Service vs. Solicitation
As online marketing specialists we often contrast ourselves with those in the traditional world, summarizing the differences with notions of a ‘different mindset’ - but what does that mean really? A focus on ROI, accountability, commercial imperatives, interactivity, engagement, experience, etc. are all terms that quickly come to mind but really, at a high level, what makes our mindset different is an approach to marketing based upon consumer service, not consumer solicitation.
Considering that we are each exposed to hundreds, if not thousands, of commercial messages each day, all marketers are challenged with making attention-grabbing impressions that are also persuasive. A formidable task that drives the hiring and firing of agencies every day, and made even more difficult with continued media fragmentation and the multitasking media consumption habits of today’s consumers. It’s no wonder marketers are increasingly concerned about their traditional agency’s ability to keep pace. But with a different perspective, or perhaps mindset, one might see that this increasingly fragmented and multitasked collision of media and consumer behavior is where the future of marketing opportunity lies.
No single channel illustrates this challenge/opportunity moreso than the Internet where we are each exposed to no less than two, and often many more, commercial messages on each page-load. Online, the battle for attention is at its most extreme and our understanding of what is or is not effective is at its deepest. Further, the intersection of effectiveness and cost efficiency, identified through online technology, prioritizes the channels that marketers now find most important as illustrated in this chart:
It’s also quite interesting to note that many of these most important advertising tactics are also very service oriented. The correlation between effectiveness and importance is clear but perhaps, with a different mindset, the correlation between consumer service and effectiveness is equally so.
Service as we generally think of it is almost exclusively focused on front line staff while advertising’s remit is primarily solicitation. But in the age of on-demand access to entertainment and information in a vastly fragmented media landscape with multitasking consumers, service is the key to gaining not only attention but authority, and ultimately conversion and loyalty.
So who’s doing this well? Here are a couple good examples:
Dove’s Evolution
Avis’ wetryharder.co.uk
Nuts about Southwest
Posted in Opinions
February 9th, 2008 at 6:22 am
Heya Matt,
totally agree amigo.
I thought i would share this article i wrote many moons ago. Wow im getting old.
CAMPAIGN-I: Perspective - Stop the moaning and start enjoying
by STEVE MULHOLLAND, the creative director of digital@jwt Campaign 06-Jul-01, 12:00
The past six months or so have been like a depressing soap opera
for me. Each week I thumb through the industry press, hoping for an
exciting plot development and dose of inspiration.
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Invariably, my hopes are floored, as the grand scheme of this drama
seems as unchanging as Pauline Fowler’s frown. Inevitably there may be
different characters but the script is depressingly familiar. It’s the
same bleating tone about the bad state of our industry and the same
plethora of opinions on how it could and should be changed.
Every week all I read is: “My agency knows this, the clients don’t
understand this, media this, banner that, click this, blah, blah, blah.”
Oh come on people! Is perpetuating doom and gloom like this really the
way forward?
Subjecting anyone to 17 episodes of EastEnders at its worst is surely
not good for the soul.
I make an exception and doff my cap in the direction of Mark Girling
writing in the trade press last week. He’s a media man with a statistic
or two to cheer us up, starting with the fact that according to
PricewaterhouseCoopers, UK online advertising revenue has already
overtaken cinema and is closing in on radio. In addition, a recent MMXI
survey reveals that for the week ending 10 June, almost ten million UK
at-home internet users accessed the web, with an average surfing time of
two hours, 25 minutes. That’s more time than most people I know spend
watching telly! Impending doom? I think not.
These figures are undoubtedly inspiring but need to be coupled with a
simple reality check. We are here to service clients’ needs, needs that
will ultimately enhance the consumer’s experience of their brand in the
new-media age. In the majority of the articles I have read, very rarely
has the consumer even been mentioned. Are we really listening to what
the consumer wants? More importantly, do we even care? Are we simply
selling to our clients and carrying on our merry way, safe in the
knowledge that a happy client represents a job well done?
The public who choose to consume our media are not the naive surfers
they were a few years ago. They are there for specific reasons and we
should be giving them what they want instead of discussing the latest
0.5 per cent or whatever click result our campaign just landed. We all
need to start enjoying what we do, otherwise this infectious moaning
will spread to our clients and more importantly on to the customer. It
really ain’t that bad!