CONTENT WAR Is Google truly stealing revenue?

My take on the search engine vs. publisher debate.

Admittedly as a marketer my job would be significantly harder should I not have access to the plethora of free news content I now enjoy. This said, I firmly believe neither I, nor anyone else, has a fundamental right to consume for free what others have paid to create.

Let's compare the attempts at 'free' bike share programs around the world to 'free' news share on the internet.

First, because a large influential institution has enlisted the participation of multiple entities to provide 'free' access to bicycles does that mean that everyone's bicycles are up for grabs? Even if we lock ours up, does any passerby with an interest have the right take our bike out for a spin? No. We paid for our bike and may have even taken reasonable precautions for its security. Someone just helping themselves to our bike is not OK.

Second, the bike share programs have significant positive attributes for all concerned. Lowered emissions and congestion with improved user health and regional awareness to name a few. The same benefits could be spun as an argument for free digital access to news. The reality? The ideal in its free form is not sustainable. From Amsterdam in The Netherlands, through LaRouche in Paris, and Portland, USA these free bicycle programs have gone the way of the Dodo bird. Why? 1"An inability to compensate for the cost of theft and vandalism."

...or is the real threat exposure?

I am by no means a fan of most news publishers. In my humble opinion their financial woes have nothing to do with Google, Yahoo, Bing or any other search engine. Their decreasing revenues are in most part the result of poor product development. A fact that search engines highlight. With the aid of search engines we can quickly filter for quality content. If a publisher chooses to pump out unstimulated content or thin rehashes of the same stories they have spun for the last week, they will feel the effect visa vi fewer consumers. Online or offline, fewer consumers means fewer advertisers and lower premiums. After all, publishers sell promo space in both mediums. The same thin content pain goes for magazines and journals as well. Just as I'll get up and leave a conference room if the content of a presentation is laden with marketing fluff [and I'm a marketer] I'll take my valuable readership else where when articles are peppered with brand mentions and product plugs.

What is obvious in the search engine vs publishers debate is that they can generate far greater revenue as partners than they can individually. For both parties, the bulk of their revenue model rests on their ability to deliver an audience. I suspect recent plays in the media by Rupert Murdoch and some other newspaper owners are more red herrings than accurate predictions of a future without 'ready access to information'. Indeed the days of making off with locked bicycles may soon be gone. But just as bike share programs are evolving into sustainable models, so too shall search engines and publishers figure out a mutually beneficial model.

Google's floated answer to the problem today was the catalyst for my writing this post. Here's my quick assessment of their solution.

As I understand it, a single visitor will be able to access a maximum of five articles per publication after which the reader will be required to sign in. I can't imagine that publishers will sign on for this. For one I'd be interested in knowing how many visitors to any given site read more than five articles per viewing. Sadly, as mentioned above, the majority simply don't produce that much new and interesting content. Also the ability to track a session is traditionally the result of cookies; something a visitor can easily delete in order to extend their access. Granted Google is one heck of an intellectual power house [the driving reason why I think they're amazing] so the tracking tool[s] they use to monitor a session may very well not be cookies.

Final thoughts...

I'd wager many of us categorize Google as Robin Hood in this scenario. Taking from the rich to give to the poor. They reinvest a respectable percentage of the wealth in building powerful tools that they make available to each and every one of us - free of charge. Right, wrong, or indifferent, it certainly makes it hard to not love them.

Citation:
1Wikipedia article re bike sharing initiatives: http://bit.ly/WP-bikeshare_TL-post11

Post Image:
Freely sourced from: http://bit.ly/JFenzel-image_TL-post11
[note: original image source unknown]

Citation:
Google's floated solution. American Free Press [AFP]: http://bit.ly/Google_PR_TL-post11

Social? Contribute where and what will add value.

A rising number of B2B executives over the past couple of months have said to me 'they feel their organization needs to be actively involved in social networking'. This, followed very closely by their request for advice as to how they can gain an appreciable presence on Twitter, etc.

