According to the nifty pie-chart to the right and the related study, because  print newspapers reach people who are actively looking for, or “checking,” ads, they are still a solid advertising medium.  How these people can conclude one thing from the other is utterly beyond me.

While newspapers may be a medium that still draws people  who are actively searching out ads, that hardly means newspapers are a solid advertising medium for most advertisers.

As Social Media Today rightly points out, the idea of “actively looking” basically implies the following scenario:

“To me it says, ‘I want a new job (or car etc), let’s check the ads.’ And sure, newspapers and online will come first when that’s the motivation.

I would simply add 3 things to that analysis:

1) Newspapers and Yellow Pages are inevitably being displaced by the internet. Local, lower-level job listings may remain a stronghold of local newspapers, but other than that, most prospects feel they’re better off starting with a Google search or a quick check of Craig’s List.

2) You might NOT want to attract the more eager scourers of the local paper.  Especially when advertising a job position.  Seriously, would you rather find an applicant who, while still holding down his present job, thought your position perfectly described his strengths, qualifications, personality, and so on, or would you rather get the guy who’s between jobs, is desperately seeking paid work, and who saw your position in the paper?  Might I suggest that radio, blogging, or social networking sites might be a better option for attracting the first type of applicant over the second?

3) Old school, intrusive media muscle still puts the smack-down on newspapers - especially when the radio or TV campaign is followed up by a strong web presence.   Ad-dollar-for-ad-dollar tests show radio providing a 14:1 increase in driving response over newspapers.

Why Radio + Internet kicks butt for regional and local businesses

If you hear a compelling radio message on something for which you’re not yet in the market, but you continue to hear that same offer/UVP/message from the same brand or company, what do you think will happen when you DO come in the market for that product or service?

Do you think you’ll:

• a) search Google using general category terms?

Or

• b) Type in the offer, campaign name, or brand name from those compelling and memorable radio ads?

I’d guess b, and my experience promoting website via radio strongly suggests the same.  If you do a solid job advertise your offer and your company on radio, you will influence what they search on when they’re finally in the market.

So what happens to your competition when people search on your brand name instead of a category term?

With that scenario, your competitors are pretty much screwed right from the starting block! And that’s a traffic driving system most of us can get behind ; )

P.S.  If you’re interested in learning more about this technique, the great Chris Maddock and I will be teaching Writing for Radio and the Internet in Austin on the 25th and 26th.

Click here to view the embedded video.

So, do you think that might have some rather profound effects on Domino’s marketing efforts?  Think you’ll be eating at Domino’s anytime soon?

What’s interesting is that the basic principle behind this was predicted not by some far-seeing futurist working in the technology field, but by Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Charles C. Krulak.

Gen. Krulak coined the term “strategic corporal” to refer to the possible strategic foreign policy impact of actions taken by individual Marines in an age of universal media coverage and counter-insurgency warfare:

“In many cases, the individual Marine will be the most conspicuous symbol of American foreign policy and will potentially influence not only the immediate tactical situation, but the operational and strategic levels as well. His actions, therefore, will directly impact the outcome of the larger operation; and he will become, as the title of this article suggests – the Strategic Corporal.”

Since the publication of Gen Krulak’s article in 1999, the rise of cell phone video cameras, YouTube, and twitter have further amplified the potential impact of local, tactical actions of seemingly “lower-level” or front-line individuals.

Granted, minimum wage workers operate in a far less dramatic and less-threatening arena than Marines, but the above video offers a stark example of the far reaching strategic impact of their actions.

The Marine Corps response to this has always been to recruit the very best individuals possible and to push decision-making and responsibility as far down the chain of command as possible. Many successful businesses take a similar approach with their front-line workers.  And the results pay-off when the great actions of individual employees hit the social media echo chamber.

What is (or what will be) your organization’s response?

While I can’t help but shake my head at the elevated nose and depressed intelligence of a dying attitude that associates “performance-based advertising” with creative shabbiness, that’s not what really bothered me about this piece.

What bothered me was two-fold:

1)    The Interactive Advertising Bureau’s confusion about the very medium it claims to represent.

2)   The implied motivation behind the IAB’s attempt to bring branding to the web.

Let’s deal with the first point and how it relates to branding via Internet Advertising.  Basically it boils down to this:

“You can close your eyes but you can’t close your ears.”

If I’m watching TV or listening to the radio and I’m interrupted by your ad, I can’t help but overhear your message, even if I look away and suddenly switch my attention to getting that last bit of salsa onto my Frito or avoiding the bumper of the car in front of me.

Since I’m at least half paying attention, great creative can cause me to redirect my attention back to your ad, thereby allowing the ad’s message to sink in.  Given enough repetition, the ad gets absorbed to the point where it can sway my decision when I’m actually in the market for the advertised product or service.

It’s a seemingly inefficient process that’s made shockingly effective through intelligent use of mass media.  The required repetition and non-targeted nature of your audience is more than overcome by the sheer number of people you reach and the amount of times you reach them.  As listeners and viewers convert over time, your mass media campaign can potentially create dramatically more traffic and sales on a per-dollar basis than targeted direct response methods.

So for intrusive or interruption-based media, great creative plus reach & frequency all go hand in hand for an effective ad campaign.  And I’ve said before that offline branding efforts can pair especially well with a solid online web presence.

So the takeaways are:

1. Branding almost always requires repeat exposure – this is why frequency matters.
2. Branding only becomes efficient when you can reach a lot of people cheaply – this is why reach matters.
3. The end goal of branding is to implant enough good associations about your product/brand/offer in the mind of the prospect to get them to buy from you once. You get one shot because actual experience either reinforces or destroys branded associations after the first purchase.  Lot’s of recent brands have been built on extraordinary customer experience and very little to no advertising, but almost no brands have made it with mediocre experience and lots of branding campaigns.

Unfortunately, the Internet is NOT an intrusive or interruption-friendly media.  It’s an interactive or “engaged medium” precisely because you need audience permission and participation to make it work.  Attempts to shortcut the “permission and participation” part usually meet with dismal results: we’ve become extraordinarily good at concentrating on the active window while ignoring banner and right-hand column ads. That means great creative stands very little chance of grabbing attention from an Internet user’s task at hand.

Other than adolescent boys staring at Lamborghinis and viewers of the rarely successful viral video, people who aren’t in the market for what you are offering have no interest in voluntarily exposing themselves to your ads.  And, for a participatory medium like the internet, that leaves only people actively interested in your market/offer.  People who, I don’t know, might indicate that interest by, say, typing keywords into a search engine or something…

Nor is the Internet a medium where there’s usually any significant space or time between being engaged by an ad to buying the advertised product.  If I click on a search-generated ad, I’m pretty much already at some stage of the buying process.  You don’t have to repeat the ad to make it sink in or design the ad so that its message is memorable; you just have to make it salient to my task-at-hand and I’ll click.  This is why ad relevance or “scent” has generally displaced the importance of “great creative” for PPC ads.

Yes, it helps to make more concerted efforts at grabbing people earlier in the buying process, but they still have to BE in the buying process to begin with.

So despite his protest at the misapplication of reach and frequency models to Internet advertising, I suspect that IAB President Rothenberg wants to similarly misapply an interruption-based model of branding to a permission-and-participation-based medium.

Brand builders plan around reach and frequency because reach and frequency are intrinsic to the mechanics of branding. You might be able to do branding on the web through viral videos or other entertainment-based efforts, but you’ll still have to ensure you reach a large number of people with enough repetitions to make your message sink in.

Will a fully engaged audience require less repetition than a more passive one?  Sure, but less might mean 5-15 times vs. 156 or more repetitions.  Other than planes hitting the World Trade Center or your wife saying “I Do,” very few messages are burned into your memory the first time your experience them.  And I don’t care how “great” your creative is, your actual business message (vs. the novelty you wrap around it) will never reach that level of impact.  This is why viral campaigns work better than single videos.

And this brings me to my last point and what bothers me most about the IAB’s push for “great creative” over “performance based” advertising:

They never once said that performance based advertising wasn’t making the wisest and best use of their clients’ ad budgets. They never seemed to indicate that their clients would be selling more and gaining more market share if they were actively branding on the web.

What they said was: “it was time for online publishers to reclaim some of the premium advertising turf vs. general market media, especially network television.”  Followed up by a statement that the Internet’s emphasis on performance-based or direct response advertising, “does little to elevate the perception of online’s premium communications value.”

Hmmm.  Does this sound like Randal and the IAB are most concerned for what’s best for clients or in what’s best for Internet Advertising Agencies?

Most people don’t want to draw that sharp line of distinction, and it’s why their marketing efforts blend into the clutter.

Discernible edges and silhouettes allow us to visually “grip” an object and separate figure from ground.  Eliminate those edges and you’ll effectively camouflage yourself.

In the picture above, notice how the legs present a solid silhouette and are easily identified, while the man’s upper body camouflage breaks up his silhouette and blurs his edges into the background of trees and snow.  As a result, it’s much harder to make out his his torso and arms.

Like our eyes, our minds also depend on edges and silhouettes.  We define by giving parameters, mentally grasping a concept by its boundaries.  Without the “edges” of contrasting reference points, a concept or term remains ambiguous at best.

