Fast Food Freaky Friday

What is going on in the world of fast casual dining? Earlier this week, IHOP (the chain breakfast eatery), announced a new marketing campaign, teasing the week before by announcing it was temporarily changing its name to IHOB.

The big reveal was that the “B” stands for … burgers.

Well, that’s not where I thought it was going (bacon, breakfast, blueberries; there are lots of other “b” words that go along with breakfast foods). Of course, that’s not the point. The company is trying to branch out into its other non-breakfast fare, hence the burgers.

Who knows? Maybe they’ll be really good at burgers (or maybe they already are? I just usually get the pancakes, so I don’t know about the other menu items).

What this has led to, at the very least, is an amazing combination of fast food marketing and hilarious social media teams.

Take, for instance, Burger King. Or should we say, Pancake King.

The burger and fries joint – I’m not forgetting about the chicken sandwiches – responded by taking advantage of the hullabaloo and changed its name on Twitter to Pancake King to remind the world that it offers pancakes for breakfast.

Pancakes for burgers, burgers for pancakes. It’s a fast food Freaky Friday!

Burger Pancake King was not the only brand to respond with some savagery on Twitter (As a public service announcement, check out Wendy’s social media work. It’s impressive).

Whatever happens, the temporary name change for IHOP definitely put its name out there and got people talking. Whether or not the burgers are any good, it seems like the restaurant probably met its visibility goals.

Meanwhile, I’ll just stick to the chocolate pancakes. You let me know if you try the burgers.

Survey Shows Small Business Optimism for 2018

Small business entrepreneur

There are any number of things that can derail a small business owner’s dream, particularly external issues that are out of an owner’s control such as an economic downturn, shifting consumer habits, or technology changes rendering products or services outdated.

But small business owners are optimistic, according to a late 2017 survey conducted by Staples. The survey showed 86% of respondents were optimistic and four in five reported that their businesses were thriving or surviving in 2018.

There are business matters that small business owners point to as cause for concern, as outlined in the survey. Those issues include disorganization, tax preparation challenges and a lack of marketing knowledge.

A Staples press release announcing the survey results offer a closer look at the challenges:

Disorganization Kills Productivity

  • 53 percent of thriving/surviving small business owners describe their workplace as very organized, while only 23 percent of struggling/failing small business owners say the same
  • 1 in 3 business owners believe that workplace disorganization leads to less productivity
  • 3 in 4 owners with struggling or failing businesses believe disorganization has affected their company’s productivity

Tax Preparation Challenges

  • More than half of small business owners view tax preparation as complicated
  • Nearly 50 percent of small business owners handle their business’s taxes themselves
  • 2 in 5 believe that leaving tax preparation to the last-minute causes complications
  • Nearly 40 percent are not good with numbers or do not have accounting expertise

Professional Marketing Advice Makes All the Difference

  • More than one third of thriving business owners face challenges designing effective marketing materials for their business
  • Fifty percent do not know how to reach new prospective customers on their own
  • Thriving small businesses are more likely than others to use all forms of marketing; 63 percent of thriving small businesses use social media advertising, 59% use online advertising, and 46 percent use print advertising

Big Winners in the Super Bowl Commercial Game

CommercialsDid you see Eli Manning and Odell Beckham Jr. dancing to the routine from “Dirty Dancing” last night during the Super Bowl’s commercial lineup? Granted, I did not watch the Super Bowl in its entirety, so I missed several of the commercials – but that one might have been my favorite.

I also enjoyed the marketing gusto behind the “It’s a Tide Ad” commercial. Did you have a favorite?

While the actual football game was exciting, the commercials were a mixed bag, with a few bright spots among some duds, per usual.

Forbes has a listing of the top commercial spots, as determined by a new startup that uses opt-in technology to measure actual eyes on the screen and viewer reactions:

TVision’s ranking system uses a score of 100 as a baseline, so numbers higher than 100 represent better than average performance. Here are the top 10 spots that got attention from viewers in the moment when they aired last night during the game. Note how different this list is from the spots that resonated most on social media or in earned media views online.

