The Choice Seems Clear

Seems like a situation with easy logic: advertisers should spend their marketing dollars with the medium that offers the most audience engagement, right? Well, then someone tell me why Newspapers get 20% of the marketing dollars when they only deliver 8% of time spent between the media and their audience?

BusinessInsider.com shared 2008 research from JP Morgan via their Chart of the Day post:




The Internet tops the chart in disparity of attention vs. advertising investment by delivering 38% of time spent with the medium but receiving a mere 8% of total advertising dollars.

The other big missed opportunity is Radio, only receiving 9% share of advertising budgets, but delivering 19% of audience engagement -- a virtual mirror image of Newspaper!

Certainly something to talk to your clients and prospects about as you help them plan their strategies for 2010.

BusinessInsider.com notes the numbers are from 2008, so the ad spend on newspapers is lower today-- but go on to say "it's not low enough, considering how little we spend with them."

The Day The Media Died

Mad Avenue Blues

Accountability is King

From today's Inside Radio:

Marketers Seek Accountability
Do more with less isn’t just radio’s operating standard. A new survey shows two-thirds of marketers are being told by their companies to drive more sales with the same or lower budget -- and three-quarters say their marketing budget has shrunk this year. Facing that challenge, accountability has taken on a much greater significance.

The St. Louis Business Journal report the same trend in their article about ad agencies taking a hit from Anheuser-Busch spending...

Anheuser-Bush has changed it's "free-wheeling, let’s-give-it-a-try attitude" for a more "scrutinized and calculated" results-based approach.

From the article...
"A-B has always been good at listening to agencies with good ideas. But now you’ve got to do more back-end research,” Litwicki said. “The way they make decisions is a lot more mathematical. It used to be enough to do brand building and create an image that would ultimately drive sales. Now they also want to see the component that will actually incentivize the consumer to pick up the product. When you come in with those solutions, they are very receptive."

Measurable results are beginning to matter more and more to advertisers, and they are cutting spending with their agencies to find marketing resources elsewhere who can provide those results. As the article above states, when you have an idea that is based on delivering actual results (rather than just another branding campaign) companies are ready to listen.

How Does Your Marketing Measure Up?

Read a great article in the latest MarketingProfs "Get To The Point" newsletter on Marketing Analytics. They recap a post from the Email Experience Blog on measuring the success of email marketing campaigns. This specifically addresses email, but the principle applies to ALL marketing efforts and the importance of pre-establishing metrics for success.

The blog post says data gathered on email marketing campaigns might not be as useful as you think. "Real danger lurks in not measuring the right factors or not measuring accurately. You could suffer lost revenue. You might not know which messages are working. And your sales team won't know what to focus on."

There are just SO many different things you can measure in marketing (especially online marketing), that it's extremely difficult to agree upon industry benchmarks in order to make effective comparisons. People are focusing on impressions or clicks or only those clicks that lead to a single sale.

The purpose of any marketing is to trigger an ACTION. Actions could include:

• Forward to a friend
• Signing up for a mailing list or additional informaiton
• Visit to a physical store location
• Attend an event
• Buy a product

It's vital to have a clear view of your client's specific goal for the campaign's marketing message and for the results on which the campaign will be judged. In order to meet those goals, tools must be in effect to capture the correct data by which effectiveness can be judged. As they say in the article... "If you can't measure it, you can't improve it."

A New Perspective on "Added Value"

The expectation of SOME advertising clients is that they are entitled to free radio spots, van stops, on-location broadcasts, web banners, email blasts, etc. that all seem to fall under the mysterious category of "Value Add" -- simply because they bought an advertising schedule. This expectation is utterly ridiculous. I don't know how media companies (especially Radio) ever let themselves get roped into this one-sided deal. What happened to the "win-win" deal?

Clients like this are either asking the media outlet to outright LIE to them about their "real" price (by hiding the costs of all the freebies deep within the traditional spot costs), or they really believe that media companies can afford this sort of "buy and bribe" practice.

