ANA Marketing Maestros

Great Ideas Will Create Relevancy

By Barbara Bacci Mirque

A recent ANA survey highlighted that integrated marketing now tops the list as the issue that keeps senior marketers up at night. You have heard me say before that ANA members tell us that the best way to tackle this is to start with the idea and let the idea be the media channel integrator. That was emphasized at the recent 2007 ANA Advertising Financial Management Conference. Bob Lachky, EVP, Global Industry Development & Chief Creative Officer, Anheuser - Busch Inc., talked about how the “Wassup” campaign (here are few of the ads along with some interesting consumer generated versions) began online then spread virally, eventually running on television.

Jeff Hicks, President, CEO and Partner, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, told a similar story for Coke Zero and its very funny campaign with Coke attorneys (again, thanks YouTube). Great ideas will create relevancy so the media should be an outgrowth of the idea, not the other way around. Both of those campaigns were extended into television once they were picked up in the conversations occurring online and it was the consumers who said these campaigns should also run on television. So once again, advertisers should be aware of and participate in the conversations happening around and about their products and services. Start with a terrific brand idea and let that determine which media channels you use. This is great learning from some very smart advertisers.

Technorati tags: budweiser marketing coke creative

Microsoft and Yahoo?

By Will Waugh

I don't normally rely on the New York Post for much more than Page Six, but they  are announcing Microsoft is talking to Yahoo! about a potential $50 billion bid (thanks Forbes.com) Funny, I was just meeting with Microsoft on Monday and Tuesday and they didn't mention a lick of this to me (I feel slighted). The pressure, the Post says, is coming from Google's continued domination of search and online advertising, particularly with the recent purchase of DoubleClick.

If it is true, why not for Microsoft? I don't see this as a sign of desperation, rather a desire to expand it's capabilities online.

What this would give Microsoft:

• An expanded search reach with Yahoo's #2 position in the field.
• The #1 portal with some of the best brands in online media.
• Expanded e-commerce capabilities in spaces like cars and jobs.
• More content (I love content).

That's just a start. Looking forward to seeing how this develops.

Technorati tags: microsoft marketing yahoo

CBS Gets Connected

By Will Waugh

So, CBS is going multi-platform. Sound familiar? Time Warner did it with their Global Marketing. Viacom did it with Viacom Plus. I could have sworn CBS did it already, but I guess not. Welcome to CBS Connections:

CBS Corporation announced today the launch of CBS CONNECTIONS, a newly branded sales and marketing unit designed to meet Madison Avenue's growing need for cross-platform solutions.

The launch of CBS CONNECTIONS underscores the conclusions of a recent survey by the Association of National Advertisers which shows that integrated marketing communications now rivals ROI [return on investment] as a top issue confronting marketers.

Always nice to see our work cited as reasoning for a business evolution. I wish CBS the best of luck in leveraging their many assets for marketers. It is all about solutions now, not media buys, and I think this is a step in the right direction.

Technorati tags: cbs marketing

Why Media Efficiencies are Needed

By Barbara Bacci Mirque

The ANA is a proponent of the need to impose efficiency to the entire marketing supply chain. As such, we sit on the eBay Media Marketplace (still in beta) steering committee. As I am sure you all have heard, the eBay Media Marketplace is a media exchange designed by advertisers and their agencies in conjunction with eBay.

That is a fundamental difference from all of the other media marketplaces – this one was driven by the demand side! The eBay Media Marketplace as currently designed, is comprised of a “reverse auction” which automates a fragmented and in some cases maybe even a biased RFP (Request for Proposal) process. The marketplace allows advertisers and their agencies to level the playing field and invite in all relevant parties with the flick of their wrist when they issue RFPs. It also provides a very important trail on the bid process itself– a trail in which our SOX compliant finance and purchasing departments are very interested. Recently the eBay Media Marketplace steering committee invited cable sellers to beta test the system and tell us what they thought.

We chose to start the pilot with the cable side as they have traditionally tended to be a very progressive medium. We are very disappointed with their decision - announced today - not to participate in the eBay Media Marketplace. This is a very active time for this, as evidenced by recent announcements by DoubleClick and Google. It is apparent that portions of the media buying process are going to evolve into some form of an exchange selling format. We think it is important that advertisers, their agencies and the media sellers work jointly to develop a system that works for all parties – as the eBay Media Marketplace was intended. Adweek talks about it here.

