New Wave Marketing 101: Fixing Direct Response

Direct response ads have lost whatever credibility they had mostly because of the products themselves… cheaply made and basically ineffective, then tied to the standard DRTV format that screams rip off. 

Add generally poor service… slow shipping, bad return policy, tricky automatic renewals, etc. and you've destroyed any trust between vendor and consumer. 

Here's how to fix DR:

1. Sell better products 
2. Make sure what you say in the ad copy matches what’s said about the product online (to the best of your ability)… better products should make this easier  
3. Spend some money on social media to defend your products, for goodness sakes 
4. Change the tired DRTV format, for example:
    

• Give the actual price upfront 
• Forget BUT WAIT and triple your order tricks  
• Give a full guarantee, shipping and all  
• Avoid the tired Guthy Renker model (or should I say “trusted Guthy Renker”)... look, they’ve made a lot of money at it, good for them, but GR has burned out the format here in the U.S. which is why their sales are increasingly coming from other countries 
• Avoid automatic renewal – the #1 reason why most consumers will not buy and do not trust you
   

Any takers? Probably not. DR has matured into a derivative ad form for a me-too industry built by so-called 'entrepreneurs' who are mostly cowboys.

New Wave Marketing 101: What's the big idea?

-->

Recently, I posted what must have seemed like an enigmatic Zen koan: ‘A big idea is always small; an idea that’s too big usually makes a bad story.’

I apologize. I hate things like that… when someone parses his or her words in a way that makes one seem smart, clever and in the know. Pompous narcissists in my book; then I did the same ignorant thing.

Why not just say what I mean? I did want to be concise but mostly this was a ‘dig me’ moment: ain’t I just a deep thinker? Mea culpa.

Let me explain what I was getting at with a very typical example from my college writing class.

But first, here’s a true statement: every paper, speech, PPT presentation must have a ‘big idea,’ a central focus for the narrative.

Think of it this way. If you can recall the 1950s Superman show (George Reeves, poor soul), you’ll remember there’s always a scene in the Chief’s office where Lois says something like, “I want to cover the dock workers’ strike,” and the blustering Perry White inevitably asks, “What’s your angle?”

That’s the big idea.

So, I ask students to write a 5-page paper – which to me seems like an easy task; to them five pages is a brick wall. I tell them to focus on a controversial subject. Check with me first, I warn.

OK. Here are some typical topics they’ll profer:

Civil rights

Abortion

Legalizing drugs

Creationism v. evolution

Equal pay for equal work

How in God’s name can you cover the entire civil rights movement in five pages? Or Dr. King’s Birmingham march or his assassination or his famous Washington speech? You can’t, of course; and if you try the result will be a 1/64 of an inch thick analysis that will be scattered, trite and meaningless. The big idea is too big.

Instead, focus on, say, the mood of your hometown when the news came about Dr. King’s untimely death; how your grandparents reacted; how some were so callous while others in tears. You see? Small but excellent big ideas.

When we write ads or present products we almost always say too much… include too much, try to cram it all in and down the throats of an intimidated or uncaring audience. And by doing so we are having our own ‘dig me’ moment: look how smart I am, I know so much more than you.

So my Zen koan boils down to simply this: when writing any marketing piece, any presentation (and life is a presentation, right?) lower your ambitions and shrink your ego. The results are much more interesting when you dig deeper in a small area. When you have more to say about less you have a very, very BIG IDEA.

New Wave Marketing 101: There's a Lot To Learn from Antiques Roadshow

If you’re in tune with your surroundings, and all good marketers must be, you’ll see the telltale signs of changing cultural and consumer values everywhere you look.

Last night, I watched The Antiques Roadshow. I’m like all of you; I love the program… love to guess the prices while secretly hoping my bin-diving, charity-shopping, yard-sale-loving wife comes up with a heretofore-unknown Picasso that’s worth millions. [Note: my wife and daughter did indeed find a painting worth $2000, put in a dumpster by a Park City neighbor who was moving – a Harry Mintz, to be exact.]

These days, the Roadshow is rerunning the best parts of older shows and comparing the prices then with those of today. If a hand-cut vase was worth $5000 in 1998, what’s it worth in 2012? More or less?

