Paul Levy (Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center CEO) has made a bold move in publishing his hospital's Central Line Infection data. Not necessarily because the results represent evidence of best practices, but because this may be the first example in the region of using these numbers artfully.

His latest blog posting on the subject can be found at http://runningahospital.blogspot.com/2007/02/we-saved-one-persons-life-can-we-keep.html

While we know that this kind of hospital data will form the basis for a patient's comparative evaluation and purchase decision support at some point in the future, Levy's bold stroke will likely create a preemptive impression that BIDMC is fully forthcoming about such measures — and other hospitals are not. Whether this yields any real long term business benefit remains to be seen, of course. But as the sector becomes fully transparent  and healthcare data sets are published, compared and analyzed it will be fascinating to watch more examples of how the numbers are "used" to their best advantage. Therein a business strategy lurks somewhere.

PS -- Invoking Mr Levy's blog is somewhat self-referential as he had kind words to say about our Q4 Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts campaign. See what he had to say about "Isabel's Story" at http://runningahospital.blogspot.com/2006/11/isabels-story.html

Posted by Tom Simons at 12:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Over the past two days, a group of us attended Edward Tufte's workshop on "Presenting Data and Information." For those of you who are not acquainted, Tufte (Professor Emeritus at Yale University) is the brightest light in the art (design) and science (cognitive study) of presenting all forms of data. He has authored a handful of remarkable books, each of which would be of interest to anyone working in this information-intense environment.

A bunch of our art directors/designers went to the workshop, as well as Steve Lynch and Trina Arnett our newly minted Director of Research and Measurement. And we all left with new perspectives, refreshing arguments on presentation integrity, and a boatload of insights that we will be incorporating into our work product.

Tufte runs numerous workshops all over the country. I can't recommend them highly enough. Hit one. Here's more information: http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/courses

Posted by Tom Simons at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Focus groups are an easy sell because they are tangible—there is no mystery to the idiom. They unfold right in front of your very eyes.

You can see the participants (through the glass darkly) and watch them eat M&Ms. You can conveniently edit together the selected "highlights" to support an intractable point of view. Frankly, you can generally make groups behave the way you want.

So what's not to like?

Focus groups have masqueraded as decision-support research for too long. Admittedly, well run groups can be very useful "market sensing" tactics. But there is no actionable science or data produced by this practice.

Focus groups are falling out of favor because there are so many other innovative research platforms that produce data—quickly, and inexpensively. They are measurement strategies that are based on statistics and science. These are performance enhancing marketing strategies that generate real ROI.

It's probably true: no one ever got fired for buying a focus group recommendation. But you should think twice before you buy the next one.

Posted by Tom Simons at 04:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I know many creative types that frown on research. (Just take a look at our own Tom Simons' recent post "There is no science to focus groups" !) They hate focus groups and testing of all kinds. I guess that makes me a geek because I love research. Especially when it comes to building an effective web site.

Iterative research throughout the development of any web site is the best way to ensure success.  It doesn’t have to be mind-numbing volumes of data—just the right questions at the right time.

Here are a few research opportunities mapped against the development process.  You don’t have to do them all. But the more you do, the better your site will be.  For this post, we’ll just take a look at the research moments during the discovery and definition phase—two phases in our four stage web development methodology.

Discovery and Definition

The first place to start is a heuristic analysis.  While this may sound like something you leave in a cup for your doctor, it actually refers to something pretty basic—an expert opinion of your current site.  In the hands of a good Information Architect and User Experience professional, a heuristic analysis can get you 80% of the way toward a better site.  Why?  Because someone who builds and studies sites all the time for a living knows a heck of a lot about what works and what doesn’t.  Because it only involves one person, a heuristic analysis can be done pretty quickly.

