Customer Behaviour

Make It Fun to Keep Them Loyal

What makes consumers love your Web site? The answer might be as simple as child's play. Research shows that customers have a more positive attitude toward a site when their online experience is engaging and enjoyable. And enjoyment is an important determinant of why consumers shop.

When they become immersed in your site, customers view being on it as fun rather than work. Since their experience feels like play, they return more—making them more loyal to the site, the company and the brands it sells.

What creates this immersion? Research suggests you gain loyalty when:

• 
  
  The site challenges customers. Customers don't want to be bored. When the skill required to navigate your Web site marginally exceeds customers' search skills, they see the experience as an enjoyable escape rather than a burden.


• 
  
  Customers believe they have the skills to find what they want on the site. If customers can't follow the site navigation, they will lose interest in their search and, perhaps, your company and its products.


• 
  
  Customers feel they have control over the search. If the navigation is too complicated for the average user to master, they won't return to the site.

The Po!nt: Design your Web site with the end-user in mind. Make it a fun challenge, not a task. Customers who become immersed in your site will be more loyal to the site, your company and your brands.

Marketing Inspiration

The Deviant Approach to Creativity

Take a look around your office—what do you see? The traditional mix of memorabilia, photos from company golf tournaments and perhaps a few mementos from some recent successful product launches?But you probably don't have a poster of the Sex Pistols above your desk. And Amantha Imber of Inventium says its deviant imagery, or something of similar shock value, might be just what you need for optimum brainstorming.

Imber points to a Jens Forster study that looked at deviance and creativity. "[They] hypothesized that objects or pictures that relate to the concept of deviance in some way, such as a photograph of punk rockers, are likely to promote divergent thinking," says Imber. The research team divided participants into two groups and tasked each with devising uses for a brick while looking at posters of the letter X repeated in a four-by-four matrix.

For the first group, each of the 16 Xs was the same color; for the second group, one X had a different hue from the other 15. The second group, staring at their deviant X, produced more ideas and exhibited a higher degree of creativity.

In the event your CEO or clients object to radical office décor, Imber recommends meditating on events from your rebellious past to stir up inspiration. "Thinking about one's deviant history is a great way to get the brain geared up for some creative thinking," she says.

Your Marketing Inspiration: Concentrating on a deviant image or memory may help activate unconscious thoughts that lead to good ideas, and more of them.

Get to the Po!nt

Creating Your Company's Own Online Reality

"While many business owners are beginning to understand that information is the currency of the Internet," says Rick Sloboda of WebCopyPlus," few act on it." Yes, your business has the potential to create a website that can go toe-to-toe with larger corporate sites, but there's a chance that ill-defined, irrelevant and self-centered content may conspire to undermine this natural advantage.

Instead, use language to create an online reality that impresses your target audience. "The right web content will make you concrete and credible on the ... Internet," he says. Here are some tips on creating the right image:

• Use customer-centric copy. Small businesses tend to be preoccupied with their own story. People who visit your website don't want to hear about you; they want to know what you or your product can do for them.


• Publish case studies. This is something larger companies do—so why shouldn't you? It never hurts to offer a detailed examination of a successful project. In addition, case studies build a sense of trust.


• Put your guarantee in plain sight. Highlighting your promise communicates confidence, and creates a sense of stability.

The Po!nt: "Your web copywriting doesn't describe reality, it creates it," says Sloboda. "In fact, every word you feature on your website has the ability to build—or damage—how prospects perceive you."

E-mail Marketing

Four Tough ESP Questions

Now, wait just a minute. Don't hand that online campaign to just any email service provider (ESP)—at least not before you ask some hard questions.
Here are four tough ones that SendLabs' Josh Nason says you should always ask an ESP:

• What do I get? You might want a full-service shop that handles everything from software to creative services, or you might prefer an a la carte approach that complements your in-house skill sets. Make sure you know upfront what the ESP can and cannot provide.


• How's your customer service? Ask how long it takes an ESP to respond to reported problems: the industry norm, according to Nason, is within an hour. Also investigate how their service levels might vary based on the plan you choose.


• What will this cost me? Most ESPs charge either by the month or by the campaign. "There are positives and negatives to both," says Nason, "so … communicate your list sizes, your deployment habits and your needs" to find the right payment plan.


• What's the word on the street about you? A quality ESP will have a relationship with an email reputation monitor that confirms email arrives safely, provides blacklist monitoring and offers spam checks. "Feel free to ask [an ESP] what their latest reputation score is," he says.

The Po!nt: "If checking out a company's site or speaking with a rep gives you that not-so-confident feeling, there's probably a reason for it," says Nason. So keep looking until you feel comfortable. By asking the right questions, you'll find the right fit.

e-mail Marketing

A Permission Marketing Primer: Picking and Choosing

Permission email marketing has morphed from best practice to legal requirement in several countries. In the next three issues we'll explore what Karen Talavera, president of Sychronicity Marketing, refers to as the "Six Cs of Permission Email Marketing." Here are the first two:

Conscious consent

"Terms like affirmative consent, passive consent and third-party consent abound," writes Talavera. "But when it comes to genuine, 100 percent permission marketing, the only consent that matters is conscious consent." This means subscribers make an active decision to receive future communication. This is different from having the box for future messages pre-checked on a registration form and expecting subscribers to deselect it if they don't want future messages. For conscious consent, the subscriber must physically check the box and agree to your correspondence.

Choice

Let recipients set their preferences for the manner and types of communication they receive. Some might want news about your company but not promotions, or accept messages by email but not postal mail. Some sites let subscribers determine the frequency of contact. "It's fine to restrict choices solely to what you can realistically manage," says Talavera. "Aim your sights on under-promising and over-delivering rather than vice versa, and your customers will reward your efforts."

The Po!nt: Says Talavera, "With marketing channels of choice proliferating and messaging devices diversifying, it's not hard to imagine ... [a] future where permissions are granted not only by marketing channel ... but also by content, device, time and place."

Customer Behaviour

Who Can Resist a Bargain?

Many marketers believe customers are attracted to discounted prices. Yet this assumption may be wrong. While a lowered price might make people more inclined to buy your product, they may also be less satisfied with their purchase.

