Jan 31, 2010

Digital Direct Marketing

What is the future of an advertising agency? I see three elements as one: Digital, Direct and Marketing.
These three words have haunted me for years. Today is the time to make sense of them.
Digital. It is impossible to ignore the power of the internet. In Digital Direct Marketing, digital stands for tools and platforms. It tells what you can do – and finally the answer is everything. What you can imagine a computer geek can make it happen on the digital form. Direct. This means discipline in your marketing plans. You refuse to accept anything but results. In direct marketing, you know what works, and you leverage that knowledge to strengthen all your marketing efforts. The goal in direct marketing is to get a response. Direct is a perfect match to digital tools. Marketing. You need brand management, strategy planners and designers to lead digital and direct sides of your agency. In Digital Direct Marketing every part works towards the same goal: to sell, while building the brand image consistently. Ultimately, the brand is a just another tool to sell. Stronger the brand, bigger the sales.
From Advertising to Digital Direct Marketing
I believe advertising agencies should spent more time learning about digital and direct marketing. The biggest losers in this new media boom have been traditional agencies which have refused to adapt more scientific approach to marketing.
However, focusing just to tools like many digital shops do, is not a winning strategy either as technology becomes easier to use every day. I predict that a direct marketing agency with digital tools and strategic know-how will be the killer combination of the next ten years. Does it make sense to you?
What Digital Direct Marketing means to clients?
Sales, accountability and results. Your marketing budget becomes transparent like a glass of water. You know how much your marketing investments are worth. Digital Direct Marketing eliminates guesswork. There is only a sale or no sale.
Digital direct marketing is an ongoing process, where you tune your engine. Testing is the way to improve your cash machine constantly. The internet has made tests and research cheaper than ever before.
Just salesmanship
Advertising is salesmanship in print,” said copywriter John E. Kennedy eighty years ago. Today that definition is still correct if you replace in print to on every media.
Unfortunately, there only a few experts who can increase your sales. Most agency people still live in the print ad world, where you get awards every year based on how artistic your latest campaign was. When you have a space smaller than a matchbox, and a goal to get 1000 people to click the banner and buy from you, your job becomes challenging. You can't rely only on your creative instincts, you need to know how to sell. How many advertising creatives have even tried to sell something in the real life? Not many. One more thing, dear reader, judge the the success of your marketing based on sales, rather than vagueness of brand image and awareness. Everyone knows Saddam Hussein, but you wouldn't buy a car from him. You may also like these related free marketing articles: P.S. If you want to know what really works in digital marketing, check out this brand new book. Click here to claim your FREE copy.

Jan 30, 2010

Do You Know Who Your Boss Really Is?

Watch these two videos from Earl Nightingale and discover THE BOSS

THE BOSS by Earl Nightingale Part 1 of 2



THE BOSS by Earl Nightingale Part 2 of 2




Jan 29, 2010

Ad Man's Book Club: January 2010 Choice

How to Win Friends & Influence People - Dale Carnegie

As I searched for January's
Ad Man's Book of the Month, I read six books this month. They were bestsellers. One of them had sold over 30 million copies. But I wasn't satisfied.

None of them could beat this classic, Dale Carnegie's
How to Win Friends & Influence People. If there is only one book you read in your life time, this should be it.

It surprises me that David Ogilvy didn't include Dale Carnegie to his reading list at the end of
Ogilvy on Advertising. Although Ogilvy mentions How to Win Friends & Influence People, and it's very clear that he has read it. Maybe Ogilvy didn't want to share all his secrets of success.

The first time I wrote about Dale Carnegie's book I titled the article
"The Last Book You Will Ever Have to Read". Today, I still stand behind it.

Now I let Dale Carnegie convince you that his
book belongs on your desk as it sits on mine:

'"Education," said Dr. John G. Hibben, former president of Princeton University, "is the ability to meet life's situations." If by the time you have finished reading the first three chapters of this book–if you aren't then a little better to meet life's situations, then I shall consider this book to be a total failure so far as you are concerned. For "the great aim of education," said Herbert Spencer, "is not knowledge but action."
And this is a action book.'

The book is divided to four parts.

PART ONE: Fundamental Techniques in Handling People
PART TWO: Six Ways to Make People Like You
PART THREE: How to Win People to Your Way of Thinking
PART FOUR: Be a Leader: How to Change People Without Giving Offense or Arousing Resentment

And no, I'm not an affiliate of Dale Carnegie. Although I could retire rich and young if I got a dollar every time I recommend this book to someone.