My opinion has always been that this sort of "value add" would NEVER be permitted in any other business. Can you imagine walking into McDonald's and ordering a "Value-Add Meal?" That's where you buy the fries and drink and they give you the burger (and some McDonaldland Cookies) for free.

What about going to the movie theater and buying two tickets to see a show, and then expecting to receive free popcorn and Snowcaps from the refreshment stand?

Buying a new car and getting a boat for free?

Why are media companies (hello, Radio!) the only ones expected to do these sorts of things? The next time you have a client hitting you up for a bribe... er... I mean "value add" send them a link to the video below. Perhaps they gain a little insight into just how outlandish these expectations really are.



You want to offer your clients some REAL value-add?
The added value I bring to MY clients is that of creativity, experience, marketing savvy, and personal dedication to help them grow their business. If they're really interested in elevating the success of their company -- I want truly to help them solve their toughest marketing challenges. If, on the other hand, they just want the cheapest rates and to have the station van out on a Saturday handing out balloons and hotdogs (or worse yet -- will only buy into an advertising campaign to get seats at the next game or concert) they really aren't seriously interested in their marketing success so much as getting all the "free stuff" they can from the media company. If their business can be earned by those sorts of bribes, they really aren't a client that I'd be interested in working with. Let them pick someone else's pocket.

I'm a creative marketing professional that works tirelessly for my clients, and I expect a fair rate for my services. How about you?

VBR for Video

Inside Radio shares these Nielsen stats in regard to increased interaction with online video:
Nielsen released May video viewing data that shows 134 million Americans watched online video content last month. That's up 13% from a year ago. The number of minutes a typical online video user watched jumped 49% to 189 minutes.

If you have a client that you know is using using tv spots now or in the past, a video pre-roll opportunity on the radio site can take advantage of video that has already been produced, but perhaps not fully utilized due to the higher cost of television airtime.

If the client has a product or service that would benefit from visual expores to our audience in addition to the audio spots already being aired, a landing page featuring product demonstration, client testimonials, or an amusing video that drives home an important point of their service can greatly increase the likelyhood of response by your audience.

Some great examples of video used to promote products:
1. http://www.insurance-mitchell.com/
Take a look about halfway down the page to see this creative use of a simple YouTube video embedding to brand his services and point out some perfect reasons why you need great insurance coverage.

2. http://www.savingsanity.com/
Simple 'talking head' video that promotes the advertiser's product while providing real informational content to the audience via the free tips presented in the video.

3. https://www.getsnuggie.com/
And the classic -- Snuggie. Sales not only increased exponentially once this landing page was created to enhance their already successful television spot, but a cult following developed by simple virtue of the new internet audience being reached. It wasn't long before people took the brand and product and started using it for their own creative ends:
Snuggie Remix (over 300,000 views)
Snuggie Pubcrawls (video from Chicago - WGN Radio, NYC, and San Diego - complete with media coverage)
Snuggie Parody (warning: strong - but hilarious - language) (4 MILLION views and climbing!)

Encourage your clients and prospects to use video.
Who knows where it might lead?

The Silent Click

Interesting stats about the marketing value a banner delivers beyond just the "click." Take the information with a grain of salt -- after all, the study was commissioned by the OPA (Online Publishers Association) an organization whose best interest is to promote the sale of banner ads.

The OPA's position is that, just because a web visitor didn't click on your banner doesn't mean your money was wasted. Study findings include...

• One in five conduct related searches and one in three visit the brands’ sites
• Users spent over 50% more time than the average visitor to these sites and consumed more pages
• Users spent about 10% more money online overall, and significantly more on product categories related to the advertised brands
• Higher income audiences visited the advertisers sites

The study was conducted by comScore–and assessed 80 of the biggest branding campaigns across 200 of the most trafficked sites. Here's a link to the OPA press release about the study.

