JAMBing (Just another marketer blogging)

Groupons Problem: It is Not a Platform

2011-08-18T07:11:00.000-07:00

At HBR.com, Rob Wheeler wrote a post entitled Groupon Doomed by Too Much of a Good Thing. Rob discusses why he believes that "Groupon's fundamental problem is that it has not yet discovered a viable business model."

I would disagree as I think Groupon does have a business model, it is just flawed and will never work. What do Facebook, Twitter, Constant Contact, Apple, Google, and LinkedIn all have in common? These firms all have built a platform. These are not single solution apps, like Groupon, but rather large scale platforms that can be used by these firms to add features and functions as well as tap into a community of users to help build out exciting new applications. What exactly can Groupon do to build out its application? Is it a platform? Can people leverage it in many different ways? No. It is what it is - an email application for the most part.

Think of Apples app store and all of the apps that people have built to make the iPad and iPod that much more useful and vital to people's everyday life. Can Groupon do something similar? No.

They key here is if you want to succeed and be relevant in today's web world, you need to build a platform, not a point solution.

Social Media: Broader Than Just Marketing

2011-04-20T07:13:00.000-07:00

Most of the focus around the use of social media is that it is just a marketing tool. Social media is certainly a new and important form of PR and Marcomm, branding, lead generation (inbound and traditional marketing). However, if you are only utilizing and focusing on the use of social media solely as a marketing channel you are losing out on some other very important things you can accomplish with these platforms, such as:

Competitor Intelligence
Product Development
Beta group
Product testing
Focus Groups
Customer Support
Strategy testing
A/B testing (yes, technically marketing but have you tried it?)
Sales presentations
Community outreach

If you are just using social media for marketing purporses you really need to think broader than that and get groups like those listed above involved. It is particularly true with firms that have a a large number of followers as you have an untapped audience that has shown interest in your firm/product that can be utilized for other things besides just leads. After all, the key to social media is connecting and communicating with prospects and by engaging them in other parts of your business you can deepen the relationships and drive leads and create evangelists.
Share any successes you have had using social media to promote other parts of your business!

Content creation strategies

2010-08-31T11:49:00.000-07:00

Image via WikipediaCreating unique content probably sounds daunting, especially if you are running a small business and you are already head cook and bottle washer. To ease some of the burden of creating content you should first come up with a strategic plan for all your inbound marketing initiatives including content. Here are a few thoughts on building a content strategy. If you have other good strategies please share them.
What makes good content?: As described in the previous post, content needs to be high quality, relevant and non-pitchy.
Forms of content: The items you produce do not need to be a War and Peace sized endeavor. People are already inundated with loads of content so it makes sense to make your materials easily digestible and simple to understand. As such, think of delivering quick snippets from research you have done or read, trends you are seeing in the market and why they are important and what they mean to your customers, and, possibly most importantly, links to other content providers that you consider valuable (see here for a post from Hubspot on the importance of link building). You should also consider developing some white papers and cases studies on how you solved a customers pain.
Shareable: All of the blogging platforms have widgets that allow readers to share your content with others. Make sure you have enabled them.
Tracking: Tracking how readers are reacting to the content is extremely important as it will allow you to spot what your followers are most interested in and not interested as in reading and sharing. There a number of different tools available to track your content (good overview here). At the very least you should use a service like bit.ly for simple tracking purposes.

These are just a few simple thoughts on how to develop a content strategy. Please share your own.

Meet the new boss/Same as the old boss

2010-08-04T08:05:00.000-07:00

Content is still the boss, even more so with the increased use of inbound marketing techniques and the proliferation of mobile devices providing any time access to this content and social media platforms. According to Terametric, 85% of companies us Facebook in their a marketing strategy, followed by Twitter 77%, LinkedIn 58%, and YouTube 49%. These statistics show the reach and importance of these channels but they also highlight that there are a lot of firms out there trying to communicate with customers, potentially the same ones you are trying to gain attention from. So how do you differentiate? Quality, relevant and non-pitchy content.

Quality: The quality of the content increases when the source is seen as credible and reliable. This could be in the form of a well-known author or a large survey where the methodology is clearly laid out for review.
Relevance: Somewhat self explanatory, but you need to make sure the content is relevant for your audience. The content should inform and educate your audience about market trends, customer attitudes or relevant problems.
Non-pitchy: Do you remember the last advertisement or marketing message you saw? How many of these messages do you think we see on a daily basis? Do you remember the last good article you read? The content should not be a veiled advertisement for your product or service. Your content should inform and educate your audience, not sound like a late night infomercial.If your audience believes that all you are trying to do is advertise to them, they will tune you out immediately.

Content is and will always be the boss. However, given the amount of content that is out there and accessible you need to extremely strategic in the development and dissemination of your content to ensure you are the one your audience is listening to.

Plan your inbound marketing efforts

2010-07-19T12:07:00.000-07:00

After describing an inbound marketing strategy I was asked how I would implement and manage all of the different properties and postings. It is a good question, especially if inbound marketing activities are only part of your initiatives as managing the different platforms can be very time consuming and difficult to track. If you do not have a plan the postings cans lose some of its effectiveness as the messaging can seem muddled and ad hoc. In my last post I discussed the different ways to use each platform, now you need to implement a plan to make sure you are getting the most from your efforts.

You need to draw out a weekly, monthly and quarterly plan of inbound initiatives and make sure you know when these will all fall and who will be responsible for managing them. The plan should take into account any upcoming case studies, white papers, webinars, banner or other forms of advertisement and event attendance or other items so you can schedule announcements appropriately. You also need to assign people to manage these events on the different platforms. For example, if you have technical white paper coming out in two weeks, it would make sense for someone on the development team to write a blog post about the paper and possibly promote it on LinkedIn. You will need to make sure that person is aware of their deliverables and know when and where they need post. You need to plan like a marketing agency would plan for more traditional activities to make sure your messaging is cohesive and accomplishes your objectives.

Anyone else have thoughts on how to plan or some best practices?

Give up control to gain control

2010-07-15T19:27:00.000-07:00

Image by HubSpot via Flickr

Websites have evolved from static brochure-ware to more interactive experiences with video, chat, forums, etc. However, with the new social media platforms, you need to re-think how you design your website to take advantage of the power of these mediums. Just having a Facebook or Twitter badge on your site is not enough. You need to consider these platforms as extensions, if not a discrete part of your website. You also need to treat each platform differently to get the most out of it. Here are some thoughts on how to think about each property:

LinkedIn: More formal than other social media sites and should be used to promote networking, best practice sharing and industry collaboration. The subgroups are a great way to develop specific topics for discrete groups, such as local user communities.
Facebook: You should use Facebook to develop conversations with your target market. Think of Facebook as the forum for your customers/prospects to informally interact and collaborate.
Twitter: Twitter is a "volume" play both from amount of information you should tweet as well as how "loud" you want to be heard in the market. I think of Twitter as a communication platform, where you are sending out messages to people versus interacting with them like you do on Facebook and LinkedIn.

