Just Not on Weekends

You know that slogan that has hung in USPS offices and depots around our country: “Neither rain nor sleet, nor gloom of night, nor hail shall keep the postman from their appointed rounds.” Well, it seems to be headed for the scrap heap.

Just this past week, the Postmaster General, John Potter, reported to a Washington meeting of congressional staffers a bevy of bad news. Seems that unless the congress acts quickly… the USPS is estimating that they will lose $238 billion dollars over the next 10 years. Yes, BILLIONS of dollars in LOSSES in the coming decade.

What is going on here?

Potter claims that in just the past year, the USPS has seen a drop in its signature product; first class mail down 26 billion pieces and, as such, that the agency has lost $3.8 billion during that period.  The forecast is, according to the Postal Service, that the decline in first class mail volume will only grow steeper in the coming years. The agency finally admits that is it “unlikely” that mail volume will “ever” return to pre-recession levels. Potter does believe that he can turn things around with the help of lawmakers… who basically will allow him to change the game in terms of customer service and delivery. This includes an end to Saturday delivery… more layoffs … more postal office closings around the country, etc.

If there is any humor in all of this… it is the fact that the Postmaster General enlisted the help of Boston Consulting Group and McKinsey, spending $4.8 million for research to create “50 options” for turning the dire conditions at the Postal Service around.  I don’t delight in the fact that taxpayer money is being used to overanalyze the current market conditions. Once again, there are groups of individuals in our economy that continue to act as if the digital age is a passing fancy, and govern as if there has not been a fundamental and irreversible shift in human communications. As much as some of us want to opine and reminisce about the nostalgia of yesteryear…the I ongoing belief system that communications of all kind, whether interpersonal or commercial ,will revert back to the 1980’s is foolhardy at best….dangerous in the most extreme.

The fundamental problem with the US postal service is that people just like you and I are joined with the majority of consumers who are paying most of our bills online. I can’t remember the last time I put a 42 cent stamp on an envelope and paid a bill.  Technology has devastated the core of first class mail which has always been bill presentment and payment. The ease and security built into linking your checking account with online bill pay is not debatable. It is fact.  If anyone believes that the generations to come are going to return to the old method of paying bills….it’s just not factually accurate.  I know… I know… there will always be people who will challenge this view by saying “not everyone” uses an EZ Pass when paying bridge and tunnel tolls. Not everyone who smokes dies of cancer. Not everyone that eats too many calories gets fat, etc. However, I would believe that my friends over at Boston Consulting and McKinsey wouldn’t need to spend a lot of consulting time proving out that this trend away from print and postage is only gaining steam as we move forward into this decade.

The fact is, email and social media have had a profound impact on the postal service. Think about the number of emails that you send to friends and colleagues during the average day. It’s incredible. All of that traffic on Twitter and Facebook and other locations on the blogosphere that used to be postcards, greeting cards and letters from home that carried postage. Just think of the fortune it would cost you today to put a stamp on every communication you have with a friend, colleague and family member.  ALL of those communications used to go thru the postal service. Now… communication is real-time…. 24/7 and accountable. No need to wonder whether the recipient received the message. Everything in the interactive age is instantly trackable.

Marketers are getting it as well. As costs of print and postage rise… and the data that documents the acceptance and preference for digital versions of catalogs and direct mail pieces mounts…a perfect storm has been created. In a challenging economy, and with tightening margins, marketers continue to work on innovative and cost efficient means to acquire, retain and build the lifetime value of their customers. With each passing year… their target customer becomes more of an interactive consumer. Yes, there are still folks who prefer printed catalogs and direct mail pieces. However these print vehicles delivered by the postal service are no longer the primary commerce connection. Direct marketers can simply not afford to continue to spend the money they do as their audience shifts away from this medium. Sending more into the postal service mail box has not proven to be cost-effective. Rising costs on postage and printing versus shrinking margins and a highly competitive marketplace mean cost cutting and more efficient media mix is in order…. now.

Sadly, I cannot offer any real solutions to the Postmaster General and the USPS. I believe that the best that they can do is right size their organization for the market reality. The discussions around closing down post office real estate around the country can do much to lower costs. Shifting the post office facility inside of supermarkets and other retail chains makes a lot of sense. Anything that can be done to make the services…more “self serve” would be a step in the right direction. I would accelerate those moves to save as much cost as can be.  Arming more businesses with their own postal meters and machines makes a lot of sense.  And while it might seem like heresy… I believe that with all of that cost cutting, the USPS needs to bring down the cost of first class postage as an incentive for a new breed of communicators to explore new ways to leverage this service in new ways.  The USPS needs to join forces with the DMA to promote case studies on the power of postal delivery.