All clients want to know how their web site stacks up against the competition. So conducting a competitive assessment is pretty much a no-brainer. You can learn a lot by looking at competitive sites.  Better still you can learn it in very short order.  You’ll find out what content, features and functionality are simply the price of poker.  And you’ll also find areas where you can claim competitive advantage.  Think of it this way, if your competitor’s site was launched a few years ago, chances are you won’t find any Web 2.0 features.  So this could be your opportunity to gain advantage over the other guys by including things like RSS feeds, podcasts and wikkis.  Of course you never want to add these things just because you can. But if it gives you a leg up, why not?

You’d be making a mistake to do a competitive assessment without doing a best in class consumer site assessment—even if your site is a B2B play only.  The reason is simple. Business people are people too and they form their opinions about the web based on their consumer behavior.  There is a ton to be learned about your B2B site by looking at such sites as Amazon, E-Bay, NetFlix, Flickr, Pandora.  Heck there’s a lot to be learned by dwelling on the design restraint shown by Google. Can you imagine how many times a day Google’s creative director gets asked to make a change to their interface.  You have to admire the elegant simplicity of their design.

Developing personas and validating those personas through research is a great way to make sure you are building a site for humans rather than some vague demographic abstraction. Simply put, a persona is the creation of an individual personality for each of your major users.  Instead of keeping your user in the fuzzy wuzzy land of demographic data (mothers aged 25 to 45 living on the east coast), ground your experience in the reality of a single person (Emma Johnson, 33, mother of twins, working part time, loves the environment but drives an SUV…).  The more specific your personas, the easier it will be to find out if your site actually works for them.

I could go on and on. And I will. Another day, another post and all that. But for now, I have have some research to do…

Posted by Steve Lynch at 04:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

How to Better Communicate the Benefits of Your Bioproduct

Biotechnology is coming of age. There are well over 200 medicines and related products created from biotech techniques currently available, and FDA approval of biotech drugs is expected to outpace pharma approvals over the next few years.

However, as biotech companies move from R&D-focused activity to commercialization, they will be challenged to make the transition from successful developers to successful marketers. A key factor in their success will be clearly communicating the benefits of emerging classes of biological drugs, such as Mabs and multikinase inhibitors that target causes or pathways of disease. Their stories can be more complex than the traditional pharmaceutical model of how a particular chemical addresses certain symptoms.

Clear, consistent communication helps build a sustainable brand for a product—a brand promise that has staying power in a volatile marketplace. There are certain steps biotech firms can take to make the benefits of their products readily understood and embraced.

Determine the Brand Focal Point

The brand-positioning focal point helps you write a positioning statement that pinpoints how and why your product uniquely meets customer needs. The brand focal point is the intersection of market perceptions, corporate aspirations, and organizational values—where the market thinks you are, where you want to go, and what is inherently true about your organization that will contribute to your product’s success.

To determine your brand focal point, survey a sampling of all those affected by your offering, including customers, patients, management, and employees. Ask external audiences their perceptions of your company. Ask internal audiences how they believe your company is perceived, what its values are, and where the company wants to be in five years. Their responses will help you capture the unique value of your product and company in a way that is credible to the market.

Once you’ve gathered this information, it’s time to write the positioning statement. As a starting point, try the standard model for product positioning:

“For [target audience], the [product brand name] is the [product type] that [differentiator] and [key benefit] because it [primary reasons why].”

Take the Elevator Test

A good gauge of a positioning statement’s usefulness is the elevator test: Can it clearly communicate your story in the 15 seconds it takes to ride the elevator with someone?

A former colleague recalled working with a healthcare executive of whom it was said, “If you ask him the time, he’ll tell you how to make a clock.” Occasionally when working with biotech clients, I’ve observed a tendency to employ R&D language when describing a product or its benefits. R&D jargon can be exacting and useful when explaining how and why a product works. However, it can also lead to complicated explanations.

Here are some tips to avoid getting bogged down in too much detail:

Focus on the need. Remember the famous sales anecdote about the hardware company executive who said, “Our customers aren’t buying quarter-inch drill bits. They’re buying quarter-inch holes.” What is it your customers need? A biological process or the result of that process?

