Inching Closer to the Bottom Line

“Marketers appear to be inching closer to answering the question of social media ROI—or at least making a serious effort—as the stakes get higher.”
--eMarketer, “Dramatic Difference in Approach to Social Media Metrics”

“The future of social media is about math, metrics and monetization.” –Jamie Turner, Chief Content Officer, 60-second Marketer

Social media is approaching the point in its development where most channels and implementations are no longer the shiniest new toys. The buzz isn’t quite as exuberant and the wow factor isn’t quite as transporting. Those us of old enough to remember the heady days of the internet bubble probably remember the mania over “eyeballs” and “mindshare” and how the dot bomb explosion prompted a more prosaic approach to web-based business models; in other words, they had to show a road to profitability or they were left on the table.

Social media may be entering a similar phase in its evolution. Like earlier in this millennium , we are experiencing a financial upheaval which has changed much that was previously the status quo. For social media, breathy excitement over fandom and engagement in the early days is starting to be tempered by a practical desire to demonstrate the worth of budget investment.

This eMarketer report includes data from a study by BazaarVoice and the CMO Club in which they compare results between 2009 and 2010 from a survey of marketers about their social media measurement practices and the metrics they find most valuable. In particular, Conversions (i.e. online actions that achieve a specific objective) and Revenue have greatly increased in importance. Calculating the latter in social media remains particularly tricky, since attribution is complex to identify, but the survey results seem to indicate that social marketers are now considering it much more closely and valuing it much more highly than in last year’s survey.

This changing mindset indicates that those of us who advise and assist our clients with social media need to keep several things in mind as we move deeper into 2011.

Marketers will want justification for their spend.
While the technical costs of entry are very low in social media, i.e. zero to set up a Facebook page or Twitter handle, marketers now realize that an effective program requires significant investment in talent, time, and partnership. As social channels monetize, the hard costs involved in effective community interaction have increased as well as the person-power investment to staff a quality team or find effective partners.

Mapping social activity to business objectives is a key part of demonstrating effectiveness. While these objectives can be financial, they don’t have to be. For example, applying customer service metrics to Twitter or Facebook interaction can show a clear cost reduction value, while also bringing benefit to less-specific objectives such as issue management and corporate reputation enhancement.

We need to be able to explain the value of a social media investment to our clients in more precise terms than we have to date.

There is a difference between a value calculation and a return on investment.
ROI is a financial calculation. Discussion of ROI must be tied to revenue increase or cost reduction, something that is not easy with social media in the same way that it might be for Search Engine or Direct Marketing. (See my colleague Don Bartholomew’s blog posts about this topic for a thorough and nuanced discussion.)

However, the “squishiness” of financial benefit attribution to social media should not obviate the value discussion. The point is that there can be a demonstrable and measurable value achieved through effective social channels, though it may not be specifically financial. Traditional PR has grappled with this kind of measurement for years, but still it serves as a model for identifying value calculations. To continue paraphrasing Don Bartholomew, measurable results in social media will typically fall into four categories of increasing value: Exposure, Engagement, Influence, or Action. Only the latter can some times be tied to a financial impact, and not always. Still, value to the brand is arguably brought by any of these positive results.

Value in social media may come from multiple disciplines.
Social media for a given brand often begins via the Public Relations team, conducting influencer marketing and online editorial outreach, or sometimes via the corporate group dedicated to Marketing. In both cases, the value of social media is demonstrated through exposure and engagement metrics (i.e. impressions, replies, retweets) that might lead to influence (positive tweets) and occasionally measurable actions (e-commerce or online registration).

However, for many brands, value can be derived from impact on other business operations. As suggested earlier, a Customer Service function is frequently fulfilled via social media, and value calculation can shade into ROI through traditional CRM metrics like shortened CSR time, improved problem resolution, and reduced call center usage.

In the case of B2B companies, social media channels can often directly support the Sales operation, and lead generation/nurturing activity can positively impact Cost Per Customer Acquisition, Cost Per Lead, and other sales metrics.

Finally, all R&D activity across the globe benefits from the collaborative nature of social media channels such as technical community forums, SME blogs, and educational videos on YouTube.

One cannot necessarily ascribe a specific dollar impact in each of these instances, but it will be necessary to tie them to metrics that obviously provide value and can impact the financial factors that determine ultimate success in business. Our client partners are going to demand this more and more; even though the economy seems to be rebounding, there remains considerable focus on smart spending and we need to be able to show the specific value we can bring to their brands with social media.

5 Reasons Why Engineers Should Love Social Media

A recent article in EE Times explored the supposed antipathy held by engineers for social media. Prominently referenced was a graph that showed the results of an EE Times survey from May of 2010 which clearly indicated that the overwhelming majority (85%) of sampled engineers had feelings towards Twitter ranging from indifferent at best to “HATE IT!” (Emphasis was theirs.)

It doesn’t take a CSEE degree to know that engineers are notoriously suspicious of marketing, equating it to spin which equates to lies, or at best time-wasting communication fluff. Since social media is generally considered a form of marketing, the presumption goes, the thread of disgust is easy to understand. However this supposed hatred for social media is certainly not warranted for most engineers and may not be true.

Part of the disconnect lies in understanding what social media is; for most people, and by extension most engineers, it is Facebook and Twitter. Ignorance plays into the cloud of suspicion, as evidenced by some of the comments posted in reply to the EE Times article. Apparently unaware of the irony of responding to a blog post about social media with the opinion that social media is useless, some offered hoary clichés in the ”Twitter is a waste of time. Who cares what you had for lunch?” vein. Others disparaged social media but grudgingly allowed that they found some value in LinkedIn.

If these engineers could merely apply the clarity and careful consideration with which they approach problem-solving, they would quickly understand that they should LOVE social media for the following reasons:

Speed of Information
Nothing fires an engineer’s imagination like a new product, or a new way of using an existing product. They are almost always willing to receive product or capability info because they might be able to use it. Correspondingly, when seeking a solution for a particular problem, they will conduct their research but once they choose a solution or an approach they quickly move on to the next design step. Catching the engineer in the right window for consideration is key. With social media, the engineer can constantly be exposed to a stream of information in near real-time, as well as access to archived info flow via search functionality. This means they can literally have the latest and greatest info from all their trusted sources right at their fingertips.

Without Twitter or blog RSS feeds, the responsibility falls back on them to seek out information. Microblogs and related push technology makes it easy to get the latest and greatest served up on a platter, or at least a pad.

Collaboration
Who invented the BBS, after all? The idea of posting questions in front of a community and having members reply or comment is one of the first instances of social media on the Internet. Engineers of all types routinely seek out the ways that others have addressed problems or determined solutions. Avoiding the reinvention of the wheel is deeply ingrained in the engineering mindset; use what has worked before, because it will save you time and stress. It is very important to be efficient and effective, so proven solutions vetted by others have great credibility. Clearly the many facets of social media facilitate and enable this kind of collaboration, from forums and blog responses to more sophisticated tools and community functionality that can share everything from software code to 3D CAD elements.

Evaluation
Collaboration is built on, and builds, trust, which is the core currency of all social media. The democratization of influence, broken out from the silos of professional reviewers or classic Word of Mouth dissemination, has allowed recommendation to become a valuable function of business social media connections. Research has shown time and again that personal recommendations are the most important factor in the B2B buying decision.

In the same way that Yelp reviewers can influence a restaurant choice, Twitter or blog commentary about a product can influence its specification and use. Expertise is demonstrated in opinion or commentary compared to personal experience, so the reader makes his/her own decision as to whether or not to trust any given evaluation. But again, in terms of efficiency, exponentially more recommendations can be parsed via social media feed than possible through direct human interaction. I look forward to the day when GlobalSpec allows commentary on any given company or product, since they typically qualify their registered users and could guarantee a certain amount of credibility for any participant.

