Marketing

Walking out the journey with your client

December 2, 2020

We’ve been exploring what it means when someone tells us that we should be using storytelling in our marketing efforts. Today, I want to delve into the idea of the hero’s journey. For most people, the concept that our customer needs to be the hero of the story and that the brand can be a useful sidekick makes sense. But the idea of being able to bend your marketing messages into a tale of a journey feels a little less tangible.

Don’t start out worrying about the marketing message. Just think about your prospect and how you want them to move from where they are right now (before they buy from you) to the story’s happy ending, where because they found your product or service, they’re in a much better place.

There are stages within the story/journey. Let’s look at those stages and how a hypothetical business might build out the story.

The first stage is the status quo: In my example, the hero of my story (my prospect) is a 55-year-old woman who is dealing with her aging father. She suspects her dad is showing signs of early dementia, but it may also just be forgetfulness.

The next stage is the challenge: The daughter is spending more time caring for her dad but wants dad to be able to stay in his own home because she promised her mom she’d watch over her dad, and moving him into a nursing home feels like she isn’t doing that. But it’s getting tougher to keep him home every day.

Next comes the refusal of the challenge: This is where our hero feels stuck. She wants her dad to be healthy and not need her to make this decision. What if she makes the wrong decision and doesn’t keep her promise to her mom? What if she leaves him at home and he falls when she’s not there? Or what if she chooses the wrong nursing home and he gets inadequate care?

This next stage is critical. It’s where our hero meets the wise sidekick: The daughter spends more time on the internet, looking for ideas and guidance for caring for her father. She finds a local nursing home’s website that is organized in a way that she can understand. It offers tips and resources for keeping a loved one at home. It has assessments so someone could gauge whether or not staying in the home was a safe and practical solution. It has a list of questions to ask every nursing home to assess each facility and find the perfect fit for your loved one.

This site also had testimonials from real people (with their names included) talking about the care their loved one received at this particular facility. It offered caregiver support groups for anyone in the community, regardless of whether their loved one was still at home or even at another facility.

None of this felt like a sales pitch because it was built to help site visitors genuinely make the right decision for their family. The sage sidekick demonstrated over and over again both their expertise/knowledge and their compassion with empathy for the family member dealing with this situation.

This is the pivotal moment in the story. Will the hero trust the sage sidekick enough to engage them? Will they decide they must continue the journey but invite the sidekick to join them?

And like any good story, we’ll stop here at this cliffhanging moment. I’ll wrap up the deep dive into the journey part of storytelling by finishing this example next time.

This was originally published in the Des Moines Business Record, as one of Drew’s weekly columns.

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Your brand is the sidekick to your customer

November 25, 2020

As we continue to explore the concept of storytelling within marketing, we’re going to turn our attention to you today. Previously, we discovered that you/your brand is not the hero of the story. This is something many brands get wrong. You have to make your customer the hero of the story. They need to see themselves in the current reality, fighting whatever the adversary may be. But a critical part of any story is who goes on the journey with the hero.

In Harry Potter, that would have been Hermione; in Star Wars, it was Yoda and Obi-Wan. In your story – it’s you.

If we were truly constructing a story, we’d begin to define and describe the sidekick so we could portray them authentically within the story. If you google sidekick archetypes, you’ll see models that offer up seven to 11 or so distinct types of sidekicks.

Let’s take a look at some of the most useful archetypes.

The innocent: They’re trusting, optimistic, and wholesome. This character reminds us to slow down and enjoy the journey. A great example would be Coke or Dove.

The hero: This brand saves the day. They’re fearless and fight alongside the story’s hero to beat the foe. FedEx’s old brand – when it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight was a smart hero brand.

The everyman: This sidekick is comfortable because they’re approachable and don’t take themselves too seriously. They’re fair and have high values and integrity. Budweiser and Levis are good examples of this archetype.

The lover: This archetype is all about the relationship so loyalty, connection, and commitment are crucial. They have an enthusiastic appetite for life. Brands that are indulgences like Godiva or are all about expressing emotions like Hallmark are lover archetypes.

The caregiver: The name says it all. This archetype is all about giving care with incredible compassion, generosity, and with fierce protectiveness. Good examples include Johnson & Johnson and Volvo.

The rebel: Rebels are unconventional, outrageous and a little radical. They fight the establishment and often march to the beat of their own drum. But they are forgiven for this brash behavior because they are unfailingly honest and courageous. Harley Davidson and Des Moines based Raygun are excellent examples.

