by monicawright on February 1, 2008
Most of you know I work for a mid-sized newspaper company, and like most newspapers, we’ve been undergoing quite a bit of change lately, forcing me to think about how the marketing department for the “online division” provides value to the organization.
Media, it’s consumption, and as a result marketing to people has become fragmented. Therefore capturing and fulfilling the expectation (need) of a new audience is different. Yet somehow the “Newspaper Online” operational structure and product structure reflects that of “Newspaper”.
Why is this a square peg in a round hole scenario? Well, it’s scalability (thinking large) vs. agility (thinking small). It brings back the theme of applying “New Marketing” to “Legacy Product”; which results only in a “Big Mess”. It no longer works to be everything to everyone anymore.
To attract a new segment we need to think small. Where are these people, what are they doing? With the resources, effort and focus on citizen media, as well as the concern in gaining market share, this is more important than ever.
Also, success is not only defined by the “big number” (pageviews). Measurement of success for new audience includes engagement (pages consumed and time spent) and loyalty (who is coming back).
Attracting new audiences is not all about the technology or platform involved, it’s about outreach and building teams that can do the following:
- Conversational writing, listening: The content becomes the marketing, and vice versa, it’s a two-way conversation.
- Group interactions, events, mingling, networking
- Guerilla marketing
New audience development is about the cycle of the user experience online and offline, with the common goal of creating value for the audience: getting them there and keeping them there.
by monicawright on January 21, 2008
Everyone knows that media and it’s consumption has increasingly become fragmented, and therefore marketing has become fragmented. In fact, I just purchased Mark J. Penn’s Microtrends over the weekend, in hopes that by osmosis I’ll become an expert trendspotter, influence the influencers, become a superstar and change my life forever.
What limited, egotistical, small thinking on my part.
According to Duncan Watts in a recent Fast Company article, we can’t force trends, we can’t predict trends, trends happen randomly. So if trends strike randomly, then engineering success by targeting the “mavens” or “influentials” with a big network is a waste of time. What catches on — the trend, the “idea virus”, the spark, whatever you want to call it — will eventually make it’s way to popularity. It has a life of it’s own.
In his blog covering the article, Mark Ramsey actually states that the marketing net should be thrown as broadly as possible in the hope of finding a “match” to strike.
So, magically, we need to find a way to make mass marketing trigger word-of-mouth effects among influential people, although there is no guarantee that these influential people are actually influential until after the viral effect happens.
Wish me luck.
by monicawright on January 16, 2008
Drew McLean and Gavin Heaton are doing it again - there’s a call out for contributors a new collaborative project as a follow up on the Age of Conversation. The clever minds behind this new breakthrough project is also asking for input on themes for this next book. My personal favorite is “Why don’t people get it?” This way there’s an opportunity to demonstrate some actionable steps that help us get out of a rut. But you can vote for yourself!
by monicawright on January 6, 2008
Actually it sounds pretty gross. But that’s the premise of Seth Godin’s new book,“How to Avoid a Meatball Sundae” - the mess concocted when adding the sundae toppings of New Marketing (MySpace, Facebook, YouTube, etc.) to meatballs (average consumer products sold via mass marketing to the largest possible number of people).
I admit I’m one of those folks who gets really excited about the cool stuff you can do with that New Marketing magic. Luckily I work online for a media company, so I get to experiment with the New Marketing. Some of it works for us, some of it doesn’t. Nonetheless, it requires work and persistent efforts to be useful.
I can imagine how those “meatball” companies with bottomless advertising budgets would want to get on the bandwagon. But adding sprinkles and hot fudge to a meatball organization is just nasty.
I haven’t picked up the book yet, but pan to. In the meantime I found some excerpts if you’re interested in reading more about it.