Do I think that any of this will work for the long term? I don’t.  I believe that the paradigm shift in human communications that we are living in…is profound and irreversible. Yes… there will always be outliers to changes in behavior… but as marketers and business people, we need to store our Pollyanna memories of days gone by in the closet and confront the new reality. We need to lean in on the interactive tools that will allow us to build the businesses of the future in new and exciting ways.  Instead of denying and bailing out… we need to go back to work in creating and innovating new ways for displaced employees and business models to remake themselves in the new world.

The end of Saturday delivery is only the beginning.  It’s time that those in denial woke up… and started confronting the real issues of life after the postal service.

Al D

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If It Doesn’t Sell It Doesn’t Work

I will always remember George Holtane. When offered the chance to work at Foster & Kleiser, a Metromedia company back then, I jumped. As a recent political science major, graduation meant a momentary celebration before the hard reality of work and the requisite need for money set in. Twelve thousand dollars a year was a lot of money. “We are going to teach you everything you need to become successful in the billboard advertising business,” said George. After a three-month indoctrination in Maspeth, Queens, mostly making leasing and roof leak calls, I was promoted to the Lexington Avenue New York office. At 485 Lex, the sales and creative team held court.

I remember vividly some of the tenured billboard sales guys…Joe Chizzini, Ray Amato, Bob Moran… telling me, ”Listen kid, keep your mouth shut and we will teach you this business. Don’t ask too many questions.” George Holtane and the cigar-smoking Dick Itanaga were two of the best creative directors in the billboard business. Dick was the brasher of the two, having little tolerance for sales types.

George had the dry humor and demeanor of Bob Newhart. Dick, George and I became fast friends. I guess because I wasn’t the typical know-it-all sales guy. I was just a “kid.”

I would love to spend time in their offices. In the days before computers, these guys were true artists, and their offices had the light boards, easels and clip art books to prove it. They made magic happen on a daily basis. George would lament to me all the time, “Those guys doing print advertising have a larger landscape to work with in order to get the job done. I have seven seconds.” He’d continue, “You are traveling down the freeway at 65 miles per hour and I have to grab your attention and sell you in seven seconds. “

“We get paid to sell stuff,” said George one day. “All of this creative work doesn’t mean anything… unless it sells.”

It was as if a light bulb went on in my head. If it doesn’t sell, it doesn’t work.

George never did win a heck of a lot of awards or accolades. He could have cared less. His creative work did sell A LOT of stuff for clients—and that was good enough for him. The many days following in my career placed me in midst of many creative agencies and directors. In all honesty… there have been times when I have found myself at odds with creative directors so obsessed with their craft that they miss the Holtane axiom. It’s not that I don’t appreciate theatre and humor in messaging. It’s just this peculiar problem that I have had all of these years. Seems like I am always questioning whether all of this creative design, copy writing, set design, etc., in the end actually rings the cash register.

I have also observed over the years that the mere thought of questioning most creative types in our industry was to be viewed as pedestrian. (“Surely you don’t understand the nuances of and the role of advertising.”) I have received more than a few “scarlet letters” as a result of having the audacity to question the performance of certain ad campaigns. Back in the advertising Stone Age, there was little measurement or analytics to measure effectiveness. Heck….in a thriving economy (remember those days?)…no one really cared a heck of a lot about performance metrics. Great campaigns were “worth the money.” Everything seemed to be selling—who cared whether or not it was because of a winning creative strategy.

There is no need to rehash the state of advertising and our economy in 2010. Suffice to say, this is age of efficiency, accountability and measurability in all aspects of advertising and marketing. To think that marketing and creative directors can perform their crafts ignoring performance metrics is foolhardy. And yet…I continue to get incoming from a band of creative directors who seem to be lost in a time warp.

Note to all you creative types out there: before you get all hot and bothered, please understand that I believe fervently that quality and relevance of messaging is central to selling more stuff for our clients. Back in the old days, creative directors were held in the loftiest of thrones within the advertising arena. Not only did they understand how to create engaging and entertaining campaigns regardless of medium, they seemed to be the only ones in the agency that knew anything about customer need. (I know that there are some of you folks who relish in the nostalgia of those days.)

In the world that we live in today, creating and designing campaigns with little or no desire to monitor effectiveness with the robust suite of analytic and performance tools available to you is criminal. We are here as professionals to provide our customers with superior service. We are charged with the responsibility of understanding our customer’s market sector, competitors and customers’ needs. Chief amongst all responsibilities is using client dollars in the most cost effective manner to “sell more stuff.”

Frankly…if it were me…I would have my analytics team sitting right next to the creative team. In the new world of advertising…your best partners would be this crew. A team that could provide historical insight on the effectiveness of various combinations of content, design, frequency and medium in moving the sales needle for your customer. Nothing wrong with being left-brain focused and high-minded about the creative process. This is in no way intended to limit the level of ingenuity and experimentation utilized in creating campaigns. It’s just that agencies need to be accountable in a new way for the bottom line inside our shops. The days of hiding behind industry plaques and awards given by other creative director associations are over. Awards are nice….but your customer wants results.

