Influential Marketing Blog

How "Location Shifting" Could Reinvent GeoTargeted Online Marketing

There's a pretty simple idea that could transform the landscape of targeted online communications, but no one is doing it ... yet.  If you have ever done any online marketing that has been targeted by geography, you know that there are pretty much only two ways to do it currently online:

1. Based on IP address of where the user is accessing the Internet. Notoriously unreliable because of shared servers and inability to truly pinpoint a user's location.
2. Based on a profile that the user has created indicating where they live. This is much better with two big assumptions ... that people tell you the truth about where they are, and that they are usually there (as opposed to travelling).

For someone like me, this system makes it impossible to target me on a geographic basis. I am always travelling, often using Internet through shared connections in multiple locations, and my Facebook profile says I belong to the San Francisco network (intentionally), even though I live in DC.  My email address has the word Australia in it and I registered it while I was living in Australia and never changed my region. There are a lot of other consumers like me, making it tough for any business to truly target geographically by relying on such uncertain data. The one solution with promise involves using the mobile platform to geotarget based on where a person physically is. This is good, but still incomplete because it doesn't allow you to predict where someone will be.  What if there was a way to geotarget your messages not to where a user currently is, or even where they say they live, but to where they will be?

This is possible today, because more than ever before, people are now broadcasting where they are going to be and what they are currently doing through social media.  Look at a platform such as Twitter, where people routinely update their status to indicate where they are and what they are feeling.  Or a travel site like Dopplr, which I use to update my upcoming trips.  To a degree, this is private information - but many people publish it live for anyone to see.  Location shifting means geotargeting your marketing communications based on information about location that your consumers are giving you or posting online.  As a result, if smart marketers started using this information, a whole range of things could be possible:

1. Banks could verify that you are travelling and not have to cancel your cards because of suspected fraud
2. Marketers could send special offers to people who express a particular sentiment in a certain location (eg - someone Twitters that they are hungry in Manhattan, and gets a Twitter message back with a coupon to a local pizza shop)
3. Car services could automatically update their drivers who are waiting for pickups
4. Your friends could invite you to events through social networks based on where you will be and not just where you live

What else could be possible with location shifting?  Let me know if you think this idea works.

Everywhere Mag and the Arrival of the User Generated Magazine

As someone passionate about travel and the travel industry, I pay a lot of attention to sites that are out there.  Travel has long been an active industry online, whether you talk about people's behaviour with increasingly booking travel online, or the slate of review and opinion sites that let people share their opinions about travel destinations. From Yelp to Driftr to Dopplr there are new travel sites that let you do just about anything you want and they are all great ... yet none have quite found the right formula to harness the one thing that travel enthusiasts like me all have in common: a passion for talking about travel and sharing my experiences.

Sure, I could post a review on Yelp or publish my own travel blog - but what about something a bit more ... substantial?  Something that I get a bit more credit for.  Travel magazines are usually substantial in that way because they do manage to capture the wanderlust that characterizes many travel enthusiasts and offer a real experience you can hold in your hands.  The problem is, very few of them build on the great content being created by individual travellers online because they have a professional editorial staff to do it for them.  Everywhere Magazine is a publication composed entirely of user generated content.  Every month, the editors select the best articles and photos (based on their editorial team and a system of voting on their website) and lay out a new magazine. This is brilliant for a number of reasons, but most specifically the costs they save on hiring a staff of writers and paying their expenses is put into the production of the magazine which is every bit as professional and beautiful as any other travel magazine likely to be on your coffee table. 

I joined the community and have several ideas for articles that I am just itching to write about, because they relate to places or things that I experienced and am passionate about, or tips for travelling better.  Either way, it will be interesting to see if this model of a completely user generated magazine could work in other industries.  Is this unique to travel because of the passion people have for writing and photography in this category, or could it work for any industry?  Anyone seen other examples?

Notes From the Twitterbowl: The Top 3 Strategic Super Bowl Ads

Last night during the big game, I joined a large group of marketing and social media types to share some live thoughts about the Super Bowl ads through Twitter (sending them to the @superbowlads user account).  The aptly named "Twitterbowl" consisted of lots of folks live rating ads and sharing some feedback about the ads live during the game.  Voting on ads in real time is nothing new ... however doing it and reading the thoughts of my other contacts during the game was an interesting way to experience the ads.  Though I would have expected a more sophisticated commentary from the group as a whole, being marketing people and all.  Many folks seemed to just be rating ads on entertainment value as opposed to whether or not the message actually made sense for the brand, but it was still a fun experience as part of the game.

Aside from realizing that people can really have completely opposite views of what makes a successful Superbowl ad, it was also clear that all of us love to have our opinions.  Everyone decides what is most entertaining for them, but since this is a marketing blog, I'm going to go with my own top 3 Super Bowl ad list based on strategic value for the brand.  So, here is my list of the top three 3 strategic ads that were creative, engaging, messaged properly and could actually have a real impact in terms of sales (and only one of them made the USAToday Top 10 popular ads list):

1. Tide "My Talking Stain":  This spot was easily relatable (everyone has had that stain they couldn't do anything about), funny, and generated awareness for an under appreciated product  In the Twitterbowl, most folks loved it, and it will easily have the recall when anyone is walking the grocery market aisles and sees it.  The only downside?  The word in the Twitterbowl was that their marketing site (www.mytalkingstain.com) went down under all the traffic.
   