Aside from discussion surrounding my questions... why? and to what end? My 50k-foot advice is always the same. First determine where your relevant communities are interacting. This requires a decent amount of research. Is it really Twitter? Maybe. Or are we knee jerking? In B2B, the answer is just as likely to be news groups, forums, or other less sexy but potentially more relevant spaces.

Once the space is determined, listen & learn. Another investment. Understand what a valuable contribution sounds, looks, feels, and tastes like. In the introduction to the book 'Built to Last', authors Jim Collins and Jerry Porras write "What is the true price of a book? Not the fifteen- to twenty-five dollar cover price. For a busy person, the cover price pales in comparison to the hours required to read and digest a book." Applying a value rational to our posts, where our intended consumer has no vested interest [they didn't buy it] and can easily click away, our contribution should at minimum be worth the equivalent value of the 'read & digest' professional time. Think about the quality of content we often see. Do we really care that Joe is at the airport waiting for his flight, or Mary is anxiously awaiting Susan's keynote speech? For most of us the resounding answer is NO. We tune out and turn off... quickly. However if Mary posted highlights or nuggets of wisdom from Susan's speech AND it was relevant to us, our business and it's needs, would we positively take note? For most of us the resounding answer is YES.

In short, the concept of community 'share' is not new. Not by a long shot. And yes, there is very little doubt any B2B organization can benefit from some logical, intelligent form of contribution. The challenge is, we are playing with very easy-to-use tools that only require a click of a button to publish [community/social platforms] and an incredibly powerful publishing engine that never forgets [the web]. My advice? Employ the tools well... think twice, get creative, and contribute where and what will add value; for all parties.

Associated reading material: AIIM Industry Watch Report
Collaboration and Enterprise 2.0; Work-meets-play or the future of business?
© 2009 AIIM - Find, Control, and Optimize Your Information

Determining marketing strategy: step one

First we need to understand where we are currently positioned in the minds of our target market[s]. Spend, thus strategy needs to be aligned with positioning. The five stages of consciousness [positioning] we typically focus on acquiring are....

awareness = you exist
interest = sticky trigger that resonates
top of mind = automatically on the ‘to be considered' and/or ‘take the call’ lists
preference = standard by which others are measured
conversion = best resolved ‘what keeps them up at night’

Logically we cannot achieve stage 5 'conversion' unless we have achieved the preceding stages. This excerpted video from a live staging of the classic McGraw-Hill "Man in the Chair" ad at the Business Marketing Association's 2009 national conference does a spectacular job of bringing this point home.



Additionally, the more stages we need to acquire the longer the process. To a certain extent the greater our resources the better empowered we are to speed up acquisition, but we also need to be very cognizant of 'diminishing returns' and 'waste'.

Our marketing strategies are typically segmented into three time sensitive categories; short term results, mid term results, and growth & sustainability. As discussed, the shorter the time frame the fewer stages we can appreciably affect; therefore the more granular our target and subsequent strategies. The following representation of the three categories and the goals I have associated with them is typical of B2B environments where our product/service falls under a high consideration/high investment purchase category. If your offering falls outside of a typical six to twelve month sales cycle adjust the time line accordingly.

short term results
6-12 month time line
acquisition goals: preference thru conversion
reach: targeted prospects
strategy: direct dialogue.

mid term results
13-24 month time line
acquisition goals: interest thru conversion
reach: targeted market[s].
strategy: community dialogue.

growth & sustainability
3-5 year time line
acquisition goals: awareness thru conversion
reach: broad opportunities.
strategy: seed and steward.

Our top down organizational needs will determine the percentage of marketing resources we can apply to each of the three time sensitive categories. If for example our organization is in 'critical care' mode, with an immediate need for revenue infusion, we may be forced to allocate >70% of resources toward short term results, but this is risky. Focusing almost exclusively on the bleed without at minimum stabilizing overall health is not sustainable. The best strategy is to architect a plan that nourishes a healthy state at all stages while continuously monitoring and adjusting for our vitals.