Perhaps the revolution needs to start in design and journalism schools. Courses that focus on leveraging customer profile and performance data as a foundation for creative development and execution. Reality demands a much tighter connection between analytics, design and performance. It’s pretty simple: leverage as much audience and historical data as a foundation for your messaging and design. Execute your campaign, and then be ravenous about analytic data about all aspects of the campaign’s interaction with your target customers and prospects. The tools are available today for real time performance updates.

Be in testing and tweaking mode continually, always monitoring performance and transforming campaigns to improve performance metrics. Imagine the day when you and your creative team make your next presentation to your client and demonstrate that you understand their success metrics in all areas of their marketing campaign. When you stand up and show the methodology and data that was leveraged to develop concepts as part of an ongoing learning and adjusting philosophy at your agency. The delight when you report that all of this hard work in learning and monitoring has resulted in a campaigns and executions that have sold the customer more stuff.

On that day….you will have known what George meant so many years ago.

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Digital Agency 2015: Predictions for a Changing Industry

There is little doubt that we are in the midst of one of the most profound paradigm changes within the world of human communications. The incredible and unrelenting shift of consumers and business to the internet platform continues to have a profound impact on an expansive array of related strategies, businesses and individuals. Everywhere we turn these days, there are examples of those who, having been faced with this change in the fundamentals of human connection, have failed to adjust their overall strategies to compensate for the new world order. The road is littered with organizations which have been caught up in a state of denial and have been penalized severely for their lack of innovation and creative thinking. While there may be bailouts for some industries, our own—the marketing and communications arena—is feeling the full force of this change and the casualties are mounting up. The only answer here is a radical transformation of current agency thinking and business model.

The root cause of this turmoil has been the fundamental shift in terms of consumer media consumption patterns away from legacy vehicles –the likes of direct mail, magazines, television, newpapers etc. –to a suite of interactive platforms. The agency model business and profitability model has been built on a foundation of several fee structures. Both inexorably tied to the media outlets that have been the focus of this work. Agencies have always received placement fees as a percentage of media for schedules run in costly platforms like television, newspapers, radio and magazines. Supplementing these media placement fees has been the core creative capabilities that have served to define and differentiate agencies from each other. Whether Ogilvy or Della Femina, creative directors have always been the rock stars of traditional agencies. Individuals who understood more than the unique selling propositions of their customers value offering; they had the unique ability to craft marketing execution in a format and manner that engaged prospective customers in a deep way creating brand awareness , preference and loyalty. Marketers were willing to plunk down major creative, consulting and production fees commensurate with the respective media platforms to execute the creative vision of these agencies and directors.

With an economy that for decades seemed to be on autopilot, marketers paid little attention to the cost value relationship between campaign cost and execution fees. Sales and profits seemed to be growing as a step function to overall media spending. Budgets burgeoned. Agencies increased the size of their human capital to attend to their ever supportive customer demand for new plans and strategies. Agency research departments were sure to provide clients with a steady diet of industry statistics to bolster the overall philosophy that spending aggressively and broadly to boost overall brand awareness and preference was the right thing to do. I remember those days clearly. There was very little attention paid to concepts like channel relationships, merchandising and any sense of return on investment. Few realized that the foundation was being laid for our current crisis back then. I remember being ridiculed for even questioning the relationship between dollar spend and actual unit sales generated. Not important… I was scolded.

Of course in the early 90’s the world began to change with the rise of a small and inconsequential media platform called the internet. Surely this would be the playground for the technological elite and nerd population. A small segment of the consumer population would embrace the new platform… there was no need for alarm. Some traditional agencies added interactive wings to their organizations to address the need for website and banner builds. Always being careful to relegate this discipline to secondary status within the overall agency P&L. If a customer wanted “interactive” the agency would provide the capability. In that way the legacy agency could still insulate the core legacy media P&L from any thought of dollars shifting from their clients legacy media schedule to this new platform. Surely there would be incremental budget dollars available to support this new initiative. No customer would be foolish enough to fund this distraction with dollars putting the core strategy “at risk.” The age of denial gripped the agency and marketing community at that moment. No one would accept that a day would come when that “nerdy” platform would become the pivot point for all media and communications. Even today…many believe that legacy media is going thru a “cycle,” and that someday…the pundits who are evangelizing about a return to legacy media will be “proven right.” The media landscape continues to be littered with the remains of those whose denial of reality caused not only their own demise…but that of their customers.

