Marketing-Works!

Salesforce buys DimDim and immediately upsets me

2011-01-07T10:03:00.002Z

Sometimes it's not what you say but how you say it. This morning I got an e-mail telling me that Dimdim.com (a web conferencing system that we use a lot) was being taken over by Salesforce.com. Here's the e-mail:

Dear Customer:

Dimdim has been acquired by salesforce.com. Your free Dimdim account will remain active until March 15, 2011. After that date, you will no longer be able to access your free Dimdim account.

Please see the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) for additional information.

We appreciate your understanding, and we thank you!

The Dimdim Team
________________________________________
Pursuant to the Dimdim Terms of Use (the “Agreement”) governing the use of Dimdim Inc.’s (“Dimdim”) Site and Services (as defined under the Agreement) by you (“You”), Dimdim is hereby exercising its right to terminate Your Dimdim Account and the Agreement in its entirety. Dimdim will continue to provide Services to you until March 15, 2011. Following March 15, 2011, neither You nor Dimdim shall have any further rights or obligations of any kind under the Agreement, including the right to access the Site, or receive or use any Services. Dimdim thanks you for your business, and wishes you success in the future.

Hmm - not an especially great piece of communication which makes me think that they are closing down the whole show. They had a great opportunity to (re)introduce me to the Salesforce.com world - tell me what was better etc...

Even better is the legal stuff hidden at the bottom of the e-mail. All quite off putting.

Oh well - time to find another provider for these services - Dimdim was fantastic and I do hope that I will be able to use their services again. Maybe it's time to go back to Zoho meeting.

IPA Databank - what does it tell us?

2010-03-25T10:05:00.004Z

The IPA have just added a (for now) free tool to their website to help marketers review the various case studies they have pulled together throughout the era of their IPA awards (see http://idol.ipa.co.uk/). Whilst the usefulness of the tool is limited, it does provide us with some insight into the nature of the various campaigns evaluated and entered for awards.

For example, there are 921 case studies available. By looking at the meta data (the data that describes these cases), we can see what's going on. For example, I did a visualisation of primary business objectives for campaigns vs the number of campaigns reporting "very large" effects:

So overall I think this is a useful source of data although in truth, it's also a great way for the IPA to see you more case study downloads. A valuable resource no doubt.

UK MOT failure rate visualisation

2010-03-10T12:23:00.002Z

Here's a quick visualisation I did on UK MOT failure rates for 2007 across various makes. It shows the power of Tableau - a solution that I'm a big fan of.

Pop-up Genius

2009-11-23T14:23:00.003Z

I'm still here (just). The blog will re materialise in the new year but for now, let me just highlight one piece of marketing that I'm sure will work wonders in the new world - the pop-up shop. A great example of this can be seen here with the new Marmite shop on London's regent street.

With this concept, brands can quickly get out and about - it feels partially like test marketing but really it's a reasonably opportunistic way to get attention on a budget.

The reality of the economic climate is that even the Unilevers of this world are watching the pennies. This is a trend that will either fizzle out as rental rates climb or may come into it's own. Either way, interesting times...

Recession - marketing still works doesn't it?

2008-11-24T11:03:00.002Z

Long time since last post which shows that either I’ve:

Given up
Been very busy

The answer is (fortunately for me) 1 – been busy – in fact I still am. I’m one of the lucky ones. Given the current economic climate, being busy and gainfully employed is starting to feel almost like a luxury.

Assuming that we all now agree that there is a recession on, one question was put to me over the weekend – does marketing in a recession still work in the same way?

I have to admit that I’ve only seen a mild adjustment rather than a full recession in my working life but to be honest, I think we can all see from the high street that the rules are shifting a little bit. In the last week, lots of retailers have been having “extravaganza” events or similar – 20% off everything, Buy One Get One Free etc….

I think a quote from Time magazine best summed up the feeling of many consumers towards these offers – “Is that the best you’ve got to offer”. That’s a dangerous message but it’s what many people seem to be saying. The danger is that we all wait until tomorrow then the next day to spend. Here in the UK, we’re about to get a sales tax reduction (if you believe the papers) but retailers are warning that it’s going to cost them to pass on this reduction.

What then are the tactics that will work in the current climate? If conspicuous consumption is out of fashion, what’s the solution for marketers? Maybe things aren’t as bad as they seem here in the UK or maybe they are worse than many realise.

In terms of making sure that marketing is effective, many advertisers and retailers are turning to “tried and tested” direct tactics – Direct Mail, Vouchers, Online etc to try and buy short term sales. This undoubtedly makes sense for most and must be a real worry for the big media companies. Whether this type of activity damages brands in the long term doesn’t really matter right now when everyone is just trying to improve cash flow. The price of traditional brand building activities will certainly be reducing as competition for spots or sponsorship opportunities dries up. At some point the pendulum will swing back as brands stop fighting fires and look to rebuild. Those that are nimble will undoubtedly do well – others will fail.

What is clear is that unaccountable marketing is going to be one casualty of this whole economic event. If you’re marketing budget is delivering only unquantified benefits then you’re about to lose it. The good news for some is that there is no marketing activity out there that needs to be unaccountable.

25 Pieces of Data for You to Review

2008-07-24T10:29:00.000+01:00

John Billett is writing a fantastic series of articles currently called “25 Things we know about what we don't know about Marketing Effectiveness”. This is one of the most concise series of its type that I’ve had the pleasure to read. I suggest you take a look at this since John has essentially covered all the great myths about effectiveness in one simple to digest framework. He’s now up to number 18 so let’s see what the next 7 installments bring.

See http://blog.johnbillett.com/

It may not be the catchiest title but it’s certainly worth reading.

New Media driving out Old?

2008-07-18T14:52:00.004+01:00

The common perception is that new media is driving out old. Given the current recession, many DM and digital agencies are hoping this is going to be the case. However market forces are at work....

Traditional media is going cheap or at least cheaper. It's also getting it's act together re accountability.

An interesting battle awaits...

Way Off Topic - don't sync your RSS feeds with Microsoft Outlook

2008-06-25T09:19:00.002+01:00

Just a quick FYI – unless you have a great reason to do so, don’t sync your RSS feeds between Outlook 2007 and Explorer. Outlook maintains all your RSS history which can stack up over time – at least Explorer doesn’t do this.

Great Ad but Did it Sell?

2008-06-23T07:31:00.004+01:00

I always thought this was a very underrated advert. However given that it's never won any awards that I'm aware of nor is it well known, I can only presume I'm missing something.

Did it sell any product? No idea. What I do know is that Alan Sugar hasn't got a clue either. On room 101 this week, he suggested that both the Honda Cog and launch adverts for Orange were both worthless since they can't have sold any product. I can't comment about the Honda ad (although I have a stong belief that it did very well) but I can be certain that the launch ads for Orange were vastly more successful that the traditional positioning employed by One2One (now T-mobile in the UK). For more on this, check out Simply Better by Patrick Barwise.

I think Alan Sugar may have misunderstood the nature of building a brand or he's being deliberately obtuse about the whole thing. More on this another time...

Some Thoughts on Software Brands

2008-06-06T23:23:00.002+01:00

Just an observation that occurred to me earlier

| View | Upload your own

Software brands (and I know that Apple isn't really the software brand) are rarely loved. However why do creatives all love their Apple systems. They still crash sometimes and there's only one mouse button....

Irrespective, I would love one.

Dashboard Competition Notice

2008-05-27T14:02:00.002+01:00

Two nods to XLCubed.

1) They just published an excellent article on their blog about using different data sources for an Excel dashboard - see http://blog.xlcubed.com/data-sources-for-excel-dashboards-avoid-spreadsheet-hell/

2) XLCubed is also running an Excel dashboard design contest - see http://www.bonavistasystems.com/NewsMicroChartsCompetition.html if interested in entering. Looks like it could be interesting and offer learnings to all interested in the subject.

Can we forecast marketing performance?

2008-05-20T10:36:00.003+01:00

One issue which I've been looking at recently is that of forecast accuracy in marketing. The question I've been asking myself is this - how accurate can a forecast be and if we're not sure of the forecasts accuracy, what should we do - ignore it?

Tim Harford (the Undercover Economist) recently wrote an interesting piece on Economic Forecasting and the long running debate about why economists bother when their forecasting is so often inaccurate (see http://timharford.com/2008/05/why-economic-forecasts-are-so-hard-to-get-right/). The conclusion which is reached by Prof David Hendry is that we fail to forecast accurately because in part we fail to quickly realise when a "structural break" has taken place in the environment being investigated.

This issue is one that applies tenfold in the field of marketing because there are so many potential things which can lead to a structural change in the market. For example, a competitor launches a revolutionary new product; your advertising is run in a recently vandalised environment; a factory burns down. None of these things in inherently predictable but as a brand manager each can be catastrophic to the performance of your portfolio. Does this mean that it's not worth forecasting because the likelihood that the forecast will be "accurate" is low?

Predictably I'm going to say "no". There are many reasons that forecasting is a useful discipline in itself. In the marketing area, these would be something like:

It forces you to consider a wide range of outcomes from each strategy
It's a discipline which helps ensure consistency across the business and gives credibility to your operations
Getting all your forecasting ideas and assumptions down on paper will help you evaluate and learn from past mistakes. Finding out that an idea was a success is great - being able to repeat the logical process that led to the idea is fantastic and will take your marketing to a new level

Will the forecasts be accurate? In the marketing world, the answer is they might be in the short term but in the long terms, it's anybodies guess. Will advanced analytics solve this? Again better analytics may give a small improvement in accuracy over the long term but it has yet to be proved. In the short term, practical quick analysis is more powerful than advanced time consuming analysis.

Forecasting is necessary in all businesses (although many still fail to add any discipline to this process). How accurate these forecasts are does indeed depend on the effort put into them and the predictability of the market in question. Whether the incremental effort that goes into advanced analytics is worth it depends on whether you can find the correct balance between speed of analysis and the degree of "forecastability" in the market.

Econ 101 reading

2008-05-16T15:19:00.003+01:00

Again I've been slow to blog so in place of a real post (interesting news coming soon), I'll give a couple of tips on reading for anyone off to study Economics or Management in the coming years:

1) The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World by Alan Greenspan
This is a fascinating book which is surprisingly well written considering an economist had a big part in the creation of it! If you want an overview of how the modern world economy works at a high level and the implications on the major economies of various govermental polices, this would be a great place to start.
The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World
2) Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt - only just picked this up but it seems a great read from page one and comes with a strong recommendation from someone I respect a great deal.
Economics in One Lesson: 50th Anniversary Edition

Publicis wonder if we're all idiots

2008-04-24T11:40:00.002+01:00

Apparently we don't know if TV advertising works. That is apparently the "hold grail" (see http://adage.com/mediaworks/article?article_id=126611). Hmm for me, this one is in the bag. TV advertising does work - or at least some times. Maybe someone at Adage isn't so sure.

Do we manage brands on past performance?

2008-04-10T10:46:00.004+01:00

People often question using techniques such as marketing mix analysis to help manage brands. They accuse it of being a blunt backward looking tool which fails to take into account the changing dynamics in a market. This is the "driving using the rear view mirror" critique.

My response is always the same - you need a three point plan in order to mitigate against this potential issue:

Acknowledge that analysis is indeed backward looking but it's only one piece of the insight jigsaw and nobody has an Oracle with which to look into the future
Ask yourself some tough structured questions about how and why the future might be different from the past. Construct some kind of process around this questioning (Delphi workshops work well here)
Invest some effort in activities designed to answer new questions - if you haven't got a clue whether sponsorship and events are a great way to communicate with your core customers, try it on a small scale

Not doing the above and relying blindly on historical analysis will leave you looking a bit like this guy when things to shift.

Information Visualisation Workshops in London this September

2008-04-02T15:12:00.004+01:00

Just a quick post to let you know that we (marketingQED) are hosting three workshops on Information Visualisation this September.

Very briefly, the workshops are as follows:

Table and Graph Design for Effective Communication - Sep 17thThis full-day course will teach you how to effectively communicate quantitative business data using tables and graphs. You will learn how to select the appropriate medium of communication (table vs. graph, and which type) and how to visually design each component to express your message clearly and compellingly.

Dashboard Design for at-a-Glance Monitoring - Sep 18thDashboards offer an exciting new way to provide people at a glance with the critical information they must monitor to do their jobs. This full-day course reaches past the hype to give you the unique design skills required to build dashboards that really work.

Visual Data Analysis for Discovery and Understanding - Sep 19thMost business data analysis requires skills and practices involving the use of graphs that can be easily learned, but resources that teach them are almost impossible to find. Almost all books and courses on data analysis teach sophisticated statistical and financial analysis techniques, but only about 10% of business data analysis requires them. This full-day course is for those responsible for the remaining 90%.

More details here -> http://www.marketingqed.com/Services.html

All workshops will be run by Stephen Few of Perceptual Edge.

Highlight of the morning from the BBC

2008-04-01T10:52:00.001+01:00

Director: Rilap Loof according to Scamp....

Viewing the previous post - YouTube clip now removed

2008-03-12T09:59:00.004Z

FYI - The youtube link I posted yesterday for the "do the test" campaign has been pulled because for copyright reasons - click on the vid.

Much to my joy, this commercial is also getting a lot of comment on Scamp so I must be onto something - see http://scampblog.blogspot.com/

You can still find the video here: http://www.dothetest.co.uk/

Update - new YouTube clip now added - It would appear that you can't keep a good thing down.

Great new commercial focusing on Awareness

2008-03-11T09:49:00.003Z

I often find myself telling people that running a commercial JUST to generate awareness is a waste of time - the commercial needs to alter behaviour as well. I'll make an exception for the great new commercial from Transport for London. This is the first commercial I remember seeing which was designed for the time-shifting generation. Viewing it on a broadcast system without the ability to rewind the broadcast just wouldn't have been the same.

