Microsoft to Google - "It's On."

This past week, I’ve been reading with interest the latest coverage in the share battle between Microsoft and Google in online search and advertising.

This time, it’s not the same press coverage about which company they’ve snapped up or what anti-trust suit is being filed. Rather, Microsoft, eager to challenge Google's internet advertising empire, has hired Brian McAndrews from aQuantive as its general manager, in charge of waging war against Google. And this time – it’s on.

Since announcing the deal to buy aQuantive and recruit McAndrews last month, Microsoft has been expressing its online advertising ambitions more loudly. “We are hell-bent and determined to allocate the talent, the resources, the money, the innovation, to absolutely become a powerhouse in the ad business,” said Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s chief executive, at the company’s financial analyst meeting in July.

While Google has a big lead in online advertising, a field that is relatively new to Microsoft, McAndrews is seen as the right person to challenge the search giant. And it's in the area of search where McAndrews is planning to attack, by offering up Microsoft advertisers a system known as "conversion attribution."

Credit where it's due.
In a nutshell, the process of conversion attribution credits all the online ads and web pages a consumer has viewed along their personal buying path until they end up on a company’s website or online store. The system aims to give advertisers a fuller perspective on a customer journey and to give credit (I mean money) where it’s due.

With this new tracking power, McAndrews believes he will be able to seriously challenge Google by proving their advertisers are spending needless dollars on premium site locations, like top of page “Sponsored link” areas, to host web links – links that a customer was going to click on anyway.

Mr. McAndrews contends that search engines, which long have claimed credit for sending people to companies’ Web sites, do not deserve it all. “Google gets all the credit, and in fact, you might have just gone to Google to type in the U.R.L.,” Mr. McAndrews said, pointing out that people often search for companies’ names after seeing their ads elsewhere.

Using technology from aQuantive’s Atlas division, Microsoft will be able to provide advertisers with a log of all the places on the Internet where people see ads before going to the advertisers’ Web sites. The data is based on individual computers’ electronic signatures, not individual people.

More tracking means more computing power.
The new service will require massive server capacity and the ability to analyze billions of ad impressions every day. And Microsoft will be able to use the new tracking capacity to prove the value of its ad space, much of which is not directly related to search activities.

For the next generation of tracking technology, researchers are already figuring out how to measure the combined impact that online and offline media has on consumer awareness, interest and purchase.

After finishing this article, I got a chuckle....for when I typed in "aQuantive" in my Google search bar, guess who has both the top sponsored link and the first 'natural' result? I think I've found a way to save aQuantive some online media money by following their own advice.

Marketing to the Millennial Generation

Meet Paul. He could be described as the “average” young man of today. At 25, he’s just finished college, has a new job, a large circle of friends he can instantly connect to using his mobile. And he’s never had a land line. Paul is part of the generation of Canadians surrounded by digital media and technology since birth. By the age of 12, he’s been comfortable using IM, text messaging his friends and sharing music files.

And then there’s Tiffany, 24, a senior editor at a local online city site. She begins each day in her Liberty Village loft with a diet of Gmail, Hotmail, work e-mail, Globeandmail.com (I haven't picked up a print newspaper in like, forever," she says) and blogs, in that order. She says it’s a necessary regimen for maintaining a functional dialogue both at work and in her circle of friends. Tiffany, who grew up in Markham and earned a fine-arts degree from the Ontario College of Art, says mobile phone text messaging is the default mode of communication for her set, surpassing e-mail, instant messaging or even talking on the phone itself.

Introducing... the Millennials.

In a recent USA Today article, children of Boomers and older Generation X’ers are being referred to as the ‘next great generation.’ Since arriving on planet earth, they’ve been told they’re smart, to be inclusive and empathetic, and focus on goal setting and achievement. According to another ready by Claire Raines, Connecting Generations, Millennials have been bombarded with a unique set of consistently positive messages that have created idealistic, confident and hopeful youth.