The Perfect Storm Comes to Pass
The stage had been set for the perfect storm. An economic recession, shift in media consumption patterns and an omnipresent era of denial collided and threw the entire industry into chaos. In every paradigm shift, the market provides for those who embrace new thinking to profit. Who would have thought that a couple of “egghead nerd types” would redefine the advertising marketplace? And yet that is exactly what Google has done to the marketing and advertising community.

With no loyalty to the old world…the folks at Google realized a fundamental requirement for consumers was their need to find products, services and information quickly and efficiently. The pre-Google internet spoke about surfing the web…an aimless journey from one website to another. Google saw the futility and frustration of a consumer who knew that the internet provided “all of the answers”…but was disorganized. Google moved past the Yahoo’s and Microsoft’s, creating a new way to find information that delighted its users. The team also figured out a dynamic way to monetize all of this searching by offering advertisers positioning at the key intersection between need and solution. The rest is the history of the systematic draining of billions of advertising dollars away from legacy media of all kinds into the search world. Dollars once within the control of traditional agencies. Funds that were once commissionable to a wide array of agencies…now suddenly gone…never to return.

Audience movement away from legacy media platforms…meant declining circulation and viewership. Advertisers have been very democratic with their media spending. Where the consumer goes…the dollars must follow. The challenge in all of this, of course, for traditional agencies has been the relative cost of interactive media and production. Placement fees for interactive media pale in comparison to that of legacy media. The major production costs around building and executing campaigns in this new world are a fraction of their broadcast grandparents. Coupled with the financial dynamic has been a dearth of agency personnel who truly “get“ the interactive pallet of offerings. Traditional agencies continue to hear the sucking sounds of budgets leaving the legacy media world to the new suite of offerings with no solution in sight.

In light of the market conditions…we are seeing two strategies deployed. The first is that many agencies are racing to add “interactive” to their names. The hope here is that if we call our agency “DiGuido Interactive,” we will be perceived to be in the center of this phenomena. The second strategy being deployed by mega-agency holding companies is a consolidation move. Here the thought is that if we build a bigger boat…we won’t feel the pain as much. The flaw in that thinking reminds me of those who were arranging deck chairs on the Titanic. My prediction is that without dramatic change in the next 24 months…we will be witness to the a era of demise and devastation within the agency business and profitability model. In the next five years…many will not survive. When we ring in the year of 2015 only few from today will be leaders.

Change is Gonna Come
The fundamental changes in the agency model that must happen in order for your company to survive may seem radical today. Like it or not…we must deal in the real world and realize that the consumer has embraced a new communications channel and will not return to the legacy world. With each passing year, those consumers that were the stalwart of the purchasing population are dying off leaving behind them a new consumer that doesn’t look at legacy print, radio, broadcast in the same way as their ancestors. To believe that your agency will continue to pivot its strategy and business model supporting the old world is a road to ruin and death. Interactive, which was always a stepchild to your legacy media practice, must now become center stage in the DNA of your company. You must start with planning strategy, media and messaging in and around the interactive platform. Legacy media can still play a role in your overall plan…but must be relegated to a supplemental role in the overall plan.

Data to Reign Supreme
One of the benefits of the economic recession has been the rise of a new level of tracking, analytics and accountability in the media and marketing world. To think that your agency can continue to command significant fees for consulting , creative and media placement without the proof that this strategy and dollars are generating the return on investment that the client demands are foolhardy. All that you recommend must be tied directly to the proof that dollars spent are moving the needle in the desired direction for your client. Take all of those creative accolades and awards down from the shelves in your lobby. The client today and much more so in 2015 really doesn’t care about all of them. Ring the cash register. Grow sales and profits for your customer in a cost-efficient and effective manner and you will be a survivor mid decade.

Never before will there be greater demand on the need for your agency to build a robust analytics and research discipline. As we have said in the past; your customer will demand a new level of accountability. As such, your research dept must work with internal planning and creative teams to insure that all of the work being done by your company for your customer is being monitored against performance and accountability standards. Planners cannot plan without an understanding of measurability and metrics of success performance standards. Creative and messaging teams cannot create without an obsession on monitoring in terms of the relationship between creative execution and customer engagement metrics. The age of prima donna and or ego driven production will be long gone replaced by a new breed of creative type that is thrilled when his or her work generates the desired result. Just think about how many folks are standing in line to plunk down billions of dollars within search engines because it makes the cash register ring.

Small is the New Big
With smaller media placement and production fees in the new world, the agency of 2015 will have a much smaller human capital component. The challenge for the HR department of your company will be to create an organization of subject matter experts in all areas of the new media world. Clients are going to demand efficiency, optimization and accountability in their programs in the years ahead. They will no longer tolerate “junior” staff of any kind within your agency. Gone is any concept that you and your team will “learn on the customer’s dime.” Clients will demand excellence from all staff members.
The new account and media team will be asked to be experts of their subject area and more importantly students of the customer’s competitive arena. Clients will rely much more on your agency to craft new and innovative strategies based on a comprehensive understand of market dynamics. All of this means that a new commitment to being students of the marketplace is in order.

