Everyone needs no babysitter

I am halfway through Clay Shirky’s latest book “Here Comes Everyone.” The treatise has many great insights into the social front of the ongoing digital revolution.

Here are the top three points from the first half of the book, as well as my questions that we as marketers must be asking in regards to each:

1. Massive amounts of energy previously spent on passive media consumption are now being redirected into social networks and digital spaces such as Wikipedia. *
Question: Does your organization understand the relevant ways and places this is happening?
This is not about discussion boards or CEO blogs, rather it’s about where your customers are now in charge and where they will take control next and how you must change and prepare.

2. True democratization of expression and communication, nearly unparalleled in history even by tectonic shifts such as movable type, are taking place.
Question: Are you playing it too close to the vest?
Newspapers did, and look where they are today. How can you let go and be a part of the wave? If you don’t, it is very likely your brand/cause will drown.

3. Everyone needs no babysitter.
Question: Are we looking at our organizations and markets as managers or as facilitators?
Yes we must advertise and we must drive revenue, etc.; however, to excel I believe it’s an imperative of our roles to provide platforms, environments, and tools for our organizations and markets to collaborate together. If we don’t, they will go elsewhere.


* I cheated on this one a bit, this is actually from a speech Clay gave recently and not from the first half of the book (although they are related and I am expecting to see this at least implicitly before the volume’s end). You can find this video here, its well worth the few minutes.

Digital as a Verb – Part I

We have all heard it, but maybe not noticed, “Google it” (check Wikipedia) , “Hit the Space”, “Blog”, “Surf”, “Post”. The web is about action, it is about doing and experiencing. Many web-age brands get this, Yahoo for example got it early and played to it with their “Do you Yahoo” campaign. Of course, it may have done well for the Yahoo brand but we all “Google” and I have never heard anyone say they were going to “Yahoo” something, but it was a good attempt to harness this phenomenon.

So what is it that moves a brand into this space? From being an abstract product or service provider to being a part of what we do, a verb? For Google is seems to me that it is very much about the way they started. In 1998 Google was just a logo and a search box (check WebArchive.org). One word, one page, one function (and a few links that I had forgotten about, Linux...) . For this reason the brand name is forever tied to the activity. They were relatively early into the space also, and had at the time the best search algorithm. It is worth nothing that it appears the search function is still what we think of as “Googling”, not so much the newer services they have rolled out.

Also, many web brands are so wrapped around their services it is hard to separate them. Used to be that we would see an ad on TV, billboard, or magazine and we would go visit a store or make a phone call. These activities are separated by time and by medium. Enter the web and it can all happen within minutes and all in the on line space. So even if your product is not purely web based it can be closer to this model than you might think.

But why are all on line brands not experienced as actions, used as verbs, or social powered waves? This is the mystery to crack. We have identified here a few factors:

1. Be a pioneer or at least early into a space

2. Be sure that the service or product is from the heart of your brand

3. Simple is better than complex

4. Be surprisingly good, better, or different

In installment two I think we will take a look at some other companies that have some of this happening right now, Apple is worth a look. Also, we will talk about this phenomenon outside of the actual verb usage proper; what are the essential elements of this phenomenon and how can brand and product marketers create the catalyst to spawn and harness them?

J

PEOPLE + Proposition

Being in between gigs I have had the chance to talk to many of the agencies in Atlanta recently. Combining this with my time working at several big agencies, it seems to me that there are some distinct positions agencies are moving in between. Only a few of them seem to equate to a compelling value proposition. I look at a few of the more prevalent ones below.

Positioning one: Strategy

These agencies stand their ground and don't cave into the lure of revenue from junior staff. They hire senior pros, they go in with strategy, that is what they sell. The execution is as needed. There is little work for the sake of work. Of course, the private agencies are in a better position to do this than those that are beholden to Wall Street. A challenging position, but no doubt a more unique value prop than others.

Positioning two: Creative

This position is about art. It's about being artists. Compelling, exciting, award winning creative is the lead sales point. This is all good, but it seems that is needs other elements to stand alone. My sense is that this is not a long term proposition. Businesses face too many challenges to pay big money for beauty, they must have ROI and other concrete wins. This is great as a part of a portfolio, it feels thin by itself.

Positioning three: Advanced Experience

Where are we going in the next decade? How will people be experiencing digital content? Got a picture in your mind? OK, then let's build for that now. Get the IT pieces, the organizational systems, and the partnerships in place now to be there first. Broadband, on the go, distributed, democratized, less about page turning and more about visual immersion; these things are where we are likely headed. Lot's of value and differentiation to be had here.

Positioning four: Buffet

We do it all. The services page on the website is a laundry list. Full service. Many of the big agencies are in this mode. One stop shops can serve big clients and create 100 million dollar agencies portfolios. The danger is you loose identity for size. When Avenue A pitches against Digitas, how does one really differentiate against he other. The reality is they really can't. It comes down to who puts on the best show.

Of course there are also other positions and many specialty firms focusing on search, production, etc.

At the end of the day, no matter where an agency falls, its about people. However, better to have a unique, compelling value proposition and great teams rather than just the latter.

