Phil Bernstein – Page 28 – Phil Bernstein's Advertising, Marketing, and Sales Training Blog

Delta’s New Campaign Misses The Point

I’m a Delta Airlines frequent flyer. Not quite George-Clooney-“Up In The Air”-frequent, but I average two round-trips a month on the airline, have managed to hit Gold Medallion status, and have an outside shot at Platinum.

A week ago, I was one of 180 passengers who had to hike from one terminal to another at Minneapolis-St. Paul airport because Delta had parked its plane at the wrong gate. This was the third time in 2010 this has happened to me on a Delta flight.

So I was amused and astonished to see see this ad in today’s morning paper:

The substance of the message is terrific: Delta is bringing back their “Red Coat” agents to assist passengers who need help rebooking or otherwise solving problems. This is a good thing.

The problem with the ad is its self-congratulatory tone, which directly contradicts the experience of anyone who’s ever flown Delta.

You should be able to depend on an airline to make your trip easier, no matter what’s going on in the industry — those are our concerns, not yours.

Well, yes.

But this is not some secret information that only Delta knows. In fact, there is considerable evidence that in terms of dumping the industry’s problems on their customers, Delta has been one of the worst offenders for years.

Delta has consistently ranked near the bottom in national customer-satisfaction surveys. Their Skymiles frequent-flyer program is considered one of the very-worst in its availability of free tickets. Google “Delta Sucks”, and you’ll find page after page of horror stories.

Passengers really don’t like Delta Airlines.

There is significant evidence that Delta’s senior management recognizes the problem, and is taking steps to address it. The return of the Red Coats is certainly a signal of that. If the campaign told its customers, “We heard you, we know we have a problem, and we’re fixing it”, Delta would deserve applause.

Instead, this ad attempts to position Delta as if they’ve always led the charge for good service. Which reminds one of Judge Judy Sheindlin’s timeless advice:

Don’t pee on my leg and tell me it’s raining.”

Until Delta proves to its passengers that it is committed to improvement, this is one message that will be met with derision.

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When You Have Only One Chance to Persuade

There’s been a steady drumbeat for months about media dollars moving from “traditional” media to online. According to a recent report by Outsell, a California company that tracks the information industry, online advertising spending will exceed print advertising for the first time this year.

Here are some predicted numbers from Outsell:

$120B Online/Digital
$112B Print/Magazine
$ 60B TV
$ 24B Direct Mail

But the stampede to digital only goes so far. Media Blogger Tom Taylor reports that as the General Election approaches, political types are sticking with television:

Six weeks to go, says Borrell Associates, and digital media might get about 1% of the total political ad spend in this election cycle. Just 1%, versus the 65-70% that is funneled into TV. Borrell’s figuring a total commitment to digital this year of about $45 million, which is double 2008, but still a minuscule part of most candidates’ budget. Why so little going that way, after the Obama success with online in 2008 and the Tea Party social networking of the last year? Borrell theorizes that political consultants are sticking with proven techniques, and they know TV works. There’s relatively little research about doing political advertising online.

There are a number of ways to interpret this, including:

1. Some political operatives may just be scared of the unknown. They will continue to do what they’ve always done until someone forces them to do otherwise.

2. In some cases, campaigns have tried to use the “free” side of digital — videos on YouTube, tweets on Twitter, and Facebook “fan pages” — in the hopes that something will go viral. As Alabama Agriculture Commission candidate Dale Peterson found earlier this year, viral doesn’t always translate into votes. He got 1.5 million views on YouTube, but finished third in the Republican primary.

3. The fact that online spending doubled could mean it’s just a matter of time before digital dominates political advertising, too.

But the thing to keep in mind is that political advertisers are in the pure persuasion business. They need to force their way into the consiousness of people who may not be thinking about them, and convince them to take a particular action on a particular day. They only have one chance to get it right — Tuesday, November 2 — and if they fail, they will be unemployed on Wednesday.

With one chance to persuade, these people are still choosing intrusive old media — television wins this election in a landslide, 65 to 1.

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Why You Need to Get To The Point Fast

The issue of short attention spans is having a profound effect on those of us in the advertising business. It’s also causing professional speakers to radically change their presentations.

