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Are we becoming a world of snackers?

October 29, 2007

I’ve long said we’ve become a USA Today world. Bite-sized chunks of information, a pretty chart and we’re good.

I recently wrote about the power of downsizing how much information you try to cram into any marketing tactic. We’ve also talked about how being long-winded can hurt your effectiveness. And the value of offering bite-sized test drives to our prospects.

So, I was excited when Connie Reece tagged me on a meme that was started by Jeremiah Owyang. He asks the question — do you respect media snackers and if so, how?

So I’ll play along. Here’s where I think I am holding my own:

I write posts like the ones listed above, trying to not only walk the talk, but teach it.
I keep my blog posts short. (for the most part)
I write a weekly marketing column that tops off at 300 words.
I use solo visuals to help tell the story.
I use Twitter and other micromedia.

Here’s where I need to get even better:

Adding more categories so topic-specific readers can find content easier.
Introducing my readers to more resources for just in time searching.
Continuing to hone my messages down to their essence.

So, as the game is played…I tag David Armano, Chris Wilson, Tim Siedell, Gavin Heaton, Mark Goren and Doug Meacham.

Even if you weren’t tagged, feel free to jump in and play along. How are you modifying your communications to accommodate media snackers?

Create forms on the fly for your website or blog!

October 28, 2007

We talk about conversation and the need for providing feedback mechanisms for our readers, clients and prospects. But how do we make that happen?

One of the elements we’ve been wanting to add to the MMG site’s Contact page is a form where people could subscribe to the blog, our e-newsletter or get more information.

But we were struggling with creating a form that actually worked in all the different browsers and let us modify the form on the fly. Then, I stumbled onto Wufoo.com.

You create the form and then they provide the code to paste into your site. I literally created our Contact Us form and had it on our site in less than 15 minutes.

Think about the kinds of things you could add to your blog or website:

Event Registration
Contact Us
Customer Delight survey
Employee Application
Post Topic Suggestions
Speaking Requests
What else?

Wufoo.com has a free version (the one I used) and depending on your needs (# of forms, # of fields etc.)

Besides how easy it is…my favorite feature is that when I edit the form on Wufoo.com, it automatically edits the form on my site. So there’s no going back to amend the code. Gotta love that!

Mother Nature = Art Director?

October 27, 2007

Here in the Midwest the most vivid colors of the turning trees are coming into their full glory as we enjoy fall’s crisp air.

Mother Nature has a way of creating some amazing color palettes that we should study, consider and make our own as we create visual identities, ad campaigns or collateral material for clients.

Over at COLOURlovers.com, you can explore all kinds of color combinations and trends. Check out their post on autumn colors, including more than 50 different fall color palettes to inspire you.

You can also submit your own color palettes for readers to critique and vote on.

Thanks to my friends at AOR for pointing me to the post.

Are you giving your marketing tactics enough time?

October 26, 2007

You till the ground until it is ready for the seed.
You enrich the ground with nutrient-rich manure.
You carefully pick out just the right seed, perfectly suited for the time of year and climate in your state.
You plant the seed, covering it with the rich soil.
You water the seed, making sure it has everything it needs to grow.
You check the garden the next day. Nothing has broken ground.
You water again, hoping to see a sprout of growth.
You check the garden the following day. Still nothing.
Following the expert advice on the HGTV channel, you lightly water again.
You check the garden again the next day. Nothing.
You figure you did something wrong, so you dig up the seed, 2 days before it would have broken ground.

Crazy, right? Who the heck would go to all that work and then not give the seed the time it needed to grow?

Look in the mirror my friend. Marketers are guilty of this every day.

One of the core tenants of marketing is patience. Long after we are sick and tired of an ad campaign, marketing tactic or tagline — our audience is just beginning to notice it.

How do you know if you’ve given the seed time to break ground?

Related posts:
~ Create a stack of impressions
~ Close your eyes and say no

Evidence that we need to pay attention to our brand

October 25, 2007

When was the last time you saw a grocery aisle stocked with generic products?

You remember the generic promise:

Made by the same manufacturers as the brand name products
In blind taste tests, no one could tell the difference
Cheaper

Sounds like a slam dunk, doesn’t it? And yet, generic products have vanished off the shelf.

Consumers are drawn to the safe and familiar, for the most part. They want reliability and comfort in their decision.

They want you to create a brand they can trust and rely on. Are you?

10 things I hate about you (say our clients)

October 25, 2007

RainToday.com (one of my favorite resources) has an eye-opening collection of articles that reveals the 10 major problems encountered by decision makers during the process of hiring consulting and professional services providers.

