7 Marketing Lessons for Businesses from the Super Bowl

Running a small business is a lot of pressure. But, what if 110 million people were watching you everyday like at the Super Bowl? This is the type of stress that businesses face when they advertise by spending $3M for a 30-second Super Bowl commercial.
For some consumers, the commercials are a very popular part of the event. Super Bowl ads have produced many breakthrough moments in television and many more bombs. There are memorable commercials from the 2010 Super Bowl like Betty White for Snickers and the Old Spice Man, and 2011 Super Bowl's Doritos. But there have been many more horrible ads like Pets.com sock puppet.

So without spending millions of dollars, what can your business learn by watching Super Bowl commercials?

1. Bring a cliché to life (Snickers). The advantage of cliché’s is that everyone immediately "gets" them. The danger is in having your marketing become part of the cliché itself. Snickers brought the cliché of your friends comparing your effort on the football field to that of an old woman by showing Betty White on the football field. The tagline - "you are not you when you're hungry." It was a moment most guys can relate to and used humor to bring home their overall strategic message for the candy bar ... which is that it conquers hunger.

2. Make your competition the bad guy (Comcast & Teleflora) - Comcast had an ad featuring an overeager Verizon rep ready to bring out the heavy machinery to rip up your front lawn in an effort to install their new Fios lines. Teleflora poked fun for the second year in a row at their competitors who send flowers in a box. What both ads managed to do is give the viewer a very clear portrayal of the bad guy (ie - their competition) and therefore positioned themselves as the far better choice as a result. A relatively straightforward marketing tactic that is applicable no matter what your marketing budget happens to be.

3. Tap the cultural zeitgeist (Audi) - For Audi's ad touting their new A3 (a "green" environmentally friendly car), they showed a vision of a world where the "green police" were a real group. For anyone who has had a passionately believer in all things green as a friend or colleague, this concept of the green police is very recognizable. With the increasing attention from all angles (the media, your friends, your kids, etc.) on being green, all you need to do is make one simple choice to get the A3 and you'll be travelling in the faster green lane on the road and give yourself a "get out of jail free card" in relation to the environment. A powerful message.

4. Be the statement your customer makes. (Dodge & Flo TV) - I wrote on my own blog this week about the recurring theme in this year's Super Bowl of the "emasculated man" who is portrayed as having little of his own will left after giving up much of it to his wife/girlfriend. This is, of course, a caricature of men, however the more interesting marketing strategy is that both Dodge and Flo TV positioned their products as the "last stand" that a man can make to keep his manhood. In other words, buy a subscription to our service or get our car and you will be a man again. See how the power of making a big statement works?

5. Appeal to your customer's ego (Dove & Cars.com) - In stark contrast to the concept of the ads in #4, both Dove and Cars.com presented a much more positive portrayal of today's man. Dove pitched their product to men who are "comfortable in their own skin" and Cars.com used a child prodigy/man-of-the-world character to show how even renaissance men need help with buying a new car. The lesson from both was that sometimes you can also use the ideal vision of themselves that your customers have to position your product as the enlightened choice.

6. Don’t risk everything at once. In small business marketing, it is far safer and more effective to spread your bets by testing many different marketing methods. Homeaway.com took a big risk for a small company running their second Super Bowl ad this year. For your small business, it is far more effective to take patient interim steps. After your company has learned what works and doesn’t work in your marketing campaign, plot the next step. With limited capital, small businesses can’t afford the risk of a “one and done” strategy.

7. Track how the marketing tactic performed. Most companies have a variety of things they do to promote their business. Spending money on marketing is worthless unless your business knows what worked and what did not work. It is essential to get feedback on all aspects of your campaign. It is simple with today’s technology to ask the consumer in the targeted segment to go to your website or use a social media tool to judge results. The Ford Focus commercial encouraged the audience to cheer on their team online and “Watch, Compete, and Win."

What You Can Learn From Apple To Market Your Store

The Apple store turned 10 this past May celebrating a spectacular and surprising success. Back in 2001 when the first two stores opened in Tysons Corner, Virginia and Glendale, California, it seemed like a crazy and desperate idea, writes Peter Gorenstein, financial blogger.

Critics asked, "why would a technology company like Apple open a brick and mortar store when the future of commerce is moving online?"

"Literally half the store is devoted to solutions because people don't just want to buy personal computers any more. They want to know what they can do with them," was Steve Jobs' answer, in a video presented at MacWorld just days before the first grand opening. Like so many of his decisions over the last decade Jobs was right.



Today, with its 300 stores across the country, and more than $9 billion in retail sales last year, Apple is arguably the most successful retailer on the planet based on sales per square foot, says Peter Gorenstein, finance writer.

According to a recent MacWorld article Jeweler Tiffany & Company's $2,700 per square foot used to be considered the gold standard, but Apple has surpassed Tiffany, generating more than $4,000 in sales per square foot. By comparison, Best Buy's sales per square foot is about $1,000, and Walmart's is about $400.

Apple has been able dominate at a time so many other retailers are struggling or have gone out of business, due in part to Apple's iPod, iPhone, iPad, Mac and iTunes offerings.
Remember Virgin, Tower, and all those independently owned music stores? You might, but your kids may not. They've been buying music on iTunes and using their iPods for as long as they can remember.

Many suspected electronics giant Best Buy would benefit when its top rival Circuit City went under. That hasn't happened. Best Buy has reported three straight quarters of declining same-store sales, including a 5.5% drop in U.S. stores in the last quarter.

Borders filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last winter but Barnes & Noble isn't likely to see an increase in business, what with Amazon and the iPad and all the tablet copycats popping up. Meanwhile, direct competitors like Microsoft and Dell have had little success with their retail stores. It's unlikely fans of either will be lining up outside their doors when the next version of Windows is released.

The lesson Apple offers is to give customers a chance to interact with your product, test it out and ask questions. Going to your store should be an experience for your customers regardless of the product you sell. The more time customers spend in your store, the more comfortable they will be with your product and the more likely they will be to buy.

5 Tips for Using Online Video to Market Your Small Business

For small businesses, getting noticed online is a challenge, particularly when competing with big brands with large marketing departments and seemingly endless marketing budgets. But more and more local companies are finding success cutting through the clutter with online video. Statistics show that video improves online visibility and drives more action online than plain images and text. For example, according to the BIA Kelsey Group, viewers engage more after watching a video, with clicks for more information increasing by 30-40% and phone inquiries by 16-20%.