We invite any interested parties to contact us as we move forward on this important media marketplace.

Technorati tags: eBay media marketplace

Garfield's Chaos Scenario

By Will Waugh

I like Bob Garfield. I have followed his writing and reviews for some time. I know his criticisms have hit a lot of nerves (including many of our members) but his insight on the future of marketing are extraordinary and, in many cases, spot on. I did ask him about the future of associations like ours and he was bullish on our role in marketing's evolution. Would he tell me otherwise at our event? Probably not but he is pretty straightforward.

I can't embed the video that Advertising Age is hosting but here is the link of Garfield speaking at our TV Forum a few weeks back. He hasn't posted on his blog Garfield: The Blog in awhile, but the writings are always entertaining and insightful.

Technorati tags: video marketing chaos scenario

Bob Wehling - Lessons Learned from a Marketing Legend

By Barbara Bacci Mirque

I am fortunate enough to meet the top marketers in the world through my employment at the ANA. Every day is an incredible learning experience for me as I interact with these marketing mavens. But I don’t just learn about marketing from them – I learn about leadership. One of the marketers with whom I have interacted at the ANA was just inducted into the AAF Advertising Hall of Fame. Bob Wehling, former Global Marketing Officer at The Procter & Gamble Company, accomplished many things in his 41 years at P&G but counts among his most cherished accomplishments marrying Carolyn and being the father of six daughters - and now the grandfather of 23. There he learned true insights about marketing to women, he said at his induction ceremony on March 20. He is also very proud of his community service work, particularly in the area of education and children’s issues.

One of the most compelling things I have heard about Bob from folks who were lucky enough to work with him or for him, is how he started every meeting with the question - "What can I do for you today?" Here is a person at the top of his game, commanding hundreds of millions of dollars in marketing spend, who was seeking to help those with whom he came in contact. That is the leadership lesson we can all take back from Bob Wehling. Similarly, what struck me as I listened to the biographies of each inductee was how they all seemed to have a similar style to Bob and were more concerned about others than themselves and their own career trajectory. So that is a key success attribute we can all start employing in our interactions with our staffs and marketing partners. I can’t wait for the folks who work for me to fall off of their chairs when I start a meeting with that line! You can read their inspirational stories and learn more about Bob and the other Hall of Fame inductees at this marvelous website.

Technorati tags: wehling marketing procter & gamble

Tripodi's Pet Peeves

By Will Waugh

At yesterday's TV Forum, Allstate's illustrious CMO Joe Tripodi told a compelling brand story and shared his pet peeves of advertising. He urged advertisers not to be:

• The Class Clown - Thinks everything is a joke with nothing really tying to the brand or product
• The Jock - An advertiser who is lost in strained sports analogies and attaches product or brand where there is no real linkage.
• The Prom Princess - An advertiser who is all about image with no real product or substance -
• The Slacker - No goals or measures.
• The Geek - In love with all the new media and technology (this might hit a sore spot to this audience). He feels these people are trying to be ingredient branders.
• The Drama Queen - All emotion, all the time. These are advertisers who attempt to inject emotion where there is none.
• The Heavyweight - He mentioned that it is good to go on intuition some time, but not all the time. My favorite quote here: "If you go with your guy all the time, you will be out of a job." The overriding concept here is you absolutely need consumer insight and analysis.

Ad Age is hosting some video of Joe Tripodi here.

Technorati tags: tripodi marketing TV Forum

Out at TV Today

By Will Waugh

We will be hosting our annual precursor to the Upfront today we call the TV Forum. I will attempt to post from there but am not 100% sure on the hotspots at the Marriott Marquis. So that being said, I will report back on what our friends at Allstate, Nissan, NBC Universal, et al. have to say as soon as possible. Also on the slate is Andy Jung from Kelloggs delivering the ANA's commercial ratings stance. This is the area I hope to see some debate on. Most of the chatter about this subject states that our advertisers are fighting a losing cause. Sorry, it's a fight that needs to be fought. Vietnam can do it, why can't we? My favorite quote comes from Chris at Open the Dialogue:

Nielsen's system isn't actually going to be able to track commercial viewing because it only tracks viewer numbers every 2.5 seconds, a time gap that's too wide for accurate measurement. That's just fine with most parties involved in this discussion, though, since ad agencies seem to be paranoid about their commercials actually being judged with hard numbers. They like those fuzzy numbers, but their media-buying counterparts are wanting the same accountability for TV that they're finding online.

