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?
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Thursday, April 17, 2008
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.
--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.
Monday, March 10, 2008
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.
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.
Monday, January 21, 2008
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!
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
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.
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.
Thursday, October 18, 2007
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.
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.
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
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.
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.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
