The power of video gaining viral legs can create incredible visibility for a brand. One of my personal favorites – the Evian roller babies – brought this brand back to life for me after moving it to the passé section of my mind sometime in the 90s. However, even though I loved the video, I still haven’t been motivated to pick up a bottle. I just smile when I see the logo and pay heed to the creative talent who developed the video.

Interestingly, Evian started running the ads on TV a few months ago. Apparently the sales pipeline thinned out from the online push and they’re trying another approach.

This week, SymphonyIRI released the latest sales data for Old Spice body wash, the product that has risen to the number one most viewed video spot thanks to the muscular Isaiah Mustafa sending messages from the shower.

Bad news Mustafa – sales are down. Apparently these past four weeks, the campaign has been running without a corresponding coupon, leaving consumers less motivated to purchase. Sales have dropped 30-33 percent since the buy one, get one free sales promotion ended, giving Mustafa quite a bit less muscle on his own.

This serves as an important reminder that motivating target audiences to take action requires more than an entertaining video. Today, capturing a consumer’s attention takes a minimum of 3-5 touch points from multiple sources. Companies must create 360 degree campaigns which reach their targets in all the places they are engaged — media, blogs, point of purchase, social networks, online video sites, events, etc.  And there has to be a compelling call to action and/or incentive. For the general consumer, coupons are particularly hot right now as the recession has conditioned us to look for ways to save.

Regardless of your target audience, the importance of having a multichannel marketing plan is imperative. A one legged stool just won’t stand up. Unless of course your only goal is to be the number one viewed video and have people smile at your water bottles. And let’s not forget – viral isn’t a given, so even this goal has no guarantee.

What brands do you think are the best success stories when it comes to multi-channel marketing? Failures?

How many times have you heard or read that companies should just forge ahead with a social media program even though the return on investment is hard to quantify? I’m not going to point fingers, but it’s been repeated so often it’s become the mantra of so-called social media experts.

This is really bad advice.

Social media is no different than any other type of marketing activity. It takes time and resources to write blogs and record podcasts, build followers on Twitter or create decent videos for YouTube. If you’re going to suck up those resources they had better bring demonstrable value that advances critical business goals. Without that grounding, you’re just wasting your time.

Every solid PR or marketing plan I worked on over the last decade or so began with a SWOT analysis linked back to business objectives, like establish a foothold in market X with this demographic, or protect our flanks in this segment Y from low-cost competitors.  From there we worked out strategies and tactics – that could involve a social media component –  and thought through a set of metrics to determine if the programs were successful.

A major advantage with social media compared to traditional PR is the abundance of tracking tools. You can see the number of re-tweets or Facebook Like button clicks and then drill down to better understand the type of traction you’re getting. Ideally these efforts generate more website traffic which leads to more business.

Social media is ultimately a tool, another arrow in the marketing quiver. If you combine it with solid business and marketing practices, the ROI is sure to follow.

I remember a conversation I had with a colleague about 15 years ago when the Web was starting to become a mainstream part of our daily business world, especially in the high tech market. The person said that the Web was simply another distribution channel and she somewhat downplayed the importance that the Web would have in our daily lives. Boy was she wrong.

Fast forward to today and you have a much different picture. The Web is critical to our daily business lives, both in the B2B and B2C worlds. But it cannot be done in a vacuum. As analyst firm AMR said in a recent report, “Two thirds of B2B marketers believe that online must be complemented by traditional marketing activities.”

I’ve read articles and heard from multiple companies that “we need a social media plan.” The reality is this cannot be done as a standalone effort – it must be part of a larger marketing strategy. With experts like Forrester Research predicting a doubling in B2B interactive marketing spending by 2014, forward-thinking B2B and B2C companies need to continue to strengthen their online and social media talent with a combination of in-house and external resources. Sadly, BizReport says that 60 percent of B2B firms have no staff dedicated to social media compared with 54 percent of B2C players. Why is B2B lagging here?

