Storywriting 2.0

This is just an effort on my part to undertake story writing the Web 2.0 way i.e. user-generated content is the king. The rules are , "Elementary my dear Watson" , so synonymous with Sherlock Holmes. I will do the honours and start the story by posting the opening line. You can follow it up with one line of yours continuing the story. You can post your line in the "Comments" section. I can't foresee the end of this endeavour. But it sure will be fun to have complete strangers dig into the meagre lines at their disposal and craft brilliance. So, here it goes:

The child was shot point blank.

Great Advertising for a Good Product

This Baygon ad is what an advertisement should exactly be. It leads you to the product and its usage (and it makes you stand up and applaud the Ad agency that came up with such a brilliant ad, BBDO Kuala Lumpur in this case). By bringing in a well-known fictional character like Spiderman, the product has now been assured of a high brand-recall. The critical factor in a product's life is visibility. If it's not visible enough, it's as good as dead. Hence, the race to be visible at Superbowl where you have a guaranteed and a high number of target audience. Now when you are assured of visibility comes the hard part i.e. living upto people's expectations. More often than not, have products failed miserably because they failed to satisfy the need although they were efficiently advertised. Hence, a good visibily does not always lead to a good brand. Now comes the tricky part- brand recall. Unaided brand recall is what most companies would love to see. "Top of the mind" recollection of a particular brand usually indicates the popularity and usefulness of the brand. And then this varies on an individual basis. A person on being asked about shoes might come up with "Nike" as his first choice while someone else might come up with "Reebok". Now, this is due to a plethora of choices. The shoes niche in the footwear category has many well established and good companies who have been able to serve the needs of the people efficiently. So, in this case its a close call and "Top of the mind" fails to be the correct indicator. Although you need to remember that both Nike and Reebok have some great advertising campaigns behind them helping in a high brand recall rate. So, the essence is that in addition to a great product you should have high visibility to reap dividends else death is yours.

Romancing the stars

Google has now become synonymous with search. The roaring success of its search engine has prompted Google to strive even harder and diversify into other online applications, some prime examples being e-mail communications and social networking. Its emphasis on constant innovation and betterment of existing products is the key differentiating factor that separates it from the rest of the Internet-spawned companies. Gmail,Google Earth,Froogle,Google Desktop.....and the list continues. And when you thought that the list has reached its dead end, Google again came up with an offering that we can only wonder at. Google Romance (Beta Version) is one of those cool offerings that, if successful, would revolutionize the conventional methods of romance. Still a doubting Thomas? Try it here http://www.google.com/romance/

Missed Call Marketing

Meandering through marketing blog archives, I recently came across this fantastic application of human psychology in the domain of marketing. Fantastic because the idea was almost there on the shelf waiting for someone to give it a lease of life while on the other side I foresee a negative feedback in the reaction of the end consumers due to too smart marketing.At http://www.textually.org/textually/archives/2006/09/013576.htm, Emily gives us a fabulous insight into "missed call marketing", a new form of mobile marketing.

"Missed call' marketing is the term that has been given to the practice of calling a mobile telephone for such a short period of time that the owner cannot answer the call. When the marketer disconnects the call, most mobile phones present a 'missed call' notification with the marketer's number. The marketer intends that the owner of the phone will think that they have missed a legitimate call and ring the number back, in which case they hear a recorded promotional message".

Let us spare a moment for the marketing guys who came up with this brilliant idea.In this era of marketing where consumer attention is so precious and almost fleeting ,this is nothing but revolutionary.How often do we get a missed call from an unknown number and our first reaction is to call back ?? That behaviour is on predictable lines and the marketing people are tapping exactly into this psyche to get to the consumers. And more often than not, they are reaching a dead end.

Refuting Laura Ries

Recently, I came across this post by Laura Ries, one half of the famous Ries & Ries duo:http://ries.typepad.com/ries_blog/2008/01/after-a-brand-o.html where she argues that the recent re-branding of Xerox with a new logo fails to serve the purpose.Xerox has long been identified with the ubiquitous photocopier.So common did the process perforate into the general population's awareness that the word "Xerox" soon became a verb.Laura argues that Xerox became so synonymous with photocopying that its forays into other business domains failed to take off.People believed that Xerox was good only at photocopying and viewed the other businesses with skepticism.Its popularity became its bane.But with due respect to Laura,I tend to disagree.I wil cite the example of the Tata group in this respect. Although a family business venture, it benefitted immensely from having visionaries at its helm.Right from establishing Tata Steel at Jamshedpur in 1907 to the formation of Tata Aviation, the forerunner of Tata Airlines and Air India, which was later nationalised ,its actions always earned the respect and trust of the people.And it was this trust that it built its business empire on.Agricultural appliances to Multi-utility vehicles,Broadband services to E-learning. You name it and chances are that Tata has a presence in that domain. With global powerhouses like Tata Consultancy Services and Tata Steel in its kitty its not surprising that the Tata empire has been growing at a steady pace.And what with the Rupees 1 lakh car Nano being unveiled recently, it is poised to do to india what Henry Ford did to USA in the early part of the 20'th century.Further, I would like to reiterate that although I am a bit skeptical about Tata diversifying into too many business domains, I am convinced that it has managed to do well only because of the respect and trust it enjoys among the people.The same holds true for Xerox .With a high brand recall and impressive track record, it is also in a similar position.With a proper vision and practicality it, too, can surely consolidate on the trust it enjoys to diversify into other business domains and do well in re-inventing itself.I wouldn't put a termination to their re-branding efforts but would like them to take the challenge head-on.

Marketing Insight Contd.......

An audience need not necessarily be the "wrong target audience" even if they don't have an immediate requirement for the product or worse still , they might never use it. As people are more likely to buy a product based on the advice of their friends,family,etc, it always helps when your product has atleast a recall value rather than being a familiar product having a negative feedback. And this is exactly the moment when the "wrong target audience" can help your company's cause subconsciously. A mere mention might tilt the scales in your favour. Remember,free marketing hasn't hurt anybody till date.

Marketing Insight

"The more people you reach the more likely it is that you're reaching the wrong people", this sentence by the Marketing guru Seth Godin made me think hard. But then if you don't reach out to a larger audience, the competitors might take them away. In an era where the customer is spoilt for choices, it is logical enough to make your pitch first and leave a favourable impression on the customer. To be continued.......