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...but they still have the ability to piss off random people, and people still (mentally) mark it as junk.
Some fun facts about SPAM:
SPAM is not just digital.
SPAM was around before the Internet.
SPAM will be around after the Internet.
Probably the most frustrating thing about SPAM is that people usually know when they are SPAMMING someone.
They also know that it will be fairly ineffective. SPAM artists rely on sending out en masse and hope for a (usually tiny) percentage of people to buy
Is your marketing goal to avoid the SPAM folder or is it to actually engage, enlighten, and perhaps sell something?
Thanks to FedEx/Kinkos for this poster that inspired me to think about SPAM. It makes me wonder why they sent this message on a poster and not on a flyer. Probably because I would have marked it as SPAM.
While perusing Twitter the other day, I found an "alarming" fact that I'll paraphrase here: "One of the world's largest brands publicly announced that it would rather drive traffic to their Facebook page than their web page."
Gasp!
I followed up with the Tweeter to no avail, so who knows if it's true or not. Regardless, let me talk about why this isn't (or wouldn't be) so shocking after all.
Why would you, as a brand, want to get more hits on your Facebook page rather than your website? 1. Facebook Gives You A Captive Audience
Having an active Facebook page is your opportunity to have a captive audience tuned into your "channel." Sure there are comparable solutions in the web world; you can gauge your analytics; you can see how many unique visitors are on your website everyday; you can even create a Feedburner account to see how many subscribers you have. Unfortunately all of this data provides faceless numbers and zero opportunity to really know who your fans are.
The benefit of having Facebook "fans" is knowing that at any given moment you can broadcast a message that you know will reach your audience. The results are near-instantaneous: If your message fails, you know immediately. 2. Facebook Gives You An Open Forum (if you want it)
The key to reaching your audience on Facebook is message portability. Not only are you reaching a captive audience, but they have the power easily share your message throughout their base. This is a bit more difficult to achieve from your website.
Furthermore, having "likes" on your Facebook page gives your fans an opportunity to communicate with each other. You might notice a bigger opportunity: the forum is your opportunity to communicate directly to your fan-base.
I mean this in the most personal sense. Websites are generally used for sweeping statements and basic info. With a Facebook page you can respond directly to your fans' needs.
3. Facebook Gives You The Ability To Show Your Fans That Your Message Is Worthwhile
Perhaps you gained a fan because they like your product, restaurant, or store. On a whim they tuned into your channel. That doesn't mean that they will stay. This is your chance to prove that your messages are worth hearing. You can do this by offering a great deal once a week or maybe just by being genuinely engaging.(Actually, both is a nice approach!)
The great thing is that actively maintaining your Facebook page puts you in a more active role in front of your audience. Instead of relying on updating your website once a quarter and updating your blog once a month, you end up on the frontlines with your fans. Before you say "Well my webmaster said he can make all of that happen on my website with a couple of simple design changes and a few widgets!" Think about it. Websites are great and they remain a very needed tool in your brand marketing. But to deny the fact that web audiences are spending a humongous amount of time staying on Facebook is to deny yourself an opportunity to really reach those people. Join Render Perfect on Facebook!
"Please just delete the message if you do not want it" -actual message from a Facebook spammer
The words Social Media tend to conjure up images of birds chirping, tweet-ups, keeping up with grandma, and perhaps happily drumming up more customers for your business. But let's not forget the golden rule of communication on a mass-level: your message has to be wanted. It's a bit confusing that while a ton of people are up in arms about the ever-changing Facebook privacy policy, I hear few people complaining about the easily-abused message system within Facebook.
Let's say, I am a SPAMMER (most people will picture a brooding ominous figure ala Dr. Claw, but in this case let's picture the SPAMMER as a well-meaning yet tasteless event marketer.) I create an event that I think is really cool and I want everyone to know about. I invite all of my friends, and perhaps encourage a few close friends to invite all of their friends as well. I then, very quickly, have 1000 or more people invited to my event. Here's where the fun starts. I can now send ALL invitees a message, over and over again.
Is there a way to stop getting these messages? Sure, but its not as simple as just hitting UNSUBSCRIBE. You have to navigate to the event and remove yourself from the event manually. That doesn't mean I can't throw you back on the list whenever I want to.