Use simple language. “Use” instead of “utilize,” “with” instead of “accompanied by” and “after” instead of “subsequent to” are just some examples of ways to simplify phrasings. In general, don’t use a 75-cent word when a 25-cent word will do. Words with fewer syllables are easier to understand and remember. Save complex concepts for detail aids. Ads, e-mails, and other awareness-building tools should focus on topline messages. Once the customer is engaged, secondary pieces such as technical sheets can be used to provide appropriate detail about mechanism of action and the finer points of the science behind your product.

Remember the patient. The endpoint of R&D is sometimes viewed as getting the product through clinical trials and on the market. The product’s true endpoint is better care. Let that notion serve as your compass, the “true north” that helps all other messages align.

When it comes to biotech marketing, the simpler approach is the stronger approach. Remember the need and remember the patient. There will be plenty of opportunity to get technical with the customer once you’ve captured their attention.

Posted by Michelle Boudreau at 10:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Enterprise technology firms tiring of the shark infested waters in the large enterprise market are targeting the perceived blue sky of the small and medium enterprise space in droves. After all, why wouldn’t a smaller company desire the same solutions as their larger brethren?

Unfortunately, targeting small and medium business customers is a little more complicated than a solution and pricing strategy. That’s why so many of the largest and most successful tech players in the enterprise world have failed in their attempts to market downstream.

Based on many years of learnings from working with a variety of technology companies, I offer a few tips to improve the odds of implementing a successful SME marketing strategy.

Clarity is king. Clarity is the name of the game in B2B communications; in the SME space it's even more critical. Chances are your SME decision maker wears more hats than his large enterprise counterpart. Their familiarity with your new offering may not be as top of mind as your current enterprise messaging. Conduct research to be certain your SME messaging resonates.

Focus on a solution. There is all kinds of pain in the SME space. Find out what hurts the most and lead with a laser-guided solution. The more solutions-focused your message can be towards a specific challenge – be it industry-specific, region-specific or size-specific - the more likely your message will engage that audience. Give them reason to believe you are the perfect solution for their needs.

Don’t mention size in messaging. “Not just for large companies anymore”...screams..."large company trying to force big solution in small box." Such hyperbole is completely transparent. One company's definition of "small" is very likely another company's "big". SME is fine for internal targeting, but should be avoided in external messaging. Instead of focusing on size, demonstrate you can solve their challenges. This kind of authenticity very quickly demonstrates that your business is in a position to serve their market.

Lastly...

Channel your energy. Too many technology firms enter the SME space only to sign up any VAR with a heartbeat willing to hawk their products, later questioning the lack of focus and commitment of their partner network. Instead, choose quality over quantity, and select partners who are the best fit for your company's solutions and target audiences. Then invest in these partners. You will both reap the rewards of a long-term partnership.

Posted by Doug Fox at 04:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This letter by Tom Simons was published in today's Boston Globe regarding the coverage of the recent Turner Broadcasting guerilla marketing snafu in Boston. The campaign received nationwide coverage by the news media when local police, homeland security and other agencies descended on the Boston area thinking that, what Turner considered a guerilla marketing campaign, was in actuality some sort of terrorist activity. Turner and their marketing agency have since agreed to pay a $2 million fine for their actions.

WHILE THERE may be a lot of folks in the attorney general's office congratulating themselves, there is certainly no shortage of high-fiving going on somewhere inside Turner Broadcasting. For while the settlement in the guerrilla marketing episode may be adequate compensation to cover the response expenses and associated anxiety, it will not deter similar guerrilla tactics in the future. Quite the contrary.

The extraordinary media coverage generated by the campaign -- to say nothing of the late-night talk show airtime -- is "worth" tens of millions of dollars. Legitimate and honorable public relations firms regularly calculate the "value" of the press they "earn" for their clients, and I am certain that someone at Turner Broadcasting or marketing firm Interference has run those numbers for this campaign and updates them daily. (The name of that cartoon show was on the front page of today's Globe again -- above the fold, no less.)