Social network ads are tough sell to Gen-Y

Seeking to grab the attention of Gen Y's on social networks? Better put away the old online display ads if you're seeking to grab the attention of Gen Y's on social networks. A new study by the Participatory Marketing Network and Pace University shows traditional banner ads to be ineffective to young adults aged 18-24.

Researchers asked a group of Gen Y's if they notice ads at all when navigating through a social community, and if they approve of them. While 84% said they notice ads on social networks, only 19% said they find them "relevant."

Researchers also found that 74% of the young consumers in the study click on social network ads "infrequently," and 36% don't click on the ads at all.

There were a few signs of hope in the results --
62% of the respondents said they have "visited a brand or fan page on a social network" and 48% said they have "become a fan or friend of the company or organization" showcased on a brand or fan page.

The top three reasons respondents cited for joining a brand or fan group were: get product updates ( 67%), view promotions (64%) and view or download music videos (41%).

Read full article: http://www.internetretailer.com/dailyNews.asp?id=29703

Are You Helping Your Clients 'Work the Room?'

...or are you just selling them advertising?

Nationwide Is All A Twitter

Meet Shawn Morton.
He's the Senior Consultant for Social Media at Nationwide Insurance.

Nationwide Insurance hired a full-time guy to oversee their social media. That's huuuuge. Shawn's job (according to his linkedin.com profile) is "establishing the enterprise social media strategy and advocating social media within the organization." (Watch your back Shawn. I want that job.)

Shawn recently held a Twitter 101 seminar for his Nationwide associates and was kind enough to post his slides on a (what else?) social website dedicated to sharing presentations.

Twitter 101

View more presentations from Shawn Morton. (tags: socialmedia twitter)

Slide 12 should be of special interest to any of you with 'boring old insurance accounts who cut all their advertising budgets this year...' It's a screen filled with some logos of corporate entities who are using Twitter. Among them: State Farm Insurance, Allstate, and of course Nationwide.

For any of you who've wondered why I send links to companies and articles and examples of businesses who are embracing new media as an option to traditional advertising -- THIS is the reason. Because, although they've reduced their spending on traditional media advertising, they are embracing and investing time AND MONEY into developing their social media efforts.

Become an expert in social media and apply the concepts of effective marketing principles to this new way of communicating to your audience and YOU will be the expert to whom they turn when they decide to reallocate advertising dollars to social media dollars. YOU can be the social media expert who gets rewarded for helping these companies strike up a dialogue with the audience that already loves YOUR brand and communicates through YOUR traditional media and social media tools.

Branding vs. Awareness

The PR News Blog has a nice post on the difference between branding and awareness...

"Often people mistake branding with awareness. Awareness is fleeting. Like a fireplace -- there's fire as long as you're feeding it logs. Branding is the ability to leave the family room and still feel the glow of the fire within."

I also liked their advice on making sure your brand possesses the four tenets of branding: intellectual, intuitive, emotional, value-based.

A good article to keep in mind when discussing awareness and branding campaigns with clients.

Do Ads Work?

A great post to kick-off the new year for anyone buying (or selling!) advertising. Forward this post to your favorite media salesperson or buyer.

Do ads work?
by Seth Godin

If the local bank were offering a sale on dollar bills, ninety cents each, how many would you buy?
Most rational people would say, "I'll take them all please." Especially if you had thirty days to pay for them.

So, why, precisely, do you have an ad budget?
If your ads work, if you can measure them and they return more profit than they cost, why not keep buying them until they stop working?

And if they don't work, why are you running them?

The time-tested response is that you're not sure, that ads are risky, that you can't tell. And for some sorts of products and some sorts of ads, you'll get no argument from me.

Digital ads are different (or they should be). You should know cost per click and revenue per click and be able to make a smart guess about lifetime value of a click. And if that's positive, buy, buy, buy.

And if you don't know those things, why are you buying digital ads?

When Amazon was at its key growth peak, the mantra there was $33. They would buy unlimited ads, of any kind, as long as they generated new customers for $33 or less each. There was a risk that $33 was too high a number for the business to sustain, but the ads were no risk at all. As long as they came in under that number, there was unlimited money to buy them.
How often do year the marketing person say, "that's a neat idea, but we don't have the budget this year"?