"I heard it on the (digital) Grapevine."

As this group is the most tech savvy in history, they tend to use altogether different channels for gathering their news and information. "What we're seeing is a whole different relationship with marketing and advertising which obviously has ripple effects through the entire economy," said Mr. McKenzie, who heads a Millennials Strategy Group at Frank Magid & Associates. For the millennials, he said, "reliance and trust in non-traditional sources - meaning everyday people, their friends, their networks, the network they've created around them - has a much greater influence on their behaviours than traditional advertising." It’s the peer-to-group phenomenon - a digital-age manifestation of the grapevine.

Consider these thought starters and innovations as ways to reach the interactive generation:

1. Learn the abbreviated language and slang of the IM and text user.

2. Social networking spaces like Facebook and LinkedIn will continue to gain share of mind and time and become new digital ‘jump off points’ versus the traditional portal home pages of today.

3. Corporate blogging will be seen as a primary way for PR folks to plant, shape and influence conversations. Success will be measured by the frequency with which a company’s key messages become part of a content conversation string or ‘online snowball.’

4. Bloggers and their opinions will become new “brands” and will be actively targeted and courted in the hopes of your key message coverage.

5. Marketing programs benefiting those less fortunate or helping causes will be widely accepted.

6. Commercial units will be produced in a variety of sizes, formats and lengths to fit the vastly increasing number of video formats and delivery systems available.

7. Look for continued innovation on mobile phone screens that improve texting, graphics and general usability.

8. Look for more advertising messages that are activated before and after application usage, like browsing or texting.

9. On the horizon - “Active” searching, whereby a mobile user takes a ‘photo’ of a billboard of say, new Gucci eyewear (actually the phone is reading a barcode located on the ad), and then be automatically connected to Gucci’s company website.

10. Currently being tested - contextual messaging, where a user is pinged with a message from Jodie Foster herself, asking you to check out her new movie, as you walk by the Movieplex.

Millennials are a fast moving, connected, and tech savvy bunch who trade information in a flash. Being invited into their circles and keeping them interested in what you have to say will no doubt require ample battery power and seriously good conversation skills.

Advertising Slogans of the last Century

1. Diamonds are forever (DeBeers)
2. Just do it (Nike)
3. The pause that refreshes (Coca-Cola)
4. Tastes great, less filling (Miller Lite)
5. We try harder (Avis)
6. Good to the last drop (Maxwell House)
7. Breakfast of champions (Wheaties)
8. Does she ... or doesn't she? (Clairol)
9. When it rains it pours (Morton Salt)
10. Where's the beef? (Wendy's)

HONORABLE MENTIONS

1. Look Ma, no cavities! (Crest toothpaste)
2. Let your fingers do the walking (Yellow Pages)
3. Loose lips sink ships (public service)
4. M&Ms melt in your mouth, not in your hand (M&M candies)
5. We bring good things to life (General Electric)

Webinars – Made for the Modern day Multi-tasker

Where else can you listen to an in-depth sales presentation, one that’s hopefully interesting, while you’re eating lunch, catching up on email, or writing out your grocery list?

I’ve attended five webinars so far this year and I have to say that for the most part, they’ve been a good use of time, in that I learned something new, put a company on our consideration list and in one case made a purchase.

Most customers and prospects attend webinars for a multitude of reasons, according to a 2007 study by Osterman Research – to get company product information, understand market dynamics, learn about industry trends, or learn about a vendor before making a purchase.

Like a cold call without the awkward introduction, webinars reach out to current customers and identify new prospects for a relatively low cost. If you don’t want to invest in the technology, there are lots of service providers to choose from that offer end-to-end solutions. But before you switch on the microphone, there’s a few practices you should follow to improve your odds for success and impress your customers big time.

1. Guest speakers can improve attendance – studies show that a well know industry name can increase attendance by as much as 60%. If you don’t have a keynote lined up, consider an exclusive offer or promotion as a way to generate interest.