When branding interferes with persuasion.

I read two papers in the last week re Web Analytics Assesment/Usage.

Appraising Your Investment In
Enterprise Web Analytics

● research conducted in Q2-thru-Q3 2009 by Forresters

● authored by Forresters Consulting
● commissioned by Google.

The Cost of Free

● based on research conducted in Q2 2009 by Forresters
● presented by web tech experts
● commissioned by Omniture.

Both are informative reads - thank you to all contributors for making them freely accessible. And both appear to present the data and subsequent analysis in the light most complimentary to their commissioners business interests - S.O.P... Aside from the content of each paper, what I find most interesting is the profound differences in positioning.

Should you read each paper you'll notice...
Branding

• the Google version includes a persistent but relatively obscure mention of Google as the host through out.
• the Omniture version includes logo and their standard collateral look & feel through out.

Scripting

• the Google version is academic, void of product mentions or associative need/solution based content.
  
• the Omniture version is promotional with a high volume of product mentions and associative need/solution based content.

Objectivity

• the Google version includes full disclosure of research methodology. Is authored by the researchers, Forresters.
• the Omniture version discloses competitors. It employs the reputations of web tech experts cited as the presenters; John Lovett [senior analyst at Forresters Research] along with Tony Bradshaw and Tim Munsell [senior DaveRamsey.com representatives]. Note... presenter vs author may be a matter of semantics.
  

My questions is...
Which approach do you believe to be more effective?

My take...
If the consumer believes the data and conclusions presented adheres to unbiased and accepted research standards they are more apt to use the information to assess competitive 'value offered'. Therefore perceived 'truth of data' is a significant factor in the probability of tactic persuasion. Google's hands-off approach feels more objective, thus credible, thus able to persuade.

Given the Omniture paper is categorized as a 'workbook' it may not be entirely fair to make an apples-to-apples comparison. As a workbook I would suspect presenting participants with the data and interspersing it with [carefully crafted] questions, allowing them to form their our own Omniture affirmative conclusions, may be a more persuasive variation on the original approach.

To access a link to each paper please click on it's corresponding image above.

Asking for the cheque.

In yesterdays post I wrote about the frequent opportunity we are now provided by freeware developers to donate a few dollars in trade for using their application. This is a smart revenue generation tactic on their part. One I assume most of us do not mind being requested to participate in... providing we gain value for our contribution.

My question is 'How successful are these appeals?'

Situation
This morning when I opened my Firefox browser I was greeted with a number of 'thank you' pages from developer groups whose add-ons I had installed last night. All included some variation-or-another on an honest and simple request... "Should you like using the application we would appreciate a donation". And conveniently they provide a donate button directly underneath the appeal.

Problem
We are making the appeal before our consumers have had a chance to test drive the app.

A good comparative is when our server at a restaurant asks us 'how is everything?' right when we're taking our first bite. Not only is our mouth full of food, rendering us pretty much incapable of a legible response. But more to the point, we haven't had a chance to start forming a 'value' opinion yet.

Suggestion
First, change that initial communication experience. Simply thank our consumer for...

• taking the time to download and test our app
• trusting our solution
  

Second, set expectations... i.e.

From time to time we release feature updates for 'X'. [browser name] will prompt you when these are available. Our ability to continuously add value to this and other applications is in great part determined by you. Should you decide to upgrade when new features become available we would appreciate a small donation. Your support keeps our computers humming, your applications free of ads, and engineers working hard for you.

Third, update often. Requesting a donation at that time.

Providing our consumers are satisfactorily engaged with us/our product [?] our efforts should be well rewarded.

Free + Cloud = Careful Planning

We marketers now have a literal landslide of free and often powerful widgets and tools we can utilize for everything from community building to campaign tracking and analysis. Most of which are deployed on the cloud [a.k.a. hosted on someone else's servers] and are 'by design' pre-integrated with big brother CMS, CRM, ERP, and Social applications - also on the cloud. Cloud means we generally don't have to invest in hardware. And pre-integrated means we generally don't have to invest in heavy-weight configuration challenges. Also cloud applications typically provide what can be a significant advantage, rapid deployment.