Enjoy

Going through the bins

2008-02-29T10:34:00.004Z

I'm currently reading a brilliant book called "The Black Swan" by Nassim Taleb where he exposes just how poor humans can be at forecasting. Taleb was a quant on Wall Street so he should be well aware of the power or otherwise of forecasting.

One interesting observation I took from the book was just how poorly we forecast because we limit the set of information we consider before drawing conclusions. So how do the guys in the city make their money?

One explanation came my way the other day. The "top" guys look for the big unexpected (by others) events. How do they do this? Well according to my source, one method is to hire private detectives to go through the rubbish of directors from the firms and industries that they track. Why bother trying to forecast share prices with dubious assumptions on productivity gains etc when you can just go through the rubbish and find out whether the company has a massive law suit creeping up on them. Genius forecasting if you ask me!

Is "on demand" a new concept?

2008-02-20T12:24:00.000Z

There is nothing new in media.

What is a Brand Painting?

2008-02-12T16:54:00.001Z

One of the key lessons that any analyst needs to learn is the ability to turn numbers into insight which can be “read” by almost any client. While analysts deal in numbers all day long, many of the audience for their research see numbers as an impediment to their understanding of a subject. Therefore every analyst needs a good set of charts, visualisations and other associated images to help them tell the story of their analysis to a wider audience.

For Marketing Mix Analysis (an analytical technique which seeks to estimate the incremental impact of each core marketing activity on total sales performance), one such key chart is the “Brand Painting”. A Brand Painting is a visual decomposition of the sales performance over time showing how much each driver is contributing at each point in time.

Here’s an example of a brand painting taken directly from our modelQED™ application:

In this picture, we can see a “base” level of activity which contains a range of inputs including seasonality, longer term market trends, special events and in the case of output from modelQED™, the impact of competitor marketing*.

We can then see the incremental impacts of TV, Press, Radio and Outdoor advertising as well as some short term promotions plus the detrimental impact of price rises on total sales.

What makes this a useful graphic? Well I think the following:

The Brand Painting gives you a great view of sales performance across time – something often ignored
Brand Paintings are a great way of assessing the overall impacts of drivers – whilst the ROI on an online campaign may look fantastic, has it actually moved the needle? Being able to see the relative sales increase from each channel is important
Trends can become more obvious – the impact of all those small price rises can soon add up to a lot of units for an elastic brand but an elasticity value of -3.2 often fails to convey the magnitude of this change
They can give a great insight into the medium term impact of marketing – the period over which the short term impact decays

Any pitfalls?

Brand Paintings don’t show the ROI of investments – a large impact may or may not have a large investment behind it
You can’t easily get any sense of whether there are diminishing returns present in the drivers
You can only plot Brand Paintings if a model uses an additive mathematical structure – or at least if only makes sense to in these circumstances

So the upshot is this: I love Brand Paintings and almost every client I’ve ever worked for instinctively found them valuable when I presented my analytical results. If you don’t have the right applications then they can take a little bit of effort to construct in Excel or SAS but ultimately they’re worth it.

*note that modelQED™ does estimate the impact of competitor marketing but it is not charted on Brand Paintings by default.

The 30 second spot is alive and well

2008-02-11T16:52:00.000Z

Interesting little presentation on the "death" of the 30 second spot. It appears that it's another top media myth. Having said that, I've never had access to the IPA databank and I'm also sceptical that the databank is all that useful since it contains only campaigns percieved to be success stories. Nonetheless it's an interesting starting place and I completly agree with the conclusion that TV advertising is still the best medium if you need.

Whatever anyone says big campaigns need TV for reach and impact - nothing else can match it!

View Upload your own

Nod to Scamp for the link (http://scampblog.blogspot.com/2008/02/heresy-of-month.html)

the true value of research...

2008-02-05T13:58:00.000Z

As posted by Seth Godin via Gabe

Honda vs. Ford via Scamp

2008-02-04T14:56:00.000Z

Nod to Scamp - (see http://scampblog.blogspot.com/2008/02/battle-of-epic-car-ads.html)

This post vividly shows the difference between a great commercial and a reasonable one. My guess is that Ford are a little too "safe" when defining a brief whereas Honda have built and been true to a brand philiosophy.

Wieden & Kennedy must be the best around at the moment!

It's not 50% but even more that's wasted!

2008-01-31T10:53:00.000Z

An interesting little piece appeared on Jaffe Juice today with the headline "94% of my advertising is wasted, the only problem is that I keep on investing in it".

Apparently BIGresearch have discovered that only a few people pay absolute attention to TV commercials to which they are exposed. So more bad news for beleaguered TV execs - people aren't paying attention any more & your medium is dying.

Actually I think this isn't such a bad stat when the dust settles. There are precious few campaigns where consumers engage to the degree that more than 5% of those exposed will take in the message fully. If an " UK GRP costs in the region of £1,500 and the potential audience is 20m people, this still makes TV an effective way of engaging with a broad range of people effectively.

Precision Marketing

2008-01-25T20:05:00.000Z

Three times this week, Precision Marketing magazine has sent me an identical piece of Direct Mail offering me a reduced rate subscription package. Three identical mailings.

As my wife rightly pointed out that this lacks Precision!

Google and Publicis in Love

2008-01-23T18:51:00.000Z

According to Adage, Publicis and Google are launching an exchange programme (see http://adage.com/digital/article?article_id=123263).

The article states that:
"Publicis Chairman-CEO Maurice Levy invited a small group of journalists to lunch today at his Paris headquarters on the Champs-Elysees and surprised them with the appearance of Google CEO Eric Schmidt. He and Mr. Schmidt also sent an e-mail to the staffs of both companies today that describes plans for joint 'initiatives related to accelerating the ability of technology to make advertising more effective.'"

This is interesting because it's not WPP or Omnicom that Google are teaming with. The fact that Google need more advertising savy knowledge is not news but the fact that they teamed with Publicis is coup for the Paris based organisation.

Getting into bed with Google is a double edged sword but one agency group had to do it and it's publicis. Let's see what happens next.

New Year Predictions

2008-01-07T14:46:00.001Z

Now that we're all well into 2008, it's probably time to reassess goals and targets for 2008. With a predicted downturn in the major Western economies and a proliferation of new ways to interact with customers, the chase for "hearts, minds and wallets" is going to be harder and faster than ever before.

Given everyone else is making predictions, here are mine - I'm not sure why we all feel the need to predict the future but nonetheless I thought I'd also have a go!

My Three Predictions for 2008

Economic downturn adds pressure to marketing budgets again – no new news here but once again, get ready to justify each £,$,€ of investment like never before. If you need help, the first question to ask is whether each element of the marketing mix washes it's own face. What would happen if you dropped each part of the plan? Would you really loose money? If so how much. If you're justifying budgets on "soft" metrics, do you really understand how those metrics translate into meaningful business?
Google to overstretch into traditional media – for a long time, I've been stressing how interesting it will be to see Google get out there any play an important part in the placement of traditional media. From what I've heard and seen, their offline offering doesn't offer the same level of immediate impact and the online one. Since Google haven't pre-brought the real estate from media owners, it's more difficult for them to prove the ROI case, Advertisers in traditional media need to know when an ad will run and where – the Google system doesn't currently guarantee this. Unless Google figure out how to make this work, they risk becoming another trading house and the incumbents will fight long and hard to maintain their existing businesses.
Customer Focus is key – I don't mean any of this "we're going to focus on customer satisfaction" stuff – what I mean by this is a year when customers have more power than ever before to rate and reward good products and services. The focus is on marketers to be seen as advertising and marketing truthfully and with reason. Best not to lie because you'll get found out.

My prediction for marketing analytics is that it will play an increasing role in helping organisations make decisions about which product and customer opportunities to pursue in the coming years. With the prospective downturn in the economy, marketing budgets will come under increasing focus and short term ROI will become a more important metric than longer term branding objectives. This presents a danger for brand builders as highlighted by people such as Len Lodish – the temptation to run a business for short term ROI comes at a potential cost to longer term profits. However try telling this to a Finance Director or MD desperate for some good news for the stock markets.

And finally - for marketingQED, we will be launching some great new products, updating existing products and generally offering exciting new opportunities for marketers to get more value from their marketing investments.

A Nod to Gaping Void

2008-01-02T09:10:00.000Z

OK - I've been really bad in updating the blog over the past month. I wish I could say that my new years resolution was to update the blog more frequently but let's be honest, I'll get it done when time permits.

I wanted to draw your attention to an article over on Gaping Void called "why the "social object" is the future of marketing". I suggest you read it if you're in any doubt as to why the face of media is changing. As always, Hugh is on the ball with his comments - i love the quote "The bad news is, most products are boring. The good news is, most word-of-mouth is boring".

The one thing that I think Hugh has missed is the economics of advertising - in other words, one thread of the argument is that media became too expensive to execute whereas the opposite should be (and probably is) happening. Media costs are falling - especially in real terms. Furthermore production costs (the real barrier to entry) can be almost negligible. With Google on the horizon for mass media, the barriers to entry are falling further and further so that "mom and pop" shops aren't that far away from being able to advertise on TV or in National Press titles (but only the local edition).

London startupweekend creates alittlebitbetter.co.uk

2007-12-03T13:11:00.000Z

This weekend, I met up with a load of really interesting people from bloggers through to techies and marketing folk to launch a new business called alittlebitbetter.co.uk. This was a startupweekend event of which more later.

Alittlebitbetter.co.uk is a new ethically focused consumer reviews website for the UK market. We’re trying to combine the trend for User Generated Content with the rise in consumer consciousness that has started to grow in recent times.

As the blurb says:
“At alittlebitbetter.co.uk we don't pretend to be perfect – we occasionally leave lights on when we don't need to, buy fruit out of season, and nudge the thermostat up for a 'duvet day'. But we do try to be a little bit better wherever we can.“

Alittlebitbetter.co.uk was born out of 1 weekends work by a team who hadn’t met until about 7pm on Friday night. The whole idea was that a load of diverse people would get together an launch a new business in under 51 hours with no prior plans or collaboration. It’s a really cool idea and I urge anyone out there to go along and take part in future events (see http://www.startupweekend.com/ for details of future events).

Did we succeed? The next few weeks will establish whether the business itself is viable and whether it will survive. However the principle has been proved – bring some smart people together then led the event take off an anything is possible.

All the best to those that took part and watch this space for future developments!
John

oh iPe!

2007-11-12T09:11:00.001Z

iPhone UK launch wasn’t the marketing triumph many expected. Further thoughts to come but let me point you to a few interesting articles:

iPhone Crowds? Don’t believe the hype! – pics of the stores on launch day – not exactly packed are they

Tumbleweeds outnumber punters, as iPhone's First Night flops - http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/11/11/iphone_uk_flop/ - Summary from the ever great Register

Confession: In London we had to hire actors to form an iPhone queue outside our store – From the Fake Steve Jobs!

From personal experience, there's certainly no supply side issues with plenty of stock available but is this actually a good thing for leading edge technology? Is categorising the iPhone as "leading edge" even appropriate?

For all the bad press (and there has been plenty), I'd trade in my p990 in a heartbeat for one if it was financially viable.

Update on iPE - phone not yet on sale

2007-11-09T11:33:00.001Z

OK – my mistake – the shops don’t open until 6pm for iPhone purchases. Makes me look like an idiot!

iPE (hype) in London

2007-11-09T09:55:00.001Z

iPhone arrives in the UK today and the question is what happened to the mass hysteria?

I took the attached grainy photo (on my useless SonyEricsson P990i) as I walked past. Given the coverage of the original launch in the US and the Apple PR machine getting a head start, I expected a little bit more interest that this. It’s left me thinking that Apple got it a little wrong with the marketing of this baby. Where was the crowd!!!

I’m really busy today with some urgent work but look out for my post on what Apple could learn from Nintendo about launching better products into the tech market.

What I forgot about Google's targeted media

2007-11-01T13:42:00.001Z

I listed 9 interested parties who will stand to win or loose if Google controls media placement across more than just the internet. However I forgot the general public – you and I in our real lives.Will we benefit from more targeted advertising?

The answer to this question depends on your viewpoint on the benefits of advertising I guess. I used to take a snotty attitude to advertising wondering what social benefits advertising offers. Now that I’m a little older and wiser, I understand that it’s advertising that pays for interesting content, it’s advertising (marketing) that drives innovation and it’s advertising that let’s me know that there are alternative opportunities out there. Whether the adverts be for jobx, bank accounts or cars, ultimately we all benefit – even if we don’t appreciate it. On the assumption that Google will improve the relevant of adverts I see, I can only suggest that it’s going to be a good thing if they take over more and more media placement.

Who wins when Google sells airtime?

2007-10-26T10:33:00.001+01:00

In case you’ve missed it, Google have officially announced a tie up with Nielsen to provide demographic ratings data for their new TV advertising service (similar to Google Adwords) - http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/24/business/media/24adco.html?ex=1350964800&en=e65d0a27003a1153&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink). This deal will enable Google to collect immediate demographic data from Nielsen to estimate who was watching the commercials that they had placed on advertisers behalf. The most interesting thing about this for me is the immediate benefit for advertisers in being able to effectively buy media space more efficiently and effectively.

Although Google are starting small (limited release for the US market only), it’s only a matter of time before they branch out into other geographies and media channels. They already offer a similar limited service for Print and Radio advertising in the US and don’t expect to see Cinema, Outdoor and other channels too far behind. The cat is already out of the bad and it’s not looking good for some.

So who wins from this deal?

