ANA Marketing Maestros

Ten Best Practices For Long-Term Growth In a Recession & Beyond

By Bill Duggan

ANA’s recent “Brand Building in Tough Times & Beyond” conference promised that all speakers would leave behind actionable ideas for immediate and longer-term brand growth. Below are highlights of those key takeways.  Your ideas for driving either immediate and/or longer-term brand growth are welcome too!

1. There is a reasonable chance the recession is over.  Therefore, if you are one of those marketers who plans to increase marketing activity three months before this recession ends, now is the time to act. 
    • Liz Ann Sonders, Senior Vice President, Chief Investment Strategist – Charles Schwab

2. Optimism sells.  People need to laugh, or at least smile, to feel good about parting with their money in this economy.
    • Cynthia Ashworth, Vice President, Customer Engagement – Dunkin’ Donuts

3. Focus on the 95% of growth that comes from big, established brands.  Most new products generate only a small amount of sales yet receive an inordinate amount of attention.  
    • Patrick Edson, Vice President, Marketing Innovation – MillerCoors

4. Spending in a recession can generate sales and share.
    • Steve Bratspies, Senior Vice President, Marketing – Wal-Mart Stores

5. Understand the difference between your customer and a shopper. Consumers are making purchase decisions well before they enter the store. Shoppers, on the other hand, are bombarded with in-store messages and are often distracted.
    • Jason McDonnell, Vice President, Marketing – Frito Lay

6. Redeploy your assets.  Focus on lifting the areas of most immediate impact.  Evaluate the contributions of all your current business partners.  
    • Richard McDonald, SVP, Global Marketing – Fender Musical Instruments

7. Value is important but it’s not just about price.  People want to be smart, but not feel cheap.
    • Cynthia Ashworth, Vice President, Customer Engagement – Dunkin’ Donuts

8. Optimize the experience of your product when it’s in the hands of the consumer.  That’s a key moment of truth.  
    • Patrick Edson, Vice President, Marketing Innovation – MillerCoors

9. Be true to who you are.  Your brand “is what it is,” so don’t change in the short term.  Look for partners and other alliances for growth.
    • Steve Bratspies, Senior Vice President, Marketing – Wal-Mart Stores

10. Frugality will be with us for some time.  It will be a longer-term generational mindset and advertising will need to reflect that. 
    • Liz Ann Sonders, Senior Vice President, Chief Investment Strategist – Charles Schwab

Remember -- your ideas for driving either immediate and/or longer-term brand growth are welcome too!

Golden Opportunities on Twitter

By Irina Skaya

Not a day goes by without someone asking me, “Why do you use Twitter? It’s so useless. Why do I care what you are up to every second of the day?” Wake up people! You are missing out on engaging with and learning more about your customers.  As Cynthia Ashworth, Vice President of Customer Engagement @Dunkin’ Donuts said, “We don’t have to justify Twitter. It’s free customer-service.” Indeed it is, Cynthia. It’s a free focus group and a cheap option for collaboration.

As I try to keep up with the cutting edge marketing trends, I enrolled in a two-hour course on Twitter Love where I learned how marketers can utilize the microblogging Web site to promote their products and services, research consumer insights, improve customer service, converse with and engage their customers, and group collaboration.  For instance, @JetBlue is using Twitter to help improve customer services and teamwork across business units.  As a customer service tool, Twitter’s benefit is that everything people say about your product/service is public on Twitter and is easy to find via using their built-in search tool. This makes Twitter an instant focus group with over 10 million participants, many of whom are your customers.  Collecting customer feedback via Twitter is easy and effortless, especially when you compare it to the number of responses you get back through email surveys.  Zappos is using Twitter to make personal connections among employees, and between the company and its customers.  For those marketers who want to improve their corporate culture and customer service, Twitter is a great tool.

So just like there was Facebook and then came LinkedIn, a professional social networking Web site, Yammer is like Twitter for business. Yammer offers groups for discussions on a subject between people in the same workgroup. It can connect employees from different departments, so if you work in a 500+ company, you won’t feel like just a number anymore.  Although some may argue that Twitter and Yammer may be distracting and may affect employees’ productivity, it can, if used moderately improve corporate culture by connecting employees to one another and letting them know what the organization is up to, its achievements and pretty much anything.

So for the Twitter rebels, get on it, add ANAmarketers to your list of the following, and most importantly, start talking and listening to your customers.  And here are some Twitter tools to get you started:

TweetLater.com – helps you in following everyone who follows you; includes auto DMs and a tweet scheduler.

Twitter Karma - keeps a follow-to-follower ratio in order for you unfollow those who are not following me, with a few exceptions.

TwitterCounter - see my followers in graph form. It also predicts how many followers you will have in 30, 90 or 365 days.

TweetDeck – as an Adobe Air app, TweetDeck allows you to see your @replies, direct messages, timeline, and a lis of folks you follow whose Tweets you want to make sure you read. You can also use it to update your Twitter and Facebook accounts simultaneously. I use and love this tool!

PS.  Download our most-read 101 on Marketing with Twitter. 

