Buzz, Balls & Hype

Did you hear about...

Linktopia Monday (with the help of Judge Page) and the focus is on one thing (actually three) when it comes to WOM/viral.  Over at Fast Company Dan and Chip Heath point out why some things make it and some don’t.

This idea is sticky -- it's memorable and may change the way you behave -- but it's also viral. People love to retell it. (Many sticky ideas aren't viral. Your physics teacher may have come up with a mind-blowing demo for Bernoulli's principle, but chances are you didn't chat it up.)

Viral marketing has become a hip, low-cost way to reach a lot of people very quickly -- with little effort. But as marketers, including giants such as Anheuser-Busch, Coca-Cola, and Procter & Gamble, slash ad budgets, "viral" needs to mean more than "free" and "fueled by prayer." Making an idea contagious isn't a mysterious marketing art. It boils down to a couple of simple rules.

Find out what you need to make it work here.

THE DOCTOR IS IN

(If you're interested in a double dose of Dr. Sue, check out her new weekly Career Coach column for Mama Ph.D on Inside Higher Ed, starting Monday, April 27.)

FEAR ITSELF

According to most studies, people's number one fear is public speaking. Number two is death. Death is number two. Does that sound right? This means to the average person, if you go to a funeral, you're better off in the casket than doing the eulogy. ~ Jerry Seinfeld

Recently, an ex-writer friend (that is, a current friend who used to make her living writing nonfiction books) told me that the one part of her writing career she had consistently loathed was the obligation to promote her books. “I would panic,” she said, when faced with a reading or radio interview. “I’d choke up, grow short of breath, my face would flush, and I’d be afraid I was going to pass out.”

Eventually, for a number of reasons, she stopped writing books and trained for another career. Ironically, and unexpectedly, her second career thrust her even more prominently into the spotlight. This time, her livelihood depended on her ability to present her points calmly and clearly. She visited a psychiatrist, who prescribed beta blockers.

“They didn’t make me any less anxious,” she said. What they did was contain the external symptoms of anxiety—the flushing, choking and gasping. “I was still terrified, but after a while I was able to stop worrying that I’d have a panic attack during a presentation. I could read a speech and my voice wouldn’t shake.” Eventually, as she came to trust that she would not exhibit the feared symptoms, her anxiety about public speaking subsided, though it never left her entirely.

The studies Seinfeld refers to are real, though the conclusion he draws is dubious. It isn’t that that most of us would rather die than address a group; just that we tend to worry more about public humiliation—a possibility most of us face more regularly than that of death. We may not risk our lives every day or even once a year, but we do get numerous chances to court the possibility that we will go blank, stumble over our words, make a transparent, embarrassing slip, or even throw up or pass out in front of a judgmental crowd.

The first time I read one of my stories in public, I did everything “right”—I practiced repeatedly, in front of my family, friends, and, when they were not available, my cat. I attended other readings in the series to get a feel for the setting and the likely audience. I practiced deep breathing and self-hypnosis exercises for relaxation and focus. Yet I was distracted throughout my reading by the conviction that the microphone was picking up the knocking of my knees under the podium and projecting this bizarre sound throughout the room.

Over the years I have become more comfortable reading, to the point where most of the time my performance jitters are of the “good,” motivating kind, not the crippling variety. But the first time I had to present a song in my new voice class, I desperately wished I had invested in some beta blockers.

I had no objective reason to be frightened, and I knew this. The other students are friendly and supportive, and the focus of the class is on incremental improvement, not polish and perfection. Even if the atmosphere had been cutthroat, it was unlikely that I would be stoned or shot for missing a note or two. Yet I could not respond naturally to the accompanist’s friendly banter. I couldn’t figure out where to put my hands as I sang. And I felt that my voice was coming out thin and shaky, because of the need to force it past the knot in my throat.

Since then, I have made a point to ask other, seemingly more confident students how they managed to achieve their poise: Have they always just known they have beautiful voices?  Is performance anxiety simply not an issue for them?

The responses range from, “You couldn’t tell how nervous I was?” to “You should have seen me two years ago, when I first started this class!” One classmate told me that for his first three months in the class, before the teacher put her foot down, the only way he could sing was to raise the music stand high enough to block his face from the audience. Another had hesitated for three years to bring in his favorite song because “I knew I would freeze up and not be able to convey the emotion.” (He sang it last night, and it was stunning.)

