A marketers rant about ‘content porn’

A marketers rant about ‘content porn’

Oct 10, 2018 | Branding, Communication, Social Media

Content has become a marketing buzzword delivering a tsunami of crap into our inboxes, cluttering up our phones, and potentially delivering all sorts of nasty surprises if we open them.

Content started as a great idea, suddenly we could communicate directly with those in our markets and give them stuff of value, that coincidentally led to a transaction, perhaps many transactions.

Anyone would think this was new, this is what advertising has done for decades, we can now just target the recipient more accurately.

We have forgotten the ultimate objective of content is to create circumstances where a transaction can occur. However, ‘Content’ has become a cliché, and we all indulge, churning out shit that does nobody any good.

It is like Porn, interesting at first, perhaps educational for some, offensive to others, but quickly becoming just boring.

People are keen to receive things of value, things that make a difference to their lives, but increasingly the stuff they are being delivered is just content porn, doing nobody any good, leading to the turn off, so that the good stuff gets missed in the never ending churn.

There is a branding opportunity here, send only good stuff, and personalise it!

What we need to produce is ideas, not indulgence, and there is way too little of the former and too much of the latter.

Let’s be fair dinkum about what content is.

Fair chance it is a regurgitated version of something else, and by the time the first good idea has been reshaped, and re-imagined, it has become blurred and unrecognisable. An original good idea is something most recognise when they see it, simply because it demands attention and action.

That is what  we need, more ideas, originality, and deviance, in a nice way, that demands your attention, and drives an action. We do not need more of the same old content porn.

I read somewhere, and I wish I could take credit for it that: ‘if I take a photo of a pile of dog shit, I have a photo of a pile of dog shit, if I upload it to  a website, it becomes content’

Sounds a bit like the inimitable Bob Hoffman, but could not locate the source.

 

Content quality trumps quantity, every time!

Content quality trumps quantity, every time!

Sep 28, 2018 | Communication, Strategy

Marketers have always created ‘Content’ as a means to  raise awareness, motivate an action, build a brand. It is what they do in an effort to hook into the behavioural patterns of their customers in order to build a relationship and generate revenue.

Human beings learned to tell stories as a means to communicate the things that are important to them way before they learned to record things on clay tablets.

So, ‘Content’ is not new, the form has just morphed over the last 20 years with the emergence of digital tools as a more efficient way to spread the ‘content’. We also know that the ubiquitous bullet points may simplify things, but they are easily forgotten, whereas a compelling narrative is remembered.

It is just the way our brains have evolved to work.

Content should be organised as stories, marketers should know this by now, and mostly do, but often fail to give us stores that are memorable and relevant, that touch an emotion.

The old story of the poet and the beggar makes the point.

The beggar asks the poet for money, but the poet having none himself offers to re-write the beggars sign, which just says ‘Blind. Please help.” to ‘Spring is coming, but I will not see it’. A week later, when the poet sees the blind man again, he is not surprised to hear the donations have soared. A simple change of word from a fact to a story that touches the emotions.

Our brains are wired to recognise and recall stories, details are remembered, so when you relate the story to others, all the colour, movement and emotion of the original remains.

Stories take a lot of development and telling, they are very hard work and are optimised over time. Attention to detail, selecting stories and story lines that really dig into the emotions are crucial.

Marketers are now required to measure everything, stories are no different. Generally the conversion rate that is relevant is the best measure. How many finished the story, how many then did what you wanted them to do.

Mediocrity rules, the 80:20 rule is really 95:5 in stories, as only the great ones  get read, create engagement and sharing, and to do this, it is all about quality, not quantity.

Ever wonder why some content goes viral?

Well for one reason or another it is in the 5% that is worthy of  the attention and sharing, aim to be in the 5%, which means that the effort has to be organic, you cannot outsource passion and commitment, it has to be in the DNA of the business.

(Sorry about the ickky  word in the headline, I have even stopped playing 500)

Cartoon credit. My thanks again to Tom Fishburne, the Marketoonist. Another marketing story told in a cartoon

P,S. This morning, in my inbox was this new ‘storybook’ by the great Hugh McLeod and Brian Solis, supported by Linkedin. It makes my point better than I ever could. I encourage you to download it and have a look. I love Hughs work, as any reader will know, I often have his cartoons as headers, as the say so much in a few lines.

 

 

 

 

The online advertising fantasy revealed

The online advertising fantasy revealed

Sep 20, 2018 | Branding, Marketing

 

The web gives us huge value, piles of stuff we want that we think we need, for free.

Or is it?

The web is fuelled by advertising. Pure and simple.

The ‘free ‘ stuff we get is really in exchange for our eyeballs, not because there is some benevolent power seeking to help us.

The two most powerful businesses on the planet, Google and Facebook are dependent on advertising for their profitability. Ok, Google has diversified a lot, and now generates profits from all sorts of other activities, but the core is still ads.

As consumers we all want the free stuff, and resent the advertising, otherwise, we would not install all the millions of ad blockers we have.

Pity no-one seems to have figured out what Don Draper knew, that advertising to be of commercial value has to be entertaining, as well as informative and behaviour changing. The deluge of crap on the web seems to have overwhelmed the need to be anything other than there. Those who flog various forms of unaccountable ‘ad tech’ have badly  mistaken the value of the big idea, believing that many small poor ideas used every day, labelled content, can add up to the impact of the one big one.

Fantasy.

