Apr 5, 2012 | Marketing
Like Theodore Levitt’s old adage of marketing that people don’t buy a drill, they buy a hole, so it is with Social Media.
Social media is the tool, it can be used badly, effectively, creatively, and efficiently, like any tool, but it is the impact of the tool, the outcomes it delivers, that really matter.
The social media experience is the tool, the benefit is delivered by the effective use of the tool in the right circumstances.
The building of a SM presence that encourages people to order and pay on line, or signal preference, or interact in some other way, one to one, that delivers something both parties value is the benefit SM has the potential to deliver, but it is not easy, in fact, it is really hard to do well.
Having a 1000 friends on facebook is pretty pointless, the benefit comes when those “friends” act like real friends, and give you something you value, just because they can.
Apr 4, 2012 | Marketing, Social Media
I find myself continually attempting to argue the case for investment in Social Media at the expense of more traditional broadcast and print media. Almost everyone I interact with from my large clients to the local tennis club fail to instinctively understand the full potential power of SM.
There is plenty around on the net shouting the advantages of SM, much of it with the objective of selling something, so it was great to come Across this report from Bain & Co “putting Social media to work” courtesy of Steve Goldner on his blog.
Then this morning, Mike Stelzner’s Social Media Examiner blog, a wonderful source of links, ideas, and tips published their 4th Annual Social Media Marketing report, which offers insights into the way marketers are using social media.
It is pretty clear that Marketing has been democratised by the web, Social Media Marketing is now mainstream marketing. It consumes huge resources, delivering huge benefits to marketers and their markets, despite the hubris, misunderstanding and snake oil salesmen that inhabit the marketing ecosystems.
Apr 3, 2012 | Leadership, Management, Small business, Strategy
A small manufacturing business I work with, operating in a domain now dominated by a few huge retailers, and cheap imported products, is facing a dilemma.
Three key people are leaving at pretty much the same time, for different reasons, just with difficult co-incident timing. This is a small business, there is no “bench” of executives who have been mentored, trained, and nurtured so that they can step in at short notice, no such luxury in an SME to whom every dollar of cashflow is critical to survival .
The purpose for this business to exist is to showcase the great products coming from Australia’s food basket, the Riverina, this is what makes them different, and gives all stakeholders, customers, suppliers, employees, and those who fund the business, a reason to keep on supporting it through the current challenges.
It seems that the opportunity presented by this sudden and unwelcome personnel churn is to start again, almost from scratch, to rebuild the processes, and renew the sense of shared purpose amongst the employees. That task however, is a bit like getting to the top of a sand-hill in a desert, and seeing just another sand-hill rather than the expected oasis.
The key distinction between leaders and managers is that leaders find the grit to climb this extra sand-hill, ways to bridge the gaps between peoples differing experience, expertise, and expectations, so that there is a shared purpose that is larger than an individual. Leaders are not leaders because they are always right, but because they listen, learn, and enable others to do the same. That is the opportunity facing my small client, to be a leader, and to remain one of the very few Australian owned food manufacturing businesses left.
Mar 30, 2012 | Change, Innovation, Strategy
Evolution happens in most circumstances in the absence of strong ‘anti-evolution” measures, and often even then, generally there is stuff happening at the fringes.
However, rigid barriers hold back change, until like the boy in the dyke, you run out of fingers, and then all hell breaks loose.
Allowing, even encouraging evolution acts as a pressure relief valve.
For some years I worked in the regulated milk industry, it was pretty obvious that the regulations protected a small number of people to the detriment of many, were a barrier to growth, and had no rational economic or social base at all. The problem was politics, not economics, there were a small number of electorates that could swing on the votes of dairy farmers, and we all effectively paid a price to keep them in business.
It was pretty obvious it would end badly, as indeed it did. The costs to everyone were far greater than necessary when the regulations were removed, particularly to those who had survived only because of the barriers. Instead of having time to adjust, those farmers were “killed off” overnight, a tragedy for them, but an inevitable outcome of the sudden removal of significant protection.
In effect, the evolution that was happening on the fringes of the market, and in other regulatory jurisdictions, was disregarded, and it required a bloody revolution, with all the associated pain, to get change.
Just think how much less pain would have been felt in the Middle East had the various autocrats in the region allowed change to evolve, rather than supressing it for years. It is much easier in the long run to encourage evolution.
Mar 29, 2012 | Change, Communication, Innovation, Social Media
It is all a matter of perspective.
Digital marketing implies an application of the existing disciplines of marketing, just tweaked a bit to accommodate the presence in the environment of digital options, facebook, linkedin, Pin it, and the rest.
Marketing in a digital world implies a pivot, the old rules no longer apply, because the world has changed.
Comscore has released their latest research, summarised and commented on in Mike Stelzner’s great Social Media Examiner blog. The impact of on line shopping, our seeming addiction to social sites and the opportunities to find new ways to engage with consumers as they conduct their digital lives, is delivering a host of new businesses, business models, and service opportunities not on the radar just a couple of years ago. Just look at the sudden emergence of cloud computing, the question is not where in the organisation responsibility for operating the cloud interactions should reside, but how can we best leverage the opportunities thrown up by this piece of the digital revolution.
Digital is no longer an option if medium term commercial survival is an objective, weather it be marketing, managing manufacturing, customer relationships and inventory, or just doodling, it is the other side of the inflexion point.
Not every body is there yet, but it will not be long, so don’t be late.