That’s why grabbing after an “infinite” market and seeking to be all things to all people ends up camouflaging one’s brand and messaging; without contrast it all just blurs into the background.

Want to stand out?  Sharply define the edges between you and your competitors.

The better you do this, the more strongly you’ll turn-off some customers.  But wouldn’t you rather powerfully persuade some of your market than be overlooked by all of it?

Just follow the example of this doctor:

I found this ad in my local newspaper and was immediately struck by the bold headline:

“You don’t want me to be your family doctor.”

Pretty ballsy headline for a doctor, huh?  Wouldn’t you feel compelled to read more about this doctor with the courage to so brazenly declare what he wasn’t?

Having gained the reader’s attention, the body copy further explains: “Neurosurgery is one of the few medical specialties for which I am well-suited.  I am not warm and fuzzy.  I could never be successful as a pediatrician or in a family practice – no one would come back a second time.  But I am very good at what I do.”

Dr. Goodman then substantiates his claimed expertise with a list of very impressive professional qualifications and accomplishments, rounded off with some examples of his extreme commitment to surgical excellence and his patients’ well-being.

While his professional qualifications are truly outstanding, most readers would never have read them without Dr. Goodman’s use of reverse camouflage in his headline.  Saying what he wasn’t allowed him to stand out amidst the clutter.

So here’s 3 sure-fire ways to reverse-camouflage your messaging.

1.    Get yourself an enemy and/or reject a reasonable alternative position
Nothing fires the blood quite so much as declaring what (or who) you stand against.  But you get no points for tearing down straw men; rejecting a reasonable alternative position puts teeth into your message.

2.    Present a tightly focused perspective
Once you’ve narrowed the group of customers that you’re most interested in attracting, focus your messaging to speak most directly to their felt needs, desires, and frustrations.  People who don’t share those experiences will feel excluded, but your core audience will feel an instant connection.  Both will instantly recognize you.  Tim Miles offers a brilliant example of this on his “About Us” page.

3.    Explain what costs you’re willing to bare and admit the downside to your offer/product.
This one is more about credibility than definition, but amidst a background of ad-speak, solid credibility acts as its own form of reverse camouflage.  Plus, you don’t just want to be seen, right?  You want to be believed as well.

Finally, if all else fails, you can always use your new-found knowledge of camouflage to escape weekend chores (just ditch the boots in favor of camo socks)

• Established his own (very successful) ad agency
• Launched the Dodge and Chrysler brands
• Hired and mentored Leo Burnett, creator of the Marlboro Man, Tony the Tiger, Pillsbury Doughboy, and many other advertising icons that made his clients rich
• Turned positioning into a fine art form half a century before Ries and Trout even coined the term.
• Helped establish Cadillac’s pre-eminence among early automotive marks
• Wrote “The greatest ad of all time,” as voted in 1949 – an ad still listed in the top 50 of Ad Ages Top 100 Advertising Campaigns.

Interesting, but why should you care?  Because MacManus’s – and by extension Burnett’s – approach was the yin to Hopkins’ yang, and because MacManus’s approach still works today.

And what was that approach?

In a word, it was to position the client while dethroning competitors in the minds’ of the audience. He wanted to create, in the mind of the public, a deep-seated prejudice towards his client’s brand.

If, in the words of the legendary Gary Halbert, the biggest key to success is to sell to a starving crowd, then MacManus aimed to persuade the consumer that only his client’s product would fully cure their hunger, and then wait for the more-cheaply-persuaded and much larger mass audience to get hungry as their individual circumstances dictated.  This would be in contrast to targeting only hungry people and then selling to them via direct mail.

And so the two poles of advertising continue on to this day, as is clearly seen in the following comments by an extraordinarily successful brand builder, Chris Maddock.  Chris was responding to my request for his opinion on Google’s recent attempt to track the effect of offline advertising upon online sales/conversions.   Here’s what he had to say:

Jeff,

I think Google’s traditional ad analytics are interesting, sexy, and certainly useful on some level.  But I think the program could also be dangerous, in that it could give some folks faulty impressions of what is actually happening – or what is right – because it assumes advertisers know things they probably don’t.

Let’s say a local hardware store runs some print ads, and compares the online response to another time they’ve run radio ads.  If the print ads were for a short term offer, and the radio ad of a more institutional bent, the print ad could drive more traffic to the website and have the hardware store owner thinking that print’s the ticket.  The reality in such a situation is that the print advertising is impressing and motivating a tiny, albeit palpable, percentage of the market to respond and go the the website, while the time-sensitive nature of the offer makes the advertising all but invisible to the bulk of the market.  On the other hand the radio advertising is likely creating greater long-term top of mind awareness, yet probably not motivating as many to go the website.  Mr. Hardware likely thinks that the radio campaign was less effective, when in fact most category dominant businesses are those that eschew short-term sales, offers, promotions and the advertising tools that make them work, while leaning on intrusive media such as radio and television to push long-term awareness.  Over time, radio could likely drive many more visitors to the website – visitors who will likely buy.

So my worry is admittedly Hamiltonian.  Years of interaction with average business owners and traditional ad people has revealed a startling blindness to things like buying cycles, differences in long and short-term strategy, and proper media selection.

So these new Google analytics are cool.  I just hope the good people using them understand what they’re trying to make happen, and what the numbers returned really mean.

-    Chris

Do you see how Chris picks up the standard of Theodore McManus, Leo Burnett, and Roy Williams?  Although I think it is possible to intelligently and rigorously compare media, I can’t help but agree with Chris’s larger point.  Creating a prejudice in the mind of the customer before they’re hungry is often a more effective strategy than trying to only target hungry customers.*   But it requires a longer time horizon.  So if you are only measuring on the short term, you’ll likely come to the opposite conclusion and then deem your position to be “scientific.”  It’s a perfect example of one of the deadly sins of Web Analytics.

So what’s your time horizon?  And have you implemented a measuring/analytics system that will enable you to measure accordingly?

* To be fair, there are certainly also times when it pays to directly target hungry customers, rather than engage in a lengthier branding campaign.  I’m not necessarily advocating one over the other; I’m arguing that you shouldn’t base your decision on skewed metrics.

Most people failed by mentioning brands that were built well before the 10-year limit.  But one reader suggested Airborne, and I had to agree that it met the criteria, even if it was the exception that proved the rule.

How so?

Well, first off, Airborne basically invented its own product category.  Emergen-C existed before then but wasn’t widely available outside health food stores, and wasn’t fully marketed as a cold or flu-preventative.  And this new product category made substandard product performance extraordinarily hard to detect for the average consumer.  You took Aiborne and still got sick? Well, you probably didn’t have it nearly as bad as you would have if you hadn’t taken it, right? Or you didn’t take it soon enough, and so on.

Second, Airborne owed more of its rapid growth to a fabulously sticky mythology combined with extraordinary PR than to outright advertising.

The myth is that Airborne was the unique discovery and formulation of a 2^nd Grade School Teacher, Victoria Knight-McDowell, and that the demand for the product by friends and local merchants was so great that the product just naturally grew from a home-brewed recipe into a national brand.

If one were to evaluate this story in terms of Chip and Dan Heath’s SUCCESS principles, the story is:

Simple – It’s a classic create-a-better-mousetrap-and-achieve-fame-and-fortune story.

Unexpected – A grade school teacher turned entrepreneurial genius and final vanquisher of the common cold? Check that one off.

Concrete – Lots of great details here, ranging from 2^nd grader’s notoriously snotty noses to the mental image of the teacher-slash-herbalist cooking up a “super weapon” to combat the common cold.

Credibility – It’s practically a self-made Sinatra test: whose immune systems are more challenged than grade school teachers?  If Airborne works for them, it’ll likely work for anyone, right?  Plus, until ABC News blew their cover, Airborne also had that oh-so-conclusive “scientific” test to back them up.

Emotional – A teacher achieving financial wealth and fame through inventive problem solving definitely has emotional appeal. It’s a modern day Horatio Alger story!

Story – Not only is this a story, it’s one of the most powerful kinds of stories: a creation myth.

Is it any wonder that Victoria’s husband, a successful screenwriter, managed to recognize a great story when he saw one and decided to invest heavily in the company and it’s marketing.

Although Airborne did invest in advertising, it owes far more of it’s growth to Oprah and other great PR than to any traditional ad campaign.

The story behind Airborne made the product an easy pitch to media, and the PR lent the product more credibility than straight advertising ever would have, making the tablets an even hotter commodity.

Yes, Airborne built it’s brand success on the back of marketing, in spite of its rather dubious performance. But, it had no real competitors, and the subjective experience it delivered – as a result of its creation myth and fabulous PR – was more than good enough to allow for continued growth.

In short, if the rule is that a product has to be remarkable for marketing efforts to gain traction, then Airborne is a mediocre product that proves the rule, because what was ultimately marketed was not the unremarkable effervescent tablets, but the remarkably sticky creation story behind them.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here’s the question: what do you want to bet that Apple has been just waiting – even itching – for Microsoft to release that kind of response to their “I’m a Mac” campaign?