You need to utilize each of these sites to achieve a connection with your customers/prospects. Let's go through a use case with an integrated site that includes your corporate domain coupled with the appropriate social media sites:

Let's use Bestbuy as our use case. I am looking to purchase a new camera. I have been on BB's site and identified a few options. I have read the reviews on the site to better narrow my options. I now go out to Facebook to seek other experiences and gather feedback on my options. I go to LinkedIn to also see if there is a camera sub group to ask for feedback. After this due diligence, I have chosen the camera I want but do I need to go back to Bestbuy's site to purchase the camera? If the platforms are integrated, I should be able to buy it where I am at that moment. Frictionless commerce is an old concept but it is more important and more possible today than ever with these social media extensions. But we are not done yet.

To add to the complexity you also need to add in mobile as a potential platform. Say Bestbuy has my mobile information from our interactions on the website. My phone sounds and it is from Bestbuy telling me I am right near a Bestbuy and here is a coupon for 10% off in the store for the camera I want to buy. Ask for Jim if you go to the store or you can purchase it now with the credit card we have on file. Friction? Not so much. And that is the point; your corporate domain is no longer the place to go to purchase something. I am not coming to you - if you want my business you be where I am. And that is the potential with these platforms if you use them correctly.

Extension. Placement. Location. Timing. Sales.

Cleaning out the marketing attic of the mind

2010-06-22T13:43:00.000-07:00

Cleaning out the marketing attic of the mind.

We received our first lead from Facebook. I am still amazed when I look at referral traffic and Facebook is one of the highest referring properties.
Still somewhat skeptical of Twitter, however. Not sure I have gone to a site to purchase something based on a Tweet. It is good for finding interesting articles, but is that all there is to it?
Need to start thinking about how and if to include Youtube and Flickr in our social media portfolio.
The soccer world is not helping to get the US as an avid follower with all the fake diving in the World Cup. Brutal.
The vuvuzela's aren't helping either.
If you are interested in Inbound Marketing or how to use social media in general, you must subscribe to http://blog.hubspot.com/
User generated content is going to be the learning platform of the future.
The golf industry needs to slow down new product introductions. You can get last year's model's for next to nothing. It is like they have not noticed that consumer spending habits have changed.
I do not have a good feeling about economic recovery in the second half of 2010 or even 2011.
When was the last time you saw a really funny commercial?
I wonder how the marketing folks at the Bruins office are going to spin next year after the awful fail of the playoffs and the lousy 3 decades. "This time we mean it!"
Obama could use a new PR and marketing person.
Not quite sure I get what is happening at Google. I get search/ads, android and apps but not Buzz or them opening a music store. Seems like they are trying to be like Apple instead of choosing their own path.
Worked on my first logo design project this year. Not as easy as it looks. Makes you appreciate some of the iconic logos out there.
Very clever: http://www.cheeseandburger.com/ Definitely a bookmark for burger ideas.
Going to be revamping our corporate website in the coming months. Really need to make it more informal and social. Something our brand is not necessarily known for in the market.
What is the next great idea in the vein of the iPhone, Google, Facebook, Twitter?

Ollie Ollie In Come Free

2010-05-11T08:05:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

As my kids get older, I am amazed that they use the same expressions in their games and daily play that I did when I was their age. I did not tell them any of these but they have picked them up on their own, somewhere. It made me think about how powerful it would be if you could create your own slogan or brand reputation that is passed from user to user or even generation to generation. There are certainly examples:

Have a Coke and a Smile
Good to the last drop
Snap, crackle and pop!
I'm a Toys R Us kid
A diamond is forever
Got Milk?

And then there are famous characters from Ronald McDonald, the Donut Man, Burger lady, Marlboro man, Flo, and the Geico Gecko as well as iconic firms like Coke, IBM, Apple, and others that have enjoyed a long held brand respect in the market they serve.

I am wondering with the noise of all the social media platforms if it will be easier or harder to have a long lasting impact in the marketplace like the ones referenced above. The item that was "it" yesterday can be torn down and replaced extremely easily now and that has huge implications on developing brand equity. Given the power that has been transferred from marketing departments and media agency's to the end user we may see the consumer become the generator of the next great brand or slogan. The hard part will be giving up the control over the message, but that is already happening so the sooner you can embrace it the better off you will be.

Ollie Ollie in come free - who will be next?

Integrate Social Media activities into your CRM/MAP systems

2010-04-27T09:09:00.000-07:00

The power of a CRM system and a Marketing Automation Platform (MAP) is that you are able to see a comprehensive view into the activities around your customers. The lense gets even stronger when you integrate your CRM and MAP so you can see both offline and online activities for your customers. The inability to integrate social media tools like Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and blogging into your CRM/MAP systems is a negative but it also represents a great opportunity for the vendor that can figure out how we can do this.

Imagine if you looked up a customer in your CRM system and you had a view of all offline activities such as show attendance and phone calls along with all marketing campaigns from your MAP and all interactions with your various social media sites (retweets, blog visits and comments, FaceBook fan, LinkedIn groups). That would be a true Digital ID. I know Eloqua and Hubspot have done some things for tracking social media activity but I do not think anyone has been able to integrate it all into one view. I am not even sure this is possible, but it would make life a lot easier!

Very Good Slideshow

2010-04-27T06:48:00.000-07:00

I am also trying to figure out the impact of social media on the b2b buyer. It is not nearly as clear as it is in B2C land. Here is a good slideshow that reviews the potential of social media for B2B firms.

B2B Social Media Marketing: Building the B2B Business Case for Social Media

How many handles should you have on Twitter?

2010-03-16T12:40:00.000-07:00

Image by stevegarfield via Flickr

I just came from a meeting where the topic of how many Twitter handles should we have to message out to our customers. This particular unit currently has five different handles and different parts of the business are approaching the social media group to ask for a handle so they too can tweet.

I believe that there is a danger in diluting your overall messaging with too many people tweeting. While the theory is you should tweet more to get your message out, that does not, in my mind, mean that you should have multiple handles tweeting the same or different ideas. To me, that sounds like Twitter spam.

Additionally, the more people you have the greater the risk of someone tweeting something inappropriate. Everyone has a different ideas of what "Do not post anything stupid" means. A 20-something may think it is ok to tweet anything as that is they the way they have been brought up. An older worker who has not grown up with these technologies may not understand the reach that they have and the impact an off-hand comment could have on your firm and brand.

Your marketing message needs to be clear and concise and the more people voicing that message the greater risk there is in being tuned out.

An integrated approach to technology and market strategy is critical to success

2010-03-09T10:42:00.000-08:00

Image via Wikipedia

The firm I work for has several new products being released over the coming months that will require a technology acumen that we are not currently best suited to handle. As a result, we need to develop a long term technology strategy to support the release of these products. Additionally, our marketing needs to be aligned with the technology road map to ensure that we are messaging our new capabilities in a cohesive manner. If you are a technology company, you can no longer think of your technology and market strategy as mutually exclusive.

SaaS firms like Salesforce.com understand that there is no difference between its technology infrastructure and go to market planning and messaging. However, some firms, in particular mine, do not view technology and marketing as related to one another. An approach like this will dilute our overall messaging and branding and could lead to confusion about who you are in the marketplace. Additionally, if you do not implement a strategy road map that looks at technology and marketing strategy as an integrated unit then you will end up supporting multiple one-off technologies and have to craft multiple messages.

In the past, the positioning of my firm was one as a content provider or publisher. However, we are releasing a new platform that will make us more of a service provider that delivers content, with as much if not more focus on the technology than the content. Our approach to date has been to explore individual technologies like vcms and mobile, an approach that only addresses weaknesses and is not an overall road map. The goal now is to work with the technology group as they map out their needs so we can also adapt our messaging to fit this new world order.