  1. Bud Light – Bud Knight – 130.8 
  2. E*Trade – This is Getting Old – 123.6
  3. Mountain Dew/Doritos – Doritos Blaze vs Mountain Dew Ice – 116.9
  4. Mission: Impossible – Fallout –  Mission: Impossible – Fallout – 114.2
  5. Avocados from Mexico – #GuacWorld – 113.7
  6. NFL – Touchdown Celebration – 112.4
  7. M&Ms – Human – 112.1
  8. Tide – It’s a Tide Ad –  111.1
  9. Netflix: The Cloverfield Paradox   – The Cloverfield Paradox – 110.9
  10. Amazon – Alexa Loses Her voice – 110.7

TVision also tracks a metric called the Smile Index, using data the observes the facial expressions of its opt-in panel to identify positive emotional responses. So which ads lit up the room? According to the data, it was…

  1. Bud Light –  120.2 on the Smile Index
  2. Avocados from Mexico –  118.8
  3. M&Ms –  117.8
  4. Netflix – Cloverfield – 117.2
  5. E*Trade – 115.2

Emojis Here, Emojis There, Emojis Everywhere … Even in Business?

I was recently working from home when my six-year-old wandered over to the computer to see what I was doing (and to see if she could worm her way into the chair to play games).

“Are you writing an email?” she asked me.

I told her I was posting to our company Facebook page. She doesn’t understand what that means yet, but I knew what her next question would be (and I was right): “Are you going to put an emoji on it?”

I tried to explain what “professional setting” meant. She got bored and walked away.

She knows little of the internet and social media, but she knows email and she knows emojis. And who can blame her? Emojis are fun to use in text messages and emails to your family and friends.

Ironically, a few hours later this article from Forbes caught my eye, “How Emojis Have Made Their Way Into Business :-)”.

Read the full article for a bit of emoji history, but this section was what stuck with me:

Ad technology companies like Emogi and Snaps are at the forefront of using emoji marketing to prove measurable ROI. When IKEA wanted to be top of mind as people discussed shopping for college, they worked with Emogi to create and send custom IKEA stickers to consumers who expressed interest for the brand, talked about going back to school, or used positive emojis.

The campaign was a success: People actively engaged with IKEA’s custom stickers more than 25,000 times and included the custom stickers in college conversations more often than traditional school-related emojis.

Messaging marketing platform Snaps also helps brands manage and measure their emoji and sticker ad campaigns by tracking how emoji usage increases campaign shares and views. “We can show it drives scale and real ROI and that the media buy has been effective,” Christian Brucculeri, CEO of Snaps told Digiday, “A low six-figure investment can deliver millions in media value.”

Emoji ROI? I wouldn’t personally put a lot of stock in using emojis in your everyday business correspondence, but as a social media manager I have indeed used emojis on sporadic, appropriate occasions (mostly on Instagram). I’ll have to keep an eye out for emoji ROI in the future.

(Insert winky face here.)

Winky face emoji businessman

Tech Talk: Getting the Most From Your Marketing Firm

EDITOR’S NOTE: Jim Walton is CEO of Brand Acceleration, Inc., which focuses on economic development marketing. Jim’s tips, however, can apply to all company-marketing partnerships. Learn more at www.brandaccel.com.

After working in the advertising and marketing industry for several decades, I can tell you that there remains a lot of confusion about what a marketing firm or ad agency does. For many, the notion is that such firms are made up of purple-haired, bearded designer types with tattoos and flip-flops. Admittedly, there are some of those, but today’s successful marketing firms offer much more than just design.

So, how do you select a marketing firm? What skills and characteristics do you look for? Once selected, how do you make the partnership work? Here are a few pointers:

It’s a partnership
The first thing the client (economic developer) needs to remember is that it’s a partnership relationship. Great marketing firms work as part of your marketing team, not just as a vendor who is there to take orders and design stuff. They assume an ownership role in you and your community. They’re in it for the long haul.

Think big picture
Great organizations, including economic development organizations (EDO), have a well-thought-out set of goals, setting forth their vision for the community’s future. From the first day, the EDO should get the new marketing firm involved with the visioning, making them part of the team, and sharing the vision. This is not the time to hold back or to be secretive.

