Category Archives: Marketing
For Marketers Who Want Their Commercials to Go Viral: Be coy with your logo and “out there” with joy and surprise.
by Paula Lovell on April 5, 2012 | 5 comments
in Marketing
Using infrared eye-trackers and technologies that analyze facial expressions, an assistant professor at Harvard Business School has predicted what’s needed in commercials to make them more apt to go viral.
The bottom line:
1. Don’t flaunt your brand logo. Show it repeatedly, but subtly.
2. Use joy and surprise, and use it early. People stay more engaged and stick with an ad when it starts with joy or surprise. Special note: surprise is good; shock is not. Funny is good; nudity keeps a lot of people from “sending it on.”
3. When creating a video ad, think roller coaster. People easily get bored, so you have to turn it on and off, creating an emotional roller coaster that pushes emotions from joyful to surprise; tension to relief. And all this in 30 or 60 seconds.
4. Only a subset of viewers will pass along an ad, no matter how joyful, surprising, mercurial or logo-subtle: primarily, people who are extroverts and/or egotistic. The extroverts are just out there sharing and having fun. As for the egotists, the author speculates that egotism is a trait of someone who shares an ad link because that kind of personality wants to be considered, “in the know,” media savvy and connected. Who knew?
The observations in the article in the Harvard Business Review aren’t that much of a surprise, but it has to be a monumental challenge to convince most company CEO’s to downplay their logo. And I can’t even imagine making a presentation of a new ad built around these pointers to “the suits” in most corporate boardrooms.
Seriously, how in the world do these agencies get this kind of risky promotion past the corporate gatekeepers?
How to Rank Higher in the Search Engine of Life
by Scott McIntosh on March 20, 2012 | no comments
in Marketing, Networking
Recently, I’ve just returned from a vacation where I noticed a fun similarity in the way Google ranks website value and how people rank each other’s social value. And as you may already know, our social value can be extremely important in the successful marketing of our business as well as in our overall happiness.
If you didn’t already know, Google ranks websites for its search engine results by backlinks. A backlink is a link from another website back to your website – thus the name backlink. The more popular the other site is that links to you, the more valuable the backlink. It’s a web-based voting system.
But what about in the real world? You come across many different people in your daily routines, some that you know and many that you don’t. This is especially true when you are traveling. Humans are naturally a very social species and derive pleasure from connecting with others. Each person that you engage with throughout your day is an opportunity for a social backlink.
Each person that “likes” you is another vote for you in the greater social network that is our lives. The more votes you get, the higher you move up in the ranks of business and in life. Now I’m not talking about “spamming” everyone you meet with your business card and sales pitch. Please don’t do that. I’m talking about just being a nice person. I’m talking about engaging everyone you meet as you would a friend or loved one. Listen to them. Remember their names. Ask them how their families are and HEAR what they have to say. Empathize with them and respect their differences. Each new person you connect with on a social level throughout your life will not only help you in your business endeavors, they will also provide a greater richness that can only come from increased social connections.
So get out there and build your social backlinks! And if you need help with online backlinks, call us.
The Cyberchrondria Dilemma
by Paula Lovell on February 7, 2012 | 7 comments
in Healthcare, Marketing
For those of us in healthcare marketing, it’s important to study the public’s evolving and expanding online habits.
So I’m fascinated and mildly amused by the newest cyber-contagion spreading through communities: cyberchrondria. The word probably doesn’t require definition. It’s a term coined to describe people’s obsession with self-diagnosis based on reading online healthcare info.
According to American Medical News, which cites a Pew Research study, 80% of internet users search for health information online. Since about 75% of Americans go online, that’s almost 60% of the US population who are ferreting out online information about illnesses or diseases related to themselves or someone they care about. Some of that information is quite reliable; some not so much so.
Physicians are now reporting an increased number of patients who are needlessly worried about diseases they think they have as a result of internet reading. The docs say they require significantly more time and counsel or, even worse, they sometimes demand costly screenings and tests just to prove they DON’T have a certain disease.