So far no one has ever told me that it was waste of their time to read
How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie. This book changed my life and I guarantee that you will find it thought-provoking too.

Maybe next time I will tell you what is the second most important book in my life. I can tell you this for now,
Ogilvy on Advertising was number three.

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Jan 22, 2010

10 Things Drayton Bird Taught Me

This week has been unbelievable. Last Wednesday I flew to London to meet Drayton Bird. Yes the same man which David Ogilvy said, "knows more about direct marketing than anyone in the world." Let me share with you briefly what Drayton Bird taught me.

  1. Your knowledge is the most important thing.
  2. You need to be well-known to attract clients.
  3. Advertising is direct marketing.
  4. Think. Nobody thinks any more.
  5. People skills matter.
  6. Effective presentation skills are vital part of the business.
  7. Product launches are like striptease.
  8. Make clear contracts with your clients.
  9. Write out and share everything you know.
  10. Positioning is the difference between failure and success.

My week continues busy as I travel to Estonia tomorrow. You can expect more articles and Drayton's lessons next week as I hopefully get back to home by then.

A good thing with traveling is that you have time to read a lot. For some odd reason it's challenging for me to write on the move. I will announce my new 'Ad Man's Book of the Month' soon too.


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Jan 18, 2010

Do You Make These Mistakes in Marketing?

Here is a list of seven marketing mistakes which keep showing up regardless of the industry or business. Do you make these mistakes?

1. Lack of purpose
Can you define what is the purpose of advertising? What about marketing? How about your colleagues, how they define the purpose advertising and marketing? If you think this is a not problem, ask the people next to you, what they think the advertising is suppose to do?

2. Lack of goals
This is easy. Yet, who has clear goals for their marketing? Some companies decide they don't need marketing people at all, since their products are made by engineers and are too complicated for anyone except for engineers to understand. The problem is that without setting goals it's impossible to know if you hit your mark or not. And without proved marketing results it is easy to say 'we don't need marketing people.' You can put it this way, do you need sales? Start from your goals.

3. Lack of measurement
How do you define success in marketing? You spent 2,3 million dollars to a multichannel advertising campaign? Is that success? Marketing budget spent? Can you show what worked – and why? Or are you just guessing? By the way, if you missed the second point, measuring is useless. Google CEO Eric Schmidt said it best,
Advertising is the last bastion of unaccountable spending in corporate America.”

4. No strategy
Who needs to think about marketing strategy, when you can hire people to do it for you? They can sort it out, right? Wrong. Strategy, the plan to get from A to B, changes every time if you leave it only to your marketing people. All successful companies have been consistent with their strategy for decades. Only fools change something which has proved to be successful.

5. Spending, not investing your marketing budget
Do you see the marketing as a cost or as an investment? The answer tells an awful lot about you. When you consider marketing as investment, you demand 1) growth, and if you are like me, 2) dividends. Please remember that you can't save yourself to success.

6. Poor execution
Translation for poor execution in my dictionary is an amateur approach. You use artists for
advertising, when you should have hired an agency of salesmen. This leads to lack of testing, which is the mother of all mistakes in marketing.

7. Ego
As soon as you think you know, you stop learning. Arrogance is one of the biggest reasons why businesses fail. It shows as poor communication, attitude and relationships. A formula for destruction. Too often when you become successful you close your mind for new ideas. The ego is permits you to admit your mistakes or accept other opinions.

What would you add to this list?

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Jan 16, 2010

Haiti and Charity: 6 Ways to Raise More Money

Seth Godin inspired me to pay more attention to charity work. He supports Acumen Fund, which has a little bit different approach to solving poverty. You can visit their website from the link at end the of this article.

Non-profits like Acumen Fund lives from donations. I have been ordering Acumen's free newsletter to see how they are going.

It was their latest email message that caught my eye. Not because it was so persuasive, but because it was obvious that it hasn't been crafted by a direct marketing expert. See the message below.

Dear Timo,

I've heard from many of you asking for suggestions of where to give and what to do in light of the devastation taking place in Haiti. It is impossible to look at the extraordinary photographs of destruction and despair without feeling your heart twist, wondering what it will take to rebuild and how long that process will require. Right now, of course, the world's focus must be on helping the millions of victims survive. As soon as that situation is stabilized, however, we need as a world to help Haiti build for a better future. That will take much more than money, but a more determined insistence on establishing the right policies and infrastructure to enable markets to work, better education for all, and investments in entrepreneurs that won't stop until they have solved tough problems or created significant numbers of jobs.