Gadgets and Apps
The first people I knew to get iPhones were not interactive marketing gurus; they were electrical engineers. The bleeding edge is crowded with MSE’s and their brothers and sisters who can’t wait to get the latest toy. This is related to the need for the new described above, coupled with the longstanding geek cred that comes from possessing the rare and the special. Also important is figuring out how it works, and applying it to ones needs in order to be more efficient (as described above as well).

The hottest gadgets are in the mobile device space; iPads and iPhones are natural social media enablers, so by extension as the engineer figures out how to use these advanced devices, s/he will be exposed to the mobile versions of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube, and may just realize how they might be worth using. More obvious will be the appeal for dedicated apps published by vendors, consultants, and other resources that meet specific needs and allow quick calculation and specification in the field. EE Times mentions that Agilent offers a Microwave (µWave) calculator to find errors in measurements. I doubt it will rival Angry Birds for number of downloads, but for a specific audience that could be keenly valuable.

Modest Glory
Finally, let’s be honest: the engineer wants the world to know about his or her great skills and accomplishments. I did it! is the mantra for all problem-solvers, and the common yearning for efficiency prevalent in any engineering mindset means that others will want to know how they did it, right? The mores of social media not only allow this non-boastful bragging, they almost demand it. Any engineer worth his or her salt needs to hop on Twitter and tell the world how they visualized a particular system’s time response to various inputs. or overcame the limitation of space and load with a judicious brace. Alternately, they can cruise trade media blogs or the LinkedIn groups in their specialty and respond to questions.

I’m sure that every engineer, being rational and open-minded, will take these proof points to heart and open themselves up to the world of social media. In fact I think that it is quite possible that, in the nine months since the EE Times survey, engineers might have been changing their minds all along and are now happily utilizing all social media channels for help, value, and advantage. It’s the smart thing to do.

B2B Comedy Videos

Social Media B2B just posted this story listing their top 10 B2B comedy videos on the web: http://socialmediab2b.com/2011/01/top-10-b2b-comedy-videos/

These are all pretty good. Inclusion of the Dell Jib-Jab video prompts me to list one other which I happen to think is hilarious. Of course, I helped create it, so I am pretty partial.

The Powers Tempering Valve Configurator launch video features two characters in jib-jab animation and I think it works pretty well. And is funny. If I do say so myself.

http://www.dynamicduoexposed.com/video_episode.htm

Excited about 2011

Every year of the Digital Age produces exciting new technologies, bright industry superstars, and the purported decay or demise of some hereditary company, platform, or application that (in an earlier time) we previously could not live without. The only constant is change, as somebody probably said at some point while playing Space Invaders on his Commodore 64.

Even in the B2B world, where traditional ways of selling still reign supreme and early adoption is a dirty phrase, this past year has been one of evolution and innovation. In particular, there has been explosive growth in the use of digital technologies and social media for sales, marketing, and communications. The challenging business climate of the past couple years has resulted in very sharp marketers who know how to do more with less, always a key digital/social strength, and the improving economy has now created even greater opportunities for smart technology-driven initiatives.

This constant change is what excites me about 2011. Trends that are just now sprouting will blossom and grow in the coming year, and B2B marketing professionals will be in an excellent position to help clients leverage these evolving memes into sound business strategies for growth and market expansion.

Here are some of the things I look forward to in 2011:

Mobile keeps moving. The continued growth of mobile device use, especially smart phones, tablets, and other advanced platforms, will be a dominant story in the coming year. The ubiquity of consumer use will continue to cascade into the B2B world, as business customers come to expect the same capabilities and user experience as in B2C. Engineers and the R&D crowd have always been eager adopters of personal gadgetry, but in 2011 even the crusty traditionalists and old-timer sales reps will have advanced Blackberrys or even iPhones. The brands that provide a seamless experience on all mobile devices between web site content, email, social media channels such as LinkedIn and Twitter, and online video and audio media will have the competitive advantage.

Clients get real. This year I expect clients to become more sophisticated in their understanding of the potential business value of social media…and in what they can expect from these channels and the expert partners they hire. In the B2B world, Return on Investment is a key consideration for any expense. It is surprising to learn a recent survey found that less than 15% of surveyed companies measure ROI for their social media programs (SmartBrief, The State of Social Media 2010). That percentage will certainly increase as the buzz and resulting hyped desire to participate or get left behind, is replaced by an acceptance of social media as a mature marketing/communications channel that should be subject to the same measured consideration as any other. The ability to measure impact and demonstrate ROI will be key to continued growth of social media use for consumer brands as well as B2B.

The Cloud and the Crowd take over. From a technology perspective, the development of “Cloud” computing is almost as compelling as the growth of mobile. From the corporate Facebook page to Salesforce.com lead tracking to the branded YouTube channels, hugely important marketing, communications, and enterprise operation elements are now hosted completely outside of the corporate IT structure. This results in an unprecedented freedom of access for both audiences and employees, but also raises huge questions of security and risk management. Savvy technologists are thinking long and hard about ways to leverage the Cloud for business gain while mitigating the risk of loss of control.

In a similar vein, brands have lost a great deal of control because of the growth of social media which is fueled by the Cloud. Customers now communicate with each other about, with, and through the brand in ways they historically never could. Influential voices in an audience community now have power to directly impact brands with a broader reach than ever before.

However, this also means the learning from customers is now easier and more effective than ever, in particular with the use of social channels for almost real-time feedback and crowd-sourcing innovation. One thing is clear: brands have got to understand how to operate within the new reality to deal with both crowds and their angry incarnation—mobs--if they want to avoid public firestorms like those famously experienced by BP and Nestle in the past year.

This is a key reason why Public Relations professionals are very important in the management of social media: identification of influencers, and engaging them as champions, has always been a core PR competency. In an agency like Fleishman-Hillard, this is now coupled with expertise in social media technology and practice to create powerfully effective client programs.

One thing I know about the coming year: it is going to contain innovations and developments that nobody can predict. Something new will come along to fire the imagination and attract all the attention. The key is to be ready to decide whether and how a given splashy innocation can help a business succeed and grow, while still capitalizing on the evolving strategies and tactics of previous technological revolutions. That’s what really excites me about 2011.

Vital Statistics for B2B Marketers

Back in June the folks at Earnest Media decided that B2B needed its own catchy video, like the Socialnomics "Social Media Revolution" video that has embedded itself in our digital consciousness.

Well, for some reason, I never caught it when it was released but happened to come across it today. I love it! And not simply because it has a kickin' Dave Brubeck tune as a soundtrack. So I provide it to you, in case you missed it the first time around.

What's Driving Lead Generation in 2010?

Consumer marketers have been at the forefront of the effort to capitalize on the explosive growth of social media, but Business-to-Business communicators are also coming to realize how the new modes of connection apply to them. The social Web, and the development of communication tools that optimize peer to peer and community conversation in real time, have allowed the customer to completely control the marketing process in the B2B space as well as B2C.

Forrester has some particularly useful data regarding how business technology buyers are now willing to use social media:
· 51% would use social media to try and solve a work problem
· 36% would turn to peers via social media network for answers or opinions
· 30% would use social media to find new ideas or insight

(Source: Forrester North American And European B2B Social Technographics® Online Survey, Q1 2010)

Lead generation has always been a key part of all B2B marketing. Social media has opened up new ways to find, qualify, and nurture prospective customers in 2010. To address some of these trends, Fleishman Hillard will present a Webinar on May 26 entitled “What’s Driving B2B Lead Generation in 2010?”