2. Under Armour "Under Army":  Any company that is number 3 in a competitive industry has perhaps the most to gain from a Super Bowl ad because it positions them on equal footing with the other two.  For Under Armour, this meant taking the reigns from Nike and Adidas with their "Under Army" spot, which they did brilliantly.  Not to mention it was one of the rare Super Bowl ads that (gasp!) has something to do with football.  Ironically, it wasn't popular in the Twitterbowl - but for the masses and Under Armour's target audience, I think it was spot on.
3. Audi "Godfather": Audi's spot was a big deal in marketing circles before the Super Bowl even aired because it represented a rare entry from Audi into the Super Bowl mix.  The ad itself was a brilliant parody of the Godfather that positioned the new __________ as the ultimate in new luxury.  Anyone want to bet what percentage of the boomer males watching the game were picturing themselves in that car?

Of course, I am tough on these ads because I am putting the often forgotten lens of strategic value over deciding what was a good creative execution.  If we just looked at entertainment value, which I am sure lots of polls are doing today, the winners were probably a few of the Bud ads and the Pepsi Night at the Roxbury spoof.  Worst ads?  They have to be the Gatorade/Vitamin Water/Sobe combos (seriously, can anyone tell them apart?), the CareerBuilder nasty exploding heart ad (they should have stuck with the monkeys), and the singing Comcast ads (which, thankfully, most of the country probably didn't see).  Big props to Dell and Lionel also, for being the only advertiser (that I could tell) to actually be part of the Twitterbowl. 

Oh, and it was a great game to watch too ... congrats to Giants fans everywhere.  If it can't be the Redskins, it might as well be the Giants doing the NFC East proud.

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Lufthansa Proves Sweden Is Full of Gorgeous Blondes

Typical marketing advice says that you should never focus on marketing your category, but instead focus on what makes your service distinct from your competitors.  Marketing an industry or type of service is usually a losing proposition because even if you convince someone they need something, you have not convinced them that they need to get it from you.

In the travel industry, this lesson is somewhat different.  Today American travellers are increasingly choosing destinations outside of Europe for their vacations because of the weak dollar against the Euro.  Europe needs to find a way to get its appeal back and Lufthansa (an airline with many of the most frequented routes from the East coast to Europe) is helping the cause with a smart new campaign called Rumor Travels at www.rumortravels.com.  The site offers a few videos focused on three of the greatest rumors about great European countries:

1. Sweden is full of hot blonde women - Watch Video
2. Germany has beer everywhere for every meal - Watch Video
3. France is full of lovers who cannot stop kissing each other - Watch Video

The videos are meant to visualize silly stereotypes and all end with the compelling tagline, "you'll never know if you don't go."  There is a contest on the site where users can submit their own videos to win 2 business class tickets to Europe and a new Sony digital video camera.  Strategically, the campaign works on on several levels:

1. Demonstrates the necessity of travelling in a world of increasing virtual experiences.
2. Positions Europe as the ideal destination to travel for challenging your preconceptions (something people may usually associate with other more "exotic" destinations)
3. Targets the young, professional and single travellers (who will likely be least deterred by the negative exchange rate between Dollars and Euros)

Of course, it doesn't hurt that each video features attractive people and focuses on the romance of travel.  Europe, romance, professional, single ... you get the picture.  This campaign seems like it would work - if only Lufthansa was doing any perceptible amount of marketing around it.  I read about the campaign on Adrants and most of the less than 20 blogs that are listed on Technorati as linking to the campaign come from people reading about it on Adrants.  Even the Lufthansa US homepage only features a blurb on their promotion with Iron Chef instead of any links to the RumorTravels.com site.  The video views on YouTube are still super low, and the contest ends in just 2 days.

As far as I can tell, it seems like a classic smart, strategic and engaging campaign that will ultimately underperform and fade into obscurity because the team behind it was unable to coordinate enough marketing support from whomever controls the ad budgets for Lufthansa.  If anyone has insight into the campaign, please share.  I would love to be wrong on this one ...

A Recap of Ideas from Nielsen's CGM Summit 2007

I spent the day today at the Nielsen CGM Summit in NY listening to some panels and presentations from Nielsen and many of their clients about the future of measuring CGM.  One thing I was looking forward to about this event in particular is that the percentage of brands vs. agencies in attendance would be much more favored toward brands.  It is sadly ironic when you think about all the events that agency folks attend to basically talk to themselves, while their clients are all interested in (and spending time attending) events on measurement (which few creative folks from agencies would be able to stay awake through).  I must admit, I had a bit of a hard time staying awake myself today ... but to be fair, that was probably due to my redeye from the west coast to NY last night. 

In any case, I managed to stay awake throughout the day long enough to take some notes on some key takeaways from the summit which you will find below.  I also had the chance to meet several folks in person that I have been reading or known from afar, including Peter Kim, Henry Copeland, and Emanuel Rosen (author of The Anatomy of Buzz).  Though some of the "wonder of Nielsen" presentations that I expected throughout the day ran a bit long (not yours, Pete!) - overall the day was a great deep dive into all the ways we can and should be measuring.  As one speaker shared earlier in the day, "media is not an island" and is interconnected as consumers watch and interact with messages across mediums. Marketers may be specialists in one particular channel (TV, Online, Mobile, WOM, etc.) ... but consumers are most definitely becoming experts in all of them and use them concurrently. 

