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Website Critique   URGENT - Need Help Fast!  
 
This question has been closed, and points have been awarded.
Advice On Website - Marketing To Cultural Creatives
Posted By: Rita Wilhelm on 11/13/2006 1:27 PM (CST) 500 Points
Hello everyone,

You were so helpful to me on my last question, that I decided to post another one. This feedback is wonderful!

Overview- I have a free cause-based social networking site for pet lovers, where every pet can have their own homepage and blog.

The crowd I want to attract, are cultural creatives who want to make an impact in this world, who value peace, their environment, and animals. I want them to have a place where they can connect, be creative, and know that they are coming together, and impacting causes that are important to them.

We have created 9 PetBoogaloo cartoon characters, who each have a story, a personality, and a cause that they represent. Our intention is to get these characters known, and eventually license them . We'd like to be aligned with a larger corporation who is interested in improving their triple bottom line, and sees that PetBoogaloo is a brand /partner that is committed to that.

Here a pretty good description of a cultural creative:
http://www.evomedia.com/other/cultural_creatives.htm

With that in mind, would you be so kind as to give me your feedback? If you would look on both the homepage at http://www.PetBoogaloo.com and at the cause-based page at http://www.petboogaloo.com/causes.html and give me your thoughts and suggestions. Should I put more focus on the causes on the homepage? Also, what do you think would help attract and convert more people?

Posted by: KSA Accepted Answer
11/13/2006 7:01 PM (CST)
Rita,

I hate to be obtuse, but I don't get it. I don't see the connection between the site and the causes. Are you contributing to particular causes? If people start a blog about their pets, are they contributing somehow?

What do you want to convert people to do?

Maybe I'm the only one who is confused, but any more information you could provide would be appreciated.

In summary, I think the site does need something, because it is not obvious what you want people to do beyond creating a blog for their pets.

Kathleen
 
Posted by: jamie Accepted Answer
11/13/2006 8:29 PM (CST)
I agree. You want to have a faster call to action. I am sitting there wondering, what is the catch.

Maybe you are generating an ad-driven business model.

Your cartoons, while cute, are hard to take seriously, but would offer a nice place for children to post items on their pets. Then do a more serious adult verions. Your audience takes itself much more seriously. Cartoons belittle their core vales.
 
Posted by: Rita Wilhelm Author Response
11/13/2006 10:45 PM (CST)
We are working on children books and hope to eventually have a cartoon series. The idea is to impact social change for future generations.

We would like people to become part of PetBoogaloo as a show of support, even if it is not financial. And of course... we want them to take part of Petboogaloo because it is entertaining and fun. We will be highlighting animal and environmental charities and causes throughout the site, so that our characters and the causes they support become 'familiar', and eventually impact social change. (Think of Smoky the Bear).

Our business model is actually similar to that of the The Cherokee Group , but with a focus on being a brand with meaning.
 
Posted by: shghosh Accepted Answer
11/14/2006 3:36 AM (CST)
From that point of view- If you need to make people come over consistently have a forum similar to Mktg profs but on lines of pet care,concerns, training, food habits, recommended brands etc.

Pet brands can pilot on your site and do price tests on your bloggers, offer discounts, get feedback etc before their launch.

Have a pet story corner, with the uploaded pet pics- have a 'pet of the month' photo pic. Use your mascots to hand over the prizes. Make the mascots like the thought leaders in their own animal category.Have the certificates carry the mascots. Start a comic strip also in which viewers can contribute. That will make animal lovers come back and check on their postings, pet of the month, comic strips etc. Your characters are cute and lovable- have options of printing them on t shirts, mugs etc.

For the charities and causes that you wish to support- that needs to be with organisations of repute. If you wish to accept donations make your site secure for credit cards. Also for the past charities/ causes that you have supported make some data available on amount of money donated, people who signed up etc.

As a pet lover i like the site- but currently there is not much that will make me come back here again and again. Pls work on that.
 
Posted by: KathySmithFilms* Member Response
11/14/2006 8:31 AM (CST)
Hi Rita,
Harry Potter got made into a movie only because the teachers in schools are required to put out new books each year and chose that. It became such a hit through the schools first, it was then optioned to films. You could have contests with the kids on how they intend to "Save The Animals" campaign or something creative.

