ANA Marketing Maestros

Vanity Fair: The New Recessionista?

By Cara Brooke Schultz

The recession is taking a hit on every industry, especially the media. With numbers down across the board—The Tribune Company filed for bankruptcy, Doubledown Media shut down, Condé Nast ceased production of Domino, Gourmet, Cookie, and Elegant Bride, and Hearst closed down the print version of COSMOGIRL  (just to name a few)—it seems like every company is doing whatever they can to stay afloat.

Perhaps we can call Vanity Fair the next “recessionista” for recycling a photo for the cover of their March 2009 issue. The original photograph (right image)—shot by Annie Leibovitz—was used for the cover in July 2007. Vanity Fair acknowledges the reuse in the following statement on their Website, “This portrait of Obama, then a senator, was originally taken for one of 20 covers on Vanity Fair’s Africa issue of July 2007.”

What do you think about the decision to reuse an image that is over two years old?

The 2009 ANA/MMA Marketing Accountability Survey

Key findings from the ANA/MMA Marketing Accountability Survey presented by Barbara Bacci Mirque.

To Tweet or Not To Tweet…

By Cara Brooke Schultz

It seems as if everyone is tweeting these days. In fact, your boss might even encourage you to write tweets. However, after reading an article on imediaconnection.com, I felt compelled to throw a few tricks of the trade out there. iMediaConnection rounded up a few sceneries when you should refrain from tweeting:

1. Do not tweet when you are in the middle of a crisis. If something terrible happens and you are dealing with a ton of negative feedback from customers, stay calm and try to rectify the situation prior to tweeting. One tweet announcing the change is enough.
2. Try to steer clear of all negativity on your twitter page. There is no reason to make fun of another company, a geographical location, or another person. Although you might think you are being funny, chances are you will offend someone.
3. Do not post everything online for the world to see. Always get the go ahead to broadcast breaking news, new deals or any developments that might come up in the office. Most likely, your boss will want to wait before making the news public.

I also wanted to add a few suggestions to the list:

1. Don’t write negative tweets about your competition. Your customers like you for several reasons, highlight those reasons and leave out the negativity!
2. Think before you tweet. Have well-thought out and spelling-error free tweets before making them live online. Remember, tweets cannot be edited once they go live, so do a thorough edit before posting.

Before writing your next tweet—take these ideas into account—it will help create a positive twitter experience.

Value Based Compensation

By Barbara Bacci Mirque

At the recent 2009 ANA Agency Relations Forum, Sarah Armstrong from The Coca Cola Company updated the audience about Coke’s journey with value based compensation. You may recall that Coke first spoke publicly about this at the ANA’s 2009 Advertising Financial Management Conference because they wanted to socialize the marketing community to this new agency compensation model with the hopes of more widespread adoption of a construct that has been discussed for the past several years with little action taken against it. They wanted to expose their learning so that as more advertisers utilized VBC they would add to the body of knowledge on how to generate maximum results, thus benefiting all advertisers including Coke. Coke has rolled their VBC plan to many markets and expects full implementation by 2011. 
Along the way they have made some refinements but the central tenet still remains the same–Coke believes that there is no correlation between the amount of hours an agency works and the value it provides. It is not about cost cutting Sarah emphasizes, it is about focusing on the components of business growth. But Coke feels very strongly she adds, that they are no longer going to guarantee their agencies’ profits if the agency performance does not meet up to certain predetermined standards. An agency can make up to a 30% profit if it meets a set of prearranged goals–or none at all. The importance is that agencies are being measured on results–not on hours worked. There is no doubt that for marketers, labor based compensation was an advancement over fixed rate commissions. But spending hours and hours constructing and tracking labor based compensation does not move the business ahead nor does it work well in an era of integrated marketing. Advertisers generally agreed that although progress had been made, labor based compensation was not the end game. But not much progress had been made on moving forward. The groundbreaking work of The Coca Cola Company certainly adds to the debate–and knowledge–on improving agency compensation. The discussion will no doubt continue for years to come.

ANA members interested in participating and sharing their agency compensation learnings should consider joining the ANA’s Advertising Financial Management committee.       

Magazine Bleed Charges - Why Do They STILL Exist?

