ENGAGING MARKETING MINDS MAY/JUNE 2017
An inside look at creating new business development processes
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publisher’s note
in this issue
VANITY MATTERS
S
cott Stratten, best-selling author of “Unmarketing,” recently told a story during the United Marketing Conference in Nashville, Tenn., about metrics that really matter. The general gist was that many of the metrics Getting in touch The answer of a video he created were not only misleading, but with consumer is in the distracting from what really mattered. emotions (small) data Stratten saw remarkable click rates, views and “likes.” 08 04 He was able to go even deeper into the analytics and determine that his overall “vanity” metrics were pretty high. But he also noticed that he never received a spike in sales or inquiries from his speaking. 02 Cover Story...........................Orchestrating Business Vanity metrics are driven by the need to validate. Whether it’s the CFO who 06 Feature................................................................... Touchy, Feely wants to confirm that every dollar spent turns into something greater than a dollar, or the Millennial marketing coordinator who wants to prove a level of 10 Quick Hits............................................................................. Insights intelligence, validating existence plays a major role in marketing today. 12 Infographic........................................... Why today’s CMO This really is one of the best times to be in marketing. Technology, must be a growth driver tools, data, information, ideas and innovation abound. But, as a result, prospects and customers are feeling a massive overload. The vanity 13 Trending With......................................................Pete Hayes metrics matter less and less each day, and the world craves to connect on a deeper THE VANITY METRICS MATTER LESS AND level. This may mean doing the things that LESS EACH DAY, AND THE WORLD CRAVES simply do not scale, being more vulnerable TO CONNECT ON A DEEPER LEVEL. and doing some real soul searching around what really matters to move the needle. Marketing must be more than a series of e-blasts married to an automated drip campaign that most of us can smell a mile away. Marketers need to harness all the available tools to optimize efficiency, but also be able to directly engage with people to seek an understanding and trust that traditional marketing practices don’t allow. Due to the noise within the channels, people don’t necessarily want to Publisher be marketed to anymore. Therefore, brands are desperate to determine Mark Steputis how to create engagement and conversations at every consumer touch Mark.Steputis@visiongraphics-inc.com point. In our cover story, “Orchestrating Business,” we discuss how buyers have all the control today. Managing Editor In our second piece, “Touchy Feely,” we extend the theme of customer Tyson Polzkill intimacy to remind you of the ownership you take when sensing things Tyson.Polzkill@eaglexm.com through touch. The current economic climate is such that people want Editorial & Creative Direction more connection to one another and print still is a great example of Conduit, Inc. - www.conduit-inc.com developing intimacy. With the support of Dr. David Eagleman’s work around the neuroscience of touch, this is a must read. Connect is published bimonthly, ©2017. All rights reserved. Enjoy the issue and remember to think of what really matters. Warmest wishes,
For more information, contact Scott Nordstrom at Scott.Nordstrom@visiongraphics-inc.com
Mark Steputis Publisher MAY/JUNE 2017
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EA D I E L O H THIS WATTENTION OF ANIS, I THINK, A SPAN EOPLE HAVE R. P TTENTION E M O N MIS INFINITE A OU ARE Y AN EM.” SPAN IF H T G N I ELD AIN Y SEINF T R – JERR E T N E 2
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ating orchestr
e An insidcreating look at siness new bupment develo ses proces
BY L J. MICHAE O IN R PALLE
p –you how dee of d n a – t ere t in fron g on wh ependin formation is righ to ad in ed look, the mers are expos They are u s n conds. you. Co ry 2.7 se nd messages a e v e s e g messa ,000 bra reens at least up to 10 en sc hit with research h betwe c it w s icrosoft d M ? t e y day an now ed frighten attention span is t o N r. u an ho person’s 21 times average e h t o reach t a h annels t h c shows t econds. e r o to grow and m ts ly going n just eigh rands find more o e r a s b number tention spans). And, as s, those r e t at u m o o t b s a lking a t their cu e ’r e k, if w (or shrin
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“Brands keep investing in interruptions and the audience keeps running away. Consumers want immersive content and tools that fight friction.” – JEFF ROSENBLUM, FOUNDING PARTNER, QUESTUS
To say that how we do business today has changed may be the mother of all understatements. The switch has unequivocally flipped to the buyers’ side, not only giving them all the control, but also forcing brands to review everything and anything they ever knew about getting their message in front of their customers. It’s a conversation Jeff Rosenblum loves to have. In his book, “Friction: Passion Brands in the Age of Disruption,” which he co-wrote with Jordan Berg, Rosenblum explains how some iconic brands are losing marketshare to up-and-coming companies that have found how to creatively capture – and hold – our collective consciousness. Great brands, Rosenblum and Berg argue, are no longer built through interruptive advertisements. Today, success is more than just clever messaging or shiny technologies drilled into our subconscious via traditional advertising methods. Today, success comes from refining your business strategy to fit the new narrative. The playbook involves employing simpler messages that can be communicated in more visual, emotional and engaging ways. “Your customers must go on a lengthy journey with many critical touch points,” says Rosenblum, who also is founding partner of the market research and strategic planning firm, Questus. “Successful companies provide the critical emotional and rational information that prospects need at each
THE ANSWER IS
IN THE (SMALL) DATA
BIG DATA. There aren’t many marketing conversations happening today without that term working itself into the mix. But what about small data? Whereas big data is all about seeking correlation, small data is about seeking causation. Why did something happen? As a modern day Sherlock Holmes, as he has been called, Martin Lindstrom often is hired by the world’s leading brands to find out what makes their customers tick.