So my advice is to integrate your technology and market planning to make sure each one knows what the other is doing so there is no disconnect.

Utilizing Financial Formulas to Determine the Value of Community Equity

2010-02-23T10:31:00.000-08:00

Image via Wikipedia

A very interesting post by Radian6's David Alston entitled: Can We Calculate “Community Equity?”

David states that: Community equity refers to the marketing, public relations, sales, recruitment and customer service effects and outcomes that accrue to company that engages in community building compared to what would accrue if the same brand did not invest in efforts to find, build & care for their community.

His premise is that Community Equity is much more valuable than buying eyeballs as your community is much more involved and engaged. They are there because they want to be not because they were coerce. How to calculate this equity is an interesting dilemma.

David further states, It becomes clear why 500 passionate community members on Facebook or Twitter are no comparison to the 500 eyeballs or even 1 million eyeballs purchased in a media buy. It becomes evident that community building goes in the investment column while buying media buy goes in the expense side.

So if this is an investment, I would propose utilizing existing financial calculations such as Net Present Value (NPV) or Internal Rate of Return (IRR) to calculate the value of a community. NPV is a common calculation done to determine if you should invest in a project or not. NPV is the defined as the difference between Initial Cost Outlay and present value of expected cash inflows. A positive NPV value is acceptable where as an NPV of zero yields the internal rate of return. A negative value for NPV suggests that investment is not worthy of the money we are about to invest.

Like NPV, the IRR is a rate of return used in capital budgeting to measure and compare the profitability of investments.

Instead of using a dollar amount, could you use number of people in the community you would like to capture over a certain time period? What would be the initial outlay - possibly the total amount of people you want in that community? What about the discount rate - 10%?

Using IRR, I did a calculation as follows:

Year	0	1	2	3	4	5
Amount	-10000	1000	1500	2000	5000	7500

Discount rate of 10%
IRR was 15%

Not by any stretch perfect but I hope it starts some discussions and other ideas.

Sequencing Change

2010-02-18T12:14:00.000-08:00

Image by Todd Huffman via Flickr

It used to be that technology was adopted first at the corporate level and then by consumers. That sequence has now changed. It is the consumer who is driving the adoption of technology by corporations. Social Media and mobile are prime examples of this switch.

According to Web measurement firm Compete Inc., Facebook has passed search-engine giant Google to become the top source for traffic to major portals like Yahoo and MSN, and is among the leaders for other types of sites. I would bet that this traffic is primarily consumer driven. That said, what does this mean for corporations, especially in the B2B space, as it has been shown that the Internet is one of the top places buyers begin their research on a product. Will they now be shifting from Google searches and SEO to FaceBook Fan pages? Searching Twitter for end users or stories? Mining LinkedIn for Groups and people that can help them with their decision? Yes, they will be.

The ramifications for corporations is that they must have a presence on all these sites, regardless if they are B2B or B2C. At my firm, we are really just ramping up the use of FaceBook, Twitter and LinkedIn to support the launch of our next generation product, Harvard ManageMentor. I am the primary person updating all these sites, as well as contributing to our new blog, and I know that it takes a lot of time and effort. As the use of these mediums becomes more prevalent in buying decisions, the need for a full time person in the marketing department will be mandatory.

Additionally, marketers will need to rethink which marketing automation platform they use and your messaging to fit to these sites. Can you explain your value proposition in 140 characters or less? Firms such as HubSpot are going to become even more important to help analyze the new inbound marketing results. It will be interesting to watch VC investment in this area of analytic's.

It has been interesting to see the new traffic being referred by these sites and I hope it only increases.

Twitter traffic report

2010-01-19T09:48:00.000-08:00

HubSpot report on Twitter traffic.
http://bit.ly/4nU7A3

Does this help support my previous posts on breaking through the noise as well as prediction number 5 on my Top 10?

A few musings on 2010

2010-01-06T10:56:00.000-08:00

Looking back in 2011 this list will probably read closer to a David Letterman Top 10 but here are a few thoughts on things that could happen in 2010.

Microsoft buys Salesforce.com. MSFT needs to get into the SaaS world in a better/bigger way and SFDC would be an instant, game changing move
Walmart does not buy Amazon again.
Google buys eBay to boost its mobile strategy and m-commerce
Leadership development in corporations becomes a hot topic to retain and reward people who have survived.
Twitter will have to change its business model or die. Big danger in it just becoming a spam platform.
In the theme of #5, new technologies will emerge to help marketers calculate an ROI for different SM platforms. Those that can't prove it will become irrelevant.
The economy will slowly recover as the consumer starts to spend in the second half of the year.
Infrastructure tech firms will do well in 2010 as companies replace old systems that have been neglected for too long.
The SaaS model continues its rise in importance for several reasons including a move away from the perpetual/maintenance model, the variability (add/subtract users) and the impact on the balance sheet.
Clouds everywhere but end users become confused on how, when and why they should use them.

Good example of a nice initial approach

2010-01-04T08:08:00.000-08:00

I recently received the below email and I thought it was a very good way to approach someone who may have a need for your service. No hard sell, just an introduction and a request. Well done. Here it is. I left out the senders name but check out the firm.

Hi Barrett-

I was recently doing some marketing research and came across your blog. You offer some great insights in to the world of marketing, particularly online marketing. Your post about "Death of a Salesman" had some great points. The more the consumer can be directly involved with the process, the more it becomes being what they are looking for, and less about selling to them.

I work for an online marketing start-up, Kutenda (Kutenda.com). We have created a toolset with PPC management, email marketing, website management, SEO and more- all in one place. Our goal is to help small businesses increase their visibility online and grow their business. To this point, online marketing is often seen as overwhelming and complicated, especially for small to mid-size businesses. That's where we come in. Our suite of tools is simple to use, with expert knowledge built in. In addition, we also provide training too, to walk people through the process, start to finish. We are working on getting our name out there and having people experience all we offer. I know how busy life gets- particularly after a holiday!- but if you have a moment, it would be great if you could check us out. Kutenda.com- we offer a great free trial program and a demo to learn more.

If you feel we would be a good resource for your readers, a link would be much appreciated. If you have questions, please don't hesitate to ask. I hope to hear from you soon. Thanks for your time and happy new year!

Sincerely,

What price does your brand pay for discounting?

2009-12-31T13:31:00.000-08:00

I can't remember the last time I drove past the Gap in my town and they did not have a big SALE sign in the window. Sometimes it is just a one day sale, or a sale on top of another sale. As a result, I can't believe that people actually pay full price for anything at the Gap. Why would they when they know if they wait a few days the item will most likely be discounted. The constant sales promotions have damaged the brand in my mind as I do not believe the clothes are worth full price. The Gap used to be one of the top brands in the country but, to me, it is now is relegated to third tier status.

The Gap reached an adjusted high of about $55 per share in 2000, but has been bouncing along in the high 20's or low 30's since around 2002. It would be interesting to know when they started their aggressive discounting policy. My guess is that it began when the stock began to fall and competition increased.

