Choosing the Right Media for Your Message
| Category: PR/Publicity and Media | Date: 2002-05-14 |
Today, there is a great need to communicate to the customer (trade or end-consumer) with intimacy, timeliness and relevancy. But many marketing managers are stuck in a rut of communicating in the same old ways.
While the technology is available to communicate one-on-one with each customer, todays marketing managers continue to rely on the same mass marketing model that communicates to everyone with one voice. In addition, many brand marketing companies still define success by short-term market penetration metrics.
While the old ways are simpler, they are no longer the communications paths to success.
In the old days, managers had less to consider. Advertising choices consisted mostly of print or television. Direct mail was used only to support some type of service issue which could not be addressed in the mass media. There were three major television networks, a few major print magazines which offered broad demographic or vertical special interest groups, and a handful of local radio stations and newspapers that offered the same audience demographics.
Today, the media possibilities have proliferated into many styles. Advertising -- lets call it "customer communications" -- has gotten complex. The current environment offers five major television networks, 11,000 magazines, 10,000 newsletters, 1,600 newspapers, 5,000 radio stations, 7,000 cable systems and 3,500 prime web sites (11 million total web sites). Add to this the direct marketing industry which drops more than 700 pieces of mail a year to the average American. Theres also the promotional and telemarketing industry. And now, with e-mail, theres the digital media.
All toll, the average American is exposed to more than 3,500 advertising messages daily. This translates to an advertising investment of more than $2,170 per man woman and child in America.
Leaving the old advertising notions has been a difficult evolutionary process. Trying something new involves risk. But when the new media choices are used correctly, the results are better than anything the old methods could deliver.
Direct Marketing Is Leading the Way
The direct mail industry opened the way to change with the ROI (Return on Investment) concept. ROI began to place accountability to perform with the media. However, as the new media began emerging at an extremely fast pace, it became more difficult to measure their accountability. This led marketers to review the metrics used to calculate value.
Again, the direct marketing industry led the way by developing the Life Time Value (LTV) concept. LTV places the metrics on how important the customer is to the organization over the time they will purchase goods and services.
Fred Wierseman in "Customer Intimacy," writes that companies must be prepared to "custom design their businesses imaginatively and irresistibly" in order to solve the current and future needs of their customers, no matter how dramatic a shift that may entail.
Customers today want to have information provided to them when they want it, and in the media that is best suited for them. Simplicity and convenience are the advertising mantra of the 90s. Most of us are overworked, overburdened and over-committed. We need to get our information tailored to our needs.
These then are hard times for those who cut their teeth on mass marketing and when brands where strong and viable.
The Need for Communication Leadership
Providing leadership for the new forms of communications is to experiment based upon what the customer is expressing. In the past, traditional communications firms such as ad agencies were the clear industry leaders. Today, with the new media, communications agencies need to re-think their priorities if they wish to maintain creative leadership in the new millennium.
Certainly it doesnt take high tech savvy to know that e-mail is becoming one of the biggest opportunities for business-to-business communications. Broadcast fax is also becoming extremely effective in a business-to-business context.
E-mail and broadcast fast offer unique high efficiency benefits and substantial client cost saving. Both offer the ability to capitalize on "quick to market" opportunities which translate into increased sales and monetary velocities. They also offer the benefit of knowing whether a program is working right a way.
For us, the broadcast fax has generated the highest response of any of the various mediums weve used in recent business-to-business integrated marketing programs for our clients. Broadcast fax is also one of the most cost effective methods of getting the message out fast.
E-mail is also becoming a hot-hot-hot opportunity. There are many ways to implement e-mail messages. These include via in-house e-mail lists, which are fast becoming excellent equivalents to the direct mail house lists. Highly targeted e-mail lists now can be purchased from outside companies such as Juno or Big Foot. E-mails also can be sent to responders to banner advertising that results from key words offered by many of the Internet directories such as Yahoo, excite, Alta Vista and others.
These are two prime examples of how the new media is affecting traditional communications companies. While agencies want to provide services for their clients, they also like the high revenues that are associated with traditional print and broadcast media and their corresponding production values. E-mail and broadcast fax dont have those production values or high revenues.
This poses a dilemma for traditional communications agencies: the same amount of human resource support is needed for less revenue-generating media. The solution we recommend for agencies that want to offer this service to their clients -- and certainly they should want to control the communications and the database -- is to enter into a cost-per-project or a compensation agreement based upon out-of-pocket cost plus bonuses for responses.
How to Create When there isnt "That Same Old Feeling"
The new media is also posing a dilemma for the creative folks. The traditional creative department wants to win awards! They want to work their magic in colorful graphic excitement. So how do you get the creative crew excited when the new media offers little four-color opportunity and does not require the traditional graphic arts tools? There just arent award programs for broadcast faxes. No matter how great it looks and how effective it is, the fax just doesnt have the excitement to bowl-over creative judges.
E-mail is a little better. It offers the creative department an opportunity to cut its teeth on a new media. E-mail can be creative and it does offer the opportunity to combine color and motion. Over the next few months sound will also be embedded into the e-mail message.
As the new media becomes increasing complex, smart communications agencies will find greater opportunities to provide leadership to their clients.
Keeping the Creative Director Motivated
The issue remains how to get the creative director excited about these non-traditional media.
From our experience, weve learned that we have to show the agencies how "lay" people are using the medium creatively and make it a creative-friendly challenge. We say in essence, "look, if a computer nerd can do this trick looking banner, then surely your professionally trained creative department can do it better. Your award-winning writers can write more compelling and arresting body copy for this broadcast fax." To many creatives the new media is still an unknown. Like everyone, theyre reluctant to experiment because theyre afraid of criticism.
