Category: Strategy

Free Marketing Strategy eBook

Branding, Comms 101, Digital Strategy, Strategy

Earlier this week I received a LinkedIn question from Jay Ehret, wondering whether I knew of any good, free eBooks on marketing. Unfortunately, most of the eBooks that I knew of were not free. But then, yesterday, Andrea Vascellari, sent a message on Twitter advising on the availability of a free marketing strategy eBook.

From a quick scan, "Strategic Communications Planning" by Dave Fleet is a great introduction to the steps required to develop a corporate communications plan. It covers context, audience, messaging, tactics, budget and even evaluation. For those wanting to go into further detail on the planning process, I would advise you to join the Plannersphere and begin reading the blogs of various members. AND don’t forget to visit the Staufenberger Repository to download this valuable (and rare) PDF of Stephen King’s Planning Guide.

But remember, while this material is available free of charge, putting the recommendations and suggestions in place in either a client or in-house setting is a challenge. The ideas are out there, but the devil is in the execution, in how you actually turn these ideas into frameworks, notes, analysis documents and creative briefs — and that is where professional planners can add real value. Good luck!

Read this document on Scribd: Strategic Communications Planning

Generate vs Stagnate: John Grant @ Planning Begins at 40

Digital Strategy, Smart Bloggers, Strategy, Videos

Here is John Grant’s excellent speech at JWT’s Planning Begins at 40 conference. He raises a fantastic point — that we either choose to generate or stagnate — and while this applies to planners, it also extends to all of us on an individual level. He argues that we can continue, in an ongoing way, to challenge ourselves, be open to the new and the different … or we can stick with what we know and what has worked for us in the past.

There is even a suggestion that someone’s generative challenge may be the agency of the future. Any takers?


John Grant: Planning’s Midlife Crisis? from JWT on Vimeo.

78% Happy

Strategy

What does it mean to be happy? According to Malcolm Gladwell, it is the different between 60% and 78%. In this great TED Talk (thanks to Drew McLellan via Todd Andrik), Malcolm delivers a great story built around Howard Moskowitz’s pioneering work in the field of psychology-led market research. Moskowitz successfully used data to not just build out a long tail type analysis of data, but he aggregated this data to form clusters of relevance. How this works for a taste test for coffee is as follows:

  • Participants in a focus group are asked to rank from 1 to 100 how happy the coffee makes them feel
  • On average, the ranking sits at about 60 — which actually translates to a cup of coffee that makes you wince

However, if a high level pre-screening takes place before the focus group, the outcomes are dramatically different. If participants can self-select a style of coffee (eg mild, heavy roast etc) — from as little as three categories — and then that particular style is provided to the focus group, the ranking from 1 to 100 will rise to 78. A 78% ranking is a "coffee that makes you deliriously happy".

Think about this in terms of your brand. Consider it in light of your profiling and strategic approach. Perhaps we don’t need to deliver value to the "nth" level of the long tail … we simply need to deliver value to the clusters. The old adage "you can’t please all the people all the time" is true — but if you can spend your research and insight budget in a way that will identify the clusters that make sense for your brand/product, then making your consumers 78% happy will more than deliver on your brand promise. It will open new markets. Don’t believe me? Listen in to the whole of Malcolm’s speech.

Strategic Happiness

Digital Strategy, Smart Bloggers, Strategy

This excellent presentation by Tara Hunt clearly draws a connection between customer experience and brands. To do this, Tara suggests we need to understand the four pillars of happiness — Autonomy, Competence, Relatedness and Self-esteem — as well as the barriers to happiness — fear, confusion, loneliness, lack of control and struggle for survival.

By delighting your customers you are adding to their happiness. By removing the pain/anxiety of your customers you are removing barriers to their happiness. Makes sense. Sounds simple … and as Tara explains, it ties into the self actualization model of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. But how does this tie into your business strategy? How does it really become part of the way that you do business, drive revenue, and manage your costs?