Unlike the hefty price tags associated with TV advertising, online video is affordable for businesses of any size. And you don’t have to be Scorsese to make video work either, says Morgan Brown, marketing director at TurnHere.
Whether you choose to do-it-yourself or hire a pro, marketing your business with online video doesn’t end with the production. Remember, videos need to be seen. Here are a few tips to help you make the most out of your video marketing:

1. Aim for Authentic, Actionable Content
Don’t worry about stock photography, templates, or videographers who will make you look like all their other clients. Be authentic. Be personal. After all, this is your big chance to highlight your strengths and show what really makes you different. Keep the video short and the less scripted, the better — since customers are jaded by typical sales pitches and marketing buzzwords. Creating authentic video that captures the human element behind any business allows customers to connect on a personal level.

And don’t forget to incorporate a call to action. While your authentic video builds trust and drives action, viewers must be given a reason and a way to call you, visit your website, or stop by your store. Be sure to include some action path — for example, a trackable URL, a coupon, discount code, or unique phone number to call. This not only encourages viewers to engage with you, but also provides a tangible way to measure the results of your video.

2. Optimize Video for Google Search
The advent of blended or universal search has changed the search game. Search engines now display more and more videos, images, blogs, maps, and books in their results. These new search algorithms weigh video heavily, giving you a great opportunity to increase your relevance in search results (and even achieve that coveted first page ranking on Google). In fact, Forrester Research ran an experiment on the top-searched keywords and discovered that videos have an 11,000-to-1 chance of appearing on the first page of Google’s results, while text has a 500,000-to-1 chance of making it on the first page — in short, video has a 50 times better chance than plain text for getting to the top of search rankings.
Even with this incredible opportunity, many marketers don’t yet think about making their video Google-friendly. There are several simple steps you can take to optimize your online video content.

3. Add Video to Your Facebook Page
Most likely, your Facebook fans are already customers — the social network gives you the chance to strengthen existing relationships, build your brand, present special offers, as well as find some new customers as you reach into the extended networks of your current fan base. On Facebook, use video to show the human side of your company. Think fun and creative. Show a ‘behind the scenes’ peak at your office or shop. Use video to announce a new contest or special. Post video highlights of past events, customer testimonials, etc.

4. Put Video on YouTube and Other Video Sites
YouTube has quickly grown from a network of user-generated content to become an invaluable repository of content. Next to Google, YouTube is the second largest search engine, with more than 3.5 billion queries a month according to comScore. YouTube and other video sites are great vehicles to reach an audience who might not find you otherwise. Best of all, you can create a branded YouTube channel and host your videos without incurring any bandwidth costs. And don’t worry — you don’t necessarily have to create the next viral sensation to find success on YouTube. Small businesses can create valuable new relationships and build sales without generating a million views.

5. Add Video to Your Google Local Business Listing
By adding video to your business listing on Google Local, you’ll be able to tell your story and connect with those people who are looking for your products or services, at the very point in time when they’re actively researching or ready to buy. This ultra-targeted form of marketing is highly effective for driving clicks and calls. And amid a list of company names, addresses, and phone numbers, an engaging video brings your listing to life and sets you apart from the crowd.

Most Importantly – Get Started

There’s no time like the present to get started with video. While spare time is always in short supply for the small business owner, online video can be less time intensive and is relatively low cost compared with other marketing initiatives. Most importantly, video will reap dividends in both the short and long term.

Bon Jovi’s Strategy to Succeed in Business through Time

Bon Jovi the band took home $125 million over the past 12 months by FORBES' estimates, more than any other music act besides U2--and more than relative whippersnappers Justin Bieber, Katy Perry and Kanye West combined. In the past year the band has played 74 gigs in 15 nations, grossing $203 million in ticket sales and $20 million in merchandise; Bon Jovi ranks No. 8 on this year's Celebrity 100. Bon Jovi was named the #1 worldwide touring act of 2010, according to Billboard. The iconic band scored the top-grossing spot for the second time in just three years, an achievement that only Bon Jovi, The Rolling Stones and The Grateful Dead have earned.

Surprised? Throughout his career, Jon Bon Jovi has plunged into every venture not as pretty-faced front man, but as a passionate entrepreneur and a successful marketer who guided his own career through the fever-chart topography of pop music, selling 100 million albums and counting. Bon Jovi out-earns younger, glitzier acts thanks to a relatively affluent, aging fan base who turn out to hear the ballads of their youth and see a tightly run touring machine built on decades of experience.

Whereas Lady Gaga schleps dozens of dancers from town to town and needs 28 trucks to cart her equipment, Bon Jovi typically plays with six people. A dozen trucks carry the gear, including a circular stage and 192 double-sided LED video screens connected with a specially designed motion control system, which allows them to come together to form a screen 13 feet high and 40 feet wide. At arenas like Montreal's 21,500-capacity Bell Center, the in-theround setup lets the band sell up to 5,500 more tickets than a traditional arena stage would. Wherever possible, Bon Jovi plays consecutive nights at the same venue to cut back on setup and strike costs. By playing 12 shows in 19 days at London's O2 arena the band saved $300,000.

On the revenue side the band's U.S. fans sport an average household income of $78,989, slightly higher than the mean for the 350 music groups tracked by research firm NPD's Brand Link database. The economic difference between Bon Jovi's fans and those of, say, Justin Bieber ($71,389) or Metallica ($71,089) is more than enough to cover a pricey special like the Crush Package, which comes with a grab bag of perks and tchotchkes, including souvenir lanyards, autographed lithographs and two front-row seats that you can fold up and take home after the show. The average cost for this VIP treatment is $2,550 per couple; low-end alternatives set you back $450. Bon Jovi sells an average of 600 individual special package tickets per arena show. Though regular tickets start at $20, these packages push Bon Jovi's average price to $95, about 50% higher than acts like the Dave Matthews Band ($59) and the Black Eyed Peas ($63). Bon Jovi shows have up to 20 different price points, including special packages; on a recent tour AC/DC offered only one.