The $2 million settlement is a small price for Turner to pay (on top of whatever Interference charged) for all the publicity this (obviously successful) campaign stimulated. But if this kind of unfortunate stunt is to be successfully discouraged, the penalty will have to be equal to, or greater than, the value of the resulting media coverage.

TOM SIMONS

Boston

The writer is president and creative director of Partners and Simons, a marketing service firm.
© Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.

Posted by Tom Simons at 08:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Live for today. Live for tomorrow. Which one are you?

On the surface it may seem pretty easy to describe a customer segment using these labels. After all, you could use account balance data (savings, checking, retirement, investments, debt, etc) and basic demographic data (age, marital status, household income, etc) to paint a behavioral picture. You could even conduct surveys, interviews and focus groups to determine rational, emotional and social motivations to overlay attitudinal detail. You would have a pretty good portrait of these groups based on all of this, but consider the following. 

On any given day, I know I can make a purchase decision and spend a little more based on a live for today attitude. At the very next purchase decision, however, I tend to spend less based on a live for tomorrow motivation. Did guilt over the previous purchase influences the next purchase? Absolutely. But the guilt merry-go-round doesn't end there, because on the next purchase decision I'll tend to spend a little more. Feeling the guilt over acting cheaply. Guilt is a complex emotion. The point here is that emotional motivations tend to have more influence over our purchase decisions than we tend to admit (especially in a research setting where we want to appear smart).

So where does this leave us? I think the conclusion here is that these attitudinal labels -- "live for today & live for tomorrow"  -- are not set in stone. Instead, they represent two ends of a continuum. One where people are likely striving for a balance in their behavior. So it's likely that you are both living for today and living for tomorrow.

For financial service marketers rich with behavioral data, beware the emotional and social motivations of your customers. It may not always appear to be what it seems.
   

Posted by Todd Baird at 09:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

If you have Tivo or another DVR you already know how it changes your life. Shows like Sixty Minutes become Forty Minutes without commercial interruptions.  It’s great.

Like it or not, most people do not want to watch advertising.  Except, of course, during the Super Bowl – the one day of the year that advertisers get a free “Get Out of Jail” card.

Now this may seem un-American of me, but I am not a football fan.  But I do like advertising (naturally).  So this year I used my Tivo to record the Super Bowl so I could skip the game and just watch the ads.  Sort of Tivo in reverse.

I’m not going to slam or praise this year’s ads. There are enough people blogging about that. I simply want to make a few observations.

Not only do we have Tivo turning ad viewing upside down; but many of this year’s TV ads were just conversation starters.  Most of the dialogue took place on the web—before and after the game.

Chevy ran the Chevy Super Bowl Ad Challenge in which they asked college students to create this year’s Super Bowl ad.  Katie Crabb of the University of Wisconsin came up with the prize winning male strippers ad.

Doritos also ran a user generated content contest called “Crash the Superbowl.” Prior to the game, viewers voted for the best spot online. Though labeled “amateur” the spot was better than many of the “professional” spots that ran during the game.

And of course all of the good ads got passed around the web the next day extending the life of the ad well beyond the 30 second spot that now costs the same as the annual GDP for most mid-sized European countries.

So where is all this going?  Who knows? In a year marked by Time Magazine declaring YOU the person of the year, I suspect we’ll see a lot more user-generated content.  But it’s all still a great experiment. Not everyone can write. Not everyone can tell a story. Great content will win out—regardless of who created it.

But I hope this sort of thing doesn’t carry over into other fields of endeavor.  Can you imagine user-generated surgery? Hey, wait a minute. We might be on to something…

Posted by Steve Lynch at 05:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

For the ultimate mind bend – here’s a special report on whitepapers?  Okay it’s called a “special report” but you and I know this is a whitepaper on whitepapers.  Does this signify a cosmic event? The end of the universe as the comedian Louis Black would lead you to believe because there’s a Starbucks on all four corners of an intersection?