Clearly activating this comes down to the experience of your product/service. It comes down to the exchange of value between your brand and its community and that means that you need to understand how your brand rubs up against the factors that affect happiness or the barriers to happiness. This is a strategic choice and should inform every iteration of your brand’s product/service line. But there is also a more significant opportunity around happiness that applies directly to social media and to digital strategy. Take a look through Tara’s presentation, and then continue reading below.

Most brands are likely to position themselves on one side or other of the "axis of misery" that Tara talks about. However, the larger opportunity is to activate your digital strategy in a complimentary manner. That is, if your brand positioning is closely aligned with the four pillars of happiness, then your digital strategy should focus on removing the barriers to happiness — and vice versa.

Many "Web 2.0" brands are already take this holistic approach. Think about Google, for example. Not does the experience of interacting with the Google Search Engine deliver value on the four pillars of happiness, it also directly impacts on the barriers to happiness. This is extended through a range of other service offerings from Orkut through to Gmail.

It strikes me that viewing happiness as a business model provides a unique way of investigating your brand’s strategic positioning and provides insight in terms of its future direction. It reverses the debate around brands from one that is internally focused into an analysis which is oriented towards the experiential impact of your brand through the eyes of your brand community. Revolution? Maybe.

The Dream of Influence and the Democracy of Action

Blogging, Digital Strategy, Old Media, Smart Bloggers, Social Media, Strategy

Touchgraph Over the last couple of days there has been a rash of conversation, discussion and analysis around the concept of "influence" — driven by the publication of Duncan Watts and Peter Dodds article on Influentials, Networks, and Public Opinion Formation. David Reich points out that the Fast Company article, Is the Tipping Point Toast, offers a little more context on Duncan Watts and his area of research; and this great post by Noah Brier drills down into the concepts even further.

Basically, Watts and Dodds are challenging the notion that influentials ("a minority of individuals who influence an exceptional number of their peers") are important to the formation of public opinion. This flies in the face of accepted marketing theory and the popularity of The Tipping Point. It also challenges the notion that marketers have of influence — and the way in which this notion of influence makes our lives easier. After all, it helps us target our messaging, our communication and our schmoozing efforts. This is why we dream of influence — it is aspirational. As marketers we like to feel that we have a finger on the pulse of society … but what happens when that pulse flatlines — or simply proves to be a phantom?

Late last year I wrote about the strength of weak ties. This fascinates me. The findings of Mark Granovetter’s research into social networks demonstrated that it is the WEAK ties that lead to action. If this is the case, then influence may only play an important role in the very early stages of branding efforts — to facilitate AWARENESS. But as consumers begin to engage with the brand messaging and various forms of communication, it appears that the power of the social network lies not in the level of influence of any select group but in the susceptibility of the audience to contagion.

Why is this relevant? Because on some level, our role as marketers, strategists or activists is not simply to raise awareness. Our job is to change the way that people think, or act — we want to prompt a change in perception or in behaviour. As marketers then, perhaps our best efforts — and probably our strongest DIGITAL STRATEGY lies in activating the weak links and leaving influence to the mass/traditional media (or to those bloggers who have mass audiences).

It is the democracy of action that drives much of my interest in social media … take a look at what is hot on YouTube or on Technorati. Think about BSP and the way in which a number of people "suddenly" begin writing on a similar topic. It is not the "influentials" who are going to instigate a new trend … they are merely documenting its early rise out of a network of weak links. So while my heart tells me that influencers are important, my head is telling me to go for the gold — and that seems to be quite a turnaround. Now … if only I could model it! 

RIP Newspaper Advertising?

Strategy

RIP News Release
Originally uploaded by prblog

The Caxton Awards is a long running program that recognises excellence in newspaper advertising here in Australia. Supported by the major metropolitan newspapers, awards are spread across 20 categories that range from "automotive" and "fashion" through to "best copywriting" and "best campaign".

This year, the judges refused to nominate a winner in twenty categories, reports Lara Sinclair in The Australian. It raises an interesting question … where has the talent gone? The focus?