My concern? What does all this free stuff really cost. Security issues aside, what happens to all of our data and content should any given provider cease to exist [atleast as we know and love them]. After all, free is not sustainable. The brilliant developers of these tools have bills to pay too. Thus, if they don't figure out how to make a buck, eventually they will disappear.

When assessing cloud tools in general I suggest looking for solid back-up options *and* how/if breaking the chain of tools deployed will affect the overall structure we have in place. Tools built on open source platforms for example, provide us some measure of a lifeline required to rebuild or bridge if necessary. It may not be easy, but atleast it's conceivable. Second, those tools that make light[ish] work of maintaining a secondary/internal repository are a much safer bet.

With the aid of careful contingency planning, we may miss a beat or three if a cloud tool disappears [free or otherwise] but it shouldn't cause permanent arrhythmia.

PS. Many freeware providers include a donate option on their download page. If you are so inclined, sending them a few bucks in gratitude is a mighty neighbourly thing to do!

Good bit of viral marketing

Recently the British Columbia government shut down Tourism BC, an external marketing arm, in favor of saving a few bucks. Given the Vancouver Olympics are just around the corner I questioned the wisdom of this decision. I suspect we'll never know if it was a prudent or foolish act. This said, a rather clever piece of viral marketing that appeared in my inbox today leaves me feeling a bit more confident in their capability atleast. With the not-so-inconspicuous use of BC tourism keywords it's pretty safe to assume the piece came from the desk of one of our in-house provincial marketers.

One of the reasons I give them kuddos is for how they chose to execute their message. Where some billboard ads for Coors beer had to be quickly pulled for having offended a neighbor province; a campaign with a likely multi-million dollar price tag. These guys have produced a similarly clever 'comparison theme' piece that once forwarded will gain a life and momentum of its own. One which cannot be pulled and cost virtually nothing. All of us proud BC'ites will happily forward the mail and tease our neighbors in favor of good old BC pride.

Here it is:

Balance...........

God was missing for six days. Eventually, Michael, the archangel, found Him resting on the seventh day..

He inquired, "Where have you been?"

God smiled deeply and proudly pointed downwards through the clouds, "Look, Michael. Look what I've made."

Archangel Michael looked puzzled, and said, "What is it?"

"It's a planet," replied God, and I've put life on it.. I'm going to call it Earth. And it's going to be a place to test Balance."

"Balance?" inquired Michael, "I'm still confused."

God explained, pointing to different parts of earth. "For example, northern Europe will be a place of great opportunity and wealth, while southern Europe is going to be poor. Over here I've placed a continent of white people, and over there is a continent of black people. Balance in all things."

God continued pointing to different countries. "This one will be extremely hot, while this one will be very cold and covered in ice."

The Archangel, impressed by God's work, then pointed to a land area and said, "What's that one?"

"That's the Province of British Columbia, the most glorious place on earth. There are beautiful mountains, rivers and streams, lakes, forests, hills, and beaches. The people from British Columbia are going to be handsome, modest, intelligent, and well hung, and humorous, and they are going to travel the world. They will be extremely sociable, hardworking, high achieving, carriers of peace, and producers of good things."

Michael gasped in wonder and admiration, but then asked, "But what about balance, God? You said there would be balance.."

God smiled, "There's Ottawa! Wait till you see the idiots I put there."

Author unknown.

I read an interesting paper titled 'Memes, CI and Marketing: A Preliminary Framework' published by The Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals. Author Mr. David O'Gorman offers a logical theory whereby analyzing memes inputs collected from speeches, interviews, in-person observance, or writings of top managers one can accurately predict the mid-long term strategic direction of a given organization.

