "Partnering for Success: The CIO - CMO Relationship." The advice given above is Sam's perspective on how CMOs and CIOs can build a more effective partnership.
Maybe that's a good analogy for how close IT and marketing need to be in today's business world driven by technology change.
Good timing - in my own work on the state of the marketing organization, I found that marketers have their most unproductive relationships with the IT department. This situation needs to be improved - now.
It's time for Forrester to update its online marketing forecast. A graphic from the old 2005 - 2010 forecast is at right. There are a lot of forecasts out there and I think the consensus opinion goes something like this:
"Traditional media flat to slightly declining. Online channels up, big time. Unmeasured media...?"
Forrester's last forecast included four areas: email, online classifieds, search and online display ads. Not sure how this new forecast is similar/different (it's not my research) but if these areas are important to your business, you can participate here and receive a copy of the research once it's complete.
I caught the Transformers movie last night; it's the first time I can recall wishing a movie had an "R" rating instead of "PG-13"...maybe because the previews for "I Am Legend" and the untitled 1/18/08 movie looked pretty good. Still, it was definitely better than the robots we grew up with.
For a blockbuster summer film like this, I was curious to see what brands had stepped up to be incorporated into the story. Here's a quick run-down and my take; if you've seen the movie, I'd be interested in hearing what you thought.
- GM: I heard about this first via :30 TV spots and dealership signage. This is the best and most natural placement for the movie, given that it's all about cars after all. The only one that seemed forced was the Pontiac Solstice in a showroom - nice car but kind of underpowered vs. the others.
- eBay: The first couple of times it made sense, but by the 3rd or 4th mention, it was over the top.
- Apple: I don't know if this was paid, but there was a clear shot at one point of the hero using a MacBook
- Burger King: The shot of the female lead with her friends at this QSR just didn't seem right. Not saying it couldn't happen, but in LA? They should've been eating at Pinkberry instead.
- Mountain Dew: Machine transforms into Decepticon. Gratuitous.
- Vespa: The worst placement of the movie. When all the other motorized stuff transforms into a cool robot, why not the scooter that you paid to place in the movie?
Hoping we can buy a Duff Beer and and pay $5 to catch the Simpsons Movie on JetBlue this summer...
I'm about to wrap up my 2nd trip to New York in two weeks. I've been blogging about what I've been doing here and over on Forrester's Marketing Team blog:
- The luxury marketing, Google, and Critical Mass
- Notes on luxury: Giorgio Armani keynote
- Three things about Avenue A/Razorfish
- The company-owned store: an immersive brand experience
- Turning customer experience into a competitive weapon
- Fidelity Investments: Moving beyond customer satisfaction
- Customer advocacy 2007: USAA wins again
- What North American banks can learn from Europe
Thankfully I'll be at home for the next few weeks.
Whenever I walk through Times Square, I'm amazed to see the number of brand-owned flagship stores there. After dinner last night, I went into the M&M's store at Broadway & 48th.
This is a great example of how a brand - one that you may not think needs its own store - pulls off an immersive experience for enthusiasts and those who are just plain curious. For example, the wall upstairs has tubes filled with M&Ms of all different colors - over 22, many of them exclusive to the store. You pick out a bag and fill with whatever colors you want, $9/pound. And yes, while that may be 2 - 3 times more expensive what you may pay at your local CVS...it's the experience that counts.
In a world filled with complex distribution and trade operations, the company-owned store is a manufacturer's best option to maximize presentation of a brand on its own terms.
p.s. this applies to your website, too...
Do you ever get privacy policy notices from the financial institutions you deal with? You have to according to the law. I got one from Chase today and found the phrasing quite interesting. Chase gave me two privacy option choices.
- Option 1: "Even if you do tell us not to share, we may do so...as permitted by law."
- Option 2: "Even if you do tell us not to share, we may share other types of information within our family."
To me, this says that Chase is going to try and make money off of my information in any way legally permissible. Whether I like it or not.