Why do I ask that?  Because I’d bet anything that Mac’s marketing was smart enough to engage in what Mike Smock has termed The Three Move Set.  You see, when you try to take market share from a competitor, it’s usually a fair bet that they’ll react with some kind of countermeasure.  And that means smart marketers think at least far enough in advance to consider their response to the competition’s countermeasures.  Ideally, one wants to make sure this response is decisive, or at least hurts the competition as much as the initial challenge.  Here’s how Mike breaks it down:

Move 1: Challenger attacks Leader

Move 2: Leader reacts to Challenger.

Move 3: Challenger reacts to Leader.

And here’s how to view the current Mac/PC ad campaigns in light of that:

• Move 1: Mac challenges PC by personifying Macs as hip, cool, and reliably workable and PCs as nerdy, problematic (especially with the release of Vista), and behind the curve in user experience.

• Move 2: Microsoft responds by creating an ad that actively evokes Apple’s framing of the issue and that essentially says, hey, PCs are cool, too.

• Move 3: Mac slams Microsoft for covering up real problems with Vista by creating fancy advertising campaigns.

Do you see?  Most strategists could have – and should have – seen this one coming.  Apple goads you into advertising to respond to their ads and then they slam you for being more concerned with creating ad campaigns than fixing your software, as in the case with the ad I posted yesterday or Apple’s PC Bake Sale ad:

Click here to view the embedded video.

So what should have (or could have) Microsoft done?

Well, leaving aside the obvious bit about getting Vista right before releasing it to the public, they probably should have:

1. Responded to Mac in a matter of weeks, or at least months, rather than years.  This one is sort of a no-brainer.
2. Come up with a response that re-framed the issue rather than responding to Mac’s frame.  Saying, “I’m not a dweeb” is a bit like saying “I’m not a crook” – it just forces people to think of you within the frame of dweeb/not dweeb (or Crook/Not Crook).  This is actually a well known phenomenon that is actively used by modern politicians.  Just as asking people not to think of white bears is actually counterproductive, so too is Microsoft’s denial of Mac’s characterization of PCs.
3. Possibly take a page out of Trout and Ries’ playbook and attack the weakness inherent in Mac’s strength.  In this case, it’s Apple’s closed system and (lower but still there) price premium.  William Thomas alluded to the limitations of a closed system in a comment to my previous post when he compared Linux to catching and gutting your own fish and Apple to ordering fish at the restaurant.  And I’m guessing here, but it’s also what Microsoft might be getting at with the “Life without walls” slogan.  Of course, Microsoft will have to be as creative and sharp witted in pressing this point as Mac has been with their campaigns, and, well, their ad above hardly qualifies.  The slogan is nothing but an afterthought.

So what do you think Microsoft should do?

Here’s an example from the world of politics:

When California’s conservatives wanted to define the word “marriage” by law, Proposition 22 was added to the California ballot.  It was officially titled the “Defense of Marriage Act.”  As the date for voting drew near, it became apparent that the proposition was going to lose by a wide margin.  Finally, a wizard said, “The meaning of a word is always bigger than its definition; words carry associations.  The word ‘defense’ is a violent word, conjuring associative memories of ‘national defense’ and ‘defense budget.’ It makes us think of Vietnam and bloodshed.  And what is the ‘marriage act’?  Sex.  Juxtapose the word ‘Defense’ with the ‘Marriage Act’ and you get a very uncomfortable feeling.  The subconscious image is that of a battered wife, defending herself in a marriage, or of a woman defending herself from sexual assault.  No one wants to vote for a thing called the Defense of Marriage Act.”

With just a few weeks to go, the new ads began talking about “Proposition 22, the Protection of Marriage Act.”

It won by a landslide.  “Protect” and “Defend” may mean the same thing in a dictionary, but they’re radically different in the human mind.*

And of course, there’s Newt Gingrich’s infamous memo, “Language: A Key Mechanism of Control,” detailing entire lists of words designed to frame and color issues to favor GOP policies and platforms.

Indeed, when it comes to using strategic word choices to frame and re-frame the way an audience perceives an issue, the academic authority on the matter is George Lakoff, author of such noted books as Metaphors We Live By, Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things, and Don’t Think of an Elephant: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate.  And, as one can guess from the title of that last book, George is not shy about applying his Linguistics theories to political debate.  In fact, he recently authored an entire post advising the Obama Campaign on how to most advantageously frame the issues.

Even more topically, there’s plenty of debate and analysis about whether “bailout” is an appropriate term for the proposed legislation to address our current financial crisis.

So clearly at least some politicians get this at a very deep level.  But what about marketers?  Here’s an example I’ll steal from Holly Buchanan: why do spas continue to talk about their treatments in terms of pampering and indulging?  Are these words really activating the right mental frames to best position a spa’s services?  Wouldn’t most women prefer to think about renewing or rejuvenating or healing rather than the more self-centered or selfish frames of indulging and pampering?

How this fits in with Web copy

When asked if and why political consultants are better marketers than most mainstream marketers, one of the very best campaign strategists in the business, Brett Feinstein, wrote back with the following:

“It’s not so much that we are better marketers…we aren’t. Most of the industry is filled with utterly incompetent marketers. This is a backwater for advertising. We make less than our equals in the commercial ad world and work a lot harder. It’s that we focus on different things…

We often see things in real time. Because of how most serious campaigns deliver message (few non-political advertisers buy 1,200+ GRP a week in a given market) we generally do not have to wait a few weeks to see the effect of what we are doing. In the biggest of campaigns, we are running tracking polls nightly. At the Congressional level, we are doing it weekly. We literally see if the ad moves the needle almost instantaneously and can tweak (or change) message much more nimbly than in the commercial advertising world. We also just move faster too. If Coke’s sales were plummeting, it would take them weeks if not months to change an ad campaign’s strategy and content. Just shooting and producing one new TV spot would take weeks and huge expense. I can shoot and produce a top-notch political spot in a day and have it on the air with a new message or look or whatever. And once I put it on the air, I can see if it is working within a day or two…” [Emphasis mine]

In a word, Brett’s answer as to why the best political strategists often create better messaging strategies than their marketing counterparts is not skill or deep theory but:

1. Measurement – they invest time and money to see the effects of their efforts so they can know what is and isn’t working.
2. Testing – they tweak and fine-tune copy and messaging during a campaign
3. Agility – coming up with a great new strategy is worthless if you can’t implements it in time to win the election.

Would it surprise you to learn that Web Optimization requires the same three traits?

1. Without the proper analytics and measurement, you can’t really know how your visitors are reacting to your copy/content.
2. Without tools to conduct A/B and multivariate testing, you can’t effectively drive continued improvement.  An understanding of language nuance is important, but you’ll still want to take your copy changes to the “court of last resort” with testing.
3. And without the ability to rapidly implement important website changes, you’ll incur enormous opportunity costs and fall behind your more aggressive competitors.

So, in my opinion, internet marketers really could learn a lot from (the very best) political consultants – both of the importance of messaging AND the importance of ongoing optimization.

* Quote taken from pg.113 of Magical Worlds of The Wizard of Ads by Roy H. Williams

** Of course, most politicians could learn quite a bit from business on the importance of creating customer loyalty by actually delivering on marketing promises

Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t this sound like the opposite of the effects competition is supposed to create?

Like us, many of you are frequent fliers and are concerned about these trends. So when Jeff Eisenberg pointed out a site that highlights the fees associated with this growing phenomenon of sacrificing service to maintain pricing, I thought I’d share it with you.

For me, this illustrates a couple of things.

1.) We have surpassed the number of elements it takes to trigger over-choice behavior (aka “analysis paralysis”). Before, it was just price, departure/arrival times, and brand that influenced our flight-booking decision. Now, with so many other factors involved — multiple bags, bag surcharges, seating, drinking, and the (in my eyes) completely unforgivable “minimum stays” United just announced — has caused consumers to be put in the position of having to make a very complex decisions, which typically causes people not to choose*. The way I see it, the airline industry is headed right back to the time of the travel agent, paying someone to make sense of the mess.

Unless the travel sites can quickly adapt and easily incorporate these new elements to their functionality.

2.) The airline industry is devoid of real positive differentiation and unwilling to compete beyond price. As Jeffery pointed out in our conversation, airlines will become completely dependent on their ability to market being the “least awful.” One Philadelphia newspapers even launched a spoof of this concept last week with ads for a fake airline called Derrie-Air, which supposedly charges passengers by the pound. (Hat tip to the Influential Marketing Blog for spotting this.)

Normally I would say, “Market-capitalism to the rescue!” and insist that open competition will allow the fittest to prosper. But amid government subsidies and an apparent lack of interest by carriers to compete on something other than price, I’m skeptical this will right itself. So this is my open call to airline owners (yes, even Virgin Airlines) to reposition their fleets by differentiating themselves by meeting or exceeding customers’ wants, not just the bare minimum expectations we’ve grown accustom to by the current state of the airline industry at large.

My question to you, dear reader, is this: What ideas would you bring to bear on this problem? How would you change the company, product, or marketing to better meet the consumer’s needs, as well as the health of the industry?

.

*From Barry Schwartz’s “The Paradox of Choice” presentation at TED.

. .

About the Author: Brian Bond is VP of Marketing and Product at FutureNow, Inc.

Do you have unique, untapped talents to show the world but find your efforts frustrated, either because you’re an outsider or because your own internal resistance gets in the way?

