Category: Uncategorized

If you’ve been on Facebook recently, you saw a series of one-word Status Updates. The word was always a color, and there was no explanation in the update:

 “Black”!

 “Tan!”

 “Pink!”

Those among the baffled who Googled the subject learned that people (mostly women) were posting the color of their bras. Days later, it’s still not clear who came up with the idea, or what they were hoping to accomplish — it apparently had something to do with “breast cancer awareness”.

 It’s a great illustration of the difference between response and results.

 There was certainly a response — hundreds of thousands of women took the time to post their bra colors on Facebook. But what was the result?

 The campaign didn’t raise funds for breast cancer research, or services for patients. It didn’t help form support groups, or lobby for government support, or cause women to get mammograms. It didn’t even increase “breast cancer awareness” — nobody learned anything new about the disease.

 Response, yes. Results, no.

 For a look at a social media campaign that got real results, read this article about Jonathan Marcus, an assistant track coach at Portland’s Roosevelt High School. Marcus was appalled that many local track athletes couldn’t afford running shoes or other essential gear for their sport.

In mid-December, Marcus and his friend Jacob Buckmaster, an assistant track coach at Roosevelt, decided to take a different approach to outfitting athletes. Tapping into the local running community on the Internet through Facebook, they appealed for donations.

“We just figured we were going to get used or gently worn clothing,” Marcus said. “Initially, it was a clothing drive. But then it just started to take wings.”

Donations came from everywhere. Nike gave 40 pairs of shoes and new clothing. Road Runner Sports in Tualatin, where Marcus is a “grassroots partner,” contributed 30 pairs of slightly used shoes. Adidas on Thursday donated 14 pairs of new running shoes and 217 articles of new clothing. And Fit Right Northwest, with stores in Northwest Portland and Vancouver, came through with more than 200 pairs of shoes and about 100 garments — roughly $15,000 worth of merchandise.

Unlike whoever came up with the “What Color is Your Bra” idea, Marcus and Buckmaster knew exactly what they wanted to accomplish, and used Facebook to accomplish the goal. They asked their target audience to take a specific action, and were able to measure the results: to date, about 360 pairs of shoes and 700 articles of clothing.

To paraphrase advertising legend David Olgilvy,

Response is “I like your ad.”

Results is “I bought the product.”
 

Which would you prefer?

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Check out Phil Bernstein’s Facebook Fan Page — and become a Fan – here

Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising and Marketing Blog.

Got a question? Call Phil Bernstein, America’s Attention-Rental Expert, at 503-477-4933.

Arbitron, the ratings service that measures radio listening, recently launched — with great fanfare — a new device called the Portable People Meter (PPM). Before PPM, Arbitron used a diary system in which survey participants were supposed to write down the stations they listened to.

The accuracy of this system depended on the accuracy of the subjects’ memories.

Which meant that the ratings, to put it mildly, were not terribly accurate. Many people filled in their diaries well after they had listened to the radio, and didn’t remember all the stations they’d been exposed to. Others filled in what they thought they should have listened to, rather than what they actually had on.

The Portable People, a device that partipants carry, records an encoded signal. If a participant is within range of the signal, the device picks it up. So memory and opinion are no longer factors. This is meant to be a significant improvement, and maybe it is.

But it ain’t perfect, as blogger Jerry Del Colliano reports:

 A friend of one of my readers is a People Meter family. The woman of the house carries her meter with her.

Her husband — well, how can I put this?

…he attaches it to his dog and his dog wanders wherever it wants and some fool at a radio station thinks the man of the house likes Oldies 101 when it is actually the dog. And an even bigger fool — advertisers — are accepting hearing (as in somewhere near an encoded signal) instead of listening (as in fans of the radio station).

While I’ll admit the Doggie Meter is likely an aberration, it dramatically demonstrates that man’s best friend is not a People Meter unless it is understood for both its advantages and limitations.

The lesson here? Raw numbers by themselves won’t tell you where, or how, to advertise. If your message was bringing in customers before the diary-to-meter switch, it will still bring in customers, even if the station you’re using has dropped in the rankings. And if you didn’t belong on a station before, you don’t suddenly belong on it now that it’s jumped nine spots on a ranker.

Listener behavior hasn’t changed — only the way it’s measured. And the measuring device just might be on a dog.

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Check out Phil Bernstein’s Facebook Fan Page — and become a Fan – here

Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising and Marketing Blog.

Got a question? Call Phil Bernstein, America’s Attention-Rental Expert, at 503-477-4933.

Media writer Tom Taylor  recently heard Starbucks executive Bill Black speak at an Arbitron conference. Taylor had this to say in his newsletter:

Boy, does Starbucks study its customers, creating profiles of “Super regulars” who visit daily and produce 20% of revenue, spending over $1,000 a year at Starbucks. (They’re just 4% of total customers.) And “Coffee house enthusiasts”, who comprise 17% of the customer base and 37% of the revenue. Then “Treat-seekers”, who visit maybe once a week and are 27% of customers/25% of revenue. And finally “Basic occasionals”, with special attention on the “Youth occasionals.

Bill Black – who donned the famous Starbucks green barista apron – says “it would take us 16 Basic occasionals to replace one Super regular” who for some reason quit coming in. So “we need to focus our attention on the one, and make sure we’re showing the love.

All customers are not created equal. A Super Regular is worth 16 times as much as a Basic Occasional – so Starbucks directs its time, attention, and resources toward learning about their Super Regulars, attracting them, and keeping them happy.

As a long-time radio rep, I trained myself to always ask prospects about their core customer – the person most likely to do business with the advertiser. I received a wide range of answers. Some advertisers had a pretty good idea, while others would say things like

· “I’ve seen teenagers in here, and I’ve seen seniors.”

· “Mostly women, but I don’t want to ignore the men!”

· “Everyone is a customer!”

Now, very few local advertisers can afford to do the kind of market research that Starbucks does. But it’s possible for them to learn a great deal about their core customers just by spending time with them.

In my new role as a national marketing consultant, I recently met with Marvin, who owns a consumer electronics store in the Southwest. Marvin’s store specializes in big-screen TV’s. He doesn’t have a research department – he is the research department. When I asked him who his core customer is, he answered right away:

Men, 55 and over. They don’t trust the salespeople in the big box stores, so they come to my store for help. They come in here twice – the first time they’re by themselves, so they can decide what they want. But they can’t make a $3,000 decision without permission, so they have to come back in with their wife to make the purchase. When they come back, I make sure I give a lot of attention to the wife – the man’s already sold, but if she feels ignored she can kill the deal.

Marvin has a great TV Account Executive who has concentrated his advertising dollars strictly on shows that men 55 and over watch. And he’s learned what’s important to those customers: for example, they get up early, so while the Best Buys of the world open at 10:00, he’s open at 8:30 every day.

There are riches in niches, and Marvin’s niche is older men. He doesn’t have a big marketing budget, but he’s figured out who his core customer is, and focuses his dollars on the core. That approach has allowed him to successfully compete against the big boxes for two decades.

If you’re wondering whether it’s worth taking the time — and making the effort — to figure out who your “Super Regular” is, remember the story of Starbucks – and the story of Marvin.

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Check out Phil Bernstein’s Facebook Fan Page — and become a Fan – here

Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising and Marketing Blog.

Got a question? Call Phil Bernstein, America’s Attention-Rental Expert, at 503-477-4933.

This has nothing whatsoever to do with advertising or marketing. But when you’re married to someone who can design a costume like this, you just have to tell the world about it. Thank you, PDXKnitterati.