Bing vs Google – side by side
Here is a great idea: someone created a site that let's you search one term and brings up Google and Bing side by side. The moment I saw this I realised why I liked Google so much. First, have a look that this:
The information provided by Google on the term Aconex is a summary of the most relevant pages right on the top. In contrast, Bing gives me a list of seemingly unstructured information.
Add to that the "show options" link right above the result and I can't for the life of me think what would make me change from google to Bing...
Anyone have other ideas? Am I missing someting?
“My 6 year old son could have done that”
Anyone in marketing dealing with branding has heard that one before. About a logo design. About a tag line.
Most of the time, it is very hard to argue the point. When you look at the final product of a logo design, or when you read a final tag line, it is probably really simple. Doesn't look hard to do. But that's measuring the wrong thing. It's not about how hard it is to create something, but how strong it communicates the desired brand positioning.
For example. Kraft thought it was a fun idea to engage their customers in naming a new product. They put little jars with Vegemite flavoured cheese spread and decided to crowd source the name for the new product. "Name Me" the little jars of spread shouted off the shelves. So that was the brief. "Name Me".
The result was that thousands sent in their ideas, and the good people at Kraft, (custodians of one of the most iconic brands in Australia, Vegemite) chose one that sounded like something their target audience might like. iSpread 2.0. I won't go into all the reasons why this was a terrible choice, there is plenty of commentary from all sorts of media (social and otherwise) on that. In fact, the Wall Street Journal even reported the fact that the company has decided to pull the name and think of a new one.
What I am more interested in is how they got there. The reason you don't let your 6 year old son design a logo (or a product name) is that he is not likely to be clear on what you're trying to communicate, how you are trying to position the product. That is the difficulty in design and good branding; how to communicate an idea in the simplest, most powerful way.
The sort of thoughts you expect to go through someones mind naming a product (especially for an iconic brand) are:
Without that, how could either the people creating the name, or the people choosing the name know if it was good, bad or indifferent?
It is the difference between advertising thinking and brand positioning, and I think Al Ries should have a field day with this one, in one of his contributions on Branding Strategy Insider.
Get your customers involved is fun, but don't think that you can take a short cut to the hard work of positioning a product.
Brand Australia – trying to be all things to all people
$20 Million. That's what's up for grabs to design the next "branding" campaign for Australia. The trade minister, Simon Crean told us that it needs to position us as a place to live, a place to invest, a place to study, a place that is more than just natural beauty. (pic by Ernieski)
First this:SIMON CREAN: Building brand Australia has an unashamedly commercial focus which will help promote Australia as a great place to live, a great country in which to do business, a great place to invest. Building brand Australia is also about Australia reaching out to the world; it's another sign that we're not turning inwards, going down the path of mandatory buy Australia campaigns.
Than this: "Australian trade minister Simon Crean announced a $20 million plan today as a means to 're-brand' Australia with a new tourism tagline and logo to reboost diminishing interest in the country as a tourist destination"
He admires the New Zealand campaign: "100% Natural". The CEO of the Tourism and Transport Forum is a little cautious (and rightfully so) about what a new brand might look like and realistically achieve. He says:
We often look to the great success of 100 per cent Pure New Zealand, though New Zealand in a way is almost mono-destinational and mono-product. Everything can be encapsulated in that.
Exactly. They are promoting NZ as a tourist destination. That's it. And that's the problem with this brief, IMHO.
You can't be all things to all people. What do we want to do? Appeal to tourists? They don't give a rip about the investment opportunity. Do we want to appeal to investors? Why would they care that this is a great place to study? Or fish? Or go to the beach?
You want to do it right? Three audiences. Three dreams, three campaigns. Not one. With that many spin doctors around, is there no one to help the politicians with this?
Gordon Ramsay’s Marketing Nightmare
Not sure if you watch Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmare, (or if it is broadcast in your part of the world) but I’m a little hooked. There is plenty not to like about the show, in particular his tendency to humiliate people to get a point across. What there is to like is that every episode is a marketing and branding case study.