Advertising as Art or Creative, Creative

By Barry Garbarino

As I rode home on the train last night – for some strange reason and old jingle from a telecommunication company popped into my head from thin air.  I think it went something like, “second class phones, their making, second class phones, phones you can’t hear though, phones with no tones...” I have an idea who the company is, but I don’t want to point any fingers.  I guess what really jumps out to me is that the creative jingle stuck with me after all these years (normally, I would post the ad creative in this blog, but sadly, it isn’t available online as of yet.)

Classic ad campaigns like, “Where’s the beef” and the ever popular “Meow Mix” jingle (which I believe some ad genius ran during morning news programs, so the annoying catchy song would get stuck in all of our heads.)  have left a void in the current mix of creative execution in the broadcast medium.




The perception that some advertisers have today is that every commercial they produce must have broad-appeal content that reaches multiple demographics.  While other cutting edge marketers are blazing new trails with edgy, dare I say, controversial commercials.  Take the recent “Whopper Freak-Out” campaign that Burger King ran.  The scrappy burger joint, removed their famous menu item, the Whopper, from one location for one day.  The results were not only dramatic, but also shocking and quite amusing for the viewing public.  

Take a look at this daring social / marketing experiment below.

The Initial ad creative spurred many a social media parody (most I can’t post on this blog as they are even too edgy for me…) My suggestion would be to look some of these up on YouTube.

The bottom line I guess is that with new innovative shows coming this fall, marketers need to raise the bar when it comes to their advertising.  Shows like “gLee” on FOX, give creative marketers the opportunity to step up their executions and borrow from the excitement (and musical numbers) of the

show.

 
Times are always changing and the viewing public expects to be more entertained or they will just fast forward with their DVR’s and leave the expensive advertising in the dust.  

Recession: Glimmer of Hope?

As a follow-up to my blog, "Is an economic recovery near?" I would like to share with you are new video snippets from the 2009 ANA Building in Tough Times Brand Conference where heavy-weight executives from Dunkin' Donuts, MillerCoors and Wal-Mart shared their insights and best practices in regards to overcoming tough economic times.

Thank you to AdAge for these valuable video highlights. If you have any best practices on coping with the recession, please share in our comments section on this blog, YouTube page, or email me at irina@ana.net. I'd love to hear from you!

The Psychological Boost of Coffee Marketing

Turning Beer Temperature Into Marketing Gold

Partnerships, Not Brand Renovation, Best Growth Strategy

You can’t afford to miss one ANA event!

By Barry Garbarino

You can’t afford to miss one ANA event!

Did you realize that ANA members have access to over 75 complimentary events that include committee meetings, training webinars and regional meetings?  Some include the choice of attending in person or via web and phone interface!  (We would love to see you in person, but we totally understand if your travel budget has been slashed!)  ANA Members also receive discounted rates for our paid events.  Check out all the activities that we offer members at ANA.net or see the highlighted event section on the twice weekly ANA Today!

It’s your membership and we are your organization.  Below are some quick links for easy access to member benefits:

Conferences

Regional Meetings (Peer to peer interaction)

Committee Meetings

Listen – in & Learns

ANA School of Marketing (Training)

Marketing Insights Center (MIC)

Take action and utilize us as much as possible.  We are here for you and look forward to assisting your organization!

Customer Service Makes a Difference

By Susan Burke

At a recent ANA Central Region Workshop, Michael Dunn, CEO and Chairman of Prophet, argued that a customer-centric strategy remains a way for great companies to win, despite the current economic conditions. At many ANA workshops, committee meetings, and conferences, I have heard industry experts agree with Dunn, stressing that customer service is often what differentiates one brand from another. I could not agree more.

Given the economic conditions and the changing mindset that many Americans, myself included, are experiencing, deciding where to spend our money has become not only a decision about value, but also about our experiences as customers. People today are more willing to switch retailers or brands if they find that they are not being treated well, especially if they can get the same value someplace else.

Recently at a branch of my bank, I had some difficulties with an ATM machine while depositing a check. The manager of the branch was not only unable to help me, but he was also dismissive and unsympathetic in his manner. A few days later, after learning that the issue was still unresolved, I called the bank and was assisted immediately. The person I spoke with was courteous, knowledgeable, and friendly. My first experience with the bank made me question whether or not I wanted to keep my business with them, but the second experience reassured me and my problem was solved. The difference?  An encounter with an employee who was efficient and pleasant.

In the past, customers may have been more loyal to a particular brand or company, but in today’s market all bets are off. Every encounter a customer has with a representative of your company (regardless of if they are part of the customer service division or not) contributes to the overall impression they have of your organization and making sure that customers view your organization positively is more important than ever right now.  Stellar customer service in all aspects of your business can make a real difference in determining if a customer stays or goes.

Is an economic recovery near?

By Irina Skaya

Yesterday’s ANA Brand Building in Tough Times & Beyond Conference was filled with optimism, actionable ideas for marketers to cope with the depressed economy, confidence for a speedy recovery, and Donut Love.  How does one recession proof their brand?