Here are a few other key B2B ideas that were topics of discussion during the Marketing Profs B2B Forum 2010 held in Boston in early May.
· Think like a publisher, not a marketer
· Lead nurturing supports the longer buying cycles of B2B
· Search and Email are still B2B’s best friends

Think like a publisher. Content is king, especially for the modern B2B buyer, but not just product literature or application studies. The length of the buying cycle, and the increased restrictions on purchasing and decision making because of the economy, typically mean that multiple influencers and deciders might enter the process at any point. Providing value at any touchpoint increases our worth to the prospect and reinforces our position of thought leadership and industry expertise.
· Provide content with true value to your customer, not simply materials to market your products
· Use social media channels to push that content out, but also use it for feedback and engagement from your customers
· Change, adapt, and improve based on that feedback

Use lead nurturing to support the buying cycle. Too many leads fall by the wayside in B2B companies, for any number of reasons:
· Prospect is not immediately ready to buy, so Sales team discards the lead
· Sales is oversubscribed because of economy-driven force reductions and cannot follow up
· Sales simply does not value leads from Marketing

Implementing a lead nurturing program can sort out hot opportunities from longer-term possibilities, and keep prospects engaged with your company as they move along the buying cycle without requiring time-intensive involvement from your busy Sales team.
· Score leads both for value but also where they are on the buying cycle, to help qualify for quicker action
· Use marketing automation technology to manage ongoing communication
· Email is still a hugely important and effective way to touch your prospects

Search and Email are still B2B’s best friend. Despite the huge attention rightly given to the social media revolution, and all it means to the future of business communication, the kings of B2B engagement remain Search Marketing and Email.
· Marketing Sherpa reports that 75% of daily social media users say email is the best way for companies to communicate with them.
· While 66% of marketers plan to increase social media budgets in the coming year, 54% plan to do so for email AND 64% intend to do so for SEO/SEM (from a 2010 study commissioned by Exact Target and eConsultancy)
· Integrating email delivery with social media engagement promises to be the most effective way to connect with B2B buyers at each step of the buying process

Search hashtag #mpb2b to see Tweets from the conference and afterwards, including links to photos, live blog entries, and thoughtful commentary on the subject of B2B marketing.

Please join us on May 26 at 11 am CDT for our Webinar, “What’s Driving B2B Lead Generation in 2010?” Register here and please feel free to share the invitation with any B2B clients, prospects, or colleagues interested in lead generation.

The People in the Room

Crowdsourcing at the Highest Level

I recently made a career change, joining Fleishman Hillard in their Chicago office as a Digital Strategist, primarily working on B2B accounts. As chance would have it, the company-wide FH Digital group was holding a Digital Leadership conference in Washington DC shortly after my last day with ARENDS, wherein they assembled as many of their best and brightest Digerati for a meeting of the minds. Through sheer dint of fortuitous timing, with a little on-the-fly schedule adjustment, I was able to attend this conference on my very first day on the job.

It was literally a global event, with attendees from Milan, London, Toronto, and Hong Kong as well as a number of other US cities and the large digital hubs in Washington DC and St. Louis. I found it simultaneously exhilarating and bewildering to be thrust deep into this community without much preamble or preparation. On the one hand, it was a tremendously valuable exposure to this deep and multifaceted network. An office like Chicago can tap into many resources across the world, with specialist skills available for any tactical or strategic need. Case study after case study was presented demonstrating the breadth of capabilities we can offer clients. It was great to meet these team members, and to be able to have a face with which to attach a name as we interact in the future.

On the other hand, there was a good deal of discussion relating to policies, processes, and procedures to which I was unable to add much (given my relative unfamiliarity with the agency). Even this was instructional, of course, exposing me to nuanced discussion of how things really work in an agency this large. It was especially illuminating to see so many brilliant minds, literally at the peak of their profession, bending to the topics at hand.

In fact, the leadership of FH Digital were quite open about tapping this talent mass to help solve (or at least inform) the challenges facing the practice. There were many exercises specifically designed to elicit quality input on business problems, such as how to market ourselves and how to describe the value we represent to our clients. These are things that traditionally come down from management on high; in this case, we were helping build them from the ground up.

Which struck me as being both obvious and inspired. The concept of crowdsourcing is pretty well-established at this point in the interactive space. Wikipedia is the most obvious example, but others abound. The entire Open Source software movement, for example, is based around the idea of presenting a concept to a talented and capable group, and having them dive into it and bang it around so that changes will be found to improve and expand on the original idea. Similarly, some web sites have sprung up that facilitate the outsourcing of graphics projects. Members of these networks review online requirements for a particular need, such as a logo or an illustration, with a posted budget. If the members choose to participate, they submit designs that they develop on spec with the hopes of winning the project. They are then paid the posted price for their work. Most people agree this process is less effective for complex creative projects, but it is a good way of leveraging the web to expand on the traditional creative process of submitting three options for the client to choose one.

However, I am not sure how many companies utilize the strength of their own people in a similar way to approach the challenges of business operation. Collaboration is encouraged and supported in many, of course, or at least in theory. Large manufacturing technology companies will use intranets to facilitate sharing of ideas and information between design engineers, for example, and the growth of blogs and wikis as tools for feedback and data-gathering is certainly part of this. But these are all based around support for the effort of the individual member to address his or her individual problem; for a company to use the collective abilities of its own people to work on corporate challenges is a little more unique and maybe even visionary.

It’s not hard to hypothesize why corporate leadership might not leap to the concept of using its own workforce to advise on strategic or even tactical challenges. Leaders are supposed to lead, after all. In any industry, the managers are charged with the planning and vision to direct the company in all areas. The worker bees, no matter how sophisticated their abilities or extensive their training or how broad their experience, are the ones who have to actually do the work. It is difficult to imagine that management of any company would willingly cede their authority and control to labor.

But it makes enormous sense to realize that the ones “in the trenches” have a depth of practical knowledge that can be keenly valuable in planning and strategy. And if one has the capability of mining information from each of thousands of persons who do a particular professional task every day, and do it very well, then the sheer aggregate of data will likely produce insight that can point to solutions. Statistically the crazy or poorly considered ideas will be minimized and can be ignored, but any broadly-suggested concept represents the collective wisdom and would merit support. A smart researcher can devise poll questions or other methods that will produce optimal results; technology is available that can make it very easy, and very rewarding, for subjects to participate.

While the FH Digital gathering was limited to the people in the room, and the data collection was not rigorous in methodology (admittedly, according to the FH Digital Research Group which was well-represented), it still revealed the value of approaching an executional work force (in this case dedicated to interactive communication strategy and tactics on behalf of clients) for input on organizational challenges. The feedback received by our leadership will go a long way toward crafting worthwhile strategy effective tactics that represent real-world conditions.

A common trope is to talk about the “smartest people in the room;” if you have a situation where everybody in the room is smart, then it is a smart idea to tap into that talent, especially if the “room” can be metaphorically extended across your company. That’s crowdsourcing taken to a higher level.

Display Ads, Whither to Wither?

According to the "Natural Born Clickers" study (released recently by ComScore and media agency Starcom), the number of people online who click display ads has dropped 50% in less than two years. They conducted a similar study in 2007 which found that 32% of the respondents affirmed they clicked on banner ads; now, two years later, the figure is down to 16%.

Ad Age, in their article discussing the study, leaps to the question of whether Click-Thru-Rate is the proper metric for online display advertising. They report ComScore as determining, through "client studies," that banners generate significant lift in brand-site visitation, trademark search, and both online and offline sales among those exposed to the ads.

I have to confess to skepticism about this. I'd have to see those "client studies" to determine their scientific rigor.

While I believe in the importance of branding, and I am willing to admit that display ads might be able to help lift a brand's awareness or mindset penetration, I doubt very seriously that really accurate data can be identified to prove this. We in the interactive marketing space like to tout metrics as a core part of the web's value, but in the case of display ads, the most obvious or intuitive metric (clicks) are usually SO LOW as to be worthless as a way to make money. I sure wouldn't pay thousands of dollars for at best a 0.4% CTR...so it behooves publishers to try and justify, however possible, this revenue-generation method with which they are stuck.

