Discover This: Timing is Everything

And the latest Discover More mailer has very poor timing. Arriving in my mailbox yesterday, the copy trumpeted rewards available from leading retailers in their online mall. And at the top of the list:
Circuitcity.com.

On November 10, Circuit City filed for bankruptcy. A week earlier, the company announced they were closing more than 20% of their stores. On October 20, they said they were considering closing stores to avoid Chapter 11. More than six weeks before I received your letter.

Yes, direct mail has long lead times. Yes, the piece was sent standard mail, and took its time in transit. So Discover, you have poor timing. Yes, circuitcity.com is still selling products. But you lost me. Probably like so many others, I will not see your mall as really representing my top online shopping options.

Timing is everything.

Widgets People Want

I had lunch today with a friend from a research and measurement company, and the conversation turned to widgets and the kinds of widgets people will pass along.

Marketers want their widget to be adopted by the community as their own. If it is, then the savvy marketers can lean back, drink margaritas, and watch their widget spread like wildfire. At least for five minutes. So what does it take to give a widget a chance?

First, it has to engage the audience. Marketers have three methods generally at their disposal to engage the audience:

• Inform
• Entertain
• Incent

With a wealth of information channels, a multitude of entertainment options, and micro-second multi-tasking attention spans, engaging is the first challenge. Second, the audience has to believe it will capture and engage the community. The initial audience acts as a filter for the community. So the first requirement for distribution:

Appeal to a connected community

As an example, I enjoy working in the yard, pruning, planting, and the like, but I could certainly use some help. I would gladly use a Garden Care widget that tells me when and how to prune, fertilize and care for the plants I have. However, seeding that widget with me is not going to drive distribution. My friends and family tolerate my interest in gardening more than they share it, and would not appreciate the Garden Care widget.

Even within a connected community, there are numerous widgets already competing for attention. Southwest has done it, but very few widgets today truly stand on their own and gain mass distribution based on their value to an individual. So the second requirement:

Incent distribution

Most widgets incent distribution through comparisons or challenges (the ubiquitous movie compatibility or movie trivia challenge) or pyramid structures (who hasn't been a waterboy for their favorite team?). In all cases, by passing along the widget, the value to me is increased. What good is knowing your movie compatibility with ... no one?

Now that your widget is on top, how does it stay there?

Continue to engage

Continuing to provide information or entertain requires continual updates or lively community contributions.

So when attention spans are only micro-seconds (and blog posts run to multiple pages), put down the margarita, its time to start working on your next hit widget.

Consolidate processes to increase efficiency

As we enter the final stages of 2009 planning, we are looking for ways
to squeeze more out of each program. Yet in just the last couple days,
I have talked to clients who are continuing to plan and execute each
campaign individually. As we are all pushed to deliver more with less,
it is time for this approach to end. By pooling resources and
consolidating processes, you can do more with less.

Here are a few examples where processes can be consolidated to save
time, money, or both.

List Rentals: consolidate your list research. You will save time, and
depending on the size of your programs, you may save money and
increase your list options as well.

Production: Combining multiple print jobs can reduce costs. For
smaller campaigns in the same format, the savings can be dramatic. And
save time on press checks while you are at it.

Advertising: Look to establish larger relationships with partners that
can cross multiple campaigns. Not only will you get price
efficiencies, you may find yourself getting better service with your
increased scale as well.

Webcasts: Consider a larger webcast instead of another webcast. You
willl save on speaker and productions costs as well as your time to
manage the program.

Fewer campaigns: This is heresy to many traditional direct marketers,
but if you have more than a handful of campaigns, make certain you
really need all of them. The cost of running two campaigns is
significantly more in terms of time and, if you aren't already
consolidating processes, money. By combining the budgets for two
campaigns, you can increase reach, improve offers, or upgrade campaign
elements within your existing budget.

In short, look across all your marketing activities for opportunities
to operate more efficiently.

