John Capone explores trust in brands. Visit gge.com to see how we can help you build trust in your brand across your markets.

When Millward Brown’s latest research (conducted in partnership with The Futures Company) reported Amazon is “the most trusted brand in U.S.” (either online or off) it said as much about the way customers now relate to brands as it did about customer service or the usual metrics used to measure brand success. The new “TrustR” metric employed by Millward, which indexes for both trust and the likelihood that a person will recommend a brand might very well have been termed the Facebook Factor.

That an online brand is most trusted is significant, that it is most trusted and most likely to be recommended is even more significant. The study, titled “Beyond Trust” purports to address “engaging consumers in a post-recession world,” but it can not avoid the post-digital world, where Amazon, a brand that has been at least partially socialized since the beginning of Amazon Lists more than a decade ago, has earned loyalty from its customers, and the ease of passing the brand around, of course puts it in position to capitalize on that loyalty.

A recent Forrester Research study showed that 59% of all online consumers engage in social networks at least once a month, and as this time spent with social media increases, so too do the opportunities for brands to connect with customers. Perhaps, at present, the interaction with customers is most effective in a niche area, as indicated by a study out of Rice University which found that a relatively small part of a brand’s customers are likely to become Facebook fans, but this is an area brands must master, as the Rice research also indicated that “fans” were significantly more likely to by loyal and spend more money on a brand.

Posted by Tom Foremski @ 2:51 am
The annual Edelman Trust Barometer always has interesting results. The tenth survey consisted of 4,875 interviews (25 years to 64 years):

The finding that jumped out at me was this:

- Trust in information from friends and peers, “people like me,” dropped by 20 points, from 47 to 27 percent.

- Trust in information from digital media–blogs, social networks, and free content sources like Wikipedia or Google news, remains low: only between 11 percent and 22 percent of respondents express trust in information about companies from these sources.

This is bad news for PR agencies because social media has been the ‘point of the spear’ for so many firms. This is what brings in new business.

This is bad news for all the ’social media experts’ out there trying to convince companies to buy their services because of the potential brand damage from not responding to ‘conversations’ in social media.

What’s the point in jumping to engage if people don’t trust their peers anyway?

This is bad news for many startups that offer real-time monitoring of the ’social’ web. There is less need for their services.

But it’s not just social media…

Other types of media have also fallen in the Edelman Trust Barometer, but not to the same degree as trust in peers.

- Trust in credibility of TV news declined by 20 points, from 44 to 24 percent.

- Trust in news coverage on the radio dropped by 17 points, from 48 to 31 percent.

- Trust in newspapers fell by 14 points, from 46 to 32 percent.

- Only 38 percent trust media (as an institution) to do what is right, down from 46 percent in 2008.

- Media companies (as an industry) have declined in credibility by 16 points (from 48 to 32 percent).

- In the U.S., media companies are tied with the insurance industry for last place. Banks are second from the bottom.

- Top trusted industry is technology and it has widened its lead over other industries.

- Tied for the second most trusted industry is Biotech and Automotive at 63 percent, followed by Energy, Retail and Food at 61 percent.

But why is ALL media less trustworthy?

- Is it because we now have more media now than ever before, both social and traditional sources of media?

- Is it because more of any thing, devalues that thing? We have more media in more forms, at more times, than at anytime in our history. Is trust in media being lost because trust has become more diluted?

- Traditional media still leads as a source for social media. But traditional media is under pressure, with fewer resources. That means more mistakes, less time to check sources, resulting in a lower quality product. That can’t be good for building trust in media.

- Is social media losing trust because of all the social media marketeers that seem to be the loudest voices in many streams?

That would make it seem as if social media can be manipulated, or used to an advantage by businesses. Which is exactly what the social media mavens are saying. A key finding of the Edelman Trust Barometer is that trust in businesses is fragile.

Therefore, is it business involvement in social media that is affecting people’s trust in social and traditional media?