Your site is a good idea. Check out
http://www.neopets.com/
They have made millions and it has
been surveyed. This is a good indicator
that yours too can make millions.
This is marketingProfs Blog that relates to this genre:
http://www.mpdailyfix.com/2006/11/blogging_your_way_to_the_top_o.html

Recently I went to an event at the Directors Guild which was a fundraiser for animals. It had a packed house, booths for a lot of charities and real animals up for adoption. Your cartoons would fit in with charities but in the beginning pick a few to focus on and have each of your various cartoon animals beside the dog or cat that is up for adoption or just got spayed and some success stories from people helping generate more sign ups. I like the above input from shghosh as well. Good luck with
the launch and any tweeking you are doing on the site.
Kathy
 
Posted by: Rita Wilhelm Author Response
11/14/2006 9:48 AM (CST)
Oh man you guys are good! This is EXCELLENT feedback. I'm going to keep this post up just a little longer to see what other discussion may develop. This feedback is wonderful.

Just FYI- I just put up our free 'Pet Award Certificate Maker', http://www.petboogaloo.com/award.html .
I think it will be a fun thing for pets to receive a customized award certificate from Santa with a little treat. (At least it will make good conversation during the holidays). It's a marketing piece that I would like to make viral for this holiday season. I'll be sending out a series of press releases on it.
 
Posted by: skoobie99 Accepted Answer
11/14/2006 10:51 AM (CST)
Rita,

Looking at the web pages, there is definitely a "cuteness" factor there, but I agree with the other posts, there does not seem to be much more than that.

I would urge that you bring your pet characters "to life".
Give them their own web pages, perhaps create a blog for each (warning: this may be a lot of work for the folks behind the website). They can then select their favorites from the correspondence the website receives - e.g. "Jake's selection for dog of the month" (or week). You might want to consider creating "news" stories for your cartoon characters, e.g. "Buckee the horse visits with some wild horses in Wyoming" (or wherever) and of course include some appropriate graphics/images, etc. You want to make them as "real" as you possibly can.

Overall, if you want to keep people coming back to the website often, you will need frequently updated content - lots of it - so you need to put on your thinking cap(s) and get to work.

Hope this helps,
John
 
Posted by: Gunjit Accepted Answer
11/15/2006 3:04 AM (CST)
HI

First of all congrats for putting up a neat site. It looks attractive. When I see it from a creative guy's point of view I may even fall in love with it. Kids would love it too and the blogging may become pretty happening and a beehive of activity too.

But I have serious reservations from one angle. And that is the perspective of someone who wants to donate. If I want to give money for charity I really wanna know where exactly is my money going, what has the money of the others been utilized for, what difference has it made and stuff like that. Your site fails to communicate this info to me!! As a person visiting your site to actually donate, either people cant figure out what you do for the environmental causes or they have to make a lot of effort going through each and every link and then get some hazy info.

My suggestion is that you should dedicated a separate page where you give me all this info. Show me where exactly can I as a person who wants to donate will be making a difference. Provide a link of this page on your main page.

I think this should make a sea difference to your clientele.

Correct me if I am wrong.

Looking for your feedback so that I can make my suggestions more meaningful.

Best of Luck!!
 
Posted by: neshthompson Accepted Answer
11/15/2006 3:14 AM (CST)
Agree with all that has been said before. From a purely web design point of view, I think that you need to do a little more work. The cuteness of the characters and photos in the banner and throughout just seems a little 'home made'. This is not to say that is a bad thing, but if you are looking to make corporate millions by aligning with other companies then perhaps you might have to look a little more professional.

If you look at any example of 'cute' being succesfully employed on the net, you will see that there is a special mix. Usually the cute factor is only sparingly used, assuming of course you are targeting an adult market.

I am a pet owner and I love the idea though.
 
Posted by: Rita Wilhelm Author Response
11/15/2006 8:29 AM (CST)
gunjitjn-

We're actually not set up to take donations. In fact, we never will be taking donations. Instead, what we are going to be doing is highlighting charities that we in turn sponsor on Make The Difference Network (which is actress Jessica Biel's project expected to launch soon). It will be the on Make The Difference Network site, where people make donations to charities. A charity must meet certain minimum requirements such as being around for at least 2 years, publicly posted records, at least 65% of funds going to the cause itself, etc. in order to be accepted onto Make the Difference Network.