Researchers at Stanford, INSEAD and MIT found that consumers who were given an energy drink felt the product was less effective if it was purchased at a discount. Consumers who drank the discounted product felt they that had a less intense workout than those who purchased the drink at its regular price.

When advised that the drink helped improve mental acuity, consumers who were told that the drink was purchased at a discount were able to solve fewer word puzzles than those consumers who used the same product purportedly purchased at the regular price.
Also, consumers exposed to strong claims about the energy drink's effectiveness were able to solve more word puzzles than consumers who received weaker advertising about the product. Your marketing messages, therefore, may impact your product's potency. Advertising claims, even if not based in fact, may become reality to customers.

The Po!nt: Customers may, in fact, get what they pay for. Price drops, and advertising overall, may shape consumers' expectations, making them believe a product is not as effective, and hence lower in quality.

Get to the Point

Nickel and Dime on the Not-So-Sly

In a post at his Living Light Bulbs blog, Ryan Karpeles talks about the wrong way to make a buck. And he offers a prime example: Dollar Rent a Car, which recently introduced a $2 "topping off" charge to any vehicle returned with a full tank of gas. "Not only is this obnoxious," Karpeles complains, "but it's also unfair to the customer ... you either pay $2, or you get stuck with the bloated 'local refueling charges' (which are always higher than the market cost of gasoline)."

If the company needs to generate an extra two bucks from each transaction, Karpeles suggests that rolling the surcharge into a rental fee—where it's likely to go unnoticed—would secure the revenue without alienating customers.

It's a principle worth considering if you find yourself in a similar situation. For instance, would you feel ripped off if your $240 hotel room came with complimentary Internet access? Of course not. But you might resent a $15 connection charge when it's added to a $225 daily rate. Likewise, you probably wouldn't give a second thought to a $603 plane ticket that included refreshments; but if you pay $600 for the ticket and they want $3 for a soft drink, you're going to roll your eyes at the price gouging.

The Po!nt: "Before you enact a bunch of new policies to make an extra buck," writes Karpeles, "think about what kind of message you're sending. There's probably a lot better way to accomplish the same thing."

Marketing Inspiration

Social Security Shenanigans

Everyone knows you're supposed to guard your social security number like a state secret. After all, those nine digits are the open sesame for criminals who want to run up huge tabs on credit accounts opened in your name. They get new computers, Caribbean holidays and expensive watches; you get to spend years rebuilding your credit.

So it's more than a little shocking to watch this television ad for a service called LifeLock. It shows a large panel truck cruising the streets of Manhattan with the social security number of its CEO Todd Davis emblazoned in a bright red, easy-to-read font. We kid you not—it's right there for all of New York, and anyone with a television, to see. The seeming insanity continues at the LifeLock Web site, where the first words you'll see are: "My name is Todd Davis. My social security number is 457-55-5462."

It turns out Davis isn't out of his mind. Instead, he's actually making the best possible case for his product. "Why publish my social security number?" he asks. "Because I'm absolutely confident LifeLock is protecting my good name and personal information, just like it will yours." He finishes off by announcing a $1 million guarantee.

You can probably anticipate why we consider this Marketing Inspiration: By making himself as vulnerable to identity theft as anyone can possibly be, Davis exhibits a breathtaking confidence in the service he sells. How we can convey that level of faith in our own companies?

Get to the Po!nt

Setting Your Evangelists on Track

In a post at the Church of the Customer Blog, Jackie Huba asks a question you've probably faced at some time: How do you handle a customer evangelist who is misrepresenting your company? Even though the offender's facts may be correct, his or her stance could be off mark. It can be a tricky situation.
On one hand, you've put a lot of thought into positioning your products or services in a certain way; on the other, attempting to micromanage the word of mouth is likely to backfire. So how do you react? According to Huba, you have four basic options:

• Make a public correction. Leave a comment at the customer evangelist's blog, for instance, that thanks them for the attention and gently clarifies your company's message.


• Make a private correction. Include the same content in an email that leaves the person free to follow up as they see fit.


• Acknowledge the mention without a correction. Express gratitude privately or publicly, and leave it at that


• Do nothing

Huba recommends the third route, and offers a tip for keeping future evangelism on target: Invite the person to join a special program that gives "inner circle" access to your latest news and updates.

The Po!nt: "If the customer's information is technically correct but incomplete, or uses her own words and not yours, get over it," she writes. "A word-smithing scold is old."

Marketing Inspiration

A Super Bowl Strategy That Paid Off

In a post at MarketingProfs' Daily Fix, Steven Schreibman discusses Nationwide Insurance's controversial decision last year to leak its Super Bowl ad a week before the sporting event. Outside observers weren't the only skeptics. "There was even some debate among our own advertising team about whether this was 'spoiling the surprise' and watering down the ad's game-time impact," he says.

But his company's gambit paid off. The spot—starring Kevin Federline as a rap star wannabe who works at a fast food joint—garnered 600,000 hits at the company's Web site, and the majority of these were from first-time visitors. Further, Schreibman notes the unorthodox strategy didn't prevent the ad from winding up on several "best of" lists.

Other companies recognize the value in the Nationwide approach as can be seen by the companies that posted their Super Bowl ads on YouTube long before their scheduled airtime. Pepsi, for instance, offered up the differently EnAbled humor of Bob's House; Bridgestone, gave us a sneak peak of Richard Simmons as the target of a speeding automobile.

"This experience has made me a true believer in the power social media," says Schreibman. "In fact, the early buzz we built by making the ad available to social media outlets became a catalyst for overwhelming interest from traditional media." And that's our idea of Marketing Inspiration.

Get to the Po!nt

Master Your Domain

In December, Hollywood learned that the AMPTP—which represents producers in their protracted negotiations with striking writers—hadn't covered its online bases. While the organization owned amptp.org, it didn't control amptp.com. A pair of TV writers with time on their hands used this oversight as an opportunity to make jokes at AMPTP's expense. Nikki Finke of DeadlineHollywoodDaily.com described the satirical coup as "laugh-out-loud funny no matter what side of the issue you're on."

Ed Lee of Blogging Me, Blogging You provided a side-by-side comparison:
From the "real" amptp.org: "The WGA has now been reduced to pounding the table, and this baseless, desperate NLRB complaint is just the latest indication that the WGA's negotiating strategy has achieved nothing for working writers."