The Edelman survey has raised some interesting questions…(see GGE.com for some answers)

Tom Foremski reports on the business and culture of Silicon Valley at the intersection of technology and media. He also writes at Silicon Valley Watcher. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.

from  Jim Gilmartin 

(To reach the important trade show attendee, the experiential potential of conventions must be tapped. Visit gge.com to see how we can help)

The 18-to-49 age group has been the Holy Grail since the 1950s. Today, the baby boomer generation makes up about one-third of the U.S. population but it controls three-fourths of the wealth. It wields $2 trillion in annual buying power. Nevertheless, frustration is mounting because the $275 billion ad industry still gears only 10% of ads toward 50-plus customers.

So How Do You Connect?

Marketing communications should be easy to read and be experiential in nature. They should reflect and understand the values of this demo and positioned as a gateway to desired experiences. Values and motivators for this group include:

• Autonomy and self sufficiency (independence/participation)

• Social connectedness (relationships/friendships)

• Altruism (opportunity to share wisdom and ability to do for others: family, community and country)

• Personal growth (gain knowledge)

• Revitalization (need to rejuvenate)

The more ads and sales approaches that reflect the product or service is in harmony with these values and motivators the higher the success rate.

Aging-related changes like reduced vision need also be considered. For example, as we age, we need more light to see, pastel colors become distorted and blend to dark, etc. Large font, serif type, vivid colors, etc. are recommended.

We See What We Want To See

There is also evidence that communications that take a “less is more” approach to this demo are more effective. Presenting your company or product in a manner that is more suggestive than descriptive allows the target demo to subjectively interpret the message based upon his/her needs, values and motivators.

Most marketing and sales center on customers’ objective identities (demographic and psychographic) and research shows that a product’s message succeeds when it connects with a customer’s subjective identity (allowing for individual interpretation). Brilliant messages and sales presentations not connecting with the subjective mind are usually unproductive.

Stories Work Well

Another good communication tactic is the greater use of story-telling techniques. Stories are generally quicker to arouse emotions than straightforward propositions about a product’s features. Think Hallmark cards. They surpass most in using stories to present its products.

Today’s customer universe is age-weighted toward midlife values. Resistance to emotionally neutral information (mainly processed in the left hemisphere of the brain) increases in midlife. Receptivity to emotionally enriched information — such as stories — increases in midlife. Storytelling has become an important part of market strategy. Whoever tells the best story and tells it best will most likely win.

Engage:Boomers blog.

At GGE, we’ve known about experience marketing since 1961. Visit gge.com for more information.

The Last Campaign: How Experiences Are Becoming the New Advertising

Red Bull, Virgin America, Uniqlo and Guinness Lead the Way
Posted by Garrick Schmitt on 11.10.09 @ 09:50 AM         
Garrick Schmitt

Is advertising dying? It’s certainly fashionable to say so. Conventional wisdom holds that traditional media’s grip on consumers continues to slip as they increasingly turn to the internet and their peers for entertainment and purchasing recommendations.

In fact, any planner worth his or her salt can reel off a stream of statistics pointing to advertising’s demise — or lack of effectiveness, at least: Prime-time continues to erode as all the major networks saw significant declines for last year’s season; 77% of U.S. consumers trust businesses less than they did a year ago; consumers trust their peers’ opinions online more than any other source and a whopping 83% of Mad Men’s supposedly ad-friendly time-shifted audience fast forwards through commercials according to Tivo. The list goes on and on.

But perhaps it’s not that advertising is failing but that brand experiences (both on and offline) are really what are capturing the imagination of today’s consumer. In FEED, a new report that I authored with my colleagues at Razorfish, we found that digital brand experiences are having an inordinate sway on consumer purchasing habits and brand affinity.

For example, 65% of U.S. consumers report a digital experience changing their perception about a brand (either positively or negatively) and 97% of that group report that the same experience ultimately influenced whether or not they went on to purchase a product from that brand. In a nutshell, experience matters. A lot.

Of course, brands that were “born digital” intuitively know this. Google and Amazon are pioneering experiential brands. That’s why Amazon continues to pour money into improving its customer service rather than run traditional advertising or marketing campaigns. As Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has said, “We are not great advertisers. So we start with customers, figure out what they want, and figure out how to get it to them.” Zappos (which recently hired Mullen) built its brand the same way, as has Facebook.

