Thursday 28 February 2008

Another way through the line

It looks as if someone has managed to create a single platform for analysing both on- and off-line customer activity, and then turning that data into effective media-neutral marketing activity. Huge step forward. It's no accident, they've been working on it for two years. Will be fascinating to see how it develops.

One of the early challenges is going to be how to describe it to a client or prospect. You can't call it CRM because that's become meaningless now; it's a lot more than 'web analytics' or 'modelling'; 'campaign management' also sells it short. Here's a suggestion - Integrated Customer View Marketing (or ICVM).

For a bit more detail, take a look at http://www.talkingnumbersmagellan.com/index.html

Tuesday 19 February 2008

Inertia, and word of mouth

Interesting insights yesterday from a conversation with a lady who has just moved her home insurance policy after more than 25 years. Why now, I wondered?

Well, she has been thinking about it for a few years, because the price keeps going up, but each time she got round to looking at the policy, it had already passed its renewal date. This time, some friends told her how much money they had saved by changing.

She read the policy, decided that there were a lot of things that she didn’t need (for example £5,000 cover for home entertainment equipment), made some comparisons, and switched to another insurer for half the price. When she called to cancel her original policy, the company told her that they had a range of offers which could save her a lot of money. This simply confirmed her decision to move, since, as she pointed out, they had never bothered to tell her about these money-saving offers before.

What can I learn from this:

1. Inertia, and the comparative difficulty of making a change, continue to be strong influences on decision-making (has any insurance company tried a two-year policy, or 18 months, to take advantage of this?).
2. The influence of friends is so powerful, especially when it is spontaneous and where the friend is just being friendly, with no axe to grind or product to sell (and of course it’s pure coincidence that the company this lady now insures with, is the same one that her friends first mentioned)
3. Beware the product features that you turn into benefits – the cover for ‘home entertainment’ might be a benefit for some customers, but others can see it as something they are paying for that they don’t need
4. Amazingly, companies are still putting existing customers at a disadvantage compared to new ones. In a world where so much information is available so quickly (in the UK financial world, look at information exchanges like http://www.moneysavingexpert.com, or to the consumer champion Which? http://www.which.co.uk), it’s just bizarre that we still think this is sustainable.
5. Isn’t it interesting how much you can learn by listening to people?

Oh, and the company that used to insure this lady’s house? Northern Rock.

Wednesday 13 February 2008

Silos

A very large and successful global organisation is wasting untold amounts of money, creating ill-will amongst its customers and prospects, and helping to perpetuate the bad news stories about poorly-targeted marketing. And it would be so easy to fix.

It’s good practice and common sense, when preparing a direct mail campaign, to check the mailing data against reliable suppression files to remove known goneaways and deceased records. There is a cost for running the suppressions, but it’s substantially less than the cost of producing the pack and then posting it unnecessarily.

In this case though, the marketing department does not hold the budget for postage. They are responsible for the creative and production costs, but not the cost of getting it to the consumer. If they run a suppression, then the cost comes off their marketing budget. So guess what, they don’t run suppressions, because it means they can ‘do more marketing’.

I hardly know where to begin.

They are deliberately sending out marketing communcations to some people who definitely don’t live there any more. They are perpetuating all the bad news stories about mailing dead people. They are wasting the company’s money and its reputation.

The company is getting exactly what it measures – more cost-effective campaigns … as long as you measure ‘cost-effectiveness’ as the cost of production, not cost of response, cost of reputation, or cost to the customer service centre of dealing with the fall-out from the distressed bereaved.

What sort of culture must there be in an organisation that prevents the marketing, data or customer service team from doing the right thing? What sort of message does this behaviour give to the rest of the business?

I wish I knew how to find the person in this organisation who has the authority to put it right.

Tuesday 12 February 2008

The first 100 days

Why 100? Why not 76? Or 83? 100 is a nice round number, that’s why. If history had decided on a different global numbering system, then maybe it would be the first 100001 days (which in fairness, is quite round too, although – I think – it’s 65 in binary).

Anyway, the first hundred days. It’s often mentioned in the context of new presidents or prime ministers, or to focus attention on the crucial early stages of an acquisition, a relaunch, a merger, or a turnaround. The implication is that whatever this new thing is, it’s going to make a big impact quickly, and generate sufficient inertia to drive through the rest of its implementation.

Impact and inertia, says Newton, are functions of mass and energy. Those first hundred days often fizzle with the enthusiasm and drive of the new team, the new idea. Then reality and detail bite (look at Gordon Brown’s regime, hit by flood, bombing and disease in very short order), and the energy dissipates.

Just think what you could achieve if you could retain the passion of the first however-many days.

Well of course you can. Those first days were just a convenient construct. You’ve chosen to believe that those three months are the key ones and that everything gets harder thereafter. So, as NLP will tell you, you will prove yourself right.

