Beyond Good is Useful

Think about 'why' we use the web. We' are looking for something. Right? It may be information or perhaps entertainment but either way we are looking to consume something. In the marketing game, providing your 'something' meets the 'what I am looking for' criteria, the player which efficiently acquires & retains the most consumers has the best odds of winning.

Previously, 'retain' was a big challenge. If our audience must continually seek out what we offer, we run the risk of losing them to other 'somethings' that may have caught their fickle interest. In the last few years a common 'good' marketing tactic is to provide consumers with an opt-in tool that 'pushes' desired content/information to them - think an RSS feed of your newsletter for example. This way consumers do not have to seek us out - we go to them. For the nimble, this tactic was a source of significant competitive advantage. The problem with a competitive advantage of course is that it's fleeting. Once others pick up on it, it becomes a common commodity with a tonne of competing noise a.k.a. no loner an advantage.

Today competitive advantage can be found in providing consumers with a relative 'something' that transcends your product/service. This 'something' is often a digital share or web social tool.

Branded widgets and apps are clever and 'useful' push tactics that can regularly prompt our audience to perform a personal-positive-outcome action. This is clever because the benefit activity [X] delivers, is then psychology connected to your brand/products/services. Executed well, widgets can be an excellent launch point for achieving today's competitive advantage goals.

Here are a couple of examples of big brand widget implementations.

• Having a tough time remembering to drink your daily recommended water in-take? Millions of us are. Try this Johnson & Johnson widget. http://bit.ly/Hydration-tracker_TLblog13
  

• Have you ever forgotten to send someone birthday greetings? Hallmark can help you to remember. http://bit.ly/Hallmark-reminder_TLblog13

• Want to know which products or services can earn you bonus membership rewards points? American Express to the rescue. http://bit.ly/Amex-rewards_TLblog13

When we embrace digital technology, the possibilities are endless.
So also remember to think beyond the web for 'useful' tools. How about offering trade show delegates a branded USB stick with your promotional materials loaded on it. It costs less than a 10 page glossy brochure and there's a high probability the recipient will keep, use, and appreciate you for it. [Sit outside near the convention facilities doors and watch delegates as they leave. You'll be shocked at the volume of promotional materials that are dumped already at that point. Many don't even wait to do the purge at their hotel room.] For a fraction more money you can add more value by attaching the USB on a lanyard. Delegates can wear it around their neck for convenient access to load other materials. Now you have walking billboards. A prime real estate billboard I might add. The USB should hang at the same eye level and beside everyone's name tag - the first place you look when introducing yourself to someone at an event.

Finally, when architecting a marketing campaign, rule one is we cannot rely on one great tactic, no matter how useful, to accomplish our goals. We must economically incorporate as many 'in-line' touch points as possible to guide our audience toward the finish line. Therefore, don't abandon tried and true 'good' tactics. Integrate the new with the old and proliferate for increased breadth, loyalty, and acquisition.

Here are a few links to widget provider sites to get you thinking...
Widget Box
Widgets Lab
Web Wag

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!