No, it reinforces the value of whitepapers and the need to write a good one in order to stand out in the sea of whitepapers. They are valuable content in the technology industry – particularly when a prospect is in decision making or buying stages.  Here are three tips to help increase downloads, content, and pass along and separate your paper from the masses.

1. A smart title. Keep it to the point (not funny or trite).  Try testing whitepapers names to see which receives more downloads.  Michael Stelzner author of the book “Writing Whitepapers: How to Capture Readers and Keep Them Engaged” and founder of www.whitepapersource.com suggests trying numbers in titles.  For example, “Ten things you need to know about compliance”.  The title is one of the most important factors on whether your paper is read, not an afterthought or something that should be left to a technical writer.
2. Keep it short and relevant.  While a short whitepaper sounds like a contradiction, we all know how hard it is to find the time to read a 25-page paper.   Instead try 4-6 pages and make it’s direct and easy to scan online.
3. Use key words. Using the right key words in your abstract/paper summary will help ensure your paper can be found via search engines and within your site.  You wrote this great content – you want it to be easy to find and determine whether it’s relevant for them.

Keep in mind that whitepapers are a valuable marketing tool and should be given the same attention and care that a high profile ad campaign warrants.

Posted by Kara Tierney at 04:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The pharmaceutical industry continues to have major concerns about potential future tightening of FDA regulations, specifically around direct to consumer advertising (DTC) for prescription medications. While there are some politicians who would like to see DTC advertising disappear, this type of regulation would be devastating to the pharmaceutical industry and to the consumers who currently receive a huge benefit in disease awareness education through DTC advertising.

The pharmaceutical industry is gearing up to confront the issues they face with congress. While there are no quick answers to the outcomes of political process, I think the pharmaceutical industry can continue to improve its position with congress and with consumers by doing more to show that the industry truly cares about the people who use its products.

By its very definition, DTC advertising is meant to provide educational informaiton about pharmaceutical products to consumers, but unfortunately there are plenty of examples of ads that are less educational, and more misleading.

King Pharmaceuticals®, Inc. is taking the lead for a new approach to education by launching a three-year sponsorship of the American Heart Association’s high blood pressure website with a :60 national spot that will air during Super Bowl XLI.

According to King Pharmaceuticals, the ad aims to increase public awareness of high blood pressure and other risk factors and the impact it has on a person’s overall risk of serious cardiovascular disease by driving consumers to the new website and an easy-to-use online high blood pressure risk assessment tool/questionnaire that runs in Flash.

While I will have to wait to see the spot during the game this weekend, it sounds as though the ad will be highly engaging to consumers, and will certainly get the target audience’s attention.  When/if consumers visit www.BeatYourRisk.com, they will find a simple online test that takes 2 to 3 minutes to complete. (People must have a rough idea of their current blood pressure in order for the test to be effective.)  Results from the test will help people understand their risks of heart attack, stroke, kidney failure, etc., specifically in relation to their blood pressure and will help them assess their needs for changes in diet, exercise levels, alcohol consumption, smoking, and other lifestyle issues.

What I find most remarkable about King Pharmaceutical’s involvement with this website is that there is very little promotion of King and their hypertension drug, Altace®.  On the website there is a King Pharmaceuticals logo and the following text: “King Pharmaceuticals, Inc., maker of Altace® is a proud sponsor of the AHA Hypertension Web site.”  If you click on the King Logo, the link takes you to another page within the AHA website and provides more information about King.  There is a short invitation to visit King’s website, but again, nothing about Altace.

This appears to be a well developed campaign and I believe it will be:
1. Successful
2. A leader in true DTC educational advertising that others will follow

Posted by Ed Feather at 04:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

We have all heard about the decreasing impact of mass media and the diminishing influence of the :30 spot. So I find a delightful irony in that PARTNERS+simons has been much more active this past year in TV broadcast production than at any time in our past. But I hasten to add that the strategies we employed and the objectives that we worked towards were hardly traditional.