There are many theories about why performance anxiety is so prevalent and debilitating. One common one is that our ancestors’ perceived value to the tribe determined their place in the pecking order, and thus their share (if any) of food and warmth. For them, losing face or showing weakness actually could be fatal.

Not for us, though, which is why it’s safe to keep plugging at it until it becomes habitual, until our unconscious is satisfied that our survival does not depend on presenting a perfect, invulnerable façade. So I keep going back, exhibiting my weak points and garnering praise, support and help. My public voice is growing stronger, and I’m having fun. May it be the same for all of you.

Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. Her book,  Getting Unstuck Without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007) is now available in bookstores. Send your questions to her at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.

The Ad Man Answers #59

Thursday + Gregory Huffstutter = The Ad Man Answers

We’re back for part two of our conversation with author and blogger Steffan Postaer, the Chairman and Chief Creative Officer of EuroRSCG Chicago.  You can find part one of our chat here. 

Steffan latest book, “Happy Soul Industry” (Inkwater Press), is a rollicking read through advertising and theology… so tap those fingers, pull up your favorite online bookseller, and order it today.

Steffan, why did you decide to go with an independent press for "Happy Soul Industry"?

My first agent, Jeremy Solomon became a publisher and one thing led to another.  Obviously, if someone like Penguin bit, I’d be with them.  Inkwater, however, allows me to market the book as I see fit.  It’s also a very personal relationship.  Even if they are lucky enough to get a deal, unknown authors (like me) are often treated shabbily by publishers.  If the book isn’t a hit, they get dumped, often unceremoniously.  Inkwater and I work hard keeping the book relevant.

 

Has Inkwater been able to secure any shelf space at brick & mortal bookstores, or have your sales been mostly online to this point?

98% is online. This is the primary rub of author subsidy publishing: no brick and mortar (unless you really work at it).  Had I gotten shelf space I'm convinced my sales would be infinitely higher.  When “The Last Generation” came out I conducted an experiment.  I snuck 5 copies of the novel into a Borders on Michigan Avenue and surreptitiously placed them on a table of new releases.  Within 20 minutes, they were all picked up.  Given they weren't in the computer, it created a bit of a scene at the cash register.  But the event showed me how lucrative the concept and design for my novel was... is!

 

How did your adverting experience guide your book marketing campaign?

Are you kidding me? I wrote the copy for HSI marketing with the same passion as the book.  That’s part of the fun.  A big part.

 

What specifically did you do to advertise “Happy Soul Industry”?

I created the ad below for postcard leave-behinds, mailings, and even a billboard campaign in Chicago. (If you add me as a friend on facebook, you can see me standing under my billboard.)

  Then I ran digital outdoor billboards in LA to target the film industry.

Copy 1: Just what God needs...

Copy 2: An ad agency

Copy 3: The Happy Soul Industry.

I was able to get the Outdoor Advertising Association of America (OAAA) to comp me these wonderful boards in exchange for doing work (and potentially hosting) the Obie awards. They (OAAA) have been good to me since the glory days of Altoids, where outdoor advertising launched that brand into the stratosphere. I went after film people where they live, work and play. The strategy worked as I now have manager (Sleeping Giant) and potential agent at CAA.

 

I've read that you will match the price of every book you sell with a donation to your church.  That seems like an odd marketing strategy for someone who's a master of marketing... is this a tactic you'd recommend to one of your clients?

Inspired by a sermon at our church, I wrote a blog post promising anyone who ordered my book that I would donate the proceeds to the church.  I’m afraid it’s a limited time offer!  I did have a book signing in December.  All the proceeds ($1100) went to Chicago Lights at Fourth Presbyterian Church.  For the record, as an author, I’m deeply in the red.  But that’s okay; it’s a labor of love.  If I’m to make any money, it will be from the movie deal.  Fingers crossed!

 

I was a fan of the TNT show "Trust Me", and found it an extremely accurate portrayal of the advertising business -- office politics, long hours, stealing desk chairs.  You were an early champion of the show -- with one of your Cannes Golden Lions as a prop piece – but, alas, the NY Times just announced it would not be back for a second season… so what happened?

It wasn’t just awards trophies.  We were also able to get three of Euro RSCG’s clients on the show: Effen Vodka, Potbelly Sandwich Works and O&I Shoes.  They “play” actual clients of the fictional ad agency.  Totally post modern, I’ve written about this extensively on the blog.