Anyway, here are some key notes and insights I took away from the event:

1. Influencers are emailers.  There was an interesting data point in one of the presentations that said that 55% of people who were considered "speakers" (those who share opinions vocally) have emailed directly to a company about a product that they liked.  This was a big insight throughout the day, as it indicated that brands seeking their influencers may simply need to listen more closely to the feedback they are already getting.
2. CGM generates powerful insights, not just influential voices to "target" - In response to a question from Max, I shared this point of view during the recap of the day and it was something that came up repeatedly throughout the morning.  Listening to CGM can drive strategy if you find the gaps which you can use CGM and social media to solve.  One example I shared was using CGM to find the conversation about Julian Beever (a sidewalk chalk artist) before we started our Fountain of Youth program for Aveeno.  We learned that there was lots of discussion online where people wanted to see more of his images and know how he does it.  So we created a Flickr gallery of all his images and a video of him drawing to rave reviews online.
3. Buzzphrase #1: Consumer Fortified Media - This was a new concept that Pete introduced in his presentation about how brands are putting their commercial messages online (like Dove Evolution), and consumers are talking about them and adding credibility to these messages, thus making them fortified.  Of course, there is a handy acronym for this as well: CFM.  (I suppose it could be CFM2 when those commercial messages are for products already "fortified" ... um, like Fruit Loops).
4. A new reason 2008 Superbowl ads will be better than the game - The guy from Fox Interactive shared that next year Fox has a deal with the NFL to create an official site where the 30 second spots will be accompanied by "long form video."  The smart marketers will take the chance to create "making of" secondary ads around their $3 million Superbowl spots.  Not sure how CGM plays a part here (unless lots of brands do the "you can create our Superbowl ad" thing again), but I still thought this idea of extending the most watching ads in the world with long form content behind them is a great concept.  Maybe worth an idea bar post at some point ...
5. "Getting out of the way" is a strategy - During the panel where media brands shared what they believe will happen in 2010, the guy from CBS talked about the things that they are doing and noted a significant moment where a random user placed a clip from Letterman where he interviewed Paris Hilton on YouTube and the clip got millions of views.  His point ... we didn't go after him, which signifies a great case study.  I loved the irony that getting out of the way is now considered a strategy.  Actually, sometimes it's the best one. 
6. Buzzphrase #2: Consumer Emulation - In this second concept from Pete's presentation early in the day, he talked about how we are in the midst of a wave of "consumer emulation."  Citing examples like the JetBlue and Mattel CEOs addressing the public as if they were doing consumer produced Youtube videos, or politicians and celebs who have Facebook or MySpace pages  - the point he made is that the pros are sometimes emulating the amateurs.  And of course, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't ...
7. It's not about volume anymore - The great conflict with how brands used to purchase media to buy influence online versus how they do now is that tricky measure of CPMs.  When you are buying in blocks of thousands of impressions, it is impossible to say you are not buying volume.  Yet as many marketers noted today, less is really becoming more.  One thought I shared is that sponsorships of blogs and social media sites that are persistent can offer a much higher value, but not measured in terms of page views, but rather in terms of brand perception.
8. The silo-fication of marketing remains a barrier - Many of the brands that participated in the day were large ones, and all seemed to struggle with similar issues when it comes to ownership.  This was not about the typical debate on whether blogs belong in corporate comm, or product development, or marketing, etc.  The silos on a macro level are those between marketing/communications, customer service, product testing, and other large divisions.  In many large organizations, these groups are in geographically disparate locations.  CGM may be a brilliant place to gather insight, but if the marketing team who gets the blog monitoring reports isn't sharing them with product development, or the customer service team who is speaking with a blogger doesn't share that information with marketing ... the power of CGM is never realized.

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7 Lessons On How To Be a Great Client

I've spent a lot of years working in marketing agencies and the one thing you learn with that kind of background is how to build relationships quickly.  Of course, the thing that's a bit tougher to admit is that some relationships are much better than others.  It is simple human nature to say that people work the hardest for someone that they like and respect.  This means having an agency and motivating their team to produce their best work for you are not necessarily the same thing. 

I have written before about some rules for smart agencies to win presentations and provide excellent client service.  I take those rules to heart in every one of my client interactions, but recently I also participated in some interesting discussions about what makes an ideal client.  As it turns out, there are some very distinct qualities that most folks who work in marketing agencies consider common among their favourite clients.  Here are just a few of them with some suggestions about how you might be able to use them to be a better client ... and get better work from your agency as a result.

1. Provide clear direction - This was a clear #1 priority for many agency creative workers in particular who have struggled to interpret vague instructions.  Making something "more corporate" in look or language is not clear direction, though you may know what you mean by this.  The best clients are the ones who are able to articulate what they are looking for.
2. Invite us to the table early - The earlier we learn about a campaign or new marketing initiative, the smarter recommendations we can bring to you.  This may seem in contrast to the first point, as inviting your agency early might also mean you don't yet have clear direction to offer ... but at the early stage it matters less because as long as we have enough information, we can produce the best work.  That comes from clear direction, or from early participation.
3. Be honest about success factors - The easy thing to say is that a campaign needs to get X number of views.  Many times, the motivation for a campaign are more subtle.  The smart agency guys (or gals) understand that part of your motivation is also to look smart in front of your colleagues.  That's nothing to be ashamed of - our job is to help you look smart.  If we work together, we can all win.
4. Take the advice you are paying for - One of the toughest things to do as your advisors is to tell you when an idea doesn't work.  Too many agency people roll over and obey commands, but my experience with clients is that they respect you far more when you have a distinct point of view.  The challenge is that once we share it, if you choose not to take the advice, we need to understand why.  You don't need to always follow what we say, but the thing we hate most of all is telling you something won't work, being forced to do it anyway, and then getting blamed when it doesn't work.
5. Know what you don't know -  We all have limitations in what we know and what we do.  The clearest example of this comes when looking at design.  If you don't have a design background, you need to tread carefully with design feedback.  Take the time to understand why a designer chose to do something a particular way rather than just sharing your personal dislike.  A lot of thinking often goes into designs like this, and the most disheartening thing for a creative person is to just be told to arbitrarily change a color or font or image that spent hours to select based on someone else's personal choice.
6. Understand that changes affect timelines - This again is one of the common gripes from people in agencies, that clients change requirements or requests and still expect things to be done within the same amount of time.  This isn't reasonable, and the best clients know it.  If you need to make a change, its ok - we get it.  But work with us to get a real timeline for when we can make the change and get something back to you.  We'll respect you for realizing that.
7. Ask our advice - There is a book called The Trusted Advisor which has become the bible for many people who are in service businesses.  As the title indicates, the book is about building a relationship of trust that gets to a level where you are considered an advisor even on things outside of your expertise.  This remains the ultimate relationship between clients and agencies, and the one we all strive for.