So... we are in essense going to drive traffic to MTDN and then directly to specific charities that we have sponsored to be on Make The Difference Network.

So with the 'cuteness' factor, do all of you think I should I be targeting kids instead? The kids of the cultural creatives?
 
Posted by: Frank Hurtte Member Response
11/15/2006 12:08 PM (CST)
your site is not opening -- is there something wrong
 
Posted by: mbarber Accepted Answer
11/15/2006 9:23 PM (CST)
Gidday Rita.

As for wesbite suggestions all that has been offered so far is quite useful.

I'm going to swing things back to your question which was targeting the cultural creatives, an issue that is yet to be addressed by the majority of the respondants here.

You asked for responses based specifically on wanting to target the cultural creatives market.

As someone with an extensive training and application of the Spiral Dynamics model (the model that Ray & Sherry took a great slab of their cues from when putting together 'How 50 Million people are changing the world') as well as being a fan of Richard Florida's work with his tome 'The Rise of the Creative Class' I offer the following:

Your website is targeted at kids who, though perhaps children of cultural creative thinking are NOT cultural creatives themselves. Therefore you'll need to target the parents about how they can do things for the children VIA the pet approach.

Merely tapping into good social causes and donations is NOT of itself an approach to attracting those whose thinking has shifted from the 'greed is good get all you can, surround myself with trappings of success, trinkets, watches cars and shoes' mantra to one that has started to answer the question 'how much is enough and what am I actually contributing to society by being focused on having lots of stuff?'

If you are REALLY wanting to tap the cultural creatives (what in Spiral Dynamics terms is more closely positioned as a shift from level 5 to level 6 thinking) then you need to get your charity driven message more clearly aligned to your pets message.

Your body copy therefore needs a MAJOR improvement.

I'm not sure if the cartoon images do any favours. They come across like you are talking down to people. If they were separated and placed in a part of the site specifically for kids, it'd work and right now I reckon you are treating me like I am stupid. Then again I may not be a cultural creative!

The causes you support - rainforests, wetlands, being the odd one out etc are all worthy causes and your connection to me as an adult is unclear. If you are targeting children as primary target then again your body copy needs improvement and the initial structure would need to be revamped.

Best of luck - nice idea, solid potential, lots of work to do
Marcus :-)
 
Posted by: KathySmithFilms* Accepted Answer
11/16/2006 2:45 PM (CST)
I agree with Marcus--"...cultural creatives, an issue that is yet to be addressed by the majority of the respondants here."

With that being the purpose each critter could explain to the children 1. The Rainforest; 2. Wetlands; 3. House Pets care;
4. The Shelters and the blogs show the character's solution and invite the kids to blog in their own solutions.

You can look at the Youth for Human Rights site for the 30 precepts and read about culture; and another separate book called "Imagine" edited by Marianne Williamson. This would help possibly on structuring any rewrites to empower your characters while now allowing them to talk down to humans. This is only my take. Nothing is intended to take away from the website and projects you are expanding into doing to help.
Kathy
 
Posted by: KathySmithFilms* Member Response
11/17/2006 6:37 AM (CST)
oops...the above is "not" allowing them to talk down to humans. (typo)
 
Posted by: Rita Wilhelm Author Response
11/17/2006 10:34 AM (CST)
Thank you all very much for your help. I am going to take all this feedback, think very seriously about what the brand means to me personally, and move forward from that perspective. From there, I will probably get clarity on whether my main focus is kids (and then what age group), or cultural creatives. Then again, maybe I just need to focus on pet lovers in general.

It is important for me to not only grow a good business, but create a brand that is positive, fun, entertaining, and one that makes a strong social impact in the way we (and future generations) treat our world.

I'm closing out this question. However, if anyone has great feedback for me after the fact, I would love to hear what you have to say. You can contact me at this link:
http://www.petboogaloo.com/contact.html

And... if any of you blog, it would be great if you could let people know about our Pet Award Certificate Maker, in which you can create a custom award certificate for your pet. http://www.petboogaloo.com/award.html


Boogaloo!

Rita
 


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