Born in 1962 in Perth Amboy, N.J., a rough port town just south of New York City, John Francis Bongiovi Jr. decided to be a rock star at age 13 after seeing the Doobie Brothers in Erie, Pa. His break came when he wrote and recorded the song "Runaway." He sent his tape out to record labels but didn't receive any responses. So in 1983 he took his cassette to Long Island's WAPP, a station so new it didn't yet have a receptionist. He banged on the window of the DJ's booth and convinced him to play the song. Within months it hit number 39 on the Billboard charts. "That same cassette that was sitting on every record guy's desk was suddenly getting me phone calls," he says.

Mercury Records signed Bon Jovi that year. He clipped his name to Jon Bon Jovi and recruited guitarist Richie Sambora, drummer Tico Torres, keyboardist David Bryan and bassist Alec John Such to form his band. They're still together (minus Such, who left the band in 1994), but it isn't an equal partnership: Jon Bon Jovi keeps the bulk of the earnings, whereas bands like U2 split proceeds evenly.

Jon is the CEO of Jon Bon Jovi Enterprises where he is intimately involved with every business venture from research to marketing. As CEO he doesn’t believe in overhead and runs it lean and mean. “I've got just two people here. I've been self-managed for 19 years now. I had a creative falling out with my manager at the time, and the options were to go to another big management company -- and be a part of the puzzle -- or create my own. Twenty percent was just going out the window for something that wasn't necessary. My record deal was done. CAA was booking the tour. I just had to handle the creative and continue my relationships with the record company; I've been with the same record company for 20 years,” Bon Jovi said.

When Grunge transformed Rock many thought it would be the end of the band, but Jon implemented a new business strategy by entering other markets in Europe and Asia. His business success is very much grounded in authenticity –customers know when you’re faking it. “I'm not trying to be the 18-year-old new kid. And I'm not hanging out with Bob Dylan and Tom Petty and Bruce Springsteen and pretending I'm an old guy. I'm just me. Every time I release a song I know I may have to sing it in 20 years, so therefore I better be happy with it, really happy with it, and not do it just because it's going to be a hit,” Jon said.

There is a story that Jon once took some tracks to a pizza parlor and did a focus group with kids. “We were making demos for what was our third album in Sayreville, N.J. -- my hometown -- in a little demo studio. The game of telephone makes it sound like I was so smart to poll these people. But the truth is that I went around the corner to have a pizza, and a bunch of kids were in there, and they said we know you guys, you made two records, blah, blah, blah. So we invited a dozen of them back, and their reaction to various songs helped influence the decision-making.” His business advice? “Have failures because it strengthens you as an individual. The diversity that is part of my career has been great to help me learn about who I am and where I want to go.”

A Marketing Lesson from the Apocalypse

This is a post by Seth Godin, blogger and marketer

If you're reading this blog, then the world didn't end, at least in my time zone.

How does one market the end of the world? After all, you don't have a big ad budget. Your 'product' is something that has been marketed again and again through the ages and it has never worked. There's significant peer pressure not to buy it...

And yet, every time, people succumb. They sell their belongings, stop paying into their kid's college fund and create tension and despair.

Here's the simple lesson:

Sell a story that some people want to believe. In fact, sell a story they already believe.

The story has to be integrated into your product. The iPad, for example, wasn't something that people were clamoring for... but the story of it, the magic tablet, the universal book, the ticket to the fashion-geek tribe--there was a line out the door for that. The same way that every year we see a new music sensation or a new fashion superstar. That's not an accident. That story is just waiting for someone to wear it.

And the some part is vital. Not everyone wants to believe in the end of the world, but some people (fortunately, just a few) really do. To reach them, you don't need much of a hard sell at all.

Too often marketers take a product and try to invent a campaign. Much more effective is to find a tribe, find a story and make a product that resonates, one that makes the story work.

That's the whole thing. A story that resonates and a tribe that's tight and small and eager.

I hope you can dream up something more productive than the end of the world, though. 

Build Fan/Customer Loyalty With A '2C2R' Approach

In a still-uncertain economic climate, sports marketers are rightfully putting greater emphasis on customer loyalty and fan experience. Jon Last, president of Sports and Leisure Research Group spoke at a golf industry conference about an approach he developed to address this, known as "2C2R." The four elements are:

1. Communication: The best loyalty marketing efforts take great care in crafting the right type and frequency of marketing communication to best customers. They recognize that one mass message is often insufficient in establishing the "one-to-one" bond that demonstrates to a best customer that they are valued and appreciated. Further, the communication acknowledges unique needs and articulates a solution, rather than simply a sales proposition.

2. Community: Effective fan communities bring people of shared needs together in a meaningful and honest exchange. We applied it for a cruise line by offering forums for future passengers to meet in advance of their sailings, for past guests to share memories together and through special events that fostered literal community building within local markets. Finding the right approach can often be as simple as conducting needs assessment and concept testing research.

3. Recognition: Best-of-breed loyalty efforts go out of their way to make the customer feel special. A great example was when I returned to a favorite hotel after about a three-year lapse. To my surprise and delight, the agent at registration welcomed me back and asked me if I would like the same room that I stayed in during my most recent visit.

The gesture cost the hotel nothing, but it demonstrated commitment to cultivating customer relationships. Recognition can be as simple as remembering birthdays or distributing commemorative pins or apparel that fans can wear as badges of honor, distinguishing themselves from others. It's a soft-sell approach that shows appreciation and doesn't tarnish your brand through discounting.

4. Reward: Many marketers skip immediately to this step, associating good customer retention efforts solely with points and reward programs. While research has demonstrated the efficacy of offering aspirational "carrots at the end of sticks" to acknowledge long-term loyalty, too many sports marketers falsely assume that fans will become as locked in on the prize as they are.

In countless loyalty research that we have conducted, clients are often underwhelmed to observe how unwilling the customer is to engage in a new points program or track their behaviors for far-off rewards. The key is to reward frequently in soft and subtle ways, while making the pursuit of long-term rewards as seamless and self managing as possible. We've heard in too many focus groups, "Please don't give me another points card to carry around!"

It Starts with Research

Like any CRM approach, identifying the right consumers for targeted offerings is both art and science. But even absent sophisticated databases and mining systems, a fundamental research audit of the customer base can enable sports brands to segment their customers by demographics, attitudes, past behaviors and defined need states.