Not only are these the things decision makers hate about you, but, more importantly, they are also the reasons why they don’t buy your services.

It’s a must read. You have to register to get to the download page, but you can always say you are Arnie Fuddleknicker.

Seriously — go read it now. Shoo.

Marketing Resources — 10/25/07

October 24, 2007

As marketers, we are being pushed to know more about more things in more ways than ever before.

Today — we are literally stacking our education, experience in the business, acquired knowledge, personal experiences, interactions, observations and musings up like building blocks to create our portfolio of skills and abilities, in terms of marketing and branding.

The good news is that the information has never been more readily available. Books, podcasts, white papers, blogs, e-newsletters, webinars and the list just keeps going.

One of my goals for this blog is to be well, a resource for helping you find those resources. So from time to time, I’m going to give a nod to some good sources that I’ve stumbled upon.

Here are the offerings for this go around:

Resource #1:

Thanks to a post on the accenture blog about their new book CRM Transformation: Transforming Marketing, Sales and Service, I discovered Montgomery Research and their host of thought leadership white papers. Correlating to the accenture book — they have a section called The CRM Project.

There you can find white papers with titles like: Smart Enough Customer Decisions, Continuous Customer Dialogues (strategies for growth and loyalty) and Transform Customer Data into Profit. (Note: You do have to sign up to access these white papers, but it’s pretty painless.)

Resource #2:

Joseph Jaffe launches his new book, Join the Conversation, this week. Jaffe, best known for launching the conversational marketing company, crayon.

It makes sense that a man whose company specializes in community, dialogue and partnership would pen a book that spotlights how companies must adapt to the brave new world of the Internet, social media and networking, consumer-generated content, blogs, and podcasts by joining the rich, deep, and meaningful customer conversations already in progress.

I just got my copy today and can’t wait to dig into it.

:60 ticks marketing tip: High tech legibility test

October 24, 2007

The world of marketing is now very high tech. We have computers and digital files and PDAs and a host of other technologies that have improved the way we do our job. But sometimes the old fashioned method is still as good as it gets.

Outdoor is a tricky medium. It looks great on the screen or layout, but how will it look 50 feet up in the air, as you whiz by at 65 mph?

Assuming you were mindful of the 7-word rule (try never to have more than 7 words on an outdoor board) here’s how you can quickly check the readability of your board.

Squint.

Yup, squint. Print out your design and tape it to the wall. Step back 10+ feet and then squint. Can you still read the board? If so – odds are it will be legible from the road as well.

Now let’s see them create a high tech alternative for that!

If you were Apple, how would you respond to iCrime news?

October 22, 2007

I was watching the local news the other day when a sound byte caught my attention. "iPods linked to crime wave." So being a man of the new millennium, I DVR’d it.

Here’s the scoop.

Violent crime in the US increased in 2005 and 2006 for the first time in 14 years. Homicides and robberies are up, while other violent crimes are down.

"At the same time that violent crime rates began to rise, America’s streets filled with millions of people visibly wearing, and being distracted by, expensive electronic gear," explained the authors of the Is there an iCrime wave? report.

According to the report, there are four reasons why iPods are playing a key role in the iCrime wave:

iPods contain almost no easily accessible anti-theft protection
Unlike mobile phones, there is no subscription associated with iPods
iPods are high-status items and may be stolen for their status or to be resold
Since iPods plug into both ears (unlike a cell phone’s one ear occupation) iPod users may be less aware of their surroundings than users of other consumer products

Here’s my question for us in the marketing world: If you were the CMO of Apple and heard about this report/news story — what would you do or not do?

Grow or die. How’s that for simple?

October 21, 2007

A business cannot remain stagnant for long. You either grow or you wither up and die. Now remember that grow doesn’t necessarily mean you get bigger. Maybe you just get more efficient and more profitable. But somewhere, there needs to be growth.

Bob Bloom (former US Chairman and CEO of Publicis Worldwide) has created a free e-book called Bloom on Growth. In the e-book, he’s pulled some money quotes out of his new book, The Inside Advantage, which will be available in early November.

Here’s my favorite. Probably because I’ve been preaching this for eons.

“You can deliberately influence your customer’s entire experience with your firm or you can simply let it happen.”

We all know this is true. We feel it when we walk into an Apple Store or fly Southwest. So why do you think most businesses do not do this for their own business?

Is it too hard?
Too expensive?
Too time consuming?
Do they not know how?

What do you think?

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