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Shot from the loft, warming up

Shot from the loft, warming up

Last night I headed to a client’s photo shoot at a discreet warehouse on Norris Road.  What I expected was work at a basketball game.  What I got was an amazing experience.

Here’s why:

JAM-STYLE HOSPITALITY: When you walk through the front doors, the friendly staff greets you like you’re a welcome visitor in their home.

IT’S EXCITING, UP-CLOSE AND PERSONAL:  Every seat in the house is close enough to the action for you to reach out and touch the players.  You feel the energy on the court – think Jack Nicholson at a Lakers’ game.

THE OWNERS AND MANAGEMENT ARE ‘PRESENT’:  In addition to being at the game, they’re actively mixing with fans.  They know you by name and you can feel their authentic appreciation that you’re there.

IMPECCABLE SERVICE:  The efficient and friendly staff helps serve dinner before the game and visits your seat often to see if you’d like another beverage or saved room for some Dewar’s Ice Cream (there’s always room for Dewar’s, right?!).

THE BACKSTORY IS IN INSPIRATION:  When the Jam couldn’t fill the thousands of seats at Rabobank, they reinvented themselves.  By purposefully limiting game attendance in a smaller venue, they were able to partner with some of the County’s most successful business people for a win-win.

The team is very talented, has had a great season and last night won the Western Division Title.  I’m impressed by what the Jam has going on, both on and off the court.  They get it.

It doesn’t matter what business you’re in.

Create a memorable experience for your guests and success is a slam dunk.

 

Storefront

Is Yelp being used?  During the last quarter of 2012, the average number of unique visitors to the site was 86 million. (yelp.com)

Is Yelp perceived to be a trusted source for consumers to find accurate reviews on restaurants, hotels, bakeries, and other retail establishments?  Many people rely on Yelp; it’s more popular in urban areas.

Do business owners like Yelp?  Yes and No.  Yelp’s aggressive sales tactics and most recently, vague practices in “filtering” are creating some concern. Business owners wonder why good reviews are being filtered while questionable reviews remain. The algorithm used to filter and sort the order of reviews is not specifically revealed in Yelp’s Terms of Use.

Are there guidelines for reviewer conduct?  Yes and No.  Here are a few excerpts from the Yelp General Guidelines (yelp.com):  In a review you may use “colorful language and imagery…but there’s no need for threats harassment, lewdness, hate speech or other displays of bigotry.  We are big believers in freedom of speech, but beware the legal consequences if you post false information.”

Do reviews ever get removed?  Yelp says sometimes.  Industry says no.  According to Yelp, “Our support team may remove a review if it violates our Terms of Service or Content Guidelines” (see above).

What if your business gets a negative review?  In social media management, the Agency always recommends responding to negative feedback, viewing it as an opportunity to resolve problems quickly.  Yelp may be the exception.

Important to know about Yelp; if you respond to a negative comment, you actually draw more attention to it.  The more activity on your Yelp account, the more it moves up in search engines.

What options do you have if you feel there’s an unfair or fabricated business review on your Yelp page?

  • Engage.  Be prepared to dedicate staff hours monitoring, responding and managing another social media site.  Understand that you still have no control over craziness and the team at Yelp would prefer to err on the side of freedom of speech –- they place the risk of defamation action with the individual reviewer.  (Note:  you can flag the review if you’re a registered Yelp user.  This places it on the list for review for filtering.)
  • Ignore it.  Yelp is a place where people review cupcakes, movie theaters, corn dogs and ice cream parlors.  Most consumers can read a review with their own filter.
  • Wait it out.  Legal precedence is being set now.  Dietz v Perez is a case involving a Yelp review posted by an angry woman about the service (or lack thereof) from her general contractor.  Initially, it appears the courts ruled that the review needed to be toned down prior to the online defamation trial.  That ruling was overturned last month when the ACLU appealed.

What do you think about Yelp?

   

shutterstock_69901633Even the medical field is catching on.  2013 will bring amazing new innovations at private practices and hospitals designed to minimize wait times and provide additional convenience for patients.  They’re smart; they recognize change is an important part of creating a memorable customer experience.

A significant cultural shift is transforming the service landscape – consumers’ need for instant communication is growing daily.  Complete customer satisfaction now means, “I want the best solution at a reasonable price from people who care about me.  I want the finest service AND I want it now.”