The paradigm needs to continue to shift and we need to continue to innovate. A reader identified as "ivak99" makes a very good response to the Ad Age article in which he points out that internet users are "active" while banner presentation, like TV commercials, are intended for a "passive" viewer. Marketers need to leverage the strengths of the medium and craft content, as well as traffic-generation methods, that DO work on the web. Banner ads really don't and we should not be wasting money on them when we can innovate and figure out new and exciting ways to get our customers the stuff they need, and when they need it.

It's the End of the World as We Know It

…and I Feel Fine

(with apologies to REM)

Sean Carton recently wrote a very interesting column on ClickZ entitled “The End of Ad Agencies as We Know Them.” (http://www.clickz.com/3633372) He posits that a confluence of shifting forces have created a new world in which the “full-service monolithic agency model” is no longer effective and will likely die away.

• The Internet has changed how consumers are willing to receive information about products and services; instead of an “interrupt” model where channels are limited and attention has to be grabbed within a narrow set of viewing options, the consumer is now in charge and has a nearly infinite range of choices for viewing and receiving information
• Because of that, traditional media (broadcast television and newspaper/periodical readership, specifically) is experiencing monumental audience loss and a corresponding plummet in advertising revenue
• The economic downturn has exacerbated job loss in the advertising industry, releasing thousands of talented professionals into the market who often establish themselves as freelancers or independent contractors within their particular specialties. This has significantly improved the freelance pool and has made it relatively easy to find a qualified resource when one needs it for a particular project or program.

Agencies will need to remake themselves in a new image to cope with, and survive, these forces. Carton has an idea as to how that might work:

"So what's the agency of the future going to look like? Probably a lot smaller and focused on strategy, account/project management, creative leadership (but not execution), and media strategy (but not planning and buying). Most agencies will revolve around these hubs if they're honest with themselves. Agencies will exist to provide high-level strategic guidance that clients need in a media-chaotic environment. Agencies will expand or contract as needed or will explore radical solutions such as crowdsourcing to get work done for less money."

Historically, the B2B space has been smaller in scale than the monolithic full-service model as described by Carton, but the description is still applicable. Choices have been few on the business side, with media typically limited to trade publications and trade show sponsorship. Marketing consisted of making brochures or direct mail pieces, for the most part, or sponsoring educational outreach efforts that were necessarily limited in effect.

Now the options have exploded with the growth of the internet. Email marketing is now much more cost-effective and arguably more precise than printed mailers; web sites can be updated regularly and fresh information made available much more quickly and cheaply than a brochure redesign/print/mailing.

Coming from the interactive sphere, I have no reason to weep if this particular vision of Rome burning comes true. The key characteristics of interactive marketing are in direct contrast to those of traditional advertising.

Good interactive communications:

• Are crafted to receive interested visitors rather than reach out to grab attention
• Speak well to niche audiences as opposed to appealing to the lowest common denominator (and can speak directly to ALL audiences individually, there is no limit on the quantity or type of content that can be made available)
• Are measurable and can be tied to specific success metrics, vs. broadly distributed and only vaguely associated with quantifiable results

The challenge remains to develop a new agency model that can adapt to the realities of this new world and continue to properly service clients as well as be profitable. The value we bring as professional marketers will evolve from the “big idea” to more of a content-based approach, especially in these economic times where client staff has typically been reduced to skeleton levels. We will be integrated into not just the marketing of the client but the sales process as well. An agency of the future will:

• Staff core skills and abilities (like strategy, industry knowledge, creative direction, account relationship) but bring in freelance or independent resources for tactical execution needs (design, web programming, project coordination, media buying)
• Be a key partner to clients in developing content for use across all channels; this means becoming an expert in the client’s business and being able to step in and generate anything from press releases to web page content to technical white papers, at least in initial form. More importantly, the agency will need to be able to aggregate raw content from the client and refine to appropriate delivery format depending on the tactical need. Content management will be a key service in the future agency-client relationship.
• Build metrics and analysis into all client work; ROI calculations need to be considered for every engagement. Even broader-scope communications like TV or radio advertising are going to be tied into an interactive component, and agencies must be very sophisticated in how they track results that will cross several media channels and impact brand engagement over time. Clients will expect this as they themselves become more concerned with cost control and managing tighter budgets.
• Have a tight estimating and proposing process, which will then result in a tight project management process. Agencies need to know their actual costs for prospective projects, and make sure they know what they are providing for any retainer fee structure. Clients will pay for good talent, but measurable return is the benchmark of the future.

So it may be the beginning of the end, but smart marketers know that an end of an era marks the dawn of a new one, and if we play it properly we will emerge stronger from the cataclysm and succeed where others will fall away.

Towards a General Theory of Web Site Relativity

I have been grappling with a way to distill the essence of web site marketing into a structure or presentation that can instantly and easily be comprehended by potential clients. In my more grandiose moments, I feel like Newton or Einstein trying to craft a new language to describe things that seem so evident but remain so hard to crystallize. Fortunately, my co-workers and family members are quick and thorough in deflating my grandiosity before my head swells to dangerous proportions. Nevertheless, I feel moved to expound a bit on the essence of communicating via the interactive channel, and specifically what we are talking about when we talk about the web site.

Essentially, this is what we want to do when we craft a web site:
ATTRACT --> ENGAGE --> MEASURE --> ADVANCE

Please note the use of arrows, implying motion. One might envision a circular illustration depicting the cyclical nature of this process. That’s a core element of my theory, that a web site is not an object but in truth a process that involves not only creation of engaging content objects but also developing ways of bringing in users, measuring patterns of their interaction with the site, and iterative improvements designed to maximize both successful audience generation and effective user engagement.

Too often a client tends to envision a web site as an object, perhaps a library or maybe the snake curled around the globe, swallowing his own tail. In fact, in the modern web world, we cannot afford to think in terms of communicative content only (no matter how dynamic it might be). We must think holistically about how our users engage the web (and the world as a whole) to make sure that we have an effective interaction with them.


ATTRACT: to draw by appealing to the emotions or senses, by stimulating interest, or by exciting admiration
Most people first think about a web site in terms of the site itself: content, structure, functionality, domain name. But in reality the first step is to envision who we want to experience the site, which leads to an examination of how they might find it. Search Engine Optimization of the site’s content is only the starting point. A key phrase strategy must be a core part of any modern web site content plan. That concept extends beyond the site copy. We need to make sure that videos are also uploaded to YouTube with appropriate key phrase tags and clear linkage back to the site. Social media tagging for site content must be easy and comprehensive, as well as the ability to forward to a friend. Linkback and blogger support must be considered.

In short, the site itself must be as friendly as possible to all of the ways in which our preferred influencers, aggregators, and editors might encounter it.

ENGAGE: to attract and hold fast
Needless to say, once a visitor comes to the site, we want to maximize his/her experience. But it is keenly important to realize that does not always mean keeping the person on the site. Especially in the B2B space, sometimes the most effective interactions are the quickest: user is looking for something specific, s/he finds it, and they are done. Success is not measured through time on site (in fact, that might more often indicate failure.)

In general, though, content is king and the more compelling and useful content one can provide, the better. A content strategy must be based around a deep understanding of the target audience and what they will want or need from the web site. In B2B, this often means a clear definition of the Buying Cycle and the stages the customer must pass through before they are ready to purchase. Content has to be mapped to support each stage, and for each classification of potential site user—decider, influencer, researcher.

Finally, the call to action must be crystal clear and immediately available at all times. In B2B that usually involves contact, but it might involve an online sale or some other success metric that means we have achieved a business objective.

MEASURE: to estimate the relative amount, value, etc., of, by comparison with some standard
We have attraction and we have engagement, but are we getting the result we want? Are the visitors doing what we thought they would? How do we know if we have wisely spent our web-development $? Or have we wasted it all?