Recently I got an unusual diagnosis which will probably have little or no impact on my life or long term health. The physician (not the best communicator, by the way) said, “And don’t go out and read about it online; it’ll just scare you.” You can imagine the first thing I did when I got back to the office. (And it did scare me to death.) Suddenly I just knew I was having a reaction to the medicine (I wasn’t) and I was diving into “chat rooms” populated by people with the same “disease.” (I’ve never heard so many old wives tales.)
At a time when government, physicians, patients, and insurers are looking for ways to reduce healthcare costs, this can’t be good. By the same token, patients are being encouraged to play a more intimate role in their own healthcare. What’s an intelligent person to do?
Enhance Your Online Healthcare Marketing with Video – PART II
by Scott McIntosh on January 12, 2012 | 1 comment
in Healthcare, Marketing, Video
As I discussed in my previous post, in order to maximize online discovery of your healthcare marketing videos, take advantage of social media platforms and Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
Video SEO is all about using the proper keywords in your video titles and descriptions. To get a feel for the most popular keywords being searched at any given time, use the Google Keyword Tool or YouTube Keyword Tool to pick out the highest trending and most relevant keywords that relate to the content of your video. Then attempt to use these keywords within your video titles and descriptions.
Once your video is completed and you’ve chosen your keyword optimized title and description, upload the video to YouTube as it’s one of the most popular search engines itself. YouTube allows for a title, description and keyword set to be entered with each entry. Because search engines are unable to decipher the contents (spoken words, dynamic text, etc) of videos, it’s important to use titles and descriptions – using your keywords – to describe the subject matter.
Take full advantage of YouTube’s description box by placing a link back to your main website. After all, the overall purpose of this effort is to market your healthcare services – what better way than to drive people to your main website. I recommend placing a link to your site in the first couple lines of the description box and including the “http://” portion to ensure it is recognized by your browser as an easily clickable link. Here’s an example of a link in the description on the Lovell YouTube channel:
Don’t stop there, however, because as Google stated with their recent announcement of “Search plus Your World,” search and social media are being merged to help Google better tailor search results to individuals. This means that social media has become an important part of SEO and online discovery. Maximize this by sharing your video on your social networks (including Google+). You should also embed your video from YouTube onto your main website, blog, inside your press releases (if possible) and in your email marketing newsletters. This will drive all traffic to view the video on YouTube which will increase your view count. This is important because Google takes into account the amount of views per video when deciding on its popularity. The more popular a video, the better the chance it has of showing up in the top of the search results when your targeted keywords are searched. And by sharing your video on social networks, you also increase the chances of discovery from users of those networks.
What pros and cons have you seen when using video as a part of your marketing efforts?
Facebook Upgrades Insights Analytics Tool
by Allison Russo on January 10, 2012 | 1 comment
in Facebook, Marketing, Social Media
Marketers should be adept at demonstrating the value of online marketing efforts to their client or company. Tools like Google Analytics and Compete.com provide excellent ways to measure and report, in-depth, on company website traffic and the effectiveness of an online strategy. However, tools for measuring social media marketing success have only had capacity to report on very basic statistics (# of likes, shares, comments, etc.)…until now.
Last month, Facebook rolled out an upgraded version of their Insights analytics tool for business pages, providing a comprehensive look into your pages’ reach and many additional metrics to support your Facebook marketing efforts. Below is a summary of some key elements of the Insights revamp:
1) Measuring Facebook Reach: In addition to “Total Likes,” which has always been available, Insights now also reports three additional statistics to define your pages overall reach on Facebook:
Friends of Fans: This metric identifies the total number of people your page could be exposed to, if each of your fans shares content from your page on their own account.
People Talking about This: This metric identifies the number of unique people who have shared content from your page on their account in the past week.
Weekly Total Reach: This metric identifies the number of people that have seen the content that your fans have shared on their own pages.