The magician: Magicians are the dreamers who inspire transformation and a sense of wonder. They have incredible charisma and curiosity and can help others see the dream. As you might imagine, Disney is an ideal example.

The sage: They are the source of wisdom, direction, and answers. They seek truth and knowledge but balance that left side of their brain with a deep understanding of how humans function and change. Mayo Clinic and PBS are sage archetypes.

The explorer: These characters are all about adventures, being independent and self-sufficient, and will satisfy their curiosity through new experiences and perspectives. Jeep is the ultimate explorer archetype.

Just like people are not a single personality trait, your brand won’t be either. But you will have a dominant type and a couple of supporting archetypes. Think of your dominant archetype as the headline and central point of any communications piece. The supporting types can show up in the body copy as proof points.

What makes this so compelling is the emotional connection that you can create between these archetypes and your audience. We know all buying is emotionally based so that connection, or lack thereof, will move the prospect closer to actually buying or show them that you’re not a good fit, and they’ll move on faster. Either outcome is good for you.

Next time we’ll delve into the journey that the hero (your customer) and the sidekick (you) go on together.

This was originally published in the Des Moines Business Record, as one of Drew’s weekly columns.

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Storytelling 2.0

November 11, 2020

As marketers, we are continually being told that we should tell stories. But what exactly does that mean?

It’s recommended that we use one of the 14 character archetypes (the rebel, the outsider, the warrior, etc.) so the audience can relate to us. Then, we should make the customer the hero. And of course, we should follow one of the seven story frameworks (the quest, the rebirth, etc.) to build our stories, so they feel like a book or movie.

But even if we do all of that, is the audience going to care about a story featuring our product or service? If that were the case, wouldn’t most TV shows be about diapers or SUVs?

Let’s go back to our advertising roots and look at how storytelling and marketing first got blended together. Benton & Bowles was an agency based in New York that was launched in 1929 by William Benton and Chester Bowles. One of their largest clients at the time was Procter and Gamble. In a world we would struggle to understand, their challenge was that they didn’t have a channel that would allow them to reach enough of their target audience – homemakers.

Their solution was brilliant. There was no channel that attracted their core audience, so they created one.

They invented the radio soap opera so they could create sponsorships and ad placements for P&G and their other clients who wanted to target homemakers with their message. By 1936, they were responsible for three of the four most popular radio shows on the air, including “As the World Turns.”

When television arrived, Benton & Bowles replicated their radio success and launched a TV version of their most popular show, “As the World Turns,” in 1956 specifically for their client Procter & Gamble.

P&G sponsored or advertised on that show until it was canceled in 2010. Somewhere along the way, the network bought the show from Benton & Bowles, but they negotiated P&G’s exclusivity as part of the deal.

Red Bull is a modern version of the Benton & Bowles philosophy of creating media channels and telling stories that their audience wants to hear.

They didn’t buy ads or tell stories about their energy drink. They dug in deep and tried to learn all they could about their target audience, 18- to 35-year-old males. They started just hanging around them at college parties, coffee shops, libraries, and bars, paying attention to the conversations, passions, and worries of their audience. They handed out samples and listened.

From there, they started sponsoring events that appealed to that same audience. Concerts and extreme sporting events were high on their list, but even that wasn’t enough. They decided they wanted to own the channel to elevate their ability to tell stories. They created their own magazine, the Red Bulletin, in 2005.

They cover sports, culture, music, nightlife, entrepreneurship, and lifestyle stories. The focus is on people 18-35 who accomplish extraordinary achievements, move beyond the norm, test their limits, and passionately seek adventures while breaking new ground.

If you ever flip through their magazine, you’ll notice there is minimal mention of the product. Their Instagram account has over 13 million followers, and every photo is an extreme sports moment (with a lot of athletes wearing Red Bull logo apparel!).

In your head, I suspect you’re saying, “Yeah, but they’re Red Bull. That wouldn’t work for us because we sell X.” Think this strategy won’t work for B2B? Next time, I’ll show you a remarkable example of just how well it is working.

From there, we’re going to talk about how you can begin to tell your story in a way that attracts your ideal audience, holds their attention, and creates customer loyalty.

This was originally published in the Des Moines Business Record, as one of Drew’s weekly columns.

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How to market when no one is listening

October 14, 2020

We are in unprecedented times. As our country and state continue to deal with whatever the coronavirus throws at us, it’s a little tough to be thinking about your next marketing tactic.