From the "spoof" amptp.com: "We are heartbroken to report that despite our best efforts, including sending them a muffin basket, making them a mix CD, and standing outside their window with a boombox blasting Peter Gabriel songs, our talks with the WGA have broken down. Quite frankly, we're puzzled as to why this happened."

The comedy writers only rented amptp.com for a few weeks, so their site didn't last long. But it forced the AMPTP to spend energy counteracting it rather than promoting their own cause.

The Po!nt: "You'd do well to remember this story next time you propose a Web site," writes Lee. "Don't be cheap. Buy all the relevant domains you can. Even buy some common misspellings of your domain." This can prevent you from being sidelined unnecessarily, whether at the hands of merry pranksters or malevolent competitors.

Get to the Po!nt

Freedom to Brand Fearlessly

In the most recent edition of Editorial Emergency, Simon Glickman and Julia Rubiner warn businesses against fear-based branding. Many clients approach the dynamic copywriting duo with requests for their signature wordplay and then second-guess the recommended strategy, worrying that the punchy copy might not appeal to the widest audience. Maybe, these clients wonder, we're better off going with something safe—like our competitors use.

But Glickman and Rubiner don't see the point. "Your competitor's site? Dullsville, daddy-o. They're trying to be all things to all people, so there's no telling who they really are." Among the "muddy biz-babble" the two dismiss:

• Highest quality


• Industry leader


• Commitment to excellence


• Years of experience


• Solutions-oriented

We defy the average visitor to recall a single phrase from such a dreary spiel," say Glickman and Rubiner. In order to achieve indelible branding, they continue, you must (a) clearly separate yourself from the pack, and (b) figure out who your ideal clients are and speak directly to them.
So fear not. If your target audience responds to an irreverent, edgy tone, for instance, be irreverent and edgy. Your branding might not appeal to the entire world, but it will appeal to your customers.

The Po!nt: "[T]hough you may feel you're just playing it safe, fear-based branding is actually toxic to the development of your brand," argues Glickman and Rubiner. "As the old saying goes, standing in the middle of the road only means you'll be hit by traffic in both directions."

Marketing Inspiration

Did He Really Call It a 'Nymphomercial'?

In a post at his blog, Drew's Marketing Minute, Drew McLellan presents the case of Jay Nussbaum, a novelist who figured he might as well use viral video to promote his latest effort, A Monk Jumped Over a Wall.
To tease the reading public, Nussbaum dramatized a scene from his story of an ethical lawyer who battles a devious client. Doesn't sound all that exciting, does it? But Nussbaum overcame that obstacle by giving his (possibly NSFW) video a name guaranteed to generate page views at YouTube: Nymphomercial.

The title isn't totally off-topic because, before we get to the novel's surreal sequence, we're treated to a Portia de Rossi look-a-like in a turquoise bikini who rolls around on the floor and reads excerpts from the book. She then makes an improbable appearance in the scene itself—it isn't clear if she's part of the novel, or simply an extension of the nymphomercial's gimmick—and also to offer a final thought: "I mean, if a book is good, you don't need a hot girl to sell it. But she just might get you to jump the wall." Wink.

"Was it a safe choice?" asks McLellan. "Hardly. How many remarkable products/companies stay in the safe zone? How could you use viral video to shout over the crowd and be heard in a remarkable way?" And we think pondering those questions will give you plenty of Marketing Inspiration.

Marketing Inspiration

I Am McLovin!

Even if you missed the gleefully raunchy hit comedy Superbad, you probably remember clips from a NSFW scene that got heavy rotation in trailers and television ads: A high school student played by Christopher Mintz-Plasse obtains a fake Hawaiian driver's license that gives his full name as "McLovin." When he proudly presents the fabricated identification to his friends, they're nonplussed. Teenagers loved McLovin's undaunted optimism—nobody remembers the character's real name—and reveled in his drunken misadventures with a pair of cops who seem to believe the license is legit.

His popularity is no doubt why Norman Lear's voter registration initiative Declare Yourself invited Mintz-Plasse to get back into character for a PSA. The brief video opens as McLovin lies on his bed, unbuttons his shirt and seductively intones, "Hello, America. Welcome to my bedroom. I'm just about to register to vote. Join me." He then rolls over to a laptop computer and does just that. When finished, he turns back to the camera. "Now stick around and you can watch me touch myself." It might sound creepy out of context, but coming from McLovin it's hilarious.

In a post at the What's Next Blog, B.L. Ochman says the video shows "exactly how to use social media for election impact." Declare Yourself hopes this campaign will help reach its goal of registering 2 million new voters by the general 2008 presidential election.

Any Superbad fan will watch this—and very likely take action—just because they like McLovin. Your Marketing Inspiration: Find out what your customers like that much, and you might have a social media bonanza on your hands, too.

Get to the Po!nt

The Name Game

Stroll over to MarketingProfs' Know-How Exchange and you'll find that small business owners ask one question with remarkable frequency: What should I call my company/product? Sometimes they already have ideas and are looking for feedback, and sometimes they're at a complete loss. Whatever your situation, Scott Trimble has some helpful pointers:

• Look for a name that is memorable but easy to pronounce and spell.


• Avoid a name so specific (e.g., Dave's 256K Flash Drives) that it might hinder later growth


• Choose a name that doesn't carry negative connotations, whether in English or other major foreign languages


• Check for existing trademarks and the availability of domain names.

Trimble recommends asking yourself questions such as:

• What does my product do?


• How does my product benefit the consumer?


• What are the "ingredients" that go into my product or service?


• What makes my product unique?

And consider the various ways you can "stumble" on a great name:

• Find a synonym using Thesaurus.com.


• Think up puns and plays on words.


• Deliberately misspell a word you like.


• Borrow from industry lingo.

The Po!nt: "There are plenty of highly successful businesses and products out there with bad names," writes Trimble. "So, take your naming, like your friends' opinions, with a grain of salt. And, as with everything, the more you stress about obtaining perfection, the less likely you'll come up with that killer name that seamlessly fits your offering."

