The dirty 30s and advertising your way through 2011+

Back in April 2008, Russell Johnston wrote a great article on "Marketing". The article - Opportunity Knocks - tells a great story about the horrors of the Great Depression, and the actions of advertisers.

At its worst point, in 1933, more than one in four Canadians was out of work and the average farm income dropped to less than half its peak from the 1920s.

... radio experienced phenomenal growth despite the hard economic times. From 1928 to 1933-the year before the crash to the depth of the Depression-the number of licensed sets in Canada almost tripled to 763,000. ... the actual number of sets might have been closer to one million ... Radio offered one winning advantage during the depression: once a set was purchased, the programs were free. If you could build a crystal radio, the sets themselves were free.

... the trick of radio advertising lay not in the medium itself but in the careful pairing of product with program.

Fast forward a few years (okay about 80 years), and here we are with more new media in our hands.  The web is getting old, and it is being quickly eclipsed by the small-screen  (a.k.a. the third screen) mobile browsing.  Is this the radio of our generation?  It's a great place to be (and generally pretty cheap) in this economic time.  There is also plenty of opportunity to pair with a product with a "program" - also known as an "app".

Lesson #2 from the Great Depression - Look for opportunities and be relevant.

How to advertise in 2011, based on lessons from the Great Depression – Public Relations

To understand the Great Depression and how it affected people, it is important to understand some of the psyche at the time. Travis Scott Luther, President of Luther Media wrote a really good piece a few years ago which described the economic climate:

During the Great Depression of the 1930’s, a backlash against corporate America gained more traction than the bull of the 20’s market ever had. Citizens displaced and bankrupted by the financial fallout of the markets came to call on government for strict regulation and oversight. …

Understanding the increased challenges they faced in earning not only the populations’ business, but their trust, corporations were forced to find ways to bridge the widening gap between themselves and the consumers they so desperately needed to continue to operate. Deconstructing a world-view of large corporations as anti-person, evil teeth gnashing machines grew a new industry usually retained by government, “public relations.” One PR man told Standard Oil Company it would have to alter fundamentally the way it explained itself, saying “Identify yourself not with bondholders,…Wall Street, but with labor, with Americans.”

Public Relations is an element of marketing which is used to build relationships with customers, employees, investors, and other stakeholders. Public Relations may be called corporate communications, media relations, investor relations, or community investment.

Community Investment is perhaps the most visible form of Public Relations. This includes financial sponsorship or active involvement in community programs.This typically works best when it is closely aligned with the corporation’s target market and their interests.

For instance – McDonald’s Restaurants involvement with the Ronald McDonald House has very close alignment with their target market (families) and their interests (their kid’s health).

Lesson #1 from the Great Depression … Public Relations is important.

Where's the economy going ... and what can you do about it

The current noise is that the economy is teetering on disaster once more.

What is the best marketing strategy when the economy is in the dumps? Cut back? Well, yes, in some areas of your business you should cut costs to the bare bones. But, history of “tough times” has shown that companies that invest in marketing and selling value will come out the other end of an economic slump as the champions.

I'll see what I can dig up as evidence over the next few days.

Ask the question

Are you a sales person? Do you spend your days in front of customers?

Next time you meet with a prospective customer, check out how much you talk versus how much you let them talk. Then decide if you are a Sales Professional or an order taker.

More than anything, your prospective customer wants to be heard. They want you to ask them questions that will help them describe the problems they are facing. They want to tell you how badly they need your help. They want to tell you their dreams and visions.

If you are an order taker, you can wait for nothing more than the chance to tell the customer all about what you are selling. You want and need to talk. You don't ask questions. You talk.

As a Sales Professional, your job is to ask the questions that will help the prospective customer tell you what they need. The who, what, when, where, why, and how questions from many angles are the ones that make the difference. Then when they are really done telling you what they need (and only then), you get the opportunity to describe how your solution will help the prospective customer see a clear and easy path to achieving that state.

Are you a sales person? Do you want to be an order taker or a Sales Professional. It is in your hands.

Bing's not cutting it

When Microsoft rolled out Bing they were intending to beat up Google.  Unfortunately (for Bing) that's just not happening.  When it launched, Bing enjoyed an uptick on the search-o-meter.  It stole share from Yahoo!.  Google marched on. 

Now, Google is marching up.

