Five hour energy versus coffee

Posted on February 1, 2011 by Hammer

Five hour energy has never been accused of making particularly highbrow ads.  Previously they offered themselves as a midday boost, but now they’ve gone after the morning ritual of coffee.  Strategically they’ve moved from creating a new occasion for their product use, to trying to replace a use.

The strategy makes some sense.  It’s easier to convince someone to try an alternative than to create an entire new use for a product.  One detail that seems lost is the actual occasion.  5 hour is positioned against home brewed coffee, and is offered as quicker and easier.  This lacks some believability as there are both instant coffee products like Starbucks via that are nearly as easy and taste pretty good.  Also if we have the ability to plan, many coffee makers have timers.

The missed opportunity seems to be to position 5 hour energy against cafe coffee.   Even the fastest barista can build up a consderable backlog in the morning rush, and the product is pretty expensive.  Given the economic climate, a product that’s faster and cheaper than an alternative might have better results than one that’s just faster.

However, what do you think?  Is 5 hour on track with their marketing or could they do a better job.

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How Twitter generates so much hype

Posted on July 9, 2009 by Steve Hammer

By this point you’d have to be living under a rock not to have heard of Twitter.   Everyone from Oprah to CNBC has spent time talking about the microblogging system and its phenomenal growth.  A far fewer percentage of people seem to understand the utility of the service.  Certainly the controversy surrounding the Iran elections and twitter’s utility have explained it to some.  Regardless of this, most still seem to think of it as a place full of narcissists eager to tell you how much they enjoyed something trivial like their last sandwich.  I’m not here to explain it’s purpose and power, but explain why something that most consider small keeps generating big coverage.

It requires a basic understanding of Internet users.  The vast majority of people that use the internet are content consumers.  Sites are built to make this group of users be able to consume content easily.   On the other side, there’s a small percentage that create content.  Some are professionals, but the vast majority of creators toil in relative anonymity, but continue to produce.  These are the folks that create reviews at sites like citysearch and comment on newspaper stories.   They are, virtually by definition, incredibly eager to share their thoughts.

These content creators are the most vital and active Twitter users.  They see the power of the system to push out their message, and are eager to defend its virtue.  Twitter can provide a megaphone for content creators of prior obscurity, and further amplify the voice of a loud organization or celebrity.  Since psychographically they are the same as blog commenters, they aren’t afraid to provide input into any article written about their new soap box.  This creates activity and action on sites that write about twitter.  It creates a cycle, which is self reinforcing.

Oddly enough, it doesn’t yet matter if the masses adopt it.  It will, as the ability to push a message to the masses is what is attractive in the first place.  But for generating hype, it doesn’t matter.

There’s a lot that any business can learn here.  Your best customers are your most powerful advocates.  Make it easy to share your message and they will.  Also, never forget the value you are giving to your best customers.  Twitter provides value by giving a voice, and their best customers repay them by returning the favor in hype.  Nothing is more viral than that.

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When Brands go Social

Posted on June 18, 2009 by Steve Hammer

These days it’s all about social media.  If you aren’t on Facebook, then you just aren’t marketing.  It’s created a rush of entry to create fan pages for brands, even more so during the land grab that was vanity naming.  However, it’s still hard for lots of brand to get traction in the space.

There are some principles we can draw on those that are successful and some things we can learn from those that aren’t.

A brand like Coke, Budweiser, Audi helps define a lifestyle.  Most of these brands have fan pages in the tens of thousands, whether they are unofficial or official.  The jean brand Seven for all mankind has a following of over 4000 despite never posting a single thing.  In this regard, the use of becoming a fan is not to subscribe to information, but to express elements of your own personality.  To illustrate this, you can look at the great number of quirky groups that have formed around things like the “cool side of the pillow” or “joe the plumber”  People join these as a subtle way to self express.

The second way a brand can use social media is to be more informative.  This can be more time intensive, but if your brand doesn’t have the cachet of cool, it’s your best route.  Telling people how to use your product better, or offering scheduling is key here.  Movies and TV shows do this very well, but even brands and companies that few talk about can do well here.  Imagine something like being told how to date better by match.com

The final way is the seemingly unrelated but sponsored element.  Toyota created a free virtual gift that could be distributed to your friends, as a very soft way to provide value.

The bad category would come from many of the biggest brands.  Fancy feast, nor any other pet food that I could think of, have significant followings on facebook.  After working in that industry, I know that many people define themselves by the brand of cat food they serve their pet.  It seems like they should work harder there.  Of course, they also tried to launch a pet-centric network called petside, so that may have distracted them a bit.

The short answer is that going social is all about providing value in a social context.  It has to provide information, allow self expression or be altruistic.  It can’t be pushy the same way that conventional marketing can become. It’s a different idiom, but there are plenty of brands that can fill that role.

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What if everything on the internet shouldn't be free?