We've often deployed a research approach where we measure these perceptions and behaviors between disparate groups of customers and prospects and look for gaps that can suggest the right tactical marketing approaches to reach each group. Concept testing is another means in which specific rewards, recognition offerings and communications approaches can be evaluated.

Regardless of the specifics of your own marketing efforts towards best customers, or the breadth of loyalty research that you conduct, remembering the principles of 2C2R and incorporating them into your program can be a valuable first step in differentiating your brand from competitors and breaking through the clutter of too many look-alike programs.

A Marketing Lesson From American Idol

Have you noticed how often incompetent people are supremely confident? Not just auditioning for American Idol, but throughout life?

Professor Justin Kruger and graduate student David Dunning of Cornell University studied this effect in their 1999 paper, Unskilled and Unaware of It. Their conclusion: those who knew the least rated themselves most knowledgeable, and those who actually understood the topic were far less sure of themselves.

This result has been confirmed in multiple follow-up studies involving several skills and fields of expertise. It is known as the Dunning-Kruger effect, says marketing consultant Chuck McKay.

Which begs the question: why does this happen?

Answer: the basic skills and awareness needed for competency are exactly the same skills necessary to evaluate the competency.

Their lack of knowledge (incompetence) prevents them from recognizing their lack of knowledge (incompetence). People don’t know what they don’t know. They don’t even know where to look or how to look at it.

And it doesn’t dawn on them that skilled performers DO know this stuff, until they’re exposed, dramatically to their own ignorance. Until then, they delude their incompetent selves into illusions of confident competency.

If you’ve ever wondered how:
• people who can't articulate the issues, still feel confident casting their vote (or making inflammatory statements);
• how people with no experience teaching, know exactly what's wrong with our education system; and
• how those who have never studied investing, can blithely plow their life savings into the real estate market
Incompetence leads people to make poor choices. Incompetence prevents them from realizing they make poor choices. This is the Dunning-Kruger Effect (DK). On the other end of the DK continuum, competent people tend to rate themselves lower than they should. Their internal voices seem to say, "Hey, everyone knows this."

The dumb get confident; the intelligent get doubtful. And to a greater or lesser degree we're all guilty.

How Biased Feedback Makes it Even Worse

Imagine a typical Friday night in any typical neighborhood watering hole. The regular crowd shuffles in. One of them, Miss Karaoke Singer, is recognized by the rest as being the "best" in the club.

What kind of feedback does she get?

Do any of the other contestants tell her that her breath control is bad, her vibrato unnatural, or mention the odd affectation she's developed? Hardly. They don't know anything about nuanced performance. Since the only feedback she gets is positive, she thinks she's good.

Good? No, FANTASTIC! The Dunning-Kruger effect helps her to believe she's ready for American Idol!

Then comes the audition.

The judges tell her she's a poor singer. Her own incompetence prevents her from understanding what they're telling her. These judges must be stupid. After all, she just gave a great performance.

She gets angry. Tells off the judges. Not because she's defending herself. Not because she's trying not to look bad in front of her supporters. But because she's completely incapable of understanding just how bad she is.

Advertising That Doesn’t Work Probably Has More to Do With Dunning-Kruger Than Advertising

Much like our karaoke singer, every city has an advertiser who, rather than admit his advertising strategy and execution are flawed, convinces himself that advertising doesn’t work.

Does anyone in Mr. Businessman's entourage tell him his ads have nothing substantive to say? That they don’t speak to the buyer in natural language, and instead just spew out ad clichés like "fast, friendly, service?" Does anyone tell him that putting his kid and his dog in the ad won’t convince anyone to buy things from him?

Or more technically, does anyone tell our businessman that his ads don’t have enough frequency to make an impact? That he’s using the wrong medium? That his competition has effectively co-opted his position?

No. His friends get a kick out of seeing him on TV, or in the paper, or on radio, and the only feedback Mr. Businessman gets is positive. He thinks he's good.

Until he sees his sales figures. Plummeting or flat-lined sales force a confrontation with reality, and it’s the rare businessman indeed who doesn’t address his frustration and anger at advertising medium - or on advertising in general. Hence, the near-ubiquitous refrain of: "I tried advertising and it didn’t work."

Unfortunately for Mr. Businessman, if he doesn’t want to follow Miss Karaoke Singer back to waiting tables, he still needs to get more customers. And fast!

How Small Clients Can Get the Best Ads And Grow to Become Big Companies

The thing about big fish / small pond business owners is, they often believe their success in one field translates to competency in almost everything else. Rather than leveraging the expertise of their ad man, they’ll bully him until they get the kind of ads they want - ads full of Dunning-Kruger-esque follies.

But sometimes business owners who are genuinely good at what they do manage to overcome the Dunning-Kruger effect. They find a professional to bring to them the same hard-won competency and expertise they offer to their own customers.

Its much like what happens when a truly talented singer gets on American Idol: with the right direction and promotion, some dreams do come true.

What about you?

Are you an average karaoke singer? Or a true star in search of the right stage and the right spotlight? Knowing which is critical when you're fishing for customers.

How to Increase Landing Page Conversions by 45%

Marketers are a nosy bunch, says the 60 Second Marketer. We want to know your name, age, gender, location, occupation, hobbies and pretty much anything else you are willing to tell us. And for the most part, we have good reason. We have been trained since Marketing 101 that the more information that we can gather about our consumers and prospects, the better.

If we know certain key facts about people, we can put relevant products and offers in front of them, increasing the likelihood of a sale. However, sometimes the tactics we use gather information, such as requiring users to create accounts or fill out lengthy contact forms, actually lower our ability to make a sale, says Nicole Hall, account manager with Mobilize Worldwide.

It's rare for someone to get excited about filling out an online form. And the people who do get excited by this probably aren't the people you'd want to be affiliated with anyway.

Take the example given in Luke Wroblewski’s book, Web Form Design: Filling in the Blanks about an ecommerce site that required users to register or login to make a purchase. The company surveyed their customers and found that both first time purchasers and returning users were frustrated by this seemingly unnecessary process. In an experiment, the company changed the wording on their site to read: “You do not need to create an account to make purchases on our site. Simply click Continue to proceed to checkout. To make your future purchases even faster, you can create an account during checkout.”

