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| Volume 8, Issue 13 |
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In This Issue:
 Seth MacFarlane’s $2 billion Family Guy empire
 Behind the 'Wassup' ad for Obama
 The next marketing challenge: Selling to 'simplifiers'
Should you bring advertising expertise in-house?
 Gen X persuaded by e-mail, direct mail over social marketing: Study
 Cash, credit, or cell phone?
 Review: Which smart phone OS works best [for you]?
 Seven reasons your customers hate you
Why sales process gets the shaft (and what you can do about it)
Chatting up [your] customer service
Shedding light on dark marketing
 Six free tools for online reputation management
11 tips to align PC and mobile email design
CAN-SPAM: Basic real-world compliance tips for marketers
 What's stressing out Americans?
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Seth MacFarlane’s $2 billion Family Guy empire
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photograph by Jill Greenberg
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Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane nabbed a record $100 million deal with Fox and is teaching Google new ways to exploit the Web. Could this crude frat-boy cartoonist really be a model for business in the postmodern age?
It's not hard to find someone who delights in attacking the show Family Guy. Which isn't a criticism, per se. Much of the animated sitcom's purpose seems to be to stoke the opposition, to offend the easily offended. But that's not the only reason it annoys people. There is a school of thought that says the show is hackish -- crudely drawn and derivative of its cartoon forebears. Members of this school would include, most prominently, Ren & Stimpy creator John Kricfalusi, and Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the fathers of South Park, which is probably the only show on television that rivals Family Guy for objectionable content per half hour. South Park has devoted entire episodes to attacking Family Guy, portraying the show's writers as manatees who push "idea balls" with random jokes down tubes to generate plotlines. Kricfalusi has said, "You can draw Family Guy when you're 10 years old." What does Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane -- who earlier this year inked a $100 million -- plus contract with Fox, followed by a breakthrough deal involving Google -- have to say about that?...
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Behind the 'Wassup' ad for Obama
This morning when I blogged about the “Wassup 2008” Obama video, two questions sprung to my mind. First, who paid for this thing?
The production values are very high – one person from Budweiser’s ad agency, DDB, estimated it could have cost as much as $750,000 (she also said DDB had nothing to do with the video). Second, how could Budweiser possibly be cool with such a clearly
partisan advertisement? After some digging, I found out. First, it cost way less than $750k. Second, Budweiser had no clue it was happening until after the video hit YouTube on Friday. The man with the answers?...
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The next marketing challenge: Selling to 'simplifiers'
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The new economy has made it even easier for consumers to get rid of their stuff.
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Watch out for a new brand of consumer in 2008: the middle-aged Simplifier.
She finds herself surrounded by too much stuff acquired. She is increasingly skeptical in the face of a financial meltdown that it was all worth the effort. Out will go luxury purchases, conspicuous consumption, and a trophy culture. Tomorrow's consumer will buy more ephemeral, less cluttering stuff: fleeting, but expensive, experiences,
not heavy goods for the home. The economic boom of the 1990s fuelled consumption and democratized access to a wider than ever spectrum of goods transforming former luxuries into "must-have" necessities. Millions played the lotteries or aspired to what they viewed on "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous." As they grew richer, pressure
increased on those below to trade up. [As the world economy slumps, one consumer segment will grow faster than ever. The Simplifiers have four characteristics:...]
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Should you bring advertising expertise in-house?
If Mad Men advertising hotshot Don Draper was operating on Madison Avenue today, he would find competition coming from more than just other ad firms.
A recent study by Harvard Business School professor emeritus Alvin J. Silk and colleagues finds that more companies than previously thought are developing in-house advertising capabilities, especially in technology-oriented and creative industries. Working with Silk on the study were Sharon Horsky of Bar-Ilan University and
Steven C. Michael (HBS PhDBE '93) of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The study found that almost half of U.S. advertisers large and small operated some form of in-house advertising unit in the 1990s, a trend apparently on
the increase. In this decade, Procter & Gamble, Google, and Condé Nast Media Group all introduced internal advertising units. Why the increase in vertical integration?...
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Gen X persuaded by e-mail, direct mail over social marketing: Study
Consumers 18 to 34 report they are more likely to respond to an e-mail marketing message or direct mail than to one they get through a social network, according to a joint research project by Ball State University’s Center for Media Design and e-mail service provider ExactTarget.
