Advertising
Is Your Coffee Profanely Good?
I don’t even drink coffee, but this tempts me to try some to make sure I still don’t like it.
Mystery Engages
Appearing to tape over some key vowels really gets your mind moving… “did someone have to censor this ad?” or “was it a mistake?”
Making people think about something or feel like they are breaking a rule will always engage them.
At the Enterprise 2.0 Conference last week in Boston, I was talking with a new friend about how she got some stickers from one of the vendors but was told “not to tell anyone or give any away”. Even though she saw right through the reverse psychology, it still got her talking about them. Be clever, be mysterious, and engage the mind.
Risky? Yes
Yes it will still piss some people off, and it is a risk, but some of the best marketing takes big risks. It goes up to an edge, implies gratuity, but does not cross over. It messes with you a little, and if you are not too uptight will likely make you laugh.
They are obviously not marketing to a family audience with this sign, they want to shock the poor tired schmo that is walking by, trying to drag himself through another long, dry day. The sign alone, while subtle at first, might just smack the tired off your day. Imagine what the coffee will do. It does not send the wrong message for the audience they are after.
Cocky Can be Cool
Most ads are careful. Most ads are safe. When an ad or branding steps our of the normal, it gets noticed. Most ads are not cocky, this one is, and it makes you wonder why. It is no universal solution, but it is fun when done well.
Does your brand take risks with its marketing?
image via Shiny Things
I Love the Whole World
You really can’t beat inspirational, especially when accompanied by catchy music. Loved this spot by the Discovery channel since the first second I saw it. Great stuff.
Advertising, Social Media Skills
Guest post by Edward Boches, Chief Creative Officer at Mullen. Find him on Twitter at @edwardboches
Can social media professionals learn
anything from the world of advertising?
When Jason asked me to answer this question, my first reaction was he had it backwards. Shouldn’t the question be, “What can advertising professionals learn from the world of social media?” I mean consider that the consumer has become the medium, the distribution channel, and in some cases (think Don Draper on Twitter or Coke’s fan page) the content creator. Isn’t it the ad practitioner who needs to learn about social media, to understand how conversation has become the new marketing? What can outdated ad guys possibly teach social media types?
But as I thought about it, it’s obvious that both disciplines (I actually predict they’ll soon be one and the same) can learn from each other. Ad agencies and advertisers can learn new ways to listen, engage and take advantage of emerging tools and platforms for the distribution of their content. At the same time, perhaps social media types can take advantage of what advertising professionals know.
So here are three things that every social media person might want to learn from advertising folks.
1. Good advertising tells you what a product does and why you should buy it. Great advertising expresses what a brand stands for an invites you to share in its beliefs.
The best advertisers and agencies know that consumers buy into a brand’s values as much or maybe even more than the individual products. Nike advertising doesn’t push shoes; it encourages, inspires and promises individual achievement. Monster.com doesn’t tell you how easy it is to explore job options; it reinforces your right to a fulfilling career. Coca Cola doesn’t talk about what’s inside the bottle, it brings to life what’s outside the bottle: joy and happiness. You can see this over and over again in the best advertising.
What’s the lesson for social media? Don’t push a product. Don’t generate content that’s limited to offers or coupons (like some retailers do on Twitter). Instead, demonstrate what you stand for through the content and utility you offer and the community you nurture and inspire. Think Zappos, which stands for customer service and practices it using Twitter. Emulate Whole Foods, which expresses its belief in health, nutrition and the enjoyment of good food, evident on Facebook and Twitter. Model your approach on WalMart, a retailer proving its commitment to value by aggregating and generating useful content through it’s Mom blogger program. These are brands that aren’t saying what they stand for, they’re living it in a way that invites participation.
2. Elevate your creative before you increase your budget
The great agencies and the best advertisers all know this. A big creative idea is the ultimate competitive advantage. You can always buy presence, but you can’t pay for memorable. Think of ideas you’ve seen that you’ll never forget: Absolut Vodka’s bottle art, Budweiser’s Wassup, E-Trade’s Chimp, Monster.com’s When I Grow Up, The Milk Board’s Got Milk? These are all campaigns from years gone by. But chances are if you saw them just once you remember them always.
Or consider more recent efforts. Cadbury’s drum banging gorilla. Or even my own agency’s recent campaign for the Boston Bruins. The latter two had virtually no media dollars behind them at all. But they had the creative power to attract attention, become viral, and worm their way into the current culture.
The fact is it’s only a matter of time before every brand has a Facebook fan page, a presence on Twitter, and a YouTube channel. Simply being there won’t be enough. What will separate one brand from another will be the quality and creativity of the content, the program, and the experience. Consumers will want experiences that aren’t just relevant, but interesting, entertaining and inspirational.
3. Recessions are the best time to make a move
It’s been proven definitively that companies willing to spend on new programs, acquisition and advertising during recessions far outpace companies that make big cuts. Kellogg’s Rice Krispies raced past Post Cereal in the early 1930s by doubling its ad budget. According to McKinsey, companies that took equally aggressive approaches during the slowdowns of 1981-82 and 1990-91 enjoyed similar results. Why? For the simple reason that when advertising is scarcer, the brands that do advertise benefit from a greater share of voice and visibility. Yet despite all the evidence, most brands fail to take advantage of this time-tested approach. Perhaps it’s because it’s hard to think about building an addition when the house is burning down.