The results were an astonishing 45% lift in consumer purchases, which translates to $15 million in additional revenue in just the first month and $300 million over the first year.

And this does not appear to be an isolated example. Research conducted by Janrain and eMarketer reported that when encountered with a registration form, a mere 25% of respondents say they complete it and even worse, 17% are driven to competitors’ sites. And, in case you missed the irony, this is drawing from a pool of people who agreed to answer a survey about how willing they are to answer questions. Just imagine the responses of all those who blew off the survey!

Unfortunately, registration forms aren’t the only culprit of driving away prospects by being too invasive. Lengthy, over the top “Contact Us” forms can be just as dangerous. Imaginary Landscape, a web technology company, performed a study in which their website featured a contact us page with 11 questions and a contact page that had only 4 questions. In the 2 month study, the number of forms submitted on the 4-question contact us page increased 160% and the conversion rate increased 120% over the 11 question page.

This example highlights the simple fact that less is more. Once a prospect has gone to your contact page, they are already looking to engage with your brand, so don’t get greedy. In initial contact, ask only the necessary information to contact them again in the future, and leave the follow up questions for a later time.

The bottom line is that purpose of your site is to get customers to interact with your brand and make purchases, so don’t make them jump through hoops to do so. With online privacy concerns reaching a fever pitch and consumers’ demands for convenience at an all time high, asking too many questions can cause customers to put their credit cards back in their wallets and your competitors sites back on their screens.

Information is nice, but don’t let your love for statistics, Excel spreadsheets and pie charts get in the way of the main goal. The next time you are tempted to ask for your consumers’ favorite Beach Boys song before you allow them to purchase a beach towel, ask yourself if the information is worth the risk of alienating your consumers. It may not be.

Rethink the Hispanic Market

In the last few years, we have witnessed growth in Hispanic marketing. This is sometimes a well-developed plan and, at other times, it is something of a short-sighted one. In both cases, however, the definition of the Hispanic customer is often one dimensional.
Even as we've witnessed the growth in interest on the part of marketers, we have also seen the Hispanic market rapidly maturing in multiple dimensions. Examples include a proliferation of ad campaigns targeting Spanish speakers and the continued growth of media sources geared toward consumption by the Hispanic market.

Interestingly, it is at the moment this market seems to have arrived that it is changing in ways that will again challenge businesses. It is precisely at the point where the Hispanic market has become large enough to warrant such interest that it is changing and becoming something altogether new.

The Emerging Biculturalism

Marketers obviously need to be well informed to successfully merchandise a brand to Hispanic consumers, but before they can take that step they must define what it is they mean by "Hispanic." Identity and language are dynamic, and so how we perceive ourselves changes with our community at a given moment, allowing us multiple identities within a day.

The same can be said for a brand as people internalize it. One extremely difficult but fundamentally important piece of information is coming to an understanding that "Hispanic" is a loaded term and changes meaning frequently. Because ethnic identity is fluid, it means people work within a set of roles that are created in social interaction with other people. As people change, so does the meaning of "Hispanic."

A great deal has been written about levels of acculturation and the ongoing shift from Hispanic and/or ethnic dominant cultural patterns to bicultural cultural patterns. Material is continually being written about how this shift will reshape key issues in marketing, the role of language, and the continuation of aspiration advertising.

There are, as might be expected, individuals and companies conducting research to dispel the fact that language use and language preferences are changing. Of course, they have a vested interest in promoting a Spanish-language focus. On the other side, there are those who embrace the notion that English is playing an increasing role in the lives of Hispanics.

Degrees of Language Loyalty

The reality is that increasingly, the norm lies somewhere in between and that there are varying degrees of language loyalty on any given day. Considering this segment is growing at twice the rate of other Hispanic segments, it is a significant issue. They have more disposable income, higher levels of education, and a greater influence on popular culture at large.

What this means for companies reaching out to Hispanics is that the would-be consumer target is in the process of becoming something entirely new. Targeting these evolving consumers will no doubt lead to increased awareness and profits, but understanding them, reaching them and deciding how they fit into a broader business strategy is decidedly complex and requires a subtle approach.

As the market matures and becomes a fixture of the larger American experience, the question is less about whether or not the Hispanic market is viable and a point of growth. Instead, it is about uncovering how we respond in the long term.

Inevitably, as companies increase their presence in the Hispanic market, they invariably change its nature and help create something new. It is the companies who can think creatively and act quickly that will succeed in this newly developing conversation and approach to understanding.

5 Small Business Marketing Secrets from Big Box Retailers

Big box retailers like Target and Walmart have marketing down to a science and rarely do they stray from these tried and methods.  It’s worth it to take a look at these successful retailers to see what strategies they use that might work for your business too, advices marketer Wendy Kenney.

1.         The Secret of Reach: Big box retailers understand that the secret of success is in the numbers, large numbers that is.  So they focus on reaching out to the masses through media such as television, radio, newspaper and direct mail with a focus on their target market.  The idea is the more people in your pipeline, the more people you can convert to qualified buyers.    Now if you own a small home-based business, I’m not suggesting you advertise in the Sunday paper to gain more customers.  However, the law of large numbers remains true.  To be more profitable, reach out to a large quantity of targeted prospects.

2.         The Secret of Consistency: Big box retailers also understand the concept of out of sight, out of mind.  That’s why they employ a consistent advertising strategy.  Grocery stores mail out sale ads every Wednesday and put them in the Wednesday newspaper.  Consumer goods stores like Target put out ads in the Sunday paper.   Furthermore, they use strategies like social media, email marketing, and television advertising all in an effort to keep their brand in front of their target customer on a regular basis.

3.         The Secret of the Loss Leader: A loss leader is a marketing strategy in which a business offers a product or service at a price that is not profitable.  Stores like Walmart, Target, and Best Buy understand that in order to entice consumers into your store to buy there’s no better way than to offer a great deal on a product they may want or need to use every day.  The idea is that the customer will buy other, more profitable, products once they get into the store.   Of course, be careful when using this strategy.  Make sure the manufacturer allows you to price your product as a loss leader.  Also make sure that you have enough of the item in store.