Two men I worked with at Leo Burnett, John Coveny and Hunt Baldwin, created “Trust Me.”  I consider John one of my best friends.  These guys also write for TNT’s award-winning show, The Closer.  Helping them create their show was a thrill.  Seeing my awards and clients in the “mise en scene” was downright surreal.  I loved it!

As for your last question, I thought “Trust Me” was getting better and better.  But these are tough times -- a show needs big ratings in order to survive.  Moving “Trust Me” to Tuesdays did not help its cause.

 

Why do you think that show didn't attract a larger audience?  My wife, who was an advertising copywriter, thinks "Trust Me" suffered because it was almost too real.  For example, you had two co-workers -- one who's now married -- engage in a drunken kiss after an old company Christmas party.  (Very, very plausible to anyone who worked in advertising.)  But if it had been another show, like “Grey's Anatomy,” the two characters would've had a torrid affair cut to a montage of indie music.

Many argued that “Trust Me” was too real.  I think that’s a high-class problem and one they addressed.  As I see it, each episode delved further into the characters psyches.  In addition, they brought classic drama into the stories, not just advertising.  But your wife has a point: watching “Trust Me” was a little like going to work.  It made me giddy and nervous.  But there was something revelatory about seeing your world on TV.  During the pilot they shot a scene in front of a Michigan Avenue bookstore.  For fun, the producers put copies of my novel in the window, as part of the set.  Alas, it ended up out of the frame…

 

Will you encourage your children to go into advertising?  Do you think it’s in their blood?

Given my father, mother and two brothers are all in (or were in) advertising, I don't see how my children can avoid it!  Despite HSI's dark undercurrent, I think I have the best job in the world.  I make a great living doing something I adore.  Why wouldn't I want my kids involved?

 

Thanks for the time, Steffan, and here’s hoping you sell lots of Dutch vodka, potbelly sandwiches, and those movie rights to “Happy Soul Industries”!

 

Gregory Huffstutter has been punching Ad Agency timecards for the past dozen years, working on accounts like McDonald's, KIA Motors, Suzuki Automotive, and the San Diego Padres. His first mystery, KATZ CRADLE is on submission while he's working on the sequel. The first 100 pages of his novel are linked here. For general advertising questions, leave a comment or send e-mail to katz @ gregoryhuffstutter dot com with 'Ask The Ad Man' in the subject line.

Brits Declare War

A group of British Thriller writers band together to try to take control of the genre and show how much better their work is from those Yanks across the pond.

Books need Bookstores.

Seems to be David Hewson week around here.

Here's his recent blog post on author tours and why they do matter contrary to public (publisher's) opinion.

I agree with him. On every point. They do matter and they are expensive the way they are done.

With all due respect (because I do respect individual people in publishing a lot - its just the biz as usual  that I object to) I think we're seeing yet one more example of publishers saying one thing when they mean another.

First we heard this about marketing -  "We don't really think it works anymore." When what they meant was it's too expensive they way we do it to do for your book. Because  if you look at the big books - it's so odd - they seem to believe in marketing .

Now its happening with tours.
Tours the way they are done are expensive.
Publishers are cutting costs.
So they're saying that tours don't really work  - when what they mean is that for the money - the way we currently do tours - we can't afford them or justify them.

So how about a different kind of tour? Authors need bookstores and bookstores need authors and we have to get out there and meet the people who put our books on the tables vs the shelves and talk to readers and have newsletters.

And here's why. Nothing works alone. Everything works in tandem. We need to get word of mouth building for our books. That's done one reader at a time and you reach those readers through a myriad of ways. Yes on line but off line too. Yes on tours, yes at conferences, yes via ads, yes via social networking. Read The Tipping Point. You need a certain number of people talking about your book before it reaches a critical mass. So how do you get them? Every which way. 

Here are some questions.

For authors - if you start paying for your own tours and own marketing plus buzzing yourself on social network sites and blogs - how are you going to manage time wise? Money wise?

How can we make this work? Should we be working differently with publishers? Should be be asking for something else?

For Agents: How can we change the model to make this all work?

For Publishers: When are you gong to work with authors to help us figure this out honestly and in a way that benefits us both? Because when authors help sell more books - publishers make the lion's share of that money.

This Sounds Like Fun. And This Sounds Like Reality

This new issue sounds like fun: Wired Mystery.