But what about more traditionally-minded marketers who weren’t born digital? Can they succeed in an experience-driven world? The answer is “yes” and here are some of the best:

Red Bull: Red Bull basically pioneered the experiential category. Not only did the brand rise to prominence by sponsoring alternative athletes and lifestyles, it went further by creating its own events, like Red Bull’s Flugtag and even its own sports like Red Bull’s Crashed Ice, which takes over old Quebec with a mix of hockey and motorcross. Even the brand’s website has morphed into a blog, much like today’s most popular publishers.

 Camper: Most of us in the U.S. think of Camper as purely a comfortable yet stylish shoe brand. But the Spanish company is much more and pursues a brand ethos that’s both traditional, cultural and fashion forward simultaneously. Proof: Casa Camper, stylish (but laid back) hotels in Barcelona and Berlin that embodies the brand’s essence. Ditto for Camper Together which taps up and coming artists to create one-of-a-kind boutiques. 

Guinness: Guinness may be 250 years old, but it’s acting like a much, much younger marketer. The company has embraced experiential branding both literally and figuratively with its “It’s Alive Inside” positioning. For its anniversary, Guinness offered up Remarkable Experiences, including a trip into space. It also released a pub-finder iPhone application with a social media twist. More impressively, the brand created the Guinness Storehouse, a seven-story building that functions as both museum and pub, that has now become one of Ireland’s top tourist attractions. And, more recently, Guinness even wired up its rugby team with RFID tags (including balls and players) to capture a whole range of statistics about how fast, powerfully and effectively the game is played.

 UNIQLO: Few companies have so used digital like Uniqlo to both build a brand and breakthrough to new consumers — and on a truly global scale.The Japanese retailer surprises and delights consumers at every turn, whether through innovative iPhone applications, calendars, e-commerce, stylebooks and microsites. Uniqlo’s experiential efforts not only express the brand, but reach new consumers who may live thousands of miles away from the nearest retail location. 

Virgin America: Virgin America has gone further than most, ensuring that the experience is the marketing — and advertising in many cases. The brand targeted tech-savvy consumers early on with its Red system entertainment console and in-flight WiFi. It showed off its dramatic interiors in promotions with Diggnation and YouTube celebrities; became an early adopter of Twitter for customer service; and reinforced its brand values through its simple booking engine on VirginAmerica.com. And now, for the holidays, Virgin America is partnering with Google to offer free WiFi for travelers.

 Nike: Nike, of course, has been moving in this experiential direction for a few years. ‘We’re not in the business of keeping the media companies alive,” Nike’s Trevor Edwards told the New York Times in 2007. ”We’re in the business of connecting with consumers.” And so they have. The company continually earns kudos for consumer experience breakthroughs like Nike+, its online running community; the Human Race, a global running event; and more recently the Livestrong Chalkbot which enabled users to submit a text message that would be painted (digitally) on the route of the Tour de France.

Experiences, it would seem, are the new advertising. Experiences reach and engage customers in new and more meaningful ways, they promote “trial” over simply messaging and — quite frankly — experiences are much more suited to our digital era when everything is just a click away. Our challenge now, as marketers, is to make sure that our products and brands can actually live up to the experiences that we advertise.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Garrick Schmitt is group VP of experience planning at Razorfish and the agency’s global lead for user experience. He publishes FEED, Razorfish’s annual digital brand experience report and in his spare time flails about on Twitter @gschmitt.

Forty percent of exhibitors use online social media to promote their exhibits, according to a new study by the Center for Exhibition Industry Research.

Personal social networks, such as Facebook and LinkedIn, are the most popular online tools among exhibitors. Roughly 41 percent of survey respondents say they use these networks for promotional purposes, while 36 percent use videos, and 34 percent use blogs, according to the paper, entitled “Effective Methods of Visitor Promotion, Part II: Exhibitors.” The use of these three tools is expected to rise in the next three years, especially the use of blogs. In three years, 44 percent of the 218 exhibitor respondents anticipate using blogs to promote exhibits.

Approximately 26 percent of respondents use virtual events, while 23 percent use microblogs, like Twitter. These percentages are anticipated to rise to 31 percent and 30 percent, respectively, in three years.

