Read Flying Kites, my new weekly column beginning this Saturday in the Okanagan Saturday newspaper delivered throughout the Okanagan Valley.
Next week, I'm back with more blog posts... next time the topic for discussion? Demographics! Yuck!
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Monday, January 18, 2010
New Columns Beginning in The Kelowna Daily Courier
I've taken this week off, reluctantly neglecting the blog as I prepare columns for a new weekly edition starting in February in The Kelowna Daily Courier.
Starting in February I'll be working double-time preparing columns for 'Propelling Brands' as well as keeping up with my newspaper deadline.
Lots to come, so stay tuned!
Starting in February I'll be working double-time preparing columns for 'Propelling Brands' as well as keeping up with my newspaper deadline.
Lots to come, so stay tuned!
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Choo Choo, Hop On Board
I love marketing, especially the strategic and creative end of the business. I spend every day, coffee in hand, thinking up new stuff to battle old problems. That's what marketing is really all about. The field of problems facing marketers never really changes. It's the goal posts we call solutions that keep moving on us.
For a brief period some years ago (about an hour and a half) I worked in media sales. I was fortunate at the time to have been working for a Sales Manager whom I still consider to be a media sales guru. He would conduct regular two-hour weekly sales training sessions, many of the principles from which I still use today.
I remember one session during which we were presented the video of a seminar conducted by a well known consultant down south named Don Beveridge. Beveridge is a fellow who consults with major corporations like Ford and Burger King, providing them guidance and advice to improve their businesses.
In the video, Beveridge described a common shortcoming years ago of the auto industry which, in marketing new products each year, would rely on something Beveridge refers to as "the next big thing".
He described the mentality of auto makers who, in an effort to stimulate consumer interest, would look at what all the other auto manufacturers were doing trying to find and subsequently copy whatever the next big thing was going to be for the upcoming year.
"Chrysler's introducing fins... we should do fins... fins are the next big thing!"
While marketers are supposed to be the innovators, creating new ideas and new ways to drive consumer interest, all too often I find marketers can be as guilty of jumping on board the 'next big thing' express train as everybody else.
Today's 'next big thing' for marketers is a little something we like to call social marketing, often driven by a little something else we like to call social media.
Talk to any advertising agency today and they'll tell you all about their expertise in social marketing. They'll introduce you to their social marketing team, their social marketing portfolio, their social marketing process, they'll even pour you a cup of their social marketing blend coffee!
It's the thing every business wants, even though few know what they want it for or how to use it.
Take a look at the social media scene and sites like Facebook. Facebook is littered these days with businesses, all of whom feel it necessary to have a Facebook page though few know what to do with it once they have it.
Twitter is the same. It wasn't long ago the average person couldn't even tell you what Twitter was. There was even a telecom commercial this past year which poked fun at the fact that few people understood Twitter.
Suddenly today, businesses everywhere are flocking to Twitter in droves, setting up accounts and desperately posting anything they can think of in the hopes of being seen as hip by engaging in social media culture.
TWEET: "I just picked up a new client"
TWEET: "I just came back from the bank"
TWEET: "I just poured milk into my coffee"
TWEET: "I just stapled my hand to my desk"
TWEET: "I just realized how chronically boring I really am"
Social media isn't simply the 21st century version of newspaper advertising. Social marketing isn't simply a cool new way to describe flogging your wares.
Social marketing and social media are about people communicating with people. In the old days we used to call it "a conversation". Social media is simply a forum to stimulate a 21st century, hi-tech version of that social "conversation".
The part missed by most businesses seeking to use social media to conduct social marketing, is the need to actually inject compelling substance into the conversation.
Imagine standing at a cocktail party, martini in hand. You see a face you recognize across the room. What's the likelihood you'd just walk up and blurt out "Hey Bob, it's me Bill... I do duct cleaning. Can I clean your ducts?"
Of course you wouldn't, especially if your name wasn't Bill and you didn't do duct cleaning.
Instead, you would be more likely to stir up a conversation that engages your cocktail party partner and stimulates them to participate in a discussion. Only when the subject of duct cleaning is raised, as it always inevitably is at cocktail parties, would you consider inserting a plug for yourself and your duct cleaning business.