“It is too easy to assume that the media consumers choose for their own news, information and entertainment are by default the best media to use for marketing messages,” Ball State CMD director of insight and research Mike Bloxham said in a statement. “This is a dangerous assumption to make in a time when consumers are
becoming increasingly aware of their level of control over their media experiences.” The study combined observed daily media use by 350 participants studied by CMD and segmented afterwards into seven consumer “personas,” with data from the Channel Preference Surveys done by Indianapolis-based ExactTarget. The study finds that
“Wired” consumers—mostly young males 18-34, employed and educated more than average—subscribe more often than any other group for...
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Cash, credit, or cell phone?
Mobile payments may soon change the way Americans buy.
Cash may still be king, but on the streets of Japan there's anew rival for the throne. Millions of people there use their mobile phones to buy everything from vending-machine sodas to train tickets. To pay, a user passes a chip-enabled handset over a compatible reader. Credit is then deducted from a stored-value account provided
by NTT DoCoMo, Japan's dominant cell-phone carrier. Transactions take a fraction of a second to complete, pleasing customers and merchants alike. In addition, consumers can use their phones to buy products over the mobile Web, or download digital music. And losing your phone is not the same as losing your wallet, because the handset can be
remotely disabled. Japan is clearly in the technological vanguard, again, but mobile payments are catching on throughout Asia and Europe. Juniper Research predicts that remote and in-store mobile-phone payments will total $375 billion by 2013, up from a
current $57 billion. Although the United States is late to the mobile-payments party, its use of mobile banking has exploded in the past two years...
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Review: Which smart phone OS works best [for you]?
Considering a smart phone? Will it do what you want it to? We tested four major platforms to see which is best for specific tasks.
Once only within reach for executives and the well-heeled, smart phones are now at the center of many road warriors' lives. But their popularity has led to a problem: With so many smart phones available now, it's hard to know which one is right for you. The answer depends on what you most need your smart phone for. Do you need a device that
excels at e-mail or one that's optimized for browsing the Web? And will the best smart phone for e-mailing or browsing also keep you entertained on a long flight? A smart phone's power comes as much from its operating system as it does from the capabilities
the vendor builds in. To help you at least narrow down your choices, we tested four smart phones (Apple's iPhone 3G, HTC Touch, Nokia's E71, BlackBerry Curve 8310), each based on a different operating system, to find out which platform is better for particular tasks...
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Seven reasons your customers hate you
Sales is an honorable profession. Stand out from your competition by avoiding these behaviours.
Recent research uncovered almost 80 reasons why customers dislike salespeople. Here are the top seven.
1. Not listening. This was the most cited reason customers dislike salespeople.Too many salespeople neglect to listen to what their customers or prospects say, which means they fail to address the key issues that their customer has emphasized. I remember one interaction I had with a couple of salespeople a few years
ago. One of them asked some great questions to learn more about my particular situation. However, his counterpart did not listen to my responses. A as a result, his solution did not address my business challenges and buying requirements. In fact, his presentation was so far off base, I abruptly called an end to the meeting. Time is a
precious commodity for people and when you don't listen you disrespect your prospect.
2. Talking too much...
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Why sales process gets the shaft (and what you can do about it)
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Here's Some Food for Thought:
Why does the sales department so often rank dead last when it comes to process, measurement and consistent performance?
Think about the other departments in your company. Those CPAs in finance follow GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles) guidelines. Manufacturing departments have Lean Manufacturing, Just-in-Time and the Toyota Production System, among other approaches. Our colleagues in marketing depend on process and measurement with many of
their functions, direct response being only one. ISO 9000, Six Sigma and FDA validation are three among many more process, quality and consistent performance standards. So why is sales last? One reason is the long-standing belief that sales is
more art than science. It isn't, and those senior executives who believe that it is are propagating the problem. [It's easy enough to spot symptoms that indicate an absence of a sales methodology and its constituent processes. Take the case of a company that struggled with significant business challenges resulting from their inability to forecast when deals would close]...