My feeling is that we live in a results-oriented business community, not to mention a results-oriented society, which means we need numbers and validation. Gut instinct is fine but it’s hard to argue for social media-savvy staff members to the C-level executives if you can’t justify the benefits. To date, it has proven challenging to directly link things like re-tweets or blog posts to increased sales, especially for big-tickets items like database software or bulldozers.

Social media can be a great tool to help companies connect with their customers, partners and industry influencers and has potential to drive revenue growth. Whether you use an outside agency or take it in-house, a successful social media strategy must be part of the overall marketing plan for your company backed with real metrics.

How do you see social media strategies changing as they become an integral part of your marketing plan?

With technology in particular, there’s a tendency to get excited about a whiz-bang bit of “breakthrough” or “innovative” or worse “unique” gizmo or piece code that some smart guys in India cooked up for you. Seriously, who cares if something is unique or first if it’s completely useless?

I’m the first to admit that technology is cool, and I can easily get excited about a gadget just because it’s cool. I have many gadget sitting on shelves gathering dust for that very reason. Once the excitement was past, it turned out that the gadget wasn’t all that useful, reliable, or helpful.

In his Convince and Convert blog, Jay Baer makes the point that finding out where customers can use your help can improve your marketing efforts. He advocates implementing your marketing activities in such a way that customers will find some utility in your communication. One example I have is a newsletter we get from a local auto repair shop full of quirky tidbits and useful tips on gardening or cleaning out the attic. My wife actually takes the time to read it, and then gives me the coupon for an oil change.

Applied to technology marketing, helpfulness should be a big part of your strategy. It’s important to remember to always tie your messages back to what your product or service actually does for the customer. Ask the question, how does this help make the customer’s life better in some meaningful way. Ideally, you should be able to make that case that if people fit a certain profile, they will be significantly better off using your product then they were previously, or if they used a competitive product. If you are struggling to understand your audience’s needs, maybe it’s time to do a bit more research and message development.

Tools like ROI calculators that give customers a way to evaluate whether or not your product will help save some money are incredibly valuable. Yet, too often I hear about how hard it is to figure out ROI. These days customers are most interested in saving money so demonstrating how much money your software will save is a great strategy for anything in the B2B world.

On the B2C front, a big part of the iPhone’s success ties back to the huge catalog of apps. While many of them are fluff, a large number are actually helpful. Once people find something to be useful, they tell their friends who in turn run out and buy an iPhone. The real genius in the iPhone isn’t the touch screen, but a friendly UI that lets people discover and use truly helpful apps.

Want a blowout success? Think long and hard about how you can help your customers. What are their pain points and how can you help?

The Wall Street Journal today is reporting that the vast majority of Toyota accidents were the result of…driver error. Not sticky brake pedals:

The U.S. Department of Transportation has analyzed dozens of data recorders from Toyota Motor Corp. vehicles involved in accidents blamed on sudden acceleration and found that the throttles were wide open and the brakes weren’t engaged at the time of the crash, people familiar with the findings said.

The early results suggest that some drivers who said their Toyotas and Lexuses surged out of control were mistakenly flooring the accelerator when they intended to jam on the brakes.

What’s even more fascinating is how the grievance count suddenly shot up once people heard about the problem. Actually, we didn’t just hear about it, but were barraged by a non-stop, relentless news cycle involving electronic media, print and online media outlet and social media buzz.  Did the hype – not problems with Toyota – lead to the jump in complaints?  I’d say that looks like a pretty safe assumption.

A similar case of hype leading to mass hysteria is the latest (albeit flawed) Apple iPhone.  While it’s a nice device, there is very little that’s truly new or groundbreaking. If you already have an iPhone or an Android device, there’s not much reason to run right out and buy one.  The rational response would be to hold off until your natural upgrade cycle comes around.

The irrational response, fueled by months of breathless expectation by media and bloggers, along with Steve Jobs’ showmanship at launch, resulted in the thousands upon thousands of people waiting in line to drop down their hard-earned money on a device virtually the same as what they already have. Say what? My take, is the hype created a form of temporary insanity on a mass level, perhaps akin to the way mobs work.