What's the lesson here? Well, nothing really. As long as there are popular forums for mass communication, there will always be those folks who choose to ignore permission-based marketing and abuse the system. But my prediction is that it is not the privacy policy, or the ever-present rumor that Facebook will someday charge a fee that will kill the popular sharing site. Rather it's these tiny loopholes that allow marketers to easily abuse the system that will have people leaving in droves. People navigated away from Myspace because it was way too easy for bands and everyone else to SPAM them. It's only a matter of time before Myspace's spammers move aggressively to where the audience is.
Here's a Zen question that keeps me up at night: Has subversive gone mainstream, or is the new mainstream just more subversive? Since I tend to talk alot about video advertising on this blog you might already see where I'm heading.
Film buffs in the Baltimore-Washington area might remember a small film festival called MicroCineFest. MicroCineFest was a small 5-day fest located in Baltimore's Hampden neighborhood and it featured some of the craziest, most extreme, and subversive videos on Earth. Remember, these were the days before YouTube (BYT), so people would come from far and wide to check out some insanely creative videos.
I was very into the programming at MicroCineFest. It was challenging. As a videomaker it made me wonder: If this is the film subgenre I am into, how could I ever be able to put this to work? In other words, this seemingly unmarketable subgenre of film was fine for the arthouse, but could it ever break out?
Well here we are roughly 10 years later. YouTube dominates the web (and television for that matter). Film festivals of any kind seem somewhat passe. And commercials like this can be found running during primetime on national channels:
What happened? It's like all the filmmakers who made those crazy MicroCineFest films got real jobs and convinced huge companies to try something boldly different. Not only that, but it's working. I personally heard a huge buzz about these commercials from friends before actually seeing them. And just recently, I was alarmed to find my friend proudly displaying his collection of various Old Spice products.
The video is doing quite well online too. With nearly 4 million views, the majority of comments read like this:
"that was @#$%ingepic sweet vid"
"Second commercial to convince me to buy a product. First was the last Old Spice one, man on a horse."
and the comment that really hits the nail on the head:
"It's asif they wanted the commercials to become viral videos that we would love and give millions of hits. Good job!"
So I guess the answer to my question is the latter. With a variety of equally popular media outlets available for distribution, there is no longer a mainstream for media consumption. In turn, the mainstream messages must get more subversive to accomodate each. Successful campaigns are not created by pushing a variety of mediocre messages through one premium outlet but rather spreading one highly-contagious message over a variety of outlets.
Ever since there have been products and services worth talking about, word-of-mouth has always been the "Holy Grail" of marketing. Developing effective word-of-mouth is elusive in nature, but critical to the success of a business. It is hard work to create and maintain word-of-mouth, but once you have a good core group of customer evangelists out there preaching the good word of your company's product or service, there is nothing more powerful.
In order for your company to further empower its customer evangelists, you must make it easy for them to spread their positive word-of-mouth endorsement of your brand. Employing a short promotional web video to create a compelling and highly-portable message is a perfect tool to build word-of-mouth about your company.
Creating a short promotional video that highlights a word-of-mouth endorsement from your existing customers can be extremely effective. These messages can be created and distributed to your word-of-mouth influencers in the form of web links, embedded Flash video (see MultiSite®) or a posting on YouTube or other video sites.
It is important that the messages developed to support word-of-mouth campaigns include two key characteristics:
Be sure to include a strong call-to-action
Tie in your call to action with an incentive-based promotion
You need to capitalize on the momentum that your word-of-mouth influencer is providing, and you need to provide an added value within your message's call-to-action in order for your word-of-mouth influencer to be perceived as not only providing good advice but also providing a value or savings.
This value-added component is key to the success of this style of marketing. It can be a coupon code, percentage-based discount, or even a free giveaway. It is important to reward your word-of-mouth influencer for assisting you in your marketing effort.
So work hard on building your organization’s brand. Target those individuals that can become powerful word-of-mouth marketing partners and support them every step of the way.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010 at 1:36PM 
...but they still have the ability to piss off random people, and people still (mentally) mark it as junk.