Dunkin’ Donuts emphasized the importance of relevance and empathy with their “You Kin’ Do It” campaign.  The goal of this campaign was to build trust and emotional connection with their consumers because 91% buy from companies they trust.  While Dunkin’ Donuts’ challenge was to convince people to spend a discretionary $4 on a cup of coffee for breakfast, Wal-mart partnered with Kellogg to encourage people to save money by eating breakfast or the Kellogg cereal at home.  And unlike Dunkin’ Donuts, Walmart had an evergreen approach that wasn’t fundamentally different from when the economic times are better.  Their proposition, “Save money, live better” is just as relevant today as it’s always been, except now they shifted their focus from functional to an emotional relationship with their consumers.  As a matter of fact, the two themes based on both campaigns emerged at the conference: 1. Know your customers and 2. Build an emotional relationship with them.  This is nothing new, however.  Instead what marketers are doing today is they are going back to marketing 101. In 2006 at the ANA Annual Masters of Marketing Conference, the same theme emerged, and we certainly did not foresee an economic crisis then. 

The other commonality all of the presenters shared at yesterday’s event was involvement in social media.  After all, it’s free and everyone is using it—what’s a better way to continue marketing your business in tough times? Dunkin’ Donuts said it best, “We don’t have to justify Twitter, it is a real-time customer service, customer promotion.”   It seems like everyone is tweeting—thank you for everyone who was tweeting at the conference. Just search #ANA to see all of the tweets from the ANA Brand Conference. 

Finally, I’d like to leave you with a touch of optimism, “I was asked what I thought a recession.  I thought about it and decided not to take part.”—Sam Walton, founder of Wal-mart.

Engage with the ANA…

By Barry Garbarino

I know you’re out there.  I can sense that you are interested in finding out more about the ANA.  Are you curious what your membership entitles you to?  Have you looked at our website (www.ANA.net) and have a question that hasn’t been answered?  Do you read our blogs and watch Bob’s video blogs, but yearn for more interaction? 

How would you, the member, (or hopefully soon to be a new member, hint, hint) like to interact and engage with the ANA?  While this is not a formal survey, we would love to hear your feedback.  Leave us a comment here or email me directly at bgarbarino@ana.net.  (We love and encourage feedback!)

Are there any topics that you would like to see us talk about in our blogs?

We would love to have this be a two-way communication, but without your assistance and comments we are talking to cyberspace.

What’s on your mind?  Let us know if you agree or disagree or have another point of view. 

Out of home, out of mind?

By Adrienne Tallacksen

A few weeks ago I was coming out of the subway station at Grand Central and noticed that the turnstiles looked different than usual.  On second glance, I saw that the turnstile bars were wrapped with ads for an unnamed airline.  As far as I could tell, there weren’t other ads for this airline in the subway station.  Granted, I didn’t go running around the subway station looking for more ads (who has time for that during her morning commute?), but it appeared that the advertising was limited to the turnstile bars.  I may not even have remembered the campaign, except that later in the week as I walked through a different part of Grand Central, I saw ads for the same airline on the walls.  Were these two campaigns related?  Maybe, but I’m not sure. 

Another more effective example of out of home advertising in New York’s subway stations comes from UPS. Senior VP and Creative Director Andy Azula discussed the campaign at this year’s TV & Everything Video Forum.  In this case, UPS wrapped underground subway pillars to look like whiteboard markers and used nearly-blank white wall ads that resembled whiteboards.  Consumers could see how the wall ads and the ads on the pillar were connected.  This was an engaging and interesting campaign.

I still wonder if the two ads for the airline were connected or not.  If the turnstile bar wrappers were only one piece of a campaign, where was the rest of the campaign that I missed?  Was the campaign really spread throughout Grand Central?  Or were the turnstile bar wrappers the entire campaign?  If so, it wasn’t entirely effective.  While the wrapped turnstile bars caught my attention, more than anything, I was puzzled by them and certainly wasn’t moved to do business with the company.  I think this was a lost opportunity for the airline to create an exciting out-of-home campaign.  Instead of being engaged, I was just confused. 

Links:
http://www.ana.net/conversation/miccontent/ss_azula_021209
http://www.ana.net/events/conferencemtg/TAF-FEB09

A Little Marketing Spending Can Go a Long Way

By Barbara Bacci Mirque

Dial Corporation’s CEO Brad Casper, speaking at the 2009 ANA Advertising Financial Marketing Conference which concluded last week, noted that you can make “one buck look like 10 if you are creative and think about how to efficiently target.”  He explained their philosophy which is you don’t need to be the biggest spender to create effective campaigns and a little idea can generate a large return.  As a result they went from being a fast follower to becoming a fast initiator.   As an example he talked about the Purex Green brand which created a $100 million franchise in a year and received an award from Wal-Mart a being the most sustainable brand.  They also conducted ethnographic research deep dives in which they discovered a key insight  - there were a lot of shower products for women in most families showers’ but little for men.  Thus was born “Dial for Men”.  Their innovative marketing included messaging in men’s urinals and gas toppers.  They calculate they spent 75 – 100% less than their competitors and their marketing spend paid back in a year.  The results: in all categories their share of voice is below their share of market and they are growing into a most admired company on the Fortune list.