Question

Topic: E-Marketing

Blogs And Youtube

Posted by Anonymous on 10/5/2006 at 12:59 AM ET 250 Points
I need some help.
I hate buzzwords.
I work on the internet for a financial services company.
Every expert is preaching about viral marketing programs, the power of blogs and sites like Youtube.com.
But short of creating a commercial in which I launch a Mentos with Diet Coke or shoot a bottle rocket out of my rear, I am at a loss for how this can help me.
I see blogging as just another online newsletter. My industry already has plenty of those.
Maybe I am just out of touch. I welcome creative ideas on how I can use these two tactics in my next marketing plan.
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RESPONSES

  • Posted by steven.alker on 10/5/2006 at 4:16 AM Accepted
    Don’t you just love the “New”, the “Must have”, the “Happening” in marketing, to which, of course, we must all subscribe, endorse and participate in. How do you sell the banal, “It’s just an online newsletter” as exciting, new and improved? The latter despite the fact that one of our members pointed out that if it’s new it can’t be improved!

    The answer is with language. To describe a marketing idea within a company, you need to be really, really earnest about it. Buzz words abound such as passionate and 24/7 and audience participation. How do you sell an idea into a company? More of the above but done earnestly as well, as though you believe it to the last ounce of your soul.

    You are in my mind totally correct, but you are in danger of being the kid who tells the Emperor that he has no clothes. In the legend, he got away with it because of his innocence. Everyone else had their bo**ocks cut off.

    Whilst blogging is new, it will have a novelty appeal, if and only if it can be noticed. So go ahead with your idea – I used to be a Chemist, so I’ll contribute the rocket fuel formula. At least it’s still legal to do that in the States!

    Seriously, you do a blog because everyone else in your business is doing one, or you do a blog because no one in your business is doing one (Say this earnestly, “You will gain leverage through presentational differentiation”) unfortunately, you get to choose!

    Unless you can get people to read it (Back to your rocket-up-the-backside) it is of little purpose.

    Being really anarchic, what I like to do is to revert to a marketing technology which has gone out of fashion by some years. So when my clients were receiving a sack-load of laser printed envelopes with mail-merged letters, mine got hand written envelopes with notes in them written in a legible hand, with a fountain pen. Now that they all get HTML email newsletters with flash graphics, mine get personalised text emails which look as though I typed them on an old Remington. Watch this space – the next one I’ve promised to do is to use Cuneiform wax tablets, written in Latin, but with a translation.

    You sound brave. Please continue to be so and good luck.


    Steve Alker
    Unimax Solutions
  • Posted by Harry Hallman on 10/5/2006 at 7:19 AM Member
    First I think it is important to realize that viral marketing, blogs, social networking marketing and "Youtube" (user content) marketing while possible "buzzwords" are still valid ways for some firms to market. They are based on very traditional methods but using a new medium. After all Television was a buzzword once.

    Viral marketing is just word of mouth advertising, but at the speed of light.

    Blogs are, as you said akin to newsletters, but with one major difference. It is interactive. People get to comment to you and that is valuable. Also blogs are much easier to keep up to date since they tend to short ideas. Blogs are Customer Education.

    Social Network Marketing is target marketing, but in the case of Myspace it puts a whole lot of people (targeted people) in your range. And there are plenty more social networks being formed everyday. One could work for you. Once again you get input from your targets.

    "Youtube" or user content marketing isn't for everybody, but it works very well for promotions and it gives the target prospects an interactive forum, which means it helps you understand them better. And, of course, user content can be very “viral” (WOM).

    The common themes with all of these media are the spreading of valuable or interesting information and interaction with your customers and prospects. They may not be for every company. That’s for each to decide.
  • Posted by Frank Hurtte on 10/5/2006 at 9:49 AM Accepted
    I am working with a couple of businesses to promote their companies via myspace..(first) and utube (later). Here are a couple of points for the discussion...
    1) you do not reach the entire market through myspace or utube.. You are slicing out a very narrow piece of the pie. the slice consists of the 18-25 year old market and a small piece of the 25-35 market... Guys like me who know about myspace, facebook, and utube are noise in the system
    2) you need to have a special message for this market - different than the total market but not inconsistent with the message used elsewhere -
    3) you can experiment for nearly free
    4) the message needs to be thought out but pilot are free (see 3)
    none of this is new stuff...

    And, I agree with Steve... All of this "must have", "NEW", Viral marketing stuff is really just a good hype for us to harvest money from. Case in point, in 1973 I used a series of free personal ad messages in a local newspaper to drive new business to a hot dog joint my girlfriend and I worked at. If I had been a marketing guru... I would have named it, written a book, and your boss would have been asking you to put together an r-rated ad campaign in the personals.
  • Posted by Ann H. on 10/5/2006 at 9:58 AM Moderator
    Great responses, all. Here are some more ideas, set forth by MarketingProfs writer Mario Sundar. Here, he points to examples of some pretty creative corporate applications for video...like demos, training, customer videos:

    When YouTube Met Corporate America
    https://www.mpdailyfix.com/2006/10/when_youtube_met_corporate_ame.html
  • Posted by jpoyer on 10/5/2006 at 4:11 PM Accepted
    Just a note: I believe blogs also help with SERP rankings. It's like giving a double dose of your message: one for the regular search and one from the blog realm.

    Although, I think the rocket thing just might work.

    Best,

    Jennifer
    XPRT Creative
  • Posted on 10/5/2006 at 9:59 PM Author
    Thanks to everyone for the great discussion.
    I value all of your input.
    It just goes to show you that a tactical approach based on the latest buzzword doesn't necessarily match everyone' s overall marketing strategy.
  • Posted by steven.alker on 10/6/2006 at 5:15 AM Member
    Dear Scott

    Thanks for your kind words.

    The safe fuel for a rocket is a mixture of powdered zinc and sulphur (Whoops! That’s me on the MI6 and CIA investigation list, but the formulation is actually from a1960’s American school text book)

    A much safer method, but not necessarily safer for the launcher’s rear-end is to take a carbonated drinks bottle, fit it with a bursting diaphragm and fill it with a slow release mixture of a carbonate salt and something acidic to the low end of the pH scale. Insert in the said orifice and wait.

    The person who is being used as the launch-pad should be fully insured by BUPA or similar and if this is done in the UK, a risk assessment must be carried out to fulfil the requirements of the Health and Safety Executive.

    That apart, I do hope that the more sensible contributions have helped you to define your position regarding Bloggs!

    Regards

    Steve Alker
    Unimax Solutions
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