By Bill Duggan

I’d like to share a letter I wrote to the editor of Ad Age, printed in the September 28th issue:

 

Publishers should cut ‘bleed’ fees

Regarding "Condé Nast Execs to make Big Cuts, Insiders Say" (AdAge.com, Sept. 14): It would be terrific if McKinsey's analysis went beyond cost controls and also included a review of Condé Nast's pricing policies to ensure those policies are in alignment with marketplace realities. One such policy under scrutiny from   advertisers is charging an incremental fee for bleed ads. Once upon a time, publishers may have had real costs associated with the production of bleed ads. But today's printing and production technologies no longer require the press stoppages and plate changes that resulted int hose real costs. Condé Nast is one of the few remaining major publishers (Hearst is another) that has not eliminated these obsolete bleed charges, and ANA strongly suggests that the time has come to do so (end of letter to the editor).

 

More on bleed charges in the one page white paper – Are Magazine Bleed Charges Legitimate? ANA and 4A’s have reached out to Condé Nast on this issue numerous times since we published this white paper in January and all those requests have been completely ignored. Not even the courtesy of any response or acknowledgment. Meanwhile, Hearst’s response has been, “At the advice of our counsel, we will not discuss pricing policies in a group setting. So, we will take a pass on this.” 

 

We encourage advertisers and their agencies to discuss bleed charges with these respective publishers (and any others that have such fees). Not only are bleed charges no longer justified, but they actually cost advertisers additional money as sometimes two versions of creative are prepared (bleed and non-bleed) and the agency time and resources spent developing that extra creative and negotiating reduction/elimination of the bleed fees leads to higher agency compensation costs to advertisers. Finally, if publishers have a legitimate reason to charge for bleed, let’s hear it—after all this is a blog and the dialogue would be appreciated.

The “Stigma” Associated with Social Media Sites for Companies—Does it Exist?

By Cara Schultz

Some companies are diving right into social media Websites, while other companies are slightly more hesitant when it comes to setting up a Facebook page or Twitter account. Although the idea of a disgruntled customer leaving negative feedback can be a bit intimidating to any company, a recent study from Pennsylvania State University confirmed that is usually not the case. After studying nearly 150,000 tweets, they came to a few positive conclusions. An article posted by eMarketer states, “Just 22.3% of tweets about brands expressed an opinion one way or another. The good news: Twitter users were much more likely to express positive sentiments than negative.”

   

What are your reservations with jumping on the social media bandwagon? Have you had a positive experience with social media sites and your customers? Chime in with your thoughts and opinions; we love to hear what you have to say!

Agency Performance Evaluations Are A Good Thing!

By Bill Duggan

We are living in an era of marketing accountability.  So it’s a little hard to believe that one-fifth of marketers do NOT conduct formal evaluations of their advertising and other communication agencies.  That’s one of the findings from a new ANA survey.

It’s no surprise that “traditional” creative and media agencies are the types of shops most likely to be evaluated.  Evaluations are less likely to be done for other types of agencies including digital, direct marketing, public relations and multicultural agencies.  ANA encourages evaluations of ALL types of agencies.

Agency performance evaluations are an aid to maintaining and then enhancing client/agency relations. 97% of marketers believe that evaluations are effective in maintaining the client/agency relationship.  So agencies should not be afraid of evaluations or think that such evaluations will be used to “ding” them when overall evaluations are a positive tool.

Best practices identified from the survey include:
• All marketers (even those with smaller budgets) should conduct formal agency performance evaluations on a regular basis.
• Assign a trusted, neutral point person (could be internal – for example procurement – or an outside consultant) to keep focused on objectives and metrics vs. personalities.
• Consider having a more informal “mid-term review” to avoid surprises at the end of the year.
• Use a consistent format for all agencies, although specific questions can be varied for different agency types.
• Use technology to facilitate adoption, ease of implementation, and analytics.
• Consider 360-degree evaluations to get the perspective of the agency.
• Present results in person.
• Have clear corrective action plans with due dates and owners.

Full survey results will be presented at the ANA Agency/Client Forum September 24 in New York.  View the press release here.

Are Things Looking Up for TV in 2010?