The marketing firm should provide depth and counsel
Have you ever hired a designer to create a new brochure or website, just to find that you spend much of your time teaching him or her about economic development? Maybe you even have to do all the copywriting because the designer doesn’t write.

A great marketing firm should know your industry and your audiences as well, or better, than you. Do they know any site selectors or real estate professionals? Have they ever visited c-suite offices or interviewed corporate executives about their expectations of marketing tools? To save yourself a lot of aggravation, seek out a marketing firm that knows your audiences. They should also demonstrate a deep knowledge of marketing principles. From start-to-finish, the marketing firm should know and be able to communicate your story.

Get them involved early and often
Let’s say your organization wants to target the food industry, and you’re considering ways to reach out to people in that industry. From that very moment, that’s when you should get your marketing firm involved. Rather than simply cranking out a food industry brochure, the marketing firm, working as your partner, will help flesh out important considerations and provide ideas for ways to successfully reach the audience with the right message.

Be open to new ideas
Coming off point number four, you should always be open to new and different ideas. A marketing firm with broad experiences may bring you a suggestion that you never considered. They will also offer suggestions that are more in tune with the big picture (point number two).

Cheaper isn’t necessarily better
We are often asked what our hourly rate is, as if a lower rate means a cheaper final product. It doesn’t. If a vendor has a low hourly rate, there’s probably a good reason for that. Instead, you should look for a firm, fixed price that won’t change unless the scope of work changes. That way, you’ll know how much to budget.

What services do they provide, and which ones do you need?
Some agencies offer a very narrow line of services, like web design. Others offer a much broader list, such as media planning and buying, public relations, video production, workforce attraction marketing, event planning and management, etc. It’s unwise to limit yourself by selecting a firm that is unable to grow with your needs.

Be responsive
Working with a marketing firm does not mean that all the burden is on their shoulders. They’re going to need your input to get work done, especially if the work is on a deadline. You’ll be asked to proofread work and answer numerous questions to be sure it meets your expectations. It’s important to respond right away.

By making your marketing firm a trusted partner in your community economic development marketing effort, you’ll have a much greater likelihood of success. Hire the best, and you’ll experience truly positive results.

Voice Searches Taking Over

A recent report by iProspect offers a glimpse into the trends and opportunities regarding paid search marketing.

Google AdWords data showed strong mobile growth in terms of both impressions and clicks. Volume on desktops and tablets, however, was down, indicating an overall decrease in demand for those devices. Cost per click (CPC) increased across all devices, reaching the highest CPC recorded since this report’s inception in 2014. Mobile CPC saw a particularly significant increase, up 40% year-over-year, further closing the gap on desktop.

Voice search is quickly becoming the search method of choice for many consumers, says the report. Today, 500 million people use a voice search-powered digital assistant of some kind, and half of all searches will be voice searches by 2020.

This behavioral shift is ushering in a rise in longer, more conversational queries, causing savvy advertisers to refocus their keyword strategy to ensure it includes question-based keywords such as who, what, when, where, why and how, as well as qualifying phrases such as near me.

Customer Service as Important as Ever

I was at a marketing conference a couple years ago when a presenter asserted that a company’s top marketers are really its customer service people. I found that to be one of these really simple, yet complicated concepts. We are lucky to have a great customer service team in place here at the Chamber, and they are often the face of our organizations both via phone and at our conferences. Fast Company delved into this notion in a recent interview with Thor Muller of San Francisco-based Get Satisfaction:

1. Re-humanizing consumer interactions

For Muller, it is simply not enough that companies use their tools. "We really want people to change their whole approach to what it means to talk to customers," he explained. "For a long time, maybe a hundred years, we’ve been gradually squeezing the humanity out of our interactions; scripting it, automating it, scaling it." Instead of asking people to take a number, "Companies now have to revolve themselves around individuals." Muller noted, adding that in doing so, "we’re making the world a better place, certainly more human!"