The Consumer as Creative Director
The challenge to the Creative Director and team in this new world is life changing. Gone are the print and broadcast landscapes. There are a new generation of producers and script writers everywhere encouraged by the YouTube venue. The internet generation is being bombarded by creativity from all angles. The competition for consumer attention has never been more intense. All of the past credentials are now called into question. Your agency must recruit a new breed of creative and copywriting talent. Hiring evangelicals who understand how to tap into the new platform and engage fellow consumers in meaningful and directional dialogues. This may be to some of you a group of rambunctious “kids” who didn’t go to the journalism schools and/or haven’t been schooled in any of the legacy rules about what can and/or can’t be done. This the age of “no rules.” Our own research shows that consumers are less patient about campaigns. Campaigns seem not to have the same staying power that they once did….”Where’s the beef ?” Today’s consumer grows tired quickly and bored even more so. Creative folks inside your agency need to be in a constant state of innovating and creating.

Technology Takes Center Stage
Technology has always played a tangential role in the overall mix of your agency model. While I have debated many on this topic; my passion remains strident in the belief that the real winners in 2015 will be agencies that have altered their model to not only host technology solutions of their own making. I will go further that the two worlds must collide to form an agency model that builds scalable technology platforms that provide their customers the ability to centralize all of their interactive needs within one shop. Does this mean that your agency will need to have a commitment to building and maintaining an email, search engine marketing bid management, social media monitoring digital publishing, mobile messaging deployment and analytics engines. The answer is YES. Many will scoff at such a suggestion, reasoning that there will always be others who are subject matter expert based companies in these disciplines that can be contracted when the need for the solution arises. Two basic fundamental flaws in that strategy; control and margin.

Agency 2015 needs to answer the demand of the customer for optimization and accountability in the overall marketing and media plan. Without a collection of technology platforms that can share data in real time and measure collective performance…there is no way to answer the customer effectively. Have you ever tried to get disparate technologies …much less different companies talk to each other and share collective insights for the betterment of a customer ? Virtually and literally impossible. You must own up to your technology responsibility in order to succeed.

Somewhere in the last decade we lost our way in terms of the goal of our agencies. Methinks that there have been times when we forgot that we are running a “for profit” business. Our investors and employees should demand greater revenues and profits from our company. Partnering with third party vendors for solutions dilutes our margins from step one. Surely we are not blind to the fact that the new model will demand technology investment which may be sizeable. Owning versus leasing will insure revenue and profitability stability so necessary for our company in the years ahead.

The Model Goes Global
While we are on profitability….while many have read Friedman’s tome on the World is Flat…so few have truly explored and/or leveraged the global workforce to provide greater efficiency and effectiveness in providing economical solutions for our customers. Don’t believe those who continue to throw stones at offshore strategies and employees. It will take work to build the right structure and model for certain. The alternative is reduced profits and marginalization.

Charting a New Course
Very few who occupy the leadership chair at agencies today will make the cut in 2015. The new agency CEO will be a renegade and tireless cheerleader for his company and his people. He will push his people to the limits of their creativity and innovative thinking. He or she will bring new levels to performance standards in all areas of his company. The leader will look past the Fooz ball tables and funky décor of the agency to its DNA as an agent of transformation to the agency’s client. Flair will not be lost…but there will be a heck of a lot more substance. Employees drawn to Agency 2015 will have a new sense of commitment and dedication to their customer responsibility. Will the fun atmosphere and collegial atmosphere of the agency disappear? I doubt it. A new definition of fun will be a hallmark of Agency 2015. A confidence and pride in knowing that what has been delivered truly provided the customer with the solution needed to achieve their goals.

The market has provided us chaos and turmoil. It rests on all of us to move out of our comfort zones and begin anew. Tear down the old and pursue will dramatic zeal and courage this brave new world; knowing that the doubters will be everywhere spewing the FUD that characterizes those who are the laggards in our industry.

There is no white knight coming to “save” our industry. I plan on being an exciting force in the agency world in 2015. I hope that some of you will join me.

Until then.

Al D

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Relationships Matter

It’s a complicated world today…between internet, mobile, and social technologies; as a marketer it’s often difficult to know where, when and how to target your prospective customer. There seems to be an endless supply of ad networks as well as contextual and behavioral targeting solutions all promising the same thing: Target Marketing. Each solution, designed to give advertiser’s the ability to target, re-target and re-re-target their prospective customer, based primarily on behavior.

Entire industries have been built on the technologies that support these efforts. Are these methods effective? Of course they are, Forrester Research predicts that Display Advertising alone will grow 10% by 2013 in terms of marketing spend. So obviously there is ROI to be had by investing your marketing dollars here.