For other agency folks who read this blog ... any other points you want to add for what you appreciate about your best clients?

10 Truths of Marketing in a Web2.0 World

I am in Austin today participating in the eMarketing Summit as part of the Innotech Conference.  I had the chance to do a lunch keynote presentation following Allen Olivo of Yahoo - focused on marketing in a Web2.0 world.  The presentation had a great crowd of engaged people and most (surprisingly) managed to stay awake despite my excellent spot right after lunch.  Below is the presentation I gave at the event, and I am told there will be a podcast of the presentation with audio synched with slides online in the next day or two so I will share the link for that as soon as I have it.

Update (10/15/07) - Read a Dutch Translation of this presentation from Enthousiasmeren

Influential Marketing Blog Featured in Wall Street Journal

Many of you may have already caught this yesterday, but this blog was cited in the Recommended Reading  section of the Wall Street Journal yesterday in an article by Keith Huang.  As Jay Berkowitz from Ten Golden Rules shares on his team blog, my blog was one of 60 resources that they recommended to the journalist as part of their reading list and was selected from that list as a recommended resource for companies looking to "optimize their online presence."  Here's the writeup:

Influential Marketing Blog, rohitbhargava.typepad.com
Rohit Bhargava's blog is intellectual and educational. In a recent post, he discusses the art of stamp collection and how, even today, many smaller countries use stamps as a key marketing tool. He writes, 'Next time you pass a post office in any country, pay attention to how they are using their philately to promote the country, cater to tourists, or commemorate moments of significance.'

It is a great media hit and to be selected from a list of what I am guessing were 60 stellar resources is flattering.  I'm in awe at being included among the other bloggers and authors mentioned in the article - including Seth Godin, Steve Rubel, Matt Cutts, John Battelle, Chris Anderson, Joseph Jaffe, and Danny Sullivan. Thanks to Jay for including me in this great list, and to Keith for selecting to include my blog!

IdeaBar: Still Seeking The Great Semacode Marketing Idea

Gizmodo just posted a piece about how H&M is using semacodes imprinted onto Billboard ads in Europe for clothes to allow consumers to purchase an item of clothing directly from their phone.  I am a big fan of the promise of semacodes for marketing because they can offer a reliable way to let consumers interact with static outdoor ads and get more information or take an action right on the spot.  There are some obvious flaws in what H&M is trying to do ... most notably that I don't know of any woman who would see an article of clothing on a model in a billboard (especially after Dove's Evolution showed how these ads are created) and immediately decide to input her size and color choice to buy it.  But the idea of semacodes has lots of smarter potential applications.  Here are a just a few I could imagine for some smart forward thinking marketers:

1. Food and Lodging Recommendations - This is probably the most obvious application, as you are in a single physical location so you are most likely to agree to receive information for places to stay (if you are looking) or a good restaurant to eat at.  Any restaurant guide service like Zagats could easily use this as a promotion to share their content.
2. Personal Homing Beacons - Who hasn't been stuck in a new location and unable to describe your location to someone else who is trying to make their way there?  Street intersections are good, but sometimes that is not descriptive enough.  Imagine semacode lamp posts where you could snap a photo and essentially create a homing beacon for yourself for anyone to find you.  You could help your friend with no sense of direction find you through Google maps on their phone, or more usefully, order a Domino's pizza straight to the middle of nowhere.
3. Scavenger Hunt Style Promotions - As these rise in popularity, using semacodes imprinted onto locations or objects could enable a really fun chain reaction game where you find one clue and get a message telling you about the next one.  These would be indecipherable to people who do not know what they are, but provide essential clues to game participants.  For more interaction, a brand could even let people generate their own and generate clues for others.
4. HyperLocal Town/Suburb Info Guides - Walking into a new city with a Lonely Planet guide is great, but in smaller areas or suburbs, the infornation is often very little for travellers.  Semacodes printed into public spaces could bridge this gap by offering a way for local citizens to contribute content online and share information about destinations and attractions that no tourism book would likely cover.  Think more broadly about this, and it's easy to see how semacode marketing could reinvent how small towns or even suburbs market their localities as tourism destinations.

I am sure there are lots more possibilities for using semacodes - especially as camera phones become more common and people get more sophisticated about how they use their mobile devices to access timely and relevant information.  I will definitely be watching this space.

About the Idea Bar:  Working in a creative team, the life of our business is new ideas.  We come up with them every day for clients, but sometimes there are ideas that just don't fit a client.  They are too big, too different, or just not quite right. Inspired by John at Digital Influence Mapping Project, the IdeaBar is a category of posts that are meant to be "open source" and offer new ideas for marketing.  Take them and use them ... all I ask for is a link back to this post if you find these ideas useful and talk about them.  Read more IdeaBar posts on this blog.