I want to remind you that this isn’t actually the first time most of us have seen a season like this. 9/11 and the Great Recession were very similar. Events outside of our control had an incredible impact on the economy, our businesses, families, and personal finances. This particular threat feels even more imposing because we’re also facing a health concern.

The country will survive this. The question is – how will businesses fare? There’s no doubt that companies have been harmed. Our goal is for you to mitigate as much of the risk as possible and prepare your organization for the calm that always comes after the storm.

That’s the good news – no storm rages on forever. There’s always a calm that comes after the storm has run out of steam. We’ll get to that point too, just like we did after 9/11 and the recession. But first, we have to do all we can to survive the storm.

How do you market when no one is listening, and even if they are, they’re probably not in a position to buy? It’s time to move to a long-term strategy. What you do now isn’t about immediate sales. It’s about making a sale in six months or a year.

This is not the time to capitalize on the situation. We’ve already seen opportunists re-tooling their marketing to seize the opportunity. When people are in panic mode, they don’t react well to feeling taken advantage of by someone they thought they could trust.

No sale or coupon is going to get people to care about what you have to sell right now unless it’s a necessity as they wait out this storm.

It’s time to shift entirely into “be of service” mode. It’s time to focus your attention, time, and efforts into helping your customers, prospects, and employees through this season.

How can you help? That’s the question to keep asking yourself. What can you do that will genuinely be of service to your most important audiences?

Let me give you an example.

Shine Distillery & Grill, a small distillery in Portland, OR found a unique way to help. The first batch of alcohol in their distilling process isn’t drinkable. They’ve been throwing it away after using a little bit of it as a cleaning agent to keep their facilities shiny and disinfected.

At the onset of the pandemic, as they watched people scrambling to find hand sanitizer, it occurred to them that they might be able to help others during the coronavirus. They reached out to local authorities to find out what they would have to do to use their waste alcohol as a sanitizer. Turns out as long as they’re not making medical claims – they can bottle it and give it away. It’s an 80% alcohol solution that is well above the CDC’s 60% recommendation.

Maybe you can’t replicate that. But perhaps you can create some financial relief through a payment program for your customers and then build a communication strategy around that. Perhaps you can hold educational webinars that help your prospects, and customers save money or serve their customers better in this odd moment in time. What if you gave your smaller customers access to some of the perks that your more prominent clients enjoy?

That’s being of service without remuneration. For now. I believe that kind of generosity is our marketing mandate right now.

Be of service.

This was originally published in the Des Moines Business Record, as one of Drew’s weekly columns.

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How do I pick you out of the crowd?

September 30, 2020

A few summers ago, my daughter and I spent some time in South Africa on a safari. When we first got there, all of the zebras pretty much looked the same, other than their relative size. But as we looked more closely (and our guides patiently pointed it out), we began to recognize that every zebra’s stripes are unique, like fingerprints.

I commented that it would have been a lot easier to pick out a specific zebra if they each had a single stripe of a unique color. They would have been easy to identify, even from a distance.

To your consumers, when they look at you and your competitors in the early stages of their buying process, you’re like that zebra herd, with all of the animals looking pretty much the same. One of the most crucial elements of your marketing plan is being very specific about how you are different from everyone else. We need to paint one of your stripes a unique color.

Today, we are going to focus on how to make sure your prospects can pick you out of the crowd.

This is not a stay on the surface activity. If all of your competitors can claim the same point of difference (i.e., it’s our people, we partner with our clients, we truly care, etc.), then it actually is not a point of difference.

To identify what genuinely makes you unique, you have to drill deeper than those surface statements that, in fairness, are true about most good businesses including our competitors. You have to ask some tougher questions if you want to get to a truth that only you can own. If all of your competitors can say “we do that too” then it is not unique enough.

The way to get started is to ask yourself these questions:

Is there something unique about our business model and how we deliver our product/services? (Do you embed an employee into your client’s office or do you get compensated based on their sales success?)

Do we have knowledge or expertise that most people do not have? (Are your employees all nurses, so they have incredible medical knowledge or have all of your travel agents been to Africa?)

Do you take a common element in your industry and do it to an extreme? (Do you give away free soda and sunscreen at your theme park or do you donate a pair of socks to the homeless for every pair of socks you sell?)

Is your business taking a delivery element and re-inventing it? (Are your bank branches open until 8 pm or does your team stay onsite for a day to make sure everyone is trained on your equipment?)

Is your product or service genuinely different than what your competitors’ sell? (Is your seed a new hybrid that you just created or are you using artificial intelligence in a way that no one has imagined before?)