Would it surprise you to realize that most people self-identify with that description?

At some level, all of us feel alienated — from others, from ourselves, or both. We worry about not living up to our talents, so we gravitate toward things that allow us to feel empowered.

(iPhone 3G, anyone?)

Audiences love superheroes because they dramatize these psychological conflicts in exaggerated, symbolic glory. Superheroes are not only uniquely talented but uniquely broken; their very talent is what alienates them from the same society they struggle to help with their superpowers.

The emotional resonance generated by this formula – even more than their over-the-top action sequences – is the real secret to superhero-sized success at the box office, with 7 of the top 20 biggest movie openings belong to superhero flicks. And with Ironman, we’re starting to see even the less popular comic book heroes transform into smash hits — a superhero plot in itself.

So my advice is simple: Borrow these same elements to magnetize your copy and draw popular readership. Speak to the inner superhero in them. Here’s how…

The Three Essential Traits of Superhero Web Copy:

1. Superheroes are outsiders – learn to see like an outsider, to appeal to the outsider, and to give other outsiders an insider’s insight into your area of expertise. You don’t think all those “for Dummies” books succeeded by freak accident, do you? Provide readers a free pass to cross daunting knowledge barriers and they’ll feel like they’ve just been given the ability to fly.
2. Superheroes want to overcome limitations, their “brokenness”, and use their “freakish” gifts productively. Learn to appeal to one or both of these needs in your audience, either by showing readers how to overcome their own personal “suck factors” or by helping them use their natural talents to thwart evil. (43 Folders does an incredible job at the former, and Creating Passionate Users remains a perfect example of the latter.)
3. Superheroes’ motives are bound to the greater good. Ensure that your copy is directed toward the good of your readers. Remember, they should be the hero within the drama unfolded by your copy. In a way, self-centered copywriters and selfish bloggers behave like super-villains who try to game the system. But in the end, “we-we” copy never really wins.

Do these three things and your copy will draw enough fans to make even Spider-Man jealous.

To Be Continued…

If you liked this post, join me over the next few weeks for a technique-driven, step-by-step look at how to turn your company’s hidden superpowers into web copy that performs wonders.

. .

About the Author: Jeff Sexton is a Persuasion Architect at FutureNow, Inc. Yes, that’s his real title and, yes, his superpowers can be harnessed to persuade speeding visitors to take action.

Seriously, the oceans are in horrible shape, and it’s your fault. You did it, Supply, Demand, Pollution and Overfishing. And if we don’t take ownership now, our brands, our children, and our collective appetite for seafood may never forgive us.

I’m not trying to bum you out, but the next time you feel the need to impress clients or co-workers with your sushi-ordering skills, you should at least know whether you’re eating sustainable fish. (Either way, you’ll have to kiss your Chilean Sea Bass goodbye.)

Perhaps you’re wondering, “What’s all this hippy, save-the-Earth stuff got to do with online and multi-channel marketing optimization?” Great question, and I’m glad you asked.

By now, you’re familiar with the environmental catch-all term “green marketing,” but what you may not realize is that “blue marketing” is a relatively untapped way to differentiate your brand while raising awareness for an urgent problem that affects everyone. Besides, it’s not easy being green, because, when everyone’s doing something “green,” it loses meaning fast. (Seth Godin has a great post on the coming backlash over green marketing.)

A quick anecdote to make my point: The other week, I saw two containers of soy milk — original flavor, same brand, same size — sitting next to each other in the fridge at my corner store. One of the containers had a green cap, the other didn’t. I picked up the container with the “green caps for green energy” promotion, turned it around, and saw that they were promising to donate 30 kilowatts of “green power” (solar power?) if I entered the number from under the cap into the database on their website. Pretty smart, right? Well, yeah, but when the first words I read are, “Can one little green cap change the world? Just maybe.” I have my doubts. Even if their campaign is a great idea, it’s lost amid the over-branding of “green.”

It’s sad, but as much as we care about the planet, Broca is tuning out.

Making Waves

World Ocean Day happened on June 8 and, if you’re like me, you didn’t think to commemorate it. Still, I have been paying attention. Did you know that if we don’t curb overfishing, pollution and global warming trends, there will be no more (edible) fish in the sea by 2048?

It’s true. Here’s how I found out:

The URL at the end caught my attention, so I went to Oceana.org/matingseason.

Oceana is the world’s leading ocean conservation group, and their website is full of blue ideas. You can become a WaveMaker, tell your grocer to buy sustainable fish, find out why you should say no to shark fin soup, and you can even download a pocket seafood guide so you always know if you’re ordering something sustainable and low-mercury.

Not concerned with saving the fish? How about saving the humans? As the climate of the ocean changes, so goes the rest of the world. Anyone who’s lived through the East Coast heat wave these past several days will find it easy to believe that 11 of the warmest years on record have happened in the past 13 years and ocean temperatures are rising.

How to Avoid Drift Net Marketing Tactics

Whether your eco-friendly marketing initiatives are focused on land or sea, here are a few ways to build trust, encourage word of mouth, and keep it financially sustainable (read: the other “green”):

1.) Be specific — What’s the exact dollar amount you’re trying to raise? What’s the exact percentage you’re donating, and to whom? Why are you donating to that cause and that specific non-profit?

2.) Campaigns are best — It’s so much easier to track and manage special promotions at the campaign level than it is to track it across the entire organization. By focusing on campaigns, you can see very closely how and why your customers and clients are responding to your environmental marketing efforts at each touch point across channels.

3.) Don’t guilt trip — Nothing is a bigger turn-off. People donate because they want to, not because you’ve nagged them to. Be careful not to come off as holier-than-thou about whatever cause you’re promoting. (I was at an event to raise money for drinking water in sub-Saharan Africa the other night, and the CEO of the company that was hosting the event was yelling into the microphone, acting as though attendees — who’d already donated $100 just to be there — were being cheap if they didn’t raise their hands to sponsor a $5,000 well, and literally shushing the crowd like they were in a grade school library. Whatever the online equivalent of that is, don’t do it.)

If Sharks Were Marketers…

Ideally, giving to a great cause should be the icing on the cake that encourages fence-sitters to convert to happy customers. Whatever you do, don’t go the drift net route and merely advertise your brand’s inner green- or blue-ness as though it’s self-evident. Each year, tens of millions of sharks are killed by drift nets while marketers like us roam free.

Hmm… If sharks had better marketing support, maybe we wouldn’t have an irrational fear of them.

“Are you new to the team?” asks the nuclear engineer of the stranger who saves a frazzled control room from reactor meltdown.

“Actually, I’m with the tour group, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.”

Holiday Inn Express has a brand promise: “Stay Smart.” Well, I had the opposite experience. Why? Blame it on their poorly named “Simply Smart” bathroom products.

It’s early in the morning — very early — and I’m looking for the hotel shampoo and conditioner. Not too difficult. Just look for the bottle marked “Shampoo” and the one marked “Conditioner”, right?

But I find no such thing. My choices include “Refresh”, “Scrub”, “Wash”, “Soften”, and “Tame”. I reckon that “Tame” is the conditioner, but as to which one was the shampoo, it’s a toss up, so I bring all the bottles into the shower with me. I then compound the situation by not brining my glasses, so now I can hardly read the labels.

Where was the helpful cut-out in the bathroom explaining what each “simple” bottle was? It wasn’t until later that I noticed tiny print on the back of the bottles explaining what each thing really was.

So, I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but did I feel like I could fix a multi-million dollar athlete’s sprained ankle or prevent a nuclear meltdown? Not exactly. I had shampoo on my legs, hair conditioner on my face, and mouthwash in my hair. I didn’t feel capable of pouring a cup of coffee. (Though I must say, their hot breakfast bar really is impressive.)

In hindsight, once I knew what each container was, it made a little more sense. (Though how you get Spot & Stain remover from “Rub”, I still don’t know) but surely I’m not their only guest who was confused.

Nothing against Holiday Inn Express. I stay there often and the staff is usually lovely. But this bath product labeling thing really threw me.

So, what’s the lesson here (other than mouthwash should never be used as shampoo and vice versa)?

Beware of cute and clever labels. I see this on websites as well. There’s no glory in being clever if you end up confusing your visitors.

I also see this in advertising messages. I read about an effort in Australia to pull over drunk drivers. The original message was “Don’t blow your license.” Testing showed this message had near 100% understanding. But the ad agency wanted to change it to “Don’t blow it.” Clever, yes, but only 5% of the people had a clear understanding of their message. Some people even thought they were promoting civil disobedience by saying “Don’t take the breathalyser test.”

Back to websites. I know sometimes you want to show your visitors how creative you are. But do you really look at your site from their point of view? I am often befuddled by advertising agency sites. Leo Burnette has an interesting category called “We’re Idea Centric.” The sub categories are “Start Clean,” “Stay Restless,” and “Amplify.” I honestly don’t know what any of those mean or what I would see if I clicked on them.

I’m sure you’ve run into this yourself. I’d love to hear your examples of websites that had labels or navigational elements that were “clever” but not easily understood.

Well, off to getting the furniture polish out of my hair (another story for a later date).

. .