Tapping Dayparting For More Than Online Ads

Last week I took the Metro at 7am to get to work for an early meeting.  Looking around at the crowd on the train at a time more than an hour earlier than I usually get on - two things were apparent.  First, the people looked sleepier.  And second, the crowd was clearly older on average than those who took the train at my usual hour of about 8:30.  The experience got me thinking about the role that dayparting could have in the future of targeted marketing.  For those unfamiliar with the term, dayparting essentially refers to a method which I believe was first pioneered by search marketers began with broadcast television and radio to describe their practice of changing the rotation of ads depending on the time of day that they ran.  So in the morning, you might get served a different ad than if you are browsing at lunchtime.

For search marketing, this is easily possible because it's a self service way of placing ads.  Most other online advertising is purchased based on site demographics, however what many fewer online networks and websites seem to be accounting for is how site demographics might change depending on the time of day.  When you think about other forms of advertising like outdoor billboards, you can't realistically change most billboards to suit whomever is driving by.  But you could change them by time of day (for the right price).  Dayparting is possible offline as well as online - for the right publisher to come along and offer it to advertisers. 

What If Consumers Could Generate Ads They Want To See?

Last week I sent myself an email to generate a Google text ad.  As any Gmail user knows, Google serves ads based on the text content of your email.  So corresponding back and forth with a good friend of mine whose wedding I will be attending in Peru next month results in several offers for Peru travel advisors.  Those ads are relevant, so I am likely to click on them.  Of course, the saavier among you is probably reading this thinking it's not so different from text ads on any search engine.  After all, if I typed in "lima, peru" into any search engine, I would get lots of ads.  The problem is intent.  When I am just learning about Lima, all I want is background information.  At the point when I am ready to purchase, I want to see offers.  Keyword advertisers are getting smarter about targeting intent, but it sometimes seems like banner ads are getting left behind. 

Often they are still purchased based on the demographics of a site overall and simply served in random order.  Most would agree this doesn't work.  But think about how a printed copy of the yellow pages works.  These are essentially filled with banner ads and organized by category.  What if there was a site where banner ads were organized the same way?  As a consumer I could enter by region, category or even individual product.  Going to the site would give me a list of banners with the current promotional offer that the vendor has on right now for whatever I am seeking.  The ads, in effect, could be generated by page based on a user's search terms.  This is consumer generated advertising - but where they are calling up the ads that they want to see rather than creating ads themselves.  Thinking even more broadly - what if you could also call up television ads from an archive to watch based on what you were interested in buying?  Would someone in the market for laundry detergent watch three ads back to back from three different companies before making a decision?  Maybe not.  But if I'm looking for a hotel in Lima, or a new car, or a digital camera, or a new kitchen appliance ... you bet I would.

3 Things We Need (Besides the iPhone) To Revolutionize Mobile Marketing

As writeups of experiences with the iPhone cover blogs and traditional media today - many marketers will likely be reconsidering what their mobile marketing strategy should be in a world bound to evolve rapidly now that the iPhone is in people's hands.  John Bell, the head of our Digital Influence group, has a great post about how we have been helping our clients to craft a mobile influencer strategy for some time now.  The promise of mobile marketing has been far removed from what has actually been possible in the past.  The iPhone may bridge some of this gap, with it's integrated web browser, built in ability to access Wi-fi hotspots, and other features.  The device, however, is not the only thing holding mobile marketing back.  Here are are a few other changes we need to see before marketers can maximize what they get out of mobile marketing.

1. Time Based Opt In - The way most opt-in's work is that an individual company seeks my permission to market to me, and once they have it they can send me messages at any time based on their own schedule.  We all know this comes with wastage as many of the messages will likely reach me at a time when I am not interested in them.  For email, this is not as much of a problem as I can just save it for later.   Mobile marketing is about immediacy - and therefore less suited to this model of opt-ins.  What we need is a time based opt-in where I can indicate my status and openness to marketing messages as easily as I change my status on an instant messenger window.  This works for consumers and for marketers - ensuring the messages arrive at a point when consumers are most likely to act on them.
2. My Marketing Profile - Unfortunately, delivering messages at the right time doesn't necessarily mean they will be relevant.  Right now, users can create profiles on social networking sites, indicate news preferences to get the most relevant news, and otherwise create profiles on thousands of sites to save their preferences.  What people can't usually set is their marketing preferences.  Of course, you can opt in to messages from individual marketers, but what about opting into messages from every company in a mall that you frequent, or all middle eastern restaurants in Brooklyn?  Setting these parameters into my profile lets me opt into messages that have the most relevance.  The difficulty is the level of coordination (sometimes between competitors) that would be required to make this work.
3. Synchronization of Mobile And Retail - As anyone who has ever downloaded a marketing offer to their mobile phone knows, the entire process falls apart if you go into a retail location to redeem the offer and the staff are unaware of the promotion or how to honor it.  This is a large stumbling block and one that will continue to hinder the adoption of mobile as a channel to receive marketing messages.  Consumers need to feel that what they get via mobile is integrated into a real life experience (where appropriate), or mobile marketing will always need to fight the same credibility battle.

We can do effective mobile marketing without these advances, of course, but getting a model for solving some of these challenges will help the industry as a whole to get smarter and more interactive about mobile marketing that people actually want to get.  Hopefully the iPhone is just the beginning of a new era in mobile ...

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Hellmann's Takes Search For "Real Food" Into Blogosphere

Today the Wall Street Journal published a piece about our upcoming branded entertainment campaign that we are officially launching tomorrow for Hellmann's in partnership with Yahoo! Food.  Not surprisingly, the site is going to be supported by a large online ad buy across Yahoo and we are doing lots of related PR activities with the host, Dave Lieberman (Food Network TV Host).  One of the most interesting parts of the campaign (aside from the fact that the show is being produced entirely for the web), is going to be the way that we are taking the search for real food beyond the 12 weekly video episodes and events around the country and into the blogosphere.  Each week, our team will be working with Dave to choose a single blog post and an image from a Flickr gallery that explores the theme of "real food" and republishing this content on the official campaign blog (with the original author's permission and direct links back to the original post or image, of course).