While I agree with Tony Hale, CEO of the industry body, The Newspaper Works, who said "Ordinary creative compromises the effectiveness of our business", I am wondering whether the explosion of digital has distracted agencies from the lucrative and challenging news space. Given that there is a slow, but industry-wide move away from the traditional media channels, there are at least two opportunities arising in news and magazine advertising:

  • Creative thinking and strategy: Facing mediocre competition, clever creative will stand out. The opportunity here is to produce work that will play to the strengths of the printed medium.
  • Storytelling: The chance to take advantage of longer form storytelling should not be overlooked. While we spend increasingly large amounts of our free and fragmented time online, newspapers and magazines can still draw us in, but only if the story is good and the narrative is strong.

While I believe that digital is the future, I am also of the belief that newspapers and magazines will continue to serve a purpose. This purpose is now shifting and needs ongoing redefinition. But this cannot be done by the publishers alone … it needs the collective thinking of the whole industry — it needs collaboration and reinvention. Only then will the newspaper advertising rise from the dead.

Facebook and the Platform of Influence

Innovation, Social Media, Strategy, Web 2.0

I have been thinking over Microsoft’s interest in Facebook … and wondering what it is that is driving their strategic decision making. Sure there are strong customer acquisition drivers which become even more compelling when you consider this post by Charlene Li (explaining that this acquisition price is LIFELONG rather than transient — but how long is "lifelong" in a Web 2.0 world?).

But the more I think on this, the more it makes sense. You see, Microsoft are not really buying customers, they are buying a PLATFORM OF INFLUENCE. The Platform of Influence is a precondition for what Ross Dawson calls "attention profiling" (one of his six trends tranforming living online). Ross explains attention profiling in this way:

4. Attention profiling We are moving to a world of infinite content. The proliferation of blogs, online publications, podcasts, and videos means we are swamped with information. The first phase of the response has been user filtered content or collaborative filtering on sites such as Last.FM and scouta.com, giving us personalized recommendations. The next phase will be to develop detailed profiles of our interests and behaviors across different categories of content, so that we can access or be presented with content in a way that matches our available attention relative to the relevance and interest of the content. The two most promising initiatives in this space – Particls and illumio – have both been launched in the last couple of months. We can expect it to become a completely seamless process to find or be given what we want from an infinite landscape of content.

While I see the value in attention profiling, the very concept raises many questions. You will, no doubt, have others, but mine are:

  • Discovery — there are some things that I like about being pre-emptively supplied with information, services or even products based on my past usage and predictive usage patterns. However, this removes the enjoyment of discovery — something that is the reward for my curiosity. Is it possible that a by-product of this predictive sampling is the dampening of curiosity — or will this human trait simply find a new outlet?
  • Privacy — how many of us will be happy to sign-up for personal profiling? It sounds great in theory, but it presumes integrity and security on the part of the service provider.

I think this is where Facebook comes in and precisely where there is potential value for Microsoft. Not only does Facebook already perform low level personal filtering, it already enables some of the collaborative filtering that Ross discusses. For example, I am much more inclined to join a group, read a post or attend an event that is already on the list of my influencers. This means that the distinction between decision and action is compressed and accelerated — mostly thanks to the influencing power of my personal/professional network. Microsoft has wanted to bring its brand into our lives more seamlessly for years … and this may well prove to be its best opportunity yet.

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Why Does Social Media Stink?

Strategy

FREE SMELLS
Originally uploaded by Mandy Sue.

Yesterday I was thinking about Katie’s upcoming presentation on digital planning, and in a fit of BSP, Mack Collier comes to the rescue with a thought provoking post over at MarketingProfs. Mack rightly identifies one of the largest failures of marketers to respond to the social media opportunity — treating it like a channel. This is a fundamental error.

You see, what we have happening is some isolated tactical executions designed to activate a campaign. The Nikon D80 social media outreach program is a great example — hand select bloggers of influence, put a camera in their hands, encourage them to use it and post about their experience, and then, at the end, donate the camera or the proceeds of sale to charity. Sounds nice. Sounds clever. But it misses out on one of the key items of a communications initiative — feedback. As CK says, "listening is key".