Further, the study revealed that exhibitors, on average, spend about $32,200 in pre- and post-show promotion for their largest event each year. Exhibitors in the industrial sector spend the most ($47,400), while government/nonprofits the least ($4,700). Roughly 57 percent expect their marketing budgets to remain the same in 2010, while 36 percent expect a decrease.

Six out of 10 respondents use multiple promotional vehicles. Handouts (62 percent), giveaways (61 percent), e-mail (58 percent), print advertising (51 percent), online advertising (49 percent), direct mail (49 percent), and show signage (49 percent) are the most popular.

Interestingly, some of the least employed methods were considered to be the most effective. For example, hospitality/entertainment for groups had the highest effectiveness rating, with 67 percent calling it an effective means of promotion. Further, 62 percent said guerilla marketing was effective, while 55 percent ranked social networking as effective. Coupons (54 percent), and giveaways (54 percent) were also high on the list.

Overall, 84 percent of those surveyed say they would like a preregistered list of attendees from the exhibition organizer.

Around 90 percent of exhibitors measure the return on investment of exhibiting, but not all measure success the same way. The most important measure, they say, is qualified leads, followed by brand awareness and potential sales. For more information on how you can use social media in your exhibit program, visit us at www.gge.com.

Go to CEIR’s Web site for more information or to obtain the study.

 Dave Kovaleski on www.meetingnet.com

Execs Agree: For Reaching Critical Business Goals, Face-to-Face Meetings Are Best(MeetingsNet.com)

When the goals of a meeting include persuasion, leadership, engagement, inspiration, decision-making, accountability, or candor, U.S. business executives overwhelmingly believe that holding a face-to-face gathering is the only way to go.

In a June 2009 survey of 760 executives from businesses of all sizes, Forbes Insights found that 84 percent of them prefer in-person, face-to-face business meetings, citing those as more effective than webconferences, videoconferences, or teleconferences for reaching a dozen goals, including those listed above. (Forbes Insights is a custom research division of Forbes Media, publisher of Forbes magazine.)

However, technology-enabled meetings have their place as well. The respondents deemed virtual meetings best for “information dissemination” and “data presentation.”

The 16 percent of executives who preferred virtual meetings overall cited a savings of time and money as the top two reasons for their preference, followed closely by “flexibility in location and timing.” Their fourth reason for preferring virtual meetings—“allows me to multitask”—is one of the reasons other executives worry that virtual meetings do not meet business goals as well as face-to-face meetings. (And in fact, more than half the respondents said they surf the Web, check e-mail, or do unrelated work while “attending” virtual meetings.)

Despite the clear preference for getting face to face, current economic and other conditions have made this a tough year for business travel. Some 58 percent of respondents said they are traveling less frequently than in January 2008, with just over one-third (34 percent) reporting that they’re traveling “much less frequently.” Meanwhile, a corresponding 57 percent reported their companies’ use of technology to conduct meetings has increased compared to January 2008. Visit GGE.Com to see how you can get the most from your face-to-face spend.

By Rohit Bhargava
There was a time when age used to matter for marketers. We would buy media based on presumed age ranges of audiences in the hopes that this bit of demographic information would help us reach the right people. In fact, this is one of the most time-honored traditions of marketing planning. It is also one of the dumbest. The thing about age is that it was always used as a proxy for interest. If you knew that someone was a male between the ages of 18-34, you could make a guess that they might like sports, or need deodorant, or drink beer.

The inherent problem with this model is that you are just guessing at relevance–but at the time this was the best you could do. Today, you can do better. Online, people are telling you what they are interested in. They are broadcasting their interests. Their activities are not a hidden black box, they are out in the open. So you don’t have to guess that a 25-year-old male who is watching football might eat your pretzels–you can use social media and active listening to find the 41-year-old mom who has already told her friends those pretzels are her favorite food in the world. Oh, and by the way, you can find the five friends she shared that with too.