There are many organizations doing good work in Haiti, and Acumen Fund recommends two. Partners In Health <www.pih.org> has been committed to helping Haitians for more than two decades; and supporting them will enable greater focus on both short-term relief as well as longer-term investment. Architecture for Humanity <www.architectureforhumanity.org/> will focus on the longer-term by building critically needed housing and community structures. We are proud to know the entrepreneurs behind the organizations and can vouch for their quality as individuals focused on doing the right things.

I hope this helps in some small way. We stand in solidarity with our Haitian brothers and sisters and with people all around the world who are seeing how much we need one another, how interconnected we are, and how much each of us can do.

In peace,
Jacqueline

I emailed Acumen and asked if they used a direct marketing expert to write their messages. They said no. To me that is amazing, since donations are their life line. Without money, there will be nothing to offer except ideology. I drafted this reply to them to help them raise more money, it applies to all fundraising.


Six ways how direct marketing can help your non-profit to raise more money

1. Have a direct marketing copywriter edit your text before broadcasting. That is the easiest and quickest way to raise more money for your cause.

2. Focus on clarity. Try to use as simple words as possible. Your grandmother should be able to understand and respond to your message. Write in the present tense, avoid passive.

3. Write longer letters. The more you tell, the more you sell. Do you have a street team collecting donations from pedestrians? If you do, interview and record their sales pitch. If not, try to sell your cause in person to find out what arguments works. Ultimately that should be your copy text (message). Your message should be able to overcome all objections, just like in the real life fund-raising.

4. Test. This is a little bit more complicated part, where a direct marketing agency can help you. Testing is the key to success in direct marketing as well as in advertising, and it should not be over looked. It means you test different variations of the message to determine which brings in the biggest amount of money.

5. Look cheap. I know that you are not a traditional charity organization, but you too should look like you really need the money, and that you don't waste it in administration costs and fancy offices. People like charities to use their money wisely.

6. Ask for a specific amount "This Christmas you can help a blind man see. 10 $."

Having a direct marketing specialist or an agency could be the most profitable investment you make. I wonder how many other non-profits rely only to their in-house marketing skills?

Click here to learn more about Acumen Fund and their important work



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Jan 15, 2010

Why Blogging is Good For Your Business

Do you think on paper? Do you write emails to your colleagues and customers about your business? Do you have a notebook to collect your ideas? If you do any of those things, there is a chance that you have enough material to write an interesting blog that benefits your business.

Instead of holding back what you know, why don't you try to write your secrets for everyone to see? Here are two things that will happen to you, as they happened to me.

1) You will be amazed how little other people are interested in your superior ideas.

2) You will be amazed how much more you learn, when start to write about your ideas.

I'm writing this blog for completely selfish reasons. I want to learn more about marketing and promote advertising that sells. Those are the only things that truly interest me (besides food). Now, why is blogging good for your business?

"The more you tell, the more you sell," applies in all selling whether you are an on- or offline marketer. You can't get people to buy without giving them enough information about your product or service.

When you write about your business you begin to stand out, because most people don't blog. If your content is clear and consistent Google will start to pay you compliments. You start to show up more in search results for free. All it takes is your fingers to do some typing twice a week.

The same thinking applies to social media marketing, if you focus.
People who are your potential customers will start to notice you. After writing the first 35 articles I had already been offered two new jobs. They both found me because of my blog.

Whether you are a business owner, student, government worker or manager blogging is good for you and your business. It establishes you as someone who knows what she or he is talking about. "He must be an expert since he wrote all those books," I often find myself thinking like that. (Although, I'm starting challenge that belief since I started writing one, as well...)


It is important to realize that 'the internet is permanent' as Coca-Cola puts it in their social media principles. The way I see, writing for web is an investment that pays you royalties long after you have gone to bed. A blog brings you new business, new opportunities, new people, new ideas and lots of fun. What else can you think of?

These related free articles may also interest you

Jan 14, 2010

How to Create A Website That Sells

Here is my latest presentation called How to Create A Website That Sells – 7 Easy Ways to Improve Your Online Marketing Click here to watch it on SlideShare.

Discover what Apple, Amazon.com, eBay other successful online marketers know about digital marketing. All seven simple ideas are easy to apply. If you like what you see, please share.