MarketingProfs.com reported (through Experian Hitwise) that Google's market share actually GREW in April.  At the same time, Microsoft's fell.  Oh, Yahoo!'s fell too.  And, if you're asking (which you probably aren't), Ask.com's share also fell (dramatically).  Have a look at the results on MarketingProfs.com.

What a dilemma

MarketingProfs.com reports that Consumers Prefer Verizon Service, but want an iPhone).  It sounds like there should be an opportunity there.  Customers who have switched over to Verizon were happy to pick up a Google Android phone back in December. 

Project Management is – fundamentally – a simple process

You simply:

• Define what you want to accomplish
• Determine how you are going to accomplish that, who will help, and how long each of those tasks will take
• Do it
• Enjoy the results.

Unfortunately, it isn’t that easy. It is complicated by people.

• Personalities,
• Overly optimistic and pessimistic estimates, and
• CYA plays.

For marketing projects involving technology it is further complicated by people.  The technology may be a billing system enhancement, an interactive web-based ad, or a new product.  One way or another you are pitting your red/yellow/green hat marketing personalities (energetic, creative, emotional, positive) against your black/white hat technology personalities (critical and facts). 

The way through this is to use a defined project methodology that enables the Marketing people to generate creative solutions and to know when they will be able to actaully use them, and the IT people to know what they need to do, and how to deliver it.  That methodology might look something like the following:

The beginning of the end for Buick

Months ago I blogged about the lunacy of GM killing off the Pontiac brand. Pontiac is (was, or more appropriately, should have been) a fun, sporty, and slightly upscale (from Chevy) brand that would appeal to a younger car buyer.

News comes now that GM is setting up to roll out a Buick (which, with its average age of buyer at nearly dead (a.k.a. 65)), which is smaller and targetted at younger buyers. What's a younger buyer in that model? 64? 60? Holy moly ... they mean someone who is 30ish and still has a pulse. Perhaps, someone who would have bought a PONTIAC. ARGGGHHHHHHhhhhhhhhh. Now GM is setting out to dumb down the Buick brand in order to make it appeal to a group of people to whom it won't appeal.

But wait, there's more. They are planning on basing a new Buick on the Chevy Aveo. Don't they remember what happened when they based a Cadillac on a Chevy Citation?

• Read more about this fancy new Buick (please read with thick sarcasm) on CBC.ca.
• Remember the Cadillac Cimarron at any of a million sites or so out there reminding each of us to never, ever make the same mistake that GM is about to make AGAIN. If you don't believe me, then check in with TIME, who classified the Cadillac Cimarron as one of the 5o worst cars of all time.

I got a free coffee

On Monday I was at Starbucks, and I was lucky to get a "long receipt". The long receipt has a section that invites you to participate in a customer satisfaction survey - which I did. The questions were really straight forward, including: what did you order, did you intend to buy some food, and did you buy some food, was the place clean, was the service good, and so on.

The survey only takes about five minutes (as promised by the Barista). The best part is that I got a free coffee out of the deal. Great pay off for five minutes of work.

I did find it interesting that when I 'Google'd "Starbucks Customer Service Survey" I didn't come across very much about this survey. You'd think that there'd be lots of Marketing people out there blogging their heads off about this. The only story I found out there about this specific survey is a write-up by Biff Motley that shows up on several different pages.

I did find one very interesting piece of information about Starbucks customers. Did you know that chocolate and vanilla ice cream lovers are more likely to visit a coffeehouse (such as Starbucks) on a regular basis. I do love chocolate, and I do my fair share of spending at Starbucks. Their research is accurate.

How does Formula 1 sustain itself?

Formula 1 racing - something I find oddly very fun to watch and follow - is probably the most expensive sporting activities anywhere. When one considers the costs to run a team, to develop a car, to pay for drivers, to build and operate a facility, to take the circus all over the world, and so on, the cost is staggering. I wonder what it is? Anyone, anyone?

Sure, the facilities, series, cars, drivers' overalls, drivers' helmets, and so on are all splashed with sponsors logos. But, what is the return on investment to those sponsors. Does it matter to me in Canada that Santandar (a bank) and Vodafone (a mobile phone company) sponsor the events and drivers? I'm sure not running out to open a Santandar account ... among other reasons ... because I CAN'T. They don't do business in my neck of the woods. This is a waste of their advertising budgets.

Would these sponsors be better off to invest more locally in their own communities?

• Community Investment
• Local & targetted advertising
• Personalized relationship management with their current customers

Of course, this sponsorship game is one that is repeated in NASCAR, football (soccer), golf and many other professional sports.