J

STILL on the Frontier

What is important about a digital marketing program? ROI, ROMS, brand metrics? Yes and much more. Do those things usually change the game? No. Do we care about changing the game? Sometimes, right? When we are heads down building, winning, running, fixing; then probably not. When we look at our careers, when we blue sky, when we have off line chats; then yes, we think about if we are having real impact. Two points in this quick post:

1. There are not enough of us that are actively moving to change the game. Yours truly included.

2. Digital marketing is not about things and results anymore. Yes we still build “things” such as pages and we do need to hit target metric numbers. But that is not where the game is.

Notice I say that we need to “actively” move to change the game. I think many in the industry are trying, but what are we doing to build relationships, environments, and situations that allow it to happen. Again, its so heads down now. Business is good, staffing is a huge challenge, and many of us are locked into “rolling up the sleeves”. The new boom is about the expansion of “Traditional Interactive”. All good. But can we invest more in expanding the borders? Invest margin, time, people, dare I say invest a little client-equity in this? We are the pioneers, we are still on the frontier; I for one want to live like it again.

One concept that holds a lot of promise for me is this: digital marketing's shinning stars and hot spots are not about numbers; they are about shock waves, concussion, viral, they are social catalyst and enablers. Obvious ones are the social sites like YouTube, Face Book, and the bunch. But what about non-digital brands, are they making noise here? Can they? Some are. Many more can by wrapping their heads around this difficult concept: impact in digital marketing is best achieved by paying more attention to the periphery than the center. I will talk about this in a post coming soon:

Digital as a Verb

J

TOTAL Eclipse

Many years ago, during the internet “bubble”, an associate and I were debating whether or not the web would eventually replace virtually all brick-and-mortar stores. The very fact that we were having that discussion is an indication of why there was a bubble in the first place; I have to admit it is now slightly embarrassing to admit the conversation happened. Clearly there is no indication that a scenario like that would ever come to pass in the imaginable future. However, a recent car buying experience highlights how channels, distribution points, or other business elements can be if not totally eclipsed certainly made irrelevant to those that are comfortable with a mouse and keyboard.

I have owned a decent number of vehicles in my time: sports cars to family wagons, Volkswagen to Ford, new to “pre-owned”. One thing I have learned is that buying new cars is, IMHO, wasteful. I say this with all due respect to those who live in the new car biz, including my father who supported me and my family for the better part of my childhood by selling and managing the financing of new cars. All that to say, I recently bought a used car.

My son, the first in a long line of children waiting for the provision of a ride from yours truly, is going to be sixteen in December and thus I planned to give him my car. Since the car needs some repairs and cleaning up, I thought I would start me search early. So, about three months ago I started the efforts to find a new ride assuming it would be a slow process and that I would be able to wait for the right one to come along. The process was not slow and could have been completed without direct contact. The reason it was not slow is easy to explain and has nothing to due with the advancement of on line research tools or e commerce, rather it is directly attributable to me being too consumed with the browsing process to allow it to go on any longer. You see, after about six weeks I was too distracted by the process to concentrate on much else, so I decided at that point it had to end. But I am getting ahead of myself, the second point was the one I set out to post about: no traditional channel required.

I began my search by using what I consider the best source for car reliability ratings, Consumer Reports. This site allows you to research and compare almost any late model car you can imagine. With ratings driven by user questionnaires this is a predecessor to the vogue user-generated content that is so talked about recently. After using this site to eliminate the weaklings and create a short list, it was off to the many on line super-stores to compare prices, mileage, etc. I began on the CarMax website and also spent time on eBay. Several other sites that I was less familiar with turned out to be very useful for comparison including Auto Web and CraigsList. I also peeked into several car dealer sites and newspaper’s on line classifieds, all of which were less than helpful. The things that separated the useful sites from the not so useful sites were selection, ease of use, and ease of transacting.

In the end, I had about three cars on my short list. I found a great deal on one in Tennessee, but it turned out to have a rebuilt title which killed the financing. I secured my financing from eLoan with out ever picking up the phone. In the end I found an amazing deal on a car in West Palm Beach via eBay. After exchanging a few emails with the seller it was time for the first human contact, a phone call. I rang up Harvey at Florida Motor Cars. The call was simply to verify that I would be able to test drive the car prior to handing over the check, this if course was no problem. I certainly could have had this same discussion via email, so in reality this was an optional contact.

To get from Atlanta to West Palm I needed a plane ticket, this was easy to manage via several searches on PriceLine, Orbitz, Hotwire, etc. Once the right fare was found the actual booking and ticketing was all electronic. The car is great, the process was fun, and in reality I could have had the car delivered to my front door if I desired. There was no mandatory face-to-face contact required.

So, while I am not having discussions about the end of retail store fronts these days, looking back perhaps that conversation some seven years ago was not so foolish at heart after all. Does anyone doubt that real estate, finance, retail, wholesale, B2B, etc. are all heading further into the digital space? Can anyone question that our kids and their children will not use the same buying channels and methods we use today? There is perhaps not a total eclipse on the way, but the Internet and its associated technologies are a revolution and we are in the early days.

J