Shouldn't she say, "We have an unlimited budget for ads that work"...

$1 Billion in Sales. No Advertising Required.

Good article from AdWeek covering some of the reasons why Zappo's didn't need traditional advertising to create a company with $1 Billion (with a "B") dollars a year in sales.

Some insight from Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh...
"One of our core values is being open and honest. It ends up creating more trust with our customers... It's the opposite of what most businesses do."

"One disgruntled or happy employee can write something on a blog and have that read by millions. It's the same thing with a customer. Our belief is a company's culture and brand are two sides of the same coin. You can't control every touch point like you could 50 years ago."

"About 75 percent of our orders are from repeat customers. We've grown from zero to $1 billion in gross sales in 9.5 years. The No. 1 driver has been from repeat customers and word of mouth. It lets us to spend less on customer acquisition."

"There will be less reliance on advertising for a long-term, enduring brand. Word of mouth is so effective right now."

"If you go to twitter.zappos.com, you'll see all the employee Tweets. We have lots of stories of employees meeting up with each other outside of work because of Twitter. With customers we find it's good for building a more personal, emotional connection with them."

"With most Web sites, it's hard to find any contact information. We put our 1-800 number at the top of every Web page because we want to talk to our customers. It's our best branding opportunity. We have 5-10 minutes of our customer's attention where we can let our true personality shine and develop that personal connection."

The scary part?
Zappos just started a consulting group specifically created to teach other companies their method of growing business using their (proven!) non-traditional means.

The takeaway?
It's more important than ever to be perceived as a marketing and promotions expert/consultant/resource rather than a plain old media salesperson.

Facebook is free.
Twitter is free.
Domain names are less than $10 each.
Site hosting can be had for $5/month.
YouTube hosts videos for free and a myriad of sites offer podcasting and blogging options at no cost. (And we all know traditional media costs are falling like a rock.)

Your value comes from having a sound strategy to grow profits and build business for your client.

Everyone has access to the same tools.
It's what you do with them that counts.

Godin Delivers the Goods

Video recording of a live seminar with Seth Godin.
Well worth the investment of an hour to view.
Pass this opportunity up at your own risk!

If You MUST Use Banners...

...at least try and use them more effectively.

In his article "The X Factor: Why banners fail" Sean X. Cummings shares some valid theories on why our sidebar 160x600 ads get better click-through rates than the 728x90 located at the top of the page.

From the article:

One of the greatest failings of the banner format is that it is peripheral to the content and not interruptive.

We all evolved as predators. Why is that relevant? Predators evolved with peripheral vision that picks up movement better than what's right in front of you. Their peripheral vision picks up ticks in movement and changes in speed better than smooth, clean movement.

Ah, now you're starting to get it --
Have.
The.
Banner…….[pause]
React.
[pause]
[pause]
[pause] Move. [pounce] Like it's stalking prey.

The consumer's eye will instinctively glance to see what it is. Don't be impressed with your smooth, animated banner approved in isolation of the consumer. It looks nicer but will not achieve your main objective: the attention of the consumer.

The technique won't work for every business or every campaign. Sean adds "It's a very effective strategy depending on your business model. An impression does not mean that the consumer ever saw the ad, it just means that the ad server delivered the 'opportunity' to see an ad. Aim for peripheral focus in your ad creation and increase the effectiveness of your campaigns."

He ends the article with line -- which is valuable advise no matter which media you're using. "Don't create ads that annoy us."

Newspapers (Try To) Think Locally for Online Ads

Nice coverage in WSJ about challenges facing "The Dead Tree Society" as they seek to increase their share of local Web dollars.

Though the article focuses on Newspapers, one need only review the Borrell Associates chart to the left in order to realize Radio has the great potential for growth in Online Advertising.

Some of the article highlights...