But there’s a huge lesson here for social media. This new approach to marketing is still in its infancy. The first ones to get out there will grab a much larger share of attention in relationship to their effort than they will in another two or three years, when the social media environment is far more cluttered and consumers will have even more content to sift through and communities to choose from. It’s a chance to do what Kellogg did. Establish yourself when there’s less competition.
So there you have it. The value of shared beliefs. The power of creativity. An understanding that timing is everything. Maybe there is something you can learn from the world of advertising. Can you think of anything else?
SERIES Social Media Skills — Advertising, SEO, PR, Graphic Design, Copywriting, and more…
Can Twitter Stop the New User Bleeding?
Nielsen reported last week that the retention rate of new Twitter users was pretty bloody, with only 30-40% of new users returning a month after joining.
More than 60% of US Twitter users fail to return the following month. Twitter’s retention rate is about 40%. For most of the past year, pre-Oprah, Twitter has languished below 30% retention.
Many have pointed out these numbers do not take into account third party clients like Tweetdeck. For the sake of this post I am assuming that no matter the percentages, Twitter needs to improve the experience for new users and retain more of them. The fact that so many new users do not “get it” right away is not surprising (@’s and #’s be damned).
Twitter is not doing much to improve that intake process.
Weak Suggested Users
Twitter’s only big push to improve these numbers has been the suggested users list they started 2 months ago. The suggested users, in its current state, provide little value to a new user. Twitter defines these suggested users as:
a bit like your local book store’s staff picks. (We) developed a program that scans active Twitter accounts for a bunch of key ingredients such as how much of the profile is filled out
Where is the relevance to me personally?
Much of the value of Twitter comes from the personalization, shaping the information to be as relevant to our personal needs as possible. Random popular users are more novelty.
Below are some of my suggestions for Twitter.
Higher Relevance
- Location - Suggest users within a certain distance and create better location search options
- Industry - Allow users to define their industry with keywords, suggest users accordingly
- Interests - Mine a new user’s bio and ongoing tweets, suggest users accordingly
Show me people connected to me in these ways and I have something to talk about with them right away. I also have an immediate group of highly relevant tour guides and ambassadors to teach me how the game is played.
Ongoing Suggested Users
Keep these suggestions coming. List them in the sidebar or send an email or anything that gives suggested users a higher profile and does not depend upon new users discovering it on their own. I may miss it at signup. I may give you more information that improves the process.
A Real User’s Guide
I remember being pretty confused by Twitter when I first signed up. The basics are simple: type message and send. The breadth of the service, however, is quite complex. A couple short and simple video demos would do wonders for explaining to new users the potential the service holds.
If I see Twitter me this and Twitter me that on CNN and my local radio station, I might go sign up, but the people are what makes me stay. Finding people that provide me with information, entertainment, and relationships creates user investment. Once Twitter learns how to quickly provide that value to new users, their retention rate will rise accordingly.
None of It Really Matters
I would like to see Twitter make their intake process a little more user friendly, but at the end of the day, they don’t need to. I am sure their investors are eager to see retention rates rise, but Twitter already has insiders from tech, media, and Hollywood signed up and passionate about their product.
Twitter is a different type of service and can easily fail to appeal to the masses in the same way as Facebook, Myspace, or even LinkedIn. The important fact remains that Twitter has a rabid and influential customer base in their corner, and that is very valuable.
Gettin’ Social in 2009
Charlotte, NC Social Media events coming in 2009
- BarCamp Charlotte (http://barcampcharlotte.com) January 23-24th – The first big event of 2009 will be BarCamp Charlotte. BarCamp is a user generated conference, find out more here. They are using a Google Group for some of the planning of the event and they just recently jumped onto Twitter, with their website coming soon.
- Social Fresh Social Media Conference Late August – As the first Social Media Conference in Charlotte, Social Fresh aims to bring big name speakers, already to include NPR Social Media Director Andy Carvin, big attendance, and a wide variety of quality content focused on how Social Media is changing the world. We are also playing with allowing everyone to vote on who the speakers are outside of the keynote speakers.
- Better Tweetups – Of course we hope the Twitter Meetups continue to grow in size and quality, but we also plan to build on the every-other-Friday success of #BtynBiz, holding more regular University Tweetups and quarterly City Wide Tweetups Uptwon.
- Possible PodCamp – This is in the brainstorming stage. If interested, let @Charlotte_SEO know.
- Startup Weekends – There are a few people talking about getting together early in the Spring and trying to kick off some entrepenureal projects over a weekend or two. If you are interested, attend the next Tweetup and ask around.
- What Happened In 2008? – Be sure to check out the year in review for what happened in 2008.
If you are interested in staying in the loop on the 3 events above, please let me know by filling out the below form:
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Anything else happening on the 2009 Social Media Calendar? Enlighten me in the comments section.