About the Author: Holly Buchanan is a Persuasion Architect at FutureNow and co-author of The Soccer Mom Myth: Today’s Female Consumer: Who She Really Is, Why She Really Buys. If you’d like to meet Holly and judge her in person, join her on June 2nd for FutureNow’s Persuasive Online Copywriting seminar in Manhattan. Not only will you learn techniques for attracting customers online, you’ll get a chance to schmooze over hors d’oeurves and cocktails at our “Happy Hour with the Experts” reception, which we hope you’ll find to be appropriately named even though it will last for more than an hour.

Here’s what Dove has to say:

The “real women” ad referenced in recent media coverage was created and produced entirely by Ogilvy, the Dove brand’s advertising agency, from start to finish and the women’s bodies were not digitally altered.

Pascal Dangin worked with photographer Annie Leibovitz (Ogilvy has never employed Mr. Dangin on the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty), who did the photography for the launch of the Dove ProAge campaign, a new campaign within the Campaign for Real Beauty. There was an understanding between Dove and Ms. Leibovitz that the photos would not be retouched – the only actions taken were the removal of dust from the film and minor color correction.

I actually thought Ad Age’s Jonah Bloom had a better idea for how Dove could respond:

Here was Dove’s statement as I imagined it: “We’re sure our consumers are smart enough to know that photos that are going to be blown up to the size of a billboard may have to be retouched. For the sake of the women themselves, there are certain things — a pimple, a stray hair — that might be airbrushed. The idea here was to use models of various shapes and ages, not to unduly expose them. We think we’ve made a point. But, we’ve also tried to raise women’s awareness of the issue of retouching and ask whether, when taken to extremes, it can create an unrealistic notion of beauty. If this New Yorker piece reopens the debate, that’s a happy coincidence for us, and something we definitely want to hear consumers’ views on it.”

However you feel about Dove or the Campaign for Real Beauty — it has sparked a conversation — a very real, very passionate conversation. And Dove continues to back it up with efforts outside of advertising, like the recent opening of a play in Canada “Body and Soul,” featuring real women talking about their feelings about aging.

But here’s the thing…

I know I’m going out on a limb here (move over, squirrel), but I don’t think Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty has anything to do with beauty. I don’t think women suddenly feel beautiful because of these ads. I think this goes to something deeper. I think this campaign has generated so much interest and success because it touches on a universal need for almost all women: approval.

Are women saying, “Oh, Dove thinks I’m beautiful”? Could be. But I think it’s a lot closer to “Dove thinks I’m OK the way I am. They approve of me. ” In today’s world, that approval is a lifeline.

Why? Because…

Women today are SO judged.

Stay at home with your kids and you are judged because you’re not working.

Go to work and you’re judged for not staying at home with your kids.

Whether it’s an advertising industry that surrounds women with images that tell her she’s not good enough (check out this video by Dove appropriately named “Onslaught“), or a corporate workplace where you lose points if you behave too much like a man or you loose points if you behave too much like a woman.

Women get it from all sides; they’re judged by men and they’re REALLY judged by other women. (I am appalled at the way some women treat each other.)

So when a brand comes along and does NOT judge. When a brand says, “We don’t care what other people say, we think you’re beautiful. We’re going to celebrate you for being you.” Do you know how powerful that is?

Does your brand want to connect with women?

Then stand up for her. Approve of her. Lock arms with her and walk a few miles in her shoes.

You can go the aspirational route; “Buy our product, THEN you will be approved and worthy.” Lots of products have had success with that formula.

But if you want to stand out from the crowd, if you want to create fanatical loyalty, try the Dove route. Try approval. There is SUCH A THIRST for it right now.

If you have a few minutes to spare, check out “A Girl Like Me.”

. .

About the Author: Holly Buchanan is co-author of The Soccer Mom Myth: Today’s Female Consumer: Who She Really Is, Why She Really Buys. If you’d like to meet Holly and judge her in person, join her on June 2nd for FutureNow’s Persuasive Online Copywriting seminar in Manhattan. Not only will you learn techniques for attracting customers online, you’ll get a chance to schmooze over hors d’oeurves and cocktails at our “Happy Hour with the Experts” reception.

Social technologies have changed how we gather and share information. They’ve changed who we meet, where we meet, and, sometimes, how we meet. They’ve changed how we buy, what we buy, and where we buy. They’ve changed what, how, and how much we know about the people around us. And while social technologies may not have changed what it essentially means to be human, they’ve certainly amplified, at once, our voices, our influence, and our need to be heard.

Right now, a brand — possibly yours — is experiencing a public relations mini-disaster thanks to a comment left on a message board; a university student is recommending a movie to 372 people at once via Facebook; Barack Obama’s social media-driven campaign is beating the odds (and the Clintons).

Welcome to the groundswell.

Josh Bernoff, Vice President & Principal Analyst at Forrester Research joined us recently to discuss the soon-to-be-bestseller he’s co-authored with Forrester’s Charlene Li, Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies. The book is a brief history of social media — fully seasoned with research and anecdotes from the most notable triumphs and failures of the so-called “Web 2.0″ era — that explains how to thrive now that customers and clients own your brand.

Click here for the Groundswell podcast

Of course you’ll buy the book, but here’s a 15-minute interview you can download (by right-clicking) while you wait for your copy to be delivered.

POST (not haste)

As Josh explains the paradigm of Groundswell thinking, don’t forget POST:

• People – What are your customers ready for? What do they want? What’s motivating them?

• Objectives – What are your goals?

• Strategy – How do you want relationships with your customers to change?

• Technology – Swap “tactics” for “technology” and the same is true. The people, objectives, and strategy must come before your choice of technology/tactics.

Want to find your customers’ social technographics profile?

. .

Read more about the phenomenology of social tech at the Groundswell blog, or any of these other great blogs.

As first reported by Direct Magazine, the survey found that…

• 19% dislike learning an item was back-ordered or out of stock after said item was placed in a shopping cart
• 14% are frustrated by Web sites that malfunction as payment is being processed
• 8% are confounded by unclear return policies
• 6% don’t like unclear shipping information
• 6% dislike not getting an acknowledgment after an order has been placed

Adding another dimension to these numbers, Jack Loechner at MediaPost explains that:

. . . iCongo, Inc., released the results of a consumer survey conducted by Harris Interactive that reveals [that] 33 percent of online U.S. adults indicated they are more likely to shop online rather than in-person at a store due to the high price of gasoline.

If there were ever a time to optimize your e-commerce website, it’s now.

What else causes friction? Read FutureNow’s 2007 Retail Customer Experience Survey for answers.

. .

Join FutureNow’s Bryan Eisenberg on June 3rd in New York City for the Call to Action seminar. Based on his bestselling book of the same title, Bryan will show you how to improve conversion and brand affinity by reducing friction for the customer.

“Copywriting for a lifestyle blog is a mystery. How can a blogger create compelling copy that resonates in the short opportunities available, i.e. tagline, front page, about page, social media profiles so that readers subscribe?

“Long copy strategies just don’t work on my baby boomer marriage blog. There’s not enough room to describe the content, show personality and be keyword-rich without sounding crazy.

“What style of writing works best in a blog situation?”

As social media evolves, businesses of all sizes are struggling to maintain a balance in tone between website, blog, and anywhere else their content and brand are represented.

You may already know how to find your website’s voice, so let’s unpack Dina’s question a bit and see if it applies to your social media strategy as well…

Hi Dina!

First, subscribe to Brian Clark’s Copyblogger. He’s got concrete advice on web copy and content creation in general, and he’s the best of the best when it comes to copy that’s specifically tailored to blogging. In fact, one of his writers just did a post about “How to Create a Rock-Solid Tagline“.

Second — Before we, or anyone, can help you find the right tone for your blog, it’s essential to understand its goal.

How are you measuring success? You say you want to generate subscriptions, but to what end? Do you plan on monetizing the blog — and if so, how? Question your own assumptions. You’re suggesting that there are only a few “short opportunities available” to ask people to subscribe, but don’t forget that each post can present an opportunity to subscribe.

Your About Us page should be about more than just “keyword-rich” copy; it should tell your story. Take a look at Nike’s About Us page. Powerful, isn’t it? Sure, they hit all of the essential, dry corporate facts, but those few sentences that stick out let you know why people care about their brand. Your About Us page shouldn’t need to be as dramatic as Nike’s, but it should reflect your blog’s purpose. Remember, you’re asking people to subscribe to your blog, not search engines.

Let people know what you’ve done; where’ you’ve come from; what’s in it for you; what’s in it for them. Future Now’s About Us page isn’t perfect, but hopefully we’ve been both honest and persuasive — two things that are essential to our blog’s voice as well.

In your case (Dina runs a lifestyle blog about boomers getting married), here are a few questions that might help you find the right voice:

• What is the overall emotional stance that your blog has towards its subject?
  • How does your blog view marriage?
  • Write down some adjectives or perspectives to help.
• If your blog where an actual person, who would it be? Is your blog:
  • Another girlfriend to talk to about marriage?
  • A marriage counselor?
  • A sincere talk show host?
  • A close friend of the opposite sex who you feel comfortable asking sticky questions?
  • A favorite aunt who has been there, done that, and gotten the t-shirt?
• Is there a favorite quote you have on marriage that sums things up for you?
• Is there one particular moment in the life of your blog that would capture its essence in a nutshell?
• Do certain words or phrases keep popping up in your blog, and would they help show your style/voice?