2) Influence of Post Frequency: This graph is an excellent way to analyze correlations between the frequency of posts and how that influences fans. The purple dots below represent posts to your page; the bigger the dot, the higher frequency of posts that day. If you look at the graph, you will notice that on January 4th (with an average sized purple dot), the “People Talking about This” and “Weekly Total Reach” numbers went up. Conversely, in late December (a larger purple dot, meaning more posts), the “People Talking about This” and “Weekly Total Reach” metrics aren’t as high. Based on this information, marketers can deduce that frequency in content is not what influences their fans. It is more likely, in this case, that their fans are influenced by the subject matter of the content.
3) Engagement and “Virality” of Posts: The graph below displays every post made on your page, alongside a few important new metrics:
Reach: This metric identifies the number of people who have seen the post.
Engaged Users: This metric identifies the number of people who have clicked on the post.
Talking about This: See #1.
Virality: This metric identifies the percentage of people who have shared your post, out of the total number of unique people who have seen it.
By reviewing these metrics for each individual post, a marketer can learn what types of posts are resonating with their audiences and make decisions about future posts, based on that knowledge.
What do you think of these new tools? Will the newly upgraded Facebook Insights be taken into account when planning your Facebook strategy?
Enhance Your Online Healthcare Marketing with Video – Part I
by Scott McIntosh on January 5, 2012 | 3 comments
in Healthcare, Marketing, Social Media, Video
The healthcare industry is growing quickly as 10,000 Baby Boomers turn 65 every day. According to a study completed last year by Google, 57% of the Boomer generation have searched online for health information. A survey done by the National Research Corporation in 2011 showed 20% of respondents rely on social networking for health information and of those, 94% use Facebook as their number one source. Are your healthcare marketing efforts keeping up with these trends?
One way to capture online attention and enhance your marketing program is through use of online video. Websites containing video consistently show a lower bounce rate and increased time-on-site versus sites without video content. Video also helps with search engine optimization efforts as sites with this type of content, according to Forrester Research analyst Nate Elliott, are 50 times more likely to appear on Google’s first page results than sites without video content.
Creating Online Marketing Videos
With the increase in simple high-definition cameras, as well as easy-to-use video editing and distribution options, video has become a more affordable option for healthcare marketers. Those looking to create videos should start with a list of potential topics. Your videos should cover topics and stories that your potential customers would be interested in. Nobody wants to see a glorified commercial for your hospital on their Facebook page, but a video teaching how to look for signs of pending health risks may be of interest. Here are a few recommendations:
Healthcare Marketing Video Ideas:
- Customer testimonials and inspirational stories (beware HIPAA regulations)
- Preventative medicine and health tips videos
- New technologies and hospital techniques
- Inspirational videos from YOUR hospital community showing positive events and trends
Editing Marketing Videos:
Once the appropriate footage is captured, simple editing software can help make your videos web-ready. Most new computer models come with basic video editing software or you can download a program such as Camtasia Studio to create your final product. Another option would be to hire a healthcare marketing firm or video production studio to assist in the production of your videos. This kind of consultant can also advise a hospital how to maximize their video efforts (on the hospital website, through social media, at locations throughout the hospital, through local public service announcements, etc.).
Remember to keep videos short as attention spans, especially on the web, are not what they used to be. Optimal length should be under two minutes but attention must be grabbed in the first 10 seconds or risk users clicking away.
Online Discovery
To get your videos discovered, ensure you are taking advantage of social media and search engine optimization. But we’ll discuss that more in Part II of our post on Healthcare marketing videos. Stay tuned next week and please let us know any questions you’d like answered in next week’s post by using the comments section below.
Content Marketing Grows Up: 5 Tips to Freshen Up Your Strategy
by Rebecca Kirkham on January 4, 2012 | no comments
in Marketing, Media Relations
Read any marketing, PR or social media blog these days and you’ll likely stumble across dozens of articles on content marketing. Fueled by the growth of social media, it offers companies a new way to engage customers and build their brand. In fact, 2011 saw industry giants like Nissan, Boeing and HSBC embrace the concept with the launch of sophisticated websites and video content designed to share their stories in a fresh new way.