Large Advertisers – Maybe not – although the beta testers for such a service, I doubt that they will be getting as great a discount on media buying once small and mid size advertisers find it easier to compete with them for airtime. Under the current system, large advertisers are effectively offered preferential treatment by media agencies and should (although do not always) pay lower rates for media brought
Small and Mid Sized Advertisers – With Adwords, any business could dabble in advertising at almost no incremental cost. Whilst TV advertising is more expensive in creative terms (and expect to see many more home movie style commercials) small and mid-sized businesses will now be able to dabble in a medium with its notorious entry costs slashed. That’s got to be good news for them.
Media Agencies – Unlikely to be good news. Arguably Adwords has made online agencies a ton of money in the past five or so years. However my feeling is that Google have been taking a long term view of this and subsidising this market to build acceptance to advertisers of the medium. Google are continuously improving their campaign management tools for aAdwords and at some point, the incremental benefit of using an online agency to manage this portion of spend will diminish. Furthermore, we can fully expect Google Analytics to get a major update for their premium customers who advertise across channels. Advertisers and agencies alike will have unprecedented access to data about their commercials and the ability to purchase spot by spot against testable targets. In other words, Google permit advertisers to sidestep agencies if they choose to do so. Expect to see many media buyers go client side once they’ve mastered the Google system!
Creative Agencies – A likely win – there’s going to be more work available for those that can turn around work quickly and effectively. They can even start in-market creative testing very early on.
Nielsen – On the face of it, Nielsen have signed a great deal. They’ve associated themselves with a top organisation and positioned themselves as the premier supplier of demographic data on the US TV audience. In reality they had no choice but to do this deal if Google came their way. However in the long term, I can see other ways appearing of getting the same data at far lower cost (mobile phones with RFID chips anyone) so the incremental benefit to Nielsen is likely to reduce over time. Maybe they can sell themselves to Google...
Consultancies – consultants (independent up to the big boys) have an opportunity to draw on the superior analytical skills they possess “en mass” vs. media agencies. When media buying comes down to the numbers, the agencies only have a handful of specialist analysts who can analyse data effectively. Many consultants feel more comfortable with the numbers and I can see them licking their lips at “outsourcing” another section of their clients businesses.
Media Auditors – a big loss. No need for auditing if there’s no debate over the price you pay.
Google – the big winner. Online advertising is still a fraction of the size of the TV and Print channels and Google’s technology addresses the key weaknesses in the media buying systems of these industries. Google have effectively decided gone from having a massive share of a mid-sized market to a smaller one in a far bigger ocean. Assuming that they can maintain service levels, continue to offer low entry costs, build the “test and learn” ability that online provides into other media channels, it’s inconceivable that they will lose out isn’t it?
Microsoft – the potential fly in the ointment for Google? Do they have deep enough pockets to offer an alternative quickly? Undoubtedly. However they don’t have the same track record in developing online advertising so it’s going to be a big challenge.

The Caveat - There is of course one big assumption with all of the above. There’s not going to be a feedback channel as there is with online advertising. How can you measure effectiveness when all you know is who saw the adverts? The answer is that Google is going to have to sign up retail partners as data providers in order to create the perfect “mash up” across channels. Once Walmart, Best Buy or even organisations such as Visa on board, the proposition will look unbeatable.

Can Marketing Analysis help the Planet?

2007-10-15T07:42:00.000+01:00

Today is "Blog action day" - a day when thousands of bloggers are going to cover one topic from a variety of viewpoints. So what has this got to do with marketing analytics? Marketing is often seen as the big bad wolf by many so called "tree huggers". We don't care that our junk mail gets thrown into waste fill, we "blight" the streets with billboards for stuff people don't need and we help damage the third world.

Basically marketing (and especially advertising) has a bad name when it comes to the environment...but it's time to stop and put this right isn't it? Whether or not you believe in "global warming" (and for the record I do), it is clear for all to see that we're living in an age when it's a key theme for a massive portion of the Western population and an increasing part elsewhere.

How marketers tackle this theme is crucial and I believe that one thing that people have really started to dislike is waste and inefficiency. Cutting these out is a start but in order to make marketing that works, we need to talk to people on a fair level. This means communicating as equals - not talking down to people. (side note - really interesting study on why humans are the only animals who have a concept of "fairness to be found here -> http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-10/m-fpi100507.php)

This is actually a remarkably difficult thing for many businesses to get - or at least that's what it seems. How often do you see an ad which you know is stretching the truth to its limits. All those adverts for face creams which will "roll back the years", beer that makes you a more fun person, banks who are your best friend for live and animals playing drums!

Seriously, waste and getting the messages wrong are obviously bad. Getting the messages right and catching the mood is valuable. Environmental issues are something that many in the west now feel strongly about. If you can honestly incorporate these issues into your proposition (not just advertising material but what you actually do as an organisation) then aren't you more likely to catch the mood of a broad part of the public? Just don't go making false or exaggerated claims....

The marketing industry prides itself on taking a lead in consumer trends but for my part, I don't think it's done what it can as yet in this area. For many, the realisation that green issues are not just morally important but financially also appears to be taking some time to sink in.
For more on marketing and environmental issues, see an article by Nigel Hollis at Milward Brown -> http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2007/08/10/green-bubbles-pop-too-i-hope-not/
P.S. All ad revenues from this site today go to an environmental charity. Since a typical days ad revenues are normally pennies (I have canny readers who can't be influenced you see), you may wish to reconsider you usual browsing behaviour.

Analysts are looking even more valuable

2007-10-15T07:06:00.000+01:00

Just seen this titbit over on Mediapost -> http://blogs.mediapost.com/raw/?p=303

"Creative comes out on top with analytics close behind when the room was asked In the future, which agency will be worth most to marketing?

Creative agency - 33%
Marketing analytics consultant - 30%
Media agency - 20%
Direct/CRM agency - 17%

"

I'm not sure of the reason for the question, the science or even the audience but it's an interesting bit of thinking. Where does this put the creative analyst? Maybe the guys who have been valuing Mobile media, Enron stock and Facebook bids are more valuable that we thought.

Who should run marketing analytics

2007-10-08T12:43:00.000+01:00

Last week, I attended a conference call / webcast called "Philip Kotler on Turning Marketing Analytics into Strategic Value" during which I asked Prof Kotler "How do you balance internal vs. external analytical providers?”.

The reason that I asked this question was both one of personal interest and professional. My belief is that the importance of strong data analysis skills will increase as data proliferation and skills resident within an organisation increase. Put simply, grad schools and the like are churning out many more grads who get analytics. In the past, consultancies managed to capture the analytical grads because their clients didn't really have a full time requirement for these skill sets. However my reading of the situation is that this is changing as organisations build better analytics into their business model (see Amazon etc).

Kotler appeared to agree with this view which was a relief for me. However as always there's a but and it's this. Whilst a great deal of analytics will move in-house, there will always been the need for think tanks and consultants to invent new and better methodologies.

(p.s. for regular readers, let me apologise for the gap between this post and my last one - the good news is that my wife just had our second child. The bad news is that my time is vanishing!)

What's your point of reference?

2007-09-25T20:03:00.000+01:00

Whenever you analyse results from a marketing campaign, you need to frame them in relative terms - that's the great thing about ROI metrics - they are relative - i.e. what did you get out vs. what you put in.

Very often, analysts make simple mistakes in their calculations and miss simple errors. Because they forget to use a term of reference before they report, they send our garbage.

I learnt this lesson early on when my then boss, Jeffrey Merrihue (http://www.lostartofmarketing.com/) suggested some numbers i'd given him were likely to be b****ks. He took out a ruler and showed me just how wrong my pages of spreadsheet calculation must have been. Because i'd been up for 36 hrs straight (it was a bad week in Madrid) and had become lost in the detail, i'd lost my point of reference.

The biggest mistake analysts can make is not seeing the woods for the trees - is the result sensible and understandable? If not, take a step back and reframe the question. If you're not sure, check your steps!

One more thing - don't always trust your calculator. Excel 97 had issues running regression calculations using the analysis toolpack and now it appears Excel 2007 can't do a simple multiplication - try asking it to calculate 850*77.1. The answer shouldn't be 100000 should it?

Will Procurement eat marketing's lunch?

2007-09-21T10:45:00.000+01:00

On Tuesday this week, I was lucky enough to briefly present at this weeks Marketing and Purchasing Conference organised by the Chartered Institute of Procurement (CIPS). I was invited to speak by Prof Robert Shaw from Cass Business School and the subject was "how we measure marketing effectiveness".

What was interesting was that the "we" in the question involved the procurement teams as well as the marketing and agency teams. For many larger organisations, this makes tremendous sense. What was especially interesting for me was to see that so many procurement professionals were clearly being challenged to assess the question of "what was returned" as opposed to just "what was spent" and it seemed like well established practice for many.

Of course, the reaction wasn't homogeneous and the audience appeared to divide into two groups. The first group knew that were only interested in focusing on cost control - even if they acknowledged that this was only 1/2 the story. The second group were open to looking at accountability but appeared to lack the tools or training to do so (bingo). What was clear was that the procurement function had lot's of tools and discipline to bring to the marketing function and this left many wondering whether the future of internal marketing teams was as a smaller coordinator of effort rather than as the owner of all marketing services for an organisation.

Another interesting discussion was the perennial one about over reliance on historic marketing assessment at the expense of creativity over future campaigns - clearly the agencies don't want to loose their creative authority. However the value of measurement may often be about measuring just how bad things are. There's no need to throw ones self over a cliff to prove gravity and the same is true in marketing. You don't have to spend fortunes to work out whether a message is having an impact.

Online Banner Blindness

2007-09-10T09:15:00.000+01:00

Online marketing presents marketers with a real wealth of data and info about what performs and what doesn't. A vast industry has grown up around analysis of online data - this industry is disproportionate in size compared to the amount spent in the channel but the reason is the ability of marketing organisations to "flex" campaigns in real time - hence the need for more analysis.

Jakob Nielsen is considered by many to be a guru when it comes to analysing web sites and their usability and in a recent study, his company turned their attention to online banner ads to try and define the key characteristics of a successful campaign. His conclusions?

"Users rarely look at display advertisements on websites. Of the four design elements that do attract a few ad fixations, one is unethical and reduces the value of advertising networks."

The unethical element that works is making your ad look like native content - i.e. trying to "con" the user into believing the ad is really native content. Sounds a bit like PR doesn't it....

If you can artificially persuade users to click your ads (that seems to be the metric people look at a lot) then the metric itself becomes a waste of time. What does click through mean when you're getting bad clicks. Better to stick with real "end of line metrics" at the end of the day.

I recommend a quick read of his article that can be found here.

So my conclusion - online ads are valuable when actioned. Advertisers can use tricks (some dirty) to persuade people to click on the ads but it's not always going to work out in the long run. Therefore, be cautious when looking at metrics such as click through rates - they can be artificially inflated using some clever formatting and a picture of a naked woman.

Cadbury's Update - it's now viral

2007-09-04T09:11:00.000+01:00

It was obviously going to happen - the Cadbury's ad has gone viral and already the imitations / mashups are coming thick and fast.

See:
Cadbury's vs. Total Eclipse of the Heart

Cadbury's vs. A skillz

As of 9am this morning, I calculate that 162,794 people had watched these ads on youtube. I'll keep an eye on that number over the coming days. Let's see where this goes.

Words that need to be banned from marketing research - Optimisation

2007-09-03T16:09:00.001+01:00

Optimisation - I hate the word optimisation (or optimization depending on which side of the pond you are on) because it implies some degree of certainty in outcome. When dealing in statistics, it's a brave person who puts their neck on the line and says they know for certain the outcome of an event.

In marketing analytics, many people talk about "optimising" the mix, optimising price points, optimising mailing lists. In reality, they mean "probably improving" but it's not such a sexy term is it.

I've used the term myself and will continue to do so on occasion (because I'm weak no doubt) but we must be able to find another way to explain that there is little certainty in analytics.

Mu suggestion - "Improvement" or "Best Suggestion" both sound a bit wet. Anybody got any ideas on terms I can use?

Cadbury's "'Glass & A Half Full" Campaign

2007-09-02T11:40:00.001+01:00

Cadbury’s are desperately in need of some decent marketing. As has been pointed out elsewhere (http://blog.johnbillett.com/2007/06/20/cadbury-gets-it-plain---dairy-milk--wrong-again--again.aspx) their recent track record in marketing isn’t the most successful and it appears to have been that way for a little while now.

On Friday, they launched a new campaign and this time I’m wondering if they’ve gone nuts or they are onto something truly great.

This is what Cadbury’s say about the campaign – “Drumming gorillas, Phil Collins and Glass And A Half Full Productions? Well it just seemed like the right thing to do. There's no clever science behind it - it's just an effort to make you smile, in exactly the same way Cadbury Dairy Milk does. And that's what we aim to continue to do; simply make you smile. So if a drumming gorilla's not enough, wait until you see what else we have up our sleeves. Sign up if you're curious...”

OK – I’m curious to know where this is all going. According to Creative Review (http://www.creativereview.co.uk/crblog/cadburys-dairy-milk-gorilla/) the film comes from Juan Cabral, the director of the Sony “Balls” commercial. It appears that there is more and Comparing this commercial to their previous effort is like comparing a 20 yr old single malt with generic 89p lager – the generic lager is pap consumed simply because it’s there whilst the whisky isn’t to everyone’s taste but will resonate with those who appreciate these things. The big question of course is whether this “Glass and a Half” message will resonate.

On the strength of what I’ve seen so far, I’m a sceptic but impressed that they are trying something different. Clearly their current marketing strategy hasn’t been working but whether this campaign marks a real turnaround is anyone’s guess. Maybe this is a bit like the Vodafone “April showers” campaign that I highlighted previously (see http://marketing-works.blogspot.com/2007/06/will-new-vodafone-campaign-add-do-more.html) – wonderful creative idea waiting for someone to finance it. Let’s wait and see – I’d love to be proved wrong. I’ll let you know what I get via e-mail having signed up.

Youtube and their "wraparound" adverts

2007-08-24T14:24:00.001+01:00

There is an amazing amount of time and money being invested in User Generated Content (UGC) by both tech companies such as Google and advertisers and yet the value of this content is still up for debate. Both Google and News International clearly believe that UCG is the future and all those friends of mine out there on Facebook clearly agree (sorry but I just don’t get it as yet). However to justify the values placed on these businesses, advertising and PR on these sites is going to have to be worth its weight in gold. I’m just not convinced it is – at least not yet.