It may seem silly, but this stuff works.

Third, once you’ve established your blog’s voice, make sure it resonates in the details. Comment directions, error messages, category titles and the like are all good places to indicate your personality. But most of all, headlines are key. Make sure the post titles reflect both your brand’s personality and voice.

Finally, to the degree possible, make sure the content on the blog matches its editorial voice as well. This may be harder to do with multi-author blogs, but having a central blog voice can help. Send the style and voice guidelines out and simply ask for your writers not to stray too far from it. When some of them (quite inevitably) do stray, you can simply make it your policy to brand the post slightly differently than normal, so the readers know that not everyone shares the guest blogger’s perspective.

When in doubt, you can always ask your readers what they think.

. .

Editor’s Note: These are all things we’ve tried to do while finding our own voice at GrokDotCom. It’s not easy, particularly when offering what one hopes is constructive criticism, to be percieved as actually having been constructive. Of course, subscribing to a blog feed or a newsletter does not mean you subscribe to everything its authors say or how they say it. And as Seth Godin points out, “Sometimes, the web is more of a cocktail party than a club meeting.” Very true — and doubly so for those of us who offer advice.

On that note, we’d like to hear your thoughts on how GrokDotCom’s voice has evolved over the days, months, or years you’ve been reading. Don’t worry about hurting our feelings, either. We’d only be hurt if you thought we weren’t listening.

Feel free to share your comments below or email Robert (that’s me) directly. Thanks!

Victoria’s Secret used to be “my” store — a place that catered to sophisticated women. Now it feels like a store catering to teenage girls and creepy guys. Why, I wondered, doesn’t Victoria’s Secret want me as a customer anymore? Could it be because I’m not 25? But isn’t that a good thing? I’m older and I have more money.

Barbara La Placa is the associate publisher of marketing for MORE Magazine, a monthly magazine aimed at women over 40. In this OMMA article, she talks about women over 40 and their buying habits:

La Placa uses the example of lipstick to compare older women with younger consumers. “Open up my medicine cabinet and I’ve got 700 lipsticks. You don’t see that with young girls who get one brand everyone else has. Me, I’m 49, and I’m always looking for the right shade. And I have the money to buy the darn things,” La Placa adds.

Touche. Wake up and meet the boomer market. There are more women over 40 than ever before. They have money and they’re spending it.

According to The Wall Street Journal, even Victoria’s Secret is acknowledging that efforts to target younger customers may have disenfranchised their core market.

In the 1990s, professional women shopped the pastel-painted stores for colorful, European-inspired lingerie, supplementing underwear wardrobes previously filled with black, white and beige styles. Soft music played in the background while saleswomen discreetly offered help.

But over time, Victoria’s Secret adapted to a changing culture. One reason Victoria’s Secret got off track, Ms. Turney said, was the success of its Pink brand, which launched in 2002 and aimed to introduce college students to Victoria’s Secret stores. Pink has grown tremendously; in October, an executive said it would probably reach $900 million in sales for 2007.

But as teens and 20-somethings snapped up Pink underwear and pajamas, too many other product lines at Victoria’s Secret shifted to target that same customer, Ms. Turney said.

It was great that Victoria’s Secret brought in the younger audience, but they forgot about the rest of their customers (like me). I’m sorry, but a pink stuffed dog isn’t going to get me to buy more bras. (Though it might make a nice “friend” for my Boston Terrier with a humping problem.)

Victoria’s Secret is working on changing its image, toning down the “super sexy” hype and going back to its “ultra-feminine” roots. Can they win back customers?

Changing customer views will be a huge challenge. Sheri Coulter, a 42-year-old secretary in Flower Mound, Texas, worked at a Victoria’s Secret store three years ago. “It was like pulling teeth to get the women our age to come in there,” she says. “In our 40s and up, we are sexy — just not the same sexy a college gal is.”

For a time, she says, the store where she worked stopped carrying sizes 38 or larger, embarrassing some older customers who were turned away.

If they want me back, that’s great. But if they are re-re-branding, Victoria’s Secret should take some redesign cues from its own website (which does a much better job than the store, in my opinion).

Here’s what VictoriasSecret.com does well:

• The homepage shows a woman with an actual figure who looks sexy without being trashy.
• Great categorization. I can shop by collection, style of bra, see specials, or get tips on fitting.
• Product pages detail why each garment is or is not right for my body.
• I can increase the text size so I can actually read the product descriptions. (Thank you!)

For now, I’d much rather shop at the online store than the retail store. That’s a problem. If Victoria’s Secret wants me back as a customer, they’ll need to match the experience they’re presenting online with the experience they present in their stores.

[Editor's Note: Holly Buchanan is co-author of The Soccer Mom Myth — Today's Female Consumer: Who She Really Is, Why She Really Buys, and co-instructor of our Persuasive Online Copywriting seminar on March 28th in San Francisco.]

“Best value” makes a bold promise. It says to your website’s visitors, “I’ll prove to you that my product/service/whatever is worth far more than the asking price.” If you’re going to make this claim, you’d better have the proof waiting for them on the product- or service-description page.

Don’t be shy, though. If you can prove the “best value” claim, it’s a great way to simplify the customer’s selection process. High-speed decision-makers (Spontaneous and Competitive types) will likely read “best value” as your attempt at saving them time. For slower-paced customers (Methodical and Humanistic types), it helps kick-start their quest to find the very best value.

Whatever the visitors’ temperament, they’ll expect you to prove your claims, so before we talk about how to substantiate “best value” claims, let’s review the elements that evoke “value.”

As Roy Williams explains,

“The value of an item – in the mind of a consumer – is simply the difference between the anticipated price and the price on the tag. When the anticipated price is higher than the price tag, it’s a ‘good value.’”

A Bargain @ Any Price

“Best Value” should be supported in two steps:

1) A detailed description of the item — (build up the anticipated price)
2) The actual, lower-than-expected price — (surprise the visitor and entice them to buy)

Do BOTH parts well and you’ll be golden. Here’s how:

Since “value” is subjective, you’ll need to support it with an objective, factual statement. Don’t tell me your hot chocolate is a great value because it’s the “richest and most flavorful.” Tell me it contains 70% cocoa powder — twice as much as any other brand. Don’t tell me your pizza is the “cheesiest.” Tell me you use a full pound of genuine buffalo mozzarella flown in from Naples for every large pizza. You get the picture.

Then, after substantiating your product’s wonderful qualities, show me that the price isn’t much more than a typical hot chocolate, pizza, or whatever. Do those two things and people will be persuaded to click the Add-to-Cart button or fill out your lead form.

The Quality/Price Ratio

The problem for most companies is that they don’t do BOTH well: Either they don’t do enough to persuade customers of the product’s value, or they price their high-quality item even higher than what they’ve been able to substantiate to the market.

Most businesses don’t offer higher quality at slightly higher prices. They offer higher quality at proportionally higher prices, then try to sell it to us as “value.” But value is actually the ratio of (Perceived) Quality-to-Price. So, higher quality at a proportionally higher price doesn’t represent better value.

If I’m considering a cheap-o $10 knife and you offer me twice as much knife for $12, that’s a good value. If you offer me twice as much knife for $20, your $20 knife may not feel like a bargain.

The way out of this used to be to stress the intangibles of the product. Not long ago, the copywriter would build perceived value above and beyond the substantiated value by talking about, say, the fact that the knife was professional quality. That it was the same knife used by Charlie Trotter, Emeril Lagasse, or the like. The copywriter might wax poetic about the balance of the knife and its feel to the hand. He’d stress the added pleasures of using a more expensive knife over time. He’d hint at the increased social status that only brand-name cutlery can bring.

That used to work very well. But thanks to our depressed economy, our heads are hardening by the day, and those sorts of value-added extras no longer add as much value — not lately, anyway.

In this type of climate, you’ll have to prove that the value added by your product provides genuine Return on Investment — (show how jeans last 2x longer and, therefore, are worth 1.5 times as much) — or you’ll have to master yet another two-step process.

The Value Margin Two-Step

Now, before I get into that, I want to emphasize that I’m NOT preaching a discount or price-cutting mentality; on the contrary, I’m recommending you substantiate your product’s value and maintain your profit margins.

Only when your best efforts have failed should you consider Plan B:

1.) Increase the saleability of the product rather than its perceived value. In other words, allow your value-building efforts to increase the number of people who are willing to buy at a lower-than-usual price, rather than trying to use it to increase the price you charge.

2.) Decrease the buying pain enough to cause a favorable “anticipated vs. real” pricing structure. This could mean price-cutting, resizing portions, restructuring payments, reducing surcharges, etc.With any luck, doing both of these things will increase sale volume and keep you from having to lower your prices as much as you otherwise might. That’s probably not what you want to hear, and, as a copywriter, it’s not necessarily what I want to write, but it’s the truth. If you’re used to charging a high premium on intangibles there are going to be fewer people willing to pay the usual premium to get such things in the coming year.

Copy can’t fix everything. Each business must decide where to draw the line.

