The “Twitter Pitch”

Apr 23, 2013 | Communication, Small business

Mark Twain

Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) famously said “I do not have time to write you a short letter, so I have written you a long one”.

This statement is a pitch for twitter 100 years before it was conceived, as the sentiment of clarity through brevity is the same. Writing to convey an idea is a challenge, writing to convey an idea in a few words requires a discipline of thought that can be extremely hard.

The restriction of Twitter to 140 characters does seem to encourage a written shorthand that I find excruciating, but at its best, also adds a discipline to constructing an idea that squeezes out the superfluous, the hyperbole, the distractions,  and forces clarity by brevity.

It seems that the “Twitter Pitch” is replacing the “Elevator Pitch” first made popular by Dale Carnegie, but the idea is the same.

A measure of brand maturity.

Apr 19, 2013 | Branding, Marketing, Strategy

 

coke

Ever noticed that people who seem to “really have it all together” are able to poke fun at themselves, take negative feedback as an opportunity to learn and improve, and surprise with their capacity to be absolutely, selflessly, honest?

It is often the same with brands, another example of the similarity of people and brands, of how brands take on human characteristics.

However, it is a revelation to see this astonishingly honest ad by Coke.

Is this the beginning of a trend, a measure of maturity of the Coca Cola brand that it is able to spend resources advertising the downside of consumption of the product, or just a mistake, like the appalling blunder with “New Coke”  in 1985. Perhaps, my cynical side asks, it is because they make more money out of their other beverage products, and want to switch consumption?

It seems to me that despite all, it really is just a measure of the security that Coke management feels in the strength of their brand. It is a recognition that if they do not talk about the cause and effect between sugar beverage consumption and obesity, and all its problems,  others will, and they better have a credibility and a stake in the conversation.

 

Brand ambiguity will be terminal

Apr 18, 2013 | Branding, Communication

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In a world of homogenisation, being different is both dangerous and necessary.

Standing for something of value  is absolutely essential, ambiguity is death.

C21 Moments of Truth.

Apr 16, 2013 | Branding, Communication, Social Media

SAS

Former CEO of Scandanavian Airlines, Jan Carlzon  write a book in the eighties called “Moments of Truth” which reflected the journey of SAS from its commercial deathbed to being the most admired airline in the world. It was a best seller, articulating the then revolutionary idea that each interaction an enterprise had with a customer was a “Moment of Truth” a point at which the consumers experience would shape their attitude and future relationships with a brand.

It occurs to me that it has changed now, and the moment of truth that now matters as much, if not more, is now the point at which a consumer posts, tweets, or other wise publicly records the interaction and their experience with it for others to see, hear, and feed into their memory banks for reference.

The 21st Century has opened up a number of opportunities to interact with consumers Carlzon never anticipated, the referral power of the devices we now routinely use has changed Carlzons Moment of Truth to just the first of many crucial moments.

“Like” means nothing, go for “want”.

Apr 12, 2013 | Branding, Marketing

unlike

Like is too easy, no emotional investment has been made, to do anything useful, you need to move to want. As noted in a previous post, social media wombats, those  clicking a “like” button on your site in the hope that you will “like” them back,  are breeding at exponential rates.

Nobody ever engaged with a proposition, or bought anything, because they “like” it. People become engaged with an idea, a brand, make a purchase decision, because they want to.

Nobody ever got marries because the “like” their potential partner, they do it for much deeper reasons, they “want” to.

 

Velocity of ideas

Apr 10, 2013 | Change, Communication, Social Media

idea velocity

In the economy of C21, we are far less interested in physical stuff that we are in intangibles.

A measure that will emerge both as one of internal corporate performance, and the performance of markets is the velocity of ideas.

 How quickly do the ideas being considered in the executive suite filter to the shop floor, and in what form are they perceived?

How quickly is an initiative taken up by others externally upon which depends the success of the initiative?

This morning I was at a meeting of small businesses, 700 of them, gathering to voice our dismay at the total disenfranchising of small businesses in our political process.  Together we employ millions of Australians, are the biggest generator of economic activity, and we create, innovate, and drive the health of the economy, but are ignored.

Hopefully no longer.

By the end of the meeting, the  “#toobigtoignore” handle on twitter had generated substantial traction,  and the hits on the website www.toobigtoignore.org.au  were starting. The velocity of the spread of the ideas expressed will be a key measure for the success of the initiative, and by watching the velocity of the ideas, and the depth of engagement of those reached, will be not just measures of success, but leading indicators of that success.

Ignore the notion of idea velocity at your peril.