Every episode starts with an audit - he assesses the look of the place as he walks in and sits down, reviews the menu and has a meal in the place. He reviews the service and the management.
Nine times out of ten the mistakes are the same.
The quality of food is often poor; no care, no passion. There is no positioning; the menu is confused or bland. The service delivery is chaotic. But one thing stands out: they see the world through their own rather than their customers' eyes. They live in a vacuum.
The next thing he does is walk the local streets. He checks out the competition, looking for a niche, chats to people in the street to find out what the restaurants’ brand reputation is. He talks to local suppliers and generally gets a feel for the specific environment he is in.
So he looks at the restaurant through the eyes of the customers. Brand: “The company seen through the eyes of the customer”. Mostly, he comes back with an idea of how to position the restaurant; a signature dish or direction for the menu that will uniquely position the restaurant. Because he knows his environment he positions away from competitors and ensures that the positioning is relevant to the target market: If he is on the coast it’s about fresh fish, if it is in the heart of the US it is about steak.
He does a local launch promotion with only one purpose; generate word of mouth. He doesn’t start promoting before the house is (more or less) in order though. Now I’ve never eaten in Gordon’s restaurant and although it makes great television, I don’t like his style. But he truly understands marketing and branding.
Time to sound out your advisors – online or on leave?
Overall, marketing and PR agencies and professionals haven't come to grips with the online world. Media and communications people believe that "online" and "digital" is about technology rather than media and simply haven't got their nut around it. Why is this important? Because it takes time to learn. Marketing professionals who wait until their clients demand it from them before they do are in trouble.
There are digital specialists of course. But try and find a PR agency that demonstrates an understanding of current online media. Try and find leading advertising agencies that demonstrate an understanding of online media not through words, but through their own presence and behaviour online.
Speak to them about online and they are likely to refer you to their "web guy" who "is really smart"" and gets all this "technical stuff" or "their specialist partner". Just don't ask me. Ask about social media and web 2.0 and it gets worse.
Greg Verdino is is not shocked to read the result of a survey by "TNS Media Intelligence/Cymfony that "agencies don't get it". Nor am I. (After all, even newspapers put anything to do with online media under their technology section, here in The Age and here in the "Tech&Web" section of The Times).
Why is this so? Everything they ever need to know is a mouse click away. All I can think of is that it is either laziness or arrogance.
If they had a poke around and took an interest, they would found that understanding and participating in online media is not about technology. It hasn't been for quite a while. They would see that it is all about media and communications. Which, after all, is their world.
Joseph Jaffe thinks it is almost too easy to lay into agencies, but they are the external marketing advisors to most companies so I think it is warranted. Over to Joseph with a few tips to marketing professional regarding social media:
To help you in your quest, here are 3 pieces of advice:
- Stop being so damn arrogant and deluded to think you can do this yourselves. You can't. This is all about humility.
- Stop trying to automate the whole process and solving your problems by a quick technology acquisition fix. You're drowning in your own data and laziness. This is labor intensive.
- Stop trying to scale the whole process and replicate your old bad habits. This is about planting seeds and sticking around long enough to reap the rewards of care, consideration and hard work.
Clients deserve better. If you are a client, you deserve better. The people I am ranting at here are unlikely to read this of course, because it's a blog. But if you are a client, expect more. There is no excuse for PR or marketing people not to have a solid grip on digital media. And I mean everyone, not a dedicated "Geek". It is no longer something for tomorrow or for other people. Media and communications people should be leading the way.
(image source as far as I can track it: http://www.oneletterwords.com/weblog/)
Riddles or offers?
Is this a riddle or an offer? I'm still not sure I've worked this out... It's amazing how many sales you can lose if people don't understand your offer.
Yes, but how do you prove it works?
Mark Earls believes that marketing "communications" is the wrong focus for marketers and that instead, we should be making sure our client/company does things that are worth writing about. He writes:
"Too often communications seek to simulate and fake the interest that companies, products and services are missing. Or distract from the very obvious lack of interest.