While content marketing – also known as brand journalism – is getting a lot of ink these days, the idea of using customer-focused content to position your organization as an expert isn’t new. In fact, most companies are already engaging in some form of content marketing whether they know it or not. From newsletters to white papers and bylined articles, content marketing can take many forms. Today, these tried and true vehicles are being supplemented with blogs, dedicated websites, videos, and social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.
According to new research, the content marketing movement is gaining steam in the B2B world as well. A recent survey revealed that 82 percent of B2B respondents use content marketing – making it twice as popular as mainstream outlets such as print, TV or radio advertising. And why wouldn’t they? Every company has access to a ready-made team of subject matter experts: their employees. The challenge comes in leveraging that expertise to create – and share – compelling content. Here are a few tips for doing just that:
- Easy on the self promotion. Treat content marketing like you would a first date: less about you, more about me. Focus on engaging your customer with content that speaks directly to their needs and interests. Save content that is overtly promotional for an ad. The mere fact that you are broaching the topic speaks volumes.
- Be transparent. As with all things in this digital age, transparency is key to winning the trust of customers. While you don’t want to hit the reader over the head with endless references to your company, a legitimate content marketing vehicle should never disguise its source.
- Balance creation with curation. Many organizations struggle with the time and cost of creating original content. Companies can stretch their marketing resources – not to mention join in the conversation – through content curation. While it may sound intimidating, curation is simply the act of finding great content – often via a mainstream news article or blog post – and sharing it. Recent research suggests 40% of content should be original – leaving the balance for curation.
- Make it a conversation – not a monologue. Engage customers by providing ways for them to interact with you. Whether it’s simply enabling comments on your blog or sharing content on a Facebook page, interaction breeds transparency, which in turn creates loyalty and engagement.
- Measure, measure, measure. As with any marketing or PR tool, content marketing should be part of a broader strategy. However, there are ways to quantify your efforts. In addition to tracking the number of page views and email opens, marketers should track which prospects became qualified leads and which leads turned into paying customers. A variety of tools – ranging from browser cookies to lead forms and contests or promotions – can be used to gauge success.
The moral of the story? You don’t have to be Nissan or Boeing to create engaging content that positions your company as a thought leader and turns prospects into customers. Good luck!
Pinterest: A Unique Twist to Social Media
by Sarah Mansouri on December 29, 2011 | 8 comments
in Marketing, Social Media
If you are a twenty-something female like me then you most likely know what Pinterest is, and you may even be borderline addicted. For those of you who aren’t so acquainted, Pinterest is a relatively new social media site with a unique twist that allows its users to communicate through vibrant images. With a quick visit to the Pinterest “About” page, you will learn that Pinterest is a virtual pinboard that lets you organize and share anything you find on the web. An easy way I describe it to my friends is to imagine several pin boards hung up on your wall at home; each time you find anything unique in a magazine you rip out the page and pin it on the board so that you will be able to find it later without having to flip through the magazine again. Pinterest is the same concept, but on the web.
Once signed up for an account, a Pinterest user is able to create and customize boards to fit their own personal interests while following other users and searching for images to re-pin (think re-tweeting on Twitter.) You can also share your pins and boards on Facebook and Twitter. Each image pinned to a board has the original website link so when other users look at your pins it creates more traffic to the websites and blogs where the images are being pulled from.
The moment I signed up for a Pinterest account I was hooked and spent nearly every minute of my free time searching for images and links similar to my interests. I was swept away by the overwhelming image overload of links to delicious recipes, creative decorating ideas and even travel destinations which are on my bucket list to visit.
While Pinterest was originally just a social media outlet for users to organize and share their personal interests, it has recently made some buzz in the corporate world.
Whole Foods Market, for example, has created a Pinterest page where they post their favorite recipes, pictures from food festivals throughout the country and even projects and art work that their employees love. It’s not necessarily direct marketing for their brand, but there are thousands of Whole Foods followers who are actively sharing their personal ideas and interests through the company’s Pinterest page. Customers are able to re-pin the images they see, allowing their own friends to see that they have been looking at that brand’s page.