My thoughts: In addition to the competitive advantage we can realize by undertaking this type of research there is another key take-away. Given the topic of the paper surrounds 'competitive intelligence' it may seem counter intuitive to say this but, 'organizational transparency and line of sight' are critical to achieving our goals. Bear with me. Where do most plans fail? Execution. Therefore, if we want success... our vision, values, and direction must emulate throughout our organization. Every member of our team needs to be on board. For this reason I say competitors be darned. Proudly and loudly define the road ahead. As long as everyone's on the same page [and we're not broadcasting IP] our lesser inspired competitors will be playing catch up while we are running toward the finish line.

Citation:
Thank you to EcoAlign for publishing Cracking the Green Code: Using a Values-Based Model to Improve Customer Communications and Marketing. Not only a good paper in-and-of itself but also what drove me to investigate the research of Dr. Clare Graves theories of "Emergent, Cyclical, Levels of Existence" or in simpler terms 'psychographic categorizing system (the seven levels of psychological evolution)'. Which then led me to the 'Memes, CI and Marketing' paper I discussed in this post.

Brand discipline, diligence, and logic.

Recently I've had the opportunity to sit down and chat with a number of entrepreneurs who are inspired by some very exciting long term goals. I'm a passionate believer in what author Jim Collins refers to as a B.H.A.G. (a.k.a. big hairy audacious goals http://bit.ly/Jim_Collins) and take great pleasure in listening to the motivating people who are guided by them. To me these goals are our fuel for monumental achievement.
In this post I thought I'd discuss a few of my thoughts on branding which some of the entrepreneurs asked me to share with them. Since all businesses and markets differ once you get up close and personal, my thoughts below are kept to the macro level; broad brush stroke points common to most business.

Branding
Our brands are the gut response and emotional reaction someone has in association with our company, products, and services. We may own the trademark and name but the world owns the experience therefore we don't control our brands... we steward them.

A unique symbol that our markets can identify us with.
Our logo/wordmark is not our brand either. Although it serves a very important role it is quite simply a visual trigger by which people can identify us; a graphic that assists them in differentiating our products/services from all the others. The key here is 'differentiate'. Think of IBM's wordmark with its horizontal stripes. Visually arresting or artistic it is not. Highly identifiable? Absolutely. http://bit.ly/IBM_logo.
There can be a good deal of investment that goes into developing a logo/wordmark, however if you're a small-to-medium sized business, get it done and move on. Of course ensure it is unique i.e. highly identifiable and not offensive or contain confusing or 'bad luck' elements but from there it doesn't even have to be particularly appealing to start. After all, most enduring organizations have an 'over time' evolved logo/wordmark. In almost 38 years the Starbucks logo has under gone atleast five make-overs http://bit.ly/starbucks_logo_evolution. I am not suggesting we want to be willy-nilly changing our brand anchors, but here's the thing. Unless we have a tonne of time and people working on it that are willing to stay up nights and work weekends to get to 'great' we'll need to be happy with a solid 'good' for now. It frees up our resources for other projects and gives us time to collect a reasonable data sample (feedback) before we go back to it.

Building our brands
Think of your brand as your garden. We water it, feed it, and weed it... but we don't control it. There is a whole world of external elements at play which we cannot logically expect to bend to our will. Seeds from a garden miles away, caught and released over our flower bed from the feathers of a passing bird. Our neighbors not tending to their weeds that then propagate over on our side of the fence. How about over or under exposure to sun, water, frost. You get the idea.

So where do we start? How do we build and nurture a great brand? With discipline, diligence, and logic.

Discipline.
First understand and embrace what it is we wish consumers to experience when they interact with our brand? What is 'the value proposition'. Exceptional price? Exceptional quality? Exceptional innovation? Don't try and do it all. We don't need to, and the odds are stacked heavily against us - many would say its impossible. We are setting ourselves up for a whole lot of pain and cost when we don't manage market expectations. For example, would you buy a Volvo and expect the tune-up to be inexpensive? No, of course not. We bought it for exceptional quality engineering. We expect that kind of quality comes with a price tag. And although we may expect some rationale for the various line items on the invoice, we are ok with the premium.
Once we've determined the basis for our value proposition we need to be ultra consistent about it. Make sure our customers always feel confident they'll experience the 'X' that they have been conditioned to expect from our brand and are willing trade us for their money. Ponder this one, we can travel virtually any where in the world and purchase the same Big Mac as we do from our local drive thru. Now that's brand consistency.

