The Lonely Marketer

What happens when two very opposite personalities and perspectives square off on a business process? Typically, nothing good. But, that is sometimes the case between marketing and IT departments. We don’t understand each other and because the gap is wide between how we each approach the business, sometimes we don’t try. IT people think us marketers should stick to our flyers and brochures while us marketing people think the IT guys should worry about keeping desktop computers running and the network fast.

Well, the truth is we both do a lot more than that and our worlds are slowly converging.

New marketing mediums such as blogging, podcasts, video, RSS and more have forced more than a few IT and marketing departments to share a conference room and hash out their differences. I certainly have been a part of a few of those!

I’ve had a post planned for sometime now outlining the friction and steps to improve, but my “Get to the Point” newsletter from MarketingProfs popped in yesterday and took care of that for me. The article titled, “Information Technology is from Mars, Marketing is from Venus” does a great job of telling the story. It’s a short article so take a few minutes and check it out.

I’m curious - is there anything you’d add?

Have you considered the fact that your next job interview could be in the virtual offices of your future employer in Second Life? No? Well, you’re not alone - I’ve never considered it either. But, an article last month in Kiplinger’s magazine about virtual interviews by companies such as Verizon, Microsoft, and HP leads me to believe that the possibility isn’t so remote.

More importantly to small business marketing is how far we are away from actually having to consider adding virtual world marketing to our plans and budgets. Admittedly, my mind was pretty closed off to the possibility. I couldn’t imagine myself, buying real estate in Second Life and flying my avatar around to meetings. But, a few recent news stories have me thinking other virtual world technologies may become more mainstream for small businesses.

Cisco recently announced a Second Life-like site for resellers and developers - sort of a virtual trade show. From the article:

The new Cisco site will be accessible through Cisco’s Web site, but it is not open to the public. The ISPN was designed and housed on servers owned by Unisfair Inc. in Menlo Park, Calif., Sage said. Visitors to ISPN will be able to click on buttons to navigate as they move through trade show halls and booths, a meeting hall and a lounge, along with various “shadow people,” without the need to pick attire or facial characteristics as in Second Life. However, they will be able to chat with one another in ISPN to compare technologies. In coming weeks, Cisco plans to allow voice communication between ISPN participants through WebEx and Skype, he said.

Hitting closer to home, a major distributor of ours is hosting virtual trade shows for the manufacturers of products they carry and the resellers and end users who buy those products. You wouldn’t believe how life-like the interface is! I can actually see our company participating in an event like that - or at least trying it to see what kind of quality leads we’re able to obtain.

So, it looks like we have another avenue to consider for future marketing efforts or at least keep an eye on. If your interested, I found a webinar being hosted by BtoB about how marketers can achieve ROI in Second Life. The webinar is this Wednesday, September 26th (tomorrow). I won’t be able to attend, but would love a recap if anyone decides to check it out.

What are your thoughts on virtual world marketing? Fad or viable marketing effort?

I came across an example of why I think it’s important that small business marketing departments pay close attention to the new trend of Blended and Universal Search. Blended and Universal search is an effort by search engines to include relevant news, blog posts, videos, images and other rich media content results into the Search Engine Results Page (SERP). To make my point, I want to highlight a recent, real-world example.

The day after I had written a post about Google Mobile Search appearing in my Adwords account, I wanted to get a little more information on the topic so I headed to Google and did a search on “Google Mobile”. I just tried the same search as I was writing this and the results have all changed which is a bit odd. But, nonetheless, the blended results caught my attention on the SERP. About midway down page one was a news result featuring some information about Google and their new search tool.

Towards the bottom, were three results from Blogs that had posted on Google Mobile - including my post.

So, what does this all mean for small business marketing? Google isn’t a “small business”, but the results on the SERP for this search highlight the opportunities small businesses have to compete for results on page one of relevant keyword searches. The game has changed and by starting now with rich media content, small business marketers have the opportunity to grab some of that valuable real estate on page one of search results. Here are a couple ways you can take advantage:

• Optimizing images for search
• Start blogging and writing relevant blog material
• Be more diligent about press releases and making sure news outlets know your news is out there.
• If it makes sense for your business, try some video production (keeping in mind that popular video is still mainly entertainment based).

What other suggestions do you have to take advantage of this new trend?

It was only a matter of time before the Google team found a way to get in on the rapidly growing trend of interactive advertising. They recently announced the launch of Google Gadget Ads and I’m betting this is going to be big. Running on the Google content network, the ads will utilize the cost-per-click (CPC) and the cost-per-impression (CPM) pricing models.

This launches a whole new set of options for Adwords advertisers! These new ad types will incorporate data feeds, maps, images, audio, video, Flash, HTML or JavaScript in a single creative. Basically, the possibilities are endless. Before you run out and buy a book on Flash, know this is a limited release so you might not be able to try it out just yet.