Another call from the ANA's paper is that some of the bigger brand names want "brand-specific" ratings, but it's hard for me to fathom the extent to which this won't happen.

Technorati tags: commercial ratings television

Engagement Making Progress

By Barbara Bacci Mirque

Max, you have broken my heart! That is Max Kalehoff I am talking about, the VP Marketing of Nielsen BuzzMetrics who made me a star (to my family and friends that is) by conducting a video interview with me (and others) about engagement that he ran last September on the video blog, Engagement by Engagement. Recently Max commented about engagement in a MediaPost article in which he questioned if engagement has stuck or if it is a passing fad.

The ANA is an industry partner in an important initiative about engagement metrics, spearheaded by the AAAA and the ARF. I agree with Max there was a lot of initial press hype and lately press about engagement has been "quiet," but the fact remains that advertisers are clamoring for information about what and how to measure in a world of fragmented media options and consumer control and our industry group is making enormous and carefully calibrated, progress.

Recently, an ANA poll of senior marketers found that accountability, usually the top issue on senior marketers’ minds, was now neck and neck with integrated marketing communications, specifically "how to bring together the various marketing channels," as what is keeping them up at night. The old purchase behavior paradigms don’t work anymore, we now live in a "feel, think, do" world which has important implications for marketers. Here is what Joe Plummer of the ARF, for whom I have immense respect, has to say about the work of the industry consortium on engagement and about Max’s post:

...the primary strategy for our combined effort is creating brand demand by "turning on" (or engaging) prospects in the brand idea enhanced by the context, this summary is valuable baseline knowledge. The vast majority of the research supports our research and thinking to date, in that much of what occurs between brands and prospects/customers is emotional and behavioral with minimal amounts of cognitive problem-solving and "rational man" economic-decision making. The research confirms that go-to-market components combine with the brand idea signifiers and meanings in a powerful (and possibly complex) process…the lack of buzz in the press reflects the short attention span of journalism in general and the ad industry in particular. It may also reflect a shift to a more applied phase in the engagement journey.

Stay tuned for a dialogue between Max and Joe in an upcoming Engagement by Engagement blog.

Technorati tags: engagement marketing accountability

Twitter Wants to Know: What Are You Doing?

By Kaitlin Villanova

Want to learn exactly what your consumers are thinking and doing and when? Twitter.com allows for that kind of intimacy. The community of “connected” users can communicate to friends their up-to-the-minute activities via IM, text, or email. Think of it as shorthand blogging.

Rather than writing a blog about how you are eating lucky charms cereal, then searching online for an image of the familiar leprechaun on a red box, just text message your Twitter account and save yourself a whole lot of time.”

Some Recent Twitter posts:

“BTW [by the way] I am in the apple store right now”

“Going to get a haircut, it is so warm out”

“Designing second life for you!”

Blogger Kevin Dugan writer of Strategic Public Relations Blog admits “Thousands of geeks texting random thoughts and keeping us up on their mundane status probably has value.”

Example of Twitter's usefulness in the community from Israel Hyman's Twitter microblog:

Robert Scoble wanted to have Kathy Sierra’s speech from SXSW (South by Southwest a music festival in Austin Texas, that has attracted a strong following amongst web creatives and entrepreneurs) so he asked via Twitter if anyone had a link to the audio. Within a couple minutes, someone gave him a link, which he posted via Twitter, and a few minutes later I was listening to the talk in Arizona. Twitter is microblogging at lightning speed. It’s an “always on” chat room.”

Now that you  have a better understanding of Twitter, it’s your turn to upload an image, invite friends, and answer the twitter question: What are you doing?

Technorati tags: twitter community social networks