However, things seem to be changing yet again. Last month Ad Age Digital ran an article titled “More CPG Players Embrace E-commerce” which explained major players such as Proctor and Gamble and General Mills will be rolling out e-commerce initiatives in 2010. Big deal? Yeah, I think so. Considering P&G to date has revenues of about $500 Million across their current e-commerce sites and CEO Bob McDonald thinks that he can get to 10 times that. $5 Billion in revenue from e-commerce is certainly nothing to scoff at, even when you are doing $80 Billion a year in traditional sales.

So why would a CPG company like Proctor and Gamble want to go head to head with their own channel partners? Mr. McDonald was kind enough to provide that answer: “The eventuality is a one-on-one relationship with every consumer, and obviously e-commerce needs to be a big part of that.” Yes that’s right…the world’s largest CPG brand just identified that they need to create a one-on-one relationship with their customers.

The value of a transactional database proved to be too alluring for companies like P&G to pass up. By providing customers a away to directly interact and purchase, P&G is laying the foundation for creating a database filled with rich customer data. And with that data they can begin to create those one-to-one relationships with their customers. They will know what you bought, what you like, what you searched, what you viewed and what you dislike. Then the CPG companies can begin to communicate with their customers is an extremely relevant fashion. (Considering myself a bit of an email buff, I cannot see how email is not a tremendously valuable tool here to help CPG companies communicate with their customers.)

And if that wasn’t enough…it gets better. No longer does P&G need to have their products listed side by side with their competition as they would say, in a retail email. No, they have complete control of the branding and product listings in their messaging. Having complete control of that messaging allows marketers the ability to create a brand experience with their customer base that will foster the one-to-one relationship.

This is the essence of what we preach at Zeta, we are what you would call relevance evangelists. Look up any Al DiGuido article and you will see what I mean. Today, marketers are sitting upon a wealth of information…some choose to do nothing with it and some are getting the picture that in order to compete in today’s world you need to be relevant or you are going to be left by the wayside. Time, money and effort need to be invested to create these solutions however I think the alternative (being tuned out completely) might be a bit more costly in the long run. So when you see companies like Proctor and Gamble and General Mills, who for decades never sold directly to customers turning to e-commerce to build relationships with their customers…Hopefully you get a slight glimpse into the future. The future is digital…the future is relevant and the future is why relationships matter.

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How to scare up a traffic boost this Halloween

With Halloween fast approaching this coming Saturday, along with it comes the usual wave of last-minute costumers eager to make a cleaver, funny or scary splash on the 31st. “Halloween” is consistently trending on Twitter, and there is an exponential jump in Halloween-related searches, so now is the time for savvy marketers to pull something out of their bags of tricks.

Zeta Marketing Solutions for the Halloween holiday

• Top seasonal retailers HalloweenMart and Spirit Halloween have a web-based retail environment in dire need of a refresh.
  • HalloweenMart suffers from a bland layout, with no notable call-to-action, compounded with oversized images that further distract from the product listings.
  • Spirit is at the opposite end of the spectrum, having an overwhelming number of category listings, field entries and a harsh color scheme.
    • Create a revamped website based entirely on a dynamic usability study, whilst conforming to their established brand identity and product lines.
    • To drive additional traffic, the retailers should create some branded content for distribution directly to customers
      • Halloween-themed twitter profile templates (downloadable wallpaper, icons, color layout instructions, etc.)
      • A photo-editing suite that “Creeps-out” a portrait you upload, inserting some Halloween-themed images (smoke, bats, pumpkins, etc.) on top of your picture
• While costume retailers seem to be fairly active on twitter (smart move) the other important aspect of Halloween (Candy) has gone unrepresented.
  • Hershey’s, arguably the largest candy brand worldwide, has no active twitter presence. While they do have a corporate profile, there have been no updates at all.
  • Mars also has failed to create a Twitter profile.
    • Both brands should take obvious first steps (Create optimized twitter profiles, update constantly, and link to profile on website homepage, etc.)
    • Tweets should highlight seasonal recipes created solely with their products.
• Costumeideazone.com; the first site that appears in organic search results on Google under “Halloween Costume Ideas” should make better usage of their company Twitter account to build brand awareness and drive traffic to their site.
  • Currently the account has only 13 Tweets and 14 followers
  • To foster fans’ creativity; Costumeideazone.com should host a Twitter based contest where users submit their most unique, original and creative ideas with the winning costume being furnished by costumezone.com or a partner
    • The contest will be cross-promoted on the costumeideazone.com where users can submit their entries and ultimately vote on the winning idea
• Costumeideazone.com should offer weekly newsletters via email marketing throughout the month of October in anticipation of their highest traffic month
  • Capture visitor’s email addresses by partnering with a site that actually sells costumes such as halloweenexpress.com to offer discounts and specials

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Companies further more than their own cause during Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Organizations nationwide, both for-profit and non-profit, have taken it upon themselves to infuse Breast Cancer Awareness into their product and service lines. With companies as traditionally feminine as Estée Lauder and traditionally masculine companies like the NFL all showing their support behind the cause, this creates a unique opportunity for active companies to not just gain some good PR, but to turn increased attention into mutually beneficial arrangements with worthy charities.

