Another Company Bites the Dust – But Internet ‘Gurus’ Get Their Money

This is a very unhappy ‘I told you so’ on my part.

But it’s like clockwork… sad, fatalistic, inevitable... a warning from Cassandra that goes unheeded.

A very promising company has just gone under. Sure, there are a lot of reasons, but primary was the decision to spend big bucks on Internet/SEO/Adword gurus. These Net guys got a relatively large sum to build an online presence that would virtually ‘guarantee’ sales and top-of-the-page organic SEO.

Remember, these were the guys who proudly boasted that they had built 159 landing pages to make sure the word got out to every corner of the digital world. (See The Big Lie: Software Is Eating Marketing).

Problem was, these guys weren’t marketers. Problem was the owner believed that metrics could boost sales rather than solid marketing. Problem was the owner paid good money for his web presence but did very little and spent very little to develop a coherent message/story for his product.

But the web guys were so confident their strategy would work – the same strategy they use for every company regardless of product.

As predicted, the 159 landing pages and blogs and tweets and Facebook pages all went for naught. No story, no sales. Period.

So the company goes bust, good friends are out of work… while the Internet guys move gleefully to yet another company, making the same promises and taking the same large chunk out of the budget.

In a letter to the company president sent six months ago, here was my warning…

There is so much chatter about new algorithms, the decline of keywords, the rise of unique content, the decline of multiple sites, etc., I focus on the long-term narrative and customer expectations. If that messaging is right, Internet professionals will know how to break the copy above the fold and those types of things. 

But… If people don’t understand or believe your message, or don’t see the need for your product, all the CTRs and CPCs and closing rates and page hits won’t really translate into the type of sales you’re looking for.

Again, simple advice that went unheeded.

Digital Catch-22 Has Stolen Marketing… Right from Under Our Noses

Let’s be honest -- marketing as most of us know it no longer exists.

There are several reasons for this and many of them lie at the feet of marketers themselves: poorly conceived campaigns, slow delivery of the creative, the attitude that we are ‘ar-teests,’ the derivative nature of most of our work these past two decades and agency billing procedures that are a micrometer short of highway robbery.

Marketers have been replaced by IT and software guys who have redefined our art/craft so that they can claim to be marketing experts. They define the job so they are the job. And that job is numbers, numbers, numbers.

Better still, here’s the new marketing task in a nutshell:

Trick consumers into seeing ads for products they don’t want and don’t believe in.

Sure, larger, more sophisticated companies still understand the need for marketing in the sense of defining a market, positioning a product and telling an emotional narrative that drives sales. Please look at the Samsung Galaxy III spot… the story it tells, the images it uses and how it’s positioned Samsung as superior to the iPhone. That’s marketing.

But most medium to smaller companies have been convinced by the plethora of Internet/SEO/automated sales people that they have no need for this type of marketing and storytelling. Instead they willingly spend on software and analytics and email lists and multiple landing pages. Numbers, numbers, metric, metrics.

Here’s the cool part: the metrics are meaningless. They were created by digital guys to match the capabilities of the software. It’s a shell game: we measure those measurements that we can measure. Catch-22 if there ever was one.

Do these metrics equate to sales or profits? Rarely, if ever. But by God they can show their clients digitally-generated numbers, so they must be true.

They toss a bone to ‘content,’ but don’t care, really. Had Google not mentioned that new algorithms would be driven by content, these Net people wouldn’t give marketing narratives the time of day.

You know that old line about ‘sell the sizzle not the steak’? These guys sell neither.

Again, they have one goal: To trick consumers into seeing ads for products that consumers don’t want and don’t believe in.

That’s Marketing 101 in 2013. Live with it.

Amazingly, these guys preach the need for a personalized message but then send unwanted and totally impersonal junk to any name they can get their hands on. Personalized? They can’t spell it.

Now here’s the real Catch-22. Because these automated mavens have the numbers and count the numbers, they never fail.(Remember what Stalin said about elections? He didn’t care who voted as long as he got to count the votes.) If a product doesn’t sell it’s because of a weak story -- fire the $20 an hour copywriter. But, if the product does sell, it’s all in the software and programming.

And gullible CEOs are lining up for the privilege.

Did I just read that 83% of company execs think that marketing has ZERO effect on sales and/or profits? Ask these same men and women about the value of automated, integrated, digital, analytic programs and they’ll virtually wet their pants with glee.

At a time when smart marketing is desperately needed, it’s been co-opted, vilified, scorned and ignored in favor of software, metrics and meaningless numbers.

The Big Lie: Software Is Eating Marketing

Software, testing and analytics cannot displace marketing... they are processes meant to enhance marketing, not direct it. Without the right message, product and positioning, analytics and measurements are useless.

Just like those of us who aren’t painters/artists will look at a painting by Braque (my favorite) or Picasso and say, “I can do that” or “that’s rubbish,” Web analytic and software guys are often clueless: they think they’re actually selling something... actually marketing when they're simply measuring parameters of their own making: clicks throughs, abandon rates, CPC and any number of spurious SEO calculations... all data that may or may not be relevant.

Recently, I had a 'guru' tell me that his company was developing "159 landing pages" for a client so his team could find the ideal message? I'd love to see that invoice!


That’s marketing, huh? Sure, like a stick figure is modern art.

Here’s a marketing message for you to populate throughout social channels: “I be a good marketer so send me sum money and I fix yer ad good.”

I don’t care if you fire up the latest software, lists, analytics, landing pages that are optimized with above the fold content, Adwords or affiliate programs… you have nothing.

CEOs with limited budgets are so happy to hear they can have impact through software and analytics alone that they eagerly buy a snake oil sales pitch. (To be fair, you can have impact with minimum budget if you direct GOOD ads and INFORMATIVE information to the right channels.That’s marketing 101.)

And let’s be honest: most 'executives' and Internet numbers guys really don’t like creatives: "You know, these people sit around all day in jeans, thinking… not getting anything done!”

In contrast: “The Internet guys are adding SEO words and creating back links and buying lists and fiddling with knobs, they’re really working. Here, look at this report!” (BTW, you just paid $1,000 for numbers that Google generated for FREE and $5 software added your logo to the top for 'personalization'.)


So these poor souls cut checks for $20,000 a month for social media and web analytics and 159 landing pages, but moan if they have to pay $2,000 for an ad that changes their company… like the Samsung Galaxy ad restructured the smartphone market in a heartbeat.

Again, let me use polysyllabic words for the net number gurus:

If you don’t have a good pro duct with a good stor y and good grap hics, YOU HAVE GOT NO THING! NO THING!

Run that through you’re analytics… and make sure your response is ‘above the fold’.