Another example is designer handbags among teenage girls. Although somewhat tempered of late by the recession, my daughter went through a phase where she simply had to have expensive purses.  Working a minimum wage job, she would save pennies to get the latest Dooney & Bourke offering. I would see her purses and just couldn’t understand why she along with many other teenage girls would pay so much for what amounted to a fancy label. Hype and peer pressure are the only explanations.

As a PR person, I’m aware of the influence of hype and therefore largely resistant to its influence.  I counseled friends to buy Toyotas when the sales crashed earlier this year, and tend to avoid overhyped, overpriced Apple products.

But I am fascinated by the incredible power of hype to shape people’s behavior.

To no small degree, this is what marketing, advertising and PR people dream about and strategize endlessly to achieve. Get enough hype, and you have just hit the lottery.  So what’s the magic formula?  Still working on that one, but I’ll let you know once I figure it out.

For those of us who work to build brands within the SAP ecosystem, one of the most important strategies is to ride whatever waves SAP is creating. The momentum SAP creates can push you along and help you be part of the discussion. Since SAP is promoting these themes, you’ll get much more support from their partner teams, and media types who are writing about these themes will be more receptive to pitches.

While the themes evolve over the course of year, SAP’s agenda for the coming year is laid out during the annual SAPPHIRE NOW events, which recently completed. The job of setting the agenda falls to the CEO, or in this case, co-CEOs Bill McDermott and Jim Hagermann Snabe.

Here are the main themes that emerged from the co-CEO’s 2010 keynotes.

• Mobility – SAP is making a huge bet on mobile enablement of its platform with the acquisition of Sybase. While much is unknown about how this will play out, it’s not too soon to start thinking how your company’s products will mesh with mobile SAP applications.
• On-Demand – According to Snabe, the SAP Business ByDemand will be ready for mass volume in July and you can bet that SAP will be pushing it hard, both as a complement to on-premise apps and as a solution for small- and mid-size enterprises.
• Changing IT Stack – With social media and mobility, users are more empowered than ever before. This will require changes in the technology stack and a new generation of analytics to find knowledge. “This requires a complete new IT,” said Snabe. “This is an era that requires collaboration.” I suspect SAP will be articulating what this means in more depth in the coming months.

Unlike some years past when the media response from SAPPHIRE has been somewhat to even highly negative, the majority of coverage I’ve seen this year has been positive and upbeat. The media enjoyed SAPPHIRE and believe that McDermott and Snabe along with a re-energized Hasso Plattner have SAP headed in the right direction. After a couple of down years, it looks like IT spending is about to rebound and SAP – and with partners who play their cards correctly – are poised to take advantage.

Nearly ten years ago when I was part of the SAP public relations team, I remember sitting in the SAPPHIRE press room observing the various activities going on. One interaction stands out.  A marketer from a partner company had just dropped off his press kit (this was back when we still did paper press kits), and happened to see the name badge for a Computerworld reporter.

The marketer practically did a back flip and buttonholed the reporter into talking to him. The response from the reporter was not good. His body language said irritation. He didn’t take notes and he didn’t want a business card or a press kit.  He absolutely was not interested in what the partner company had to say. His job was to talk to SAP executives, analysts and a few customers. No one else mattered.

Ten years ago, tech pubs had budget and reporters had manageable beats – and they still didn’t want to talk to small companies. Now, the situation has gotten worse.  Far worse. Publications are cutting staff, or just going out of business, and are consumed about what drives clicks. Needless to say SAP, IBM, Microsoft, Apple or Google drive a lot more clicks than a small company – even one with awesome technology – that few have ever heard about.

So what is a marketer, like the one at SAPPHIRE, supposed to do to generate some visibility on a limited budget?  Here are 10 tips that do not include accosting busy reporters in the hallway at trade shows.

Do something interesting – Press releases about bug fixes or your partner program aren’t interesting to anyone, much less reporters.  Text mining software upgrades, even from a company like IBM aren’t that interesting. But text mining software that can understand emoticons, now that’s interesting.  An angle like that is out there. Work with your development team to come up with something with sizzle.