Check out the gallery of examples. I’ll admit, I spent the last 10 minutes playing the Intel MobileTasker game - and I bet I’m not the only one today saying that. This shows you the power of this medium. Yes, we’ve talked on this site about banner blindness and ignoring video ads, but there are always going to be exceptions. For those advertisers that find those exceptions, the sky is the limit.

Here are some features describing the new service from the Google Gadget Ad site that I liked:

• Target by site, category, demographic, geographic location, and much more.
• Extend your campaign on iGoogle with free inclusion of your gadget in the directory
• Serve your gadget ad on thousands of sites with absolutely no serving or hosting fees.
• Dedicated engineering and customer support are available to answer your questions free of charge on our Google Group.
• Detailed reporting of interactions are available in the Reports Center.

Creativity and quality will really be the key with this medium. Poorly developed and poorly planned out campaigns will get ignored easily. But, a well-done, quality development could mean very high CPC and ROI.

I’d keep an eye on this. Your thoughts?

I was greeted by some fine text in Adwords outlining the fact that Google will soon be charging for clicks on their Google Mobile Search network. What!? I’m not running ads on mobile search!

Okay, deep breath. I’ve never had a problem with Google opting me into paid campaigns without my knowledge and this is no different. They’re just giving us plenty of time to opt out of Google Mobile Search - or try it out free of charge for a little while. While I think mobile search will have increasing importance in media plans down the road, my target market will most certainly not be buying our products from their mobile device.

So, just a heads up to you - make sure you log into your Adwords account and decide whether to opt in or opt out of the new service.

If you’re interested to learn more about Google Mobile Search, here are a few articles I found recently:

• Google AdSense for Mobile
• Want to Experiment with Google Mobile Ads?
• Search Ads on Google Mobile Search
• How Google Conquered the Mobile Content Market Overnight
• Google Widens Wireless Reach with AdSense
• Is AdSense for Mobile a New Google AdWords Hidden Network?

I logged into my Google Adwords account yesterday and noticed something for the first time. On my campaign summary page there was a tab setup for my online campaigns and a new tab setup lower on the page for Other Campaign Types which strongly suggested I look into Print or Pay-Per-Action campaigns. This could have been there for awhile, but it’s really the first time I took notice.

So, I can go to Google for paid search, pay-per-action campaigns, site-targeted display ads, and print advertisements. As with anything Google does, they get bigger and better. What will these services look like in 5 years?

So, what does this all mean for the small business marketing media planner? Can we hand over time-consuming media planning to Google? Will bigger company media planners be out of jobs?

Absolutely NOT! While Google is doing a nice job of expanding their portfolio of opportunities for advertisers, they are by no means replacing the traditional media planner - or even today’s Search Marketer. iMedia Connection made the case that traditional media planners and search marketers will need to do more collaboration in the near future, but their roles are still very important. From the article:

“Nowadays, search marketers are being asked to take on projects that have traditionally fallen to online media planners: buying advertising on targeted sites. Search marketers understand and know the Google system well, but perhaps its time for traditional online media planners and paid search marketers to work more closely together. The opportunities to do so are only just beginning to surface.”

Media planning is a big job that shouldn’t be underestimated. From selecting mediums, defining budget, negotiating contracts and placements, planning messaging and creative, delivering a schedule of placements, and monitoring results, the media planner’s role is by no means in jeopardy. In fact, the case could be made that the role is getting bigger as the options and mediums increase.

The fact of the matter is that Google’s reach on publisher’s websites is not far enough that full industry campaigns can be turned over to their mediums. There are a handful of sites on which I may put display ads through Google, but it won’t certainly include some of the highly targeted industry sites on which I currently advertise. And, since I’m not a newspaper advertiser, that medium is not even on my radar. How many years until Google covers every trade mag in every industry niche? Not sure - but it may be sooner than you think.

Breathe easy media planners! Google has opportunities for you but is no where near replacing your role.

I’ve been at trade shows and conferences as an exhibitor and attendee off and on for the last few weeks and have seen literally thousands of slogans and pitches. But, for some reason, this one stopped me dead in my tracks:

Tomorrow’s Solution Today

This might be one of the worst slogans of all time. No, I’m not going to name the company. I actually spoke them and they’re very nice people. They’re a small company with a white board product focused towards the education market. When asked about the slogan, they said they don’t have the time to put into a marketing activities like slogans. That was as far as the conversation went.

This was a large show with hundreds of exhibitors and they spent thousands of dollars to be there. Here’s how their name and description showed in the show guide:

Company Name (Which, as you can imagine, gave no indication of their product)
Tomorrow’s Solution Today

Ouch. Attendees of this show couldn’t hope to reach every trade show booth so I’m sure many of them went to the show guide to find out who they wanted to meet. I’m sure 100% of those people breezed by this company’s description without a second glance. What would stop you?

• If it’s tomorrow’s solution, why would I want or need it today.
• A solution to what? For what do I need a solution?
• What product or service? Everyone has a “solution”.
• The white board product is great, but there is nothing futuristic or visionary about it. So, why is this the product of “Tomorrow”.