Don’t let features and benefits fool you. They are rarely what makes your business, product, or service unique.

This is not an easy exercise, which is why most companies can’t articulate what really makes them different. If you are willing to go to the effort to uncover your distinct position or create one if there isn’t one in place – your marketing is about to get much simpler.

This was originally published in the Des Moines Business Record as one of Drew’s weekly columns.

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2021 Planning Deconstructed

September 23, 2020

Big, small, for-profit, or not for profit – every organization needs a marketing plan, and that marketing plan requires a refresh every year. Now is the time to get your ducks in a row for 2021. The channels, audience expectations, and possibilities are changing faster than we can keep pace. A three-year-old marketing plan is absolutely obsolete.

Many businesses don’t even venture down the marketing plan route because they assume it has to be complicated and complex. The truth is, for most companies, even if they had such a plan, they wouldn’t execute against it because it had too many bells and whistles. I’d much rather see you oversimplify your plan and actually use it.

I want to look at the big picture vision of your marketing plan. If I asked you how confident you were that you could hop in your car and get to the destination, what’s the first thing you would say? It depends on the destination! If it’s Minneapolis, no problem. If it is Hong Kong, we have an issue. In that context, it seems absurd that I would ask you to get to an undisclosed destination, and yet that’s how many businesses run.

Without a doubt, the most crucial element of your 2021 marketing plan is the defined destinations. I use the plural because every plan should have more than one. Ask yourself these questions to define where you’re headed.

What metric will best define success when it comes to new customers for my business? Don’t assume it’s about more. It might be about bigger. Or a different composition. Or a whole new segment.

What metric will best define success when it comes to current customers of my business? Is it that they stay longer (retention)? It could also be that you have a bigger share of their wallet/spend. It might not have anything to do with sales. It could be that they become a more vocal, insistent referral source or an active source of five-star reviews and ratings.

What metric will define success when you look at your department or company’s workforce? It could be tied to improvements and enhancements in their skills or knowledge. For many businesses, the retention of key employees might be vital to a healthy 2021.

Finally, you need to define success in terms of your actual products and services. You might be planning on launching something new in 2021. Or you may want to have more of your customers using a specific service or bundle of products. Success may be tied to how many products or services your average customer buys.

Once you have defined success in these four core areas, you can begin to identify the potential barriers to achieving those goals. Is it a lack of awareness? Price issues? A competitive advantage that you don’t currently have?

If you can’t identify the potential barriers, you have some work to do before you can decide which marketing tactics will help you. It makes no sense to execute marketing if you don’t understand both where you are trying to go and what’s in the way of you getting there.

The more specific your answers, the better. Don’t just say the marketplace is crowded. List the key competitors and their position or influence on the market. Don’t just say your customers are hard to reach. Define what is in between you and that decision-maker.

If you put in the time and effort in these four core areas, I promise that you will have a great start on a marketing plan that you can dive right into executing.

This was originally published in the Des Moines Business Record, as one of Drew’s weekly columns.

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New Report Finds That Brand Leaders Are Seeking More Media Cohesion

September 17, 2020

New CMO Council research provides insight on creating more effective integration between public relations and marketing

Today, the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council, produced in partnership with Cision, published a new report – Bridging the Gap for Comms & Marketing: Building Cohesion in the Age of Customer Disruption. The new report details the best practices and technologies for overcoming the challenges that brand leaders face when aligning marketing and comms teams. The insights are based on a survey of over 150 brand leaders and nearly a dozen in-depth interviews with executives from companies including IBM, Nokia, Schneider Electric, Lamps Plus, Certified First, Center for Creative Leadership, R&R Partners and InnerWorkings. Download the full report.

Bridging the Gap for Comms & Marketing highlights the importance of consistent messaging across paid, owned and earned media.

Topics that emerged from the study include:

• The future of the marketing-comms relationship
• The primary challenges when aligning marketing and comms
• Which technologies and solutions help drive cohesion

The misunderstanding of roles and media channels

Brand leaders surveyed for the report also addressed how COVID-19 increased the importance to deliver cohesive messaging. “With the majority of the world now spending significantly more time at home, consumption, sharing, and engaging with digital media has only increased,” said Donovan Neale-May, Executive Director of the CMO Council.

“In many cases, digital media now singularly impacts buying decisions and how consumers feel about brands, only amplifying the importance of consistent messaging across media channels. Yet over half of respondents agreed that when it comes to amplifying and aligning media strategies, there isn’t strong alignment between their teams.”