4.         The Secret of Psychological Pricing: Studies have shown the consumers have emotional reactions to the way that prices are displayed, and make decisions accordingly.  Because of the way we read numbers, $19.99 appears significantly less than $20, and therefore appears to be a better value.   This could work well for a business that is focusing on being a value leader.  Walmart takes this one step further by using prices ending in numbers like 8, 4, and 3, perhaps as another way to cement their low price image.

Another pricing strategy, when offering a discount or a sale price, always make sure you show the original price as well, this shows context so that the customer can determine if they are indeed getting a great deal  and value.  Perhaps your item is not on sale but the manufacturers recommended price is $49.99 while you’re selling it for $39.99, showing this difference can clearly communicate value to the customer thus encouraging them to buy.

5.         The Secret of New: There is something exciting about discovering new things which is why you see stores like Target rotating inventory, moving things around, and selling Halloween candy in August.  Newness is noticeable, newness is fun and newness sells.  If you want buyers to keep coming back time after time, bring in new stuff on a regular basis and give them another reason to visit.

As a business owner, you can have the best product, best pricing and best service in the world, but unless you market your business (that is tell your potential buyers all about it) you won’t make a lot of money.  By employing the marketing strategies of big box retailers like Target and Walmart you’ll soon be on your way to sales success.

New Technology Requires a New Market Research Paradigm

Karlene Lukovitz reports for Marketing Daily that while the Internet and social media are a potential boon to market researchers, they've also raised concerns and ongoing debate about methodology and the ability to project results.
Now, one social media-based research firm is charging into the fray with a report that maintains that today's empowered consumers and marketers' need for faster, actionable insights requires an approach that combines the strengths of newer, "humanistic" approaches with those of traditional, experimentally-based research.
The principals of Communispace, which employs relatively small (generally 300 - 500) proprietary communities for market research clients such as The Coca-Cola Company, PepsiCo and GlaxoSmithKline, say that their goal is to encourage industry conversation about the "trade-offs" involved in the two approaches and how to best leverage both, given the now "blurred" boundaries between marketing and customer research. They maintain that it's time to stop equating research quality with scientific "purity," and use brand-transparent community engagement to generate insights and explore nuances of consumer attitudes and preferences on an ongoing basis, while using traditional blind, episodic, experimental research designs for confirmation and testing purposes. This means shifting our focus -- aiming not for the perfect, bias-free study, but for an approach that pragmatically applies a range of methods to generate and test hypotheses.

While some might well point out that a firm engaged in offering proprietary online community research is bound to have its own biases, in an interview with Marketing Daily, Wittes Schlack and Austin pointed out that the report includes examples and comments from consumer market researchers based on their own experiences, and stressed that Communispace is advocating achieving a pragmatic integration of approaches that reflects 21st-century realities, rather than an either/or mentality.
Humanistic or "consumer-focused" online/social media-driven research enables an "ongoing discovery process" that allows consumers and the brand to explore new questions and issues as they arise naturally from a conversation, the Communispace report notes. In contrast, "top-down, researcher-centric" methods are most useful for "confirming what is already known or suspected," since these methods by definition "do not expand a problem space, nor do they generate knowledge outside of the researcher's frame of reference."

While concerns about the ability to project results to a general population, and the risks of bias or "group think" in brand-transparent scenarios in which consumers interact, are understandable based on the traditional research mindset, they fail to take into account changing real-world dynamics. Given that most consumers are now online, the Internet population is rapidly becoming the general population and the artificial environment of blind-sponsorship studies conflicts with the reality that "today's consumers do continually influence one another."

Contrary to intuitive assumptions that consumers are reluctant to be honest or critical of a brand or product idea if the sponsorship is transparent, a "natural," conversational environment that encourages consumers to be active collaborators rather than study subjects leads to greater candor as the relationship progresses. When people feel involved, they feel ownership toward the brand, and they are frank because they don't want you to make mistakes that will undermine the product or brand. Having an intimate conversation with consumers provides a more revealing, true-to-life picture.

Mystique as a Marketing Tactic

Alan Klein's obsession with the McRib began when he was growing up on a hog farm in South Dakota. The 28-year-old meteorologist, who now lives in Minnesota, justified his craving by saying that eating McRibs supported the family business. Three years ago, he launched the McRib Locator where visitors can inquire about and report McRib sightings. Mr. Klein says he gets 300 to 400 hits a week. On Sunday, the site's U.S. map showed a cluster of sightings in the Chicago and Detroit areas. The latest: New Baltimore, Mich.

Before traveling to visit his parents in Nebraska last winter, Jeremy Duensing consulted what he always checks before a trip: the "McRib Locator" website. To his delight, he found a McDonald's restaurant near Omaha that, unlike most of the burger chain's 14,000 U.S. restaurants, had the McRib on its menu. He bought six of the pork sandwiches, ate one right away at the restaurant, and carried the rest home to Burnsville, Minn., in an ice-packed cooler.

The McRib actually has nothing to do with ribs. It's a boneless pork patty molded into the shape of a rib slab and adorned with pickles, onions and barbecue sauce on a bun. The sandwich made its debut in 1981. But McRibs are almost never available at all McDonald's restaurants at the same time. Instead, the Oak Brook, Ill., company offers them in different cities at different times, rarely for longer than a few weeks. The sandwich's elusiveness has created a fan base of people who go to considerable lengths to munch on a McRib. Ryan Dixon of Burbank, Calif., once drove 10 hours to Medford, Ore., after hearing a McDonald's there was selling the sandwich. On Nov. 2, for the first time in 16 years, McDonald's Corp. will offer the McRib at outlets across the U.S., but even then, only for six weeks or so. "It doesn't sell well all year long because people get tired of it," says McDonald's USA President Jan Fields.

Derided by some as "mystery meat," the McRib has served as the inspiration for a Simpsons episode about a "Ribwich," and appeared on David Letterman Top 10 lists and in the movie Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, in which a character cites the McRib as an example of African-American Irish culture. Nearly 300 Facebook groups are devoted to the sandwich, including "Bring back the McRib, Please," with more than 500 members. A McDonald's spokeswoman said the company isn't behind any of the McRib fan groups on Facebook and that there is no connection between McDonald's or any of its McRib lovers.