When Advertising Annoys

As marketers, we all look for opportunities to break through the
clutter of competing messages, using tools like creative, format, and
frequency. And time and time again, we find these breakthrough tactics
work. They increase response, awareness, and other metrics.

But what about the downside? Remember the popup and popunder ads of
yesterday? Reactions bordered on rage and opinions of companies that used them dropped. But publishers and advertisers didn't do
away with them until popup blockers made the format increasingly
undeliverable (and some continue to use them to this day).

Now we have welcome ads, one of today's 'premium' formats, receiving
similarly dismal reviews. According to AdAge and a Gfk Roper study,
70% of us find them annoying. Compare that to spam email, which 84%
find annoying (just who are the other 16%?).

If history is any indication, advertisers and publishers will continue
to use welcome ads, but at what cost? Sure, with click rates ranging
from 0.5 to 2.5%, they beat most other online display formats, but
what is the negative response? How many of us think less of the brands
and products that make themselves a barrier between us and our
destination? Or of the publications that so clearly put advertisers ahead of us, their audience?

How did other formats fair? Email marketing, TV commercials and direct
mail annoy us. On the other end of the spectrum, magazines, newspapers, and free samples are some of
the least annoying advertisements.

There is a clear trend here. Unless you want to annoy (and it seems
some marketers do), be very careful when placing your ad between your
audience and their destination, don't encroach on personal space (only
5% said mobile advertising was acceptable!), put the audience in
control and always provide value, through humor, information,
services, samples, discounts or other forms.

Exploring Mobile Blogging

Ok, so it has become clear over the last couple months that I wasn't
cut out to write a blog. Or has it? Maybe the format just wasn't right
for me?

My original goal was to have a place to save, and
possibly share, reactions and thoughts on the marketing, media
and advertising world I live in. So on the train today, I was
wondering if there was a better option. Like many in this industry, I
live on my blackberry. So I thought:

What better way than to write from a very small keyboard and a very
slow internet connection!

The experiment begins today.

What does your web form tell your prospects?

Web forms are necessary for online lead generation. Or at least so the conventional wisdom goes. But with 80%, 90% or more of visitors leaving when they reach a web form, what is the cost? Is there a better option?

Generally, prospects reach web forms in response to an offer. They raised their hand, they are interested. They may even be a valuable prospect. But then they stop.

The message to marketers: I'm not ready to share my information.

As marketers, are we ready to share our content, that presents our thought leadership or highlights our solutions, without capturing a lead? No, really?

Lets ask the question another way. A prospect walks into your office and asks for information on how to select a solution that meets her requirements. There is a stack of 200 copies of a brief written by your team sitting on your desk. Are you going to say 'no, we won't share that information'? If you do, would you expect her to have a high opinion of the service and support your company would provide?

Not only did you sour her opinion of your service, you lost the shape how she approached the search for a solution. It sounds like a ludicrous decision to make, but it is the decision that marketers make online every day.

More Webcasts on the Way

If you thought webcasts were already nearly ubiquitous, just wait a couple more years. According to B2B magazine, the webcast market will go from $83.3 million in 2007 to $3.4 billion in 2014. If that's true, what might it mean for webcasts in the future?

First, webcast noise will increase. Today, you can't approach a trade site, or even magazine, and not find an advertisement or mention of a webcast. This will continue expanding to other areas with complex messages. Colleges and universities are already using webcasts, soon we will see webcasts become a standard content offering for other traditionally consumer areas.

Second, webcasts will become much more like today's social media formats. A webcast channel may develop a following like a blog does today. More likely, webcasts will become a format for creating longer or more complex blog post.

Third, webcasts will become primary training vehicles. We are already seeing this today in many markets, with webcasts used as a way to train clients and staff.

But as the number of webcasts increase, where will the time come from? Unlike advertising slots in TV, billboards along a highway, or banner ads online, webcasts require a significant time commitment from the audience in order to be valuable. With more webcasts, will the current 30 to 90 minute webcast formats survive? Will webcasts become shorter, brief clips, that add to the myriad of other short, easily digested content formats available on the web today?