This is a marketer’s treasure trove if you believe, as I believe, that the very nature of consumers has changed. [I should have prefaced this blog with the fact that I have an MA in American Culture, so I was trained to spot the signs, so to speak.]

In what way has our very nature changed?

The current trend is to value more cultural, historical and artistic items (you might say 'symbolic' things) over the practical arts like furniture, vases, antique appliances, 19^th century children’s toys and the folksy items and faux art things that usually dominate the show.

Example? A well-carved highboy from the 1770s that was worth $200,000 in 1998 is worth less today. Not by much, but less. A turn of the century pristine, all-metal child’s toy with a handmade clockwork driving the wheels is worth half of what it was in 1999. As are antique watches, baseball cards and collectibles of all sorts. Jewelry has remained flat in spite of historically high gold prices. Pop art pieces and modern American paintings have dropped in value unless they are from a handful or recognized masters.

Conversely, anything related to mythical American History – Lincoln’s autograph, a lithograph of a Revolutionary War battle, documents of even the mildest historical interest – have gone up in price by as much as 150%.

What’s this tell you as a marketer?

People have stopped collecting things: baubles, 1950s household items, Art Deco bits from the 20’s, old lunch boxes, Hollywood memorabilia, Tiffany lamps, pottery… you know, things… the things that used to dominate flea markets and antique shops. Dare I say it? Middle class, nouveau riche stuff is suddenly unpopular.

Why? Because we no longer have the time nor the extra income to buy anything that is valued on the whim of ‘collectors’, the so-called experts. Look where the banking and Wall Street experts got us. And if anything can drop in price as quickly as did our homes, why risk buying a so-called ‘collectible’ in hopes it will accrue in value? It’s always been nonsense… now we all can see it.

And suddenly, given the current economic shifts and nature of our day-to-day lives, the 1920s – 1950s seem like so much useless history that can’t teach us anything about 2012; and we no longer want to be reminded of high times that won’t come again. True or not, most believe the middle class is sinking.

Plus, jobs are hard to come by and most of us will be forced to move several times over a decade. We can’t be tied down with our collection of cute Disney characters.  Of course, the forced move to smaller homes means we don’t have the room for massive wooden pieces of furniture, even if they are Chippendale.

No, today’s consumers are leaner and meaner and less optimistic.

Conversely, there’s a longing for things related to America’s older, nobler past... when Americans actually pulled together to solve problems… when we were isolated from the trials of Europe and not worried sick about the value of the Euro… when politicians were named Jackson and Lincoln and Grant and Teddy Roosevelt, and not Romney, Obama and Newt. We’re holding onto these things; we value these things as a talisman reminder of when this country was young and fearless. Dare I say it, when we still felt good about attaining our share of the American Dream and were proud of our government?

So, if your marketing efforts can recall these days, reignite the feeling of our collective pragmatic, less ideological American spirit, or even make us feel guilty for losing the American sketch while offering a small solution – well, you’re onto something.

Final note: I said baubles and vases and carvings have lost value. That’s correct in all but one area. Care to take a guess?

Almost anything Chinese has doubled or tripled in price: Chinese jade carvings, vases, jewelry, ceremonial teapots have shot through the roof.

You don’t need a degree in American Culture to understand why.

New Wave Marketing 101: Dear Mr. Ogilvy... Where's the Enthusiasm?

If you read Ogilvy's book on advertising (and you should), you might remember his original ad seeking creative directors, which he called Trumpeter Swans.

Ogilvy was looking for personal genius, he said, and inspiring leadership. I like the imagery -- marketers as trumpeter swans: they want to stand out, and as I interpret it, they are enthusiastically creative and not afraid to flaunt it.

So, where are these swans? I sit in meeting after meeting with marketers, designers, B2B and B2C marketing managers,  CEOs, web guys, the lot, and it's like spending an afternoon in the morgue: no excitement, no buzz, nothing. It's as if these men and women are going to the gallows later in the day.

Marketing is 90% enthusiasm about your product, your service, your company. This excitement is essentially what we impart through ads and pr, etc. Passion goes a long, long way in marketing and in life. Why then is it in such short supply these days?

