MYT 36 - Economy of Meaning

Our topic 2 weeks ago started out as “happiness,” and as we do each week, interns found a number of articles relative to campaigns talking about the emotional appeal of happiness in 2009. What turned up was an article that mentioned the evolution from the experience economy to an economy of meaning – a very interesting idea! So we’re writing about it this week in MYT 36.

It’s interesting to note that the two examples we mention this week are from the auto industry. Looking to revive the category, brands such as Ford, Mini, and Toyota (see the Prius’ page on Facebook for their “Random Acts) are focusing in the positive, the good, and the optimistic.

Also, for further support, is a research paper from the 4A’s published earlier this month on the subject of emotional vs. rational in advertising

As always, have a creative week!

What happened to connections planning?

A great presentation found on Ed's Influx Insights made by Jason and Gareth at this year's Planning-ness conference in San Francisco, rallied by Mark.

Connections Planningness

View more documents from Jason Oke.

Some great points:

• Where connections planning went wrong: we applied the lens of advertising (interruptive, message-based) to new media. We should apply the lens of new media (interactivity, iteratioin) to advertising.

• We have an opportunity to rethink the value of connections planning. It's a new creative process, not an output.

• Put human connections at the heart of everything, grounded in a deep understanding of what people are trying to do, what the brand is trying to do, and how people use media.

• It isn't about digital, it's about planning for interaction.

Take a look through the slides for more, and take some time to reflect on the way you view the role of planning. Do we need to segment the discipline or should it just be the way we all think?

MYT 35 - Real-Time Search

Every week, a small group of us here put together a Trend Lab newsletter covering a topic we think is important to make the work more culturally relevant. This week's topic was real-time search.

Clients want immediate results. We try to pacify their desire for instant gratification by talking to them about the time and attention a strong brand deserves. But it seems that more and more these days, immediacy is more relevant than in-depth information. Only time will tell what wins; maybe it’s an effective combination of the two.

This week’s MYT talks about Real-Time Search – The trend of immediacy has inspired new search tools to help feed the frenzy – we want what we want, and we want it now! The Trend Lab forecasts that it will be no different with advertising in the future. In Show & Tell last Thursday, interns brought us articles that talked about a new retail ad service that would sync with inventory – if a particular product was out, it would yank the associated ads online – talk about real-time advertising.

A pretty interesting trend to watch out for.

Examples we mentioned included Collecta and Topsy.

nailing down the objectives

prologue: the conversation will always run long and unfocused unless you set objectives first.

This morning, I was looking through my Twitter feed and was engaged by a comment from my social media friend @Kyleplacy, he said: Do you think the customer cares more about the experience of the purchase and not the purchase itself?

my first reactive reply was: re: customer experience - I think the purchase is their primary motivation but if the experience is good, loyalty will ensue

@kyleplacy: I think it depends on the product.. a high cost item will be more experience driven.. thoughts?

This was all via Twitter mind you. Then because it felt like we needed a more immediate way to communicate, we transitioned to gchat, and we discussed the following:

8:36 AM kyle: hello!

how goes it in wonderful TX?

me: cloudy with a chance of meatballs

8:37 AM me: an interesting way to start for sure

about the experience...

8:38 AM I think the "brand experience" is extremely crucial to nail down, but it's the product that attracts them to that experience

kyle: I would say it is the marketing that attracts them to the experience of the product

me: bad ads for jewelry, on the radio? I think it's a bad medium

for that category

kyle: I agree

it depends on the product though..

8:39 AM the shopping experience for a low cost shopper (WAlmart) doesn't really matter

they care tooooo much about the price

me: very true

kyle: but for a high end product.. the experience matters (marketing, store, employee) just as much.. if not more

me: but what would you sell in "an ad?"

the experience or the product?

8:40 AM you'd sell the product and make it an experience

kyle: you tell a story.. an experience.. that in turn sells the product

a product is just a product without an experience..

it is just another diamond ring..

me: right

kyle: or a car..

:)

me: agreed

8:41 AM there are a lot of bad ads in this world

creating a brand experience definitely needs to be a box to check when creating a brand campaign

I think it may do more to differentiate your brand and raise awareness than drive sales though

8:42 AM kyle: amen erin.. amen

me: I think you have to ask yourself what the objectives are. and then create accordingly

All in all, a productive conversation. I think every goal you ever have should have an objective to begin with, an objective that solves a problem. What are you trying to do? What does the brand need? What need will it be satisfying? What do you want to achieve and what problem will be you be solving? - start here and I assure you the (brand) conversation, in whatever format (or media) you choose will be productive, efficient, and effective.

You can read more from Kyle's POV in his latest blog post: Diamond Marketing and Selling the Experience.

the future of search

This week, the Search Marketing Expo is happening in New York City. And there a lot of people tweeting about the topics and conversations, just check out #smx.

One of the big topics that seems to be coming out of the keynote this AM is the future of search. Check out Lisa's transcript of the discussion here.

We might have all heard the term “real-time search” but I think there are huge implications for the future – Twitter uses #hashtags to find relevant terms of what’s happening RIGHT NOW. Google Wave, I think will be along these same lines. The fact is, Google’s way of searching is a bit old-school now, we want more relevant data. This is especially true for brands that want/need to be relevant to the cultural conversation. How to be more timely...

Read more about the future of search in this great article from ReadWriteWeb.

And head over to Twitter to start following the hashtag #smx.

Happy Tuesday.

a letter from Starbucks

Hi, We're making a change. Using simpler recipes and taking out artificial ingredients. So your food not only tastes better, it is better. It's a start. But we think it's a good one. Hope you do too. Enjoy.

Your Friends at Starbucks

PS. More to come.

I don't always enjoy lots of copy on my product packaging, but Starbucks done a nice job handling theirs over the years. And this "letter" of new development is no exception. I think this will do good things for them in the wake of McDonald's offering premium coffees. If Mickey D's ever wrote a letter like this on their packaging, you'll bet they'd earn more media than Monster and Threadless combined.

the 4 S's of viral

"A viral won't go viral just because it's a viral." I said this in a meeting the other day and as clumsily syntaxed as it is, I want to develop what I meant.

The client says: we want a viral.

The creative team: creates a viral.

But what IS a viral? And what makes something GO viral?

Let's find out.

"A viral is something worth sharing," says Rob Birgfeld on SmartBlogs.

Dominque Hind says there are 3 things to remember about a viral:

• Must be a great idea
• Viral doesn’t necessarily mean free
• Nurture the campaign to get it out there.

And we learn from Karl Long that a viral isn't a strategy but a tactic within the more holistic term of co-creative marketing.

In the post from Karl, I especially like what he says about tactics, such as virals, building social equity with your brand. He described social equity in October 2007 as “built by aggregating, connecting, reflecting and amplifying all of the small user contributions over time so the whole is worth much more than the sum of its parts.”

You see, everything used to be about brand equity - where brands were one of the most valuable assets a company could have. But in the age of social media, we need different terms. And borrowing the term from Karl, social equity - where social networks are one of the most valuable assets a brand can have - is where we need to focus now. In creating social equity you need to take into consideration what starts a conversation and what begs to be shared - is it creativity? is it a thought? is it a point?

Anyway, back to viral. In this post, we learn that viral is a tactic used by brands to create Social equity. To do this, they need to

Simple - be birthed from an uncomplicated idea
Sharable - have all the necessary social media tools attached
Supported - be nurtured by various brand ambassadors - bloggers/influencers online, PR people at the agency, or synced up with traditional creative in an innovatively creative way

So next time someone says "let's do a viral," make sure you've got the 4 S's in place so that you're not just creating more digital crap to take up cyberspace.