About the author.
DBMarkets@aol.com
http://www.msdbm.com
While the technology is available to communicate one-on-one with each customer, todays marketing managers continue to rely on the same mass marketing model that communicates to everyone with one voice. In addition, many brand marketing companies still define success by short-term market penetration metrics.
While the old ways are simpler, they are no longer the communications paths to success.
In the old days, managers had less to consider. Advertising choices consisted mostly of print or television. Direct mail was used only to support some type of service issue which could not be addressed in the mass media. There were three major television networks, a few major print magazines which offered broad demographic or vertical special interest groups, and a handful of local radio stations and newspapers that offered the same audience demographics.
Today, the media possibilities have proliferated into many styles. Advertising -- lets call it "customer communications" -- has gotten complex. The current environment offers five major television networks, 11,000 magazines, 10,000 newsletters, 1,600 newspapers, 5,000 radio stations, 7,000 cable systems and 3,500 prime web sites (11 million total web sites). Add to this the direct marketing industry which drops more than 700 pieces of mail a year to the average American. Theres also the promotional and telemarketing industry. And now, with e-mail, theres the digital media.
All toll, the average American is exposed to more than 3,500 advertising messages daily. This translates to an advertising investment of more than $2,170 per man woman and child in America.
Leaving the old advertising notions has been a difficult evolutionary process. Trying something new involves risk. But when the new media choices are used correctly, the results are better than anything the old methods could deliver.
Direct Marketing Is Leading the Way
The direct mail industry opened the way to change with the ROI (Return on Investment) concept. ROI began to place accountability to perform with the media. However, as the new media began emerging at an extremely fast pace, it became more difficult to measure their accountability. This led marketers to review the metrics used to calculate value.
Again, the direct marketing industry led the way by developing the Life Time Value (LTV) concept. LTV places the metrics on how important the customer is to the organization over the time they will purchase goods and services.
Fred Wierseman in "Customer Intimacy," writes that companies must be prepared to "custom design their businesses imaginatively and irresistibly" in order to solve the current and future needs of their customers, no matter how dramatic a shift that may entail.
Customers today want to have information provided to them when they want it, and in the media that is best suited for them. Simplicity and convenience are the advertising mantra of the 90s. Most of us are overworked, overburdened and over-committed. We need to get our information tailored to our needs.
These then are hard times for those who cut their teeth on mass marketing and when brands where strong and viable.
The Need for Communication Leadership
Providing leadership for the new forms of communications is to experiment based upon what the customer is expressing. In the past, traditional communications firms such as ad agencies were the clear industry leaders. Today, with the new media, communications agencies need to re-think their priorities if they wish to maintain creative leadership in the new millennium.
Certainly it doesnt take high tech savvy to know that e-mail is becoming one of the biggest opportunities for business-to-business communications. Broadcast fax is also becoming extremely effective in a business-to-business context.
E-mail and broadcast fast offer unique high efficiency benefits and substantial client cost saving. Both offer the ability to capitalize on "quick to market" opportunities which translate into increased sales and monetary velocities. They also offer the benefit of knowing whether a program is working right a way.
For us, the broadcast fax has generated the highest response of any of the various mediums weve used in recent business-to-business integrated marketing programs for our clients. Broadcast fax is also one of the most cost effective methods of getting the message out fast.
E-mail is also becoming a hot-hot-hot opportunity. There are many ways to implement e-mail messages. These include via in-house e-mail lists, which are fast becoming excellent equivalents to the direct mail house lists. Highly targeted e-mail lists now can be purchased from outside companies such as Juno or Big Foot. E-mails also can be sent to responders to banner advertising that results from key words offered by many of the Internet directories such as Yahoo, excite, Alta Vista and others.
These are two prime examples of how the new media is affecting traditional communications companies. While agencies want to provide services for their clients, they also like the high revenues that are associated with traditional print and broadcast media and their corresponding production values. E-mail and broadcast fax dont have those production values or high revenues.
This poses a dilemma for traditional communications agencies: the same amount of human resource support is needed for less revenue-generating media. The solution we recommend for agencies that want to offer this service to their clients -- and certainly they should want to control the communications and the database -- is to enter into a cost-per-project or a compensation agreement based upon out-of-pocket cost plus bonuses for responses.
How to Create When there isnt "That Same Old Feeling"
The new media is also posing a dilemma for the creative folks. The traditional creative department wants to win awards! They want to work their magic in colorful graphic excitement. So how do you get the creative crew excited when the new media offers little four-color opportunity and does not require the traditional graphic arts tools? There just arent award programs for broadcast faxes. No matter how great it looks and how effective it is, the fax just doesnt have the excitement to bowl-over creative judges.
E-mail is a little better. It offers the creative department an opportunity to cut its teeth on a new media. E-mail can be creative and it does offer the opportunity to combine color and motion. Over the next few months sound will also be embedded into the e-mail message.
As the new media becomes increasing complex, smart communications agencies will find greater opportunities to provide leadership to their clients.
Keeping the Creative Director Motivated
The issue remains how to get the creative director excited about these non-traditional media.
From our experience, weve learned that we have to show the agencies how "lay" people are using the medium creatively and make it a creative-friendly challenge. We say in essence, "look, if a computer nerd can do this trick looking banner, then surely your professionally trained creative department can do it better. Your award-winning writers can write more compelling and arresting body copy for this broadcast fax." To many creatives the new media is still an unknown. Like everyone, theyre reluctant to experiment because theyre afraid of criticism.
About the author.
DBMarkets@aol.com
http://www.msdbm.com
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