This is very far from the concept of customer advocacy - defined by Forrester as "the perception on the part of consumers that the firm does what's best for its customers, not just the firm's own bottom line."
It seems to me that if Chase really had my best interest in mind, they'd write this policy in plain English and give me an option to truly retain my privacy. Is 2 - 3% on all of my transactions not enough to run a business?
The second panel of the day at ARF's re:think conference was "The Agency of the Future" including R/GA, Avenue A|Razorfish, Nitro and Digitas.
Continuing on the one-of-these-outfits-is-not-like-the-other theme, Nick Law, Chief Creative Officer from R/GA shows up in short sleeve shirt, jeans, and swooshes in stark contrast to other panelists in standard business casual. Interactive is the new traditional and its agency executives appear to have followed suit, so to speak.
Get it?
Followed suit?
Ok moving on, Rance Crain of Ad Age did a nice job of moderating and stirring up the pot. He suggested an alternative title for his panel as well: "Digital: Just Another Silo?" BTW, I'm guessing he's not a big fan of subservient chicken, either.
Torrence Boone of Digitas described his company as a "full service agency" with roots in direct marketing and capabilities today in integrated and digital marketing. Which is a good thing because I'm planning a Forrester Wave on integrated agencies later this summer. Torrance defined a big idea as a filter on what to do or what not to do. It's built out of consumer insight, media context, and consumption patterns, along with a good dose of gut and intuition.
Steve Marrs of Nitro spoke about his company's small size and global reach. They have three main offices, in London, New York, and Shanghai (the largest). Shanghai as largest is intriguing (unless I heard wrong). Steve said that his agency approaches work by separating strategy from advertising - the way it used to be. Nitro defines a big idea in part as something that drives business results. Note to Nitro: a good place to start would be SEO for "nitro."
Clark Kokich of Avenue A|Razorfish described his company as a "full service interactive advertising agency." He mentioned that he's been in the agency game for a long time and left his first stint because of a feeling that what matters to client businesses happens inside the core of their firm - untouched by agency projects. He brought this focus back to AARF to focus on what's "crucial to the client's business." Clark also mentioned that his agency's purpose is to drive business results, because "you can't build a brand through advertising."
Nick Law of R/GA showed how the "Agency of the Digital Age" is helping one client - Nike - beyond advertising. Their work on Nike+ gets deep into product as well as promotion - these being "wearable, networked computing devices." Not much more to say, because Nick showed how R/GA is doing it.
These agencies are certainly well-positioned for the future, especially given the way consumer behavior is shifting to digital. However, as interactive agencies compete for strategy work, they are going to run into formidable competition - traditional management consultancies. We've been here before and last time the old guns won. This time around...?
The second day of the ARF's re:think conference opened with a panels research agency executives, called "The Research Agency of the Future" with the CEOs of GfK, Kantar, TNS and Nielsen. Moderator Jim Figura of Colgate-Palmolive said it should have been called "Insights Agency of the Future."
Most of what these CEOs had to say didn't get beyond what you can read in the press today. Thus as Joe Mandese wrote in his post on the official re:think blog, the interesting parts of the panel came from reading between the lines. In fact, most of the talking points were so generic that I didn't know what company was being referenced for the middle two speakers. GfK was introduced by the moderator and Nielsen went last by process of elimination. But for Kantar and TNS, it was a few minutes before I knew what company was being represented. This was because none of the CEOs told the audience their name, title, or company when they took the podium - they all just started talking. Perhaps these guys are rockstars of research to the ARF audience.