Zeta Marketing Solution for Breast Cancer Awareness Month

• Companies whose target market is usually male-dominated should utilize this opportunity to target the female audience by developing charitable incentives.
  • Gamestop could donate 10% of all orders $100 or more to the NBCAM.
    • Promote this through their existing social media channels (@gamestopcorp), showing daily examples of what you could get for the required $100
      • ” Band Hero + Guitar Hero 5“
      • “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 1 + 2“

• Online retailers such as Zappos and Amazon should prominently feature breast cancer awareness products (pink colored) on landing pages and prior to checkout.
  • Low-cost items such as ribbons, magnets and stationary should be pushed during checkout, as customers will be more likely to purchase these along with larger orders than by themselves.
  • Offer free shipping on all pink items as further incentive for charitable contributions

• NBACM should develop a series of social media-applicable downloads and skins for promoting the cause.
  • Similar to green overlay developed in support of the recent Iran protest, a series of adaptable pink icons and backgrounds should be distributed so individuals can become actively involved with little cost.

Posted in Online Marketing, Social Media, Uncategorized, Zeta Buzz | No Comments »

Messaging and Conversion - The Inseparable Relationship

“Jazz That Dwells in the Present”
“Bluetooth Headsets With a Chic Factor”
“Slow Recovery Seen for Iceland”

Quickly scanning the Wall Street Journal website it occurred to me just why it is so easy to use this website and why it is so successful at converting people from scanning to reading—a significant conversion goal of any news/content oriented website. The reason for this success as that The Journal demonstrates a strong understanding of online eye-tracking and reading behaviors. This is apparent as their headlines act as engaging, truthful, relevant labels to the content that lies within.

Unfortunately many brands don’t practice this basic fundamental of online success and clutter their content with irrelevant, fluffy headlines and labels. Many of them invest a great deal in website redesign and revitalization when simply rethinking the content headlines and labels instead will measurably increase conversions, brand loyalty, and repeat site visits.

To increase online conversions brands must align with usability and messaging best practices. These best practices are derived from observing the behaviors of users performing specific website tasks. Some of my observations that every brand should know and implement in their messaging and labeling strategy includes:

• Get to the point

• Users tend to scan pages in an “F” shape pattern

• Start subheads, paragraphs, and bullet point content with information-carrying words that users will notice when scanning down the left side of your content

• Users will read the third word on a line much less often than the first two words

• Provide confidence and allow users to confidently predict what they’ll get if they click

• Users like numerals because numbers represent facts

• Do not be misleading or promise too much

• On the average Web page, users have time to read less than 28% of the words during an average visit

Posted in Brand Strategy/Creative, Conversion-friendly Design, Uncategorized | No Comments »

Bloggers Chime in on the Michael Vick Debate

The second Michael Vick removed his ankle monitoring bracelet on Monday; a very passionate and public debate began in America. Should Vick be allowed to play in the NFL again? Vick completed his 23 month sentence on federal dog fighting charges and will look to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell for reinstatement into the country’s most popular professional sporting league.

The crimes Vick committed are horrendous and will make anybody cringe just hearing about. Dog lovers and non-dog lover’s share in their disgust regarding the acts Vick and his “Bad Newz Kennel” crew carried out. Once one of the NFL’s most popular and exciting players, Vick seemingly had it all, yet he continued to engage in such horrendous behavior and ended up getting his just deserts.

On the other hand, we are a country that is famous, perhaps infamous for giving our celebrities and sports stars a second chance. Terrible crimes against humans have been committed and forgiven long before Michael Vick operated a dog fighting ring.  Vick not only forfeited his freedom, but also lost out on an estimated $70 million when the Atlanta Falcons released him. Now he has paid his dues to society and is a free man again.

Vick has to show Goodell and the fans true remorse if he ever wants to play in the NFL again. He committed despicable crimes against man’s best friend and that is very hard to fathom let alone forgive. If Vick is truly sorry for what he has done, which I believe he will prove, he should have the right to earn his way onto an NFL team. The battle to convince an owner to sign him will be enough of a challenge for Vick.

Zeta Buzz shows the blogosphere is more or less split down the middle on this topic, though there is a slight lean towards keeping him out of the league. The Buzz tells us that people are not quick to forgive Vick for the crimes he committed and they feel he does not deserve a second chance.

