My sister in-law picked a fight with me. No provocation. Just wound up and hit me with a big, nasty leather pillow. Highly unusual behavior from her. She’s a grandmother for cryin’ out loud. So I retaliated. Smacked her right in the Facebook. The Pillow Fight War of 2008 had begun.
Pillow Fight is a Facebook application that encourages…well, I’m not sure what it encourages. It may just be electronic silliness, but it got me thinking. What was originally the domain of the Millenials has quickly become a part of day to day interaction among those of us who have a little more life experience (or more than a little more).
The interesting thing is the difference in how we use it. Rather than a “here’s-what-I’m-experiencing-this-very-second” stream of consciousness, we treat it more like an electronic bulletin board. Or digital Post-It notes on a universal fridge.
Pictures of high school classmates at their kids’ weddings. Vacations. Reunions. Dog training tips. Birthday reminders. Lists of wines that go with beef jerky. And pillow fights, of course.
Makes me wonder how we’ll use it in thirty or forty years. Maybe something like this:
Since 2006, Apple has been hammering the PC market (and, in one degree of separation, Microsoft) with its brilliantly simple ‘Mac vs. PC’ campaign featuring Justin Long and John Hodgman.
The campaign instantly created a huge international buzz, and has been customized for markets outside the U.S.
Over the past two years, the campaign, created for Apple by TBWA/Media Lab, has won boatloads of industry awards and become beloved by ad wonks and consumers alike. With the spots still running and as iconic as ever, it’s interesting to consider the merits of the two recently released Microsoft campaigns.
The first features Microsoft’s own not-so-dynamic duo- Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates.
I think we could call this a launch pad disaster.
The spot debuted September 4 and has been criticized roundly for its lack of mentioning, you know, the product. Seinfeld’s famous show about nothing has morphed into an ad campaign…about nothing. It fails to entertain…and worse yet, it fails to sell anything. Ouch.
But the news isn’t all bad. Microsoft recently launched their ‘I’m a PC’ campaign, which begs the question- What took Microsoft so long to respond to Apple?
The spots, released September 18, use cameos of everyone from Vera Wang to Tony Parker and include clips of a variety of ordinary (and very extraordinary) people. Is it as entertaining as the Apple campaign? Nope. But does it provide an effective and reassuring message to the 95% of the world that currently works on PCs? Absolutely. With such a predominant market share on their side, it figured that at least a few cool people would be working on PC’s too- and Microsoft did a fine job of packaging that message.
Here’s hoping that they continue down this road and let Jerry & Bill wander off into the sunset.
How do you communicate with teens these days? Since two of them live in my house I think about that every day. I study what they do. How they interact with each other and with the brands they love. In their language I’m “creepin’ on them”.
When I was in high school we lived on the telephone talking to our friends. My parents put in a second line so their calls could get through. Kind of like I have two, OK three, computers in my house. Why? If you don’t live with teens, here is how it works. They go somewhere with their friends. They take pictures. They come home. They immediately jump on Facebook.com to share their pictures and their stories. Then they go to YouTube.com and watch silly videos.
Do they know they spend too much time on Facebook? Yes. At the Roosevelt High School talent show last week several hilarious skits and parody songs were dedicated to their obsession with being on everyone’s top friend list. This is where they live. In the 50’s Fonzie and Richie hung out at the drive in. Today’s teens hang out online.
If you are marketing to them you must have a digital strategy.
Oh yeah, if I absolutely have to get in touch with my teens immediately, how do I do it? You parents out there know. Text messaging. Hmmm, is that part of your marketing strategy? Happy creepin’! Let me know if I can help.
Before planning and deploying your e-mail campaign, think about the message goals:
Open the e-mail: Message open rates depend heavily on the inherent trust that lies with the sender of the e-mail and the subject line. Think carefully about the “from” field in the e-mail. If the relationship lies with an individual employee, list that person’s name rather than a generic customer service e-mail address, or the like. Subject lines should summarize the content of the e-mail and sell the value of the content found within. Ask the question the recipient will be asking – WIIFM – “what’s in it for me”? Also, pay attention to the time of day you’re sending to your audience – consider when the message will be best received.
Read the e-mail: What is the goal of the content? To educate the consumer on industry best practices? To present a client success story? To sell the features of a product? To discuss a new service? Whatever the goal, make it clear and always make sure you’re providing value to the reader.
Click from the e-mail: What’s the desired next step? Don’t provide all of the available information within the e-mail… give the reader a reason to click for more information or to complete the associated task. Make the call-to-action very clear and provide adequate instructions so the reader knows what to expect when they arrive on the web site landing page.
Click through web site: You’ve gained the web visitor – you’re done, right? Wrong… gaining the click is only half the work. Now, you need to provide a clear navigation path for the visitor to click through and convert on your web site. Conversions may be a sale, a request for information, an e-mail newsletter sign-up, a content/promotion, etc.
Convert on site: You’ve led the visitor to the final step – now make task completion easy and thank the visitor on the confirmation page.
The other day Courtney from our research team came across this interesting study:
According to the 2008 Cone Business in Social Media Study, 93 percent of Americans believe a company should have a presence in social media, while an overwhelming 85 percent believe a company should not only be present, but also interact with its consumers via social media. In fact, 56 percent of American consumers feel both a stronger connection with and better served by companies when they can interact with them in a social media environment.
The online survey was conducted September 11-12, 2008, by Opinion Research Corporation, among 1,092 adults comprising 525 men and 567 women 18 years of age and older.
So your audience wants to engage with you – where do you start? Is it a blog, is it a rating & review site, what about twitter, or facebook?
My partner in crime (Robin) also sent this graphic to me a while back, which I think is an excellent illustration from elliance.com showing how a business can utilize the myriad of social media tools to connect with customers.
The marketplace is changing and these numbers reflect the fact that social media is not just for teenagers or a fad for techies. If you want to have a relationship with your customers, it soon (if it hasn’t already) will involve conversations conducted online. Are you ready to embrace this transition?