Google has apparently decided that they need to put adbreaks around video clips (see http://www.youtube.com/advertise#invideoads) to start clawing back some of the $1.65bn they spent on buying YouTube. My concern for them is that will users of youtube simply avoid this ads (as users of PVRs do – see some research from IBM on this here) or even more worrying, they go elsewhere with their 30 second MMS clips? The price that Google paid for YouTube equates to something like $29 for each unique user per month at current rates ($1.6bn / 55m). Assuming payback over five years, discount rates and strong growth in unique users – say 25% - I think they need to get each user to click through on about 4 ads a month to break even. If growth stalls then the price Google paid for YouTube will look painfully high. However since they paid in stock and not cash, maybe things aren’t that bad.

Anyway, where does that leave the advertisers themselves. Well UGC has some well documented issues and advertisers need to be careful about how they embrace it. There are some great examples out there of advertisers turning UGC to their advantage (e.g. Coke eventually) whilst some big brands have really struggled. UGC enables brands to join in converstaions with customers but ultimately the power stays with the consumer and not the brand. Advertisers and site owners need to remember this. Look at how quickly the “community” abandoned MySpace. Is there any reason why something else won’t come along and replace the current raft of network sites? Wasn’t Netscape replaced quite quickly. Didn’t Lycos and Yahoo look like the early winners of the Internet search engine crown.

HondaMentalism

2007-08-20T09:05:00.001+01:00

Over the past three or four years, Honda must rank as one of the most improved and best run brands here in the UK. The old image of a Honda driver as a staid older person has not totally disappeared but has been adapted to a message of reasoned excellence that complements the historical positioning of reliability.

For many, the commercial that helped start their reassessment of the Honda brand was the infamous multi award winning "Cog".

"Cog" is a fantastic piece of communication and rightly won a whole heap of awards. It plays on the sensible aspect of the purchase but by adding the funky music (try thinking of this commercial running with a Vivaldi soundtrack to see the difference) they managed to broaden the appeal for a wider audience.

After "Cog" came a few other similar messages that were then followed up by "The Impossible Dream" commercial that focused on Honda as an all encompassing brand rather than just being a car company.

In addition to these great commercials were the famous "Choir" and "Hate something, change something" commercials. From a media planning point of view, the Honda commercials were excellent because they focused on finding epic spots in big events where these commercials would stand out. Whereas everyone else was running 30 second traditional spots across multiple networks, Honda focused on delivering 120 second ad break ownership in key spots. Then the ads went viral and Honda got their value for money. These campaigns were great integrated works - people could access extra content via CDs and I'd love to know how many new contacts Honda made.

So having established a fantastic track record in terms of creativity and re branding, Honda launched a campaign this year called "Hondamentalism" focusing on a new idea - Honda as a brand representing fundamental engineering excellence.

This campaign apparently launched earlier in the year and whilst the TV commercial passed me by, the associated online campaign really caught my attention (see http://www.honda.co.uk/hondaMentalism/index.html). This site represents a lovely piece of creative online communication and will no doubt win some awards. However there is a bigger question here. Do Honda believe that they have done enough to reestablish their brand in order to rely on online and direct mail for the majority of their communications budgets?

My belief is that Honda are now spending far less on ATL activities and have shifted money to these below the line activities to build on the engagement that they hope to have generated with the brand. The logic behind this appears sound but what is yet to be seen is whether small levels of mass communication can keep the customer pipeline full.

To round off, many people argue that one sign of truly great communication comes when other brands copy your style - i.e. the parody. Would any brand have tried to copy a Honda commercial back in the mid 1990's? Oh - wait. Both Honda and 118118 (the Number) had Naked as their strategic media agency at the time....do you think this was also a stunt?

Plug - try Zumyn

2007-08-17T16:28:00.000+01:00

Everyone with a digital camera is probably sitting on a database of a thousands of different photos. The way that we take photos has changed beyond all recognition and some very clever people like Flickr have figured out that the way people "consume" images has changed.

My friend Ian is one of these clever people. He's decided that those thousands of photos we all have might just come in handy if we wanted to create a montage of images. You can't just put a few thousand images on a wall but you can if you put them all together in one shap shot.

Ian has launched a business called Zumyn - he has a cunning program that will take all those images from you and arrange them all so that they form one bigger image - a mosaic. The really clever bit (which used genetic algorithms) is to make sure that there are no repeated images.

The address is http://www.zumyn.com/

I've done one of me with baby Lewis in Tokyo and despite my obvious flaws, it's looking great!

I believe that you can import photos from flickr and an importer for Facebook is coming soon. That way you will be able to import all the photos of your friends if you want or create a unique image from a special event.

Do please pass this on to anyone who might be interested and get involved!

10 ways to get more from Marketing Mix Analysis

2007-08-14T11:09:00.000+01:00

I'm currently working on a white paper about Marketing Mix Analysis and how the industry needs to adapt to meet new client needs. As part of this paper, I've created some "best practice" advice points that I wanted to share and get some feedback on. Please feed back any comments.

10 Ways to get more from Marketing Mix Analysis:

Be realistic about what the analysis can help you achieve – drop words like optimisation and replace with words such as “improvement”. Bravado is a great quality when used correctly but its place in analytics is questionable. Realistically, systematic measurement and improvement programmes in marketing can improve ROI by an average of 10%-15%. However it is not going to happen every time and when it does, it is unlikely to be effort free.

Focus on quality not quantity of results– many mix projects suffer from over engineering – both in terms of data used for analysis and detail in results. The old adage of Keep It Simple Stupid (KISS) applies as much for mix modelling as it does in any other area. Start with analysing the key metrics that determine business success before moving further down the value chain. Think of “money at risk” – that should clearly determine the key issues to be analysed. Simply adding dimensions of complexity may bring a new depth to the problems that can be solved but is that really where the real value is going to be derived from?

Beware of averages – average measures are a big danger in marketing for two reasons. Firstly, given that there is no such thing as an “average” customer, it is going to be very difficult to create a campaign that will satisfy them. Secondly, average performance may be misleading – it is the marginal returns that are meaningful – i.e. the return from the last unit invested. In an industry that rightfully eulogises the term “diminishing returns”, there is a woeful level of understanding about “marginal” performance.

Create genuinely meaningful reports – if an organisation is to make changes in marketing strategy then it needs to be clear to all those who are touched by this as to why changes are taking place. Clear and concise reports can help organisations share knowledge efficiently – long winded one hundred page presentations are not the best method to communicate change.

Use simple language where possible – enough said. The people who need to respond to marketing analytics tend not to be the most mathematical proportion of the population. Comparing results in statistical terms is easy for analysts but not for laymen. However the wider marketing community have a valuable part to play in the interpretation itself and needs to be included in discussions.

Standardise results– Not all models are built equal. Ask whether you can compare the range of potential models being presented to you on the same basis. If you can’t, how can you benchmark and improve performance. Standardised reporting may be inflexible but it is repeatable and enables quick comparisons between results. Standardised reporting enables one of the favourite techniques of modern managers - benchmarking. Marketing teams often hate it but it is valuable.

Focus on the actionable areas of the business – Report writers love to provide elaborate explanations for esoteric findings from their models but often they end up reporting on non marketing issues to marketing teams. Whilst some if this information may be useful, teams are often time pressed and it is marketing issues they need to focus on.

Systemise the analysis process– one-off reports may be useful to organisations seeking an occasional review of their activities but only continuous monitoring will lead to real improvements in performance. By systemising the reporting of marketing analytics, real processes can be adopted for test and learn marketing. The CMO council have shown that organisations that have managed to adopt these processes perform better and it can be no coincidence.

Develop test & learn processes – many successful marketing organisations have figured out ways to experiment with marketing in order to prove to themselves what is working. In almost all these cases, the organisations in question are able to action findings quickly once they have been identified. If your marketing organisation makes changes to their plans once a year as part of an annual planning cycle then you are missing an enormous opportunity to improve marketing performance.

Combine it with other analysis - Marketing Mix Analysis can be a blunt tool - it tends to give high level results. It addresses some important business questions but isn't a panacea. Never overlook other research techniques.

Any other thoughts or comments?

Is user generated content overvalued?

2007-08-10T10:29:00.001+01:00

The rise of websites such as youtube, Facebook, Flickr and MySpace has led to a raft of discussions in media land about how to best harness this phenomenon from an advertising perspective. Clearly the explosion in the number of people using such online sites has exceeded anything one could have imagined just five years ago.

Back then, we were all getting over the disappointment of WAP and other first generation web technologies - online marketing was in its infancy. Back then it was all banner ads and pop-ups until we all figured out that a) people were downloading lots and lots of ad blocker programs and b) the ads themselves were of negligible impact because the reach of the medium was quite poor. Five years on and the online digital experiment has changed quite a bit. Ad targeting has improved immeasurably and the range of measures for online campaigns is now so vast, many struggle to keep up with the latest trends.

In recent years, online advertisers have been able to rely on new targeting technologies (mainly cookie and / or content based) to help promote their ads across vast online networks. Google changed the game with their adwords program and now almost every business will be using some sort of online advertising and communication to promote their wares. These vast online advertising networks stretch far and wide across the web and one place they specialise in targeting are the User Generated Content (UGC) sites, forums, bulletin boards and chat rooms right around the world.

UCG attracts a multitude of users from around the world but very little advertising on these sites is “placed”. Most is brought as part of a package and the content against which you advertise is largely up to the site as opposed to the buyer. Of course the danger with throwing your online advertising out there without any say as to where it is being placed is now blindingly obvious yet until last week many UK brands didn’t understand this.

Last week, big brands such as Vodafone, T-Mobile, Virgin Media, Halifax, the AA, First Direct and even the UK Government were forced to pull advertising on Facebook after their ads were seen running against sites for the British National Party (a racist right wing organisation). Whilst Facebook are now offering UK advertisers an opt-out option for sites such as these (to be rolled out across other markets later on), this is the obvious risk that advertisers are taking when they have no clue on the type of content their ads will run next to. This incident in unlikely to be the only one of its type and many agencies are now going to be struggling to work out how they respond to this issue.

The great prize with UGC is that it supposedly offers much higher levels of engagement than other channels. An almost endless supply of fresh copy enables sites to grow quickly and capture hours of users online time at little cost – certainly no expensive journalists to worry about. However this also means is that there is little or no editorial control over what is being viewed, written about and discussed.

For advertisers, UCG is an interesting place to be although whether the benefits go beyond just getting another set of eyeballs is debatable. For UGC websites, these type of issues start to undermine the enormous values being placed on these companies. Google paid an amazing sum for youtube ($1.65bn - but much of this was paper money anyway i.e. a stock swap) whilst News International paid $580m (cash?) for MySpace. These valuations are almost exclusively based on potential and forecast ad revenues. Allegedly Facebook has not been sold because the valuation placed on the business is $8bn whilst organisations such as Microsoft only value the business at $6bn (see http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/item/57164/343/298/3). Such valuations are dependent on reliable revenue streams that will increase at a significant rate.

Whether these valuations take a knock after the Facebook débâcle remains to be seen. For my money, issues such as these reinforce the place of traditional media owners online. Groups like the FT, News International, Economist and Guardian have all embraced web 2.0 type interactivity but in each case, content may be vetted and advertisers are reasonably sure that their messages will reside in a suitable place. For those advertisers embracing UGC advertising, caution is recommended!

Common Afflictions that Marketers Suffer From

2007-08-08T15:27:00.000+01:00

Ron Shevlin has detected some common afflictions that marketers suffer from. I loved the column he wrote and added some suggestions then I decided that this actually needed to be made into a presentation so I made one. Please let us know of more afflictions and their cures if known and I'll add them to the list.

See here for Ron's original post: http://marketingroi.wordpress.com/2007/08/07/common-marketing-afflictions/

Thanks,

John

Microsoft patents obvious idea

2007-07-31T20:05:00.000+01:00

US patents are a strange thing. We recently consulted a patent attorney about our software product modelQED to try and determine what protection if any we could obtain for some of the more unique parts of the software. The answer we got back was not the one we were looking for. We were told that there was no chance of patenting a clever mathematical idea or software process here in the UK or the rest of Europe. However we were informed that about $30k would suffice should we wish to write (and most likely obtain) a patent in the US at very low risk.

It appears that the standards are very different on both sides of the Atlantic – so much so that even Congress is now looking at reforming the system to stop “obvious” inventions being patented.

Microsoft are sure to have an entire raft of patent and they’ve added another one into the mix in the last few days (see http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&amp;amp;d=PG01&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=%2220070174117%22.PGNR.&OS=DN/20070174117&RS=DN/20070174117). This application is for an ad targeting system making use of “biometric sensors, cameras, remote controls, or other accessories” to monitor who is watching a TV or other device and adjust the content accordingly. This is akin to web surfing on a PC who knows exactly who is using it at all times.

As I’ve mentioned in the past (http://marketing-works.blogspot.com/2007/06/privacy-concerns-to-hamper-measurement.html) privacy concerns will undoubtedly throw a spanner in the works should Microsoft try to come up with a system such as this. In many ways this device would be some sort of Direct Marketing nirvana if there was a return channel to allow purchase. Obviously there is if the device is online and this is the market that Microsoft, Google and even some ad agencies are going after. However I would bet that these patents will come to little in the next five years or so. Privacy issues are becoming more and more important and “big giant head” devices that communicate with big brother aren’t exactly popular. Even if they can somehow find a way to use ad dollars to subsidise such a device, will people really embrace a new advertising channel such as “sniff you first” TV?

One line of marketing wisdom

2007-07-30T09:05:00.000+01:00

I received an e-mail last week asking me to a blog by Matt McDonald at Penn State. Matt was after a one line quote of "all the marketing genius you can cram into one line".

See http://www.mattjmcd.com/2007/07/one-line-marketing-wisdom/

What a great idea! This is surely one of the great things that can be achieved in a blog but wouldn't happen anywhere else.