With this piece of the campaign, we are hoping to include conversations from blogs around the web to add to the dialogue of what real food means to real people.  There is already a good amount of discussion about this topic and this a great way for us to get more content into the site while also providing a way for individual bloggers and photographers get more visibility for their content.  Unfortunately for me, I can't participate in this part of it (and trust me, I'd love to get all the eyeballs from Yahoo Food visiting my blog).  Luckily for you, most of you won't be limited by this.  So send me a link to your best content (blog post or Flickr image) that describes what real food means to you (or wait until our site launches tomorrow and you can post this online) and each week we'll choose a new one to feature on the homepage of our site.  Also, check back each week for the new video episodes to follow Dave's journey around America searching for real food.  Good luck!

Full Disclosure: I'm part of the panel that will be choosing the post and images to feature each week.

500 Things You Can Learn From A Supermodel

Chances are, the idea of learning anything from a supermodel is probably not an easy idea to accept.  Yet despite your initial skepticism, consider for a moment the fact that the job of a model is to look good.  We all know that part of this look can be due to creative photoshop artistry and "post-production" - as Dove's Evolution video brilliantly pointed out.  What few of us are willing to admit is that we all engage in our own forms of "photoshoppery" on a daily basis--whether it is selecting a certain kind of makeup, or taking that week long vacation to get tan for the summer, or starting a summer workout regimen to get those washboard abs.  These are things we all do ... and more importantly, these are things that models are uniquely qualified to tell us about.  They have the personal trainers, they work with the hair stylists and they see the tricks of the makeup artists.  In many ways, a model is the person most qualified to teach you about beauty.

This is the brilliant concept behind Ford Models TV, a site run by Ford Models - one of the premier modeling agencies in the world.  Through their site, they have created nearly 500 unique videos that are each nearing 100,000 views just over the past year.  Do the math and they may very well have quietly been amassing the largest number of views for branded short videos of any company online.  Someone will be sure to correct me on that, but there is no arguing that their videos are very popular and are driving a large amount of brand interaction.  You might expect the main reason to be that they all feature hot people - and that is certainly part of it.  But no one gets naked and instead the videos cover topics ranging from how to use blush and bronzer (whatever that is) to how to do pushups properly (video embedded below).  Johnny Lavoy - one of Ford's hairstylists has a series of popular videos showing how to achieve certain looks with your hair.  Particularly interesting is the smart strategy the site has of also distributing their videos through just about every large video sharing site online. 

The result is an archive of content that has multiple distribution points, engages viewers, and positions Ford Agency very well for new talent looking to get started in modeling (which seems to be the goal of the effort).  Following through to their recruiting page, they encourage aspiring models to take real photos and position the agency as representing the "most beautiful people in the world."  Their models may not have a crush on Obama - but the way Ford Models is using online video to promote their brand goes beyond viral.  Trying to create the next viral hit is not the only strategy for using online video for marketing.  Just take a look at Ford Model TV to see how one marketer is doing it right.  Now we all just have to hope this success can be duplicated even if we don't happen to have an arsenal of the most beautiful people in the world to use as our spokespeople.

Shell Has Eureka Moment, But Sends Wrong Message

Good advertising is based on insights ... a singular idea or truth that gets to the heart of a product or brand.  The trouble with insight, though, is that it comes in two forms.  There is insight that can help you to create a great communications message - and there is insight that can help you do your business better.  They are not usually the same.  And when they are confused, you have a situation like Shell's Eureka film - part of their Real Energy campaign.  There are more than a few people who have talked about how the film has been well executed.  It's hard to argue with that, as the film is compelling and well produced - easily watchable despite being a 9 minute long commercial.  The method of distribution (inserts in Wired magazine) and postings on YouTube of the short and long videos of the film also make sense (though it didn't take long for someone to post an embeddable version to get around a request to disable embedding on the original Shell posted video).  The problem comes in the strategy and is actually very simple if you think about it:

1. Every oil company is trying to be green and get more goodwill from consumers.
2. People in general are afraid that oil companies are exploiting the earth, oil will run out and prices will keep rising.

The conclusion most competitors have drawn is that marketing and communication needs to focus on positive non-oil messages such as what they are doing to fund alternative energy sources.  Of course they are getting more efficient about drilling for oil ... everyone expects that because it makes business sense.  Unfortunately, broadcasting a "eureka moment" of an engineer getting the idea to create a flexible oil drill to suck oil deposits out of the ocean like a teenager sucks a drink through a straw is not a great choice for a consumer message.  Even the online landing page for the campaign does little to help the cause, outlining that the flexible drill was necessary to "prevent all that precious oil going to waste."  Some could argue the oil was fine where it was, but ultimately the unintended message they send is: Shell cares about inventing new technologies to suck the earth dry.

The irony is, once you delve into the film and learn about the process and the benefits, there actually is great value in the method for the environment in terms of being able to use fewer drilling platforms and produce less waste.  It seems to be a great technology advance for Shell as well as the industry.  Yet the visual of an oil company slurping every last drop of oil from the earth through their superstraw is exactly the wrong way to portray the industry and Shell itself.  This was obviously a eureka moment and a great business case for Shell - something shareholders are likely to love.  Using it as the hero story for their consumer marketing just seems like a bad idea no matter how well produced it is.