Other key survey findings include:

• Nearly 2/3 brand leaders felt they’re effective at integrating and amplifying earned media to drive customer experience and engagement strategies
• 81% of brand leaders said the change in global business climate due to the pandemic has led to a definite rise in earned media efforts and importance

One out of five marketing leaders were dissatisfied with their earned media performance

“In order for organizations to achieve true integration between marketing and comms, they must first attain collaboration within the one constant both teams can agree upon: data. Both teams need to treat data as the source of truth and have someone with the skills to interpret that data as it relates to specific KPIs in order to understand progress and ROI,” said Maggie Lower, Cision’s Chief Marketing Officer. “Cision’s own partnership with The CMO Council validates the opportunities that can arise when PR and marketing work together.”

For more information and to download the full report here.

CMO Council, in partnership with Cision, will host a webinar – Shifting the Content Game – on September 23rd to discuss the report findings in further detail. Learn more and register here.

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You didn’t get there on your own

September 16, 2020

One of the contributors to every organization’s success is the business partners that come alongside us to serve our clients better. Most businesses are reasonably good at showing their appreciation for customers. But the vendors who often save the day don’t always get showered with the thanks they deserve.

One of the truths of being in business is that sooner or later our clients get in a jam and we have the opportunity to save the day for them. But we rarely do that without an assist. I think in those moments, we probably gush with praise. As we should. But in the calm of “normal” workdays, our business partners are often the unsung heroes.

Harvard Business School and Wharton published research that shows that expressing your gratitude can result in a huge spike in a vendor or partner’s investment and willingness to help your business when you are in a jam. And if there is a given, it’s that we’re going to be presented with the opportunity to help a client navigate their way out of a mess.

I’ve seen some really wonderful ways that businesses express their gratitude to those save the day partners. But the common thread that connects all of them is that they’re intentional and calendared. If we don’t assign it that level of importance, it will get lost in the chaos of our day.

The suggestions below are not new ideas. And you’ve probably done some of all of them once or twice. What I am suggesting is that you magnify that occasional burst of gratitude by systemizing them. Which one of these, or a variation of one, would work for your organization?

Send your thanks up the chain: When someone at one of your partner companies goes above and beyond, don’t just thank them, send a note (not an email) or letter, celebrating what their teammate did. Let them know that the extra effort is what you value most about your work with their company and how it has earned your confidence and loyalty.

What if you identified one partner a month to celebrate with a letter to their boss? Get it on your calendar, so it actually happens.

Create connections: There isn’t a business you work with that isn’t looking for new customers. If they’ve been a rock star for you, odds are they can deliver that same level of service to other businesses in your network.

Do you send out a monthly newsletter? Or hold a holiday party for clients and prospects? Why not spotlight a vendor who is worthy of some extra praise?

Invite them in: One of the most impressive ways to thank a good business partner is to be a better customer. Why not ask your best vendors to help you refine the way you work with them? I’m guessing they have some pretty interesting ideas that will help you bring even more value to your customers, make your processes smoother, and elevate your product or services.

This could be a monthly or quarterly initiative. Ask your team who has demonstrated a depth of expertise that you could tap into and invite them in. This collaborative brainstorming will make your company better and deepen the relationship you have with that partner.

We should thank our vendors because it’s the right thing to do. But if you need more incentive, just remember that there’s another jam around the corner, and our business partners can be our best referral sources.

Gratitude can be your business’ superpower when it’s heartfelt and shared liberally. Give it a go.

This was originally published in the Des Moines Business Record, as one of Drew’s weekly columns.

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Give your message some space

September 9, 2020

This past fall, I was able to spend some time in New York City and was able to catch several Broadway shows. Some were musicals, and some were dramas. Some were based on real-life events, and others were pure fiction. Some featured award-winning, famous actors and others did not. Some were set in modern-day, and others harkened back to an earlier time.

To say they were all very different would be an understatement. But all of them had one thing in common. Each one was roomy. What I mean by that is each show gave the audience plenty of room to absorb the message.

The sets were simple and more representative than actual. For example, in Come From Away, twelve chairs were a plane, a path, and a church. To Kill A Mockingbird, two tables and four chairs were a courtroom. The dialogue was deliberate, and the silences were purposeful and effective. It occurred to me that we could learn from these masterful playwrights and directors.

One of the common mistakes we make as marketers is trying to pack five pounds of message into a one-pound bag. We end up drowning our core messages with noise in a desire to include everything. My recent experiences as an audience member reminded me that when we do that, we actually weaken our messages because they don’t have room to breathe, grow, or take hold.

