Free Downloadable SnarketingProfs Calendar for 2013
Inspired by the popularity of our SnarketingProfs drawings, we’ve put together a FREE fun, colorful (and downloadable) calendar to spruce up your office in 2013.
Each month features a humorous quote by some of our favorite folks, such as David Ogilvy, Tim Berners-Lee, Chris Brogan, and MarketingProfs’s own Ann Handley and Corey O’Loughlin, and a colorful brand-new illustration for each quote.
The eye-popping illustrations will boost even the dreariest cubicle wall, and the quotes will keep you focused on the lighter side of marketing.
Here’s a peek inside the calendar…
Get your free PDF calendar today!
Tags: Marketing, MarketingProfs
The New Celebrity Spokesperson Needs Social Media Smarts
The value of a celebrity spokesperson is now rooted in their social eminence.
Brands have used the power of celebrity to promote their products with varying degrees of success over the years. Michael Jackson for Pepsi, Michael Jordan for Nike, David Beckham for Burger King, and Katy Perry for Pop Chips.
The brand is hoping more people will pay attention to its message because it’s being delivered by somebody that consumers ostensibly care more about than the brand being pitched. Odds are that, because audience members are interested in this celebrity, they will at least pay closer attention to the commercial or, even better, take the spokesperson’s word and go buy the product. In short, celebrities are hired by brands for their power to influence.
The trouble is, the expectations of celebrity endorsement deals must be re-imagined in the age of social media.
It’s going to take more than just looking good or sounding good to make a true impact. Just shooting a couple 30-second spots and posing for some print ads was fine in 1995, but it’s not going to cut it today when the potential to quickly connect with customers is so much greater via digital media. That means that we, as marketers, need to take a longer look at who we decide to hire and focus more on those folks that have diligently built their own social following.
For example, a client of mine, a major CPG player, maintains a cadre of celebrity spokespeople across sports, music, and entertainment. Let’s take a look at two of these spokespeople: one a prominent athlete, the other a famous recording artist/musician. Each is arguably as famous as the other, but our athlete has zero social presence while our musician as almost 10 million Twitter followers.
Over the last couple of weeks, my client was able to activate the recording artist in a way not possible with the athlete by having her talk organically about the brand across her massive social following. According to Sysomos, her mentions helped my client to reach over 12 million people over a very short period, up sharply from normal. What’s more, this kind of reach is even more powerful as her fans are highly engaged and more likely to take a cue from her than they would from the brand itself.
Meanwhile, our athlete has been making news for remarkable performances on the field, but we’ve not been able to take advantage of this groundswell because he is completely absent with regards to social. No Twitter, no Facebook, no Instagram, no following, and as a result = no social value. The best we can hope for is a fortuitously planned TV buy coinciding with a strong game-day performance.
Social is beginning to become more and more foundational in a brand’s overall media mix. Our musician has equipped herself to be more influential for
the brand and, as a result, must be considered more valuable.
In a previous role, I helped oversee sports sponsorship strategy. I always struggled with the value of these sponsorships because—aside from a logo on the wall at Fenway, a few free tickets and related perks—it was hard to truly measure the impact of the deal.
Now, social is starting to make ROI for endorsement deals easier to quantify and place a true value on the partnership. Social listening tools can tell us how often our spokespeople are mentioning our product, how and in what forum they are doing so, how many people were exposed to these mentions, and most importantly, how many conversations were generated as a result of those mentions. These mentions equate to storytelling and powerful storytelling sells product.
When evaluating and exciting and glamorous list of celebrities to help spice up your next campaign, do a little digging into their social eminence. Will their influence fade as soon as the viewer fast-forwards through your TV spot? Or will they cast a longer shadow for your brand via their social clout?
Tags: brand, customer experience, customers, Marketing, Social Media
Small Town Rules: Author Becky McCray on Marketing Smarts [Podcast]
“There will be times when your income is zero and you just might as well plan for that right now.”
That statement wasn’t uttered by a survivalist or someone who believes you should hoard gold in preparation for the collapse of the international monetary system.
Rather, it was spoken by Becky McCray, resident of Hopeton, Oklahoma (population 30), cattle rancher, liquor store owner, and co-author (along with Barry J. Moltz) of Small Town Rules, a book which, among other things, introduced me to the concept of “planning for zero.”
What If Your Wheat Crop Were Hailed Out?
Becky’s book focuses on the lessons that business owners the world round could learn from small town entrepreneurs—farmers, ranchers and anyone who lives in and serves a rural community. One such lesson she explained to me during this week’s episode of the Marketing Smarts podcast involved taking into account a year with zero income.
If you grow wheat, for example, you have to accept—given the unpredictability of Mother Nature—that you might lose your entire crop. Likewise, if you raise cattle, you need to be prepared for years of drought or disease that decimate your entire herd. If such things come to pass, and you didn’t plan for it, you’re out of business.
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Read the Full Article and Listen to the Podcast
Becky McCray, who co-owns a retail liquor store and a cattle ranch with her husband, Joe. She writes and speaks about small town business, and she and Chicago entrepreneur Barry Moltz are the authors of the book Small Town Rules.