Customer Behaviour

Warm Up Your Thinking Cap

Organizational psychologist Amantha Imber, Head Inventiologist of Inventium, claims nothing saps creative juices like the hyperlogical mindset that professionals often bring to the table. "Most idea generation or problem solving meetings are scheduled immediately after a strategy or finance meeting," she says. "[Consider] how difficult it is to come from a meeting that requires analytical, rational thinking into a meeting that requires us to think laterally."

To ready yourself for creative activities, Imber suggests a solution she calls Fat Chance. The idea is to warm up your brain for the task at hand, much as you might stretch before going for a jog.

Here's how it works: The team chooses an impossible goal to be solved in an unrealistic time frame. "The tighter the better," she says. Since this is an exercise, have fun with the subject matter and use the brainstorming session to tackle topics such as how to boost Paris Hilton's IQ 100 points by the end of the week, or how to raise $10 billion dollars by dinner tonight. Break into small groups to generate three solutions that don't have to be logical or rational. "Indeed," she says, "those types of solutions won't actually solve the problem." After five minutes, present your solutions and have a good laugh. You're now ready for business.

"It only takes a few minutes of effective warming up to shift your brain into an open-minded and lateral thinking mode," says Imber. We think any exercise that puts you in the right frame of mind for peak creativity is Marketing Inspiration.

Get to the Po!nt

Show Me the Way

Suppose you want to make a quick online purchase, but get annoyed when you can't find the product you want on the Web site. The problem with this scenario, claims Rick Sloboda of Webcopyplus, is the site's architecture. It's important to ensure your customers aren't having a similar experience at your site. According to Sloboda, typical problems with a Web site's architecture include:

• Complicated navigation. This fundamental design error means visitors don't have a clearly marked path to the information they want. Present customers with an online labyrinth and they may give up and leave.


• Confusing classifications. Sloboda points to one client that had a dedicated page for each department. "That's how they wanted to present information," he says. "But was it logical from a potential client's perspective? Not by a long shot." To find information, site visitors had to hop randomly from one page to another.

Problematic content that decreases the efficiency of your site can compound the frustrations of inelegant architecture with:

• Self-centric copy. Address a customer's needs first when you write your copy. "What you want to say is not important," says Sloboda. "It's all about what the customer wants to do."


• Outdated information. It's critical to keep your content current.

The Po!nt: "The right Web site architecture means fewer clicks to get desired information and less effort to complete tasks," says Sloboda. "You're telling visitors you care. Bad Web site architecture sends your visitors a completely different message: Get lost."

E-Mail marketing

Remember Me?

"Most marketers have email addresses for less than half their customers and prospects," says Reggie Brady. If this sounds familiar, you should consider using an email appending service. The larger services maintain databases with as many as 90 million individuals. You provide a name and mailing address, and they give you the email address associated with that contact. In a B2B setting, match rates range from 10 to 15 percent; the B2C scenario has an expected 25 to 30 percent success rate.

Once you have the email address, your next step is to get the contact's consent by sending what's called a permission pass. "You should explain the existing relationship, tell recipients you would like to ... communicate with them via email, and give them a clear opportunity to opt out," says Brady. After that, the regular rules of email marketing apply.

Brady says one magazine publisher reached out to her using this method, and she was generally impressed with its approach. She received seven messages over the course of three weeks. The first offered 26 issues for $20. The second and fourth contained variations on the initial deal while the fifth and seventh messages offered a four free trial issues. She did not appreciate messages three and six, however, which came from third-party advertisers. Although the permission pass had mentioned the possibility of such offers, it wasn't clearly worded.

The Po!nt: Using an email appending service is a great way to reach existing or past customers. As long as you follow proper etiquette, you could see a great response.

Customer Behaviour

Do Touch the Merchandise

Despite its merits, online shopping has a severe disadvantage: Customers can't touch the products they find on the Internet. Is tactile sensation a concern, even if you don't sell products such as hand lotion or clothing, where feeling is a factor of quality?

Surprisingly, yes. Researchers have discovered that many consumers use touch to gather information or make judgments, even when an item's physical form has nothing to do with its value. Some people have a high need for touch—feeling products and packaging creates a pleasurable or fun experience for them. For these people, a pleasant or even a neutral sensation creates a positive reaction that can carry over to their judgment of the product.

While product packaging and point-of-purchase displays can obviously benefit from a shopper's interest in touch, companies can also use tactile stimuli in direct mail and print advertising. "Recent trends in advertising have focused on the experiential and aesthetic aspects of communication," the report states. "Incorporating touch may be the next step in adding a hedonic or experiential aspect to advertising and other marketing communications." Even people who are not tactile can be influenced by touch because they can see its relevance to the message.

The Po!nt: The way your product feels can affect how much consumers like it, even when touch has no relevance in determining whether the product is good or not. Communications that incorporate physical sensation is a subject area ripe for experimentation.

Get to the Po!nt

Lessons From Your Favorite Store

Enamored of Whole Foods Market, Jackie Huba decided to spend a week patronizing the various food and beverage stations at the chain's 80,000-square-foot Austin flagship—for each and every meal. Huba recounts the experience at the Church of the Customer Blog. "My week wasn't Oprah-transformational (I didn't cry)," she says, "but we bonded." And she learned a few marketing lessons, among them:

Cater to the niche. "Organic food may have started as a tiny beacon in the world of corporate farming," writes Huba, "but for nearly 30 years, Whole Foods stayed true to the niche. Maybe nurtured it, too." As an example, she includes a snapshot of a sign explaining why you won't find one packet of Splenda in the store. It reads: "Due to our commitment to sell only products with natural ingredients, we cannot offer artificial sweeteners or sugar-free syrups." Now that's devotion.

Let fans spread the word digitally. Though the media badge Huba collected each morning allowed her to photograph the store's interior, she says, "that didn't stop employees, sometimes herds of them, from accosting me (politely, usually) when I whipped out my D40 Nikon to snap a picture of some sexy cous cous." According to Huba, the store's strict no-photograph policy—designed to prevent competitors from stealing ideas—is not only impossible to enforce in an era of camera-equipped phones, it hobbles customer evangelists who want to spread the word through social media.

The Po!nt: Studying a store you admire, even if it has nothing to do with your business, can be a critical element of defining do's and don'ts for your own business.