This is the power of the online environment and the new ability of targeting. Marketers don’t need to rely on the crutch of age demographics any longer. The problem is, most sites and publications selling advertising still rely on these. So the TV spots, magazine ads and online banners are still being sold largely through these empty demographics, while what marketers need to care about is far different. Here are a few concrete reasons age demographics are generally a waste of time:

1.People are age shifting and not living lives based on traditional stereotypes for their ages.
2.The top end of a demographic (34) usually has almost nothing in common with the low end (18).
3.Age demos leave out influencers, gift buyers, and others for whom a message may be relevant, but don’t fit the age requirements because they aren’t the ultimate recipient of the product.
4.Focusing on age can take you away from emotional or relevant benefits.
5.People lie about their age all the time.
So if you do leave age aside, what matters more? Relevance. If you find the right 25-year-old who thinks like a teenager, or a 36-year-old mom (who may technically be outside your age demographic), then that’s a good thing. The only way to do it is to stop blindly thinking about age demographics and refocusing on methods of targeting that actually matter such as interests, affinity groups, location. This doesn’t mean you can forget about tailoring your message to different groups and age ranges, but the point is that you need to think of your audience in terms of action and interest–not artificially created groupings of age.

Once you do that, the places you buy media will start to follow suite. They will sell advertising based on what their audiences do and what they say and not what drop down box they chose as they were trying to register hurridly for access to a site. You have the power to demand more intelligence from the places you spend your marketing dollars. The marketers who do so will be the ones that do more than simply filling out columns on the same measurement spreadsheet year after year.  As a side bonus, they will be the ones that find their marketing working much better as well.

Read more of Rohit Bhargava’s Influential Marketing blog [1] on Fast Company. And visit gge.com for relevant marketing ideas!

Branding Today: Why It’s Ineffective, Irrelevant, Irritating, and
Impotent
By Augustine Fou , July 31, 2009

Why do advertisers still do “branding”? Probably because they’re trying to drive sales. But many advertisers don’t realize that
branding as it is done today is irrelevant, ineffective, irritating, and impotent. It’s not their fault, really. They’ve been led astray by agencies practicing the false religion of branding. Paraphrasing Lucas
Conley, author of “Obsessive Branding Disorder:” “Branding is a quick, easy alternative to true innovation, offering the
satisfaction of a sense of change without the real, hard work. In the blind pursuit of this escapist religion, their frenzied efforts –
perfecting names, wordsmithing brand essences, debating ‘robin’s eggshell blue’ as brand color — almost feel like genuine
work.” But branding today involves advertisers shouting our carefully crafted brand messages at target consumers, beating them over
the head with every opportunity we get.

A Brand Used to Be a Symbol Burned Onto a Cow’s Butt
A brand on a cow’s rear end identified the ranch where the cow was raised. Because that ranch had a long-standing reputation
of raising healthy cows, the brand was its symbol of quality. The buyer could rest assured he was buying healthy cows once he
saw that brand. It simplified purchase decisions. But once the “-ing” was added to the word “brand,” and agencies started to ply
the black art of “branding,” a brand was no longer the symbol of quality and reputation earned over time. Instead it was
something that was just made up by ad agency creatives “applying ingenuity to the disingenuous,” Conley points out.
Advertisers spend enormous amounts of money making up what they want consumers to think or believe about them and even
more money on blasting the message out through paid media (TV, print, radio, banner ads). Excruciating attention is paid to
which shade of pink best represents the brand. But, honestly, few consumers can tell what the official brand color of Victoria’s
Secret is. Even fewer care. The exact shade of red in Circuit City’s brand color scheme has little bearing on my willingness to
shop there; the more modern-looking yellow-on-blue tag in Best Buy’s logo never got me to actually buy something from that
store. In place of genuine innovation, good money and time are squandered on perfectly describing how the consumer should
think, smell, taste, hear, touch, or feel about the brand. But these made-up dimensions are hardly ever effective in simplifying a
potential customer’s purchase decision, like a true brand used to do. Modern consumers need more information than can be
delivered in the 30-second feel-good TV ad or the beautifully photographed (and Photoshopped) print ad.

A Brand Is No Longer What the Advertiser Says It Is
A brand is now what consumers think it is and tell others it is. “Digital” broke everything. The house of cards that is modern-day branding can no longer stand in an environment where
consumers can talk to each other and their conversations are spread far and wide and are even archived and available to
inform future users. Consumers can review and rate products and give each other feedback and recommendations. A brand
shouting its message is no longer the only source of information; consumers have many other sources of trust and objective
opinions.