Diligence:
Get out into the world and talk it up. Don't spam people though. Spam can cause more damage than good; mostly in wasted resources. Start conversations with our nearest and dearest friends, associates, and clients. People who know we're good at what we do. Ask them to refer us, pass something on, invite us to speak at an event or be a guest editor, etc. A third party stamp of approval is the most valuable form of proving credibility and source of leads - bar none. If we're good at what we do, i.e. keep our value promise, most people are happy to help us out. We've all heard of viral marketing right? Well this is it in its infancy. Be patient, don't expect money to come pouring through the doors right away. There's a good quote from Lance Armstrong that goes... "I've read that I flew up the hills and mountains of France. But you don't fly up a hill. You struggle slowly and painfully up a hill, and maybe, if you work very hard, you get to the top ahead of everybody else." Keep our heads up and be diligent; the harder and smarter we work at connecting with people the broader our circle of influence becomes. And the beautiful thing is, our influence grows exponentially. Think of how many people you know? Each one of them... our happy partners, customers, and friends know alot of people as well.
Here's a fantastic bit of viral branding by VW for their luxury car the Phaeton http://bit.ly/Phaeton_plant_video. A notable bit of back ground is that I didn't receive the video via Volkswagen or any of its affiliates. As a matter of fact I couldn't even find it on any of their sites. So where did I get it? A trusted friend who knows I love great marketing and cool tech sent it over to me. The key phrase here is 'trusted friend'.
The tactic worked because...
• the mail came from someone I know... so I opened it.
• someone I trust recommended it as 'brilliant'... so I invested the time to watch it.
I watched it and agree it's brilliant... so I'm passing it on to you folks. And if you trust my opinion you may invest the time to watch it as well.
Another great example of viral marketing I experienced recently came out of Vancouver Island University. One of my sisters, Lynn, is an adviser at VIU and received an inmail from an instructor in the Cosmetology program letting her know they were starting to take outside appointments http://bit.ly/VIU_cosmetology. Lynn called my other sister and I, and the three of us went in for a pamper session. It turns out alot of faculty got that same mail and the students were booked solid with appointments. Additionally, each faculty member brought in atleast one of their friends, relatives, etc; people whom if they were satisfied with the value-in-exchange-for-their-money would then tell their friends, relatives, co-workers, and so-on. What was a small, quick act on the part of that instructor could keep those students busy for the duration of their program. Moral of the story here, is that viral doesn't have to mean reaching out to tens of thousands of people. That's a daunting task, whereas reaching out to those that know and trust you is easy. Just keep at it.