Anyway my quote went in and having seen the other wisdom out there, I can only say that maybe I'm not as wise some of the guru's who submitted ideas. However it was an honour to be asked so please take a look for yourselves. Why not submit your own quote?

Great presentation - The Brand Gap

2007-07-24T15:39:00.000+01:00

May people will have seen the attached presentation called "The Brand Gap". For those that haven't, take a look. There are some great points here about what makes a great brand and how might you help achieve this for your organisation. I love this deck...

Harry Potter - has retail marketing gone mad?

2007-07-21T13:47:00.001+01:00

As almost all those of us on planet earth are probably aware, the last Harry Potter book was just released at midnight on the 20^th of July. In the week leading up to the books release, there has been lots of media chatter about this book launch – more than I can remember for some time. I’ve not read the books so I can’t vouch for their brilliance but one thing that is obvious is that the publisher Bloomsbury has lost control of the marketing associated with this launch.

Up until the final day, Bloomsbury have been keen to keep the final chapter of this saga under wraps. Embargos and security were used as methods for preventing publication and spoilers have been showing up online for weeks. In other words this is certainly a hot property that everyone was after.

Given this, how much discounting do you think would go on during DAY 1 of publication? 10%? 20%?

Even before publication, ASDA Walmart were talking up a massive 51% discount in the media that had led to a clash with publisher Bloomsbury (see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6902031.stm) . Small bookshops were complaining that at such a discount, it was cheaper for them to go to the supermarket to purchase stock than it was to go to the publisher direct. That puts the “cost” of each book at something approaching £9 here in the UK.

Imagine my surprise when I got to the shops today and saw even greater discounts on day 1. At WH Smiths they were offering a conditional discount of 61% off the cover price taking the price down to £6.99 – in other words they were almost certainly making a loss (something WH Smiths has specialised in during recent years). Further along in the shopping centre, the department store John Lewis was selling the book for £5 with no conditions. In other words, they were subsidising customers purchases to the tune of almost £4 per book. Given the threat that there was no coverage of this pricing to be seen at the front of the store and that John Lewis doesn’t usually stock books, I really wonder what kind of marketing tactic they thought they were employing?

So – Day 1 of a long awaited book release and the discounts are reaching epic proportions of 72% from list price. It’s not great news for Bloomsbury – I saw people purchasing multiple copies of the book and they are already showing up on ebay at inflated prices. Is it any good for the retailers? Well unless they are bringing in substantial new customers to their shops, one would assume it is not. Whilst Asda may have benefited from some early publicity, I doubt that the other retailers actually got the message out to consumers to tell them that they were going to offer even more generous ~~subsidies~~ discounts.

My take – the “me too” retailers were daft. In terms of marks out of 10, Asda get 7/10 because they let people know they were going to sell at cost, WH Smiths get 5/10 because at least their offer probably ensured a profitable transaction because of their use of link savings. John Lewis get 1/10 – a real stinker. Offer a book that you wouldn’t normally sell WAY below cost and then forget to tell people that you are doing this “one off” special. In other words – if you were going to buy this book elsewhere, why not get it from us and have some free money. It’s not going to build any loyalty and almost certain to lose them money. Poor.

More Potter Marketing and Economics Posts:
Drew McLellan - What is the cost of being right? http://www.drewsmarketingminute.com/2007/07/what-is-the-cos.html

Seth Godin – Keeping a secret - http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2007/07/keeping-a-secre.html#trackback

Megan McArdle - Harry Potter: the economics - http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/megan_mcardle/2007/07/harry_potter_the_economics.html

Greg Mankiw’s Confession - http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2007/07/i-confess-i-am-potter-head.html

Top economist signs for Google

2007-07-20T15:43:00.001+01:00

The economics grads amongst us will be familiar with Hal Varian. He wrote one of the standard textbooks on microeconomics if memory serves me right. Anyway he’s now joined Google as their Chief Economist (see http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2007/07/19/economics-according-to-google/ ). In the article Hal argues that the marketing world is about to see a load more economists joining ready to do battle with our mountains of data and bring better forecasting and measurement to marketing. Whilst such a trend would be welcomed by many, there is a depressing set of people in the industry who will be uninterested in what these economists might have to say for themselves.

In the past few years, I’ve seen a number of economists move from marketing into corporate finance (I’m talking about at the coalface level here) – I’ve never seen the reverse happen. We can only hope...

Why call yourselves marketingQED?

2007-07-20T10:48:00.001+01:00

I've been asked on a couple of occasions why we chose the name marketingQED for our business venture. For those that don't know, QED stands for "quod erat demonstrandum" - Latin for "which was to be demonstrated" or "which has been shown".

We are using the name to suggest that we can "prove" or "demonstrate" the effectiveness of marketing - a fairly bold claim but an achievable one.

Will we stick with the name until the end of time? I don't know. There's much more to business success that a good name. Given that many people have questioned me about the name, I'd guess that there is less understanding of the term QED than I thought. Therefore we may need to change the name at another stage.

Anyway what has this got to do with marketing effectiveness? The answer is that it very little except that we're listening (a good tactic if you want to be successful they say). A brand isn't a funky name (or a poor one come to that) but it does add to first impressions. To be effective at marketing, you've got to be prepared to change horse mid-race if that's what your judgement is telling you. At this point, we're going well but only into the first bend......

Update on modelQED

2007-07-20T10:17:00.000+01:00

Just a quick update to let you know how modelQED has been received in the marketplace.

We're really excited by the reaction we've had to the modelQED application that we just released onto the market (click here for details). When we demo the product, people instinctively "get" it and that's a great feeling. Two comments particular stand out for me:

1) "It's a Ronseal job" - this comment was made by the head of a major UK consultancy who understood that we're not trying to reinvent the wheel by making an uber-complex analytical tool. We're pragmatists and we try to be honest in our conversations with clients. Hopefully this is paying off. (FYI - Ronseal is a UK brand of consumer decorating materials famed for it's advertising tag line of "It does exactly what it says on the tin)

2) "It's amazingly beautiful" - a verbatim comment (honestly) from the head of a US agency who felt that our product was both easy to use and intuitive. This felt great because we've really tried to make our product easy to understand for an analyst. Try using standard SAS or SPSS charts to present information and you'll understand why we spent lot's of effort on "look & feel". It's not that they can't make great charts that tell a story but it takes a lot of effort.

We've still got things to improve and we're not being complacent. However it's our baby and we're proud. If you haven't seen the product and want a trial, go to our website and request one. No obligations. That way you can judge the above comments for yourself!

New Heros - Zoho

2007-07-17T09:32:00.001+01:00

Both Google and Microsoft are determined to move our applications online so that we have seamless access to our powerpoint / word / excel documents (yes I used the branded terms rather than presentation, authoring / spreadsheeting products) but there is at least one key competitor who is doing things differently – Zoho.

I’ve used Zoho apps for various things – if you purchase our modelling package, you will find that you can report a fault online via our website. It’s Zoho that powers this reporting and e-mails us your issues. We are likely to replace this code with our own once we get time but Zoho enabled us to get up and running in a quick and efficient manner.

The other thing I like about Zoho is that the apps are constantly being updated. Within any given week, new features are released as and when they are ready and these guys don’t hang about. Compare that to Microsoft or Google who release big packs as and when they feel like it. Zoho feels like a nimbler and humbler organisation and i’d back them to succeed for a while vs. the behemoths. Of course at some point, I assume that someone with BIG pockets will purchase them and make some real money from this business.

Poll added

2007-07-16T13:00:00.000+01:00

If you're reading this online (as opposed to via an RSS feed), you will notice that I've added a poll to this blog (see right). Please take a second to let me know what topics you'd like me to write more on.

Let me know,

John

Quote of the week "At least CMOs don't do harm"

2007-07-10T09:46:00.000+01:00

Adage are reporting that a forthcoming article in the Journal of Marketing research has reached the conclusion that it"...is important to note that CMOs do not have a negative impact on performance".

OK - slightly taken out of context. The gist of the research is suggesting that there is no conclusive proof that the presence of the CMO on the board of big organisations adds significantly to business performance - at least not on the tangible metrics such as sales or profitability.

The study won't be published until January so until then, you'll just have to read the Adage article. One word of caution - Adage uses the term "correlation" a lot in the article. Given that correlation could relate anything to anything else, read this one with care!

RANT - what dese "Unlimited" mean to you

2007-07-04T09:07:00.000+01:00

OK - it's time for a rant.

Mobile phone operators and broadband suppliers are advertising a range of "unlimited" services that are actually limited by "fair usage" policies. What they don't tell you is what "fair usage" actually constitutes. This is dishonest practice and does them no favours at all.

And no point running to the Advertising Standards Authority if you want to question this. Last month they rapt Orange on the knuckles over their unlimited data claim because they forgot to add small print saying that 40mb was a fair use cap (see http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/03/government_dodges_unlimited/)

Note that the ASA "...exist to make sure all advertising, wherever it appears, meets the high standards laid down in the advertising codes".

As a brand, Orange continue to disappoint and is there any marketing that can be as ineffective in the long run as dishonest marketing?

Addendum: http://uk.gizmodo.com/2007/07/04/uk_broadband_hits_new_low.html
Dissatisfaction grows with broadband suppliers - esp Orange. Note that Orange was one of the greatest brands ever created. It's a sad state of affairs....

The value of local research

2007-06-29T15:20:00.000+01:00

One perennial topic of conversation in advertising is that of local vs. Global advertising campaigns. On the one hand, local campaigns should be more effective because they allegedly understand local needs far more than global campaigns ever could. On the other hand it’s far cheaper to create one execution and hope it’s suitable in most markets (this is what P&G often do).
A story in this weeks Observer newspaper magazine highlights an interesting case showing the value of local understanding and local messaging. It’s a great article and one you really should take the time to read.

The fabulous Alcock boys

Will the new Vodafone campaign ad do more than win awards?

2007-06-25T16:06:00.000+01:00

Sometimes you see a commercial which makes you stop what you are doing, watch the TV (or online video for the 2.0 community out there) and literally stare at the TV to work our what's going on. I had this experience the other day when i saw the first airing of the new Vodafone commercial which I believe is called Mobile Internet (time rain):

I think that this is a beautiful commercial - it's well shot, interesting and it's going to get noticed. However I wonder what the ROI is going to look like on this? Whenever i see this ad, I wonder whether it wasn't a case of a great creative idea waiting for a client to buy into it rather than the other way around. Will this advert really sell incremental internet usage across the Vodafone network? I'm struggling to understand how.

There is no call to action in this advert - you don't get an offer to trial or any way in which users can sign up for services. What is commercial appears designed to do is raise awareness about online services. That bothers me because although I'm sure there was some kind of ROI framework put in place before the campaign aired, I'm amazed nobody made sure people knew how to get online or even view what content was already out there. Voda are spending a lot of money telling consumers across all networks that mobile internet services will give them back time. Nowhere does this specify that Voda is better; nowhere does it imply that customers on Voda get better services.

Payback on this campaign is going to be tough but if they can persuade millions to try a few online services, maybe those 3G network licences will look a better investment than they do at present. Before that though, they have to make this commercial pay off and we all know that 90 second ads are expensive. By my rough calculations, Voda are going to have to get each customer to increase their ARPU by more than £1 over the year to make this pay off and that's a tough ask as most people in telcos will attain to. At least the execs can look forward to a trip to Cannes next year!

Privacy concerns to hamper measurement?

2007-06-21T09:27:00.000+01:00

One thing that direct coms depends on is measurement and a perceived ROI advantage over traditional coms (I say perceived because ROI and measurability are entirely different dimensions which are often confused!).

Whilst advertisers and researchers are happy to collect all the data available on individuals, people are starting to question the data which they give up to research organisations.

Neilsen Media Research are reportedly trying to link their TV audit with an Online one only to find that privacy concerns are starting to make people wary about the data they release on themselves. Clearly linkage between the #1 and #3 media channels is a major issue which researchers would love to get some info on.

Privacy concerns, opt-outs and other phenomena are all going to become greater impediments to the "single customer view" which marketing organisations are trying to reach. For my part, I believe that because of these issues, there will always be a market for top-down analysis of marketing which will last for at least the next 10 years - or at least until all mobile phones have RFID and all the privacy issues are taken care of.

Are Ford serious about the Taurus

2007-06-20T12:15:00.000+01:00

In recent years, car manufacturers have looked to historic models for inspiration when designing and releasing new models. The Mini has been a great success for BMW, VW scored a minor hit with the Beetle (and the new Camper Van is on the way) and Fiat are about to release a new 500 model.

Whilst the Ford Taurus is not a "great" historic model, it does go back a long way (1992). However poor sales in recent years have led to the brand name becoming devalued in the US to the extent that one wonders why Ford are continuing with this brand.

From the new JWT commercial, it's clear that Ford are looking to promote this vehicle as a safe one - a bit like a Volvo. But wait! Ford own Volvo - so which is the safe one?

This strikes me as amazingly bad positioning of a brand. Taurus or Volvo for safety? Well Volvo has the track record so if it's safety i want then that's where I'll go. What about the retro value? Is Taurus a "great" brand which Ford need to maintain? erm no. I don't think it is.

Ah but wait - Volvo doesn't stand for safety anymore - the latest commercials focus on lifestyle:

Here's the question - what values does Ford assign to Taurus and Volvo. If they are sharing brand values then why keep two brands?

Off Topic: David Blane brand gets bigger

2007-06-20T09:45:00.000+01:00

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery?

Contains bad language so not in the office!

modelQED Launched - finally!

2007-06-15T16:41:00.000+01:00

Today we finally launched modelQED™, a marketing mix analysis tool (econometrics if you prefer) which will hopefully help to democrotise the usage of this powerful analytical technique.

