Joining up the dots: Part 1
| October 7th, 2008So, the global economy is experiencing a spot of bother.
Yet online advertising spend in the UK is on the up.
But, advertising itself looks to be pretty doomed these days. So doomed that it’s even starting to point fun at itself.
And over half of social media campaigns implemented by Fortune 1000 companies will fail.
Press releases are starting to feel even more out of place in today’s world of real people and resistance to corporate speak. So much so, the industry is beginning to parody itself and the language we use.
Yet the web is growing all the time and brands want to be a part of it. So what do they do?
1. Make sure that any social media/digital campaign it implements matches the needs of its community as well as itself.
2. Don’t fall into the trap of letting perceptions of short term ‘results’ override longer term, more meaningful ROI from a whole load of effort.
3. Keep focused on innovation and making its products/services better, in all respects (eg customer service).
Just a quick thought as all the dots begin to join up in my mind. Anything to add?
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Watching the Doritos video, I can’t help thinking of iGoogle. You create your screen and put all the stuff in you like.
I agree with your three points, but I reckon with the brown stuff hitting the fan in the economy more pressure will be put on marketers to look for the short term gain and limit the amount of new things they try. I guess now is the time, more than ever, where we need to stick to what we believe is the right thing to do for brands we represent
@Robin - definitely, but it’s even tougher right?! Especially in the absence of all those nice ways of measuring effectiveness 100%? Come to think about it though, I wonder how precise all the measurements for the effectiveness of ad campaigns are and which brands actually do the whole lot?
“Almost half social media campaigns will fail”.
Not surprising. In marketing generally most stuff fails. Think of old fashioned DM. Only a couple of % of people respond. A 98% failure.
Advertising is the same. It misses most people it’s trying to influence.
Yet, sometimes stuff works. Marketing people try to get a handle on it and measure it all so they can repeat it (at least online ads are better in this respect and there therefore relatively recession-proof). Trouble is, there’s no magic bullet on all this stuff.
@The Red Rocket (Phil!) good point. I guess with social media campaigns, they are quite often measured up against PPC campaigns, so things sometimes quite literally come down to the cost per sale figure comparison across the mix - which traditional PR rarely does I think.
re magic bullet. LOL. That’s what everyone’s looking for and you’re right, it’s not really an on-the-shelf, always in stock item.
I think that the causation myth of social media (”leverage social tools to create buzz and demand for your product”) is the #1 reason for failing campaigns.
Marketers don’t get the fact that social media can only amplify what people will think about you, your products or services.
If you’re great - people will talk about you
If you’re shite - people will talk about you even more
If you’re insignificant - people will ignore you
There is no magic in social media - and if ROI is your first concern than you probably will fail.
Nice comment Asi.
I suppose then you need to start looking at what ROI looks like and that might not be in line with traditional measures of it. FOr example - it could be that you’re just being talked about more online. Or you have some great feedback from people to input into your latest product. Or you could end up finding your most passionate fans. All nice end results, but maybe not the gazillion page views or sales that might traditionally be expected?
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