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For his most recent book, “Small Data: The Tiny Clues That Uncover Huge Trends,” the best-selling author spent up to 300 nights a year in strangers’ homes carefully observing every little detail of their hidden desires to uncover the next multimilliondollar product. The truth, as Lindstrom freely admits, is that brands need to know the hypothesis before beginning the search for correlations. As the business landscape continues to shift, big and small data are becoming equally as important in the race to uncover consumer desires. For example, just recently, a major American bank’s big data research concluded
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step of the journey. The brand story grows and is optimized for each channel. It’s not the same message repeated over and over.” If Rosenblum could emphasize the criticalness of one strategic element from this playbook, it would be empowerment. When brands empower prospects to make smarter purchases, and empower customers to get more value out of the products they purchase, it creates meaningful conversations. “People don’t simply want to be interrupted with slick ad campaigns,” he says. “They want brands to help them remove friction and solve problems. That’s what leads to engagement and conversations.” Winning on this new playing field means your consumers are interacting with every touch point along the way, producing behavioral data that enables brands to optimize their sales and marketing efforts. They do this by understanding the psychographic profile of each prospect and identifying their unmet needs. “It’s all about providing value through their journey,” Rosenblum says.
GETTING PERSONAL
When done correctly, the sales and marketing landscape is completely integrated. Unfortunately, as Rosenblum and Berg discovered, few companies are doing this successfully today. Hamstrung by legacy marketing models, too many sales and marketing departments sit in silos, causing valuable
data and information to go unshared. “When each step of your customers’ journey is not integrated or optimized, it creates a precarious situation that opens the door for disruptive companies to leverage new, integrated strategies,” Rosenblum says.
“The reality is that we’ve migrated our social interactions online, and thus rarely meet people in our day-to-day life. This is increasingly creating an out of balance in our lives, and thus, a gap for a new brand or need.”
SO, HOW DO YOU FIGHT THE FIGHT?
The answers can be found in the playbook of brands doing it right. Patagonia, for example, fights friction by defending the environment. It builds immersive experiences – website, documentaries, retail events – that educate its audience about how to take small actions that can make a big difference. Yeti is another example. The highly innovative cooler and accessory manufacturer has created a series of seven- to 10-minute inspirational videos celebrating the lengths that people push themselves in the great outdoors. “Successful brands are simply taking a portion of their paid media budget and applying it to owned and earned media,” Rosenblum says. “Rather than buying ads, they’re building content and tools that empower the audience. Great brands are built, not bought. Advertising still provides a critical role in the process, but most brands are asking it to do too much. First, brands need to build great experiences. Once they do that successfully, they’ll still have money for traditional marketing to build awareness and traffic.”
that its churn (people leaving the bank with their bank accounts) was due to high fees and interest rates. Just before adjusting their rates, an internal research team spent time with their customers to try and identify the small data. To its surprise, the research team found that a large portion of its customers was leaving in the middle of, or just after, a divorce. They either opened separate bank accounts or moved to another bank. Spending some time with these couples to help navigate this unfortunate situation not only helped retain fleeing customers, but also saved the bank millions of dollars in interest rates and fees. “What you have to
remember is that as robots and technology take over, we humans will become and will have to become smarter,” Lindstrom says. “Small data is just as important as big data, because 85 percent of what we do is irrational – like pressing harder on your remote when you think the batteries are flat. Big data struggles to understand that human dimension. It’s hard to evaluate love using a spreadsheet. This is where small data comes into play. By first understanding the human dimension – we’re able to understand the reason why we behave a certain way. Big data then can help to verify this observation – creating a complete picture.”
