November, 2009

Leadership — No Comments
9
Nov 09

7-Eleven Sells Wine?

Why walk into a 7-Eleven:

1) Morning coffee
2) Slurpee for hot days
3) Cheap beer for a party
4) Kitchen basics (bread, milk)
5) Wine for a romantic evening?

The convenience store known for their Slurpee is now going to be selling it’s own wine, Yosemite Road label. Fifteen thousand outlets will be offering the private label, “value” wine at $3.99 a bottle. What sparked this new wine venture? Was it misguided focus groups or a complete misread of the market?

First, look at how wine is purchased. If the wine is intended for a last minute pickup for diner, why not go to the liquor store where there is more of a selection? As there are not often many “beer stores,” picking up a six pack at 7 Eleven seems reasonable. There is a designated place for wine (a liquor store) and a designated place for beer (a convenience or grocery store).

Simply put: wine is not a convenience item. Therefore, for 7 Eleven will have to change the cultural image of wine as a whole in order to be successful. Quite a task for a convenience store, but more luck to them.

Branding — No Comments
8
Nov 09

NPR: The Value of Humanity

Making an emotional connection could be as simple as cutting cake — at least for NPR. As a daily listener of NPR, All Things Considered’s Melissa Gray and Morning Edition’s Steve Inskeep and Renee Montagne have become staples of my everyday. The on-air hosts often stay close to the script, but on a rare occasion they slip in a bit of personality. That’s why I was pleased to hear about the “sweet potato pound cake, still warm.” Melissa Gray sent an e-mail to the NPR staff about the sweet potato pound cake in the lobby. This small, minute detail spoke volumes of their personalities. It humanized them in many ways.

That little cake bit made a connection with me. It put a personality behind the reporters I listen to every day. I could relate to them on a personal level and it is this audience / publisher relationship that creates long-term relationships.

My suggestion would be to incorporate more personality into the funding drive. It could be as simple as putting a mic in the middle of a dinner table with NPR’s favorite hosts. And let them talk away. Something as simple as a candid conversation could add emotional value to the non-profit organization.

It’s as simple as: would you rather help out your friend out of a bind or a random person? Most likely, you’d choose your friend. You have an emotional investment that you do not with a complete stranger. If NPR could create this emotional value for their stations, they would most likely receive more funding — as their listeners have more of an emotional investment in them.

Business Development — No Comments
7
Nov 09

The New York Minute

Do you know where the New York Minute originated from? The New York Minute came from the subway time schedule. All trains leave one minute later than scheduled, on purpose. That extra minute is for the laggards that cannot make the train on time.

Allow yourself a New York Minute. You might find you get more accomplished. By adding a “minute,” you allow for flexibility. Maybe you have a New York Minute by scheduling your blog posts ahead of schedule so you aren’t overwhelmed by other work and cannot post. Or, maybe it’s working on your business plan while you have a couple of minutes to spare. Because if you do not allow yourself that extra time, it might never get finished, or at least finished on time.

“Buying” a minute can be tremendously valuable to effectively manage your time. Whether it’s catching the train (though you’re late) or crafting an A+ business plan (as you allow more review time), a New York Minute can make all the difference.

Branding — No Comments
6
Nov 09

Don’t Just Say It, Dissolve It

Creativity in advertising often involves a witty tag or thought-provoking image. That’s great, but take it a step further. Go off the page and start to think multi-dimensional. What better company to do that than the Creative Review. The Creative Review recently released its new magazine in a special bag. Typically, the plastic sleeve that protects the magazine gets thrown out along with the annoying inserts. However, the Creative Review took this innocuous element and made it buzzworthy.

The Creative Review made the plastic magazine sleeve out of biodegradable material so it would dissolve in water. Though this new sleeve is not going to radically curb global warming, its carries symbolic value that speaks to the Creative Review’s commitment to the environmental.

The key take-away here is how can you make your company not just say your core mission, but actually do it. Is it developing an internal bike service to cut-down on emissions or is it as simple as creating a bio-degradable magazine sleeve. To create impact, it’s not just enough to say you’re remarkable, you have to act and be remarkable.

Marketing — No Comments
5
Nov 09

Best of Us Challenge

The Best of Us Challenge is a competition to create some buzz for the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. It’s not your standard competition, however. It’s all about the b-sports like hula hooping. And to top it off, you’re being challenged by Olympians. Michael Phelps will challenge you to speed putting, professional snowboarder Lindsay Jacobells will challenge you to a hula hooping contest and the list goes on.

And not only can you post your performance, you can create different challenges. Those contestants that come out on top get a chance to go to the Winter Olympics. This contest works on many levels to engage users that other promotional campaigns could take note from:

Have Fun: Start with a fun concept. If you’re constantly thinking about how to make your product or service buzzworthy, you’re going to talk about the product or service, not the fun.

Be Relevant: It wouldn’t make sense for the Winter Olympics to have mural painting contest. Though it might spark some fantastic user-generated art, it wouldn’t be all that relevant to the Winter Olympics. Keep focused. The creatives behind the campaign had the insight to identify the fun elements of sports: b-level or non-sports. Putting might be a part of gulf, but it’s by no means an actual sport.

Have a Face: Whether it’s Olympic athletes or a local hero, put a face to your campaign. It’s easier to identify with a human than an abstract concept.

Allow for Participation: In today’s digital age, there are many sharing platforms to engage your audience. Best of Us Challenge utilizes YouTube, but you could use Facebook Connect or Twitter (think Twestivals). Additionally, you can feature the user generated content on your site while promoting it on the uploading platform as well.