What can you do to keep up with these new expectations?  Here are a few tips:

  • Answer your phone quickly, with a smile and ready to be of service.
  • Return voicemails, the same day they’re received.
  • Reply to emails and web contact submissions, the same day they’re received.
  • Monitor your social media; respond to requests the same day.
  • Be on time, every time.
  • Make it easy to quickly access your products or services.
  • Lastly, and most importantly, develop new systems to make it more convenient for your customers to do business with you.

For most people, time is money.

Show them you value their time.  Now.

In 2009, Andy Rooney, one of my favorite curmudgeons (may he Rest In Peace), did an air travel bit on 60 Minutes.  I always enjoyed his segments and as I flew home this holiday, I remembered this one with a smile.  He was, of course, sarcastic and at times cynical, but his overall point was right on.

Rooney said the airlines had a lot going for them.  He said “all people like to travel because they want to be anywhere but here.”  He went on to suggest that “getting there ought to be fun.”

I agree.  It’s like everything else we know in the business/advertising world; the experience is what keeps our customers coming back for more.

Cheers to U.S. Air for listening to their focus groups.  They’ve made me a loyalist and I honestly enjoy the vast majority of my coast-to-coast flights with them. Here’s why:

  • We all value our time.  How about flying out of your hometown (thanks to the William M. Thomas terminal), making one stop in Phoenix and 7 hours after initial departure landing somewhere close to the Atlantic?
  • There are still some great host/hostesses serving as flight attendants.  Most of us still enjoy the stereotypical 50’s flight attendant from a favorite vintage ad.  You know, the happy ones who welcome you with a smile like you’re a guest in their home.
  • WIFI is awesome.  That is all.
  • Dividend Miles work.  Great benefits and flexibility – refreshing.
  • We all value our time.  Wait, I already said that.  On time departures and arrivals are the new norm.  Who doesn’t like that?

Rooney’s idea applies universally.  Is your business making whatever you do or serve enjoyable?   Are you listening to what your customers like and what they could do without? (ie:  airline ‘meals’)

It’s always been about the experience.

It ought to be fun.

 

Looking  for local businesses to get behind your cause?

It’s on my mind this Sunday morning, because my clients receive so many worthwhile requests and believe me, they would love to fund them ALL!

Wanted to share a few tips that may better your odds for success and also to let you know being declined doesn’t mean your program isn’t important to the business.

Do:

  • Ask the business if they have a donation policy.  Check their website or make a quick phone call.  Some support children’s programs one year, help tackle homelessness the next and others strictly support programs their employees are actively involved in.
  • If it’s consistent with their policy, put your request in writing and take the time to find out who the request should be addressed to.  Form letters will end up at the bottom of the pile.
  • Know the difference between a donation and a program grant request.
  • Be specific about what the donation will fund.  If you’re looking for help to subsidize a high school student trip to perform at Carnegie Hall, ask the business to sponsor one child and provide the cost breakdown.
  • Follow up with ONE phone call or visit if appropriate.

Don’t:

  • Rely solely on trolling the newspaper for leads.  While businesses who have sponsored other events represent active community partners, they are also businesses who are most likely at budget for the year.
  • Wait until the last minute.  Most businesses review requests once a month.  Larger requests are often considered one time a year during annual budgeting.
  • Visit a business during their peak hours to ask for help.  Visiting a restaurant at 12:10 is unlikely to result in a positive outcome.
  • Call over and over again.  This is one area where the squeaky wheel does not get the grease.
  • Take it personally if a business is tapped out for the year.  It doesn’t mean they don’t want to help.

Understand that most businesses do have a donation budget and their goal is to use it to provide the most impact in the community.  Also, know that most businesses receive hundreds of requests each month.

Most of all . . . remember, if you receive one donation from contacting ten businesses, that’s one more donation than you had yesterday.  Celebrate it and keep pounding the pavement with enthusiasm.

Happy Fundraising!

we would all get along and always play nicely when interacting with fan pages.

Here’s the problem:  just who decides in the subjective world of ‘codes of behavior’ what playing nicely means?

Let’s face it, social media has created a protocol conundrum for us all.  What’s acceptable for one may be totally offensive for another.  Views of decorum run the gamut in an online world that is cross-generational and demographically, geographically and experientially mixed.  While diversity is completely celebrated, it can also put page administrators in the occasional position of having to be the ‘manners police.’