This missive is fuelled by the recent tightening of the LinkedIn algorithms related to the number and apparent management of ads being shown on an individuals home page, and the increasing challenge of communicating in groups. Clearly, the Microsoft behemoth is becoming more aggressive about squeezing  a return from its purchase of LinkedIn. Not unreasonable in principal, but if they wreck the reason we are all there, it will blow up in their face.

It is time to wake up and recognise that advertising is the foundation of the web, so it had better be good, or the foundations will crumble. Advertising itself is not bad, it is bad advertising that is bad, coupled with its rotten digital bedfellow, tracking.

Having our digital footsteps stored and accumulated to better ‘personalise’ the ads we see, which is really code for trashing any personal digital security and privacy we may have, is not something I like at all. To my mind, it is a significant part of the price we really pay for the ‘free stuff’, and is on he verge of becoming too high.

Cartoon credit: Once again to Tom Fishburne, who continues to distil the fluff, self interest, hubris and pure bullshit that infests the marketing industry into bite sized chunks of reality.

‘Data Science’ in marketing is frequently bullshit

‘Data Science’ in marketing is frequently bullshit

Sep 17, 2018 | Branding, Marketing

I started life as an accountant, and luckily, recognised before anyone else that I would be the world’s worst. However, from my trials, I do have respect for numbers, proof, real outcomes tested and validated by the scientific method.

As a marketer, I have always tried to find the quantitative base of the stuff I was doing, rather than being seduced by the hyperbole, supposition, and self-interested ‘data’ presented by someone with an interest in the outcome.

Usually that someone has had a pecuniary interest in the decision. They are selling something, from a piece of machinery to an advertising campaign, to a bottle of shampoo sitting on a supermarket shelf.

Science starts with a hypothesis that you set out to prove by trying to disproving it. Having failed to disprove it, the result must be the truth. As Arthur Conan Doyle via Sherlock Holmes said ‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.‘ A sample of 12 carefully selected personnel from your ad agency does not constitute proof that your made up new natural sounding ‘extract’ will make your hair shine.

‘Data’ as used by whole ranges of marketers, advertisers, and perhaps worst of all, politicians, is often nothing like a reliable representation of the truth, it is just the opposite. It is the selective use of bits of pieces of information, (real or imagined)  and contextual engineering that suits the pre-ordained conclusion that is presented. The opposite to the scientific method, in that the result is determined, then data is constructed that does as good a job as possible to ‘prove’ the outcome.

In academic and scientific circles, this is a heinous crime that will end your career.

From time to time I have not been popular as a result of asking what to me seems to be reasonable questions of those presenting ‘data’ in an effort to sell something.

What is the size and structure of the sample used?

How does the methodology replicate actual behaviour?

What controls were used to manage the data?

Where did the outliers come from, and where are they in the stats?

Have the results been substantiated by independent repeat studies?

There are a few more, but usually I only get one or two out before I am dismissed as some sort of data cretin who does not understand these things.

It is amazing to me how often I see major decisions taken on the basis of flawed, incomplete and inconsistent ‘data’ where the vested interest is clear to all who choose to look closely.

 

 

The 5 steps to optimise process development

The 5 steps to optimise process development

Sep 10, 2018 | Change, Management

 

Processes are the means by which we get stuff done, and are therefore an integral part of our personal and professional lives.

Mostly we just  allow them to evolve, usually in a pretty unthinking manner without much critical analysis. However, this is a mistake, as it leads to duplication, mistakes, omissions, personal idiosyncratic behaviour, and waste.

When valuing a business, one of the tell-tale signs of good management is the presence of a simple set of process maps which guide the way things are done, from the most mundane to the really important. This ensures, or at least makes the effort to ensure, that the same jobs get done in the same way every time, irrespective of who is actually doing the job.

The cost savings that result from this simple idea are enormous.

Creating a ‘process map’ or running sheet for the simplest to the most complicated process is pretty much the same.

The point however, is not to create a set of rules that can never be broken, it is just the opposite. A process to be optimised and improved  needs to be subjected to critical analysis on an ongoing basis, the written process just gives a stable starting point.

My experience with process mapping has involved 5 steps, that usually happen in an overlapping manner

 

Learn by observation and questions: Observe what happens currently, how things actually get done, consider the range of cause and effect chains in place, ensuring you do not confuse cause and effect with simple correlation. Go out and ask questions, seek insight into the hidden ‘wrinkles’ that exist in every process.

Experiment: An effective experiment requires discipline, primarily to test one thing at a time so you can accurately measure the impact of any change. The scientific method works: develop a hypothesis, test if it is true or false by collecting data, adjust the hypothesis and test again, until you find a hypothesis that holds true. As  Sherlock Holmes’s mentor said: ‘When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth’

Codify: a process that remains in one persons head is no more than an opinion. To be effective the thought must be codified in such a manner that it can be accessed by anyone, and given the status of the ‘right way’ of doing something. I like visual process maps, they are easier to understand, and absorb quickly.

Distribute: once codified, the process needs to be distributed, and made easily available. There are now many digital tools around that enable distribution and simple reference. In the ‘old days’ processes would be in a manual somewhere that nobody looked at, even if they knew it existed. Nowadays there is no excuse, the process can be available to everyone with digital access.

Optimisation and creativity.  The paradox of all this is that with a stable process, you can now be creative, seeing alternative ways of delivering an outcome.  For improvement to occur you first need a stable system so the impact of changes are visible in measureable outcomes. This is the opposite to the chaos that people often consider to be a part of the ‘creative process’

Header acknowledgement:  Hugh McLeod at Gapingvoid.com