Make yourself useful – Complaining to reporters about how they never cover your company is sure to fail. You’ll get a lot further by demonstrating to reporters that you can be a useful knowledgeable resource about industry trends, or can provide timely comments. Are you tracking the editorial calendars? Publications are obligated to write up what’s on the calendar every month. Some smart ideas about how to address a topic just might get you quoted.

Groom customer spokespeople – Every company has customer references and can rattle off names of companies using their products. Your list is probably not that different from that of your archrival. The value to reporters comes when they can get the CIO or a senior IT manager on the phone, and he or she is quotable and can cite useful stats.  It’s hard work finding customers like this, but they are incredibly valuable when you find them.

Win awards — As Woody Allen famously said, “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” Similarly, eighty percent of winning awards is just making sure you’re entered in the award contest, and that you’ve put together a strong, credible entry. While winning awards won’t necessarily lead to press coverage, reporters do notice such things and may opt to call you instead of a competitor.

Sponsor a study – This isn’t free, but reporters love to write up stories about studies. Look around for some topics that are timely and lack supporting data more or less in your space. Say, if you create developer tools, a study about the impact of Facebook and Twitter on developer productivity might be interesting.

Write, write and write some more – Publications and blogs are short of staff. This means they are always looking for content. You can fill the void with a steady stream of journalistic quality content. Leave the hype to your website. The point here is to get your perspective and company name out there on a regular basis. What’s more, this content can be re-purposed for your blog. Speaking of which…

Do you have a blog? – If you expect anyone to take you seriously, start blogging. Immediately.

Know what news is – It’s unbelievable how many marketing VPs seem to think that customer wins and partnership deals are of interest to reporters. They are not. Most publications have blanket policies of not writing these up, or it’s pretty much all they would be writing. Which would also cause them to lose all readership.  Be sure you’re putting out hard hitting news that publications can use.

Get on power panels – The company you keep can make a big difference. Like winning awards, getting yourself invited to participate in a panel with Microsoft and Google execs at a big trade show isn’t that hard. It’s a matter of pitching the show and conference organizers and putting someone smart from your company on stage. Reporters and bloggers attend these panels and write about them or make video blogs. Chances are your expert will get exposure.

Read, listen and comment – You can gain a lot of insights by reading what’s being written. Moreover, you can take advantage of commenting and social media functions to judiciously add your voice and perspective to the mix. Reporters and bloggers read comments thoroughly, so this is great way to let influentials know that you’re engaged.

This is by no means the exhaustive list of ways that small companies can drive exposure while staying on budget. By focusing on activities that work, you can generate the type of consistent buzz that drives revenue growth and helps you to steadily move up the food chain.  If you have some more suggestions and tips of things that have worked for you, please chime in.

When you hear the names Proctor & Gamble and BlueCross BlueShield what images come to mind? Conservative? Old school? Bureaucratic? I think it’s safe to say that these two companies, fairly or unfairly, aren’t exactly known for being progressive or nimble. Yet both of these well-known American brands have recently implemented programs that might surprise you.

P&G is letting several hundred of its workers use their own laptops as part of a workplace experiment.

This pilot program is based on a simple idea: many of P&G’s younger employees would rather use their own laptops than corporate-issued systems.

BlueCross BlueShield plans to introduce online care this year, a service that allows patients to connect with a physician on-demand 24 hours a day using webcams for video links, or secure text messages or telephone conversations.

I find that the word “brand” is thrown around quite loosely nowadays. Establishing brand takes careful planning, time and smart execution. Yet all the hard work in the world can be thrown by the wayside by a simple misstep – think Toyota could have handled that little gas pedal/floor mat issue any better?

If someone were to ask me what companies come to mind when I hear the words progressive, nimble, risk taking, I don’t think of P&G or BlueCross BlueShield. Yet both of these companies, albeit for different reasons, have adopted new technologies and policies which have helped to strengthen their already strong brands. By implementing these two new programs I believe that both companies are doing a good job of reinforcing their already strong brands by leveraging technology to adapt with the times.

By using new technologies and new methods of communicating with their employees and customers, both P&G and BlueCross BlueShield have shown that they have the guts (in a rough economy) to evolve their own brand strategies and take chances.