Discounting is common in all industries, particularly the software vertical where customers expect a discount and will wait until a quarters end to get the best possible price. I worked at The Mathworks a few years ago and they are the only firm that I know of that refuses to discount and actually gets away with it. Customers now know the discount policy and do not ask for one. The Mathworks has been a very fast growing company in a competitive space so it is interesting that they continue to be able to get away without discounting. I believe they have done a great job of linking price to value and have enhanced their brand in the eyes of their customers. They are a model that others should try to replicate.

Recently, a competitor of ours at Harvard Business Publishing has been offering a 25% discount on their courses through year end. The competitor is a high end, well know brand in the corporate learning space so it was a big surprise that they were doing so. Their policy is a great competitive selling point for us as we can plant the seed of doubt in our prospects minds that their courses must be inferior to ours if they have to run a sale.

Once you start to discount your product or service it is very hard to get full price or even raise prices.Price should equal value but if a customer knows you will eventually cave in and discount than you have lost that relationship and your brand suffers in the end.

How do you break through the noise of Twitter?

2009-12-29T11:33:00.000-08:00

Image by blprnt_van via Flickr

The constant stream of tweets makes it almost impossible to connect with your followers unless they are constantly online monitoring you. There are certainly people out there that seem to be consistently updating and informing their followers but that seems to be the exception rather than the rule. Additionally, these users are ones that are tweeting to try and promote their own brand or company. Twitter almost seems like one big advertising feed to me.
Yes, I know there are tools that can help you track and find certain topics, but these seem more geared toward the marketer trying to analyze their own data rather than an end user seeking out specific information. The constant flow of tweets makes it difficult to leverage your Twitter network for inbound marketing purposes. I have had some success with inbound marketing when I have offered free white papers or articles, but not everyone has access to the Harvard Business Publishing library like I do.
I would be interested in hearing how others have succeeded or failed in trying to break through the constant noise of tweets to generate tangible business results.

Can a B2B product be a luxury brand and marketed as such?

2009-11-24T13:16:00.000-08:00

Image via Wikipedia

The firm I work for, Harvard Business Publishing, is a division of the Hrvard Business School. Obviously our brand is very well known across the globe and the brand stirs certain emotions. High end B2C luxury brands like Bentley, Gucci, Aramni and Patek Philippe are also well known across the globe and also stir different emotions than a Dockers, Gap or Walmart.

Luxury brands command a price premium and usually justify the higher price by messaging the emotional benefits of owning such a product and implying that access is limited to only an elite few.
The P's are well defined in the marketing of luxury B2C brands but can a B2B brand also take some cues from these products in our own marketing?

Looking at a few of the luxury brand traits, you can see that B2B brands have the potential to market themselves as higher level than other products.

Pricing power: High
Emotional pull: High
Status: High

If your product does fall into the luxury B2B category, it would seem that your approach to marketing should encompass the same attributes as B2C luxury brands. Off hand, I can't think of any true luxury B2B brands in the same category as a Rolex or Gucci. Can you?

See my winning blog post for the innovation contest for October

2009-11-05T07:57:00.000-08:00

Braden Kelley is the editor of Blogging Innovation and founder of Business Strategy Innovation, a consultancy focusing on innovation and marketing strategy. He recently held a contest for blog posts on Innovation and one of mine won. Check it out.
http://bit.ly/kxRmq

Update to Death of a Salesman post

2009-10-21T07:31:00.000-07:00

I just read 2 stories in BusinessWeek that show exactly what I was saying in my last post. Check them out:

Amazon: The Web giant's cache of consumer-generated reviews lures ever-more shoppers, who increasingly research products before buying
"Amazon's review program reflects a new reality for the way consumers shop in the Digital Age: The Internet has become the world's greatest research tool, and consumers hardly buy anything anymore without first getting the skinny online. Some 70% of Americans say they consult product reviews or consumer ratings before making a purchase, according to an October 2008 survey by Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates, a research and consulting firm. Amazon has played a central role in the change in consumer behavior by being the first successful Web retailer to embrace consumers' views. "What we try to spend our time on is harnessing customer passion," says Russell Dicker, Amazon.com's senior manager of community." bit.ly/25mYeg

FaceBook: They're reaching customers via new tools such as Facebook Connect and pushing the social network toward profitability
"Merrill Squires avoids car salesmen at all costs. So when the 48-year-old marketing executive from Dallas was choosing between a Chevrolet Tahoe and a GMC Yukon Denali recently, he turned to his 600 Facebook friends. Dozens responded, and one old pal—a Denali owner—steered him toward the Tahoe. "I trust his opinion on it, and I would never have thought to pick up the phone and call him," Squires says. bit.ly/2dshZJ

As one commneter posted on the original post, big, complex sales will always need a salesperson, but I bet that the salesperson comes in later in the salescycle after the research has been done.
How can you control what they see?

Death of Salesman?

2009-10-15T13:26:00.000-07:00

Lately I have been wondering if, as social media tools mature, will marketing become the new salesforce or at least a closer extension than it already is?

There are certainly some products where face to face interaction is critical in the selling process. However, with more people doing research beforehand on social media sites and seeking out opinions/reviews on products, will marketing have to monitor those areas to make sure the correct message and information can be found. This role of gatekeeper seems more suited for marketing than sales to me.

Marketing's key role is communicating with the customer until they are ready to buy. Social media sites provide a great venue for this conversation. I do not think it is too far fetched to think that marketing could become a key player in turning prospects in customers without interaction from sales.

Augment your SEM and SEO programs with SMM and SMO

2009-10-09T06:43:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Everyone is familiar with SEO and SEM. But with the emergence of all the new social media (or social marketing as Mike Volpe from HubSpot is saying it should be called) platforms you should be augmenting your SEO and SEM initiatives with SMM (Social Media Marketing) and SMO (Social Media Optimization).

The interesting thing about SMM and SMO is that it allows you to inexpensively test words to see what resonates with your followers. Maybe these will be the same words that you are using in your SEM/SEO efforts, but you may passibly discover words you had not thought of before and these could turn out to be cheaper than some of the more popular words.

SMO and SMM should be part of your overall marketing strategy and the good thing is that there is not hit to your budget!

Building the platform for long term success

2009-09-24T11:26:00.000-07:00

Image by McNamara Images via Flickr

Seth Godin has a great post up on his blog entitled, The platform vs. the eyeballs. In the post Seth states:
Now, when you buy something (that thing you used to call 'media'), you're not paying for eyeballs, you're paying for a platform. A platform you can use to build your own audience, one that you can nurture, educate and ultimately convert. You'll take care of this audience differently, measure them differently and have a different sales cycle. This isn't natural, but it works.

I am fortunate to work for a company, Harvard Business Publishing, that has a world class brand and a terrific platform. However, I do not believe that we have taken advantage of this platform to attract people across all of our properties. We have the ability to offer a plethora of content, from blogs by leading experts, books, Harvard Business Review articles, Harvard cases, online leadership development and Executive Education. To move towards Seth's vision, we need to leverage all of these properties to build an audience. Like any company that has multiple product lines, we tend to work in our own silos, worrying only about our audience. However, if we were to look at all of our properties and audiences as one and deliver advice and content that is relevant and timely then we could build a hugely successful platform that would allow us to get to the conversion rates that Seth mentions.

The problem is, how do we get there?

Can social media take the place of marketing automation platforms?