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Chatting up [your] customer service
Companies turn to click-to-chat technology to reduce operating expense and enhance customer service (Edited by Stacy Straczynski)
The days of waiting on hold for a service rep are through. Now customers can increasingly use click-to-chat technology via a company's Web site to get immediate on-demand solutions to their problems and questions. And those companies who have watched their competitors' revenues and customer satisfaction scores soar are more
frequently jumping on board with these virtual conversation tools in an effort to maintain their sales during economic lows. Click-to-chat technology—also referred to as "chat"—enables companies to communicate online with customer service reps via real-time instant messaging, rather than over the phone. Because chat allows service
reps to handle more than one contact simultaneously and provide customers with a detailed record of the online conversation, companies are able to...
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Shedding light on dark marketing
Here's a brief primer and a "how-to-market darkly" checklist for those brands looking to cross over to the dark side.
"Dark Marketing" is slowly making its way into the advertising lexicon, and for good reason. Rock bands like Nine Inch Nails and burger giant McDonalds have unleashed their brand engagement and reinforcement capabilities with results that CMO's can cheer for. But, for many in the industry, the term is still more likely to conjure an
image of Darth Vader opening a bag of Cooler Ranch Doritos instead of what the concept delivers: legions of brand enthusiasts actively participating in an artfully designed
and carefully executed brand marketing campaign that spans countries and continents. It's powerful stuff. Let There Be Light Dark marketing isn't sinister, but it borders on covert...
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Six free tools for online reputation management
Online reputation management consists of tracking your brand and reacting when necessary.
Though sometimes tedious, brand monitoring can save you from a potential disaster when someone cites your name in an article that misrepresents you. Aside from protection, it can help you proactively join conversations around your topic area, helping to get your brand name out there. It's almost 2009... and if you aren't active online you are
missing valuable opportunities to advertise your value to the world—through articles, blog entries, social-network profiles, comments, videos and more. As both a content producer and consumer, your name is being spread throughout each of these circuits by people you might not even know. In fact, research firm IDC finds that there is more
content being created about you than you create yourself. Part of your brand is in the hands of others, so it's critical that you monitor it before a flame becomes a forest fire. Do you know what people are saying about you?...
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11 tips to align PC and mobile email design
As smartphone sales go through the roof (Apple sold over 1 million 3G iPhones on its launch weekend in July), inbox and message views are growing in numbers—and shrinking in size.
The good news: More of your customers can read your email messages on their smartphones now, instead of waiting until they get back to their home or office computers. The bad news: The email that looks so great on your home or office PC/laptop may look like a garbled mess on the average smartphone. Although the iPhone,
for example, beautifully renders HTML messages with images, most smart phones don't, so you must design a message template that will render well in both a PC and the mobile email environment. Because most of your subscribers who access email via a mobile device may also access the same email via their PC or laptop, sending
mobile-optimized text messages is usually not the best strategy. Also, don't expect a mobile device to detect and present the text part of your multipart message format. If your mobile user signed up for HTML, that's what she'll get on her phone, as virtually all mobile operating systems today present the HTML part. But, except in the case of
the iPhone and Windows Mobile, it will probably look like a malformed text message. So until the majority of mobile devices can render HTML well, the best compromise is to create...
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CAN-SPAM: Basic real-world compliance tips for marketers
In 2003, the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography And Marketing Act (CAN-SPAM Act) became law. It was a big step toward cleaning up the "Wild West" of email marketing.
Continuing that clean-up, earlier this year the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) modified the act, allowing email marketers to use their "accurately registered post office box or private mailbox" instead of a "valid physical postal address" in their emails. The CAN-SPAM act, however, has not changed much over the years and should be
followed not only because it is the law but also because it will make you a better email marketer. How Your Email Service Provider (ESP) Should Help Reputable ESPs make it very easy to comply with key CAN-SPAM provisions...
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What's stressing out Americans?
It's no secret that Americans are stressed out. But even with everyone from Manhattan to Manhattan Beach pointing to stress as the cause of headaches, increasing waistlines and ruined relationships, not everyone experiences stress in the same way--especially from city to city.
The recently released 2008 Stress in America Survey from the American Psychological Association, which polled 1,791 U.S. adults along with 250 in each of eight major cities, concluded that--no shock here--Americans are a bunch of worriers. Thirty percent of participants reported chronic "extreme stress," with another 50% reporting
regular stress levels in the moderate range. But what's striking about Americans' stress is that there are, in some cases, major differences from city to city in what causes all the hair pulling...
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