There are some very real reasons business pages were developed and why they thrive today (aside from the revenue stream they generate for Facebook).  Both brands and fans have embraced the idea that open dialogue is mutually beneficial and enjoyable.  From the perspective of the business owner, the feedback brings them closer to the very MOST important people they know – their customers.  While it’s my experience that 98% of Facebook exchanges are positive and fitting, there is that 2% . . .

To Facebook users, and to the page administrators who find themselves in the situation of having to make a call between appropriate and inappropriate postings, here are some observations I’ve made over the past few years.

Fans can almost always expect a positive response and get the most from pages when they:

  • Share about brand experiences – good and bad.  If you’ve had a negative experience, most brands will jump on the opportunity to listen to you, learn from it, and make you happy. Remember, owners and managers will also welcome your phone call or a personal visit to make things right.
  • Ask questions. Most pages are monitored often enough to answer you quickly – even during off hours.
  • Watch pages and use them to your advantage.  Get involved with contests and watch for posts on new product arrivals and sales.
  • Tell the business if you have an idea for something you’d like to see offered.  Some of the greatest new product offerings come from customers.
  • Keep it light and positive.

There are some things most administrators will agree reflect universally poor taste:

  • An individual’s use of the Facebook Message feature to spam a business about the latest weight loss miracle product.  Highly unlikely to result in a sale.
  • The posting of your business ad/link on another’s business page wall without permission.  Think putting a political yard sign in someone’s lawn without first asking.  It’s irritating – and like the sign – will be removed.
  • Sharing one’s devotion to another business on a competitor’s wall.  Makes you wonder what type of people frequent that other business.
  • Inquiries about the cost of a displayed item ought to be handled differently on a page than at a yard sale. “how much?” (with a lower case “h”) works better at the latter.
  • Posts including foul or sexually explicit language will always be deleted.  Duh.

Think of social media as a creative, amusing experience and it will be.  As different as we all are, we can all get along.  And to the page administrators of the world – good luck with those grey areas.

Post on.

“Will email continue to play a role in the future of advertising?”

If you had asked me that question a year ago, I would have said “yes, but it’s diminishing.”   There were so many compelling reasons to think it was becoming a dinosaur in the ad world.   Major universities were dropping it, consumers were opting out of email subscriptions because of irritating overuse, Facebook messaging was becoming more popular, and IM and texting and use of other fresh methods of communication were on the rise.

I didn’t anticipate a few important trends.  Along with many other agencies, digital experts and technology bloggers I didn’t see the rapid fracture in the digital and social world coming so quickly.  While consumers now spend time on many different social media platforms, practically everyone has an email address (yahoo is the most common, go figure).  The second thing keeping email alive is the exponential growth in the use of smartphones.

More than 50% of all phones in the United States have the capability to receive and send email and 88% of Americans still check their email daily.  It’s predicted that by the end of 2012, more people will be reading emails on their smartphones than their desktops and 85% of all mobile email will be read on an Apple device. (-cdn.techi.com)

I’m happy for forward thinking email management companies like Constant Contact who have embraced the social movement rather than trying to compete with it.  The folks at CC are actually creating ways to integrate their email offerings into the social world.

While I’ve always advised my clients to create and maintain accurate customer email lists, it was more of a back-up plan in my mind rather than a solid means of connecting with their consumer in the future.

So ask me today:  “Does email have a future in advertising?”

I don’t believe it’s going away anytime soon.

Smartphones and tablets have given it new life.

” Social Meets Experimental ” is my number two pick for being the most fascinating 30 minutes of the of the conference.   When Tim  Ellis, the EVP and Global CMO at Activision, took the stage at the Pavilion, I was tempted to take coffee break.  Seemed hypocritical to spend a half an hour listening to tips on selling the virtual killing game once banned from my house because of the violence.  Happy I stayed.

Ellis, who left his mark on innovation while at VW with the early release of the Super Bowl ad turned viral, “The Force,” is now rebooting Activision’s Call of Duty.  His imagination, innovation and ability to turn negative brand feedback into positive made his one most impressive and thought-provoking presentations of the conference.

He was charged with launching Call of Duty Elite, a paid service for their gaming users.  Once early word of the service hit the web, it resulted in a summer-long viral outcry from their fans.  The brand was painfully reading every comment and blog and watching every COD-bashing video about the new Activision ‘rip off.’   While complete details of the program couldn’t be released,  Ellis took the challenge as an opportunity to experiment.  To take a risk.