2. Plan a rehearsal – it’s good to run through your presentation in advance and check for flow, timing and pace. Plus you should confirm the transition slides for each speaker. If you’re using a 3rd party service provider, understand any bandwidth limitations and how customers will be helped that encounter technical issues.

3. Promote in advance – Like other ‘direct response’ vehicles, generally speaking your current customer email and dmail lists will generate higher response rates than outside ones. Your sales force is also a great tool to identify and invite key customers to the event.

4. Collect relevant customer DNA – customers expect they’ll be asked a few profile and purchase intent questions when signing. But be brief and keep the list short. Ask only questions you don’t know answers to and make sure you have a plan that uses the responses after the event. Odds are your company dB is already bloated with unusable customer information.

5. Collect compatible customer DNA – don’t wait till morning to find out the prospect list you generated isn’t compatible with your customer dB. In some cases, webinar service providers will work with you to ensure information collected is compatible with your company’s internal database formats. However if you think you’ll be hosting webinars regularly, consider developing a sign up tool built specifically to integrate on your dB.

6. Deliver an exclusive offer to attendees – free product trial, a deep discount or another means to thank people for attending. Exclusive offers will also measure response rates and program ROI. Send invitations one week in advance too - and reminders the day before. Have a customer service number clearly visible to handle any attendee questions.

7. Limit the presentation to one hour max – and keep the pace at a moderately fast clip. Because you’re not seeing any visual cues (like yawns, bum shuffling, or blackberry-ing) in your audience to assess if your message is getting through, keep the subject matter moving along and of course, provide time at the end for a Q&A.

8. Ask for feedback – a BRIEF 3 to 5 survey delivered immediately after the webinar with only one open ended question is a good way to collect top of mind feedback from attendees. You’ll have a highly useful “did well/ do better” best practices list to aid in decision making the next time round.

Used correctly, webinars can be a highly effective method to deliver company and product information, and a very measurable marketing tool when paired with an exclusive offer or promotion. And of course, a most satisfying way for multi-taskers to spend time over the noon hour.

Happy Birthday Aveda

Sometimes the simple gestures make the biggest impact on customer loyalty. Every year, Aveda sends me a postcard in the mail, "Happy Birthday - from Aveda."

They want to help make my birthday a memorable one. So the next time I come into any Aveda store, I'll get a cup of comforting tea and a birthday gift.

Probably costs them no more than $2 to produce and mail the postcard, brew a cup of tea and send me home with a gift.

But I wonder how much I'll spend by the time I finish my tea.

Sell it to me FAST baby...

Sometimes stating the obvious is a requirement. People are impatient. They want information and they want it now. Consider the thousands of online and offline media choices customers have to collect and evaluate information. The new media world isn't a place for the faint of heart.

Now more than ever, the 'communicate only one idea' and sell it in a unique way - is the golden rule if you have any chance of breaking through and holding a viewer's attention - regardless of the medium.

The new stopping power for "interruption selling" on traditional media such as television, has to be using innovative visual treatments that have never been seen before - to stop a viewer dead in their tracks...Think Apple iPod dancing. Think Sprint Ahead light effects. Think Xbox anything. These spots all have one thing in common - a singular idea with a powerful graphic treatment to grab the viewer's attention.

"Go ahead..." viewers are saying... but if you don't hold me with a stirring visual, a laugh, a gasp, and stop me from instintively reaching for the remote ... more than likely your spot will be reduced to 3 seconds of fast forwarded images.

Got it.

Corporate Blogs- the new breakfast meeting?

Organizations are seeing the value of creating and maintain blogs for their senior management team as an alternative to traditional PR channels. Arguably the most widely used and understood of user generated content types, blogs can be an effective way for execs to carve out a unique voice for their organization and connect with stakeholders – employees, customers and the investor community in a personal, more authentic way.