Watch the video:

Full Disclosure: BP is a longstanding Ogilvy client, though I am not currently part of the BP team or participating in any ongoing work for BP.

Newsflash for Ask.com: The Algorithm is Dying

In case you hadn't heard - Ask.com has a new advertising campaign through their new partnership with Crispin, Porter & Bogusky (CP+B) focused on making a hero out of the algorithm.  The idea behind the marketing strategy is described on their blog:

If you get great search results, you don’t care why or how you got them.  But for more than 80% of searches, there can be more than one right answer. And even when there is one right answer, there’s more than one way of getting you there, understanding those results, or getting ideas for alternative searches. For these searches, the editorial voice of your search engine matters. Search isn’t the commodity it may, at times, seem to be.

You might know CPB for their superfun and standout ad campaigns for Volkswagen and Burger King (including my favorite, the Subservient Chicken viral).We've been working with them to create a campaign that champions "The Algorithm" and how it brings good search to life--from plain old “ten blue links” to popular, algorithm-driven features such as Smart Answers and Zoom related search.  ... So ready or not world, here comes the Algorithm, soon to take its rightful place as a household word, once and for all.

Um, ok.  Obviously they are excited to be working with the "cool kids" at CP+B, which is great.  And the campaigns that are mentioned were wonderfully creative campaigns that defined a new positioning for each client and offered something new and viral.  Unfortunately, there are three pretty obvious flaws in this marketing strategy for Ask:

1. No one cares about the algorithm - This is a fact which they already note above, stating that consumers don't care how they get search results as long as they work.  Everyone in the tech industry is trying to be more "human" with their advertising - but Ask inexplicably decides to go the other way and focus on the algorithm.   
2. The algorithm is declining in importance - As anyone following the search industry knows, the rise of social networks and human filtered search mean the algorithm is not what is used to be.  Even Ask notes above that "the editorial voice of your search engine matters."  Seriously, does the editorial voice of Ask come from an algorithm?  Not so much.
3. The core brand value or positioning for Ask is not about the algorithm - This is perhaps the largest strategic issue of this campaign, that it misses the mark in focus.  Ask happens to be a search engine, but the core value proposition is not about the power of the algorithm.   For years the company focused on user friendliness and having Jeeves as a personal assistant to navigate results.  Quite simply, the algorithm is not what makes Ask unique.

Strategically, the campaign misses the mark pretty widely - and the only explanation for how it launched that I can think of is a marketing team getting blinded to strategy by a creative concept that they fall in love with (probably because of a great sales job from the CP+B team).  Unlike most of CP+B's work, this is definitely not a winning idea.  As Techcrunch recently shared, the execution doesn't seem too much smarter with their Unabomber billboards and incomprehensible microsite.  Even Valleywag was confused.  Am I missing something?  This doesn't inspire too much confidence in Ask.

Rohit Bhargava: Social Media Today Podcast Just Launched!

Last week I was invited to do a podcast interview as part of the Social Media Today Weekly Podcast series being put together by Maggie Fox.  I am part of a group called the Social Media Collective which is a group of bloggers that write often about social media and it's impact on business and marketing.  Our content is republished on the Social Media Today site and it is a wonderful collection of writers and thinkers in the social media space.  During my brief conversation with Maggie, we had a good dialogue about the future of blogging, social media marketing, effective techniques and a few thoughts about social media optimization.  You can check out the podcast on the original site or on Maggie's Blog, or you can download it direcly from here. 

A Manifesto for Microsponsorships

NOTE: THIS POST IS AN ENTRY INTO THE SVAMA MARKETING THOUGHT PUBLISHING CONTEST

There is a gap in online marketing today. Despite the rising budgets being allocated to online advertising, the distribution of this money is not equal. Even as thousands of new blogs and social networks are created, the vast majority of online ad spending is still going to only the largest portal sites or search engines. Of course, there is a vast traffic difference between Yahoo and a small blog - however the theory of the Long Tail shows us that there are plenty of reasons to think outside the portal (or search engine) when buying advertising online. For example, it is generally accepted that word of mouth marketing can be successful even if a person tells just 3 people about a product or service because the interaction is personal, direct and comes from a trusted source. That interaction is worth far more to an advertiser than millions of empty impressions. Yet buying word of mouth rather than impressions on the Internet is an impossible task. Microsponsorship is about making this possible.

Before I get to explaining how microsponsorship would work, consider the following trends and facts about the state of marketing and the Internet today:

1. Everyone is becoming a content publisher as technology makes publishing content online easier and easier
2. The vast majority of the online advertising dollars today go to only the largest sites or networks
3. Most online advertisers have little incentive or no process for advertising directly on small sites
4. Brands struggle to find influential brand ambassadors and the right ways to "activate" them online
5. People have products and services they love and are usually eager to tell others about it

Social media amplifies individual voices and helps them be heard far beyond the close circles of friends and family. This is the truth that has led to the current popularity of consumer generated advertising. The problem is, you can't always identify brand affinity easily. For example, I write a marketing blog, but have never had cause to write about my Vornado desk fan (which I love). As a result, Vornado has no idea I am a brand enthusiast, yet how many of my readers are people who sit at desks and might take action on purchasing a desk fan of their own if given a strong, personal, authentic recommendation? More than a few, I imagine. This is the type of missed opportunity common in online marketing today. Instead, ads are placed based on industry category (ie - consumer tech ads on a gadget blog) or inconsistent keyword algorithms (ie - text ads for "Spicy Spam Kabobs" when you visit your spam mailbox folder on Gmail). What most marketers need is a way to get authentic word of mouth endorsements for products and services from influential sites and individuals. This brings me to microsponsorships.