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Jan 13, 2010

10 Coca-Cola Social Media Principles

Coca-Cola Social Media Principles for Spokespeople
  1. Be Certified in the Social Media Certification Program.
  2. Follow our Code of Business Conduct and all other Company policies.
  3. Be mindful that you are representing the Company.
  4. Fully disclose your affiliation with the Company.
  5. Keep records.
  6. When in doubt, do not post.
  7. Give credit where credit is due and don’t violate others’ rights.
  8. Be responsible to your work.
  9. Remember that your local posts can have global significance.
  10. Know that the Internet is permanent.


Download the full policy here: Coca-Cola Online Social Media Principles

Visit ViralBlog.com for more information about this topic.


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Jan 11, 2010

Focus – The Forgotten Factor in Social Media Marketing Strategy


The forgotten factor


"Minds can't cope," says Jack Trout, the brand strategy guru. Focus is better than "Spread & Pray"-strategy. The same is true in your marketing strategy for social media. Being a star in one place is better than being a little known here and there. After you make a name in one place you can move to another.

Start by selecting the top five relevant communities where your customers are. The word relevant here means that the communities and online groups are relevant to your business. Testing will tell you which ones are most suitable for you.

You don't need everyone to know about you. Start with a clear focus. Set a goal for marketing efforts which you can measure. Ultimately, your goal should be to make more sales.


Build your home base first. Pay special attention to people who trusted you when you were new. The people who supported you early are more likely to support you also when times get rough. You are in a long term relationship business.


See your customers and fans as your family. Remembering names and birthdays is not just a job of Hollywood agents, but yours as well. The more personal the better. Build you permission level with your customer until you become as trusted as his or her doctor. Make it your goal.

Technology makes it possible to personalize every contact, use it.

"Remember that the person's name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language"

Dale Carnegie


And last, be consistent with your plans. Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) or Marketing Director lasts 12 to 18 months on average, according to a study made in USA. You cannot afford to start over every time that happens.


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Jan 9, 2010

The Mistake Most People Make in Their Social Media Marketing Strategy

Don't confuse action for achievement. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and blogs are just tools for your business. Joining every new service is not the answer. Media and technology will continue to change, but people will not.

The biggest mistake in marketing – and how to avoid it

"You have to be in every platform and social network." I think that is a terrible advice to give. People have social networks for different reasons, for business, friends, hobbies and even family. Soon there will be a social network for left foot leather shoe lovers. It probably exists already, since blogs have become communities for their readers. "Focus" is much better and simpler advice to follow.

According to research, choosing the right media to reach your prospect makes estimated 40 per cent of your success. In the other words, you increase your odds by 40 per cent, when you select the most suitable media for your marketing message. That is something which most people still struggle or refuse to accept.

You may know the theory that today 1 000 true fans is enough to support you, if you pursuit your passion. The same thinking applies to media. Now, you can afford to talk only to people who care about you. And to the people who are in the position to act upon your offer. Ignore the rest. Buying a giant outdoor billboard
for everyone to see doesn't impress anyone, but you. There are cheaper ways to do that...

Instead of aiming 74 different targets at once, choose one target that brings home those 74 together. It is out there. Your job is to find it. Focus.


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Jan 8, 2010

Social Media Marketing Strategy

Strategy is one of the most abused words in the marketing dictionary. It is easy to hide incompetence behind fancy terms.

Management consultants will continue to make our lives
more complicated and introduce a ton of new terms and trendy words like "social media marketing strategy" every year. Luckily, there is another way to manage your business in this jungle of meaningless jargon.

The late business
coach Jim Rohn once said that he become successful, when he simplified his life rather than made it more complicated. That's the lesson most managerial experts certainly skipped.

Now, let's focus to a simple social media marketing strategy for a minute.

What are you trying to accomplish?
  • Do you want an online campaign that gets buzzed around the web or do want your sales curve up?
  • Do you have a brand strategy?
  • How is your social media marketing going to fit to it?
The great success, Dove's campaign for Real Beauty, used viral marketing to get people to talk about "what is real beauty?".

Dove positioned itself as the beauty brand for real people. Not a bad place to be, when you consider that most people are not super models. And it worked – sales grew extra 500 million US dollars between 2004 to 2009. The campaign attracted worldwide attention, it was covered on medias such as CNN, BBC, Ellen and The Oprah Show.

However, attention is not a good strategy, if it's not working towards your goal. When Dove asked questions they made the people work towards Dove's goals.

Social Media Marketing Strategy in brief *

1. Start from your goals
  • Where are you today?
  • Where do you want to be? When?
  • Determine your position to get there.
2. Ask questions

3. Listen

4. Offer


* Read "A New Way to Use Social Media for Selling" article for more information about the steps.