2009-09-18T07:32:00.000-07:00

The Corporate Learning group at Harvard Business Publishing currently uses Eloqua as our marketing automation platform (MAP). Eloqua is very robust and does everything we need and more. However, I have been thinking lately as social media applications mature do they have the potential to be a free marketing automation platform, especially for a small business? Already today there are services that you can use to do some rudimentary tracking. For example, if I use bit.ly to shorten my URL and post a note on Twitter about a free article on my site I can track click throughs and retweets through bit.ly's tracking capability. I can then use Google analytics on my site to gain even more information.This certainly is not as robust as an Eloqua, but it certainly gets the job done, and it's free.

Another important aspect of social media that can't be replicated by a MAP is highlighted by the findings in the recent Nielsen Global Online Consumer Survey as seen in the chart above. The survey found that recommendations from personal acquaintances or opinions posted by consumers online are the most trusted forms of advertising. Ninety percent or consumers surveyed noted that they trust recommendations from people they know, while 70 percent trusted consumer opinions posted online.

“The explosion in Consumer Generated Media over the last couple of years means consumers’ reliance on word of mouth in the decision-making process, either from people they know or online consumers they don’t, has increased significantly,” says Jonathan Carson, President of Online, International, for the Nielsen Company.”

Marketing is all about building trust and being relevant to the consumer. I know I regularly look at recommendations on sites like Best Buy before I purchase any electronics. I do not know these people, but it goes back to James Surowiecki's Wisdom of Crowds theory, "under the right circumstances, groups are remarkably intelligent, and are often smarter than the smartest people in them." Social media has a much greater advantage over a marketing platform because a Tweet to people who follow you is more likely to be taken more seriously than an email from a campaign.

Think of the power of some of the services below and compare them to how you would react to items posted there versus an email in your inbox from a vendor that you may have a passing knowledge of but no real relationship. What do you trust and believe more?

LinkedIn
Facebook
Twitter
Digg
Stumbleupon
revver
Gist
knol (yes, knol)
Meetup
Youtube
Hollr

What other services are out there that have this same power? Do you think that social media could eventually be the defacto MAP as the technologies mature and people start building applications to track items (like Metricly)?
I've entered this article in Blogging Innovation's October Innovation Contest - To show your support for this article, please follow the link and add a comment.

It took how many users for Facebook to become cash flow positive?

2009-09-16T09:49:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Facebook recently announced two significant milestones:

They crossed 300 million users worldwide
They are now cash flow positive (they were EBIDTA positive).

Given the size of the network, it amazes me that it took that many users for them to become cash flow positive. There have been many discussions about how Facebook needs to discover new ways to monetize their base but having to get to 300m users to become CF positive is mind boggling.Granted the following shows their extreme cost structure:

From Techcrunch: The company is likely spending well over a $1 million per month on electricity alone, say experts we’ve spoken with. Bandwidth is likely another $500,000 or more per month on top of that. The company has earmarked $100 million to buy 50,000 servers this year and next. And sources say they’ve been buying one NetApp 3070 storage system per week (me: like to be that sales rep) just to keep up with all this user generated content. At up to $2 million each, that adds up quickly – we’ve heard estimates that they may have spent as much as $30 million this year alone with the company. And the icing on the cake – earmark another $15 million per year in office and datacenter rent payments.

One of the difficulties cited to becoming CF positive was the huge amount of photos that are uploaded and stored on Facebook. However, I do not see the growth in uploads of pictures decreasing any time soon so how do they continue to scale (even with Haystack) and have the corresponding revenues to stay positive? What if utilization rates of users drop off making it harder to attract advertising (already limited). How do they keep adding people and keep up usage? How do they generate more revenue/user? It will be interesting to watch. Any one else have any thoughts?

Eloqua and social networking

2009-09-10T10:38:00.000-07:00

Image by fredcavazza via Flickr

For those of you not familiar with Eloqua, it is a marketing automation platform. The software as a service allows you to track email campaigns, website visitors, lead nurturing and prospect profiling (among other things).

My company, Harvard Business Publishing, had a full time person working on Eloqua up until about 4 months ago. Since then I have been in charge of it. I have a basic understanding and really had just been using it for email campaigns. Lately, I have been trying to utilize more of the functionality to help drive leads.

One very interesting campaign I just launched involved placing links to Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn on the landing page and encourage people to use those platforms to pass along information about the article we were giving away.The audience was probably not perfect for this experiment (high level C types), but the potential is very intriguing. Considering that many firms are seeing traffic from these sites explode I hope to take advantage of this trend for our website.

The one outstanding question is does our customer base utilize any of these services. I know a lot of our prospects are on LinkedIn yet I do not know how many are on Twitter. I expect few to be on Facebook, let alone use it for business. All of this goes back to a previous post I made about whether or not every business can use social media sites to driver traffic (Can any site use social media to drive traffic?). I think this will be a good experiment and possibly provide a glimmer of an answer to that question.

You can see the landing page here

The voodoo that you do to price software

2009-07-09T07:40:00.000-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Of all the marketing P's, pricing evokes the most emotion across an enterprise. My perspective is in software pricing, a voodoo like process that somehow results in a "price." However, this is not before emotional feedback from all impacted - and that is just about everyone in an organization.

Marketing: Pricing should reside in marketing as part of the marketing mix. Mostly it does, but not without a lot of "marketing" volunteers.
Sales: In their opinion, since they actually develop proposals and talk to users about pricing, they own it and have the most knowledge of it. Marketing? Who needs marketing. Sales will tell us what the price should be, marketing just needs to develop a nice little slick.
Product Development: They want to make sure their "baby" is priced appropriately given all of the hard work and features and functions that are included (even if they are not needed. Hello, Microsoft.)
Accounting/Finance: They are privy to all the costs so they know what we need to generate in revenue to cover the costs and produce an acceptable margin.
CEO: Ultimately it is his/her head on the line if numbers are not met.
Your mother: OK, kidding, but just barely.

So be careful, once the subject of pricing is actually broached, be prepared for a lot of bitter feelings, hurt looks, and fighting over who is right.

If you have a blog and nobody comments does it really exist?

2009-07-01T13:06:00.000-07:00

Image by Laughing Squid via Flickr

I knew when I started this blog that I was doing this on my own to experiment and not to fill some untapped need for people clamoring to read my thoughts and ideas. However, not one comment? Not even by accident?
It does go to show that for a blog to be successful you need a following. Obvious, I know, but what does this mean for businesses who are being told to blog, blog, blog to drive traffic and generate leads but have very little brand recognition or following?
Blog it and they will come? Not so much.

Comments as market research

2009-05-20T10:16:00.001-07:00

Blogs, wikis, communities, etc. are a great way to reach out to customers and to start the "marketing" conversation. Another great feature of these technologies is mining all of the comments to conduct market research.

I have recently been reading a lot of the comments on The Boston Globe's website, in particular, about the proposed tax increases here in Massachusetts. If I were a politician I would be reading the overwhelming critical comments and wonder about my future if I supported the increases. Some articles produce 100's of comments that provide great insight into the issue as well as alternatives to help solve the crisis. These comments may be a politicians nightmare, but they are a market analysts dream.

The current methods of focus groups, surveys and phone interviews are certainly useful, but gathering reliable market intelligence in these ways is time consuming, inconsistent and unreliable. What good is running a survey if you only get 15 responses? It would be so much easier if you could mine comments to see immediate feedback on product concepts, positioning statements or other elements you are trying to test and gather feedback.