For many years, i've figured that marketing mix analysis was actually a fairly well understood tool by many advertisers. There are many articles saying that it needs to be performed by professionals with years of experience. However my personal experience was that for 90% of the models i've ever created, the simple straightforward model was often the best. My econometrics knowledge was only used on the most specialist assignments. For the rest of the time, i was following a well defined process which in most cases gave the correct answers. modelQED™ is designed to deal with these challenges in record quick time and leave the hard core analysts to tackle the remaining challenges.

As with all things marketingQED are trying to do, we've focused our efforts on making modelQED™ both simple to use but also powerful in context. By this I mean that the users interaction with the package is made as easy as possible whilst the analysis delivered is exactly what would be required for the majority of mix modelling. The feedback to date is that we've largely achieved this. I think we will continue to develop the product focusing on even more simplification and user friendliness.

modelQED™ solves lots of issues for modellers but this is only the beginning. Give me a call or drop me an e-mail if you want a demo of this truly unique tool.

We have many other products in the pipeline. Hopefully the market will find these tools useful.

Any comments on the screenshots etc - please post or e-mail. Feedback always appreciated.

Online banners for branding - have these guys caught a fever?

2007-06-09T07:54:00.000+01:00

Please read the following article by Jim Novo on the value of online banner ads and the frequent excuses used for this spending.

http://blog.jimnovo.com/2007/06/08/banners-brand/

A great article and one which is bound to get comments over the coming week - keep watching.

What went wrong in the 2012 research

2007-06-07T14:48:00.000+01:00

...yet another blog post on the 2012 logo then?

Well yes - what I want to focus on is not necessarily the validity of the logo (which I think is actually quite cool in it's multimedia incarnation) but what lessons there are for researchers.

It's clear that public opinion in the UK and elsewhere isn't 100% behind the logo. Any well conducted research would have shown that this logo would divide opinion. That in itself is no big deal. However there is another theory and it's this. Although a great deal of research would have been done to justify the logo (£400k goes a fair way), it may not have actually been done properly - it's possible that they asked the wrong questions and in this may have included the use of leading questions - these are a real problem in this type of research.

In this case, a leading question would have been "do you think that this logo expresses dynamism and energy?" - clearly the question itself leads the respondent to assess the logo on the emotive terms dynamism and energy. If the selection criteria for the logo are these characteristics then - hey presto - we have a winner. A better question would have been "what emotions does this logo convey" - at least this wouldn't have led respondents to certain answers.

Let's turn to that great TV series "Yes, Prime Minister" for the definitive explanation:

Sir Humphrey: "You know what happens: nice young lady comes up to you. Obviously you want to create a good impression, you don't want to look a fool, do you? So she starts asking you some questions: Mr. Woolley, are you worried about the number of young people without jobs?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Are you worried about the rise in crime among teenagers?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Do you think there is a lack of discipline in our Comprehensive schools?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Do you think young people welcome some authority and leadership in their lives?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Do you think they respond to a challenge?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Would you be in favour of reintroducing National Service?"
Bernard Woolley: "Oh...well, I suppose I might be."
Sir Humphrey: "Yes or no?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Of course you would, Bernard. After all you told you can't say no to that. So they don't mention the first five questions and they publish the last one."
Bernard Woolley: "Is that really what they do?"
Sir Humphrey: "Well, not the reputable ones no, but there aren't many of those. So alternatively the young lady can get the opposite result."
Bernard Woolley: "How?"
Sir Humphrey: "Mr. Woolley, are you worried about the danger of war?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Are you worried about the growth of armaments?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Do you think there is a danger in giving young people guns and teaching them how to kill?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Do you think it is wrong to force people to take up arms against their will?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "Would you oppose the reintroduction of National Service?"
Bernard Woolley: "Yes"
Sir Humphrey: "There you are, you see Bernard. The perfect balanced sample."

As I said at the start, I like the logo. However many people don't and such an adverse reaction to a picture has to be unique in the history of logo design.

So that's my theory - it researched well for one of two reasons - either they asked leading questions because they wanted a certain answer or the questions were formed in such a way that one logo one over the others. Either way, I'd love to see the research which gave us this new logo.

Don't just analyse the sign-ups! The case of the missing Channel lipstick.

2007-06-06T07:41:00.000+01:00

Here's a little story about why it's never the best idea to analyse the success of a campaign by the number of "clicks", visitors or sign-ups.

My wife was browsing the Internet about 6 weeks ago and was presented with an online advert (or somehow found a link) for Chanel makeup - since you ask it was for Le Rouge lipstick. The premise was a typical one - watch the online advert or in this case film, learn about the product and we'll send you a free sample.

At this point, I'm assuming that their analytics team are quite happy with the data they collected and the value the campaign generated. I'm also assuming that their brand manager is feeling quite good about this campaign:

got the viewer (in the right target market)
got the details
they've signed up to our database (and are likely to have selected to receive more info)

Now so far, there's no real ROI - but they have now got a person to go and sell to. The next part of the implicit deal that they have made is to send out a free sample but this is where the "deal" falters. Instead what actually happened was that my wife received an e-mail yesterday telling her that she can't have a free sample - "sorry but it's all gone" was the message. Those with a keen memory will recall that this is a 6 week process between sign-up and being told that stock has run out of the freebie. So the question for Chanel is this. Was this a successful campaign?

From a marketing measurement point-of-view, i suspect that internally it's being regarded as a promotion that worked "too" well - certainly a success! Too many people said that they wanted to trial the product and we got too many interested customers. Oh how tough can this marketing game be?

In practice, what Chanel did was raise then lower peoples expectations about the brand and it was all unnecessary for the following reasons:

It's easy to work out how much stock you have then close the offer when it's run out - Chanel didn't do this (and by implication can't). That's dumb. In fact it took 6 weeks for Chanel to spot this.
The marginal cost of a few extra lipsticks must run to literally a few thousand pounds which is a tiny amount in comparison to any potential damage from not fulfilling the brand promise - again dumb.
Chanel could have offered something else in return if there was a shortage of product. Maybe an alternative free sample, consultation or even a voucher

You may of course question why a premium brand like Chanel is offering a free trial or even vouchers. Neither are very "premium brand" but clearly Chanel's team felt that it was a risk worth taking to bulk up their database of prospects. In practice, I'd guess that they've added a whole list of names to a database with little value and potentially negative ROI given that they left so many people disappointed. My guess is that there is a whole range of people out there who are now less inclined towards this prestigious brand than there were previously which can't be a good thing.

Overall:

On a "sign-ups" basis - a success
On a "visitors" basis - a success
On a "brand equity" basis - fail
On an ROI basis - really?

A new term emerges for online analytics

2007-06-05T20:23:00.000+01:00

Pete Affeld at Numeric Analytics has coined a new phrase to describe the analysis of online advertising using econometrics - "3rd generation" web analytics (see http://www.numericanalytics.com/pdfs/AdServ.pdf).

What I like about this is that it acknowledges that there is now a realisation that you cannot analyse online advertising in isolation from other actives. I've noticed this trend as i talk to online media companies about their analytical capabilities and it certainly seems to be a good time for these organisations to reassess how they define ROI for their customers. If Pete is right then all those TV and Radio analysts will be moving into online in the near future. However as others have noticed, there is plenty of money in the bigger media channels to justify top researchers fees but less is going to be available - hence the need for better tools, training and processes in marketing research. It's this last reason which gives me faith that our new venture marketingQED will be a success.

Walmart's Brand Positioning Report Leaked

2007-05-31T12:01:00.001+01:00

The NYTimes has published a branding report on Walmart which was prepared by their agency GSD&M. There's going to be a lot of chatter about this online the gist of it is that the Brand Reputation may be failing or at least the "Pride" in the brand needs reinventing.

See Brand Autopsy for further comments on this (http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/11572/18918300).

Report available here - http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/business/20070530_WALMART.pdf

New research highlights the presence of Strategic Consumers

2007-05-31T11:51:00.001+01:00

A new piece of research from Gérard P. Cachon and Robert Swinney at Warton (http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/papers/1339.pdf) suggests that there may be three types of shoppers which retailers need to consider when setting stock levels and retail strategy. To quote:

“Some shoppers just can't help themselves and buy mostly on impulse without regard to price. Others are die-hard bargain hunters, who only open their wallets for a discount.

“Then there are the strategic consumers, who are willing to buy full-price sometimes, but at other times they will wait for a bargain. According to new Wharton research, it's these customers that retailers need to focus on in order to reap the full benefits of lean retail inventory management and variable pricing”

If this article is correct then the current model of release at top price, take the profits then discount towards the end of a products lifespan is not going to last. The research looks at retailers like Zara and airlines such as Southwest and highlights their policies which commit customers to an early purchase rather than waiting for discounting to take place.

For marketing analysts, there is an interesting suggestion here. Whilst most segmentation is behavioural is terms of how consumers actually use products or interact with them, retailer segmentation is typically behavioural. The question now is can you use store card data to identify the strategic customers and can you bring forward their purchases? Any ideas if this has been done anywhere and what it actually meant in practice?

last.fm

2007-05-30T20:41:00.001+01:00

Today was a great one for the people over at Last.fm - CBS purchased them and I signed up! There's even a widget connected to my blog now (click to enjoy some music "like" that produced by Blur).

It's an amazing service which shows just how far the web has come in the past 10 years. I remember signing up to a similar service seven years ago when Napster was still the real thing! However all sorts of issues meant that the previous service failed (no way to make money and not enough bandwidth).

In a way, i get last.fm more than myspace. By that I mean that I can see a way where it can become both a social AND a commercial success. I guess only time will tell.

More great advertising from ...Microsoft?

2007-05-17T07:12:00.000+01:00

In recent months, I've noticed that Microsoft have been coming up with some great commercials - Office 2007 was one example.

Now there's a new one aimed at people like me - online advertisers. I thought you'd enjoy this one.

However - one question - does anyone have any ideas how Microsoft is going to solve the gap between consumers and advertisers through technology? My concern is that the commercial highlights the natural gap between any database marketer and real consumers. There's no substiute for actually listening and seeing how consumers actually interact with a product.

"You can't trust early adopters"

2007-05-14T20:40:00.000+01:00

So says James McQuivey from Forrester who was commenting on the slow (read no) growth in iTunes video downloads as reported here - http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/05/14/forrester_online_video/.

Early adopters have apparently skewed the forecasts for PAID online video downloads. Many analysts assumed that once the rest of us "got" it, we'd behave in the same manner as the early adopters did. However we didn't and it’s now looking like iTunes isn’t going to be the killer investment Apple and their media owner backers had hoped for.

What does this mean from marketing analysts? How does it make a difference to how we think about marketing? Well it shouldn’t change backward looking analysis too much in practice. However the focus has to shift for many organisations to start answering questions like “how do we shift this in the future?” It really brings home a point which was made to me over and over again by former colleagues – namely you have to add judgement to historical analysis in order to create a more reliable model for forecasting. In the past, I’ve been involved in a number of workshops which seek to qualify historical models with beliefs about how the future may differ from the past – Delphi style has been common. These workshops are a great way to test new hypotheses about the future and one key topic must encompass the question of “how might our consumers differ in the future?”

As many of you will be aware, my company is about to launch modelQED – a backward looking modelling tool which creates marketing mix models in record time. One of the key benefits of this tool is that it will cut down on the amount of time spend on backward looking analysis enabling organisations to spend much more time looking forward and understanding how the future will differ from the past. For me this is a winning combination – reduce historical analysis time (and increase the quality of the analysis) + systematically review how the future will differ from the past.

I hope that this powerful combination will prove irresistible to many organisations!

The psychology of advertising.

2007-05-12T14:14:00.000+01:00

The process by which advertising actually "works" on people is certainly open to debate and I'm not at all familiar with the psychology of what actually goes on in the heads of consumers. As a researcher, one of the key characteristics one needs is the ability to put yourself in the mind of the consumer and imagine how they may react to a commercial.

Nigel Hollis over at Milward Brown should know more than most about this and he's written a very interesting post on the subject here (http://www.mb-blog.com/index.php/2007/05/11/rehearsing-reality/) which is well worth a read if you have time. He suggests that "the concept of an ad exposure (serves) as a mental rehearsal of a brand encounter " which i think i get. See what you think.

Being busy

2007-05-09T17:37:00.000+01:00

I've been very lazy with the blog recently so apologies. We've been really busy getting ready for the official launch of modelQED - our new marketing mix analysis package. Watch this space for more details next wee!

In the meantime, for those interested in online analytics, can I draw your attention to Ron Shelvin's recent post: http://marketingroi.wordpress.com/2007/05/09/a-letter-to-web-analytics-from-the-ceo/

Is media research media neutral?

2007-05-03T08:28:00.001+01:00

In this weeks edition of Marketing, Raymond Snoddy draws attention to the latest research from the Newspaper Marketing Agency which reaches following five conclusions:

TV plus newspapers drives 5 times the increase in bonding versus TV alone
Newspapers create a more powerful emotional response than TV
Creative pre-testing of newspaper advertising doubles performance
Newspaper advertising drives sales and web traffic
Multiple executions are significantly more effective than single ads

See http://www.nmauk.co.uk/nma/do/live/whyNewspapers?whyNewspapersModel=7468

There are two key things that bother me about this research - firstly the agency runs the exercise has a vested interest. Secondly that the methodology employed for much of the research analyses soft metrics rather than more meaningful sales or revenue based metrics.

Whilst some of the research has been conducted by a highly respected scientist called Dr Lawrence Farwell and his company Brainwave Science, i’m sure that even he will agree that the conclusions drawn from the research may be a slight “stretch” based on the research techniques actually employed.

Let’s look at these points one by one:

TV plus newspapers drives 5 times the increase in bonding versus TV alone – I’m not exactly sure what “bonding” is but we’re told that it’s strongly correlated with sales. I’d love to know what this level of correlation was and whether there was still a strong relationship between changes in bonding and changes in sales performance. The report fails to tell us what the impact was on other measures in the Millward Brown’s Brand Dynamics Pyramid.