During the coming weeks I will focus more to social media. I will show you easy ways to use social media for your business. The goal, of course, is to increase your sales – and to prove why something works. I have a zero tolerance for guess work, when more accurate methods are available.

Coming up more. Thanks for following this blog.


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Jan 7, 2010

Viral Marketing: Why 15 Million Viewers Doesn't Guarantee Your Success

I recommend to watch South Park's Canada on Strike episode to learn why being a hit on YouTube doesn't automatically make you a millionaire. Attention doesn't mean anything.

Why millions of viewers on YouTube doesn't guarantee millions of dollars to you? You probably remember one or two funny viral videos which your friends have shared with you. If you are anything like me, you sometimes wonder the massive number of viewers on the most popular videos on YouTube.

Here is one video example, Stars Wars Kid with over 15 million viewers at the time of writing this article.





South Park's
Canada on Strike episode is about Canadians who want more money. In the episode, the Canadians call a strike until USA and other countries gives them more 'internet money.' The boys Stan, Kyle, Eric and Kenny begin to investigate how to make money online. They decide that making a weird video is the best way get rich on the internet.

After the kids make a popular viral video, they find an office where you can get your internet hit video reviewed for what is it worth. It turns out that they are not the only stars out there.

Do you recognize these internet celebrities?


The picture
above from Canada on Strike shows the internet stars fighting about who is the most successful celebrity online. At the end of the episode, the online stars gets a check of theoretical dollars according to what their viral hit was worth. The boys get several millions of theoretical dollars. In other words, they get nothing. Is this fair?

For what would pay for Star Wars Kid? Over 15 million viewers – so what?

Some advertisers use celebrities in their ads because people tend to notice them. It's true that a celebrity draws attention, but it doesn't guarantee sales. In most cases, the product and the star are unrelated and therefore lack the credibility. Everyone knows that you paid millions to the movie star to drink your soda in a 30-second commercial. Attention is not enough, you need to sell.


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Jan 6, 2010

How to Create an Effective Viral Marketing Campaign: part 2/2

Today, you learn why millions of viewers doesn't guarantee success to your viral campaign, why those previous three examples worked – and increased sales. What makes an effective viral marketing campaign, and how to do it. You may want to review the previous article before you read further. 1. A clear objective All three campaigns had a clear objective that they were aiming for. First, let's look at Dove.
  • Campaign for Real beauty positioned Dove as the brand for real people, not for super models.
  • The videos supported their new position. They weren't made just because viral marketing was a cool thing to do in 2004.
  • It wasn't a random coincidence to talk about "what is beautiful?", but a part of the much larger global marketing plan from Unilever.
  • If you visit Dove.com you see how serious the people at Unilever took this campaign, which is still running successfully.
  • Dove used dramatization very effectively to communicate what Dove is all about – every one can be beautiful. And it worked. Their sales are growing as you read this.
2. Make the product the hero This makes me smile to see how simple effective advertising can be. "Make the product the hero of your advertising" is such an old idea that you and I weren't even born when it was first introduced. An excellent example of this technique is Blendtec's "Will it Blend?" videos.
  • The product is clearly the hero.
  • The videos communicates the product's benefit to the viewer, a Blendtec blender is stronger than an average blender.
  • Blendec uses humor and dramatization to tell you in a second what is going.
  • Destroying a new iPhone guarantees attention. It hurts to watch, but it works. What blender can blend anything?
3. Make it easy and worth sharing The third case was Whopper Sacrifice campaign. "Sacrifice 10 Facebook friends and get a free Whopper". It doesn't get much simpler than that. However, there was something else which is worth studying closer.
  • Leverage social networks. The campaign was created for Facebook. The Burger King application to sacrifice friends was easy to install and use. Having a separate website where you name your unnecessary friends may not have worked.
  • Burger King broke the rules. When Facebook closed the application because of the violation, it guaranteed the attention of media.
  • It was fun, different and worth talking about.
  • It offered a reward. 10 friends = 1 Whopper.
All three examples are advertising in its purest form. Here are 11 key takeaways 1. Have a goal 2. Be clear 3. Simpler is better 4. Demonstrate your benefit 4. Dramatize 5. Call for action 6. Make the product the hero 7. Provoke 8. Reward 9. Use credible people 10. Make it easy and worth sharing 11. Test. By now, you may be wondering where did I wrote the part about "Why a million viewers doesn't guarantee your viral success". If this is okay with you, I would like tell you about it in an exclusive article next time. To make it better, that article includes also a million dollar lesson from raging Canadians who were going to attack America...