To put it more simply, if advertising is s statement, social marketing is a question.
Used well, social marketing can be terrific. Used ineffectively, social marketing will be seen as a contrivance and may, in its worst form, do more damage to your credibility than good.
So my advice in this column is to hop on board that social marketing express train, just make sure you know where the train is going, pack appropriately for the trip and above all else, keep your eyes peeled for the soon to be phenomenon of 3D holographic morse code... I hear it's the next big thing!
For a brief period some years ago (about an hour and a half) I worked in media sales. I was fortunate at the time to have been working for a Sales Manager whom I still consider to be a media sales guru. He would conduct regular two-hour weekly sales training sessions, many of the principles from which I still use today.
I remember one session during which we were presented the video of a seminar conducted by a well known consultant down south named Don Beveridge. Beveridge is a fellow who consults with major corporations like Ford and Burger King, providing them guidance and advice to improve their businesses.
In the video, Beveridge described a common shortcoming years ago of the auto industry which, in marketing new products each year, would rely on something Beveridge refers to as "the next big thing".
He described the mentality of auto makers who, in an effort to stimulate consumer interest, would look at what all the other auto manufacturers were doing trying to find and subsequently copy whatever the next big thing was going to be for the upcoming year.
"Chrysler's introducing fins... we should do fins... fins are the next big thing!"
While marketers are supposed to be the innovators, creating new ideas and new ways to drive consumer interest, all too often I find marketers can be as guilty of jumping on board the 'next big thing' express train as everybody else.
Today's 'next big thing' for marketers is a little something we like to call social marketing, often driven by a little something else we like to call social media.
Talk to any advertising agency today and they'll tell you all about their expertise in social marketing. They'll introduce you to their social marketing team, their social marketing portfolio, their social marketing process, they'll even pour you a cup of their social marketing blend coffee!
It's the thing every business wants, even though few know what they want it for or how to use it.
Take a look at the social media scene and sites like Facebook. Facebook is littered these days with businesses, all of whom feel it necessary to have a Facebook page though few know what to do with it once they have it.
Twitter is the same. It wasn't long ago the average person couldn't even tell you what Twitter was. There was even a telecom commercial this past year which poked fun at the fact that few people understood Twitter.
Suddenly today, businesses everywhere are flocking to Twitter in droves, setting up accounts and desperately posting anything they can think of in the hopes of being seen as hip by engaging in social media culture.
TWEET: "I just picked up a new client"
TWEET: "I just came back from the bank"
TWEET: "I just poured milk into my coffee"
TWEET: "I just stapled my hand to my desk"
TWEET: "I just realized how chronically boring I really am"
Social media isn't simply the 21st century version of newspaper advertising. Social marketing isn't simply a cool new way to describe flogging your wares.
Social marketing and social media are about people communicating with people. In the old days we used to call it "a conversation". Social media is simply a forum to stimulate a 21st century, hi-tech version of that social "conversation".
The part missed by most businesses seeking to use social media to conduct social marketing, is the need to actually inject compelling substance into the conversation.
Imagine standing at a cocktail party, martini in hand. You see a face you recognize across the room. What's the likelihood you'd just walk up and blurt out "Hey Bob, it's me Bill... I do duct cleaning. Can I clean your ducts?"
Of course you wouldn't, especially if your name wasn't Bill and you didn't do duct cleaning.
Instead, you would be more likely to stir up a conversation that engages your cocktail party partner and stimulates them to participate in a discussion. Only when the subject of duct cleaning is raised, as it always inevitably is at cocktail parties, would you consider inserting a plug for yourself and your duct cleaning business.
To put it more simply, if advertising is s statement, social marketing is a question.
Used well, social marketing can be terrific. Used ineffectively, social marketing will be seen as a contrivance and may, in its worst form, do more damage to your credibility than good.
So my advice in this column is to hop on board that social marketing express train, just make sure you know where the train is going, pack appropriately for the trip and above all else, keep your eyes peeled for the soon to be phenomenon of 3D holographic morse code... I hear it's the next big thing!
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