An “education” in developing a marketing message.

By Steve Fodor

In a posting about a year ago, I said that I don’t believe in focus groups as a research methodology for developing a marketing message strategy. And I still don’t. Focus groups are great for learning about opinions, but are often of little value for finding that emotional “hook” for a message that will connect with your target audience.

For finding and developing a message strategy that will connect with customers, we utilize a technique we call Benefit Galvanizing ^TM. It takes place in a one-on-one setting where a subject is presented with various benefit “statements” that cover a gamut of topics and potential message approaches. Respondents are asked to “react” to each statement (an emotional response) and then rank each statement from most favorable to least favorable (a rational processing of information). That’s precisely how the brain processes information, and it’s why the most effective and memorable marketing messages connect first on an emotional level and then present rational reasons (support).

Recently, we got to practice what we preach. Our local United Way in Marion County, Ohio came to us for help in developing a marketing message to promote education in our community. Though we specialize in business-to-business marketing communications, we’ve been more than glad to help the United Way of Marion County on many occasions over our 25 years in business. Developing a marketing message to promote education is kind of a broad and ambiguous challenge. We needed to find that emotional “hook” that would make a marketing campaign get noticed and connect with students and parents on an emotional level. We’ve always heard things like, “If you don’t work hard at school, you’ll never get a good job.” Or, “If you want a big house and a cool car, you need to work hard in school.”

To some degree, there’s truth in these things we’ve always been told about education. Why, then, don’t more students and parents listen to this seemingly sage advice? Because they’re tuning it out. It’s not connecting. It’s lacking that emotional “hook.” What we found through our Benefit Galvanizing message research is that students and parents really see education as a possession that will provide value over the course of their lives. An education is something no one can ever take away. Education represents hope in an ever-increasingly uncertain world. It’s so much more than just getting “a good job” or obtaining personal possessions. Really, education is something that’s yours. For life.

We’re about to launch this campaign in Marion, Ohio. As far as we know, Marion, Ohio is the only community to combine both programmatic and marketing strategies to help improve educational performance. This is an incredibly worthy cause, and we’re proud to be associated with it.

Education. Yours. For Life. is copyright and logo is registered trademark of Badertscher Communications, Inc.

Old Media Marketing for New Media

by Steve Fodor

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Media in any form is just a tool to deliver a message. Audiences, regardless of the medium, will not be persuaded unless your message is motivating in some way. New social mediums have such tremendous applications. But, I still think the marketing messages in these new mediums could learn some tricks from the “old dogs” like print.

Before you jump to the allure of a social media strategy, think about how you need to craft your message. Here are some thought starters:

Put a face on your brand – People do not relate to faceless bureaucracies. People relate to people with likable personalities. That’s how people relate to brands, too. Testimonials from customers or from employees can bring your brand to life in social media video applications and give your brand a unique appeal.

Demonstrations sell – If your product has some unique functionality or features, social media video applications can be almost like a trade show demonstration, 24/7. Think about production values, music, lighting and how to tell your story with words, pictures and entertainment. It’s usually difficult to hold a viewer’s attention for very long, so think about telling your story with multiple, segmented videos that are singular in focus.

Brand empathy – Brand loyalty comes from a demonstration of understanding. When a brand demonstrates that “it knows what you’re going through,” you’re more inclined to see that brand in a more credible light. This is especially true for B2B marketers, where selling propositions need to be framed into a business case. White papers on your Web site and blogs are great ways to provide branded content, demonstrate a focused customer understanding and add credibility to your brand proposition.

Promise a reward – Sweepstakes, trial offers, contests, free trials. All are great techniques for generating leads. Not only do these sorts of things promote sales, they provide ways to measure online banner advertising, Twitter and Facebook campaigns so you can learn and adjust your message and media over time.

For many, the allure of social media is that the media is “free.” That’s especially appealing in today’s economy. But “free” doesn’t mean that you can skip the thought process and generate messages without a strategic foundation or a brand vision. If you don’t give thought to your message strategy in the so-called “free” social media space, you’ll get just what you paid for.

Flickr Photo Credits: me'nthedogs

Stand For Something

by Steve Fodor

A colleague of mine likes to say, “If you needed to have brain surgery done, you wouldn’t go to a general practice doctor.”

The same is true when it comes to positioning your business and how you go to market. If you don’t stand for something specific and own it, or, if you try to be too broad in your positioning, you end up standing for nothing in the minds of prospects and customers.

Positioning is the discipline of making trade-offs. And I say “discipline” because it is hard to focus your marketing message and positioning. But, as Bill Cosby once said, “The surest way to fail is to try to be all things to all people.”

Defining what you do best (or the two or three things you do best and can own) requires you to take a hard look at yourself and have insight into what the unmet needs are in your category. What makes you unique? Will this motivate customers? Will this render the competition helpless? Not only is this a critical business strategy, but think about how people find information today. In many cases, their first avenue is to enter some words into Google. If you’re not presenting your information in a specific, well-defined and positioned way, you’re probably not going to be high on the search page.

Today’s consumers and buyers have way, way more choices than they did just a decade ago. If you don’t stand for something specific, own a relevant position and stand out in a unique way, you’re just another commodity. And if you’re a commodity, you’ll always be forced to compete on price. That’s not the most enjoyable position to own.

Flickr Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mistressf/