Marketing is meant to be creative, thought provoking and entertaining. How can it be any of these things when both clients and agency types are so low key, so ho hum, so boring?

If you don't have enthusiasm for what you do, stop doing it and try something else.

If I'm a company looking for an agency, I want to see three things: intelligence, creativity and enthusiasm. Two out of three ain't good enough. All three or nothing. 

From the agency side, I want to see the same traits in potential clients. Those who come to us with no excitement or enthusiasm, dragging their feet to the meetings, acting as if they're being forced to market and with no passion in their product offering or company... well, these clients will fail no matter what we do or try to do for them. Why get started and, as an agency, why get tarred by the brush of boredom these clients will surely bring? 

Two rules about marketing that have not changed since day one: frequency works no matter how mediocre the marketing; and, enthusiasm is the most important ingredient to a successful campaign or ad. 

OK, here's the third: start with a quality product or a superior service... quality breeds enthusiasm.

New Wave Marketing 101: Bring All You Have and All You Are to the Table

I believe that marketing, like writing, is an activity that requires you to bring all you are, all that you have to the table. That’s what I love about both.

This is a difficult idea to get across quickly but I’ll give it a shot.

If I say to a varied group of students in a basic writing class, “Write a few paragraphs describing your favorite person,” I might expect to get a very different essay from, say, a 20-year-old single woman born and raised in Georgia and a 55-year-old-married man from Liberia. (I did have these two students in one of my classes at Georgia Perimeter College.)

That makes sense, right? Two vastly different people should produce two very different essays.

It doesn't work that way.

As an adjunct professor for 12 years I can tell you that the stories will be amazingly and disappointingly similar and trite. “My favorite person is my wife (boyfriend). She (he) is always there for me and loves me for who I am.”

The problem? These two students didn’t bring all they are to the job. There’s no ethnic, cultural or personal detail... nothing about family or city of birth or life experience. Instead, they turned in what was expected, what they heard on TV last night, what they’ve written in other classes.

It takes courage to bring all you are to the table because if an instructor (or client) critiques the essay (or advertisement), he or she seems to be criticizing you at a deep, personal level. Plus, most people wrongly believe that their lives are uninteresting and unimportant. So why would you write about the details?

Same for products and brands.

I have worked with dozens of companies and hundreds of marketing people (oops, ‘executives’). When I suggest that they say something unique about a product, they reject the idea. Out of fear, I suppose… but also out of the same false belief as my example students: our stuff is not really that new or that interesting. And what if someone criticizes us… says we’re not what we claim we are… how will we defend ourselves?

I am from Pittsburgh. A lower middle class ethnic neighborhood of Italians and Lebanese. I spent eight years in college studying American Culture and 20 years as a musician, 10 of those years on the road. I love Pittsburgh sports teams, read a lot of literature and try to understand quantum physics. When I get angry I curse enough to make a sailor blush. Through my teen years the daily greeting among friends wasn't "Hi, how are you?", it was 'What the f, mother f?' (You can’t make this stuff up.)

So guess what? I’m an aggressive marketer. I sometimes ‘hate’ the f—ing competition… I love assertive direct response, but after reading great literature the copy/story has to be logical and a bit sophisticated. More often than not, I’ll use a literary style and even break into the poetic (because I’ve studied a lot of Modernists like Eliot and Pound). And it will all be framed in a perverse sense of gallows humor that comes from spending 10 years 24/7 with cynical musicians. I can cut like a knife if provoked.

That’s what I bring to the table with every ad, every marketing piece, everytime. It’s unavoidable for me... as it should be for you.

Look, your style won’t be applicable for every job… there are some marketing tasks you just won't do well… and your style should never overpower the product. But you should be able to see yourself in the work… in the insights you bring and the stories you tell… stories that come from your unique combination of upbringing, schooling and life experiences. Otherwise, you’re just like every other schmuck who loves his significant other because he or she is “there for you.”

[If you can’t bring everything you are to the table, try B2B. It takes very little to write copy or develop a campaign that basically says, “We’re pretty good, just like our competitors.”]