Klaus Wübbenhorst from GfK proposed his company was best positioned to help businesses - after all, GfK stands for "growth from knowledge." I asked Klaus about GfK's brand monitoring plans after the panel. No response - he looked at me as if I had just asked him to go a grab me a coffee with cream and two sugars. I asked again, mentioning how TNS and Nielsen were building capabilities in the space. He mumbled something to the effect of "sure, it's important." I asked him if he thought brand monitoring were an important capability for a research firm to have in its portfolio. Certainly a slow-pitch underhand softball in my book, but it must have looked more like a Matsusaka gyroball. No response. Pretty clear he just wanted me to leave; unfortunately, I had to in order to deliver my breakout session. Note to Klaus: 70 million and growing. Think about it.
Credit to Eric Salama from Kantar who was aware enough that the Blackberry in his pocket was creating interference with the mic. Salama says it's time to mind the gap between what research firms promise and what they deliver. His firm's strategy hasn't changed for four years, built on three principles: people, innovation, and data quality. I asked Eric about brand monitoring, too. He said none of his companies were doing it. I asked about Visible Technologies - he said, "yes, we have a partnership with them."
David Lowden from TNS had this to say: "The research company of the future will be a partner with its clients." "Cost-effective servicing is an increasingly important issue, but quality must remain." "Clients will only commit to insight that positively impacts business in a meaningful way." He did mention the Cymfony acquisition as part of their efforts to stay cutting edge.
David Calhoun from Nielsen was certainly different in appearance - he was the only panelist sans jacket. He also heavily referenced his client-side experience, which others did not. Calhoun was formerly at GE and mentioned his experience and mentors from there both in his prepared remarks as well as the Q&A. These remarks certainly pointed out management acumen that puts The Nielsen Company in good hands - hopefully Calhoun will be able to change the industry standard as well and help marketers make advertising work.
Lester Wunderman, speaking at Forrester's Marketing Forum:
“We create relationships…or else.”
"The business of advertising is to create relationships between buyers and sellers. We used to be in the business of direct marketing – now we’re in the business of relationship marketing." We will eventually move on to personal marketing, which will be facilitated by the use of data.
"Communications used to be dominated by the seller. Today, the hero is the consumer. Advertising used to speak – now they must listen." Marketers need to move from product trial to creating and retaining loyal customers.
Four goals for direct marketing: Relevance, relationship, repurchase, and retention.
Do consumers switch brands because they’re not loyal? "No - people aren’t loyal to brands like they’re loyal to country, family, or faith. Loyalty means fealty." "I doubt you’d put your life on the line for your favorite brand of breakfast cereal."
"Word of mouth is still the most powerful force around."
Closing thought: “In marketing, as in life, there’s no substitute for imagination or leadership.”
UPDATE: Mr. Wunderman's own post regarding his speech.
Yesterday, I gave the opening keynote at Forrester's Marketing Forum. The audience was engaged and in a great mood. In a nutshell, here's my message:
Customer centricity is easy to say - and hard to do.
We have some great bloggers here that have written recaps:
The most interesting side note from the session? Six different people told me afterwards that they are familiar with the Wellesley dump. It's a small world after all.
UPDATE: Got feedback on the scoring - I was the highest rated speaker of the event. Good times!
I'm in Miami for Forrester's Marketing Forum. Beginning Tuesday, check out the team blog for updates. I'll be posting here on the sessions I'm attending as well.
Wednesday morning I'm delivering the opening keynote, so hopefully we'll get a good recap from Josh, Marianne, Julie, or Ross. (It's kind of tough to blog your own speech.)
When I was a client-side marketer, I would get calls all day long from sales people pitching stuff. After a month, I learned how to vet call value within the first 10 seconds. After six weeks, I learned how to respond to aggressive sales pitches.
I don't have [a lot of] sales people calling me anymore, but I do get lots of people calling to try and pitch their great ideas. Of course you think it's great. It's your business. But why would you assume that I am #1 interested in your offer, when I'm almost certainly in the middle of something else that has nothing to do with your call and #2 that I am interested in stopping what I'm doing to listen to your pitch?
Maybe advertisers don't understand this either. Interruption and irrelevance don't work. You can't annoy consumers into caring.
Push and pull. Permission and relationship. Use them wisely.
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