Of course, once you have feedback, you need to do something with it … but that is a WHOLE other post. But in terms of integrated digital strategy, it seems to me that there are some things that should be considered:

  • Not all traditional marketing methods or channels work for digital. In many ways, digital messaging is more akin to direct mail. This is especially true for mobile activations where you are limited to a number of characters rather than a number of pages. Think SMS. Go experimental and choose TWITTER.
  • Some of the traditional approaches DO work. The old adage that you need to deliver your message THREE times for it to sink in is true — tell them, tell them and tell them again. Only it seems to work better when you work across channels. Think BLOGS, EMAIL, MICROSITE. Get funkier, choose YOUTUBE, PODCAST and RINGTONE.
  • With the explosion of social media forms, the challenge is depth of experience with the tools. Remember, we are all constantly learning how to use social media … so there is an argument for digital planning requiring its own process and discipline. However, the returns may not (as yet) warrant it. The challenge is to open the dialogue in the spaces where your consumers "hang out". Think EXPERIMENTATION and SMALL BUDGET. Be daring and COMMIT 5% of your MEDIA SPEND.
  • Support your digital work with a mainstream media buy. Remember, you want to drive traffic and awareness online — while also activating any social media PULL. Even the most technical of us don’t live 100% of our lives online. Think BALANCE and INTERLOCK. Remember the meaning of INTEGRATED.
  • Finally, and I think this could be a post on its own, remember this is an Age of Conversation. What is the point of a campaign if you let all your efforts fade into nothing? If you are capturing attention, CONVERT it to conversation. If you are collecting email addresses, USE them to CORRESPOND. If you are INVITING your consumers into your brand, make them WELCOME.

So, after all that, what makes great digital integrated planning? Really it is the desire to NOT STINK. They say that smell is the strongest determinant of memory — so if your social media or integrated campaign is on the nose, we will all remember it for some time.

Is Your Digital Integrated?

Strategy

Katie is presenting at an Interactive Bootcamp this week and has asked for input … what makes great digital planning?

Now I could go on and give my view straight up, but that would be too easy. And what do I know anyway? So I thought I would see what the rest of you thought … but with a couple of provisos:

  • What "traditional" elements work or do not
  • Is digital just another channel to be managed, or does it constitute an ENTIRE planning genre on its own terms
  • Can digital planning or digital execution stand in isolation — or do you need help from MSM

Tomorrow, when I have had some sleep, I will provide my views. Oh, and it has more than a little cross-over with The Age of Conversation.

Adieu.

Is Your Media Plan a Disaster?

Strategy

Disaster Plan
Originally uploaded by TaranRampersad.

One of the best things about Twitter is the instantaneous sharing of ideas/links. And while I know there has been some discussion around Twitter hitting a plateau, I still have a suspicion that there is unrealised potential in it as a platform.

Be that as it may, my personal Twitter usage has dropped off. The unreliability of service is a major factor … but today when I logged on for the first time in days there was an immediate payoff. David Armano had broadcast this link to an intriguingly titled post "How to Completely Screw Up Interactive Media Planning" by Rohit Bhargava.

In this post, Rohit covers some of the pitfalls (or should I say shortfalls) of interactive media planning. One of my personal bugbears is that there are many planning agencies who pay lip service to digital/social networks while continuing to plough money into MSM buys. The cost of MSM involvement in terms of budget and attention is significant and many marketing directors and brand managers simply do not have the personal bandwidth to assess, manage or test non-traditional media tools — but the opportunity cost directly impacts BRAND INNOVATION.

In my view, social media or even an INTEGRATED media plan can provide a framework for brand innovation that can help reinvent or reposition the contact between brands and consumers. This is why I feel that interactive and social media is an exciting place to play … and work. So if your media plan is looking like a disaster, take a step back, hive off 5% and do an experiment. The results will AMAZE you!

Update: Drew McLellan has a great post about David Meerman Scott’s upcoming book — The New Rules of Marketing and PR (publishes in June). The potential for PR to "change the game" is significant — especially given the tools that allow us to turn strategy into executions. Of course, the same applies to ANY agency … fun times ahead!