Plenty of companies offer limited-time products to coincide with holidays or promotions. Burger King offered actual ribs for a while this year. Mars Inc. sells red and green M&M's at Christmas. For McDonald's, with about $23 billion in annual revenue, these sorts of items might be considered a drop in the bucket. While the chain says it sold more than 60 million McRib sandwiches in the last three years, it sold 1.5 billion Big Macs in the same period. But every sale counts in a business that demands month after month of strong same-store sales.

"A tenth of a point in sales at McDonald's is a lot of money," says Dennis Lombardi, executive vice president for WD Partners, an Ohio restaurant design and development firm. "There's a certain percentage of people, when a product is not available, that crave it, and for the short amount of time that it's available again, it stimulates traffic."

The franchiser has helped cultivate the McRib mystique. Five years ago, one of the company's marketing regions in the South said it was permanently removing McRibs from all restaurants and announced a "McRib Farewell Tour." At the same time, the region created a "Save the McRib" website sponsored by the fake "Boneless Pig Farmers Association of America." The sandwich continues to be sold on and off in the region.

WOM: Paranormal Activity Case Study

Movie studios and music houses are tapping social media not only to generate digital word-of-mouth (WOM) appeal - a strategy first deployed to great success with the Blair Witch Project more than 10 years ago - but also to listen to fans' judgments of film and music and make decisions based on them.
According to Marketing Vox, though Hollywood has always intuitively understood the power of WOM marketing, such buzz usually paled in comparison to the publicity generated by mammoth-sized advertising and promotion budgets. Now, those budgets are not quite so large, and thanks to the viral nature of social web, WOM has become an important communication channel in its own right.
Twitter and Facebook, perhaps not surprisingly, are the two main WOM platforms used by movie studios. Studios are also using Twitter and Facebook to track movies that prove unpopular with viewers as well.
The movie "Paranormal Activity" was a $7.9 million box office hit on its first weekend last year in large part because of the online viral campaign that accompanied it. Part of what made the original "Paranormal Activity" such a topic of conversation last year was how it took audiences by surprise. The trailers didn't give away much of the story, showing how audiences reacted to the movie more than the actual footage. While some of the buzz was genuinely favorable reaction from viewers, some of it was also studio produced. The trailer, instead of typical scenes from the movie, was instead a clip on how defibrillators fell short during the test screenings. The actors didn't pop up on talk shows. And anticipation for the movie grew organically on the Web, and it quickly became the "must-see" movie of last fall. According to CNN, the campaign's ROI is impressive, especially since the movie cost only about $11,000 to produce. When the first movie made an astonishing $107 million at the domestic box office, it was inevitable that a sequel would be haunting theaters once again. Now it's a year later, and "Paranormal Activity 2" is opening tomorrow. And like before, the film's studio, Paramount Pictures, is releasing very little information about what's in this new movie.
WOM entertainment success stories are so prevalent now that other industries have wholeheartedly embraced the techniques, making it a $3 billion-plus phenomenon that is clearly entering a new phase of growth – one that is accompanied by stepped up government regulations.
Transplanting these techniques to other business sectors, though, is not always straightforward. Much depends on the product in question of course; in some instances, the community that generates the buzz is just as important as the buzz itself.
In other cases, marketers find they don’t need to prompt customers too much to work on their behalf. A study out of Penn State University found that 20% of Tweets are brand-related, and many are positive. Bottom line: WOM has become a huge IT category. Another study by PQ Media reported that WOM marketing is the fastest-growing segment of the
 $254 billion marketing services sector of the media industry, with expenditures projected to climb at a compound 
annual rate of 30.4% in 2006-2011 to $3.7 billion.
More so than other forms of marketing, WOM, can be a double-edged sword if its use is seen as inappropriate or manipulative, and over-the-top campaigns are likely to attract regulatory scrutiny if not action. For example, the Federal Trade Commission's new guidance calls for bloggers and tweeters to explicitly state if there are financial ties to the products they are promoting. As it happens, the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA) agrees with the FTC - especially since it has become clear the agency expects more of the burden of disclosure to fall upon marketers vs. bloggers.

Reaching Latinas Through Virtual Goods

Virtual goods --the non-physical objects such as game points, avatars, and gifts purchased online -- are a massive market, says Andiara Petterle of MediaPost. According to market researcher Inside Network, Americans alone will purchase $1.6 billion worth of virtual goods this year, mostly for use or echange with others in virtual worlds, multiplayer mobile and online games, social games, and social networks. In fact, half of all virtual goods purchased in 2010 will be within social games such as Pet Society and Buddy Poke. Marketers are waking up to the importance of associating their brands with the sale of virtual goods, making the category one of the fastest-growing advertising platforms online today. And new research shows that one key demographic almost every marketer is trying to reach -- Latina women -- is especially interested in buying and exchanging virtual goods. According to a recent study Sophia Mind, 45% of online Hispanic women living in the U.S. have purchased virtual goods, and 61% of those purchasers are between the ages of 26 and 40. Sophia Mind also found that Latina women are extremely open to receiving marketing messages and branded products and services alongside their virtual goods purchases. Some 75% of Latina women surveyed in the U.S., Mexico, Brazil and Argentina said they would buy more virtual goods if they also received a discount for the purchase of a real product, or an actual real product, like a magazine subscription. Some new ways top brands are marketing their products in virtual environments include associating their brand with a specific virtual good, such as a branded virtual piece of clothing, necklace or car; offering buyers a coupon or discount for their products in return for purchasing a virtual good; and rewarding users with in-game currency when they buy a real product. However you approach the virtual environment, here are some ways to get started: Pick games that are popular with Latinas: Similar to television programming, the most successful games are built from the ground up with a demographic in mind. Take Playdom's Sorority Life, for example. This is prime hunting ground for any retailer looking to reach women between the ages of 17-35. When adding social games to your marketing mix, make sure that this game appeals to your target audience and that you target offers are relevant to your precise demographic. For example, research shows that games from companies such as Zynga and Playfish are popular with U.S. Latinas as well as women in other Latin American countries. Offer coupons for relevant goods: Seventy-six percent of U.S. Latinas said they would buy more virtual goods if they also received a discount coupon for the purchase of a real product. Working with your social network and virtual goods partners, offer relevant coupons or discounts for your products when a customer buys a virtual good Pair product purchases with free virtual goods: According to research, 68% of U.S. Latinas surveyed said they would buy more virtual goods if they also received a real product or service with the purchase, but what if you enabled them to get those goods for free? Many gaming companies are now pairing advertiser offers with free virtual goods or currency. This practice, known as "transactional advertising", allows consumers to get virtual goods for free in return for buying something from a brand like Gap or Netflix. As a brand, you can target Latinas (and other demographics who use social games) by offering them something they want (a virtual good), in return for making a purchase of your products. For example, in a Valentine's Day promotion, ProFlowers worked with transactional advertising company TrialPay to place offers inside Playfish's popular Pet Society game; social gamers who sent their loved ones real flowers from within the game were awarded virtual Playfish Cash. Focus on security: Even though the concern over online transactions for real goods has greatly decreased over the last few years, buyers of virtual goods still worry about security. Some 76% of American Latinas said concerns about security had kept them from making virtual goods purchases. Make sure every social network, virtual world, or social game your brand is associated with adheres to and publishes a strict security policy, and work with partners who have a trusted reputation in the market. Also keep a close eye on what's happening with Facebook Credits, a new sort of universal currency that gamers will be able to use across participating applications. It may be that users will be more apt to trust a credit card transaction with Facebook than an lesser-known game developer. Make sure to cross-promote: When running a special offer or ad connected to virtual goods purchases on a social game or social network, make sure to cross-promote it on your website, in email, video, and paid search campaigns, or any other way you usually market. For example, send an email to your marketing list saying "Get 20 Free Facebook Credits with your Next Purchase," adding a link to your virtual goods promotion on Facebook. The Latina consumer is one of the most attractive markets for brands today. This fast-growing demographic controls a large percentage of household spending, is technology-aware and socially focused, and is more willing than other groups to receive marketing messages from trusted brands. Since many Latinas are active users of social networks and social games, and repeat buyers of virtual goods, smart marketers should craft a strategy now to reach this sought-after demographic in the virtual world.