Web analytics seems like a basic sort of tenet yet I am consistently amazed at how many clients do not pay attention to site statistics. One must identify Key Performance Indicators that can be used to gauge activity on the site.

It is almost worse than ignoring analytics when customers pay attention to stats that ultimately have no meaning. As mentioned above, things like Time on Site can be worthless barometers of success. Even a large quantity of site visits or numbers of pages viewed can mean nothing if few users do what we’d hoped they would do.

We must construct the site in such a way as to be able to determine whether or not we are achieving our goals by statistical analysis. Data that documents this is called the Success Metric, and when a user completes our objective we call it a Conversion. It can be a direct-to-the-bottom-line sort of parameter, such as quantity of sales for an e-commerce site, or indirect as in a lead generated (for most B2B sites), to as ephemeral as visitors following a designated content path to get exposure to a particular set of information pieces. It is up to us to decide our success metrics when we design the site. And then, we must build the site to suit our needs.

Measurement is an ongoing process. Unless you are in the midst of a particular campaign with a particular calendar, you will want to regularly measure your Key Performance Indicators. The definition above indicates one needs a standard for comparison, and regular review allows that. One can see user behavior before and after an implementation; and of course averages over time give the best indication of trending and allow some estimation for the future.

ADVANCE: to improve or make progress
Finally, the real purpose of all of the measurement is to determine whether or not you could do it better. Take the data you have gathered, make some conclusions (or at least develop some hypotheses), and make changes to see if you can improve. Testing is a key to this; keep track of before and after data, and make sure you are scientific in your efforts. A/B testing is simplest, but multivariate testing is also very valuable. A book like Tim Ash’s Landing Page Optimization (http://landingpageoptimizationbook.com/) spells out the process very well.

The main idea is that one must keep moving forward, even as the process cycles back around to generating more traffic. Whether your web site moves on a seasonal basis, or can be rotated through a regular monthly cycle, or whether other market forces shape the ebb and flow of your universe, you need to keep refreshing at each stage in order to maximize your return on investment and achieve the greatest success. In order to attract new visitors, keep generating fresh and relevant content within your communication plan. When you have traffic on the site, measure to see if your goals are being achieved and whether you can learn anything helpful from the data. And then use that information to make changes that can improve the whole process, and begin the cycle anew. Thus my General Theory of Web Site Relativity.

Ow! Like Newton, I just got hit on the head by an apple, but I think it was thrown by our VP of Strategy…

Summary from SES Chicago

Following is a summary of the key findings taken away from the Search Engines Strategies conference in Chicago last week.

• Social Media and Video dominated the conference; as search marketers move forward from traditional key phrase, text-based search into making sure they can be found in the so-called Web 2.0
• Content is once again confirmed as being king; it’s crucially important as the core source for all search marketing, social media exposure, viral propagation, and web-based public relations. Quality content serves as the basis for user interaction as well as the technical indexing aspect of all search engines.
• Local-type clients need to take control of their exposure in Local Search (i.e. Google Maps/Local, Yahoo Local). They should maximize representation on a variety of channels, including Flickr, YouTube, and Facebook/MySpace whenever possible.
• Keyword-driven search is still important but the paradigm is shifting. Companies need to monitor, and optimize, their exposure in the broader social media scene. They need to periodically scan blogs, Facebook/MySpace, social tagging engines (i.e. Digg, delicious, etc.) and reviews/comments on local search engines to see if they are being discussed, either positively or negatively.
• Universal Search combines web pages with video, blog, etc. entries to list on Search Engine Results Pages. Thus those non-web page elements are very important to maximize exposure for your key phrases and categorizations.
• Optimizing any web page but especially landing pages is easier with free tools like Google Optimizer. One should consider implementing a more rigorous protocol for testing pages to see what is most effective in achieving your conversion metric.

Specific tactics we might recommend for clients:

• Monitor social media, blogosphere, etc.
• Optimize client exposure in the broad interactive space by implementing or disseminating good quality content, such as press releases, white papers, blog posting, etc.
• Optimize local search engine listings for appropriate clients
• Check and take control of local listing
• Create product or service reviews
• Post videos of any kind on You Tube/Yahoo Video
• Post photos on Flickr
• Create Facebook pages
• Create opt-in communication programs
• Test landing/interaction pages and iterate for better conversions
  

Search Engine Strategies Chicago
Lawrence Lessig and the “Copy Wrong” Laws

I have been attending the Search Engine Strategies Conference in Chicago this week as I am wont to do this time of year. Things got off to a rousing start with a very interesting keynote address from Lawrence Lessig, legendary Internet rights proponent and Stanford professor. He basically extended some of the themes from his book Remix and exhorted us all to activate with our elected officials on behalf of change to copyright laws.

I am a Lessig fan from back in the day and can remember reading his columns in Wired. His presentation was very smooth—in particular, his slide show was very dynamic and sync’d closely with his speech. I imagine he has presented it more than a few times. However, I came away vaguely dissatisfied.

In general I agree with the need for copyright reform as a central part of resolving the hubbub surrounding the music industry. Music companies cannot realistically enforce their interpretation of copyright laws in the digital age; still, it is arguably immoral for people to take and pass along somebody’s creative output without some sort of compensation for the artist. There has to be some common ground, and Professor Lessig paints an evocative picture of modern mash-up artists and children alike being branded as criminals in the heat of an outdated legal structure that is no longer applicable. His solution, broadly speaking, is to evolve the law to allow more explicit, and more enforceable, categorization of use (i.e. professional vs. amateur) and intent (art vs. commerce).

I guess that I feel he underestimates some aspects of the issue and overestimates others. I’ll start with the latter first.

He made a pretty big deal about “remix” artists, those who use existing copyrighted material to create something new. From obvious musical examples, like sample king Girl Talk or legendary remixes like the Grey Album from Danger Mouse, to more obscure You Tube darlings who pair up political footage with a clever soundtrack, he argues persuasively that these artists deserve to be allowed to make their art. These are the artists that must be protected by copyright revision because that is the wave of the future.

I think he oversells this concept and undervalues the “original” artist (to coin a phrase) who creates his or her own, original art. In the future, there are still going to be people who compose their own music and lyrics, and record their original art without using sampling or remixing. Even in the future, there are going to be talented artists who do it the old school way—inventing new music rather than piecing together snippets of old. I’ll go so far as to say that they will remain the dominant type, even at the amateur level. For every user of Garage Band remix software, there will be 10 users of Pro Tools and their own mic or Final Cut and their own camera.

I think he underestimates the power of money in this equation, too. He seems to imply that change will come in ready fashion if we can just update the laws. The fact that record companies literally can’t prosecute every single violator (there are just too many) leads to the conclusion that, if presented with a reasonable alternative, they will readily accept it. I tend to think that both the industry behemoths AND current popular artists are going to continue to fight the sampling/mash-up/digital download trends because of the money involved. For some artists (does Metallica still fit this bill?) they will never agree that they have to relinquish their notions of fair pay for their work. Songwriters will fight for residual rights and ASCAP payments, no matter if the forced payment of such will bankrupt many interactive music providers. They would rather, it seems, kill the golden goose than allow it to change and become a series of golden sparrows with smaller, although more numerous, golden eggs.

To me, that’s what the new technology represents: the true democratization of music as a commercial medium. The barriers to entry, which have been smacked down lower and lower ever since the punk DIY movement, are now essentially eliminated not only for the high-quality recording of music but its marketing as well. Now it is easy and cheap for artists to get their music to fans and be compensated for it. My italics are meant to underscore that in previous eras, distribution of music was a complicated and logistically expensive business that required proper financial resources and industry expertise. Now, however, it is easy for an artist to get a web site and post mp3’s and even to get their music into a 99 cent download compensation model. Thus they are able to reach everybody in the world, although most will not. The point is that they control their own avenues of promotion and distribution and thus will reap an exponentially higher margin of return on revenues, especially compared to their major-label contemporaries who are still being exploited by the suits.