Obviously, there are many analytics out there such as Google analytics and others (see a good overview of some tools here). However, these tools appear to only provide tracking data on site visitors, sign ups, etc. I wonder if there is a firm out there that can mine comments and provide an analysis of the content for reliable market intelligence. Anyone know of such a firm?

UPDATE: Just came across a firm called Crimson Hexagon, Crimson Hexagon's VoxTrot listening platform provides companies with actionable insight into consumer opinion of their brand, product, or market. VoxTrot technology can identify opinion from large quantities of text, whether it's an in-house content repository or the vast blogosphere. Pretty cool.

Can anyone use social networks to drive traffic?

2009-04-07T07:19:00.000-07:00

Image via CrunchBase

You’re all aware of the rise in social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter. Businesses are using them more and more to reach out to customers. An interesting stat that highlights the emerging power of these platforms to reach customers is that some commercial websites are reporting Facebook and Twitter as the number 2 and 3 referrers of traffic behind Google.
That type of trend begs the question: Why aren't' all firms, B2B and B2C, using Facebook or any of the other social media platforms to drive customers to their websites? First, you need to think about whom is your typical customer and ask which social media platform they would frequent for information to help them do their job.
Facebook
Facebook has seen huge growth in adults lately. The growth in older adults would make you think that Facebook is a great place to interact with your customers. However, do you believe that your target market is frequenting Facebook for work? If the answer is no, then move on but continue to monitor its relevance for you audiences.
Twitter
A lot has been written about Twitter, a micro blogging site. Twitter also has seen huge growth rates, particularly in the workplace. In fact, in February the largest age group on Twitter was the age group 35-49 (42 percent of the site’s audience). Nielson ratings found that the majority of people visit Twitter.com while at work, with 62 percent of the unique audience accessing the site from work only versus 35 percent that accessed it from home only. Again, this is a pretty amazing trend. However, if you look at the top followed people on Twitter you see that Britney Spears is #3, Shaq is #8 and Whole Foods Market is #24. These facts may lead you to believe that Twitter is not a place that your target market is going for information about your product.
LinkedIn
At my work, I am currently discussing setting up a Harvard Business Publishing Group on LinkedIn. We feel that LinkedIn’s business focus lends itself well to interacting with our prospects and partners. In fact, according to the latest January data from comScore, the LinkedIn’s U.S. unique visitors shot up 22 percent to 7.7 million, up from 6.3 million in December. Total minutes spent on the site doubled in January to 96.8 million, from 47.6 million in December. These trends do make us feel comfortable that LinkedIn may be a good place to interact, and help, our customers.

Web Marketing Manager opening

2009-04-01T13:38:00.000-07:00

Keywords: marketing manager, Web marketing campaigns, demand generation, lead generation, campaign metrics, b2b marketing, AdWords, webinars, Eloqua, Website management

Harvard Business Publishing is seeking a highly motivated individual for the role of Web Marketing Manager. This person will be responsible for creating and managing marketing campaigns designed to generate quality leads for our sales team. This position will work closely with our corporate marketing team and sales team to develop a solid strategy for quick response to the resulting leads. The individual will also be responsible for the Corporate Learning website, editing/proofreading content for style, accuracy, grammar, punctuation, spelling, and search engine friendliness. This person will manage the content development and overall design of the website to ensure branding strategies and marketing plans are effectively administered through the site.

The ideal candidate will have a strong background in driving qualified sales leads and will have a track record of demonstrated success in demand generation. The candidate will have experience creating/managing and maintaining a highly engaging and interactive website. The candidate must possess strong leadership skills, outstanding communications skills, and the ability to adapt quickly in a changing environment. Prior experience in a fast paced, high growth emerging business is desired.

Responsibilities:
1. Manage strong web marketing campaigns to drive qualified sales leads and awareness in our target industries. Work cross-functionally with product marketing and sales team to create targeted web-based campaigns including: webinars, Google AdWords, and other lead-generation campaigns.

2. Develop all internal and external communications to support the campaigns including email invitations, online ad/landing page content and newsletter sponsorships.

3. Manage online events including the development of strong messaging and the ability to drive traffic to our website. Define budgets and campaign metrics, monitoring and measuring campaigns to improve results and achieve lead goals.

4. Manage Corporate Learning Website including all content updates, multimedia content, identify and execute new programs based on a target account/target industry strategy.

5. Track and report on all programs and resulting leads. Effectively communicate the results to sales and marketing management for continuous improvement and refinement.

6. Oversee internet and electronic marketing media activities to include: Search Engine Optimizer/Search Engine Marketing, internet advertising, e-mail campaigns, customer data capture, social media, viral campaigns, affiliate marketing, mobile marketing, etc.

7. Develop promotional and informational e-mail list through utilization of our customer and prospect lead database.

8. Source and acquire the services of external agencies/vendors for internet marketing media.

Qualifications:

- 5+ years experience in B2B marketing, with demonstrable track-record in demand generation and campaign execution
- Highly motivated, self-starter who thrives under tight deadlines; quick learner with a "roll up the sleeves" approach and attention to detail.
- Experience working closely with field sales team
- Highly proficient in MS Office (Word, Excel and PowerPoint); CRM tools such as Oracle and Webex (or other Web events program) highly desirable
- Experience using Eloqua a plus
- Experience in pay-per-click, online advertising and SEO a plus
- Strong interpersonal skills
- Travel required: 15-20%
- Bachelor's degree in marketing or related field; MBA a plus

Some Advice to Sales

2009-03-20T10:35:00.001-07:00

Image via Wikipedia

Our sales team had an onsite meeting over the past two days. Reps from across the US came in for a series of presentations before we start our fourth quarter (April). The marketing team was involved in a number of the presentations including a product launch of Leading Through Uncertain Times as well as a general session that provided an overview on some of our initiatives.

We received some good feedback that can definitely help us refine some of our programs and messaging. However, it also produced some frustrating moments, most particularly with the sales people who consider themselves marketing professionals. I am not sure this attitude happens between any other groups. Would you go up to accounting and give them advice because you do your own taxes or balance the checkbook?

Sales is a great source of information because of their frequent customer interactions that marketing cannot replicate. That said, I know marketing, you know sales, let me do my job and I promise not give you any suggestions on proper cold call techniques.

Is Twitter and FaceBook a vialble source of traffic for all firms?

2009-03-13T10:49:00.001-07:00

Fred Wilson, a partner at Union Square Partners, blogged today about the impact of social media on driving traffic to 3rd party sites. Specifically, Fred's post highlights the power of Twitter and FaceBook in driving traffic to websites. However, while the data certainly shows that firms should be using these outlets to drive traffic, can Twitter, FaceBook and other social mediums be leveraged by all firms?

In my case, it is not obvious given my firms brand (Harvard Business Publishing) and the restrictions surrounding the use of it for marketing purposes. Not only do the restrictions have to be weighed, but would Twitter and FaceBook have the same effect on driving traffic to our site?

Given the impact of Twitter and FaceBook, we will certainly look into having a presence and it will be interesting to see, brand restrictions aside, what the outcome will be if we do use these outlets.