Scrambling Cannibals

In an effort to make up for their plunging print-ad revenues, newspaper companies have been scrambling to train their sales teams in the intricacies of selling online ads to local marketers.
But in many cases they aren't selling a lot of ads and at least some of the new ads they are managing to sell are cannibalizing their print-ad revenues, industry analysts say. A common scenario is that a trusty local print advertiser -- a car dealership, say -- that used to spend $20,000 a year on advertising might now spend a quarter of that with the newspaper online and nothing in the print product. Thus, the newspaper company is now selling more digital ads, but the new sale is taking away from its bottom line.

Losing Their Edge

Whatever edge Newspaper may have had in capturing web revenue appears to have evaporated. Newspapers now control only 27.4% of the local online ad market, down from a 35.9% share in 2006, according to Borrell.

Cracks and Gaps

There are several reasons why newspapers so far have failed to crack this market.

• Online ads are far less expensive than print ads and thus offer lower commissions, making it difficult to get salespeople to focus on selling the digital products
• Newspaper is typically selling banner ads which don't meet the needs of local businesses
• Most local online revenue growth comes from small and medium-size local businesses -- a market segment that Newspapers have typically ignored

Read the entire article here.

Brilliant Billboards Could Be Leaderboards

Here's a great example of an outdoor campaign that could easily be translated into an online campaign using our 728x90 Leaderboard banners.

Click here for the full campaign series of billboards.

Even more interesting than the campaign itself is the backstory of how it all came together and was actually executed. Click here for the full story.

Which of your clients might benefit from the creation of a compelling storyline...
Missed romance at a traffic light with that cute guy driving a TOYOTA?
A long-lost friend spotted in the aisles at KROGER?
What other variations can you create?

Goodbye Yellow Pages?

Borrell Research predicts 39% of yellow page revenues will vanish as local advertisers shift spending to the internet.

This doesn't mean one less competitor for your Radio dollars!

Other Borrell findings report there are now more than 34,000 local sales reps peddling online products -- more than for any other medium. The chart at right shows that 84% of these reps are being fielded by newspaper and yellow pages companies, all cross-training sales reps to rush toward their most-promising growth opportunity. To date, and in the foreseeable future, directory companies have fared better than any other legacy media at this strategy, garnering about 14% of their total gross revenues from online sales.

Their report also details how online video commercials have emerged as the fastest-growing online ad format for small businesses. By 2012, they expect streaming video advertising to surpass all other formats, including banners and paid search. The report includes local online spending estimates for search advertising and streaming video for 210 markets.

Download a free executive summary of the report by clicking here.

My advice is to continue focusing on the task of finding a real customer need -- the one that goes beyond driving traffic, selling more ('whatevers'), and branding/awareness. Find the customer's pain and create a custom marketing strategy that integrates Radio and Web to provide both audience reach and message trackability in order to take their pain away. Solve the real problem and you'll have a customer for life.

Landing Page Video Piracy

Interesting take on providing engaging content on an advertising landing page:
http://www.vidsense.com/touchofgray/index.html#evtv1-2121

"Touch Of Gray" took video accessible from a video sharing site of a scene from "A Few Good Men" and embedded the video player on a promotional page. Since the video was actually provided via a social site using their embedded video player, I think this effective skirts the issue of licensing rights -- the infringer is actually the site that provides the video -- not the owner of the landing page.

We use similar reasoning when posting music videos from YouTube on the Mix site and sports videos on The Fan -- this example took it a step further by using a single advertiser. This could be a concept to exploit for advertisers of our own.

A Veterinarian landing page that displays a funny animal video...
A Sports Bar that displays a funny beer commercials...
A Travel Agency that uses a clip from the movie National Lampoon's Vacation...
An Employment Agency that uses video from Office Space...
An Insurance Agency that uses videos of catastrophes...

Lots of possibilities.

Videos Worth Viewing

A couple great media videos -- the first mocking banner ads (one of my favorite past times!) and the second mocking how pharma markets to women.