Posted on April 1, 2009 by Steve Hammer

There’s a wide conception among consumers that everything on the Internet should be free.  The success of companies like Craigslist have promoted the notion that other than ordering products, everything else should be free.  The work of Internet opinion leaders like Jeff Jarvis and Chris Anderson have forwarded the notion that free and freemium business models are both proper and sustainable.  Basic economics would predict that in a market as competive as the Internet, all business marginal revenue would rapidly approach marginal cost.  For all intensive purposes that means that everything should be darn near free.

However, there have been a number of recent articles that suggest that there are areas of dissension in this thought.  Internet advertising, a prominent mode to support free content, is showing signs of cracking under the economic pressures. Banner blindness has been long documented and has limited the effectiveness of online “push” advertising.

Continue reading →

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Fixing a problem is the best path to loyalty

Posted on March 4, 2009 by Steve Hammer

It might seem counter-intuitive to some, but when you’ve screwed something up is the best time to build customer loyalty.  Your angry customer could end up being your best.  It’s all in how you handle it.

The Ritz-Carlton has understood this for a long time.  They know that any nice hotel room is pretty much the same.  It’s a bed and four walls.  What matters is what happens outside the room.  That’s the service.

They also know that service is easy when things are going well.  It’s not that hard to check you in and out, valet the car and deliver your luggage.  What makes the difference is how things are handled when things aren’t going well.

It doesn’t matter if you need a reservation to a restaurant, a special delivery or have an issue with a noisy neighbor.  What ever the problem is, The Ritz has realized they can distinguish themselves as one of the best hotel chains by fixing it and fixing it well.

The Ritz has a customer service policy that borders on amazing.  If a customer has a request, the employee they tell about it must see that it is closed.  They own that interaction beginning to end.  No one gets to say “that isn’t my job” or “here’s the person to call.” They do it.  They have to.

Any business can learn from this.  Your customers want their problem fixed, what ever it is.  They don’t care who does it for them.  When they get shuffled around they lose faith that the issue will be solve.  Empower people to make it right, and it will get better.

There’s the famous Nordstrom story about the woman who returned a tire there even though they don’t sell tires.  Charlie Trotter has told a story about ordering a steak from a nearby restaurant to serve to a customer who wanted one, even though he didn’t have one on hand.  Fix a problem and you can build a loyal customer.  How would you have liked to have your business mentioned as one of these service leaders?  It’s a viral marketing buzz that’s hard to beat.   Anyone care to share a comment on a great experience?

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Top Chef and Product Placement and much more

Posted on February 25, 2009 by Steve Hammer

I’ll freely admit that I’m a devoted fan of Bravo’s Top Chef.  As a foodie it’s one of the more interesting shows over all.  However, as a marketer, it’s fascinating in terms of marketing opportunities.

Product placement is one of the most obvious ones.  It’s one of the rules of the Top Chef drinking game, and that rule alone would have you pretty buzzed by the end.  I will give them credit for keeping most of the placements relevant to the “story” A few things like the phone placements this season were a bit forced, but in general they work.  A stove or wine brand makes perfect sense in a show about cooking.

Top Chef also does a great job of providing challenge sponsorship opportunities.  Creating a frozen dinner (Bertolli) or low calorie treat (Dr. Pepper) makes sense for the brands in the past that have done it.   The Glad family of products sponsors the overall pride and gets more than frequent mentions as a result.

Even those placing traditional ads might get a bit better off in the show.  They use frequent mini-sodes that bring fans back into the show if they tune out or try to skip past via Tivo.  I haven’t touched the mobile content or website integration, which further extend the show in advertiser friendly methods.

I don’t have the data that proves or disproves the effectiveness of their tactics.  What I can say is that the same sponsors have appeared season after season.  To me, that’s pretty good evidence that something is working.

There is a real lesson that any marketer can use.  Engagement is key to effectiveness.  If you find a place to promote your product that is relevant, it’s likely that you’ll do better.  Placement matters for you and your brand.  Scattershot placements are far less valuable than relevant ones.

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More on how worthless free has become

Posted on February 17, 2009 by Steve Hammer

After my recent post on the death of free, I attempted to run an ad on Yahoo’s network for our free dating site, downtoearth.com.  The ad was pretty simple.  It text in the ad read simply Online Dating.  100% Free.

The ad was rejected by Yahoo.

Why?

It lacked a disclaimer on the word “Free.”  That’s right.  They expected that the word could only be used with some sort of catch.

I tried to explain that we are truly free and get a sample disclaimer.  How can you disclaim something that’s true?

I’m leaning toward using “internet connection required” for our online ad.

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The sad death of the word Free

Posted on February 5, 2009 by Steve Hammer

Allow me to write an obituary for what was once an appealing and meaningful word.  Sadly, it was beaten to death by advertising claims and shows no hope of recovery.  Certainly in the days before the Internet, it had been frequently over used, but recent time has finally sent it over the edge.  It no longer means anything.  The mere mention of the word leads people to think the opposite, and forces them to check the fine print for the catch.