For once, I’m glad I’m not the Commissioner of the NFL. Good luck with this one Roger!

Posted in Uncategorized, Zeta Buzz | No Comments »

Is Wall $treet Officially Back?

After repaying in full a $10 billion federal bailout to the government this quarter, Goldman Sachs apparently jumped in a time machine. In a time of economic crisis and uncertainty, Goldman Sachs announced Tuesday a $3.44 billion profit in the second quarter. That marks most profitable quarter in the 140-year history of the financial services company. The revenue for the second-quarter was a staggering $13.8 billion with Goldman Sachs setting aside $6.7 billion for bonuses and compensation benefits. The average banker at Goldman Sachs could make at least $770,000 in bonuses and benefits at the end of the year.

Many people blame the excessive Wall Street paydays for getting our country into a financial mess in the first place. The lure of these massive paydays lead to great risks being taken by financial institutions that ultimately did not work out for them. Just 9-months ago Goldman Sachs was receiving a federal bailout, they paid off the bailout to their credit but they would not be receiving these bonuses today if it weren’t for our bailout money. Things seem to be getting back to normal on Wall Street at least for some people, how long is it till the rest of us has to clean up the mess they are bound to leave behind again?

The other side of the coin believes this news is a step in the right direction to solving the credit crisis and other economic failures in our country. Goldman Sachs coupled with a strong financial report from Intel spurred a 3% increase in the markets today. Hopefully, this will spur an economic rally and increase the time to recovery and more importantly give people confidence again in the markets.

The internet is certainly abuzz about the Goldman Sachs news. Zeta Buzz shows a dramatic increase in the blogosphere over the past few days. Buzz peaked on Tuesday as the news of the record quarter profit was released but a substantial amount of chatter has carried over as bloggers offer their two cents on what this means for everybody else.

The most important thing Zeta Buzz tells us is that people are mad. The graph below shows that 88% of posts regarding Goldman Sachs were negative. People are upset and they are going to the internet to vent their frustrations about what is soon to be another round of massive Wall Street payouts. Many bloggers are angry about the greed factor others at the aforementioned thought of their bailout money being the catalyst for the Goldman Sachs payday.

The long term effect remains to be seen. If Americans keep losing jobs and companies continue to struggle; public outrage will only increase over the exorbitant earnings. Goldman Sachs may find themselves all the way in the red- on Zeta Buzz of course.

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Game Seven of the World Series decided in July?

As Barack Obama loosens up his arm tonight, he will become the first president since Gerald Ford in 1976 to throw out the first pitch at Major League Baseball’s All-Star game. He will kick off tonight’s Midsummer classic in St. Louis for what is always a star-studded night for Major League Baseball. Tonight marks the 80^th All-Star game when the game’s best players come together at Busch Stadium to represent their respective league and team.

The All-Star game used to be a simple exhibition game between the best players from the National League and the best from the American League. That all changed in 2003 when baseball introduced a “ this time it  counts” campaign and subsequently decided that the winning league would receive home field advantage in the World Series. This decision came on the tails of the 2002 All-Star game fiasco in Milwaukee which ended in a 7-7 tie after 11 innings. This marked a very embarrassing event for baseball and Commissioner Bud Selig. Fans were outraged and heavily criticized Selig for the final decision to stop the game after 11 innings. In attempt to add some spark to the game, Selig decided that starting into 2003 the All-Star game would “count”.

Proponents of the change argue that it does add some incentive to the game and makes the players take the game a lot more seriously when so much is on the line. Baseball purists and other opponents of the move point to the fact that the root of the game is an Exhibition Game. For the All-Star game to decide something so important such as home-field advantage and simultaneously the World Series having a major outcome on the World Series is ludicrous in the eyes of many sportswriters and fans alike. The fact is players from last place teams in July can affect the outcome in October, when the best from the National and American league meet. Every year many of the game’s best players skip the game for personal reasons or are injured throughout the season and cannot play thus skewing the point of rewarding the dominant league. Over the past six seasons since this rule has been implemented, there has not been a deciding Game 7 of the World Series; yet when that does happen how will you feel if your favorite team has to play Game 7 on the road as a result of the outcome of the All-Star game?

The consensus is that even entering the seventh game to be played deciding home-field advantage, fans are still upset and angry with Selig and view his rule as very unnecessary. After carefully mining the blogosphere Zeta Buzz tells us that 75% of fans view the home-field advantage rule in a negative light while only 25% support the decision. TV ratings tell a similar story as they have not raised the dramatic spike in interest that baseball hoped for. As you watch the game tonight be mindful that your team’s World Series aspirations could be riding on a player from the Washington Nationals or Kansas City Royals, I know I will- Go American League.

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