Even if a brand claims it has great customer service, how consumers actually perceive the brand and how they describe it to
others has far greater weight in the minds of future consumers. Further, digital channels break through information and
geographic boundaries. Consumers can now compare features and prices of dozens of similar products — e.g. digital cameras -
- rather than rely on the measly in-store selection and the limited information on tech spec cards. Consumers can also now buy
products that better suit their needs, even if those products aren’t available in their local stores. Branding claims are irrelevant.

Consumers are empowered now and will speak up. Nowhere is the new level playing field more painfully apparent than in the movie business, where examples abound like an
extremely low-budget movie. “Blair Witch” (No. 210; $6 million budget for production and advertising) outranks a super highbudget
movie, “Matrix Revolutions” (No. 217; $160 million budget for production and advertising) in gross sales on the All Time
USA Box Office List, according to IMDB.com. Despite millions of dollars of new beer advertising, some big beer brands
reportedly suffered a double-digit drop in sales over during the July 4th holiday period compared to a year ago; perhaps the
product does not have as much “drinkability” as its glossy ads claim.

Big Don’t Need Branding; Small Brands Don’t Need Branding
Big brands and small brands both need sales. Big brands like American Express don’t need more branding. American Express
already has 100 percent unaided recall. What it really needs is more people signing up for credit cards. The brand campaign of
comedian Jerry Seinfeld speaking with Superman certainly was delightful, but did it accomplish the goal?

Small brands don’t need branding either. They especially need sales. Sweetriot, a brilliant 3-year-old startup on a mission, has
not done any branding. Yet its chocolate sells for more per ounce than Valrhona or Ghirardelli. In the same vein, Apple never
said in its ads that it was about beautifully designed products that are easy to use; but its products were and have consistently
delivered on this promise. Google never said it was about efficient, accurate, and clutter-free search; but it was and still is.
Zappos never said it was about great customer service, but it was, so its satisfied customers told others that it stood for great
customer service.

The true brands never do branding; they never make it up or even say it. Instead the brand is earned as great products and
services substantiate and deliver on the brand’s promise continuously. In this way, a reputation is earned over time and the
brand is a symbol of this reputation, which helps new customers simplify their purchase decision. Fake brands, on the other
hand, are the ones that make up what they think customers should think or feel about them; typically, they shout the loudest at
consumers. Modern consumers have enough information overload during the day that they are irritated by advertisers finding
crafty new ways to shout at them everywhere they turn — e.g. “on urinals, golf holes, beach sand,” writes Conley.

What to Do if You Can’t Do “Old” Branding Any More
Branding that involves made-up claims and fanciful brand smells, colors, or auras has been rendered completely impotent by
the habits and expectations of modern consumers. What should an advertiser do in this Darwinian new world of empowered
consumers? First, make a kick-ass product. Second, make a kick-ass product. Third, repeat one and two — remembering that
the “kick-assed-ness” of your product evolves over time and you need to continue to innovate to stay ahead of very capable
fast-followers (i.e. copycats). But how do you make an awesome product and do so continuously? You listen to your customers
and then listen some more. And then you change internal business processes so that the insights gained from this listening can
be quickly turned into new product features, value-added services, and more.

We are talking about real product innovation here — “true innovation” as Conley calls it. It is hard work. But digital also provides
the tools and venues where feedback from customers is readily and continuously available. Advertisers can review user
feedback, comments, and archived suggestions. Instead of branding, practice brand stewardship. Brand stewardship is
constantly being aware of what your customers think of your product and what they need. With this knowledge, advertisers are
empowered to innovate their products and services to substantiate their promise to customers and earn a reputation over time -
- i.e. the brand. Good brand stewardship is not branding.

A true brand exerts brand gravity. What is brand gravity? It is the accumulated reputation that attracts new customers to buy
and keeps current customers in orbit. The new branding is true and rapid. It calls for continuous innovation, informed by realtime
consumer feedback that leads to consistent delivery of stellar products and an earned brand reputation is earned. That is
why branding (as we do it today — shouting made-up messages) is ineffective, irrelevant, irritating, and impotent. There is a
correct way to do “brand-ing” excellence.

Visit gge.com to learn how to build on your customers’ connections with your brand.