Market Your Small Business with no Budget

From a marketing standpoint, it’s a great time to own or start a business, says Matt Silverman, Mashable’s Associate Features Editor. The social web makes it more cost-effective than ever to get the word out about your products and services, no matter what industry you’re in. Most social media accounts are free to set up, and many targeted online ad platforms are inexpensive. The most it will cost you to get your marketing campaign rolling, at least in the beginning, is time. In fact, the toughest challenge facing small business marketers these days is not cost, but finding a strategy to get your message heard over the din of a noisy Internet. For advice on this, we checked in with a few experienced social media marketers. Here’s what they had to offer. Become an Expert Advertising is not always the best way to market on social networks. People crave valuable content, and it can be as niche as the very products you’re selling. By blogging, tweeting, sharing, and updating about things relevant to your industry, you can build credibility in your field. “Whether you’re selling specialty cookies or enterprise software, you probably have significant expertise that you can share with potential customers,” said Leyl Master Black a Managing Director at Sparkpr. “You can write how-to articles, create educational videos about your products in action, or post pictures and tweet out commentary from an industry trade show. Every piece of content you post online — whether it’s on your blog, your Facebook Page, or on third-party sites — has the potential to boost your brand and drive search results and traffic at very little or no cost.” Black notes that YouTube is an often overlooked platform for building low cost, high impact content. A small investment in a consumer-level camera and editing software, and a bit of time learning the basics of video production can pay out big in the long term. “E-commerce vendor BigCommerce, for example, is generating tens of thousands of views for its online marketing video series for small business on YouTube,” said Black. Cultivate Super Users The social web has changed both the medium and the message for marketers, and we’ve discussed extensively how the users are now in control of your brand’s image. This can be a very positive thing if you understand the social media ecosystem and leverage it to your advantage. The key is targeting and cultivating super users — customers who are already fans of your brand, and share their positivity about it on the web. “If I know there’s a Twitter user who loves purses and talks about them a lot (which I can find using Twitter Search, and I sell purses, I reach out to her and offer her 20% off to come in or check out my catalog online, just because I know she digs purses,” said Jason Falls, a social media strategist and consultant whose blog discusses the online marketing industry. “If she blogs about purses, maybe I send her a new model with a note that says, ‘Thanks for telling people about purses. We dig you.’ I’m betting she’d talk about me, and I didn’t have to break the bank to get the conversational love.” When an endorsement comes from someone outside of your company, like a trusted blogger or social sharer, it has greater value and reach than anything you could send through official channels. You can’t control what the social web says about your brand directly, but by identifying and wooing brand ambassadors, you can certainly have an influence — the kind that no paid advertisement can match. Ensure People Can Find You on the Web This point may seem obvious, but it’s a common misstep, especially for new businesses. If and when people hear about your brand, they will go straight to their favorite services — Google, Yelp, and other listing sites — to find out more about you. Take the time to ensure that your entry there is accurate, and that there are direct links to your website and phone number. But there’s more you can do to get your brand out there for free. “Look beyond Yelp for free business listings,” said Black. “MerchantCircle, Google Local Business Center, Angie’s List, Yahoo! Local, YellowPages.com, SearchLocal, and SuperPages are some of the online directory services that allow businesses to create a free listing. Make sure that you’re on these sites, and if the site already lists your business, you should ‘claim’ it by adding more details to the listing, such as your company website URL, a map, phone numbers, or business hours.” Black also noted that many of the directory sites allow customers to leave feedback and reviews. “Encourage your customers to post reviews of your products or services, or provide incentives for them to do this. For example, one merchant applies an additional 10% discount to their coupons on MerchantCircle if the consumer leaves a review on the site. This encourages repeat business as well as reviews.” Offer Ad-Funded Payment Options If you have a steady flow of customers, and you’re looking to boost the size of your transactions and increase customer loyalty, one low- (or no-) cost strategy is to implement transactional advertising. “Popularized by TrialPay, this ad-funded approach to payments works to turn browsers into buyers,” said Black. “Consumers are able to get your product for free in return for buying something from a brand advertiser such as Gap or Netflix. The advertiser then pays you once the sale is completed.” For companies selling relatively low-cost or web-accessible products, a highly targeted “reverse advertising” strategy like this could be a smart move. “For example, IntroWizard used TrialPay to convert ‘intermediary’ customers who had tried their free Flash web design software but hadn’t made a purchase yet — boosting their profits by 15% at no additional cost,” said Black.