Lastly -- if you want to know what really works in online marketing, check out this new book. This crazy guy is handing out FREE copies right now. Click here to get yours, before they're all gone ... Hurry!

Jan 4, 2010

How to Create an Effective Viral Marketing Campaign: part 1/2

I believe an effective viral campaign means a campaign that brings results. Clear results which you can measure. Do you know any other way to tell whether your campaign was successful or not?

At first, you have to decide what are you after. In business, our job is to earn profit. Profit comes from sales. I think making sales is the only way to justify spending money to advertising campaigns. It doesn't matter whether it's print adv
ertising or viral marketing, you need sales. Here are three examples how to create viral marketing campaigns that sell.

1. Dove: Campaign for Real Beauty


Video: Dove - Evolution
This campaign was started in 2004 and it
has produced 500 million dollars of extra sales for Dove until May 2009, according to Brian Fetherstonhaugh, an Ogilvy executive, which is the agency behind the campaign. The campaign is still performing well today.

2. Blendtec: Will it Blend?


Video: Will it Blend? - iPhone
This simple campaign allowed Blendtec to sell blenders for higher profit margin than its competitors. They are charging 300 to 500 dollars per blender. You can get a powerful blender from a supermarket for as little as 50 dollars.

3. Burger king: Whopper Sacrifice

"Sacrifice 10 Facebook friends and get a free Whopper"

This campaign lasted only one week after its launch, when Facebook forced Burger King to end it. It was breaking Facebook's legal terms. In other words, Facebook didn't like too see people ending their virtual "friendships". However, numbers are impressive: 230 000 friends were sacrificed, that means Burger King handed out 23 000 free whoppers for its fans.


Stay tuned for the part two of How to Create an Effective Viral Marketing Campaign. Subscribe to my blog via
email or RSS to get it first. It's free.

In the part 2, you are going to find out why a million viewers doesn't guarantee success, why those three campaigns where successful, what makes people share your content, and most of all what makes people to buy the product you are trying to promote virally.

Until next time...

Click here to read the second part


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Jan 2, 2010

Ad Man's Message to Students: A Career in Marketing or Not?

My ambition is to get people who are NOT interested in advertising to make career in advertising. And to get those people who are thinking about a career in advertising to go to do something else. You may ask why?

The purpose of advertising

There is a fair chance that your decision to pursuit a career in advertising is misinformed. Most probably, it is not based on the understanding of the purpose of advertising. And what is the purpose of advertising? – To sell.

Advertising is not art or entertainment. Advertising is statistics, research, testing and problem solving – it is science, where thinking and analytical approach plays a big part just like in engineering, for example.

Wanted: Results

But facts and research can't solve everything. They can't write an ad for you. They can point you the right direction and help you create the ad, but eventually man makes it.

The current marketing people has turned that upside down. They hire artists who rely on their gut, rather than facts. Or how else can you explain all those ads in magazines of which you can't even tell what product is being advertised or where and how you can buy it?

What research shows

If the marketing industry used more testing and research, they would know that long copy texts sells more than short, or that people actually like to able to respond to ads. If more marketing executives demanded research, our industry would start to attract different kind of people. The people who actually want to know what works and what doesn't work – rather than just relying on their creative instincts.

It's not just pretty pictures without statistics, nor is it just statistics without understand how to use pictures. You need to know how to be persuasive using both: art and science.

How to succeed in advertising

Test to find more effective ways to do your job. Judge your success based on sales. Advertising is that simple.
Your job in advertising should be to find ways to sell whether in print, on TV, online or even in person. Anything else is just waste of time and money. The way I see, if you can't measure it, it doesn't exist.

Scientific advertising

Through testing we can point out things that work. We can quickly find out how pictures, headlines, copytext, colors, offers, call-to-actions, place of the ad on the medium, repetition, target audience and different combination of all of those work. In other words, that way we can understand and improve your advertising's selling power.

The secret behind every successful business...

...is sales. Scientific advertising means measurable results such as how many sales you get from a single ad and how much money is spend to get that sale. For those who argue that "I work in marketing, not in sales" I want to say this: Remember that nothing in the company happens until the sale is made. Trust me, I know, I busted two of my companies, because we didn't have enough sales. We are all responsible for sales, especially marketing people.


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Jan 1, 2010

2010: A New Beginning for Advertising?



Watch
this video. Is the year 2010 going to be different for advertising?

What do you think?

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