Another aspect of Pinterest that differentiates it from other social media sites is that, because it is so organized and image oriented, followers can easily browse through content and clip out what they don’t want to see. Users decide what they want to see on the web, without leafing through long searches and reading through lengthy text. What a better way to catch consumer’s attention than to let them organize and pick out what they want to see each time they log in so that in the future they won’t have to browse through the exact same information.
Do you think Pinterest could fit into your brand strategy? Creating a page may help your company reach new demographics and increase sales. Let us know what you think!
Coca-Cola Sheds Light on Changing Brand Images
by Sarah Hamilton on December 27, 2011 | 3 comments
in Marketing, Media Relations
In case you missed the news, Coca-Cola recently changed their iconic red can to a white can for the first time in 125 years. The white can was released in late October in order to raise awareness of the threatened polar bear species. The campaign was supposed to run through February, but was quickly pulled after customers aggressively demonstrated their disapproval through social media websites such as YouTube and Twitter and accused Coke of changing the taste as well as the can. Customers also complained that the white cans with silver polar bears looked mistakenly similar to the traditional Diet Coke cans, causing them to purchase the wrong product.
Coca-Cola assured their customers on national television that they did not change the formula of their product. Scott Williamson, a spokesperson for Coke, also told the Wall Street Journal that they simply wanted a “disruptive” marketing campaign to raise awareness of threatened polar bears.
Coca-Cola appears to have appropriately handled what could have been a PR glitch by pulling the white cans off of the shelves and replacing them with the traditional red, publicly assuring consumers they did not change the taste, and publicly explaining why they changed the cans in the first place. But there are a few lessons you can learn from Coca-Cola’s mishap.
1. Consumers generally do not like change. They want to identify with a brand’s image and logo. Therefore, as the old saying goes, don’t fix what isn’t broken. It may have been honorable of Coca-Cola to try to raise awareness of polar bears, but their previous failures with changing brand images should have warned them of the risk they were taking.
2. If your company decides to change its brand name, logo or image, explain the changes publicly, clearly and thoroughly. Consumers will be more likely to identify with the new image if they understand why you are making changes.
3. Have a crisis plan ready like Coke did in case things do go awry.
4. Keep in mind that consumers are using social media to voice their opinions more than ever before. While you shouldn’t fear what your customers are saying online, you should be aware of what they are saying by monitoring social media. Responding to both positive and negative feedback accordingly will benefit your company.
What do you think about Coca-Cola’s can change? Have you or your company changed their brands or brand images? How did it go?
What Three Things Can a Champion Wrestler Teach Us About Marketing?
by Scott McIntosh on December 8, 2011 | no comments
in Marketing, Productivity, Small Business
As any marketing firm will tell you, marketing is a never-ending process. Whether it’s attending networking events, connecting with past clients or writing that new blog post, there is always something that can be done. This can get overwhelming and cause one to want to give up. But if you want your company to stand out above the rest, you have to keep going.
Anthony Robles, winner of the 2010-2011 NCAA individual wrestling championship, recently spoke at a local school in Nashville, TN (watch his inspiring speech here). He had some great things to say about not giving up and he should know. Anthony had a hard time getting started in wrestling. He had a losing record his first years in high school. He wasn’t recruited by any colleges. His father left when he was young, leaving his unemployed mother to raise four kids (at one point they were homeless). Oh, and did I mention he only has one leg?
Anthony Robles was born with only one leg but wrestled through his daily challenges to become a champion! He didn’t give up when times got tough and neither should you. Here are some takeaways from Anthony’s speech that you should consider next time you’re ready to quit:
- Focus on what you CAN do in life and not what you CAN’T do. The only thing you have power over is yourself. You can’t control your environment, you can only control how you respond to it.
- The only difference between a champion and an average person is that champions work harder, champions put in more time.
- The prize is in direct proportion to the price, the greater the rewards you seek, the greater the effort must be to achieve them.
In business as in life, passion and hard work pay off and that includes achieving your marketing goals. And this story gives me the inspiration to dig in and find a way to deal with every challenge.
Have you ever faced an enormous marketing challenge and overcome an obstacle to create a success?
