Sales persons are key to strategy

Many times I have felt a disconnection between the people that design and decide a strategy and the sales persons, who are the latest link in the execution chain of that strategy and, typically, are the also the ones that are closer to the market, getting first hand feedback from what has been decided and executed.

The latest HBR article on "Putting Sales at the Center of Strategy" highlights it, stating that only 10% of companies' strategies are effectively deployed and that there is a huge gap on delivery versus objectives. The lack of awareness of the company-customer interface, of what is usually referred to "what needs to get done to sell" is one of the most compelling reasons for this. 

The Sales function is one without excuses, as a former sales person (and current marketing director of Swatch) once told me - "Whether you make or you don't, there aren't excuses". It is also the face company to their direct customers, the ones who are closer to the market and that get more direct, many times first-hand feedback. It is, thus, key to ensure a strategy works out and to fine tune it quickly when needed (and believe me, there is no strategy that resists wholly to contact with the market reality).

That means a strategy will only work if it is properly communicated to Sales - and not only at top level, but also to the sales persons that engage directly with customers. It was one of the great lessons I took from my first years as a brand manager - make sure that the people that will be selling your products know what these products are and mean, and what is your overall strategy for your portfolio. Repeat, repeat, repeat - engage when you are talking at sales conferences, but also individually, with a coffee in your hand. And remember that you are talking with experience people - Sales will typically listen, suggest, challenge based on their experience, and it is a wise move to listen and to make the adjustments that then you think are needed. 

Also, remember how you are intending to generate profitable growth, and  operationalize the sales factors that affect it. This means that you need to provide clarity on areas like which customers should the company be focusing on, how to maximize profits (revenues but also cost of engagement) with them, what behaviours you want to drive when the company is contacting the market, which products of the portfolio and how and when do you what to drive (some products are create to create volume to a customer, but then others might follow suit to generate profitability), payment terms... You also need to ensure you have a number of tools that support and direct the Sales teams on effectively deploying your strategy - reward systems, feedbacking and communication tools, portfolio knowledge, visibility of competition, insights and strategy of customers,...

The HBR article ends up with a curious quote from Sam Walton "There ain't many customers at headquarters". So, remember to put yourself on the Sales teams' shoes to understand them, communicate and support them on your strategy and listen to them - they will often carry the whispers of customers to the headquarters... but also your whispers to the market.

The rule of the multipliers

When we are talking about multipliers in a social media context we are referring to the number of times a message will be made visible to other users in the network. If you post a message on Facebook, that message will spread out and be visible in a number of walls / timelines of people that follow your company (or yourself) and friends of friends. Easy.

Now, as you can imagine, the multipliers are controlled by the social media company. It is enclosed in their social algorithm. And the algorithm (and multiplier) that serves a social media when it is in its early stages of business and is searching the gain penetration and show relevance to its future consumers (and customers) is very different to the one of a social media company that is already established and is trying to generate turnover by doing business - namely when that business also comes from selling "promote your message" products. Like Facebook. Or Google+. Or Youtube. These companies have already changed their multipliers to ensure the messages or videos users / companies post reach a much smaller number of viewers then did some years ago.

So, what I am saying here is really simple. The days in which you could post a business message on a social media and expect it to easily generate buzz for free are gone - to get those figures you have to pay. Even the campaigns that have generated more word of mouth in the last 3 years (and I am thinking about campaigns of brands like Old Spice and Axe) have relied in 90%+ of paid content to generate their buzz.

But, after all, we all know that there are no free lunches, right?

How to make sure your Customer Service disappoints you

One of the most disappointing experiences I ever had as a consumer was with a careline. The thing is… when you call customer service with a technical problem from the service you bought, you expect it to be sorted out. Not to be closed with a voice message asking you to call back at 8am! Companies need to understand that carelines are the last barrier to save a consumer experience that is probably going very bad. If a consumer calls, that is the last chance you have to save that person as a customer of your business – and, if he is a valuable customer, you should do your utmost to solve out the issue and keep him / her happy.

And how about Vine?

For those who have been distracted, Vine is a 6 seconds video app for iOS (and now for Android as well) that is the now running strongly on Twitter - despite being only a couple of months old. It is quick, focused and then it goes away - clearly aligned with the short attention that most consumers pay to social networks' news or tweets (for one second, it is really important, but then it just fads away).