There will still be stars in the future, popular artists who sell significant units, despite the explosion of niche artists or smaller average levels of sales. They will still sign with established music companies because that is an easier way than doing it all yourself, and they’ll make a lot of money (but not as much as their record company, and at a lower percentage of revenue than their independent cousins). Their reach and the sheer numbers of what they do will be lower, on average, than previous stars—there will be no more Elvis, Beatles, or Sinatra. Still, in comparison to their peers, they will sell the most. They may not make themselves as much money, though, as will those who control production, creation, distribution of their own product.

How do we make money? Provide artists tools and services to enable them to make and sell their music. Or perhaps figure out a way to help consumers filter through the exploded universe of content to find what they like and what speaks to them. Or maybe develop and market a “Rock Star—Manage the Tour” version, because that will be a key way artists will make money in the future—touring.

Viral Marketing and B2B

By now we are all pretty familiar with viral marketing efforts in the Business-to-Consumer advertising and marketing space. In particular, the posting of video clips on YouTube has exploded along with the popularity of the site itself. Most of us have seen the “real” videos generated by consumers that serve as unintentional marketing tools (Mentos comes to mind), as well as the popular clips that are proved to have come from professional agencies (Ray-Ban sunglasses tossing, for example).

The whole idea of buzz marketing or viral marketing has reached both apogees of unqualified success (some feature film campaigns spring to mind) and perigees of unintended disaster (such as tying up traffic in Boston, getting the police to think you are a terrorist threat, negative PR, and being fired). That last point is a key aspect of viral marketing, I think—you can’t really control it. Like chaos theory suggests, there can be unintended consequences which far outstrip your ability to plan and control. To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, you need to be ready to handle the unknown unknowns.

For those reasons, B2B doesn’t really seem conducive to viral marketing at first glance. Business buyers, certainly including design engineers or purchasing authorities, do not make impulse purchases. Their buying decisions are very considered and based around specifications and similar hard data. They seem unlikely to be moved by buzz or any kind of groundswell of interest. Likewise, B2B clients tend to be risk adverse and very interested in controlling their own messages, in part because their customer community is much smaller than the general retail market. A percentage-based negative impact can really damage their sales.

Because the target market is usually pretty narrow, dissemination of the “virus” is also a challenge. Opportunities for chance encounter, enthusiasm, and evangelism of the viral objects or objects are limited. Another way to put it is that general distribution methods that are acceptable for B2C are too diffuse for B2B. If only design engineers can be “infected” then you won’t have a contagion unless you can expose a bunch of them to your viral efforts. Fortunately, professional groups are now connected via many of the same interactive tools and social media (email, blogs, forums, YouTube) used by the general digerati populace. Because engineers use the web and can access YouTube, like everybody else, it is full of clips related to the demonstration of specific products or training in processes. It’s there for the appropriate audience, no matter how small—the Long Tail in action.

However, it certainly seems that some tactics would be effective and could transfer well from B2C, especially when you consider that most B2B marketing is pretty dry and features-based, rather than engaging and brand-based. An attention-getting device by its very nature attracts attention; the key is to inject enough hints of substance that the user is willing to follow the viral trail back to a web site that contains the substantive information needed to move forward towards a purchase decision.

Our agency works with a number of clients that develop highly-engineered products for use in manufacturing or other industrial sectors. In the past several months we have created a couple of fun videos intended to generate some buzz, if you will, within the industrial markets occupied by our clients. These clips are very different from the usual marketing efforts within the manufacturing and industrial plumbing sectors, respectively. Through viral distribution we are hoping to build viewership and create a broadened awareness of our clients and new products. We seed interest via targeted emails and trade journal advertising; success is marked by traffic to the supporting web sites which then provide some of the detail and substance that is actually needed by design engineers in order to make their purchase decisions.

These videos certainly stand out from the pack in the all-too-gray world of B2B marketing. Hopefully others will think so and be prompted to find out more about our clients and their products.

Siemens CNC Eye Team Investigates
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA-qdHbWdf4

Powers industrial plumbing products: Angus and Ziegfried, Dynamic Duo Exposed
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3UMWuWij6g

Brand Awareness in the Interactive World

Not Just Telling the Story

When brand awareness is the goal, it's sometimes easy to implement PPC as a "go to" for increasing awareness quickly and effectively. But, paid search is just one part of a broader, long-term brand awareness campaign.
--Search Engine Land (http://searchengineland.com/080527-130411.php)

This is actually a decent graphic they put together describing the elements that might go into a brand awareness campaign in the interactive world, focused around Paid Search primarily but also involving Social Media and Search Engine Optimization components.

I have a problem with the concept of brand awareness in the interactive channel. Although I happily accept that a brand represents the interaction, or at least the promise of interaction, between the customer and us the provider, and I also accept that web sites and other components should be a part of that brand, I nevertheless argue that the web is a special circumstance that is different from every other aspect of marketing, sales, and communications.

The web is a user-driven medium. The user calls all the shots, goes where s/he wants to go, and can refuse to be guided (much less led) to anyplace that s/he does not want.

The web is also a practical medium. Users come here because they need to find something, or get something done, or otherwise accomplish some sort of task. They rarely are willing or interested in having any sort of scripted experience, unless they are playing a game or watching a video clip or presentation. And even then they can depart in the blink of a mouse-click.

Thus brand interaction online takes on a much more pragmatic description than in other circumstances, including the actual use of the product. One has to be keenly aware of this difference in planning the extension of the brand vision into the interactive channel. If I may repeat myself from earlier rants, the web is NOT television or print. You cannot try and GRAB attention and/or force people to sit through your communication vehicle, because they won’t. However, if you have information or a tool or a functionality that helps them with their problem, as your product presumably does, then you can extend the brand identification properly. It’s when marketers try to squeeze a non-web experience out of the web that they run into trouble (and users run FROM their site).

One must also be aware of supporting the brand properly in the interactive space. If a brand’s identity is associated with service and efficiency, then presenting a clunky interface with slow load times and poor usability will sabotage it. Likewise a site that look straight out of Web 1.1 is not going to support a product that wants to exude bleeding edge hipness.

So I go back to the Search Engine Land graphic and my quibbles with it. In many ways, the idea of a brand awareness campaign in the interactive world seems counterintuitive, especially in the B2B space. Still, if one assumes that the core of any such campaign is a kick-ass, highly functional, extremely user-friendly site (or tool or functionality) that meets a user’s needs and solves some of his/her problems…then obviously you want to get it out in front of the right audience.

And there is no doubt, the self-selecting nature of search is the perfect vehicle for that.

I am not so sure about the “use social sites to promote your brand through video or other media” part of it, though. Did the dancing chicken really promote the Burger King brand? Or did it just get a lot of attention?

Thinking Outside the Box (or Banner)

“…’banner blindness,’ which describes the tendency of the eyes to ignore content—whether ads or noncommercial information—contained in banners on web sites…(banner ads) ‘aren’t very well-suited for the web’ and are ‘holdovers from a way of thinking best applicable to other, older media.”
--Jakob Nielsen, quoted in Advertising Age, March 17, 2008

Spurred by Advertising Age’s recent “Digital Issue” I find myself trying to brainstorm new and different ways to use interactive strategies to market B2B products and services.

Let’s pretend there is no legacy of advertising tied into this, no history of traditional media that has hardened into calcified ways of telling stories and reaching consumers. What could marketing look like without any preconceptions or expectations?