Free, we will miss you.  I wish you still meant something because in these dark times, we need you more than ever.  It’s sad how often I need to put you in quotes to signify your empty meaning.

Even in the early days of the Internet, the rise in affiliate marketing led to “free” giveaways of expensive items.  The catch there was that you needed to complete a great number of offers, at substantial cost, to receive the so-called free item.  The affiliate marketer made more revenue than the cost of the item, and the rube customer received a number of products and services.  Certainly not free, but if a person were actually interested in all of the offers they did get the product for free.

The idea of the free trial was another big blow.  The idea was for a person to try out a web service for a short time at no cost to them.  Of course they had to enter their credit card for the free trial which was mercilessly charged if the service was not canceled in time.  The “adult” industry made this practice an artform and free was kicked hard yet again.

Credit reporting services brought both of these together to deliver a deadly blow to free.  Rather than go to the government’s weakly promoted annualcreditreport.com, where a consumer can truly download a credit report from every agency once every year for no cost; the credit reporting firms promoted their own “free” solutions which require a trial of a credit monitoring solution.  No matter what it says in the url, if a consumer doesn’t watch out they will end up with a monthly bill for their zero cost credit report.

Free had a bit of resurgence with peer to peer downloading, but getting something for free that you are supposed to pay for is just as wrong as thinking you are getting something for free and then paying for it.  The big difference is the lawsuits that were directed at the biggest users of free downloading.   The legal bills made this anything but free.

I’m certain that you have been hurt many more times than I could ever chronicle.  I feel for you.  Once such a noble word.  Now people assume you are part of a deception.

People have tried to revive you by adding 100% in front of your forsaken name, but to no avail.  Even the words completely and totally have no effect on you anymore, my poor lost free.

It is time that we move on and agree that you mean nothing now.

So how can we marketers tell people we won’t be charging them?   I have to admit I’m a bit lost without you free.  Could someone send me a free hug?

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When competitors react. Questionable brand strategy?

Posted on January 27, 2009 by Steve Hammer

Gatorade for years has dominated the sports drink category.  The product itself was the stuff of legends.  The brand became an icon.  Who can forget “Be like mike?”  It’s orange lightning bolt is instantly recognizable.  Decades of research, including a sports science institute, studied its effectiveness.  Even it’s origin, as chronicled in this commercial, lent credibility to the product.

Why would a brand this strong risk reintroducing itself as “G”?  Why would it change its formula to include vitamins?  Why would it retool its entire line to feature odd text like “bring it” and ditch almost all graphics?

The answer in short is that it is now reacting to an emerging competitor, vitamin water.  While I don’t have data to support this, I have to imagine that the distribution force of Coke combined with their brand endorsements have started to take significant market share.

Gatorade is now starting to look and act a lot like their #2 competitor, and that might be a really bad move.

Moves like this are the “rock and a hard place” for brands.  If they do nothing, vitaminwater will continue to steal their share.  If they change, they lose much of the advantage they held with their brand heritage.  The normal strategy here is to innovate, but line extensions like Propel and G2 seem only moderately well adopted.

I do think the Gatorade team has done one very significant innovation they have failed to leverage, at least to my knowledge.  They launched a line for performance athletes called Gatorade Elite.  Done right, this could be a “halo” that could further their reputation as the experts in serving athletes.  Done wrong, it will collect dust on the shelves at Gold’s Gym.  I’m far from the target here, so I don’t know much about distribution.  In fact the first I had heard about it was in researching this post.

We all wanted to be like mike, so why not take that to the next level with Gatorade Elite?

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The buzz and PR strategy of a rejected ad

Posted on January 14, 2009 by Steve Hammer

The NFL and the super bowl have recently been the targets of an agressive buzz strategy that works quite well, unfortunately.   Submit an ad that gets rejected, but follows all of the listed rules.  GoDaddy went from just another web registrar to a near household name by making a racy ad.  The ad made fun of the prior years “wardrobe malfunction.” and the NFL wasn’t done smarting over the overexposure.  Several recuts later, GoDaddy made an advertisment deemed acceptable.  However they took their outrage to the press who was more than happy to let them tell their story.

In the end, the ad wasn’t very good, but they had more than made up for it in buzz.  They’ve repeated the stunt for several years, by always trying to push the letter of the law to the limit.

The latest in the string of “PRstunt-erists” is a dating website that promotes affairs and cheating.  Darren Rovell of CNBC was kind enough to provide them with a blog post about how their ad for the Super Bowl Program was denined.

Darren, when you post links to the site, the PRstunt-erists win.  They could have gotten maybe 100,000 people to notice their ad, and your coverage might generate 10x that.

Personally, I stand behind the NFL and their decison to deny the ad.  In fact to atone, I think they should offer a free ad in the program to the dating site that is the polar opposite.  One that is not for married people and is free – the free dating site downtoearth.com.

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