Blogs have also been used as a way for companies to locate highly engaged company evangelists and loyal product users. Once identified, it`s not uncommon to invite them into the organization for product previews, marketing program feedback and other planning initiatives. These evangelists are then more predisposed to deliver positive key messages to a wider online audience for you.

Business blogs can interact with a target market on a more personal level and build credibility that ultimately can be tied back to the corporate website. Nevertheless, they remain public relations tools that should be carefully, regularly monitored by your PR team. If you`re interested in setting up your own company blog, consider these starting points.

1. Identify important blogs in your industry including influential writers and opinion leaders.

2. Monitor target blogs regularly to understand what people are saying about your company (if anything at all), the market you sell to and leaders in your product category.

3. Ask senior executives to comment on other people's blogs, which can be an effective first step in delivering key messages, stimulate discussion, or reframe a competitive statement.

It`s estimated that 5% of Fortune 500 companies maintain external blogs and the number is growing by approximately 30% every quarter. The ones I've listed here are pretty good – they’re current, regularly updated and well written:

1. Mike Critelli, Executive Chairman, Pitney Bowes, Inc., "Open Mike"

2. Colin Byrne, CEO, Weber Shandwick UK - Byrne Baby Byrne

3. J. Willard Marriott Jr., CEO, Marriott International

4. Rudi Fischer, CEO, Telekom Austria - Rudi Fischer

5. David Armano, Creative VP, Digitas

6. Sab Kanaujia, VP, NBC Digital Media group - Sabk

Consider blogging as a fresh approach to delivering company points of view to key stakeholders with the added bonus of meeting super engaged customers. Could the days of the 7:30am corporate breakfast meeting be numbered?

The Clipping File

If you’re visiting the CMA blog this holiday Monday, we hope you’re enjoying our last long weekend of summer. I can’t think of a better time to dive into the clipping file and catch up on reading that I've been procrastinating over. Once I got through them, I found these articles interesting and entertaining. Perhaps you will to.

1.How Ads Affect Our Memory – New Research could help advertisers make a better impression. By Andrew Schrock, Tuesday, August 21, 2007, technologyreview.com

A new study suggests that marketers shouldn't fixate on the number of people who click on ads. According to the research, just seeing an ad on a Web page can impact memory. The findings could have a significant impact on the way online advertising is made and metered.

Typically, to be considered effective, an online advertisement has to elicit a response--usually a click of the mouse--from a potential customer. But Chan Yun Yoo, an assistant professor at the University of Kentucky's School of Journalism and Telecommunications, found that when people view Web advertisements, they store information in two different types of memory: explicit and implicit.

Explicit memory involves facts learned through conscious interaction, while implicit memory involves unconscious retention. Click here for the complete article.

2. Color Branding: The Meanings Behind Colors –Brandcurve.com delivers a daily dose of insightful and interesting reading on a range of communication topics that us marcom types like to ponder. This article was originally posted on Aug 14, 2007, by John Williams on Entrepreneur.com, who provides plausible explanations of the meaning behind colour and how our reactions can impact what we think about advertising or promotion.

Blue: Cool blue is perceived as trustworthy, dependable, fiscally responsible and secure. Strongly associated with the sky and sea, blue is serene and universally well-liked. Blue is an especially popular color with financial institutions, as its message of stability inspires trust.

Red: Generates a visceral response and makes us aggressive, energetic, provocative and attention-grabbing. Count on red to evoke a passionate response, albeit not always a favourable one.

Green: In general, green connotes health, freshness and serenity. However, green’s meaning varies with its many shades. Deeper greens are associated with wealth or prestige, while light greens are calming.

Yellow: In every society, yellow is associated with the sun. Thus, it communicates optimism, positivism, light and warmth. Certain shades seem to motivate and stimulate creative thought and energy. The eye sees bright yellows before any other color, making them great for point-of-purchase displays.


4.The New York Times online technology section: if you still have a few hours to kill before dinner, The Times' technology section is a great read. It's jam packed with interesting info on curent events, new technologies and the usual scuttlebut on the big players. Great web design too that makes navigating easy. Satisfying any day of the week.