2. Elevating the conversation from transactions to aspirations

While traditional customer service is often about addressing transactional issues like resetting passwords, Muller believes that community-driven customer support can go much further. "Customer communities at their best are really tapping people’s deeper goals, their deeper desires," explained Muller. This requires companies to, "rise above writing help documentation and be more of a good cocktail party host." Muller links this change with the new staff post of Community Manager who is part therapist, part help desk and part cruise director.

3. Reducing the costs of the traditional help desk

For years, companies have sought to drive down support costs with automation and the ironic goal of minimizing human interaction with their call centers. Part of the reason Get Satisfaction has grown so quickly is that it flips this notion on its head, increasing human interaction but decreasing costs by making support more peer-to-peer driven. Noted Muller, "we’ve seen with our communities at scale typically reduce the number of [service] tickets that go to [call center] agents by 75% or so." Muller referred me to case histories for Mint.com and Yola, both of which reduced "repetitive support by two thirds."

4. Extending support beyond your website to Facebook

While most companies recognize the need to engage consumers on social media, only the savviest have begun to offer customer support on platforms like Facebook. For these enlightened marketers, Get Satisfaction offers a Facebook application in two distinct versions, "one for enterprises who have a lot more demand for customization/controls and one for everybody else," noted Muller. Having a support tab on Facebook gives fans one more reason to "Like" a brand and get the information and support required to encourage and enable over-the-top evangelism.

5. Turning customer support into searchable content

Given the fundamental importance of search to customer acquisition, finding ways to improve organic search results (SEO) is a top priority for most businesses. That said, few have recognized that content generated via customer communities can do just that. Explained Muller, "somebody asks how they can use a particular camera to take better pictures, that is then indexed by Google and then next person who searches finds that conversation. Get Satisfaction] is taking something that used to be a cost center, customer service, and turning it into lead generation."

6. Listening builds trust in and of itself

Dell famously solicited customer ideas and ended up producing a Linux based laptop that no one bought. This kind of listening and responding is not the ultimate intent of Get Satisfaction. While community members are encouraged to offer ideas, Muller does not advocate, "design by committee" or conclude that the customer is always right. "Even if [a brand doesn’t] build what I want them to build or do what I want them to do, I may be less likely to change to another product because I feel close to them," explained Muller.

7. Integrating customer conversations with your CRM system

Many sophisticated marketers, especially in B2B, rely on well-honed CRM systems to track leads through the funnel. Get Satisfaction allows these companies to take this one step further by connecting the social web with workflow systems, trouble tickets and project management tools. Explained Muller, "Knowing who a customer is, what their buying history is, and what they care about is important to servicing them well." Suddenly a customer complaint becomes "actionable within an organization," given the CRM integration concluded Muller.

8. Measuring C-Sat on both a qualitative and quantitative basis

While some pundits strive to simplify customer satisfaction to one basic metric like Net Promoter, this may not be the ideal approach for your particular business. Having witnessed thousands of customer comments and complaints, Muller encourages clients to take a "more holistic approach" and "measure satisfaction in various ways." Having developed something called a Satisfactometer, that explained Muller, "might be something fun like an emoticon and other times might be something more structured and numeric," Get Satisfaction is delivering both sides of the measurement equation.
 

Canada to Misleading Marketers: Get That Junk Ote-a Here!

I like Canada, and not just because of the walleye fishing. The people are really dang nice. Turns out, they may also have higher standards of decorum than us, too. (Considering the popularity of "Jersey Shore" in America, this shouldn’t exactly blow you away.) PR Daily comments on a Vancouver Sun/PostMedia article:

Note to companies operating in Canada or thinking of expanding north of the 49 parallel: Do like momma told you, and tell the truth.

A whopping 89 percent of Canucks are “very likely” or “somewhat likely” to stop buying a product if advertising around it is untruthful, according to a new poll by the Gandalf Group on behalf of the Canadian Advertising Standards Council.

The study noted that 57 percent of Canadians report having followed through on this promise. Conversely, according to the survey, only 36 percent of Americans claim to have stopped buying a product because of untruthful advertising.

Canadians are also a moderately cynical bunch regarding advertising, only 50 percent said they found most ads to be truthful, a figure that drops dramatically when it comes to political ads.