One of our efforts was a series of four serialized episodic spots that drove viewers to the web where they could see a full five minute film version of the whole story.

Another campaign employed segmentation, addressable messaging strategies and cable delivery to localize the content -- by neighborhood.

A third foray was a direct response effort for a medical therapy -- that lowered previous acquisition costs by an order of magnitude.

All three of these examples are -- by definition -- television advertising in the traditional :30/:60 format. But that's where the similarity ends.

All are insightful blends of "art" and "science." Each practice leading edge segmentation and addressability strategies. All are easily measurable (and regularly measured). And just as important, all are thoughtfully and sensitively integrated into sensitively calculated multimedia campaign chemistries.

What will this year bring? Well, I know this: we've already got three broadcast advertising assignments in the chute, along with a very deep 2.0 development assignment and...

Posted by Tom Simons at 12:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I cannot leave the keyboard these days without someone asking me a question regarding an interface technique they saw on suchandsuchasite.com. I am not talking about Web 2.0 crazy, hip, content and applications (ie – canitblend.com, a talking alien shoshkalee screaming across my screen). Rather, I’m referring to business-related solutions (can you believe it) such as e-commerce, processes, and data visualization. Users are realizing that the browser is finally starting to take form and relief is in sight.

As a way to begin understanding RIAs, here are the top 10 most common questions/comments I receive when evangelizing the concept:

1. What is a (fill in some "RIA" annunciation here)?
2. Can you help me better understand its benefits?
3. Have you ever developed an RIA for (fill in some vertical here)?
4. Can you link an RIA to a keyboard command (sure, but why put my mouse down)?
5. Can I include video?
6. Where can I learn about my return-on-investment as it pertains to my project?
7. Who else is using them?
8. Does it support drag-n-drop?
9. Can my mom use it on her PC?
10. Wow, it reminds me of my first experience with the Mac.
    

The term "RIA" was coined a few years ago to describe a richer, easier, and more useful online experience. Specifically, an RIA is a set of "presentation layer" tools that allows applications to quickly deliver dynamic data to the client.  In addition, an RIA offers a high-fidelity user interface with a precision level that matches the look and feel of a native graphical user interface.

Or, more simply put, an RIA is an application on a website that behaves like your desktop.

Despite the recent growth and success of the web, the full potential of the browser remains untapped. It is constrained by the limitations of today's user experience. While it's easy for users to “Google” content, many web applications make activities like online shopping and registration incredibly difficult. Worse yet, more complex interactions like those in traditional client/server and desktop applications are almost impossible.

The advancements in interface technology have lead to some astounding experiences for the user.  Initially, we witnessed key advancements in sign-up forms, financial services and web merchandising. Now, as adoption takes hold, we are seeing a push into guided selling, customer service, visual analysis and expressive content (combining two-way or sometimes "real-time" content and video).

Consequently, users are:

• Learning how to use RIA applications faster
• Staying in applications longer
• Making more online transactions and less data entry errors
• Completing tasks quicker
• Understanding information better
  

PARTNERS+simons has built a specialized team of RIA strategists, developers, and user interface design experts that are launching our clients to the forefront of this quickly developing technology.

Posted by Jim Burke at 12:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In today’s marketing world CEO’s are demanding accountability from all aspects of their CMO’s marketingcommunications efforts. Last year, we fielded a survey among a number of C level and senior marketing executives. Eighty-one percent report that marketing is taking on a more important role in delivering bottom line results for their organization, thereby suggesting a shift in CEO expectations of the traditional roles of sales versus marketing. Due to this shift, 64% of CEO’s are looking for much greater accountability from marketing spending.

This new environment is having a disruptive effect on the traditional approach to marketing where the focus has been on launching a campaign for the upcoming fiscal year and then waiting until next year to begin anew.