Show your value. Prove it. Convince hard-nosed customers. And if that stops working — or isn’t an option — go for Plan B.

In the meantime, read the other deadly claims at your own risk:

1. “Superior Customer Service“
2. “Easy to Use“
3. “Most Experienced“
4. “We’re #1“
5. “100% Risk-Free“
6. “Cutting Edge“
7. “Best Value“

[Editor's note: Want to improve the value of your website? Join us on March 28th in San Francisco for the first-ever West Coast edition of the Persuasive Online Copywriting seminar, our popular Web writing crash course. Jeff Sexton and Holly Buchanan will be your instructors. Class size is limited so that attendees can get real advice and actually learn something.

As a bonus leap year discount, you'll save an extra $100 if you register by 2/29.]

Even though Black & Decker owns DeWalt, their Web copy couldn’t be more different. In fact, the contrast between the two brands illustrates both mediocre and powerful ways to handle the sixth deadly claim: “cutting edge” (aka, “next generation,” “revolutionary,” etc.)

Both companies have followed current trends by releasing a line of tools powered by lithium-ion batteries. Lithium batteries provide much greater energy density than other rechargeable battery formulations, which means you can fit more power into a smaller battery. This can allow tool manufacturers to create lighter cordless tools, provide more run time, or increase the voltage rating of a tool (or some combination of those benefits, depending on design goals).

Moreover, lithium batteries won’t self-discharge: If you charge your battery and leave it in the garage, it will still be charged by the time your spouse’s nagging finally forces you to complete that home improvement project you’ve been planning to get to “this weekend” for the past six months.

This innovation means a company could legitimately claim that lithium-ion batteries represent the “next generation” of cordless tools. But handle with care. The claim may be true, but that doesn’t guarantee it will be persuasive to — or even believed by — the reader. The copywriter still needs to substantiate this claim.

Break Through the Hype

Let’s take a look at Black & Decker and see how they do. If I go to the Black & Decker homepage and click on the rotating Flash banner touting the VPX System™, I’m taken to a page that contains the following copy:

• Breakthrough Lithium-Ion technology – holds charge longer, so it’s ready when you need it
• Includes: VPX Screwdriver, Cutsaw and 3 LED Flashlight
• All 3 tools powered by 1 VPX 7V Lithium-Ion Battery [included]
• VPX Batteries interchangeable with all other VPX products
• VPX Chargers include Daisy Chain Cord to power multiple chargers on one outlet

So, they’ve claimed their battery technology to be a “breakthrough,” and they do a decent job of explaining the main benefit to the casual home user. Not bad, but they might want to make room for a bit more copy and to bullet point at least one other benefit of their new Lithium-Ion batteries. I’d also want to hyperlink the phrase “Breakthrough Lithium-Ion technology” so readers could click-through to find more information. As it is, I had to use the left-hand navigation to find this information by clicking on “The Power.”

This page does a nice job of illustrating the size and weight savings offered by the new battery, and the copy reiterates the “holds a charge longer” claim — though I’d strongly recommend they substantiate it by comparing the VPX charge-holding capacity to older battery technologies, so readers can know exactly how much longer they can let the batteries sit idle.

Overall, Black & Decker does a fair job of handling their claims of “breakthrough technology,” and at least the copy points out the benefits of the new battery formulation. Still, it would be much better if they dramatized the benefits.

Also, by marketing the technology against yesterday’s competition, Black & Decker fails to persuade. Chances are they’re not really competing against older battery formulations, as most consumers are likely comparing them to other Lithium-powered tools. Yet their copy ignores this entirely. They should at least address the issue of how their lithium-powered tools stack up against the competition, don’t you think?

B & D may or may not be the “best” lithium-powered tools, but the VPX System probably does represent good value for the money for the casual home user. It would help if they made that case outright. (Check out this Amazon page and accompanying reviews for one of the VPX drills. Better than the brand’s own site, isn’t it?)

Saw, Don’t Tell

Now let’s take a look at the copy for the new lithium-powered DeWalt Nano™ products.

First, note how DeWalt compares the new technology against their old Ni-Cad powered tools and other Lithium-powered tools. Also notice how DeWalt actively dramatizes the benefit of its new technology by showing how it translates to increased cycle life and faster task completion.

Finally, notice how DeWalt never mentions “cutting edge” or “breakthrough” or “next generation.” They simply talk about how they partnered with a pioneer in new battery technology and how their new (and exclusive!) battery chemistry was developed at MIT. Then they let the geeks among us drill down to the technical details on battery technology. Though they never really explain how the batteries make use of nano technology, rather than drawing attention to a would-be unsubstantiated claim, DeWalt shows us how their tools are cutting edge.

Want to see what this looks like on TV? DeWalt’s approach is basically the online equivalent of Dyson’s “airblade technology” commercial:

1. “Superior Customer Service“
2. “Easy to Use“
3. “Most Experienced“
4. “We’re #1“
5. “100% Risk-Free“
6. “Cutting Edge“
7. “Best Value“

[Editor's note: Is your website losing its edge? Sharpen up your virtual sales pitch at our Persuasive Online Copywriting seminar on March 28th in San Francisco. Jeff and Holly will be your instructors for this first-ever West Coast edition of our popular one-day copywriting crash course. Class size is limited so that attendees can get real advice and actually learn something. You'll even get $100 off if you register by 2/29.]

According to Advertising Age, 26.4 million people spent a total of 2,600 years at ElfYourself.com, turning themselves and unsuspecting family members and coworkers into virtual dancing elves. But chances are that unless you’re a marketer, blogger, or anyone else who might have bothered to notice in the first place, you’ve likely forgotten that OfficeMax was behind the “Elf Yourself” campaign.

Don’t take my word for it. Ask anyone who’s aware of Elf Yourself — and pronounce it carefully when you do — whether they can recall who sponsored the campaign.

Most of the answers I’ve gotten thus far (”Starbucks?”; “Barnes & Noble?”; “Wasn’t that Staples?”) have been guesses.

As OfficeMax VP of Marketing and Advertising, Bob Thacker, sold it to AdAge,

“We were looking to build the brand, warm up our image. We weren’t looking for sales. We are third-place players in our industry, so we are trying to differentiate ourselves through humor and humanization.”

Really? Not even looking for sales? Wow. If that’s the case, why even bother linking the campaign’s site to OfficeMax.com?

The article goes on to suggest that since many of those who searched for Elf Yourself around the time used the phrase “OfficeMax,” that must somehow mean their branding effort paid off. And that makes sense — so long as you ignore that it seems most people discovered the dancing elves via email and instant messenger, not search.

Get Elastic’s Linda Bustos sparked some debate about all of this, asserting that,

“Brand awareness is extremely valuable and important, especially in OfficeMax’ competitive industry. It might not result in immediate sales, but it should impact long term market position. Social media marketing (including blogging, podcasting and interactive viral campaigns) is a long-term strategy. It’s not a newspaper circular, it’s not PPC advertising, it’s not email marketing. Like celebrity endorsement or a Super Bowl ad, it won’t necessarily drive sales during a specific time period.”

Absolutely. But should the successful use of cute gimmickry — so long as it attracts a large, albeit random, audience of people who aren’t in buying mode, to a site that links to homepage, for a business that sells office supplies — be considered an automatic win?

So, millions of people go to a site that has little (no offense, elves) to do with the brand. No attempt is even made to engage would-be customers in a buying scenario (”Elf Yourself and save 10% on last-minute holiday treats when at OfficeMax.com”). No… nothing? That’s branding!?

One of the folks who commented on Linda’s post makes a telling point about the SEO logistics at play:

[...] this is search engine dynamite! The domain elfyourself.com (which is linked to by nearly 30,000 other websites) links directly (and only) to the officemax.com homepage. Conventional internet marketing dictates that this will have a huge impact on officemax.com’s ability to rank in Google on competitive terms. I’d love to see their stats – I bet it’s a big win.

Rank well on “competitive terms” — for whom? Elves? In a lot of other circumstances, this would be a great point, but in this case, it’s yet another example of why “conventional internet marketing” wisdom is misleading. Getting the extra traffic feels nice — and often impresses the boss — but there’s one thing that always feels better: Money.

Still, let’s see how much traffic Elf Yourself is driving to OfficeMax.com:

Not much of a traffic boost, is it?

But, hey, this wasn’t about traffic or revenue — it was about fun, right? Not for Toy New York, the agency that developed Elf Yourself. Nope. As Linda pointed out to me in the comments on her post, they’re the ones who are probably benefiting the most from this.

Looks like she’s got a pretty good point…

How about shareholder value? Kevin Horne points out that this is the second year in a row that the elves stuffed coal in the OMX stock price:

[...] in 2006, the company actually reported a decline of some $7 million in retail sales in its fourth quarter, 11 million “elf visitors” notwithstanding. Or notwithclicking either, apparently. Talk about squandering an opportunity. Two years in a row.

Oh well, at least OfficeMax got some national press coverage out of this. Let’s see what happens in this clip from Good Morning America:

Don’t get me wrong. I like the elves. It just seems that, since they’re already such hard workers, why not put them to work? (Even Santa’s got that figured out.)

Before you elf yourself out of millions in missed revenue from a viral marketing campaign, ask yourself: What good are millions of visitors if they don’t buy millions in goods?