Workflow marketing

2009-02-20T13:08:00.000-08:00

Marketing should be a means to generate a conversation with your customers. Engage with them, identify their needs, pains and introduce your solution and value proposition. I am of the belief that this conversation, to be successful, needs to be done within that customers particular workflow. I call this approach Workflow marketing.

Workflow marketing is introducing your product when it is needed in a prospects daily routine. Interacting at the right moment is where social networking, blogs, ratings, wikis, audio, groups, etc. are so powerful because they are becoming ingrained in our every day routine and firms can leverage these tools to interact with prospects to start a conversation.

Workflow marketing is the opposite of flooding people with information in the hopes that they will remember you when the time is right. The key is to be there when your customer is seeking what they need as they will be more open to a dialog. Obviously, this is similar to behavioral marketing and targeting but I think it goes beyond those tools because it is less intrusive, less obvious and more welcoming to the prospect.

Less with less vs. more with more

2009-02-20T12:53:00.001-08:00

Image via Wikipedia

I heard someone say "less with less" is the new mantra of the day and that people now really have to do less with less at work. Less money,time,people,energy,you name it. Does this mean you should do less marketing however? I believe that this downturn is going to really show the value of web 2.0 and the associated social networking tools and services.

Web 2.0 tools now allow you to get even closer to your customer at minimal cost. Set your blog up to let your customers know what you are up to and also shed some light into the struggles that your own organization is experiencing. Set up FaceBook pages and start/join groups on Linkedin. Start to interact with peers to see how and what they are doing with less. The key is to become more open, more public, not secretive or go into bunker mentality and "ride it out." Everyone is in the same boat and looking for help and advice. The power of the network allows you to turn less with less into more with more.

Product Development: Incremental changes vs. blowing it up

2009-02-17T13:50:00.000-08:00

I am currently in the middle of market and customer research to support the next version of our flagship product. The product has good content but the technology is lacking. We compete in the corporate learning market, a market that is undergoing a wave of change due to new Web 2.0 tools and the retirement of the baby boomers. The Boomers are being replaced by younger workers who have grown up with technology and have certain expectations that they think should be met. Most current corporate learning products do not meet those expectations, ours included.

The question arises: do we build for the next generation of users now( blow it up) or perform incremental changes and arrive "there" in 3 years?
I personally favor blowing it up and building something completely new. The market is ripe for change with no real leader in the space. We have the opportunity to be very forward looking, something our customers expect from us. An incremental change will be warmly greeted by our customers, but not in an overwhelming, tell your friends, we have to have this sort of way. The technology is there, we just need use it!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

2008-11-25T11:35:00.000-08:00

With Thanksgiving 2 days away, we can be sure of the flood of advertising and deals that merchants are going to broadcast. Early trips to the Mall (by my Wife) indicate that traffic is low and they are giving stuff away to clear room for the next season of merchandise.
While it is a tough environment I think it magnifies the need for creative marketing and not just fire sales.

The small 3

2008-11-18T08:25:00.000-08:00

I really hope that the government does not bailout the small 3 car makers. The mess they are in is of their own doing and the unions. Let them go bankrupt, rewrite the contracts so they can be more competitive and which ever company survives after that so be it. Does anyone miss the air traffic control union?
bad branding, bad product development, bad channels, etc. Classic case in what NOT to do. Jim Manzi has an article and interesting article and chart comparing the foreign car makers economics to the small 3 here.

Which one is not like the other?

2008-11-12T09:52:00.000-08:00

I had a conversation with a sales rep today about a competitor of our firm. She made the observation that a member of her team that worked at said competitor was not calling on the same level person (higher now) than she did with the other firm. This made sense given the competitors product line, but poses a challenge on how to best reach our audience and not get confused with this competitor as they are well known and the market share leader.
Our target buyer is the higher end executive and our brand/product offering match this criteria. It is a little like selling a BMW 7 series vs. a Toyota Highlander, both cars but not aimed at the same market. The challenge now is to craft this higher end message to reach the correct audience and bnot get pulled down stream to a market where the message will not resonate as well.

Back to posting

2008-11-05T10:51:00.001-08:00

I changed jobs and took a few weeks off so no posting. Now that my brain is turned back on I will start posting some new materials.

Break on through to the other side

2008-10-09T09:07:00.000-07:00

Interesting move by Honda buying all the online and mobile advertising space from Sony for a week. The intent is to break through all of the marketing clutter to get customers to focus exclusively (and repeatedly) on Honda's campaign. The move is bold, one that Sony hopes to replicate for other firms.
The one potential pitfall is that people will tune out this advertising as it is happening so many times and it becomes an annoyance.
I am sure other vendors will be looking at the results as marketers not only look for unique ways to be noticed but also look for ROI in this economy.

Promotions in a down economy. What works and what does not

2008-10-07T07:56:00.000-07:00

Adage has a list of promotions that are being launched by various retail and food chains to drive purchases in this tough economy. The one that I like best is Campbell/Kraft because it ties in 2 products and it promotes cost saving without sounding desperate. All the other promos seem like "me too" (esp. the food chains) and do not do anything to cross promote their portfolio like the Campbell ad does.

Pricing in a recessionary economy

2008-10-02T12:32:00.000-07:00

I had an interesting discussion yesterday about pricing strategies in this economy. The discussion involved mergers and pricing power.

We have seen several large scale mergers that have eliminated accounts for many firms. What do you do if you have 2 firms as clients and they merge? You went from 2 clients to now only one client. Let's say Company A and B merge. Both were clients and had similar contracts and populations, around $100k and 2,000 users. They merge and you now have one client paying $100k but potentially servicing 4,000 people. You have now gone from $50/seat to $25/seat. A substantial hit. How do you gain some of that revenue back? Not an easy answer but one that a lot of marketers are faced with today.

Can you raise prices in this environment, especially if a competitor is lowering them? I think you can always raise prices, but you need to market the value first. If you have not proved the value proposition of your product or service you will never have pricing power regardless of the economy.

I believe that both speak to knowing your customers and knowing what their pain points are and how you can relieve this pain. If anyone is looking for a good book on pricing I suggest buying "The Strategy and Tactics of Pricing: A Guide to Growing More Profitably."

Wanted: Marketing Communication Manager

2008-09-30T12:45:00.000-07:00

Wanted: Marketing Communication Manager
Location: Washington, DC
Reports to: Treasury Secretary
Key capabilities:

Must be able to clearly articulate complex financial plan to Barney Frank
Tell Nancy Pelosi to not talk through the close

Sponsorships: Jet Man

2008-09-29T10:47:00.000-07:00

Remember Dan and Dave? Two athletes sponsored heavily by Reebok for the Olympics in 1992. Only problem was Dan failed to qualify, making an 8 month campaign useless. According to Sport Business Associates, global sponsorship of professional sports teams in 2006 is estimated to reach US$33.6 billion. This amount of spending certainly shows that sponsorships have become a huge venue for advertising dollars but do they always deliver?

Obviously, some sponsorships work out just fine, but for every win there is the prospect of a Dan and Dave fiasco or a Michael Landis in the Tour de France.

The impetus to write this post was Jet Man. If you did not see this, Yves Rossy strapped a 120lb winged contraption onto his back and flew across the English Channel. He was sponsored by Hublot Geneve, a high end, technically advanced watch firm. A very good fit. I went out to Hubolt's website and they have done a great job of integrating the sponsorship into their website and relating Jet Man to their brand. I can't help to think, though, what would have happened if Jet Man blew up over the English Channel?