Newspapers create a more powerful emotional response than TV – for me this is the most interesting finding from the study. I’m unsure of the monetary value to advertisers of an emotional response but there’s hardly any reason for not wanting advertising to generate an emotional response. This plus associated research will certainly help advertisers thing carefully about the type of messages they run in press

Creative pre-testing of newspaper advertising doubles performance – well it was unlikely to reduce performance so the increase isn’t surprising. What the study being referenced appears to have researched is not performance in terms of ROI but rather advertising recognition. These are very different beasts and this needs to be considered when reading the results. Furthermore, the study appears to be anecdotal rather than scientific – by this i mean that in 2005 they measured awareness measures across 13 campaigns with only limited pre-testing then in 2006 all campaigns were fully evaluated before being published – however only 6 campaigns were released. To me this suggests that the poorly performing types of campaigns were dropped and potentially more funding was spent per campaign in 2006. Without knowing the details of the report the conclusion that pre-testing helps make campaigns twice as effective is very difficult to justify.

Newspaper advertising drives sales and web traffic – and if they didn’t there wouldn’t be much of a newspaper industry to speak of would there? If anyone doubted this finding then I’d question their sanity. However this analysis differs from much of the other analysis in that it doesn’t compare results with the other media. Not sure why? As for the web traffic, there’s lots of data to show that consumers of Newspapers are exactly the demographic groups which are hard to reach through other media such as TV. Mixed media wins the day when you want to raise awareness and press hits some demographics exceptionally well.

Multiple executions are significantly more effective than single ads – again this is great advice on how to run a campaign. Newspapers are inherently a medium where coverage is limited but frequency is high. Running the same execution over and over limits the opportunity to continue to inform – it’s a case of being sensible and understanding the medium.

I guess these comments appear to suggest that I’ve either a) got something against the Newspaper industry or b) i’m a sceptic about the value of such “groundbreaking” research. Neither are really the case. The problem in this case is the body which is conducting the research lacks the credibility to say “our media channel is better than yours”. When Coke say that independent research shows people prefer Coke over Pepsi (or vice versa from what i hear) then most people roll their eyes and question whether they would have published a conflicting result. In the case of this NPA research, I question whether it’s over promoting a great medium as part of some internal industry politics of Newspapers vs. TV vs. Online vs. ....etc. and really wonder what the overall benefit is to marketers. There is a ton of media research out there which is objective and well researched (IPA touchpoints?) and i’d suggest people with a real interest in understanding the relevant benefits of one channel over another take great care when looking at channel specific reports.

Data visualisation - the next step

2007-04-19T19:19:00.000+01:00

My old boss was mad keen on making charts look cool - "tell the story" and "get rid of clutter". My old lecturer was mad keen on the writings of Robert Schiller - the excellent economist.

Put the two together and what do you get?

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2757699799528285056

Genius...

Banks and the Brand Promise

2007-04-16T07:39:00.000+01:00

I recently wrote about the gap which sometimes exists between the folks in an organisation who run the numbers and those who manage the brand (Numbers don't make up for the branding). I guess it was inevitable that having praised the folk at HSBC for their "World's local bank" campaign, someone over zealous bean counter would go and ruin the story.

In case you are not aware, HSBC last week decided that one branch in Dorset would now only offer "Full service banking" to premier customers. The reason? Well the quote from the HSBC spokesperson was as follows - "We are trying to treat everyone fairly - not everybody in the world is equal. Some people have higher incomes and need greater services through the bank. These customers demand a better service."

For me, this seems like a case of the branding and finance teams not really understanding each others needs. I sort of understand the logic that this branch is in an affluent area and in one sense this appears to demonstrate the bank acting to meet local needs. However they are forgetting some of the basics which must come before the tag line - namely that they are still a full service bank which means that their first duty to the brand is to maintain all the services which go with the category. If this is some kind of segmentation exercise gone wrong then it's even more surprising given that HSBC managed to segment customers very successfully in the past when they launched First Direct.

If HSBC really wanted to meet local needs then they should have repeated the same steps which they adopt in other areas by set up a premium area within the bank. Banks such as Coutts can afford to put security guards on the doors and turn the majority of the population away in exchange for a higher share of business from the elite - however HSBC probably can't afford to loose the broader populations business in the UK.

Numbers don't make up for the branding

2007-04-09T10:05:00.000+01:00

Many analysts like myself get a bit carried away from time to time with the power of the numbers! However we often forget to remind organisations about the benefits of a strong brand proposition. Everyone in marketing knows that to be exceptional, you need a strong brand - that doesn't mean a great logo or fantastic web domain but it means you need a compelling proposition which is well executed. What's amazing is how many poor brands stay above water and even prosper for so long so there's clearly more to it!

There are a thousand presentations out there about "keeping it simple" and "think differently" and almost each presentation uses the same examples - Google, Southwest/Ryanair/Jetblue, Dell, Innocent (next time you see a branding presentation, play brand bingo - the updated version of buzzword bingo). However this one - "The Brand Gap" made an impression on me and i heartily recommend it.

As an aside, i am always impressed when people make strong brands from low interest industries and in recent years, HSBC have taken the lead at doing this in the banking field. They have successfully turned globalisation to their advantage in a manner which Barclay's failed to grasp a few years ago. Their latest "the World's local bank" ad is another good example of this campaign although for me, the cream of the ads are those which appear at every major airport on boarding / departure - genius!

Wannamaker's 50% rule is long gone now

2007-04-09T09:36:00.000+01:00

The oldest cliche in advertising is the Wannamaker one about 50% of ad spend being wasted but not knowing which 50%. Indeed this blog is as guilty as any of using this and I'll do something about that this week!

One reason why the 50% rule is no longer appropriate is the variety of measurement tools and techniques which enable marketers to quantify the impact of advertising activities. Qualitative and Quantitative analysis techniques combined with the 1000's of reports available from web2.0 channels means that information which demonstrates advertising effectiveness has never been easier to obtain. If you're organisation doesn't monitor their advertising for ROI purposes then it's probably a good idea to question why not. The only rational reasons for not tracking marketing ROI are the following:

We don't need a higher marketing ROI - we're rich
We've never thought about it
We don't know how to check it
We were told it wasn't possible

My guess is that no organisation is going to claim number 1 (maybe Microsoft and Google) and if you're answering 2 or 3 then it's time to check in with your ad agency and ask some questions. Answer number 4 and it's time to get another agency (e-mail me and I'll give you a list of people to call).

Next time someone quotes Wannamaker at you, ask them to name an organisation who still regard a 50% ROI from their advertising being regarded as acceptable. Please let me have the details and I'll go and help them out because it's no longer rocket science!

Simple analysis - but powerful messages

2007-03-29T13:47:00.000+01:00

The old adage is that simple ideas are often the best. This is as true for marketing as other functions.

Victor Cook has written an interesting article on Coke vs. Pepsi and using some really basic numbers, he's determined that Pepsi may be a better run organisation than Coke (see http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/2288180/17256626).

Whilst this article may ignore overseas earnings and the like, it does go to show that there is a wealth of data out there which can be used to produce a report on every competitor in an industry. You don't just want data from Nielsen, BARB etc - get the financials as well. Here in the UK, you have to pay £1 for a copy of an organisations annual accounts. That's great value and the lessons in the data may be far greater than anything hidden in some randomly administered surveys.

Threshers voucher time again - too much of a good thing?

2007-03-22T08:02:00.000Z

Many of you will have looked into the effectiveness of discount coupons and vouchers and wondered if they really work. Measuring the effectiveness of these offers is actually fairly simple in terms of short term ROI - however the complications come further down the line when customers become attuned to vouchers and discounts - in theory having damaged the brand. This mistake was made by K-mart in the 1990's and this should serve as a warning to prospective discounters - train customers to expect vouchers and special discounts at your peril - it will make regular products look more expensive.

Anyway - the good people at Threshers had a massive PR coup during Christmas when they released a voucher (by accident they claimed?) which entitled those who received it to a 40% discount on any bottle of wine. This was a great offer from their point-of-view since the offer went viral and thousands of people got hold of the voucher which was only released to a few. the result was a PR coup where people believed they had received a "golden ticket" and ran round to Threshers to clear the shelves. Having allegedly made £15m from this deal they are at it again.

You can find the voucher here -http://www.gapingvoid.com/Moveable_Type/archives/003805.html - by the way this site has some fantastic images which you can use on your business cards if you're brave!

From the consumers point-of-view this is great - we can go and get some good wine at a perceived reduction of 40% on list price (although it's often pointed out that the real discount is 7% - if you were already going to get 3 bottles of wine, this retailer already gives you 33% off). From the point of view of Threshers, is this great for their brand or are they relying on very short-term lifts which may train consumers to go there only when vouchers are available - let's see if they do another one at Christmas.

Time to experiment a little

2007-03-20T07:06:00.000Z

The beauty of digital marketing is in the data - not the popups.

To the right of this site, you will see some adverts "from our sponsors" - Amazon and Google. Without giving too much away, the data i've got from these services suggests the following:

Nobody can see that i have an Amazon bookshop or nobody is interested. To test this, i'm going to make it more obvious for readers to find it. If nobody goes there again then time to get rid of it
My other Amazon adverts for Ogilvy books are also not getting any hits - they are going
The Google ads got some decent traffic early on but now that's dried up. I guess this was people "clicking for interest" but it would be better if it was more click through events occur ed - therefore i'm moving the Google ads up the page - again if nothing happens then time to review the presence of these ads

Let's see if there is any value in this online real estate....

Do S-curves really exist in marketing?

2007-03-14T11:22:00.000Z

Over the years, I've engaged in lot's of debate with potential colleagues as to the existence of the S-curve. Before i launch into a debate on the pro's and con's, i should sumarise what I'm on about:

What is the S-Curve?
The s-curve represent a non-linear (bendy) relationship between an input (labour, advertising, time) and an output (productivity, sales, population). S-curves apparently occur quite often in nature - i believe that population projections are based on an S-curve relationships. They are also popular for those considering product life-cycle projections - the classic diffusion model popular in social science makes use of s-curve type relationships.

From the marketing point-of-view, we typically use an S-curve to represent a situation where we expect that a small amount of input will make little difference whilst the marginal benefit from a large to very large input will also have little effect. In between these points is what is known as the effective range where returns are at their greatest.

S-curves in Marketing
Marketeers often talk about s-curves when debating how marketing works. A popular opinion is that there is a minimum level of advertising below which investment will be ineffective. Others counter that there is no logical reason why the second exposure to a message (if identical) will be more effective than the first exposure. As such they prefer the alternative diminishing returns curve.

For marketing channels other than advertising, the debate also exists. In the study of sales forces, it is far harder to argue that an s-curve relationship exists between the number of salesmen and overall sales. The argument goes that the salesmen an organisation adds to an already large pile are likely to deliver only marginal incremental benefit to an organisation whilst the first salesman should offer the greatest ROI. Seth Godin has recently written about this on his blog and he offers an alternative view which supports the s-curve for sales forces.

Estimating S-Curves
S-curves represent a real challenge for market researchers. In terms of estimation, one requires far more data to estimate a relationship of this type and it's difficult to determine what functional form to use for estimation. I've experimented in the past with trying to estimate S-curves using the Gompertz relationship. The fact that there are an extra two parameters to estimate in a regression means that margins of error become very wide very quickly.

In summary
I've yet to see conclusive proof that S-curves exist in marketing. On occasions, I've seen evidence which points to their existence but it's far from case proven in my eyes. From the point-of-view of researchers, my opinion is that unless it's essential to find an S-relationship in your data, I suggest you steer clear of this type of estimation and stick to looking for the point of diminishing returns.

One other point to make today - the importance of trying to measure diminishing returns is often overlooked but the power of diminishing returns is massive. In this piece, Victor Cook has outlined some basic but powerful analysis which highlights why this concept matters so much to businesses looking for answers - not just reports.

2007-03-10T15:42:00.000Z

Assuming you're using a decent internet browser, you will no doubt have noticed a logo like this popping up all over the place. If you've not clicked it then try it and see what happens. You'll find that the whole browing experience becomes easier to manage day after day (at least i have) because what happens is that you get the power of RSS or Really Simple Syndication.

I don't really know what RSS technology does exactly (something about using a simple schema to ensure that data can be read in compatible systems or the like) but what it's done for me is to enable me to get info from multiple websites really quickly and efficiently. By using the built in RSS reader of Internet Explorer 7, i can monitor a whole range of websites for updated content then see that content in a common format. No distracting adverts (well just a few) and standardised text formatting etc. The other great benefit is being able to keep up to date with the latest news - items are tracked by publishing date so it's made really easy to see the latest comments and industry news.

One interesting feature that RSS offers marketing analysts is the ability to track which info online consumers have been exposed to and see which have the greatest impact on the purchase process. I'm not aware of anyone doing it but it is clearly possible to track when people are exposed to individual messages, identify the messages which had the greatest impact and which were ineffective. My guess is that conjoint style analysis will be combined with this data pretty soon to great effect.

For more info click here to see a presentation from MarketingRev.com on RSS for marketeers.

MRM - what does it mean to your organisation?

2007-03-02T11:56:00.000Z

As part owner of a technology company in the marketing space, i'm obviously interested in understanding what is the next item on the agenda of organisations when it comes to marketing tech. Over the previous couple of years, more and more organisations have been dabbling in what are known as Marketing Resource Management systems (MRM) but the definition of what this means is a little unclear.

I've found a site which seeks to explain this - www.mrm-explained.com.

There is lots of useful info on this site and i'd encourage anyone interested in the subject to pay a visit and find out more. Clearly the definition of what MRM is needs to be flexible - my organisation (www.marketingqed.com) is building out our own marketing decision and analysis platform and some clients consider what we do a form of MRM. Clearly we're looking to go beyond the classic reporting function. We're also unlikely to adopt purchase approval process as tools from organisations such as Aprimo and Unica already manage these exceptionally well. The difference we will offer will come through superior analytical tools and more interactive simulation options - my greatest issue with many MRM systems is that they often end up as glorified reporting tools - SAP or Oracle for marcoms. I believe that clients really want help answering their questions rather than more pieces of info to print out - ie - no more "TPS reports".