Activision created a two-day immersive brand event in Los Angeles to launch the Elite program.  It was like COD heaven, complete with live gaming competitions for a $1 million prize, paintball ranges, zip lines, life-size versions of certain game maps and live musical entertainment.

Engagement gone wild.  Social madness and global media attention resulted in $20 million dollars of advertising value to Activision.  Call of Duty XP was the second-most-watched event on Live stream in history –  right after the Royal Wedding.

In a 16 day period, the new subscription service reached 1 billion dollars in sales.

“‘Can experiential media, plus social media, equal mass media?” (Ellis)

Apparently so.

This is the branded coffee cup compliments of TiVo on the first day of this week’s Advertising Age Digital Conference, 2012.

The irony made me laugh.   My peers were checking their Smart Phones as they filled their cups under the spigot of their brew of choice.  (Sidebar:  What’s the point of drinking decaffeinated coffee, really?)  Picture hundreds of agency owners, account managers, buyers, brand managers, producers and techies under the same roof at the Metropolitan Pavilion – calling it Wi-Fi overload would be an understatement.  Very little digital pausing going on.

Here are a few of the quick highlights from some of my favorite speakers/presentations:

Seth Farbman, Global CMO, The Gap: 

  • Make it easy and follow your heart when developing your brand.  Adjust but never stray from your mission.
  • Be reliable and create solutions for your customers.
  • Customer expectations are changing daily. They’re elevated and you have to meet them.

John Harrobin, VP Digital Media and Marketing, Verizon

  • There’s an algorithm that makes a human-generated text message (which performed at .2%  response) perform at 1% when computer-generated.  Copywriters of the world:  keep your egos in check.

Mark Mahaney, Managing Director, Internet Research, Citigroup Investment Research

  • I’ll tell you what his stock tips were later – I’m buying them right now.
  • In 2011, Internet usage grew 21%.  Estimates put Internet usage at 3 billion by 2016.
  • Once traditional media (print, yellow pages, direct mail) has been devalued and slowly replaced by lower cost internet options.

Cheryl Guerin, Senior Vice President and Group Head of U.S. Marketing, MasterCard

  • 50% of all phones are Smart Phones.   (This was a recurring theme throughout both days.)
  • We check our phones an average of 40 times a day.  More Americans would rather give up coffee than their phones.  I need both.
  • Mobile devices and tablet usage are expected to quintuple in the next 4 years (again, recurring theme.)
  • Get creative.  The cross-platform video on the “Yankees/Priceless” campaign showed great creativity and emotion – very well done.
  • Yes, your phone will soon be your credit card.  (Watch for the Google Wallet launch.)

Randall Brown, Global Director of Digital Strategy, Gatorade

Created and runs “Gatorade Mission Control.”  A platform for real-time social media monitoring and engagement, analytics and insights.

  • The wall between the consumer and the brand has been taken down.  It’s now two way communication.
  • Social has created a new place for the consumer to express.  Human needs, wants and behaviors haven’t changed – just a new forum.

Other bits I walked away with:

  • Mobile, Mobile, Mobile.  Phones, tablets and apps are the new king.
  • Reinforcement that information exchange is now immediate and we’re all publishers.
  • Product placement is still hot and the more creative and unexpected the better.  Midstream during a panel discussion, David Packman and Rob Norman exchanged shot-sized bottles of Tanqueray.  Very funny.
  • Look around you for unexpected creatives.  Enjoyed watching a team led by a young Cal Poly, SLO student pitch a new app concept to Anheuser-Busch. Who better to ‘tap’ than a team of college kids for new beer app ideas.  They represented California (and beer drinking college kids) well.

I’m sure everyone walked away from this conference with a little something different.  Some benefitted from the exposure and networking, others from what they learned about brands pushing the limits of advertising beyond what they had ever imagined, and some simply from two days of pure forward- thinking energy.

There are three other fascinating presentations/projects that changed the way I think and that I want to share in greater detail – stay tuned, each is a blog in itself.

Nice job, Ad Age.  The conference was well planned, organized and ran right on schedule.  Each presentation was brief (under 30 minutes) and perfect for the short attention span of the new generation (and me!)

I hope you printed this and sat outside to read it with a favorite drink.  And that you enjoyed a digital pause.

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