Marketing Inspiration

Get Over It, Kid

It usually happens when deadlines are looming and there's so much going on you can't cope with one more thing. A nasty message from a customer or a colleague sends you over the edge, and your immediate desire is to tell them exactly where they can stick their grievance. But before letting your emotions rule, consider the case of Candy Tistadt, wife of the COO of Virginia's Fairfax County school district.

Dave Kori, a senior at Lake Braddock Secondary School, called the couple's home to ask why the district had not declared a snow day when three inches were predicted in their suburban Washington D.C. town. Tistadt responded with a minute-long tirade that included choice lines like: "[My husband] is out almost every single night of the week at meetings for snotty-nosed little brats, and he may not have called you, but it is not because he's home because it snowed. Get over it, kid, and go to school."

Kori might have deserved an angry response. Though few people will notice that they haven't heard the message he left on the Tistadt's answering machine—meanwhile, Candy Tistadt's scathing words zip around the Internet, attracting the attention of media heavyweights like the Washington Post and CNN. What most people will remember is that a grown-up lost her cool.

Your Marketing Inspiration: Don't forget that social media can be a two-edged sword. So go ahead and lose your temper, but calm down before you pick up the phone or hit reply. If you don't, you might have a starring role in the viral video of your nightmares.

Get to the Po!nt

Network Like Charlie Wilson

If you've seen Charlie Wilson's War, you'll probably agree that Wilson seemed an eminently likeable and accomplished individual. Tom Peters, who read the book upon which the movie is based, noticed that Wilson also provides many lessons on how to do business. Peters wrote a detailed post at his blog providing 33 takeaways; here's a snapshot of those related to networking:

Make friends! And then more friends! And then more friends! Wilson's gentile heritage didn't prevent him from joining the congressional Jewish caucus; the Texan also joined the Black caucus. According to author George Crile, "The House, like any human institution, is moved by friendships, and no matter what people might think about Wilson's antics, they tend to like him and enjoy his company."

Make friends with people several levels down from decision-makers and with disenfranchised groups. Writes Peters, "the key to sales success is 'wiring' the client organization three or four levels down—where the real work gets done."

Seek unlikely allies—or at least don't rule them out. Simply because someone doesn't meet with your complete approval doesn't mean their buy-in and follow-through won't help move your project forward. Says Peters, "Find the right path (often $$$$) and the most bitter of rivals will make common cause relative to some key link in the chain."

The Po!nt: "I'd guess that 98 percent of projects fail in terms of even near-total implementation," writes Peters. "And 98 percent of [those] are the results of lousy political and networking skills—not selection of the wrong project management software package."

Marketing Inspiration

A Doctor Who Only Makes House Calls

Dr. Jay Parkinson's Web site is stylish enough to belong to an ad agency or a media start-up rather than a general practitioner. Then again, Parkinson isn't like your average family doctor.

For starters, he only makes house calls. Each visit costs around $200, and he stays for as long as he's needed, not the five or ten minutes you're allotted in a traditional office. Also—hold onto your hats—he's easy to reach. On the site, he displays his mobile phone number, his email address and a quartet of IM addresses.

In another shocking twist, Parkinson demystifies the process of diagnosis and treatment, using hypothetical situations like falling on your wrist in the park. You could go to an emergency room for a seven-hour visit and a $2,000 bill, writes Parkinson, or you can call him to do the following:

• Based on a phone conversation, he suspects your wrist is broken. He sends you to nearby radiologist, who charges $80 for an x-ray.


• Your wrist is broken. The radiologist emails the x-ray to Parkinson, who directs you to an orthopedist in the neighborhood who can see you in an hour and charges $400 to cast your arm.

Parkinson's summation: You've saved $1,520 and five hours of your day. "But say your wrist wasn't broken," he concludes. "It was simply sprained. You only spent $80. I then tell you what to do about that sprained wrist."

By making convenience, transparency and value the central thrust of his unconventional practice, Dr. Parkinson makes himself virtually irresistible to his target audience. And we'd say that's a healthy dose of Marketing Inspiration.

Get to the Po!nt

Would Anyone Care If You Went Out of Business?

John Moore of Brand Autopsy blog has a provocative series of posts in which he asks: "If [company name here] went out of business tomorrow, would anyone care?" Subjects have ranged from Sears to Subaru.

When Moore asked about Eddie Bauer, he received a range of answers that hinted at the struggling clothier's strengths and weakness. Interestingly, readers who said they would miss Eddie Bauer tended to cite specific products, while detractors focused on the company's image. "They stock tall size in shirts and pants that fit off the shelf," said 6' 4" commenter Jamey. "Very few places meet that specific need." A contrary view from commenter Jon Gabriel: "I would identify EB as a mall-bound pretend-outdoors brand containing items that look vaguely rugged, but wouldn't last an hour in the wild."

Moore's inspiration for the series came from Bill Taylor and Polly LaBarre, who say it's the question every company needs to ask itself. How would your company fare in the harsh glare of self-examination?

• Do you provide such a unique product or service that customers would be saddened to see you go?


• Have you forged an emotional connection with your customers that another company couldn't duplicate?


• Could your employees find an employer that treated them as well as your company?

The Po!nt: "How does your company rank?" asks Moore. "Can you answer YES with conviction? Or, do you have to concede by answering NO?" If the latter, it's time to work on drumming up support.

E-mail Marketing

Give 'Em a Good Tease

Whether your email campaign's audience is B2B or B2C, most recipients use a preview pane to decide whether they want to read the message or hit delete. Reggie Brady suggests several ways to maximize your preview pane's effectiveness. Here's the overview:

Include your logo and a headline above the body of your email. Traditionally the location for housekeeping items such as "Add us to your address book" or "Click here to view online," this space is wasted without a headline to highlight a product, service or offer. Other items to include in this valuable real estate:

• Personalized salutations. People are drawn to their own names.


• Your toll-free number. "Today, the customer is in control," says Brady, "and should have as many options as possible to conduct business in their channel of preference."


• A secondary offer. Don't crowd too much text into a small space. Relocating "Add us to your address book" to the footer could free up room for an additional offer.

Link to an HTML version of your email's content. "I am astounded to see how many marketers who rely on images in their emails ignore this," Brady writes. "[I]mage blocking represents a major challenge and it is likely that many recipients will not see your message as you planned."