– MARTIN LINDSTROM, AUTHOR, SMALL DATA
Lindstrom says that by embracing the importance of small data, brands can refine their business strategies. Everything a brand can pick up via emotional data – the chemistry, aspirations, desires and out of balances – will help form the foundation for success. “The reality is that we’ve migrated our social interactions online, and thus rarely meet people in our day-to-day life,” Lindstrom says. “This is increasingly creating an out of balance in our lives, and thus, a gap for a new brand or need. Most consumers are still not aware of this. They somehow feel they’re missing something, that tactical interaction. That
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trend – more than anything – will turn into something major very soon.” It all circles back to buyers having all the power. “This has happened because brands are completely transparent,” Rosenblum says. “Thanks to the infinite amount of information available through search, social and mobile technology, consumers can see through exaggerated brand messages and ignore clever jingles. Brands keep investing in interruptions and the audience keeps running away. Consumers want immersive content and tools that fight friction. They have the power to ignore traditional messages. Brands have to get that back.”
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TOUCHY, FEELY Understanding the science that is triggering more emotions By Charles D. Lunan
PARENTS HAVE A LOT OF APPREHENSION ABOUT HOW MUCH TIME THEY AND THEIR FAMILIES SPEND ONLINE, SO I DO THINK THE PENDULUM IS SWINGING BACK TO PRINT.” – MARY ANN HANSAN, PRESIDENT, PAPER & PACKAGING BOARD
ow ver notice h xperience ress their e p x e le p o e y’ve p ey’ll say the h T ? h c u to through ed “a y” or receiv a d h g u ro ntered had “a n” or encou o ti p e c re eir lukewarm Or maybe th .” n o ti a u it s a “sticky s silk.” s smooth a day went “a
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Getting in touch with
CONSUMER EMOTIONS
What’s that all about? More than meets the eye, says Dr. David Eagleman, whose research on the haptic regions of the brain has drawn the attention of marketers such as Mary Ann Hansan, president of the Paper & Packaging Board, which was formed in 2014 to address the sharp decline in the paper product sales. “What we love about Dr. Eagleman’s work is that he really is starting to put science behind why people feel paper is such a creative enabler and why it helps us learn better,” Hansan says.
Neuromarketing arrives
Eagleman and other researchers are achieving that by studying the haptic brain, which processes signals sent by our tactile sensors. Their findings may help explain why catalog sales are rebounding, children’s e-books have failed to thrive, and why many people still insist on printing out important documents and mailing printed wedding invitations over storing documents on the cloud or sending an email or electronic invitation. Their work with brain imaging and mapping is providing insight into how humans engage with different marketing channels. Proponents of this approach, which has spawned the term “neuromarketing,” argue it will help marketers fine-tune sequencing of multimedia campaigns to better align with consumers’ seemingly fragmented path to purchase. Consider John Bargh’s research on why people tend to classify fellow human beings as being either “warm” or “cool,” depending on certain personality traits. Bargh wondered if the tendency reflected some subconscious influence from the haptic brain, so he concocted an experiment in which interviewers asked subjects to hold a beverage container while they rebalanced an armload of books, folders or papers. When subsequently asked to rate a fictitious person as either warm or cool, 8
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IN
2016, the Paper & Packaging Board hired Heart+Mind Strategies to study the emotional connection people have with paper. Researchers asked subjects to touch different types of paper and choose their favorite based on its tangible qualities. Subjects then were asked a series of questions designed to regress their decision-making process and reveal the emotions that triggered their selection. Seven triggers emerged, but security and confidence rose to the top. “Paper represents a means of tangible proof and security that I can always have with me,” says Dee Allsop, CEO of Heart+Mind Strategies. “It creates a
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greater sense of security, less worry and less stress.” Test subjects said putting pen to paper enabled them to document their progress, achievement and mastery of a subject and approach tasks with confidence. They also preferred using paper over electronic media when it came to imparting gravitas and nurturing relationships with loved ones. “If sending wedding invitations, a digital Evite just does not cut it,” Allsop says. “There was a real sense of, ‘I’ve got to print it because I want to do it right.’ There was also this idea of paper helps me connect on a personal level with people I care about.” This was particularly true when it
“PAPER REPRESENTS A MEANS OF TANGIBLE PROOF AND SECURITY THAT I CAN ALWAYS HAVE WITH ME. IT CREATES A GREATER SENSE OF SECURITY, LESS WORRY AND LESS STRESS.” DEE ALLSOP, CEO, HEART+MIND STRATEGIES
came to nurturing children, where people expressed a strong preference for reading printed books, letter writing and post cards. The Paper & Packaging Board plan to incorporate its findings into a future marketing campaign.