State of the Blogosphere

2008-09-25T09:47:00.000-07:00

Technorati put out an interesting survey on the state of the blogosphere here.

TV to Web Advertising

2008-09-24T10:42:00.000-07:00

The Lexus ad with 4 golfers going on a race to the US Open was played over and over this weekend during the Ryder Cup (despite the fact the US Open was played in June. Another pet peeve - using outdated material. Lazy)

For those that have not seen the ad they give the initial story line and tell people to go to the Lexus website to watch the rest of the story. No desire whatsoever to do so. I would love to know the hits they got on this as well as other (BWM did one I believe) firms that have done such a campaign.

To me, they just seem too disconnected.

Friday to Monday

2008-09-22T12:11:00.001-07:00

Let's see: you leave work on Friday as a b2b marketer at Goldman and Morgan Stanley and arrive at work on Monday as a b2c marketer.
Time to brush up on Total Value of Customer.

How to use competitive analysis

2008-09-18T13:08:00.000-07:00

Competitive intelligence (CI) has been a prominent part of my past jobs. It seemed like every interview or first day on the job, the most common comment was " Great, we know nothing about or competitors can you go find out xyz?"

The problem with CI in most organizations is that it can be difficult to figure out how to best use the information. The difficult part is that people have their own need for particular information but when all the data is put all together it usually equals the length of Trinity and is hard to impossible to act on.

What I have found most useful is to approach CI in the following ways:
1. Agree on a competitive set to benchmark as well as a format in which the reports will be delivered. Most firms have their own way of communicating information so it does no good to introduce a new format that will require a learning curve as this will impede the adoption of the intelligence.
2. Do relatively in depth profiles on agreed upon areas such as pricing, partners, customers, go to market model, financial benchmarks, etc. These documents should be updated on a quarterly basis and serve as a primer for people interested in certain firms as well as provides the CI analyst with a good understanding of the landscape that can be used for other ad hoc requests and briefs.
3. Lastly, I have found that short 1 page briefs on an announcement from a competitor such as an acquisition, partnership or new product release will provide people with just enough information to keep them up to date in a highly digestible format. These briefs are also useful "trial balloons" to determine what is important to look at more deeply based upon the response of your readers.

CI is an important tool but like anything else it has to be delivered in a way that is useful, easily digestible, and actionable.

How far can you extend your brand?

2008-09-16T14:45:00.001-07:00

I was involved in an interesting analysis with an unusual conclusion. The outcome was not one that I had not thought of during the analysis but upon reflection it made perfect sense. I was a market strategy analyst at a one time Fortune 500 and one of the better known tech brands that had fallen on hard times. (Think big red N).

I had a project that was tasked with looking at the different markets that the firm was competing to determine a 3-5 year plan based upon market share, new growth opportunities, barriers to entry, competitive set, etc. The analysis was fairly straight forward in all but one market. The firm had bought a small start up that, at the time, had the hot technology du jour. The market was large and growing at a decent clip given the size. We had the right technology, in some cases better technology than a lot the better known competitors, yet we continued to lose share. The recommendation was to invest more or to fold the cards and integrate the technology into other existing solutions.

The question was: If we have strong technology, we are priced competitively, we are well known, and the market is growing why are we losing share?

The conclusion: Even though we had all of the above that would seem to put us in good position to compete, the feedback from customers was that they did not even think about us when they put out RFP's. In other words, our brand had zero currency in this market because it was not what the customer associated us with being good at and offering. Eventually the technology was folded into other solutions, but I suspect the ROI on the acquisition never came close to the plan.

Just because you have good/great brand equity in one market, does not mean that you can enter any market you see as an opportunity.

Are you really what you think you are?

2008-09-15T11:26:00.001-07:00

A few years ago I joined a small team at Polaroid to try and set up a corporate venture fund to incubate new digital businesses. These new services would help diversify the firms revenue stream away from film sales and help take advantage of the emerging SaaS and other Internet business models. Our focus was primarily on the commercial side, a division that produced over $1b in revenue in its hey day.

It sounds like a good match; Polaroid and the web. Both instant and sharable. However, Polaroid did not understand that they were a workflow company. For example, P&C insurers were big customers as they would use Polaroid film to document damage, staple it to a form, and mail it in to be processed. We propposed that this workflow was undergoing a shift to digital, with digital forms and pictures streamlining the process and Polaroid was well positioned with compression technogy, digital image knowledge, and a giant customer base with real contacts and brand equity.

Despite these advantages, the recurring refrain at the executive level was: "But, where is the print.?"
Just because you were something yesterday does not mean it is what you will be or need to be tomorrow.

Ramifications of Wall Street

2008-09-15T08:10:00.000-07:00

Besides the hit to everyone's 401k, what does the consolidation and meltdown of major financial institutions mean to marketers?

The obvious is less firms to sell products too. As a result, a marketers value proposition is going to have to be honed as they will absolutely need to prove value/ROI in this tight budget environment.

All the people you worked with before at these firms, be it on direct marketing lists or tried to sell to, they may all be gone now. Where are they and how do you make up for this volume?

A positive may be that their are very good marketers looking for jobs right now. Ones with extensive B2C experience that may have never thought they would be in the position they are now today. If you need to fill some roles, find them and reach out (est. 50k in layoffs between ML and Lehman alone).

What does this mean to your budgets and marketing mix? Can you still justify the plan from the beginning of the year or does this money need to be shifted to other methods or put away for a better day?

Unfortunately, the mess is not over and may prolong the economic downturn, despite lower oil prices. As a result, it is time to revisit your plans given the new micro and macro environments. As a friend of mine who works on Wall St. said in an email to my question to see if ML, AIG, and Lehman (and Fannie/Freddie) was the bottom or more bad to follow: "Not good."

Time to start thinking as it will effect everyone from established firms with healthy cash hoards/flow to start-ups that were hoping for that next round for growth.

Permission marketing

2008-09-14T10:19:00.000-07:00

I certainly understand the concept and utility of permission marketing, but I ma somewhat suspect on how you can actually build a big enough crowd that gives you permission to market to them and stays around long enough before getting bored.

I have signed up for countless email newsletters, deals, etc. but eventually I grow tired of them (usually very quickly) as diminishing returns comes into play quickly. I like this definition/example of diminishing returns as I think it comes into play with marketing and permission based marketing:

Much of human economic activity suffers from diminishing returns. For example, in farming, the farmer will first farm the most fertile land with the most valuable crops. To expand the farm's business, the farmer will have to cultivate progressively less fertile land and will have to grow less valuable crops (once the demand for the most valuable crop has been met). In general, the bigger a business gets, the less optimal its last venture. Assuming that a manager is good at picking the most promising business opportunities to do first, it would seem that diminishing returns are a fundamental law of doing business: the first few deals skim the cream and subsequent ones have progressively less value.

So the question is how do you continually find and farm fertile land and keep those early "crops" interested?

First Post

2008-08-21T10:51:00.000-07:00

I am a product marketing manager at Web 2.0 company. I have recently taken over the majority of the business functions thus having to learn a lot on the fly. I thought this would be a good place to share some successes, failures, and questions.
The hardest thing to date has been figuring out how to better target our end users with direct email. Subject, content, value prop, call to action. One big puddle that has to be contained.