The Po!nt: Says Brady, "What readers see in [the preview pane] can influence their decision to open your email." Remember this, and you'll increase the odds that readers get your message.

Customer Behaviour

How Saying the Least May Achieve the Most

Clearly the things you say and show in an ad can convey something about your product. But how about what you don't say or show?

A study has revealed that ads containing considerable white space lead customers to perceive the advertised product as more prestigious, sophisticated, trustworthy, higher in product quality and leadership, and lower in risk than the same ad without white space.

Researchers note that these associations hark back to the minimalist movement, a reaction against artwork perceived as deceptive or full of illusion. In advertising, the less-is-more approach to graphics is a response to the text-heavy, authoritative, "scientific" or "information"-type ads of the early to mid-20th century—examples of which include, for instance, extolling the digestive benefits of smoking Camels or drinking Schlitz beer. The removal of excessive imagery and language makes the information in the ad appear more truthful, and makes the advertiser appear as if it has nothing to hide.

The Po!nt: If you are trying to create a sophisticated and trustworthy brand image, consider saying less—not more—in the ads you create.

Get to the Po!nt

Time Is Money

It doesn't matter if you work in an entrepreneurial or corporate environment: Demands on your time can pull you in two—or ten—different directions. Taking control of your schedule can be challenging, but blogger Jeremiah Owyang suggests to wrangle your workday by thinking of time as money. Though Owyang speaks from the perspective of a Web strategist, much of his advice can be applied to a variety of disciplines. Here are some ideas that you can put right into action:

Pay yourself first. Each morning, Owyang budgets two uninterrupted hours for online reading and blogging; he enjoys both activities and they increase his professional value. "Like the advice from most financial advisors, they encourage you to pay yourself first by investing in your own funds, paying your bills and making yourself (reasonably) happy before paying off your creditors," he explains.

Cut back on unnecessary expenses. If an element of your workday doesn't provide ROI on the time invested, spend less time on that element. Owyang cites email as a typical problem area in his daily operations. "As soon as you answer emails, you're now paying for someone else's time," he writes, later noting it compounds his loss of time: "The more you respond to emails, the more you will receive."

The Po!nt: "Cherish your time as you do your wallet or purse," writes Owyang. "[T]his is yours, and unlike money, you can't invest and grow new time, you can only manage the existing time you've got, cut into other areas, or hire someone under you to do it."

Marketing Inspiration

Rules Schmules

Ben McConnell has been campaigning against inane corporate rules at the Church of the Customer blog. In a round-up of marketing resolutions for the new year he puts "Vow to eliminate a stupid rule" at number six. "You know what it is," he says. "Customers (or bloggers) have already told you. So eliminate it already. For extra points, give it a funeral." McConnell cites two examples of rules gone wild:

• A customer at a pack-and-ship store who wanted to tape his package was asked to do so outside. Huh? It turned out a woman had once sued the store for cutting her hand on its tape dispenser, and the company chose to avoid future lawsuits by banning the practice altogether. "One customer's misfortune inspired an unnecessary rule at the expense of 10,000 others who aren't clumsy and litigious," notes McConnell.


• In another logic-defying case, the manager of a high-end grocery store ordered an employee to release a shoplifter he had restrained, and then fired him for violating a hard-and-fast rule that prohibits employees from touching customers—a loose definition at best—for any reason.

"More rules are proportional to less convenience," writes McConnell. "More rules = fewer customers. You either let the tyranny of one customer influence your organization, or not. When someone wants to add a new rule, how about eliminating an existing one instead?" And we think that removing rules, not adding more, is Marketing Inspiration.

Get to the Po!nt

Don't Sabotage Your Creativity

Even for an out-of-the-box thinker, being creative on demand can be aggravating. In a guest appearance at Drew's Marketing Minute, blogger Katie Konrath offers advice on how not to get tangled up in frustration:

Don't reinvent the wheel. "Look around to see what people in other fields are doing," says Konrath. "Then adapt their solutions to your particular situation. It's not cheating if you expand on a concept that came from somewhere else." Henry Ford took the concept of an assembly line and applied it to cars. Likewise, the technology for roll-on deodorant was inspired by the inner workings of a ballpoint pen.

Actively pursue brilliant ideas. When you have an epiphany at three in the morning, or while waiting in line, don't be fooled into believing it's a random thought that came from nowhere. Writes Konrath, "Serendipitous ideas occur because you've set your mind to looking for a solution, and—even when you're not thinking directly about your problem—your brain is ticking in the background."

Think before throwing out a "bad" idea hastily. A brainstorming session often produces a few real duds, but concepts that seem implausible, impossible or silly may still have potential. "A lot of ideas that sound completely backwards at first are actually gold mines for new and better ideas," Konrath says.

The Po!nt: There are a million tools and strategies for sparking creativity, says Konrath, but none will "help unless you stop ... self-sabotaging behaviors that destroy your best ideas before you have them."

Marketing Inspiration

A Week at IKEA

Mark Malkoff, a comedian best known for patronizing each of Manhattan's 171 Starbucks in a single day, needed a place to stay while his apartment was fumigated. Since his friends had no extra space in their tiny apartments and hotels were too expensive, Malkoff decided to spend his week of temporary homelessness at his local IKEA. "My apartment is 80 percent IKEA anyway," narrates Malkoff in the first video documenting his experience. "It would be like living at home."

The premise is a bit thin. But whether a skunk works brainstorm from IKEA marketers or one comedian's inspired self-promotion, the series of videos collectively known as Mark Lives in IKEA are a win-win situation for all involved.

• IKEA gets lots of free press and product demonstrations from someone who appears to be the ultimate customer evangelist. (There seems to be no official support from IKEA, and Malkoff claimed he wasn't paid.) Additionally, the Swedish company's bemused cooperation reinforces a good-natured image.


• Malkoff has a viral venue to audition for a larger role on The Colbert Report, where he currently works as an audience coordinator.


• Viewers are entertained—and, perhaps, slightly appalled—by someone with the chutzpah to brush his teeth at the self-serve soda fountain and toss a used towel back on the shelf. All of this, meanwhile, is set to a diverse soundtrack that runs the gamut from Herb Alpert to Mötley Crüe.