Disease-state Sites
Does your product or service solve a problem? Then create a problem site. Pack in all the possible information you can about that problem, add links to resources that explain or address the problem, create case studies about the different way people have solved the problem, include data about how widespread the problem is, and oh by the way include a small mention of how you solve the problem. Here’s the key, though: you have to be honest and complete about the problem, you cannot only feature your own solution. Enough visitors will follow your link and see what you have to say as long as they accept the genuineness of the site. The second they think you are sand-bagging and/or prioritizing yourself at the expense of them, the consumers, then they are gone and never coming back. BE CLEAR about your sponsorship, don’t try to be sneaky. Once the site is up, spend some time and money promoting it via channels that are effective, i.e. search marketing and online classifieds.

Facebook for Engineers
Is there a community of users of your products? Then build a site that addresses them and their needs. If you sell to electrical engineers, create a site that helps them across the board, not just where your product is concerned. Allow them to talk to each other, even at the risk of slagging you. Help them connect with each other. Facebook for engineers? Sure, why not? And of course you are the sponsor, but do not try to control them or steer them in any direct way, and do not try to be sneaky.

YouTube
Tape fun stuff related to your products. Put them on YouTube. Tell customers and prospective customers about it. If they see and hear it first from you, that elevates your perceived expertise and could make you a preferred provider.

Crazy Social Media
OK maybe you can’t generate a Flash Mob at the IMTS show to do something wacky, but maybe you can use those tools of communication to suddenly drive people to your booth. Everybody carries a cell phone, almost everybody can receive text messages, maybe you could build a database of your customer’s mobile phone and send a group message all at once promising them something if they did something. Bring a friendly crowd to your booth, and nothing draws a crowd like a crowd, so quickly you have people at your booth who otherwise might not stop by. Figure out the digital equivalent of the guy in the sandwich board, prowling the streets and hawking to passers-by.

Be Prepared for Smaller Reach, but with Higher Value
You are never going to get web traffic that matches the eyeballs who watch a Super Bowl ad. You cannot shotgun via the web in the same way you can in traditional media. However, you must realize and be prepared for the fact that the traffic you DO get is already pre-qualified and primed to be interested in what you have to say. This is a higher-value reach, but it is also more fickle and easily lost.

What do you need to make a sale? You need three basic elements: something to sell, somebody who needs that something, and circumstances that allow that person to decide to buy it (i.e. he has to know about it, the price has to be right, and he has to have the money and the willingness to spend it).

Traditional media is about trying to create those circumstances. Get the message out to as many people as possible. Some of them will meet the criteria, or can be convinced to meet the criteria, and then they will go and find your product to purchase. Others won’t, and your efforts will be wasted on them.

In the interactive space, nobody finds you unless they want to. They may or may not know you, but they want what you have to offer. Pretty much all you can and should do is make sure they know about you. Then make darn sure you are ready when they get to you, or else you will lose them forever.

Taking the Plunge

OK I am finally joining Twitter. I have a deep-seated revulsion towards the trendy and the ephemeral, and I worry that Twitter will be both, but I have decided to take part in a social revolution (of sorts) while it is actually happening. Normally I am very late to anything hip; music is a classic example: I just purchased the Death Cab for Cutie album, the one with “Crooked Teeth” and “I Will Follow You into the Dark.” By now I have to suppose that they are no longer considered cool, having transgressed into popularity, and are wallowing in the backlash. I did the same thing with Rage Against the Machine; by time I finally bought The Battle of Los Angeles, they had broken up. That’s better I suppose than when I went through my Bob Dylan phase—nothing like being into an artist some 40 years after his first record came out.

But I digress, which will be much easier now that I am twitting. I suspect I will become one of those zombie-like texters, oblivious to the world around as I periodically work my thumbs over my cell phone. But since I don’t have a MySpace page, or a Facebook entry, nor do I post videos to YouTube or tag content via Digg or deli.co.us, I suppose this will have to be my one serious entry into the newest world of social media. (This blog, needless to say, doesn’t count.)

I have resisted the so-called Web 2.0 for so long because my Internet, the one used for business-to-business marketing, does not seem to mesh well with these newfangled gadgets. Clearly I am no Luddite, but a healthy reserve towards the new or the hip is important in my place in the marketing world. We do not need to be early adopters, since our audience is not. Only when a technology or capability has become accepted, well-known, and widespread do we employ it on behalf of our clients.

Still, Twitter seems irresistible. Quick hits of updates; a micro-blog of near-real time. How cool is that? It’s like a web cam without pictures, and without being tied to the PC (although yes tied to the cell phone, but that goes everywhere regardless).

So I guess I will give it a try. Maybe I can be more timely than with my blog.

New Year Resolutions

Resolved, for 2008:

• Pay less attention to banner ads and more attention to landing pages.
• User! User! User! Keep the focus on the user.
• No web sites without specific goals.
• Get better clients

Banner Ads and Landing Pages
It is a frequent and cardinal sin, the tendency to buy online banner space but link it to an existing, non-specialized page on the site. First of all, if you can actually get anybody to click on a banner ad you should consider him or her a beautiful prize, a rare specimen that should be treasured and coddled. Goodness knows you won’t see too many of them. But most often, they are shunted off to the home page or at best a product page that seems to be completely disconnected from the banner that brought them there. What are they likely to do? Get the heck out of dodge—why waste their time on a site that doesn’t even make the effort to guide them to the specific topic in which they have demonstrated their interest. We need to maximize the experience of the user who DOES click through and get him or her the info they need, perhaps guiding them carefully, so that they remain interested in proceeding along the buying cycle.

I intend to spend more time worrying about the user who lands on the site, rather than how the banner ad looks as it animates, streams video, or pops up into a large size.

Focus on the User
It’s not about you, the seller. It’s about your customer, your client, your web site user; so quit making your site all about you. It should be about the user, what s/he wants and needs and has to be able to do in order to buy something from you. Even in today’s age, web 2.5 or whatever you want to call it, too many sites are basically org charts and catalogs. They contain tons of info about the company and its products, but very little about how those products can help the users or how the company can solve the users’ problems. I pledge to make sites that are all about the users, because those sites will prosper.

Goooooooooooal!
Whether or not you follow Latin American soccer and are familiar with the long, drawn-out call from Andres Cantor or other Spanish-language play-by-play announcers, you can certainly understand the importance of the goal. And yet so many web site planners have no clear objective in mind. Their sites can pack a lot of information and features, but to what end? Any web site should have a particular goal as a central part of its plan, whether that is to generate leads or make an online sale or guide users to a particular download or sign them up for a newsletter. That will not only provide a success metric, to help determine whether your site is doing what it should, but also help shape the content and the language and even the way of thinking about the site. I really want to help my clients understand this and to incorporate this planning into any new site effort in the New Year.

And finally…
I really need to get better clients. And I mean no disrespect to our current stable when I say this: our agency is full of “old iron” companies that have been around a long time, compete in closed markets where the amount of business is fairly constant, and have competitors that are also well-established and not particularly innovative. These clients are happy to trudge along with traditional media and marketing approaches that vary little from year to year. It is a hard sell to get them to think about the interactive channel in new ways, and difficult to demonstrate the value of expanding and refining their web approach when they remain convinced that “customers don’t use the web” and “our customers all want to pick up the phone to deal with us.” After a certain amount of effort, one is no longer interested in pounding that proverbial brick wall, and the desire becomes overwhelming to seek out new clients who do understand the value of interactive and who can in fact think about their business in new ways and allow us to help determine solutions that can leverage the enormous power and capability of the web.

So I resolve to find new clients, like I do every year.

Best wishes for a happy and healthy 2008!

R-E-S-P-E-C-T and Respond

I’ve decided that one of the indicators of the New Rudeness is a failure to acknowledge emails.

I don’t mean that I expect everybody to respond to deposed Nigerian dictators, pharmacy solicitations, or any other spammers. Rather, when a co-worker or a friend or an acquaintance sends you an email, you should at least acknowledge that you received it.