Now that Labour Day is upon us, I look forward to longer nights, sitting through endless 2008 planning sessions and creating hundreds of 'what if' scenarios with the '08 marcom budget. And then the real work begins with the upcoming season of award shows and rounds of agency holiday parties. Another crazy busy Fall.

How Search Engine Marketing can start an Argument.

This past week I sat in on a lunch hour webinar hosted by Pragmatic Marketing. The speaker was David Merrman Scott who recently published “The New Rules of Marketing and PR.” I read his other work, “The New Rules of PR,” so I was interested in hearing his new marketing pointers.

David used the launch of his book as a case study on effective search engine marketing techniques, specifically how to reach opinion leaders. In his case, the leaders he connected with generated wide coverage for his message which led to an explosion in his site traffic, book downloads and sales.

Merrman Scott is notable because he realized what many small business owners try to do –get attention in a media fragmented world without taking a second mortgage out on the house. His practical tips are useful for the entrepreneur who needs straightforward advice on getting a message out as quickly and cheaply as possible.

No Interruption Required
The era of PR people spamming journalists with story ideas to get product coverage is OVER. In the old days, you had to have significant news before you were allowed to write a press release. It usually included quotes from 3rd parties like customers, analysts or experts. And the only way your buyer would learn about the content was if the media wrote a story about it. Plus one of the only ways to measure ROI was by counting product mentions in press clipping books.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is the only form of marketing that does not rely on audience interruption or cajoling an editor to get you attention. The internet has eliminated these practices, giving marketers direct access to buyers, where they scan Google and Yahoo! results pages at will, and consider a product story – in its original, unedited state.

However to appeal to your customers directly, you need to understand them intimately.

Getting to Know You.
To appeal to your buyers directly on the web, you need to understand their motivations, brand experiences and interest level in your product category. To do so, consider developing “buyer personas.” This makes writing content that appeals to a range of customer beliefs, attitudes, shopping needs and vocabulary – much easier.

For example, a big box home electronics store identified three buyer personas –Gordon the UBER GEEK, Harry the home theatre NUBIE, and Louise the “just visiting” casual shopper. In each case, distinct language, tone and content depth were incorporated onto their site to appeal to their user base and ensure product messaging was relevant and understood.

Once you understand your customer archetypes, it’s time to write press releases for them.

1. Write releases with ample keyword copy so your release can be crawled and included on search engine results pages more frequently

2. Understand the words and phrases that buyers understand

3. Create links in releases to your website that bring people to your site

4. Optimize press release delivery for searching and browsing

5. Drive people into the sales process and selling cycle with press releases

If you want your press release crawled by Google news and Yahoo news services, David suggests distributing your story using any of the following services: Businesswire, Prime newswire, or Market wire.

The cost can be as low as $80 to send a basic release. However to include anchor text links and photographs – features that let readers link back to your site, is in the $200 range.

In short order, his book release was picked up and reviewed positively by Seth Godin, an influential voice in marketing circles, and negatively by Steve Rubel, an influential PR writer.
Because these two power brokers had conflicting opinions, it fuelled more discussion and interest.

Before he knew it, David Merrman Scott was enjoying top natural search ranking results, incredible site traffic and more than 250,000 book downloads.

I wonder what would have happened if Seth and Steve had agreed on the book?

Corporate Blogs- the new breakfast meeting?

Organizations are seeing the value of creating and maintain blogs for their senior management team as an alternative to traditional PR channels. Arguably the most widely used and understood of user generated content types, blogs can be an effective way for execs to carve out a unique voice for their organization and connect with stakeholders – employees, customers and the investor community in a personal, more authentic way.

Blogs have also been used as a way for companies to locate highly engaged company evangelists and loyal product users. Once identified, it`s not uncommon to invite them into the organization for product previews, marketing program feedback and other planning initiatives. These evangelists are then more predisposed to deliver positive key messages to a wider online audience for you.