Business Development — No Comments
4
Nov 09

The Fun Theory and Sustainable Impact

It’s proven: we like to do fun things. We also like to take shortcuts with dull or tedious tasks (generally speaking). Not everyone takes the shortcuts in life, but if you have a choice between four flights of stairs and an elevator, most people are going to choose the elevator.

However, what if you made taking the stairs fun. Volkswagon put this “fun theory” to the test when they made a piano out of a staircase:

They also made throwing out trash and recycling fun. By simply adding a sound effect or making a game out of recycling, they’ve generated more interest and consequently, more impact.

For non-profits, the fun theory can be the difference in minimal impact or long-term sustainability. By injecting fun into your initiatives, you can create a lasting impact on your audience and those you support. Instead of starting with the money, start with the fun.

For instance, take jet skiing. Why not create a course whereby jet skiiers donate X amount of dollars for each hoop they go through. It drums up support in a fun, impactful way. It’s not enough to ask for money, put a little fun into the mix and people are more willing to help out.

Marketing — No Comments
3
Nov 09

Ninjas and Rewarding Creativity

The other day, I passed a man with a sign that read, “Wife and Family Kidnapped by Ninjas. Need Money for Kung Fu Lessons.” Call me Scrooge, but I normally don’t give money to homeless people. Partly because I hardly ever carry change (and I have trust issues with my credit card) and if I do have change, how could I only give it to one person and not the other 3 people that ask?

But for this guy, I could certainly spare a couple of quarters. If he was just asking for change, I’d keep my money. But I had to reward him for his creativity. The same principle applies to advertising. The typical message is, “could you give us your money because we have a better product?” Thank you for asking, but I’ll keep my change. You’re no better than the guy just simply asking for money because… what, he’s worth it?

Inject some creativity into your message. It could be as simple as, “No dogs. No cats. But who are we to say no if you bring in a walrus?” (This line was used by a coffee shop I believe. Not sure who to credit, as I first heard in about four years ago.) With more voices vying for attention on the web, it’s not enough to just say your better, show how you are better with a bit of creativity and guts.

Business Development — No Comments
2
Nov 09

Mozilla Raindrop and Web Intelligence Tools

Mozilla recently announced its new project, Raindrop. From the company that brought you Thunderbird, an open-source e-mail client, Raindrop aims to make the inbox fun again. By eliminating the democratic inbox (my work e-mail has the same value as a JetBlue coupon), Raindrop aims to bring some intelligence to e-mail. It will create a value hierarchy whereby e-mail that is more important to you will have a more prominent spot in the inbox.

Though Raindrop will not provide all of the answers to e-mail, it taps into the emerging trend in web 2.0 (or maybe web 3.0) of intelligent computing. With seemingly endless amounts of data, it can be overwhelming to face it all. As a result, we are going to increasingly rely on technology that understands our unique preferences and does the sifting for us.

Google Reader’s Magic feature is a great example of this. Essentially, Google Reader Magic scours the web for posts that are most relevant to you. As you build your user history, it can better find information that you’d be interested in. Therefore, you don’t need 250 subscriptions and waste time finding interesting nuggets. Simply build a small browsing history and let the algorithm do the work for you.

As more data and information permeates our lives, web intelligence tools will become more necessary than ever before. Those companies that can develop intelligence tools to make sense of this overwhelming amount of data will ride this rising trend.

Marketing — No Comments
1
Nov 09

Alarm Clock and Understanding Your Audience

For my last birthday, I received an alarm clock with an iPod / iPhone dock so I could listen to music in the apartment (a CD player is as useful as an 8-track at this point). It had several great features including a play list alarm so I could wake up to my favorite song. It was what I wanted and so consequently, I stowed the other alarm.

In the move from Rochester to Philadelphia, I started using the other alarm clock — as the iPod clock was in storage. When I finally unpacked in Philadelphia, I couldn’t figure out why I didn’t want to use the iPod alarm clock. Then I realized the iPod alarm clock didn’t have the interface I needed in an alarm clock.

The old alarm clock had the information I needed. When the alarm was set, I could see the time. Ok, so it’s not 7:00pm. I couldn’t tell when the alarm was set with the iPod alarm clock. Therefore, had I taken a nap the previous day, the alarm clock wouldn’t tell me. There were two symbols (alarm 1, alarm 2) — nothing else.

Nothing is wrong with the iPod alarm clock. It suites the needs of its audience — primarily an mp3 player and an alarm secondly. I was a bad consumer. Really, I wanted an iPod doc, not an alarm clock. Therefore, I could have saved a few pennies and purchased the iPod doc separately.

So why am I blabbering on about my alarm clock? For marketers, though you might have mound of great data on your demo and pyschographics, you can never really know who they are. There are always going to be several customers that will tell you what they want, but in actuality, they have absolutely no idea.

Everyone has an opinion about paper towels, though we never actually think about paper towels until we 1) buy them or 2) they fall apart. Sure, I could tell you I enjoy the soft, quilted kind — that paper towel makes me feel nice inside, right? But really, I’ve never thought about paper towels before, therefore I really don’t have an opinion.

Understand that there are a couple of duds in your data and account for them. Not everyone has an opinion about your product, nor do they invest much emotion in them. I would be a liar if I told you I enjoy one paper towel brand over another. To me, it’s all the same.

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