test subjects who had held a warm cup of coffee consistently described them as warm, while those who had held an iced coffee described them as cold. In subsequent experiments, Bargh found that test subjects given heavier clipboards tended to rate job candidates as being “more solid.” The takeaway from more than 100 academic papers published since the 1990s is that reading on paper uses fewer cognitive resources than reading on a screen, which improves retention, deepens engagement and enhances understanding. The paper products industry has zeroed in on these findings in a bid to halt a 50 percent decline in paper consumption since the turn of the century. One manufacturer even hired Eagleman to conduct research and produce a report that – among other things – found printing on high quality coated stock improved recall over time.
The haptic brain rebels
“We know we are not going to reverse the decline in paper consumption, which is almost half of what it was in 2000,” Hansan says. “But we are trying to make sure paper remains something people see as modern, particularly as the digital natives – the kids who grow up with all this technology – are completing high school and going to college.” A recent rebound in sales of some paper products may signal that the haptic brain is reasserting itself even as the amount of time Americans spend looking at screens
grows. American adults surveyed by Nielsen last summer reported spending more than 10 hours a day staring at a screen. “We are definitely seeing data that book sales that flattened are increasing again,” Hansan says. “Companies who said they were going to get rid of catalogs have come back and said we realized we made a mistake; consumers shop with catalogs but order online. Parents have a lot of apprehension about how much time they and their families spend online, so I do think the pendulum is swinging back to print.” Another bright spot is paper boxes, which are becoming a key marketing channel for online retailers. Online subscription shopping services are adding handles and other features to extend the life of their delivery boxes, which provide their only tangible bond with customers. Lootcrate, which caters to video gamers and comic book fans, has designed delivery boxes that transform into keepsakes, including Captain America’s shield. “That box is a billboard,” Allsop says. “This is just going to be an explosive area for printing.” Given the human brain’s remarkable plasticity, it’s hard to define the future. After all, as Eagleman points out, reading and writing on paper are not innate skills. Every individual has to learn those skills from scratch and in the process they are rewiring their brains. That means that touch may slip in the hierarchy of senses that influence future generations’ perception of reality. In other words, media not only shape the message, as Marshall McLuhan famously wrote in 1964, but actually shape the brain itself. The implications for marketing are profound.
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INSIGHTS
Brands need to dance like there’s no one watching in the postmodern marketing era, like they used to in the pre-modern era – when things like jingles were commonly and unselfconsciously expressed.” – Stein IAS Chief Creative Officer Reuben Webb on why brands need to become less self-conscious today
Ask marketers how to gauge the success of their direct mail campaigns, and the answer inevitably points to ROI. One of the biggest reasons a direct mail campaign fails is the inability to measure success. If you cannot accurately track results, your enthusiasm level drops. The key, according to Allegra Marketing Services, is to establish the tracking process up front. Here are four factors it says you should add to your tracking template:
NO. 1 RESPONSE RATE NO. 2 SALES
How many sales did you make as a result of this campaign? (Be sure to measure against each call-to-action included in your campaign – 800 number, website, reply card, etc.)
NO. 3 CHANGE IN BEHAVIOR
Were you successful in driving people to more efficient and less costly channels, a website vs. a call center? What is your savings?
NO. 4 INFORMATION
The percent of B2B marketers who say they intend to include a plan to operate content marketing
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MEASURING YOUR DIRECT MAIL CAMPAIGNS
How many people did something as a result of your campaign?
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THE TRACKER
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Were you able to capture updated or additional information from prospects and customers that will help you with future marketing efforts?
as an ongoing business process, not simply a campaign, according to the “Technology Content Marketing 2017: Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends—North America” report by the Content Marketing Institute and by IDG. The survey also says that 42 percent have a documented content marketing strategy
in place. The report queried 2,562 recipients from around the world, representing a full range of industries, functional areas, and company sizes.