For business purposes, this could be vital. The proliferation of anti-spam protection devices, not all of which are always accurate in divining junk mail from good mail, means that it is very possible to have legitimate emails blocked and shunted into the black hole. Thus you never see the email, which could be very important and relate to an urgent project, and the sender will never see a “failure to deliver” error message, so neither of you will know what has transpired. In a time-critical situation, this could be disastrous.

(Of course, if it really *that* urgent, use the phone! But some people’s reliance on email as a crutch for communication is a different pet peeve and not the subject of this post.)

However, if you are in the habit of responding to your (legitimate) emails with a quick, “Got it! Thanks!” or something similar, then the lack thereof will trigger an alarm in your sender’s mind and perhaps s/he will in fact follow up with a call to make sure you received the urgent information.

But even beyond this somewhat extreme scenario, it is always worthwhile to know that your communication has been received properly. In verbal matters, the gentle throat clearing or the less subtle “Hey! Are you listening to me?” can serve to restart the process and provide the positive feedback the speaker needs. That is not possible in the POP3 and related spaces. Thus the need for a positive action to trigger the feedback loop, a simple REPLY-TO with brief acknowledgement.

The lack of response, especially if you are asking or tasking somebody, implies a devaluation of the sender which can rankle. The non-respondent is either saying that s/he is too busy to answer (thus indicating your lack of importance, because whatever s/he is preoccupied with is more vital than the 12 seconds it would take to reply); or, worse, that s/he does not like you and is ignoring you. Even if the request is accomplished, the non-response is still rude and can only rankle the sender. It signifies a lack of respect.

Those who create interactive marketing elements need to be aware of these kinds of feelings. Nobody likes to take an action and have it seem to vanish into the void. If you as a web consumer should order something online, you want to get an email or at least a “thank you” page to acknowledge that your purchase form completion did really go through and you do stand a reasonable chance of receiving your items. If you hand over your personal info in order to download a white paper or log into a protected area, you want to know how to do it and not feel like you are left out in the cold.

This may seem like Usability 101 but problems can be found throughout the web. Do a Google search and click on the pay-per-click results along the right hand column; count how many times you are taken to a web site home page, that makes no specific mention of your search term or any targeted info about your topic of interest. That is almost as bad as refusing to respond to an email. You the searcher just put your trust in a paying advertiser, only to be given the SEM equivalent of the cold shoulder.

Make sure you respond to your users, or they will take the hint and find somebody else who will treat them with more respect.

Banner A**

I need to rant about something that is a pet peeve of mine: banner ads.

First I should say, from a practical value standpoint, banner ads suck. As documented a billion times, banner ads are routinely ignored, disparaged, and despised by web users. The actual trackable return on investment is almost always miniscule. The vehicles for these ads, the web sites and applications that can be used by millions of visitors, still do not encompass the greater pool of possible customers and cannot support the demographic targeting that might enhance your messaging.

Now I primarily swim in the B2B space. In this world, unlike the B2C, you are typically able to pretty precisely define your customers. By definition, they are engineers or architects or industrial designers in a particular vertical market. In this world trade publications really do have value because their audience really can be assumed to match our targets. The reach may not be all-encompassing, but at least you can be fairly sure that everybody you DO reach will at least have a professional inclination to pay at least a slight bit of attention.

Thus I grudgingly admit that banner ads (and its ancestor, the equally ROI-deficient print ad) in trade publications have some value. So we want to make good ads that attract attention, convey the proper call to action, support the brand, etc. etc.

HOWEVER: as important, or arguably more important, is what happens AFTER the reader clicks on the ad.

The genesis of all this ranting involves a client of my agency. We do not directly manage their interactive efforts, but we have developed microsites with them in conjunction with a very successful integrated campaign aimed at different groups of target customers. Thus we were a little surprised to see them in a banner ad on the web site of a very popular trade magazine in the building construction industry.

What I saw was on the site’s home page: our client had a square banner space in the middle, lower part of the page (falls below the fold in my browser). The ad was for a particular package of publications that our client has put together aimed at architects, which they sell via their online bookstore.

All well and good.

However, when you click on the ad, you open the home page of the client site. Problems are legion:
--the home page does NOT have a header or any other kind of graphic that mentions the Architect package
--there is no special call-out to point the users to the bookstore (where they can buy the item), only the standard navigation links
--if the user is intrepid enough to fight their way through 3 subsequent levels of navigation, they will eventually land on a purchase link for the product—but only a banal text list of the contents, no descriptions or other content that might get an architect interested in purchasing

Imagine the user experience: he or she sees the ad, interest is sparked, it is clicked, and…s/he lands on a home page with no mention of the subject of the ad, no links to where the thing can be purchased, no call to action, and no clear support for the user’s needs AS DOCUMENTED BY THE ACT OF CLICKING.

Ideally, the user should go to a landing page that echoes the message of the ad and speaks directly to the user, and preferably has a direct call to action that allows him or her to IMMEDIATELY purchase the item.

This is a classic example of how banner advertising can ultimately be *USELESS* no matter how much traffic it generates. I bet you that 99.9% of the people who click through the ad immediately exit our client’s site. All the money they spend advertising with this popular (and therefore probably expensive) trade publication is wasted because their site is not set up to properly receive those people clicking through.

The receiving end of an online campaign is as important or probably MORE important than the creativity or effectiveness of the ads themselves. It is almost criminal to have somebody click through (thus demonstrating that they are a qualified and interested lead) only to insult them with a lack of support for their interest on the site itself.

If you must advertise via banner ads, then you MUST consider the second part of the equation: what happens after the click. We have to help our clients think about their sites themselves and help them optimize the user experience, identify a conversion metric, and channel the users into that conversion—oh and by the way, help them track that metric and determine what users are doing and learn whether or not the $ they are spending on banner ads is really worthwhile. Those are foundational strengths of the web channel, and if they are ignored, why bother being on the web in the first place?

I have a colleague who has a colorful way of expressing displeasure with something. He’ll say, “That looks like a**” (using a term referring to the gluteal area, what the Hawaiians call the okole).

Well, that’s how I feel about banner ads when they are not properly supported on the web site receiving end. They are not banner ads, just banner a** when that happens.

Push Me, Pull You

In the interactive space, Push vs. Pull marketing means something a little different than in the traditional sense. I like to define Push as any tactic that thrusts itself into the user’s consciousness. In other words, by its action it causes the user to (hopefully) become aware of your products/service and hopefully will compel her to consider you and influence her to purchase.

Push works best when you have a captive audience, i.e. one that is unlikely to pull away from the media when your message is on. The old school model of broadcast television is the classic place for push, defined this way; a TV viewer in the 1960s would be unlikely to change channels during a commercial break, especially when watching a very popular show, although she might head to the bathroom. Thus anybody left in the room is almost certainly going to be exposed to the commercial.

Airing that commercial in a movie theater, before the Coming Attraction trailers, is another example. The audience literally has no place else to go (except to the popcorn stand or the bathroom).

Think about the language used with TV commercials; it can be pretty aggressive. Creative is expected to “grab” attention. A spot that is considered to have done well is said to have “killed.” You have a “target” audience.

On the other hand, a Pull tactic is set up to respond to interest on the part of the user, not to generate it. The content “pulls” the interested users to it.

Using this definition, it is easy to see that the web is really a Pull phenomenon. Participation with a web site is solely at the discretion of the user. All it takes is one click and that user is gone; you cannot force her to do anything at all, much less stick around on your lame site if it doesn’t meet her needs or answer her questions.

Push tactics don’t work on the web because the user has all the control. All she has to do is click her mouse and she’s gone to another site. And unlike the TV viewer of old, she has an infinite variety of other places to go, and she may not ever come back.