Are there other conservative, old school companies out there that are showing a willingness to adapt to the modern times?

Over the years, Apple has done a masterful job of building its brand.  From the epic 1984 commercial that launched the Mac to the cute and effective “I’m a Mac” campaign, Apple just seems to be operating at a different level from everyone else in the tech industry.

Apple fans are everywhere, willing to pony up a significant premium for spendy Apple computers and gadgets. For the perceived design and innovation they overlook considerable product flaws like crummy battery life or Apple’s proprietary, controlling policies. The Apple brand and flashy UIs mean that much for many consumers.

Given the power and advantages afforded by this brand, why on earth is Apple throwing it away because it thinks HTC – and of greater concern, Google’s Android OS – might be stepping on some of the almost laughable patents it secured on gestures?  With Google’s backing, HTC has little to worry about.  But it stands to gain a lot of brand equity.  An obscure Taiwanese maker of smartphones, HTC must be doing something right if Apple is worried. The exposure alone has been worth a mint.

Apple was, somewhat bizarrely, able to get a patent for a swipe as shown from the patent app. Is there an app for that?

Meanwhile, suing little guys doesn’t do the Apple brand much good. Nobody wants to see the hip Mac dude running around slapping lawsuits on people. Doesn’t really fit with the friendly, funny persona. Evil is more like it. Steve Jobs with horns?  I don’t think I’m alone in saying that I’m pulling for HTC and Google in this one. It’s tough to feel sorry for billionaire bullies.

What I expect from Apple is a way to buy the iPhone on a better network. How about Verzion for starters? How about some different variants of the iPhone? How about cooking up ways to deliver unlimited 4G bandwidth for $10 a month? Apple should keep thinking about the needs of customers and finding ways to help the industry to put our needs first. Lawsuits?  This is not making me happy.

As ex-Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz details in what possibly might be one of the best blog posts of all time, patent wars among tech titans have been going for a long time.  Most of the time, Company A steps on Company B’s IP, but it turns out that Company B is also stepping on Company A’s IP, so they leave each other alone. Nobody wins in a nuclear war.

In this case, Apple might have the upper hand from a patent volume perspective CNN reports. But winning the courtroom battle will be a wan victory if it leaves the Apple brand bludgeoned beyond repair.

Living in the world of high tech means, at least to me, that we play by a different set of rules. Many tech companies are seen as innovative, strategic and forward-thinking, while others are clumsy, slow and reactionary. I started thinking about this issue after I read a recent Op Ed in the New York Times written by former Microsoft executive Dick Brass. In this article Brass ripped Microsoft for not being terribly innovative and commented that part of the issue resides in the company’s corporate culture. It ruffled feathers so much that fellow Microsoft PR pro Frank Shaw posted a response on The Microsoft Blog defending the company.

Similarly, CNET recently took some shots about the engineering-driven culture at Google and questioned whether the company could tackle the growth of social media.

I took a step back to ponder this issue for a while. I’m not going to argue if Microsoft is innovative or if Google’s corporate culture might get in the way of improving its social media capabilities. Rather, what does this mean for the PR pros in the high tech world?

Start-ups generally get a few years to make good on their initial ideas. Engineering doesn’t simply happen overnight. Start-ups seem to gain acceptance early on, probably because their ideas sound interesting and people are always willing to support the underdog. But Microsoft was young once and yet now, some 35 years later, they are mocked for their lack of innovation.

“But part of the problem is communication: the term “innovation” largely has lost its meaning and has become a buzzword for big companies to use whenever they want to sound competitive and forward-thinking.” Gregory T. Huang, Xconomy

The more I thought about these issues, the more I realized that this has to do with brand. When a company is young it is energetic, full of ideas and many times referred to as “innovative”. As the company builds a strong brand reputation over time, it’s important to remain true to its principles. Your company cannot rest on its laurels as Microsoft appears to have done, for example in the mobile space as my colleague Brian Edwards pointed out recently. Create new things, share unusual ideas and push the limits so that you won’t be accused of being a sell-out. (more…)