Think Don Draper. He killed his superior officer by accidentally setting him on fire. Later, when asked to come up with a tag line for a tobacco  company, Don offered: ‘Lucky Strike… It’s Toasted’. (Don’t tell me Mad Men isn’t the funniest show on TV.)

The Prufrockian question that all marketers must ask is this: “Do I dare disturb the universe?” 

F-ing right you dare. Go Steelers.

“When It Comes To Writing, Getting Started Is the Hardest Part” (Here Are Two Ways To Ease the Pain)

No truer statement has ever been made. Think about it, the headline and/or opening paragraphs of anything take the most time and cause the most pain… because there’s nothing worse than staring at a blank screen or piece of paper and expecting yourself to fill it. Frightening.

In many ways, the pain and fear can’t be avoided. Look at it like this: if you’ve ever jogged or bicycled any distance, you know the first mile or so isn’t fun… ever. There’s pain and doubt and your body hasn’t found its rhythm. But at some point down the road it all begins to work, your breathing levels out, things are fine.

Writing is the same. It takes time to get your brain in gear and your writing muscles loosened.

But there are a couple of tricks to ease the pain and/or speed the time till you’re hitting stride. Both can help, but generally I’ve found that people prefer one or the other, depending upon their personalities and styles. (I prefer the former, although sometimes the topic lends itself to approach #2.)

1. Think before you write! Too many of us sit down and try to write without having put any thought into what we might say. Make this common mistake and you’ll stare at that screen for hours and walk away with nothing. Take some time to THINK about where the ad or press release or article is going and don’t start writing until you have a clearer idea… save yourself the agony, doubt and inevitable self-loathing... and several starts and stops and starts and trash can basketball.

Most people believe that writing is something like 10% thought, 80% actual writing and 10% editing. Pros know it’s one-third, one-third, one-third. On the positive side, that means less time sitting at the desk and staring at a blank sheet of paper, but more time thinking and polishing the finishing product. Cheat any of the three sections and your work will suffer.

2. There’s a German saying, “Nothing makes you hungrier than eating.” Same with writing: the ideas start flowing from the physical act of writing itself. So start your article and continue on, even if the intro is weak and disorganized. Get as far as you can without stopping. You’ll see, the writing gets easier as you go along, just as jogging gets easier the longer you run.

But then go back and rewrite your intro and first couple of paragraphs. You’ll be in stride and have a better idea of where the article is going; you’ll see how to actually begin. Almost every writer will tell you that the first couple of paragraphs are generally s—t and need to be reconsidered because they were written before the author got warmed up and the essay or advert took shape.

Either one of these techniques should help get you going with less agony.

----------

PS: I can’t resist taking a shot at people who have no respect for how difficult the job is. You know, “all you did was write 100 words, how long did that take?” Generally this is a graphics guy who thinks his image is what’s selling. If images are the key, how did marketers sell before TV or photography or illustrations? With words! "In the beginning was the Word," even God uses words and stories (ever hear of a parable, Mr. Graphics?).

I did this once (an idea I stole from a one-time friend). In a room of salespeople, congratulating themselves on how well a product had done and convinced that they made it happen, I took offense at their egocentric,'we did it all' attitude. As if the story I'd told to position the product and attract consumers meant next to nothing.

"OK," I said, "here’s a new product (I had nothing but a box design with a product picture and the product name) go out and sell it... duplicate your success, I know you can do it!"

After a minute or two of silence came their response: “There’s no information. What are we selling?” Really! What happened to the earlier, self-congratulatory bravado?

Of course, they still didn't get the point?

Without the words, the story, the reasons behind the product, the sense of belonging if you choose to purchase, you’ve got nothing to sell. They had an image, a picture and the product name, supposedly that's all they need. Remember, images sell and now these crack salespeople have an image in hand -- they should be golden.

"So, who sold the product you or me?" I asked sarcastically.

“OK,” they said, “so write the new ad and we’ll start tomorrow.”

Tomorrow? Like it’s child's play to write a successful ad? I guess if you can write your name, you can write an ad. I supposed they figured about 125 words would do it and that should take 30 minutes, max.

So I gave each of them a blank sheet of paper and said, “Here, you fill the page if it's so easy" and left the room.

Never got one word back from any of them. This ain’t so easy, is it buddy?