Okay, enough with bashing the slogan. They’re obviously not focused on or interested in marketing (but they should get interested soon). Check out Ryan’s recent post about another bad slogan attempt.

So, what goes into a good tagline or slogan? Well, there are many opinions on this, but here are a couple tips I think are important:

• Keep it simple - Making someone think a little is a good thing, but too much complexity will drive the casual browser away.
• Stay Relevant - Keep it short, but indicate something about your product or service that might grab some attention.
• Be Unique - Find someway to make your slogan stick. Don’t be afraid to stick out from the crowd.

What other suggestions do you have for a small business that wants to create or improve their slogan or tagline?

Remember the MyBlogLog craze? Your email box was flooded with emails announcing someone new had added you as a contact. I enjoyed the community interactions and found new sites, but always wondered - “what’s the point?”. Sites such as Facebook seemed to do a much better job.

Well, a new fad launched this last weekend, but this one has a very intriguing purpose - driving traffic to your site. BlogRush has launched itself into the social media scene with a free widget that shows relevant, targeted articles from other sites across the web. You can see it on my right sidebar.

How does BlogRush work? For every impression the widget gets on my site, I earn one syndication credit for a headline on a different site. Plus, the more referrals (people who click on my widget and sign up) I get, the more syndication credits I’ll receive when my referrals start logging impressions. There is alot more math behind it, but if you’re interested you can check it out. I like the fact it will send targeted traffic to my site.

I was impressed with them today. They experienced an explosive launch of the product this last weekend and due to that are experiencing some technical problems. But, they quickly emailed early adopters, asked for patience, and are offering bonus credits to those that stick with them.

I’ll be curious to see where this goes….

I wanted to pass along a quick story that I think highlights a point I and others write about often when discussing advertising and customer engagement.

While at SES San Jose conference and exhibits, I had the chance to be the attendee and not the exhibitor in the exhibition hall – meaning I got to walk around and evaluate different products and services that I may be able to use in my job. When I walked in the hall for the first time, I was greeted by a representative from an exhibiting company wanting me to carry around a bag with their logo on it to carry all the little trinkety, cheap giveaway handouts – or better known as “schwag” – that is handed out by exhibitors. Having decided I wasn’t going to pick up any “schwag”, I declined.

Later, after one of the conference sessions, I went back to the exhibition to continue visiting the booths. I was once again approached by the same company offering the bag and again said no. But, as I walked around I couldn’t resist the temptation to grab a few little unique giveaways that I thought the kids might like. Soon, my hands were full and I was thinking how nice it would be to have that bag.

To my pleasant surprise, the same company was there offering that bag and this time, I happily said yes. I then wandered around filling the bag with junk that never would make the trip home with me. But, I was carrying that big, flashy red bag with that company’s logo on it everywhere I went.

My point to this story is to show an example of why multiple brand impressions are important in any advertising/media plan. Engaging the customer at each point in their buying process dramatically improves your chances of a conversion.

Take the BtoB marketplace, for example. When is the last time you heard a buyer of a product or service in the BtoB world say, “I just had to have that! It was an impulse by, but I’m sure I’ll get use out of it”?

I bet never.

Justifying purchases and covering bases is paramount in corporate buying – of anything. So, don’t be naïve and expect that one impression with your product or service is going to turn into a conversion. You need to be there – both online and offline - as the buyer does their research, compares vendors, get proposals, and makes the decision.

Imagine this:

You’re sitting at your desk slightly before noon on any given day and the hunger calls are loud from your stomach. Yes, it’s time for lunch. You head for the door and start thinking about what might taste good today as your cell phone notifies you that an incoming text message has arrived. With your mind still on food you reluctantly check the message…

…but wait…

The text message advertising is from the sandwhich deli two blocks down on the right. They’re having a special today that inludes a free cookie! All you have to do is show that text message at the deli and you get the cookie with your sandwhich. All of sudden, a sandwhich would taste really good today.

How about that for Local advertising? Can you get any more local?

An article I saw recently caught my attention and led me to look into location-based text advertising. The article profiled Julian Reytel of SuddenDeals.com. From the article:

Location-based services offer consumers something they want based on where they are. Reytel’s start-up company sends free electronic coupons he calls “Sudden Deals” to the cell phones of people who sign up to receive them. Coupons are delivered based on where in the city consumers plan to be that day. (His service can’t track their actual locations, though that’s coming soon from a competitor.)

Consumers can redeem a coupon, which is really a text message, by showing the merchant the coupon on the cell phone’s display screen.

This is by no means a new advertising technology, but I’ve seen more than a few articles talking about advertising via text in the last couple of months. The medium is definitely gaining momentum. As long as the texting content doesn’t go the way of spam, I think this is a win-win effort for advertiser and consumer.

What are your thoughts? Is text message advertising too intrusive or worth trying?