The truth is that our audience is only going to remember one or two key points of any marketing message. Given the barrage of marketing messages out there, we can help our audience get the main point by not complicating the delivery so they can grasp and retain the message easier and faster.

There are some ways we can minimize the noise and give our core message the room it needs.

Visuals: One of the common missteps I see in ads, websites, tradeshow booths, and collateral material is the reliance on the photo montage. Rather than letting one visual stand alone and deliver the message, we feel compelled to use multiple images. That means the audience’s attention is immediately divided. Each photo or visual is smaller and has less impact.

White space: Another way we demonstrate our lack of conviction in our product or service is by using up every inch of space in a layout. We’re so worried that we’re not going to catch or keep someone’s attention that we need to add a starburst, five different font families, a headline, subhead, body text, bullet points, and some bold and underlined words as well.

Instead, we create a blur for our audience and force them to decipher what is most important … if they’re willing to invest the time.

Words: How do you leave room when it comes to words? There are a few ways. First – use fewer of them. Don’t tell them what you want them to know, and then tell them what you told them, and then sum it up by telling them again. Just say it. Say it boldly and clearly. And then, shut up.

Let your audience have time and space with your message so they can connect to it and assign it meaning that is relevant to them. Or, in some cases, decide that you aren’t relevant to them at all, and move on. Either outcome is better than having no impact.

It takes incredible confidence in your product or service to execute on this idea of giving your marketing message some space. If you lack that assurance, more words or pictures probably isn’t going to cut it. Instead, you probably need to take a step back and ask what would need to change so you could get comfortable giving your message a little bit of white space.

This was originally published in the Des Moines Business Record, as one of Drew’s weekly columns.

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Viral is an elusive state

September 2, 2020

Pre-COVID, my daughter and I flew to Vegas to see a Lady Gaga concert. We were fortunate and had terrific seats. Right before the show started, security walked Bradley Cooper to the seats directly in front of us. As you probably know, he and Lady Gaga co-starred in A Star is Born and everyone was abuzz about their chemistry in the film.

Oddly, most people didn’t notice him there. As the concert started, we surmised that she might call him up on stage to sing with her so when she sat down at her piano and began to talk about a friend of hers, I was ready. From our unique vantage point, I caught the moment on video and uploaded it to my Facebook news feed before we left the venue.

Over 10,000 views, 50+ shares, and hundreds of reactions and comments later on Facebook, it certainly caught the attention of my audience. I was just sharing a cool experience that my daughter and I had with my Facebook friends, but it quickly went way beyond that. Because of our unique placement in the audience, over the course of the next couple of days, we showed up on The Today Show, Entertainment Tonight, and a bunch of other news outlets, and the video was exposed to more and more people.

On a very micro scale, it went viral. Not intentionally, but it certainly got more attention than most. For many marketers, creating a video for the business or client and having it catch fire is the holy grail. We all want to launch the next ice bucket challenge, but it’s rarely manufactured. It usually is lightning in a bottle sort of magic. Let’s use my Lady Gaga video to dissect this a little bit.

Timeliness matters: If I had shared my version of what happened at the concert a few days after it happened, no one would have cared. My video was share-worthy because no one but the people at the show knew it had happened and there was no official Lady Gaga issued video of the event yet. My video was live 15 minutes after the concert ended.

If you want your video to take off and it’s tied to a moment or event – there’s no time to finesse the edit or run it by legal. You either can go live immediately, or you risk sacrificing your edge.

It’s tied to a more significant reason or cultural hot button: A Star is Born was a huge movie, the Oscar nominations had come out four days before, and both Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga were nominated. On top of all that, they’d never performed the song (Shallow) live before. All of those factors contributed to the interest level.

The Ice Bucket Challenge was tied to a charity and a crazy stunt which also added an element of participation, which the Lady Gaga video did not.

It captures something unexpected: No one who bought a ticket to that concert thought Bradley Cooper might show up. It was a fluke event, and that was part of the appeal. Think of the videos of the kid on gas after being at the dentist or the cat frightened by a cucumber. One of the reasons we share them is because they surprise and delight us. That’s pretty tough to manufacture.

Video is a very effective marketing channel, but the odds of us creating something that goes viral are pretty slim. If you happen to be in the right place at the right time – take full advantage and leverage it for all you can. But we need to stop trying to create something that is, almost by design, a freak event.

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