Imagine if any blog or any social network, no matter how small, could sell a sponsorship of their site to the right brand - one they believe in? Site sponsorships are like sponsorships of an event, they signify support and are based on relevance. They are usually limited in number. Most importantly, they are persistent. You could argue that any site can sell a sponsorship - but the problem, as highlighted earlier, is that for most advertisers the challenge is finding the right sites to select to sponsor. Added to that is the mistaken idea that online "sponsorship" simply means putting your logo in the corner or sidebar of a site. Microsponsorships are based on endorsements and choice, and therefore would include an inherent recommendation and far more value for advertisers. You might have noticed that this idea is influenced by Muhammad Yunus' Nobel Prize winning theory of microcredit. His idea that there was a market need for small loans that was underserved by the existing financial institutions of the world led to the creation of microfinance. Similarly, online marketers need a way to more authentically engage influential brand ambassadors on a micro level. Microsponsorships can do that.

The real question is, how can the industry meet this need and allow brands to buy these microsponsorships, as well as make it easy for individual content creators to sell microsponsorships to the brands they believe in? One potential answer lies in the creation of www.microsponsorships.com. Microsponsorships.com could be a directory where:

1. Every blog or social network can register their site to sell microsponsorships
2. Sites select brands or products they believe in, and define the type of sponsorship
3. Automated algorithms would be used to generate "influence ratings" (using a similar model to Todd And's Power 150 List)
4. Online advertisers and media planners register on the site to get access to see brand affinities and select sites to sponsor.
5. Site owners would get a proposal from brands and decide to accept or decline.
6. Microsponsorships would be brokered across hundreds or even thousands of smaller sites, effectively augmenting any online advertising buy
7. Once accepted, sites would fulfill on the agreed components of the microsponsorship and provide reporting
8. Online advertisers could use metrics reported, or real metrics from the landing page URL provided in order to measure performance

This is only one model for bringing microsponsorships to life, and there are bound to be others. This is an idea that represents a shift in how we think about advertising online and how the importance of having smarter techniques to find and collaborate with brand evangelists online will be the key to getting a value out of online ad spending far beyond just impressions or clicks.

Note: This article was first published as an entry into the SVAMA Marketing Thought Publishing Contest.

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How to Completely Screw Up Interactive Media Planning

In my years of working at marketing agencies (both advertising and PR), I have had the chance to do my fair share of interactive media planning.  And though I'm the first to admit I have a lot to learn when it comes to traditional media planning (an area I find very interesting, but have a knowledge and experience gap), the role of media planners is changing as media gets more fragmented and the way people consume information continues to change.  Knowledge of online media buying is no longer an optional skill for media planners today.  Unfortunately for me, I have had more than one opportunity to witness some pretty boneheaded media planning efforts when it comes to the internet over the past few months (many from top agencies).  As the role and importance of the Internet defines new divisions and concentrations within ad agencies and PR agencies - the traditional media planning agencies often seem left behind.  And, of course, agencies are not the only ones buying online advertising.  So as a resource to all, here's my quick and easy guide on how to completely screw up media planning - which will hopefully help you to avoid these pitfalls in your future efforts, or use them to check and see how saavy your agency is:

1. Ignore the small sites.  This is the easiest and most common method used to avoid doing any real work with interactive media planning.  Simply decide on a demographic (say, women 25-34), and buy ad units on the top four sites for this demographic based on easily accessible data, and you're done.  Smaller sites often seem like too much effort to plan and require that you might actually have to contact someone to get pricing and units rather than just cutting and pasting from a plan used for a previous project or client.  Yet the benefits are a much larger share of voice on the site and possibly connecting with more of your target consumer.  Smaller sites can pay off big.
2. Focus on the banner. Many online media plans just involve buying a bunch of banner ads in various sizes.  Simply get a good combination of the main ad sizes, throw in a couple of larger format ads (often called "monster" ad units) and that seems like enough.  Yet sponsorships or content syndication or other such extended advertising relationships often offer far more branded presence on a site and a stronger ad buy.  Focusing on banners exclusively often means you are ignoring the best advertising opportunities and leaving those for your competitors to take advantage of.
3. Use the "value ad" as your online buy.  There is a temptation for many large brand advertisers who spend millions on television or print advertising to expect some free online impressions to be thrown into the deal.  Often, these impressions are thrown in, but they tend to be the leftover inventory on a site, and run of site placements that display your ads in random spots across a site.  As the saying goes, you certainly get what you pay for and in these cases, the free impressions are likely to be pretty useless.  Using this as the basis of an online media buy means you are missing out on using the online channel of a media outlet you have already determined is important enough to spend millions on for tv or print placements.  If the outlet is targeted enough for that, it makes sense to save some dollars and spend them on better online placements.  Anything less is a missed opportunity.
4. Forget about blogs and social media. In the media world, there is nothing as risky sounding as advertising on blogs or social media sites.  You don't always know what kind of content your ads may appear next to, there is a chance that you may get talked about negatively on a site you are advertising on, and you may spark a controversy with any missteps.  Yet most blogs and social media sites are run by extremely passionate individuals who care about what they are talking about, and they are vocal about it.  This is exactly the type of consumer you need to reach and incentivize to talk about your product or service.  Yes it is difficult and risky, but the payoff can be huge.
5. Plan your media buy before you have creative. This is perhaps not unique to the online world, but does represent a point of contention that has been running for a long time in media planning circles.  Others may disagree, but I believe that planning any type of ad buy without knowing the key messages and creative platform is completely foolish.  Knowing the creative direction and how a product or service is positioned should have an impact on where advertising will be placed - unfortunately the two processes are often separated ... most frequently because each happens within a different group.

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