No, it's much more about doing things, baking in the interest otherwise faked and then suggesting and encouraging consumers and employees to do stuff together around this."
It makes a lot of sense: people increasingly ignore advertising and PR spin so the effectiveness to sell stuff is reducing. At the same time, if you do something special/interesting/important people can now spread the word for you with a click of their mouse. Even without a PR agency.
But it's not happening very much. Why?
It's hard to demonstrate tangible results quickly. The pressure to deliver results and outcomes NOW is immense for everyone. To do what Mark is talking about requires a significant investment in time and resources.
It involves people across the company to work together in a way that they are not used to. It takes a significant amount of leadership to revolutionise the way you look at marketing.
Anyone who is involved in marketing knows how hard it is to get support for initiatives that are medium to longterm in any case. Especially if you can't provide any proof that it will have a measurable result.
So, to get there, how do we demonstrate that "doing things, baking in the interest" is more effective than doing what we are used to doing? And how much more effective will it be?
I support the idea. I think it's what true marketing is all about. The challenge is to come up with a strategy to introduce this approach that will cut the mustard with the people who are paid to think in revenue and profit. Maybe we should make this a new online project for marketers. It is The Age of Conversation after all.
Update: sincere apologies to the owner of the photo I took off Flickr: I can't find your name anymore so no attribution...
In case you forgot what marketing is all about
David Armano from Logic+Emotion gives us something to chew on. I love that man's thinking.
The problem with the latest
Most marketers love the latest idea, strategy or tool. Yes, you too I suspect. There is a good reason for it, we are constantly looking for a competitive edge, either for our company or for our clients. Agencies and consultants are hired for their expertise, their ideas and their ability to execute after all.
The problem is the silver bullet syndrome. Something new comes along (CRM, email marketing, social media marketing; you fill in the rest) and suddenly this is the panacea to all marketing problems. So everyone is an instant expert and the currency of the latest idea quickly devalues to the latest fad.
Spike Jones from Brains On Fire laments the fact that Word of Mouth Marketing is going that way:
I’m over it (the term, not the practice). And I guess I knew it would happen sooner or later: every marketer in the free world is either trying to give advice on word of mouth marketing or says that they are practicing it. From big ad agencies to the guy working out of his garage.
I don’t buy it.
And a bit further down:
The words “word of mouth marketing” are becoming watered-down and sucked into the vast nothingness that is marketing-speak. And while it saddens me, I guess it was to be expected.
Word of Mouth is not new of course. Cavemen used it I'm sure. But talking about Word of Mouth marketing makes you sound as though you are in touch with the latest. Actually making it work for a client is a very different story of course. "Because big ideas are easy doing stuff is hard".
So in time, everyone moves on to the next silver bullet and the people who actually execute something like a word of mouth campaign do what they have always done; make sure their clients talk about the results they have achieved. Sounds like word of mouth.
How good are agency websites?
There are two types of businesses that almost exclusively use "Flash" websites: advertising agencies and architects.
Why? Does it work? I.e. do their audience want this? Are these the most effective websites for agencies and architects?
I asked a mate in a digital agency about advertising agency websites and he came back with this:
"Normally it's to show off the 'creative' nature of the business. Also, a lot of the agencies around are still tv centric so the moving image is a big part of what they know and understand. I think agencies just want to appear "cutting edge" in the internet world and they think that Flash says that about them..."
When I asked him why they create Flash sites for themselves and non-flash sites for their clients his answer was:
"For the client sites, it all comes down to demographic of their audience (for example, some brands are purely 12-20 year olds who want the flashy - everything moving - type sites. Where as (other brands) are mainly 25+ women so they don't care too much about flash."
Back to my point; is this what works for agency clients? I don't have the answer, but I'd love to hear your views.
UPDATE: David Meerman Scott posts this answer to the question. You won't be left wondering what he thinks:)
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