Logic:
Who wouldn't love to be Google. A company that in 2008 was identified as having the most powerful brand in the world http://bit.ly/Brandz_top_100. So logically if we want to be them, we should study how they and others like them got to where they are http://bit.ly/search_engine_history. They certainly didn't become the global success that they are over night. Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the founders of Google, started from humble beginnings begging and borrowing resources while they were students at Stanford University.
Second, understand our market(s), its needs, wants, and desires. Learn the language of our consumers; the information, phrases, words, and triggers that are meaningful to them. Logically if we speak their language we have far greater odds of earning their trust. In this way we can earn a company's, group's, person's trust and potentially referral without selling them a thing. For example I attended a public relations workshop sponsored by the British Columbia Technology Association (BCTIA http://bit.ly/BCTIA) where I contributed some insights to the group re building media trust. Some time after that event I received a call informing me that the company I worked for was being considered for a pretty prestigious manufacturing award. I inquired as to how we had been selected as a contender and was told a board member of the association had put us forward. I then called the gentlemen and inquired as to how he knew about us. Turns out he was sitting in that workshop and was of the opinion that any company that applied that much forward thinking to their PR must also make one heck of a product. What I said resonated with him because I offered practical advice, in lay-person terms (he was a CEO not a marketer), that he could run with. If we dig back into our memory banks I'm sure we'll all be able to come up with at least one time when we said something along the lines of... "I haven't tried it myself, but I read an article (other) discussing... and it seems quite impressive." If we hadn't tried it how would we know? Because 'X' had been communicated to us in a language and tone that convinced us. Doing our homework to understand what the language is may take some effort but its a logical approach that works.
A logical data source for building and evolving your brand is the internet. In an earlier post I mentioned that the world-wide-web (www.) can be an incredibly powerful tool. For me, one of its greatest strengths is the high quality behavioral data we can mine from it. Priceless information that up until quite recently, was only accessible by the giant corporations with mass money, reach, and cross-over consumer bases from which they could compile their data. Today we all have good quality access through our own site(s) and search engine analytics such as that provided by Google, Yahoo, etc. There's also a plethora of aggregator sites and business intelligence software such as AdMob, Alexa, Bango, BuzMetrics, Compete, CoreMetrics, KeywordSpy, Omniture, Overtone, Quantcast, Radian6, Webtrends, WordTracker... to name just a few.
I can't emphasize the value of behavioral data enough. Unlike traditional survey and most focus group reports this data is compiled from actual user activity. It is grounded in people's real interests and motivators vs respondents answering questions based on what they should or might do given a specific circumstance or event, that may or may not occur or be significant at some point in the future.
Another key advantage is that web analytics are near real-time data sources. You can act on it while it is still relevant i.e. while its hot in the media or its still seasonably applicable. As with most things that are worth while there's a learning curve, and certainly some people are far better skilled at compiling and analyzing the data, trends, etc than others. Whether you wade into the ocean of data yourself, or hire a professional to compile and monitor it for you, you will be that much richer for your investment. You will gain actionable insight into the value and discussions surrounding your, and your competitors brands.
What kind of behavioral data we want to compile and analyze is a huge topic. The data provides critical inputs for monitoring performance factors across almost all marketing disciplines, thus applies to much more than just branding. For example, we can quite accurately and inexpensively qualify whether our creative has hit the mark before we take that plunge, and run the same thing in a more costly forum or format. It's a terrifically interesting and important category so I'll leave it to a future dedicated post.

Branding, business development, and business intelligence are topics near and dear to my heart. I hope you found my thoughts on 'Branding discipline, diligence and logic' worth your time investment. Should you have any questions, would generously like to add a few of your own thoughts, or would like to inquire about me joining your team I welcome hearing from you. There's a comment section below this post or alternatively please feel free to email me at TLoslo@shaw.ca or visit my online profile at http://www.TraceyLoslo.com.

Kind regards... Tracey.

Value of a website?

The world-wide-web [www] is an immensely powerful engine. And your website is one of many tools that can be effectively applied in harnessing its value. Should someone interpret this to mean a corporate website is not entirely necessary I offer this advice...

Neglect your website and you become the architect of your own demise.

Now that's a pretty strong assertion deserving of an explanation. There are many models describing the various stages a consumer experiences, and marketers target, throughout the purchase process. I like to keep it simple and focus on three 1.awareness 2.conviction, and 3.conversion. The following is my breakdown of the associated value and function of your website at each of these three stages.

Creating awareness: poor
Given a website is a destination, so to speak, it doesn't make sense to say it is a tool for creating awareness. After all how can you consciously decide to go some where, when you are unaware of its existence. Now of course one can argue a corporate site is an effective vehicle for building awareness of new products, line extensions, etc that exist under a corporate or brand umbrella. To an extent this is true. We can expect a small lift in awareness resulting from piggy-back or switch-and-bait tactics where a visitor navigates to our site to view 'A' and, via good creative, be positively exposed to 'B'. The problem with any reliance on this, is the lift in awareness is a residual outcome; based on something of a 'wish-and-a-prayer' strategy. Perhaps I am being a little harsh, but I want to bring home the point to small and medium sized business in particular, entities with precious few marketing dollars, your website should never be thought of as the primary tool for creating consumer awareness. The world-wide-web however, can be a spectacular tool. That's an entirely different topic I'll leave to future posts.