Marketers are no longer thinking about their communications efforts as one with a beginning and an end. Instead the need for ongoing measurement and new software tools (that actually can provide real time analysis) is allowing savvy marketers for the first time to treat marketing as a systemic process.  

In this new dynamic - in addition to developing a cogent creative strategy and campaign - every element of the campaign is measured, analyzed, and optimized against the initial campaign goals including: individual messages and creative elements, unpaid and paid media channels, overall strategy, and target market segments.

How do you -as a marketer - do this? That will be the subject of my next several submissions as we discuss and review the process behind the implementation of a systemic marketing communications program.

Posted by Walter Mills at 12:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Gotcha! You swore I was going to say begin at the beginning didn’t you? But when it comes to implementingactionable measurement strategies you want to begin at the end.

You want to quantify, as best as possible, what the desired, targeted outcomes, of any marketing campaign or program are and then build your strategy, plan and infrastructure to enable measuring those outcomes.

What are some examples of measurable outcomes? Depends on the specific marketing application. But we recommend placing measurable outcomes into one of three categories of marketing strategy: Demand generation, Loyalty and Understanding. Every marketing expenditure, and therefore every measurement, should focus on measuring how effectively you are achieving these three objectives.

We then like to measure 5 specific applications, with 15 different measurable outcomes, within each of these 3 strategies:

Demand Generation

• Acquisition

  • Competitive share gain

• Product launch effectiveness

• Development

• Product migration

• Cross-sell effectiveness

• Lifecycle management

Loyalty

• Retention

• Share defense

• Usage stimulation

• Customer satisfaction

• Brand

• Perception

• Awareness

Understanding

• Consumer Insight

• Attitude and Usage

• Test Marketing

• Segmentation

• Brand Tracking

• Product strategy/pricing

Value for marketing investment is ultimately created by effectively combining demand generation, loyalty and understanding. By focusing on quantifying each of the measurable outcomes we’ve identified here, you’ll be well on your way to maximizing return on your marketing investment.

Next time, we’ll talk about the three types of program performance metrics you should utilize to optimize brand, campaign and program effectiveness.

Posted by Ken Dec at 12:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A few years ago you had an uphill battle trying to convince clients to add viral marketing to their marketing plan. Then everyone started trying it. “Try” being the operative word.

These days many clients request viral marketing almost as if they are ordering a double cheeseburger at a drive through window. “You want fries with that?” And this comes at a time when most agency pundits have declared viral dead and banished it to the same netherworld where words like paradigm shift and other trendy web words went to die.

But the truth is viral marketing is alive and well and very much with us. It’s always been with us. I imagine it started when the first caveman ate the pretty yellow berries and then dropped stone dead to the ground. Word got around the cave community pretty quickly—even without words. Why? Because the content of the message was compelling.

If a message is to go viral, it has to be compelling. That’s rule number one—and there are only two rules.

Rule number two: make it funny. If you don’t have an incredibly compelling message, you can still build buzz with humor. But humor is a tricky business. It’s hard to be funny—especially when you’re trying to be strategic. But it can be done.

Last year’s Careerbuilder.com Monkey-e-mail was strategic and funny. And CB’s new Age-O-Matic campaign, launched last week, is a great sequel. The strategic idea is that the wrong job can add years to your life. The site lets you upload your photo, watch yourself rot like a zombie in a dead end job, then add a personal message to send to your friends. In other words—good, clean viral fun.

The careerbuilder work is also a reminder that people in business are still people. And people like to laugh. LiveVault’s Institute for Backup Trauma leveraged this truth a while back. It’s still funny and still getting visits from FOFS (friends of friends).

And I’m not even going to get into YouTube other than to say if I had a dime for all the YouTube movies that come my way, well…let’s just say I’d have a lot of dimes.

The moral of the story is that Viral is far from dead. Like a real virus, it’s pretty tough to kill. But it’s also hard to do well. Make it compelling—make it funny, and you’ve got a chance.

But whatever you do, make sure you tell your friends about this blog.

Posted by Steve Lynch at 12:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)