Right on with content WHERE CONTENT FITS INTO THE AGENCY MIX Content here, content there, content everywhere. No matter where you look these days in the marketing world, telling your story through content – and how you distribute it – is key.
92% 70% 45% 30% 16%
According to CopyPress’ “The Current Content Ecosystem Whitepaper,” 82 percent of marketing agencies say they create one to 10 pieces of content, on average, for each of their
clients per month. The report was based on data from a survey of 300 marketing professionals who work for agencies, brands, and/or themselves. Here’s a look at what
services marketing agencies are performing for their clients today:
BLOG POSTS
WEB COPY
INTERACTIVE MEDIA/VIDEOS
INFOGRAPHICS
ILLUSTRATIONS
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HIGH HOPES
WHY TODAY’S CMO MUST BE A GROWTH DRIVER If you think being a CMO today is all about executing marketing plans/strategies, serving as a brand leader and delivering competitive intelligence to their organizations, think again. According to “The CMO Shift to Gaining Business
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Lift” report by the CMO Council and Deloitte, more CMOs are being held responsible for growth strategies and revenue generation within their companies. The report surveyed 200 global CMOs/senior marketers.
Here’s a look at the next level of expectations falling on marketing as a growth driver:
35%
33%
23%
5%
4%
High expectations
Primary mandate of marketing
Moderate expectation
Little expectation
Marketing measured in other ways
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Trending with...
Branding thought leader Pete Hayes (Chief Outsiders) on owning your brand
Why is it important for brands to not use a “follow the leader” strategy? Some companies may actually find that a “fast-follower” strategy is ideal. Let someone else create the market, and then come behind with a similar value proposition, but perhaps with some important extras. Lower price. Higher quality. Unique features. Or an offering that’s easier to acquire or deploy. Is owning a market too romantic of an approach? In some senses, yes. Serving a need that no one else is addressing can be quite difficult or expensive when you’re going for market awareness and momentum. Of course, when you can shape and own a market, you’re the centerpiece, the standard from which your followers will be judged. When managed well, this mindshare can contribute to good things – like brand loyalty, faster growth, better pricing and margins. Isn’t it better to own your space? It’s actually not critical to shape and own your market. According to research we did with the McCombs Business School at The University of Texas, many companies thrive by being well run, and then by growing through acquisition. There are fewer companies that are well run and learn how to grow organically by developing skills in capitalizing on market dynamics. The very few define a whole new market or “Blue Ocean.”
T
he list of Pete Hayes’ accomplishments is as diverse as it is long. That’s easy to see when you look at the list of companies and marketplaces that he has worked in over the years. Before he founded the Chief Outsiders, Hayes worked on the marketing side of firms with client lists including the likes of Dell, Motorola, 3M and IBM, to name a few. Today, Chief Outsiders is one of the country’s foremost strategic growth implementation firms, which provides outsourced CMO services by fractional or part time CMOs. The firm recently was named one of the 1,000 fastest growing privately held companies in the United States by Inc. Magazine. And, along with Chief Outsiders’ CEO, Art Saxby, he co-wrote the bestseller, “The Growth Gears: Using a MarketBased Framework to Drive Business Success.” Here are Hayes’ thoughts on how brands can own their marketplaces.
WHEN YOU CAN SHAPE AND OWN A MARKET, YOU’RE THE CENTERPIECE, THE STANDARD FROM WHICH YOUR FOLLOWERS WILL BE JUDGED. Why is it important to view the marketplace from your customers’ perspective? It’s actually always important to view things from their perspective. Brands actually have to go out and get their perspectives. There’s a real difference. It’s not the Golden Rule – do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It’s more of the Platinum Rule – do unto others as they would have you do unto them. How and why do brands miss the boat on this? The challenge with getting and keeping the market’s perspective is that it’s not a “one and done” proposition. Companies have to regularly recalibrate all that they do – their offerings, pricing, positioning, communications, especially social channels now – based on their market’s dynamics.
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Vision Graphics, Inc. 5105 E 41st Ave. Denver, CO 80216
ENGAGING MARKETING MINDS
Are You Making The Right Connections MAY/JUNE 2017 VISION GRAPHICS INC. - CONNECT Contact Scott Nordstrom at Scott.Nordstrom@visiongraphics-inc.com
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