By Susan Burke

According to recently released reports, the Television Bureau of Advertising is predicting an increase in advertising revenue for 2010, as a result of the upcoming Winter Olympics in Vancouver and the U.S. mid-term elections, both of which are expected to lead to an influx of dollars into the TV ad market.  

Additionally, Disney’s CFO, Tom Staggs, announced that they have started to see improvements in ad sales for local markets, as well as among automotive manufacturers on the national stage. Recently, General Motors ventured back into the advertising market with an ad featuring their new chairman, Edward E. Whitacre, Jr. The ad offers customers a full refund (within 60 days of purchase) if they are not happy with their new GM vehicle:

New TV shows, such as The CW’s The Vampire Diaries (yes, I watched it), the network’s biggest series debut to date, are still drawing in viewers during their regularly scheduled time slots, potentially indicating that some ads are surviving the much discussed DVR blitz.

Does all of this point to a recovery? It’s too soon to tell, but it’s certainly better news than what we’ve been hearing for the past few months.

ANA Masters of Marketing - CONFERENCE REWIND Part One

By Barry Garbarino

HIGHLIGHTS FROM 2008

The 2008 ANA Annual Conference once again attracted a who’s who of CMO’s from leading global brands. As promised, the three-day event held October 16-19 in Orlando, Fla., showcased the industry leaders who are driving growth to deliver real results and build brand equity. Many took the stage in front of a record crowd of more than 1,200 attendees, sharing their wisdom, expertise, insights, and opinions — along with examples and clips of the campaigns they have orchestrated to drive growth.

“Great brands truly do lead to impressive and stronger business results,” said Bob Liodice, president and CEO of the ANA, reflecting on the conference. “That’s an underlying philosophy that we have to embed in the minds of all marketers and agency people. The focus needs to be on building brands because all of your results come from that, whether it’s growing top-line revenue, bottom-line profitability, or shareholder value. And what we saw from a lot of the presenters were essentially different ways to grow brands.”

A few memorable moments from 2008 include:

Jim Stengel, Procter & Gamble
In an inspiring and touching keynote address that kicked off the conference, Jim Stengel outlined a road map for “marketing, branding, and life.” Having recently stepped down as global marketing officer at Procter & Gamble, Stengel took the stage for the last time as a P&G employee. His speech was billed as a valedictory address, an opportunity to share a career’s worth of knowledge with peers.

Anne Finucane, Bank of America
“The Bank of America brand stands for action, authenticity, and simplicity. Consumers of all kinds, particularly at times like these, are looking for simple and relevant brand promises that are true on a consistent and reliable basis. Being simple is key. We live in a time of ‘too.’ Too fast, too complex, too much information, too little time, too much stress. It’s our job to be simple.”

Joe Tripodi, The Coca-Cola Company
“The secret formula for growth is that there is no secret formula. It’s doing some of the basics really well, including breaking down internal silos, and moving away from ‘spray and pray’ advertising in favor of precision marketing. Focus on innovation occurs at every level of the organization and extends beyond our breadth of products. Simplicity is key. When you think about innovation, stop chasing the Holy Grail.”

To find out more about the 2009 ANA Annual Conference – The Masters of Marketing and the great line-up of speakers, click here.

Drawing Attention to Yourself by Going Local

By Adrienne Tallacksen

My daily commute takes me past a local gym. I always look forward to checking out the latest advertisement they have to get people in the door, which is posted on a chalkboard easel on the sidewalk. The handwritten ads sometimes feature quotes (always altered in some way to play up the fitness angle), sometimes verge on offensive (needling those who might not be physically fit), and sometimes they aren't ads at all (a simple "YAY!" was posted on November 5th after President Obama was elected). The messages are often targeted to the Jersey City, NJ audience with references to local restaurants and even our most recent political scandal. Above all, the ads are clever and witty and almost always get my attention.

The gym is part of a small New York/New Jersey chain, so it may be easier for it to target the local audience than it would be for a national advertiser. But new tools are making targeted ads possible on a larger scale. At a meeting of the ANA's Television Advertising Committee Meeting in March, committee members learned about how Canoe Ventures is using community addressable advertising to target television viewers in different markets.

When an ad is targeted at people who live in my community, I feel like I can relate to the advertiser, even if I might not be interested in its product. This can be a powerful connection for marketers to make with consumers.