Andy Nulman, a speaker, comedian, and author of “Pow! Right Between the Eyes! Profiting from The Power of Surprise”, had this to say about audiences in the digital age [warning — the full post contains a considerable amount of profanity]:

The Internet has changed everything. It has contracted attention spans to an almost ridiculously-microscopic measure, and has sung the swan song for the concept of subtlety.

For example, the old ‘speaker’s adage’ used to be:

• Tell ’em what you’re gonna tell ’em

• Tell ’em

• Tell ’em what you told ’em

These days, the audience fidgets through the preamble, tweets during the middle, and are out the door before the recap.

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Why Your Advertising Doesn’t Work Anymore

Not long ago, I met with the Marketing Director of a home improvement company in Texas. The company had been open for 20 years, and for most of that time, they’d had great success with an image campaign. Sales had been good, and people mentioned how much they liked the advertising as they filled out the paperwork.

For the past couple of years, however, response to their messages had plummeted. Showroom traffic was down, sales were down. Part of it was due to the economy, but the owners suspected that something else was going on.

I watched their “window” commercial. For 20 seconds, as pretty guitar music played, the screen showed kids in a backyard, playing in the leaves. Slowly the camera panned back to show that we were looking through a window. Eventually the store logo and address showed up, and a voice came on with a slogan — “Windows never looked so good. Life never looked so good. We’re at [location]. Don’t forget to ask about our Best Value Guarantee.”

Commercial over.

When it was over, I asked the client: “Does anyone ever ask about your Best Value Guarantee?”

Her answer: “No.”

She was mystified. Her strategy had been successful for nearly two decades. What had changed?

The answer may involve the way we now process information. The New York Times has been running a series of articles called “Your Brain on Computers”, which details the effect of information overload on our thinking process. A recent installment discussed the effect of multitasking — working with multiple screens delivering a constant stream of information.

While many people say multitasking makes them more productive, research shows otherwise. Heavy multitaskers actually have more trouble focusing and shutting out irrelevant information, scientists say, and they experience more stress.

And scientists are discovering that even after the multitasking ends, fractured thinking and lack of focus persist. In other words, this is also your brain off computers.

“The technology is rewiring our brains,” said Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute of Drug Abuse and one of the world’s leading brain scientists.

How do you generate results in the age of digitally-rewired brains?

* Get to the point immediately. Your prospects aren’t going to stick around while you “ease into it.”

* It’s not enough to make your target feel good about your brand. Offer a direct, measurable benefit that comes when they do business with you.

* Pick one action you want your prospects to take, and tell them — explicitly — to take it.

* Offer a reward to take the action, and include a deadline. Make the deadline specific. “This deal ends on September 9 at 5pm” is much more powerful than “Hurry, this offer ends soon.”

One of the best tips I’ve ever heard for getting to the point comes from Dan O’Day. It goes like this:

1. Write your script, and go through your standard editing process.

2. Delete the first sentence.

3. Does the message still work? If it does, leave the first sentence out and begin the commercial with Sentence 2.

I started doing this about three years ago. It’s amazing how often the first sentence of the script turns out to be unnecessary.

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How Much Disclaimer is Too Much?

I’m not a smoker — never have been. So when I saw this ad for Chantix, my reaction was purely academic. This is the longest, scariest disclaimer — after 17 seconds of “testimonial”, the warning language starts, and runs for more than a minute –I’ve ever seen, and my initial thought was that Pfizer was wasting its money.

I’m not disputing the need for the language — the law is the law, and if Pfizer wants to run an ad for the drug, every single word has to be there. My question was whether television is the right medium if the warning is longer than the pitch.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Clrkl1mixJw]

Two days after I saw the ad (it’s originally from 2009), I ran into a guy who had quit smoking a month before, and used Chantix to do it. He acknowledged the disclaimer, shook his head, and said, “I knew all about the side effects. But I had to quit smoking, so I was willing to take the risk.”

My sample size on this survey is currently one — one vote for “I know about the side effects, and I’m doing it anyway.” Pfizer may know what it’s doing. Feel free to check in. My only question for this exercise is its effectiveness as advertising — is the need so great, and the testimonial so powerful, that it can outweigh more than sixty seconds of warnings?

Check in below.