Sometimes it takes better planning.

Doesn’t the stench of such desperate insecurity ooze from most marketing copy one reads? Everyone wants to be unique, yet precious few brands are willing to show their warts for fear of rejection.

If there’s any field where insecurity and fear are a brand’s biggest roadblocks, it has to be politics — which is why every marketer should not only watch but study these political ads as textbook examples on how differentiation works.

Here’s an advertisement for Steve Novick’s campaign:

Novick is different. And if you didn’t see why that was a real advantage the first time, this commercial beats a phony handshake any day:

If you’ve been following my columns, you know that ethos is a big part of credibility, and credibility is king when it comes to persuading customers you’re worth it.

[Hat tip to Nate Kreuter for posting these ads.]

I’ve been making donations to all of the major campaigns (Democratic and Republican) in order to see how each system works and talks to me, and while none of them do a bad job, there’s a definite divide between how the older and younger candidates communicate. The standout in the group is Barack Obama.

You may feel that Barack is not your candidate, but do take a look at his communication style, which is the definitive example for how to speak to customers (especially the younger generation) if you hope to do business with them.

No chest-thumping allowed. While other candidates focus on what makes them special as a candidate (count how many times a candidate uses the word “I” or “me” on their website), Barack’s campaign theme is “Yes We Can.” His website offers the theme of community, and uses terms like “you,” “we,” and “us” to draw you into the fold.

It’s all about US. When making a donation to the campaign, you are asked to write a short note about your feelings about Barack, the campaign, or anything you wish. Then, when you receive your thank-you note, it includes a message that another donor wrote (along with their first name and city). Suddenly, you are no longer a lone, isolated donor; you feel an immediate sense of community, belonging, and mission.

“Please, call me Barack.” As with any campaign, automatic emails and news items are sent to members and donors. The language used is serious in tone but not condescending. And each email is signed, “Barack.” Not “Barack Obama.” Not “The Barack Obama Campaign.” Just “Barack.” A decision as small as how you sign your name to a piece of marketing (because that’s what this is, after all), can make a world of difference.

After last weekend’s Barack Obama rally in California, an editorial in The New York Times said,

“The Times editorial board has endorsed Mrs. Clinton’s candidacy, and we are enthusiastic about her ability to be a great president. But candidates have to win in order to serve. Attending the rally here, we hoped Mrs. Clinton and her team were also watching and listening, very attentively.”

Not only should Clinton (and McCain and Romney) be paying attention, so should you. This is the communication style of the future.

Are you ready for change?

Here’s what I meant to suggest:

1.) DO borrow from what’s best about infomercials, with an eye on what will transfer to the Web.

2.) DON’T use anything that would remind visitors of, or cause them to associate you with, infomercials.

And in case you doubt that “100% Risk-Free” falls into the “don’t” category, just try Googling that phrase — the results speak for themselves.

What Infomercials Can Teach Online Marketers

• Dramatize the benefit — Have you ever seen an infomercial that just tells you the features or merely explains the benefit? Hell no! They want you to see the thing in action and compare it to the alternative. It’s not enough that you see how well the rotisserie oven cooks. You have to see how well it cooks compared to a conventional oven. You have to visualize the thing saving you from having to pay attention to the oven (“Set it and forget it!”) and how much money your very own rotisseries oven will save you over buying rotisserie chicken at a specialty chain restaurant.

Infomercials universally dramatize the benefit to the point where viewers can’t help but picture themselves enjoying the product themselves. But don’t confuse the infomercials cheesy execution of this technique with the core strategy itself. Dramatizing the benefit is precisely what Steve Jobs did with his introduction of the iPhone. Steve always dramatized the benefit of the phone’s abilities within the context of a typical user scenario. For instance, here’s how Jobs showed the iPhone’s benefits in a real-life scenario.

Never mind the fact that Pacific Catch didn’t actually serve calamari when this commercial first aired, the case for the iPhone was so powerful, they were forced to add it to the menu.

(For websites that do an admirable job of this, check out OmniWeb and Mint.)

• Employ (and stage) “Sinatra Tests” – Honestly, have you EVER used a kitchen knife to saw through a soda can? Neither have I. But to the average viewer, the Ginsu’s ability to cut through an aluminum can, then effortlessly slice a tomato, meant the darn thing would cut through several years worth of plain-old food without ever getting dull. Same thing with the lubricant that allowed the engine to start while frozen in a block of ice. And the cleaner that can get ground in motor oil stains out of carpet.

As for the Web, the most recent, and memorable example of this technique has to be LifeLock, where the CEO posts his SSN on the homepage. (If you’re going to imitate infomercials, imitate that.)

• Use effective risk-reversal techniques — Specific, substantiated risk reversal techniques are absolutely indispensable for infomercials. Every one of them offers at least a 30-90 day money-back guarantee, or a “quit at any time with no obligation” assurance. Stay away from a generalized “100% risk-free,” but DO offer as many specific and substantiated ways to reverse or eliminate risk as you possibly can.

Lands’ End does a nice job of this, especially with their custom-made clothing. While their thorough body-shape algorithm inspires confidence, most visitors are probably still left with the nagging question of, “How can I make sure the clothing will fit just right? I’d hate to pay extra for a great fit and wind up with something that wasn’t perfect.” Lands’ End’s response:

If the fit isn’t “just so” the first time around, you can nip and tuck your profile accordingly and re-order a new item. We save all your information, so you can fill your order with just a few keystrokes. And, if your Lands’ End Custom garment is anything less than perfect, you may exchange it, or return it and we’ll reimburse you for the purchase price. Lands’ End Custom is Guaranteed. Period®.

My guess would be that this risk-reversal technique plays a significant part in Land’s End’s ability to sell 40% of their jeans and chinos as custom orders.

• Making testimonials can’t-miss, hard-hitting events — Infomercials actually break from the action in order to showcase testimonials. They don’t just sort of have them scrolling past the bottom or far right portion of your TV screen. Nor do they assume you’ll go to a website to read testimonials. They break the show in order to ensure you’ll watch normal people endorse the results. Most websites never do this. Instead, they bury testimonials on a separate page, or only have a single testimonial inconspicuously placed in the far-right column.

Infomercial testimonials, on the other hand, are frequently very specific and feature a person raving about how they’re kicking butt with the product, rather than focusing on the product itself. The interviewed customer seems ever-ready to say, “I too was skeptical, but now…” These are all things that websites would benefit from.

(Sadly, the sites that interject testimonials most consistently are those ridiculously long, single-page, direct marketing-style “internet riches in a box” sites. In addition to embodying the dark side of infomercials, these sites will also interrupt their hard-sell chest thumping every few paragraphs in order to showcase a testimonial from some semi-anonymous goober who testifies to his transformation from barely holding down a McJob to — allegedly — raking in millions per day. Check out the search results for “100% Risk-Free” to see this technique in action. Just promise me you’ll ONLY copy this one technique from these sites. And nothing else. Please.)

• Understanding the difference between saleability and value — The ever-popular “But wait, there’s more!” phrase was never used to increase the price. The price always remained $19.95, no matter how many 6-way vegetable peelers or steak knives they threw in. What the added extras were intended to do was to increase the customer’s willingness to pay the $19.95, not to make them willing to pay more. That’s the difference between saleability and value. Too often, online marketers confuse these things. They think that strong stories or ties to social causes are ineffective because they can’t always increase the selling price. Don’t get me wrong, a good story can often increase the selling price, but just as often these elements are best used to increase saleability instead of price.

So there you have it, the brighter side of infomercials. Imitate those and stay away from the “100% Risk-Free” claims.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go spray some extra hair on my head, juice a few pomegranates, set the rotisserie chicken for tonight, and watch this great documentary on Pitch People (as seen on TV).

In case you missed his farewell tribute, enjoy…

But will Gates actually stop making headlines? Probably not so much.

Gates still retains his title as one of the richest dudes in the world and, of course, he will now focus on making the world a better place. It’s enough for even the biggest Mac fanboy to have a few warm fuzzies for Gates.

Everyone raves about the charisma of Apple’s Steve Jobs, but can you picture Jobs poking fun at himself like this? Where will we find Bill Gates next?

It’s been a good week for personal brands & authenticity; first Hillary sobs, then Gates makes Jobs looks a little like a statue.

Who woulda thunk it?

“…over the past week, I listened to you, and in the process, I found my own voice.”

There was a lot of chatter about Hillary’s emotional moment in a coffee shop caught on video. Watching that moment, many people thought, “Wow, I think for the first time ever, I just saw the real Hillary.”

One of the common complaints about Hillary is that she comes off as cold, almost robotic. Are we going to see a change?

Does your website sound like Hillary Clinton? Or at least, um, how Hillary used to sound (e.g., last week)? Are you using techno-jargon, cliches, stiff corporate speak? Does your brand’s voice sound authentic? Do your website visitors have a sense of who you are and what really matters to you? The vast majority of websites have copy that sounds robotic and predictable. Add unsubstantiated claims to the mix, and you come across as phony (another common complaint about Hillary).

What can you do to change that? How can you do a better job of connecting with clients and customers online? How can you create a “voice” for your website? Read this: “Two Simple Steps for Finding Your Website’s Voice“