New launch from Prophet

2007-02-26T16:41:00.000Z

The good people at Prophet have launched a new blog called BackPocket which is aiming to collate marketing news and views from across the industry. I’ve had a look round and there’s some strong material here. The “factoids” section is especially useful for getting quotes and stats for presentations – as always the rule is check these out for yourself - at least make sure you name your source if using in a presentation.

http://backpocket.prophet.com/

Since there is too much information out there right now, it's nice when somebody takes the time to distill it for you.

Consumers are ripping up the old model - like you didn't know

2007-02-22T08:22:00.001Z

More evidence that consumers have decided enough is enough when it comes to obtaining media content. A recent research piece in the UK showed that many consumers zap through ads using digital recorders to time shift their viewing. Similarly research from Australia shows that more consumers than ever are using technologies such as BitTorrent to get to "their" programs when they want rather than when they are told they can have them. For marketing researchers, this means that we need to figure out a new and improved measurement system sooner rather than later to tell if anyone is watching our adverts. The proportion of people watching via Sky+ or similar technologies is small but the adoption rate will increase no doubt as factors such as HDTV switchover, more adoption of Media centre type PC’s and better broadband services kick in.

In theory, this change in viewing patterns should drive down the overall budget for broadcast advertising on the assumption that better targeting will mean less wastage. However it’s not clear that this will indeed be the overall impact for products with mass appeal. Would a brand such as Sony only want to advertise to people with the budget to spend £1200 on a TV? Aren’t they advertising to other groups for the longer term brand image? If it’s more difficult for Sony to get to 8m or so consumers via TV then it’s likely that their costs may indeed rise. It’s niche brands that can make the most use of superior targeting offered by new technology.

One other point on Sky+ - I really wonder whether broadcasters such as Channel 4 have investigated whether their ad breaks are too long for the new age. When we watch a big name show on 4 at home, we almost always play it back via Sky+ because we know the ad breaks run to 4 min lengths. By stretching a 45 min show to an hour, I wonder if they are really doing themselves or advertisers any favours. I would think that shorter ad breaks mean less zapping but it’s only the good folks at Sky who can tell us this.

What would Ogilvy make of modern marketing research?

2007-02-16T13:34:00.000Z

I’ve been reading a great book by David Ogilvy recently called “Confessions of an Advertising Man” which was written back in 1963 but is still relevant to today’s marketing community thanks to its common sense approach to the nature of advertising. Ogilvy is clear that Advertising is a means to an end for organisations - not some great religion to be worshiped but a practical tool to help sell. The text of this book is full on great quotes and one-liners which jump off the page. The ones which really caught my eye showed Ogilvy to be a rarity for a creative ad man back in the 1960’s – a man who wanted as many facts as possible to help him sell more of his client’s wares:

“Advertising people who ignore research are as dangerous as generals who ignore decodes of enemy signals”
“Never stop testing, and your advertising will never stop improving.”
“On the average, five times as many people read the headline as read the body copy. When you have written your headline, you have spent eighty cents out of your dollar.”
“You have only 30 seconds in a TV commercial. If you grab attention in the first frame with a visual surprise, you stand a better chance of holding the viewer. People screen out a lot of commercials because they open with something dull... When you advertise fire-extinguishers, open with the fire.”

It’s clear from the book that Ogilvy really valued facts and figures as much as great copy and certainly far more than a nicely painted graphic. This almost fanatical obsession with understanding how results could be analysed and improved came from a combination of Ogilvy’s early time in advertising spent with George Gallup and possibly also his time spent cooking in the infamous kitchens of Paris in the 1930’s where perfection was a minimum standard.

Ogilvy's Dove adverts were regarded as some of his best copy

As these adds which Oglivy wrote show, his style was simple and based upon experience he had learned through research reports - the photo at the top of the page, black on white text for readability and lots of product facts in the copy were his trademarks - in the 1960’s people read the copy if it was catchy - i wonder whether this is still the case. Another trick he used extensively was that of the testimonials (user experience summary). This made great commercials and factually based adverts talking up product features were also rarely shown to be ineffectual.

I’m not sure that these same rules apply to the market today – certainly things have changed somewhat in terms of the way consumers interact with media and there is no doubt that Ogilvy was writing at a time when even TV advertising wasn’t well researched. However I’m sure that were he alive today, he’d have some interesting ideas about the need for more research into what makes a great ad and what features work time after time.

What intrigues me most about Ogilvy’s writing is that he attributes almost all of his best techniquesto fact based research. To me, he’s saying that the reason he got things right was in part down to his (unique?) ability to listen to the numbers and suspend what may have been his personal tastes (see his point about loving art but refusing to use a painting in place of a photo which he knows to have more potential impact). This is surely a lesson to many advertisers today who appear obsessed about creating “great” commercials at the expense of “effective” ones.

Based on what Ogilvy has written, I’ve taken a guess at what his top tips might be for modern advertisers who live in the modern multi-channel world?

The test / learn / execute cycle is not optional – hence why I think Ogilvy would have loved online and 2.0 based technologies for their optimisation capabilities.
Don’t place great faith in intricate copy when useful sales messages will win the day – I hate to say it but I’m starting to admire some of the adverts run by PC World because they hammer home their points over and over in such a way that consumers can’t fail to be educated (now I know that the Advertising Standards Authority have taken a dim view of some of their commercials but they are objecting to the facts spouted out and not the style of the ads).

Make sure an idea is researchable – I think the think Ogilvy leaned from DM agencies was the great comfort one can take from measurable results. Nowadays, it’s clear that almost all advertising media are measurable – some are easier to read than others (and in some cases some are too easy but that’s an article for another time) but all are now susceptible to ROI analysis and should be so on a regular basis.
Adapt with your consumers – Ogilvy had a great point to make that your copy should be accessible to your customers. Sounds simple but I think too many people forget this.

If you can think of other rules to add to the list, why not post them below?

I think these rules of thumb would serve any advertiser well for a while in terms of watching the numbers and ensuring meaningful ROI is both achievable and measurable. Like all "rules" though, there will always be exceptions. Exceptional people are few and far between and exceptional ideas certainly don't come up every day of a persons working life. If your commericals don't follow this pattern, at least ask yourself a question on what you are doing.

It’s up to us as an industry to improve research methodologies all the time to make sure that no stone is left unturned in the ROI quest and that our clients needs are always ahead of an agencies need to win an award in Cannes.

Want to learn more? Order Ogilvy's excellent books can be purchased by clicking on sidebar pictures of this website. Thanks

Marketing happens when? How seasonal should the analysis be?

2007-02-13T09:42:00.001Z

I was looking at the very interesting “google trends” tool today to try and work out a couple of marketing related points for my new business and I came across a couple of really fascinating trends which said an awful lot to me about something which is wrong with marketing folk.

Google trends allows users to track the usage over time of a search term in order to see when and where the search term was being used most. I ran a couple of different searches to try and understand how usage of google is changing and how interested marketing folk (or others) are in some key marketing terms. Although Google don’t let users see overall volumes of search (i.e. how many searches from their sample they are showing), they do show overall trends in search activity across 2004-2006 and the level of seasonal variation.

A couple of typical searches look like this:

Vodafone – general upward trend – seasonal peak late in the year but probably following major news articles and market growth

Tax Returns – the ultimate in seasonal business? Little interest outside peak times although some smoothing in 2006 which may be consistent with the activates of some governments in trying to smooth this pattern out

So now, let’s look at the results which relate to this blog – i.e. marketing analysis and the marketing mix.

Marketing Mix – What strikes me first about our search for marketing mix is the level of seasonal variation in the use of the search term. There is a wild variation across the year in the search suggesting that this is only an issue for many at two periods of the year – 1) around April (when budgets get released?) and 2) just before Christmas (and all the parties) when budget requests have to be submitted.

Marketing Analysis – search against the term marketing analysis shows an almost identical pattern – lack of interest for most of the year then some seasonal swings in order to get the budget sorted / spent. There's even a potentially worrying trend downwards but this appears in lots of searches so this may just reflect a move away from google to other search engines or a trend towards non-search activity.

So fair enough – optimisation of the mix is only a part time job isn’t it? Don’t we only need to optimise the mix once a year – aren’t all the plans annual?

Not really no. Modern thinking suggests to me that analysis is a continual undertaking in the marketing process - how many flowcharts exist within organisations showing the "plan> execuite > review > learn" cycle in one form or another. If this is the case, the mix needs optimising over and over again – the feedback loops should exist so that marketers can review their overall performance (at least on the short term KPI’s) in a matter of weeks rather than once a year. Companies which are optimising once a year are likely to only be looking at the big picture once a year. This strikes me as too infrequent for most organisations in our new more dynamic marketing environment. Annual plans certainly have their place but from the look of the data above, it seems that we’re twice as likely to review the marketing mix once a year at Christmas than during late May.

Reasons why the annual marketing analysis cycle is a good thing

Everyone is standing back and taking a look at the same time
An annual review is like servicing your car – it’s a once a year task to check and verify safely
We’re busy for the rest of the year actually selling stuff – no time to make decisions on marketing mix or check it’s right
The agency do this for us – we just verify their work at our annual review
We review our direct activities all the time – they are continually optimised

Reasons why the annual marketing cycle may limit your business opportunities

If everyone else is reviewing their mix once a year, this leads to strategic opportunities to steal a march on competition by changing when you conduct reviews – can other organisations respond to your actions in June if they are locked in an annual cycle
A high performance race car has a full service after each race – new engines after every couple of races and the telemetry is reviewed during the race and analysed both in real time but also afterwards – isn’t your business worth the same care and attention rather than subjecting it to a review only when you have to.
Marketing is selling – if you are busy selling stuff and don’t consider ensuring that customers have oversight of your goods and services, you’ve probably made a mistake
If you rely on an agency to conduct your mix reviews, what are the chances that you will get the best people at their busiest time of year? If you do get the best people to work for you, will they really be able to give you their undivided attention?
OK so direct marketing is continuously optimised? Well that’s a start but to use the car analogy this means the steering is optimised but the engine may be running short on oil and about to seize up any day!

Marketing teams can’t turn off for most of the year and come out of hibernation when budgets are being decided or plans need submitting for another calendar year. The best marketing organisations I’ve seen work campaign by campaign with a strong emphasis on continuous learning and re-planning. The attention they pay to the mix has created strong teams who know how to keep marketing relevant to their customers year round. With consumer trends moving so quickly I believe that annual mix optimisation will give way to quicker and quicker cycles of optimisation.

Web 2.0 explained? Now what....

2007-02-09T16:12:00.000Z

Just came across this video on the subject of Web2.0. OK - it's just a buzzword but this video asks some great points of the viewer - enjoy and be intrigued!

It's certainly one of the best things to come out of Kansas in a while.

The author has requested that people leave comments and suggestions to enhance the video (this is the first draft), so if you have something to say join the conversation.

More on this and the ever popular "marketing 2.0" buzz at a later date.

Just back from the Technology for Marketing and Advertising conference in London

2007-02-07T13:56:00.000Z

I'm just back from the snappily titled Technology for Marketing and Advertising conference here in London and I have to say that I was very disappointed at the range of exhibitors who were present at the event. My overall impression was that the range of visitors ranged from "e-mail optimisers" to "direct mail optimisers" and little in between. From my point of view, i had hoped that some of the broader technologies would be on show - where were Clearchannel, DDS and others who appreciate that "marketing" is a broader church than just anything containing 0's and 1's?

Having said this, there were some highlights which made attendance worthwhile for me:

the Google University - a good introduction to Google Adwords which was well received by all present. The funny aspect of the presentation was watching tech specialists struggling to get a projector and laptop to work together which shows it happens to all sorts of organisations.
the keynote speech on web 2.0 - i couldn't actually get into this so am taking a punt but the fact that almost everyone wanted to see this speech showed how important this new trend is for the industry.
a company new to me called Apteco and their FastStats product which had some interesting graphics to help cut through data clutter and what looks to be a solid offering with a good graphical interface.

Whilst i was initially disappointed that no exhibitor that i could find took a broader approach to what marketing means, i was also heartened to see how many people attended the event. Assuming all goes well with our new business, we shall endeavour to attend this event and show people another side of marketing.

So what's going on here then?

2006-12-18T18:47:00.000Z

As i already alluded to in the title of this blog, the purpose of what I'm trying to do here is the creation of a resource for people who have to analyse marketing. I want to gather information on best practice, top software to help with the task and interesting ways of analysing problems.

As a bit of background, my experience in marketing analytics started during my time at the UK media agency PHD (formerly New PHD) where i was employed at their Brand Science subsidiary. I spent just over two years at PHD where i learnt a great deal about the UK media industry and what clients were looking for from their marketing. I was fortunate to get the opportunity to move to Accenture along with two of my colleagues in 2002 to help Jeff Merrihue form the Marketing Sciences team. I have recently left Accenture to start my own business called Marketing QED and it is this venture which has prompted me to start this blog - more on this in future posts.

Anyway a couple of final points - what do i mean by Marketing Analysis?

For me, almost all marketing activities serve one common purpose - to sell stuff to people. Some debate whether "brand building" activities fit into this framework or indeed if they should be analysed in detail...but it's not a debate which lasts for long when the cheque book comes out. For me, marketing needs to be selling something - that may be toothpaste, a dream holiday or a political idea. When if comes down to it though, if we are to learn lessons from marketing, we need to analyse it. In doing this, we should address three key questions:

What was the objective of the activity
How will it will work? Is there a model?
What actually happened - i.e. is there any data?

By addressing these points, powerful lessons can be learned and applied to future activities.

I urge anyone who doesn't believe that marketing in the past has much to tell us about the future to read Ogilvy on Advertising.