Business blogs can interact with a target market on a more personal level and build credibility that ultimately can be tied back to the corporate website. Nevertheless, they remain public relations tools that should be carefully, regularly monitored by your PR team. If you`re interested in setting up your own company blog, consider these starting points.

1. Identify important blogs in your industry including influential writers and opinion leaders.

2. Monitor target blogs regularly to understand what people are saying about your company (if anything at all), the market you sell to and leaders in your product category.

3. Ask senior executives to comment on other people's blogs, which can be an effective first step in delivering key messages, stimulate discussion, or reframe a competitive statement.

It`s estimated that 5% of Fortune 500 companies maintain external blogs and the number is growing by approximately 30% every quarter. The ones I've listed here are pretty good – they’re current, regularly updated and well written:

1. Mike Critelli, Executive Chairman, Pitney Bowes, Inc., "Open Mike"

2. Colin Byrne, CEO, Weber Shandwick UK - Byrne Baby Byrne

3. J. Willard Marriott Jr., CEO, Marriott International

4. Rudi Fischer, CEO, Telekom Austria - Rudi Fischer

5. David Armano, Creative VP, Digitas

6. Sab Kanaujia, VP, NBC Digital Media group - Sabk

Consider blogging as a fresh approach to delivering company points of view to key stakeholders with the added bonus of meeting super engaged customers. Could the days of the 7:30am corporate breakfast meeting be numbered?

The True Value of your Advertising.

Today there are many paths a customer can take to respond to your advertising. If you're not considering all the available off and online channels in your ROI calculations, you'll probably be understating the true value that advertising brings to your program.

It comes down to understanding the value of leads from different media sources and having the right plumbing in place to identify primary from secondary responses.

Call Now!
In the not too distant past, there were just a few basic ways consumers could be tracked and counted - primarily by telephone or Canada Post. It was a binary process to count BRE’s (business replay envelopes) and unique phone numbers to arrive at a fairly accurate return on marketing investment.

Fast forward to today and the tools available for Canadians to seek out information as part of their shopping experience is infinitely more complex. New communication channels are being invented and tested in developer labs, then launched as new portal features virtually every month.

Call Us Now has evolved to Contact Us Now!
In addition to offline media like print and TV, online connection points after hearing your advertising come from social media sites, blogs, RSS feeds and bookmarks, texting, web URLs, organic and paid search – to name but a few. So what is the true value of these leads? Does one generate a higher conversion rate than the other? Do some produce slower responses to your campaign than others?

To track how traditional media drive people online, some advertisers manage the situation by using a suffix on their call to action URL, like bestoffer.ca/daily. Studies have shown this is a somewhat futile effort, as fully 25% of people type in the wrong address - and end up at a “404 page not found” dead end. And it underestimates the value that advertising has on generating responses from other online tools.

Any Lunch Plans?
The first step in planning a multi-pronged tracking plan is to make nice with the company webmaster and go for lunch. They are invaluable in helping you understand site traffic and can usually provide extensive details on ‘typical’ weekly activity, including referring domains, organic and paid search, and net new or bookmarked visitors. Then,

1. Present advertising media selections to the webmaster so she can set up the right tracking URLs. Then you can follow customers from referring domains as well as leads from offline media.

2. Always drive traffic to unique “campaign” landing pages not the company home page. It's just way easier to track your responses.

3. Track conversion rates by referring source. This helps you understand which channels deliver more qualified buyers so you can refine your media investments and improve efficiencies next time out.

4. Understand the typical rate of traffic buildup and decline to your website when a program is in market. Then you can justify how long to count inbound leads – even after the program has ended.

If you’re looking for some starting advice and counsel in this area here, it’s worth a visit to the Marketing Management Analytics website based in Wilton, CT. They’ve been developing some innovative new measurement tools to help marketers assess and track the combined impact of sales from offline and online media.

I'm sure they'll know where you came from.