So here’s a thought. Pick a different number. After your first new number of days, decide that you will now have a second set, where you will have just as much energy and enthusiasm. Then a third. Change the number and have a fourth. Of course you need to look after the reality and the detail, that’s not going to change. The bit you probably can change, is to keep making an impact, and maintain the energy that led you to start the thing in the first place.

Note added 14th February: see the inestimable Seth Godin's thoughts on what happens to new organisations and new projects: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2008/02/soggy.html

Call signs

On a train this morning, a mobile phone rings. There is a collective intake of breath. The ring tone is the unmistakeable sound of a hunting horn.

The sound has lasted no longer than it takes to remove a handset from a handbag. In that time, forty people have formed their opinion about the owner of the phone. It’s a polarising sound – some thinking “one of us”, others thinking “one of them”, and not everyone thinking nice thoughts about hunting and hunters. Guessing from the age and dress of the owner, I’d say they just thought it was a helpfully distinctive ringtone.

How good would it be if you could position yourself or your brand with such speed and economy of effort? That’s why so many television adverts use well-known music as a backing, as a carrier for the idea. It’s why television stations spend so much money on station idents. Yet the ident doesn’t mean anything until it has had time to build its own story.

What sound could you use to support and explain your brand? What’s your ringtone?

Wednesday 6 February 2008

A multi-channel world

Led a thoroughly enjoyable brainstorm session today. The starting point was to find ways of using data, personalisation, and variable digital printing, to maximise the value of customers of a new service www.which.co.uk/digitalstore, and as a result generate additional digital print output.

Lots of good ideas resulted. It took a while to realise that they were all data-based marketing ideas, entirely independent of the medium. It’s up to the customer to decide how they want the messages delivered. It’s up to us to give them the choice.

It’s a tough environment for a service provider that’s wedded to single channels.

Tuesday 5 February 2008

Multi-site businesses

Running a business on multiple sites creates extra work for the senior management team, and for the boss. Everyone knows this.

What most people forget, is just how much extra work it creates. When different sites have their own history, it’s harder still.

The extra work isn’t so much difficult, as time-consuming. It involves travelling, and talking to people, and sometimes just being there, and being seen. In fact it’s so straightforward that it can be tempting to think it’s not really necessary.

Well, from what I’ve seen, if you want a single company with a single company culture, and a common sense of purpose, there is no short-cut. Plan your travel now. And find someone to manage your desk and your diary.

Monday 4 February 2008

A good business face

Fascinating research summarised in last week’s 'Economist’ http://www.economist.com/science/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10559771 suggests you can judge the success of a company from the look of the CEO. If a CEO just looks competent, dominant, likeable, trustworthy, and adult, then their company is likely to be more successful. Go on, make those judgements yourself today. Look at your own organisation’s leader. Does he/she look as if they would be any good at running the company? Avoid all the agendas you have (the same research showed that it doesn't work if you assess their personality), and just look.

A couple of questions follow:

1. Does a CEO’s face change to match the fortune’s of the company?
2. If you plan to be a CEO, do you have the face for it?

Friday 1 February 2008

Where's the value in recruitment?

Most recruitment companies talk about their knowledge of a market, of who the good people are. And of course, they always promise to interview candidates first.

It's no surprise that the reality is different. So many people, so many cvs, so easy for a desparate candidate to send inappropriate and irrelevant applications. No wonder if recruiters find short-cuts, look for the obvious candidates, and move on to the next assignment.

So where's the value?

Is it too obvious to suggest that the value is disappearing, and that the majority of recruitment is becoming transactional, a simple commodity? If so, then the online recruitment sites are the way to go. Look at ozzle for example http://www.ozzle.co.uk/ - it specialises in a specific area (print and packaging), it provides a link between candidates and prospective employers, and the fees are fixed based on the use of the site rather than on the candidate's salary. It just works.

There are, of course, some wonderful recruitment companies, companies who really do interpret cvs, and listen to candidates, working out the best fit and best potential for their clients (try David Abbott and Partners http://www.david-abbott.com/, Direct Experience http://www.direxp.co.uk/ or The Talent Business http://www.thetalentbusiness.com/, as three good examples).

Thing is, how do you tell? As a client, how do you know which company is going to add the value to justify their fee? As a candidate, how do you know which company is going to do the best for you?

If you're cv is classically impeccable, and you want to carry on doing exactly what you've been doing, then I suppose it's all very simple. But I thought we were in the era of portfolio careers, sabbaticals and life-changes? So how's a recruitment company going to help unless they are one of the excellent few?

It would make things an awful lot simpler if there was some way that you could tell whether the recruitment company you were about to deal with - either as client or candidate - was an added-value consultant, or a cv-pusher.

Meanwhile, if you are a cv-pusher, or the client is insisting on exact matches, then maybe there's a way of being more explicit in the job description? "You must have ... " We will not talk to you about this one unless ... "Do not bother to apply without ... " might all be helpful. It would save us all a lot of time.