Get to the Po!nt

This Deal Available Only Last Week

How often do you come across an advertisement with a limited-time offer that has already expired? Or a seasonal offer still lingering after the holiday has passed? Like any public goof, you're probably just grateful it wasn't your screw-up. But it could be—and that's why Susan Gunelius of the MarketingBlurb blog says it's important to stay on top of your various campaigns.

An obviously outdated ad does more than embarrass your company; it can permanently change the way people think of your company, brand or product. After all, if you don't pay attention to your marketing, what other details do you gloss over? "Even if the ad works and catches a person's attention," she says, "the negative effect of the expired offer is enough to turn that person off of the advertised product completely."

To demonstrate, she provides an example she came across online in early January. The ad is from a prestigious automaker and reads "Now's the time to bring one home for the holidays." There is a link with the ad that takes to you to a local dealership, where you see yet another version of the expired ad prominently displayed on the dealer's homepage. Simply put, Gunelius says, "An outdated ad or promotion does not drive sales."

The Po!nt: "Make sure your copy and ad placement are timely and don't have a chance to become outdated," writes Gunelius. "Or else you'll risk negating your ad's effectiveness and throwing your advertising dollars out the window."

E-Mail Marketing

Newsletter No-No's

How can businesses use email newsletters to achieve their marketing goals? Knowing what not to do is a good place to start. Mark Brownlow claims there are six big mistakes marketers make when publishing newsletters. Here's a peek at three:

Confusing newsletters with promotions. Brownlow claims that newsletters' "real potential lies in building, over time, a lasting, long-term relationship with the reader." Instead of promoting your ergonomic office chair, for instance, provide an article on avoiding back strain at work. You aren't asking for immediate action—you're starting a conversation that might lead to eventual action.

Focusing on yourself, not your audience. Is your average reader really interested in the new employee gym at your office or the retirement party for your receptionist? Probably not. Save that info for internal publications and give your readers useful, timely and relevant content to build newsletter loyalty.

Making it difficult to unsubscribe. "Some marketers still believe a disgruntled subscriber is better than no subscriber at all," says Brownlow. "So they make people jump through hoops to get off an address list, or they wait a few more newsletter issues until the unsubscribe request is properly honored." Big mistake. Not only do you annoy and alienate potential customers, you create a statistical headache by throwing off response rates. A quick, painless process is in everyone's best interest.

The Po!nt: In your eagerness to get the most out of your newsletter, you might inadvertently defeat its purpose. Avoiding these common mistakes can help keep you on the right track.

Customer Behaviour

Nobody Wants to Be a Tightwad

It would be logical for consumers to use a coupon to save money rather than pay full price for a purchase. Yet redemption rates for coupons are really quite low! Is it simply that consumers don't have the time to clip and retrieve coupons from newspapers, magazines or product packages?

Researchers have discovered another reason why consumers might not like to redeem coupons: They make the buyer look cheap. Consumers are concerned with more than price when shopping—they are also aware of the impression they are making on fellow shoppers. They not only worry about others' impressions of the quality of their purchases, such as the amount of junk food in their shopping baskets, they also care that others might consider them stingy if they whip out a stack of coupons.

Consumers do not behave the same way, however, if the coupon is attached to the package or if they make the purchase online. In the first case, the consumer is not actively going out of his or her way to save money, so there is no negative connotation attributed to the behavior. In the second case, no one sees the online purchase being made, so there is no fear of others' negative reactions.

The Po!nt: To make coupons a viable part of your promotion arsenal, you may want to rethink how they are distributed.

Get to the Po!nt

Five Ways to Boost Intranet Traffic

If you aren't familiar with intranets, they are essentially an organization's online network (a private Web site) that can be accessed only by employees or authorized users. Intranets can be a great way to communicate with employees, but getting everyone excited about logging in can be a challenge. If you're having trouble building buzz for your intranet, or are still in the planning stages, Shama Hyder of the After the Launch blog offers this advice:

Feature intranet-only content. Would you visit a site that rehashed information you had already read in memos and newsletters? Probably not. So offer worthwhile content available exclusively on the intranet.

Make the login process easy. Don't let a labyrinthine login process convince your employees that it isn't worth the trouble.

Solicit user input. The most effective question to ask users might be, "Why aren't you using the intranet on a regular basis now?"

Implement a rewards program. "[R]eward your members for using the intranet," writes Hyder. "It's a great way to increase participation and cultivate a healthy competitive spirit within the organization."

Results won't happen overnight. Even the best intranet offerings might take a while to catch on, so don't get discouraged if it takes a few months to build enthusiasm.

The Po!nt: "We often think about marketing as an external practice, but it is just as important to market within the organization," writes Hyder. "Once employees are on board, the entire operation runs easier."

Print Ads - Released January 2008

Client: Harley Davidson Clothes Collection

Agency: McCann Erickson
Location: Russia

Print Ads - Released January 2008

Client: BMW 5 Series
Agency: .sTaRt GMBH

Location: Munchen`

Print Ads - Jan 2008 Release

Client: DIESEL Fashion

Agency: Marcel

Location: Paris, France

Marketing Inspiration

Jingles 101 with Dinah Shore

If we said, "Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese," you wouldn't miss a beat before replying, "Pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun." Some jingles are that effective.

General Motors had its own catchy tune in the 1950s and 1960s, when crooners Dinah Shore and Pat Boone stroked patriotic pride and invited viewers to "See the U.S.A. in Your Chevrolet."

Here's a typical rendition of the classic song with lyrics that actually addressed a number of customer concerns and desires. Take, for instance, an extensive dealer network:

Traveling east, traveling west

Wherever you go Chevy service is best

Southward or North, near place or far

There's a Chevrolet dealer for your Chevrolet car

But Chevy didn't restrict itself to the signature song. This duet by Shore and Boone playfully teases the soon-to-come 1959 model with faux-subliminal peeks at the car's low, wide lines. And in this bluesy number, Shore touts the Chevrolet booth at the 1961 Detroit auto show.

Your Marketing Inspiration? "...it is nice to look back at messages and techniques that worked in eras gone by," The Dinah Shore Chevrolet jingle was legendary, and stayed in the public's mind for decades. Maybe looking back at this classic will ignite your creative juices."

