Marketing in 2010 – Zoomed Out
Gladwell, Godin, Bogusky, Winsor, Boches. Industry articles, blogs, books – opinions.
Our world and the way we interact is changing. Thus, the way we market our products and services is following suit – and it should. Some of the aforementioned names have become evangelists for social media or crowdsourcing. Some still call them trends. Some believe the strongest medium to convey a message is the product itself. Some, including myself, will always go back to the content in determining why an initiative was successful or not…primary to the selected media. It’s not as cut and dry as it used to be.
But to your average marketer and even agency folks, this is just getting downright confusing. We feel like we have to place ourselves squarely in one camp (of which there are now many) and promote our philosophy. What do you say when your client or manager asks, “okay, where do we start?” I hope you’re thinking more zoomed out than a social media strategy or a catchy tagline. I hope you’re thinking more long-term than setting this stuff up – and I’m not talking about analytics; I’m talking about adapting your story.
This is the summation of far too many marketing books combined with my own philosophies on what our jobs as marketers and advertisers looks like in 2010.
Okay, let me explain a bit and give some credit where it’s due.
1. Purpose. I’ve discussed this in previous posts, and I strongly believe that this always has to be the starting point and the one component that does not change. Your organization’s purpose is set in stone. You change the purpose, and you might as well start a new organization. I define your purpose as the reason you exist as an organization outside of making money (Ex. paraphrased-Disney: to inspire and encourage imagination and creativity). Roy Spence at GSD&M in Austin has really helped me develop this aspect of my philosophy.
2. Story. The story is dynamic, and I know some will disagree with me on that. The story must be consistent and agree with the purpose. TOMS Shoes purpose is to help those in need. Their current story is that if you buy a pair a shoes (which I’m happy to say I’m wearing right now), TOMS will give a pair to a child in need. If, for any reason, it’s determined that these children don’t need shoes anymore, TOMS should obviously develop a different story, but it’s purpose won’t change.
3. Product Design. If you’re selling products, this is huge. I’ll steal an example from Bogusky and Winsor’s Baked In. Nissan Xterra’s story was about a man or woman that loved the outdoors, went on camping trips each weekend and had gear on the roof. We’re all familiar with the odd hump on the back of vehicle. Of course, people wanted to know why in the world Nissan would design a random, asymmetric hump into it’s hatchback. Nissan’s answer? It’s for the first aid kit. Brilliant. Nissan knew people would ask about this hump. They could’ve put a little first aid kit anywhere in the vehicle they wanted, but they chose to build the marketing into the product. Outdoors lovers need first-aid kits. Well, we’ve got one, and that’s what the hump’s for.
4. Content. If I’m in a camp, this is it. The purpose feeds the story. The story feeds the product design. If you’re in a service business, the story also directly feeds the content. This is your web video, your banner ad, your print piece. This is the vehicle for your story. We like to talk about how much has changed in our business in the past decade. Well, we’re not even there yet.
5. Media. Obviously, if you’re going to develop the content, you need to ensure as many eyes and ears of your target see and hear it as possible. I won’t get too deeply into this because there are folks that do this for a career and know far more about it than I do, but you have to know where your audience is to determine the most effective media to deliver your story through your content. If they’re on facebook, get it up there, baby. If they’re not, be careful about doing it just because you’re hearing that everyone else is.
6. Audience, Public. Hopefully, your audience is receiving your story, and per Godin (who I strongly agree with here), that story is something they already agree with. Here’s where things start getting a little more specific to this century. Your audience talks back, and often, their platform is just as big as yours, hence, the arrows going both ways in the image. Your audience is receiving your content, but they’re also throwing their content right back out there for your entire audience to see. This leads to the next component.
7. Choreographer. To my knowledge, Edward Boches, of Mullen, coined this term, and it couldn’t be more appropriate. This individual or team is responsible for listening and reacting. The arrow going from the choreographer back to the public can be identified as customer service. Your customers deserve it. When they express feedback or post content via Twitter, Facebook or any other platform, they should hear from you…quickly. See Twelpforce and Frank at Comcast. The choreographer is also responsible for compiling the feedback of the audience (this is their contribution to the story), and (this is key) putting it back into the story. That’s right. Your audience now gets to help shape your story. This is why your story has to change. Cultural and social changes happen. Your audience identifies and spreads the word on a weakness of your product or service. Your marketing has to be nimble enough to adapt the story and start the process all over again.
See the cycle? Your purpose gets left out of it, but that’s about it. A lot of us are prepared to track traffic and comments on our websites or blogs and even optimize them based on that information. But I hope you now see that the cycle is much bigger, and we’ve got to live more zoomed out than that. In the aforementioned book, Baked In, Bogusky and Winsor actually comment that we don’t really have “brands” anymore as we understand them…we have “systems.” Do you see it?
Of course, we all need to be willing to get much more granular than this, but we need to be careful not to lose the big picture. I know I’m guilty of this. It can quickly become about making a great video and designing a killer YouTube page – that may be the correct next step for your organization, but be sure you understand why and how it fits. It’ll probably have to change next year.
(full disclosure: I’m an ad guy. This philosophy does benefit the agency because it gives us long-lasting and strategic relationships with our clients. Regardless of that fact, and whether or not your agency is involved in every step of this process, this is where we are.) Comments, e-mails, disagreements and additions welcome.