Creating conviction: excellent
As producers we have to earn buyers' trust or conviction that 'purchasing our solution is their best investment'. This holds true whether we produce goods or services for purchase by integrators, value-added resellers, or end-consumers. Think about the last purchase you made that involved what you considered to be an important investment. Now by investment I don't just mean monetary; more often than not the sticker price is just a filter. Perhaps your career advancement, the safety of your family, or even just the best holiday experience rested on the decision. Did you visit a few websites to do a little fact finding before deciding on your vendor? Odds are extremely good your answer is yes. Today, few purchase decisions of any importance are made without at least one key stakeholder investigating our competence via the web. Do you really want to leave the critical job of building trust in your solutions entirely up to the social web, or is the appropriate strategy to invest in developing your own content on your own site?

Conversion: it depends
Some products/services require much more consideration and interaction than others before a purchase decision is finalized. In this case conversion is typically the result of some form of one-on-one communication. This said repeat sales may be most efficiently served by some form of e-commerce on your site. For producers of products/services in the low-to-moderate risk category, all we have to do is look at companies such as EBay and Amazon to see the power of a carefully crafted site for conversion.
Regardless of the sales cycle one important conversion tool should be common to virtually all sites - your readily accessible contact information. Unless you're a household name, with a stellar brand reputation, you can't hide behind automated contact forms. Prospects need to feel confident you really exist and there is a means of contacting you, including some form of real-time conversation. If you don't trust your customers with your contact information, why should they trust you with their money?

Don't let the prospect of building a productive website overwhelm you. Given the markets we sell in to are dynamic, so too should our websites continually evolve. Providing you 1. partner with a talented [a.k.a. proven] web development company, and 2. ensure you have great web analytics in place, you should be able to quickly evolve your site into a really valuable tool that assists your prospects in selecting you as their solution of choice.

Understanding the strategic role and subsequent value of your website is the first step in building an effective web presence. With a little nurturing and solid commitment to performance, your site can be the catalyst for success beyond your wildest dreams.

Inspiration is for amateurs.

We've all worked with atleast one person who was paralyzed by indecision; people for whom the most difficult part of a project is getting started. The following is a great quote by Chuck Close that offers some common sense, roll up your sleeves and get the job done type of insight...

"Inspiration is for amateurs... If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lightning to strike you in the brain, you're not going to make an awful lot of work."

In marketing, hi-tech in particular, it is very common to run into a host of tasks for which we need additional inputs or information before we can move forward. This situation does not constitute a barrier; instead consider it an opportunity. It's our chance to dig in and learn much more than just the fluffy peripheral laid out in the business case doc. Equally exciting, it's an open door through which we can build lasting relationships and mutual respect among our cross departmental peers. How?... by asking questions. So let's please get off our behinds and take that stairwell to chat with R&D and manufacturing. As marketers we know very well that one-on-one beats the pants off of email any day of the week - I promise no one is going to bite your head off for asking for a minute of their time and expertise. It's my experience the vast majority of stakeholders welcome our invitation for them to make a meaningful contribution. We only have to ask.

Citations:

I discovered Mr. Close's quote while watching his interview on a promotional trailer for 'the Wisdom project'. Photographer and director Andrew Zuckerman has compiled 100's of interviews with notable luminaries for the production. The Wisdom book website describes the work as "Inspired by the idea that one of the greatest gifts one generation can pass to another is the wisdom it has gained from experience... the Wisdom project seeks to create a record of a multicultural group of people who have all made their mark on the world."

Thank you to Karo Branding and Communication Design for running the post on 'the Wisdom project' that led me to finding the trailer.