E-Mail Marketing

Clicks-and-Mortar Mix-and-Match

Email campaigns can be effective tools to encourage multi-channel sales, leading customers to make online and in-store purchases. I've highlighted a number of steps you can take to heighten the all-around effectiveness of your online efforts:

Help subscribers find your stores. The greatest email offer in the world won't generate in-store sales if customers can't find a store locator on your Web site. Put a directory of your various locations where it's hard to miss. "Make sure they know you are there to serve them."

Encourage cross-channel behavior. "Make it easy for customers to engage with you whenever and wherever they are". I suggest sending out coupons that can be used either at the store or for online orders. I also recommend allowing flexible purchasing options—let a customer shop online and take delivery at the store, at home or at the office. In other words, at their convenience.

Don't sell all the time. Think like a newsletter. Offer some content that benefits the customer such as general advice and little-known facts. Or split the difference with testimonials or anecdotes about the interesting ways your product can be used. This strategy helps build a relationship that can yield sales through any channel.

The Po!nt: Online solicitations can encourage a cross-channel buying experience. It doesn't matter if you complete a sale with an online shopping cart, by phone or at the register—a sale is a sale

Get to the Po!nt

Who Are Your Secretaries?

No discussion of product development is complete without 3M's Post-it® Notes. When Dr. Spencer Silver first developed his low-tack, reusable adhesive, he couldn't persuade anyone within the company of its value. That is, until Art Fry devised the Post-it concept several years later. Still, company executives weren't interested.

Then Fry had a brainstorm. After making a batch of pads, he bypassed traditional channels and distributed them directly to secretaries at 3M. He correctly assumed they would use the product, become fans and share them with others. In no time at all, the secretaries—and their bosses—were using the handy notepads and calling for more. The initial product launch built on the same strategy when 3M sent samples to executive secretaries at many Fortune 500 companies.

• Ask your most loyal customers for testimonials and referrals.


• Look for people who call on your customers. If they truly see the benefit of your product or service, they will become evangelists for your brand.

A few caveats, however. Networking is a two-way street; you must be willing to reciprocate. Also, these relationships don't occur overnight—it takes time to turn a customer or strategic partner into a raving fan.

The Po!nt: "Everyone needs a great secretary... "You simply have to find your secretaries, people who understand your product and will share information with others."

Get to the Po!nt

A Challenge to Conventional Wisdom

We spend a lot of time oohing over the newest ideas and technology, but it never hurts to get a contrarian perspective. And, boy, does Gene Marks have one! In a column at BusinessWeek, the cost-conscious author takes aim at everything from RSS feeds to blogs and antivirus software.

Here's a sampling from his top 10 list of items a small business owner might find overrated and underwhelming:
Spam filters. They sound good, says Marks, but they often block the customer messages you actually want. "Or [they] require a sender to complete a Sudoku puzzle before 'allowing' their email to reach your in-box," he claims. "In the end, it's cheaper for your employees to just sort and delete spam as it comes in."

Online video. Why not post videos at YouTube? Because, Marks says, the cost and complexity of using this ostensibly free and easy service might be too high. "Videos require production companies," he writes. "Otherwise you'll have grainy, useless footage."

Web 2.0. Marks saves some if his most damning comments for the online darlings of forward-looking marketers. "I hear all these great predictions of earth-shaking developments to come. I hear words like 'mashup' and 'wiki,' and I'm still trying to figure out how these affect my business," he says.

The Po!nt: "My life as a small business owner has been littered with stuff that doesn't work as billed, particularly technology," writes Marks. "We business owners are subjected to an endless array of tools that never fail to disappoint. We're promised. We pay. And we're let down." It's a pessimistic viewpoint, to be sure, but one to ponder before spending lots of cash for technology that won't necessarily improve your bottom line.

Customer Behaviour

Where's the Best Place for Your Ad?

Before you place your next ad, think carefully about its location. Research at Northwestern University and the University of Iowa discovered that where and when your advertising appears may influence whether consumers react to it positively or negatively.

While some media buyers opt for space in a lower-key environment so that their ads stand out, others believe it's more effective to place their ads in an exciting medium, one in which consumers are engaged with the material. The study revealed that of these two schools of thought, the latter is more likely to be better received.

Consumers who are engrossed in what they are reading, seeing or hearing become irritated by ads that intrude on that immersion. Thus, the audience projects this negative sentiment onto the brand, thinking of it as an uninvited guest. Engaged readers, meanwhile, may be positively inclined toward relevant advertising that comes at the end of a story or program, since the ads enhance rather than disrupt.

The study found these results were particularly true for consumers to whom the brand is relevant.

The Po!nt: Perfect ad placement requires fine balance. Attract your target market by placing your ad in an engaging medium, but make sure that it does not disrupt the main content.

Marketing Inspiration

When Your Video Isn't Viral

Great content doesn't guarantee 100,000 hits at YouTube or the adoration of bloggers around the globe. So how do you promote your video, short of tearfully defending wayward pop stars or grossing people out with the unorthodox use of excrement?

Viral marketer Dan Ackerman Greenberg of The Comotion Group has some suggestions, which he details in a controversial post at TechCrunch. While we don't endorse his less savory methods, Greenberg claims an outstanding success rate for unnamed corporate clients—he says 20 million views—in campaigns for around 90 videos during a three-month period. Maybe it's true, maybe it isn't. Whatever the case, the upshot is that some of his ideas are worth considering. For example:

Keep it short. Greenberg says videos should be no longer than 15 to 30 seconds. "[B]reak down long stories into bite-sized clips," he writes.
Avoid overt advertising. If the video feels like an ad, viewers are less likely to share it with friends.

Post everything at once. "If someone sees our first video and is so intrigued that they want to watch more, why would we make them wait until we post the next one?" he asks. "If a user wants to watch all five of our videos right now, there's a much better chance that we'll be able to persuade them to click through to our Web site."

Optimize your thumbnail. "Two rules of thumb," Greenberg writes. "The thumbnail should be clear (suggesting high video quality) and ideally it should have a face or at least a person in it."

Your Marketing Inspiration: Though great content doesn't guarantee viral success, there are ways to enhance a video's contagious capabilities. (Avoid Greenberg's creepier advice.)