And it is a new tool to engage consumers. With some good challenges. Of course Vine is basically part of Twitter, so it uses its 500 million users and segmentation to carry on the message. But, how to pass it on? The problem is that the core of the tool is how short and impactful it is - messages need to be really focused, and banners, pre-videos or anything else is simply not allowed (it would ruin the purpose the consumer is looking at that vine video). The logic answer is that the ad needs to be the vine on itself. You can complement with some words on the tweet that goes along with it, to create interest or context, but you will have to concentrate your key message (and branding) in those 6 seconds - a kind of animated business card message / elevator speech with your consumer. A 6 secs concise, focused message. If you are not able to pass it on 6 secs, you will accomplish nothing in Vine.

Of course, then you can be creative on how to use it - who will receive it, how will you integrate it in a bigger campaign (I hope you have already understand I only talk about integrated marketing, no single tool is magic to reach your consumer), ask consumers to do their own vines for your brands, geo-locate it with Twitter tools, bla bla bla. But the secrete to this will be to drive a concise, engaging, branded message in 6 secs. If you want to ride on social media biggest hype, you will need to accept the challenge!

https://vine.co/

http://adage.com/article/digitalnext/ways-brands-twitter-s-vine-app/239775/

http://mashable.com/2013/01/28/twitter-videoads-are-here/

YouTube Trendsmap

I only know it for the US, but it is still a very cool tool. YouTube has a trends map, that allows you to understand which videos are the most viewed across the US, with a gender and an age group breakdown. A very useful tool to ensure you are updated about what consumer says it is going on - and, hence, what is actually going on!

http://www.youtube.com/trendsmap

The one thing that makes memorable campaigns

Insights! That's what makes great ads - the thing that makes consumer tingle, that assures the brands are communicating to them, specifically, that the brand understands them. I don't remember a single campaign that was not based on a powerful insight, one that reveals, inspires, makes us dream or simply puts us eyes on eyes with ourselves.

And that is what I really like about these two (very different) FMCG campaigns:

2-ways communication

Advertising is changing. Fast! We all know that - 10 years ago online communication was still residual, Facebook didn't exist, nobody realised what Google was doing and mobile phones were used for calls. The world is changing and, naturally, so is advertising. Everybody knows that! But sometimes, I think an important part of the change goes unnoticed to too many people.

Many people still think of digital and mobile communication as a media to reach a target. And they are right! But there is one important dimension that is at least as important. Digital and mobile is unique not because you are communicating in new spaces in consumer lifes, but because it is not only about communication - it is about interaction!

And now, most of the people say, "But my Facebook / G+ / Twitter account is run by professionals and they ensure that all messages that consumers sent us are answered". Good! But not enough! That's not what I am talking about.

When consumers get your digital communication, they have actions. They will click on the ad, play with your games, use your apps, respond to your messages on Twitter. And that generates information. Valuable information. That tells you about your communication, your products, your brands, your consumers. And that  allows you (if you have the right setups, if you are ready for it), to adapt and evolve. You can decide to increase the weight of one of your commercials on the TV mix based on Twitter conversations, you may decide to promote a specific product in an area because you understand your consumer in that specific area is becoming more curious about it, you may adjust your prices to allow easier bundling in online shopping. The world is less and less static, and advertising should be flexible and quick to react - digital is all about that, is all about listening to the feedback and adapt.

But you need to make sure your frameworks are right for that. First, you need to make sure that you have the right tools to listen to that feedback. Consumers generate terabytes of information when interacting with your campaigns, brands and products and you need to have a way to listen and capture that interaction. So, make you have access to that information. Then, remember that consumer feedback should not be restricted to specific niches in your advertising work (like the agencies), but it should flow throughout the organization, fueling itself further and further - just think of the possibilities you have once you ensure your consumer research department starts seeing information flowing from target reactions online. And then you need to make sure that your setup is so flexible to answer fast, to react quickly. These steps are not easy, they may even imply that you need to adjust or change your organization, but it is the only way to compete in a world where digital communication is cornerstone.

Marketing is all about understanding consumers and satisfying their needs. Digital interaction is actually giving us the opportunity to shorten the cycle on 2-ways communication. You can almost see it happening real time. It is very close to the marketeer dream / nightmare (because it implies that you really need to be listening all the time to consumers and quickly adjust to their feedback). I usually use the tennis analogy of the receiver, waiting for the serve, that needs to be quick enough to understand where the ball is going and how to get it back over the net and in court - fast perception and quick, balanced reaction. And that is the game we should all be playing now with our targets, through digital.