And this new post by Seth Godin sounds like reality and a mystery that people need to start working at to solve: Zoom

Linktopia means email, social and pix

Linktopia Monday (with the help of Judge Page) and we get a good reminder about that email database we all have, plus more info on who is using social media, and you really should get a great photo of yourself.

An email campaign that works well for this company is making news.  Which part of the sentence do you think we should be paying attention to?

With the holiday milkshake, Chick-fil-A exceeded its sales goal by 70 percent. “We learn more every time we [leverage it],” McCathren said of the marketing medium.

The full story is here.

There are some interesting statistics at Forrester on boomer usage of social media in Europe.

 “We all know that young consumers, both in Europe and the US, have adopted social media avidly. But what about their parents’ generation – the Baby Boomers (those aged 43 to 63)? How are they using social media? Well, I’ve just finished a piece that looks at the Baby Boomer generation in Europe and their social media activity, and found that this audience are also starting to integrate social media into their daily lives.

Continue reading here.

Finally, that author photo (no matter where you use it) might be more important than you think.

It would seem that including a photo with other information makes the communication more personal or at least attracts the attention of the reader in a way that is more involving. We already know that a photo of an attractive woman had a profound effect on how males responded to a loan offer (see A Pretty Woman Beats a Good Loan Deal). But this seems to be a different phenomenon, unrelated to the viewer being attracted, consciously or not, by a photo of an attractive member of the opposite sex. Rather, it seems that the photo establishes a more personal connection.

Neuroscience has the story here.

United Authors - Is This The Revolution?

For a few years now I've been writing here on this blog and in a few other places that it's only a matter of time until we see a group of authors band together and start the first publishing company  owned by and run by authors. I've used the  United Artists  model to describe it.

The truth is writers want to write. Not run companies. We don't want to be on the business side. But it's happening to us like it or not. How many articles have you read about what authors have to do now to market their books because their publishers aren't? Or how busy editors are and how books aren't being edited as well anymore? Or how poor the proofreading was or how ordinary the covers are?

The more it falls on the author to hire outside help to supplant or supplement efforts once the job of a traditional publisher while still receiving the same royalty, the more authors are going to question the model.

One solution is publishers changing their model.

Some have stared to do that. Roger Cooper at Vanguard has a lot of happy authors who are treated quite differently  - no advances but guaranteed marketing budgets, higher royalties and a real say so in how things happen.  Harper Collins has a new imprint that promises to do things differently.

Another  solution is authors changing their model.

I've postulated that all it's going to take is 5 big names to get United Authors started - big  so that the whole concept of self publishing is blown out the window and big because distribution is going to be one of the more complicated parts of this to work out. It's a new model. And it is on the horizon. And that horizon looks closer and closer all the time.

Enter David Hewson.  David is,  I think,  one  of the top 5 suspense authors writing today. A bestseller in the UK and abroad but not as well know here. His latest, The Garden of Evil was one of the best books I read this year  (Stephen King - are you listening - If you liked Goddard - Hewson will blow your socks off!)

David and I have been talking about the publishing model being broken and why and how and what it means and he's written out the idea of United Authors way more elegantly and in detail thank I could.

Take a look. What do you think? Do you think we'll see a model like this? Would you get involved?

THE DOCTOR IS IN

SOUL MINGLING

Several months ago Caroline Grant, coeditor of Mama, Ph.D.: Women Write About Motherhood and Academic Life , invited me, along with other contributors, to take part in a two-day symposium at Duke University on parenthood and academia, as part of Duke’s Graduate Student Appreciation Week. We would read our essays and answer questions from students, faculty and staff on Thursday, April 9, and participate in a luncheon discussion the following day.

Normally, I refuse these out-of-town invitations, because the travel and rescheduling entailed don’t seem worth the very small honoraria offered. (English version: I’m shy around strangers, especially in an unstructured situation such as a luncheon.) I spent my internship year in Durham, though, and my brother and his family now live in Raleigh; in addition, as chronicled here, I am working systematically to overcome certain fears and inhibitions. This seemed to be a good opportunity to combine a visit with a challenge, so I accepted.

The visit was terrific, as expected.

I did not expect the Duke experience to be “terrific.” I told myself that if it fell flat, it was still okay, because it was just an excuse for the visit. (Minimizing is a common technique for avoiding anxiety. It is helpful in small doses but can be disastrous if it really convinces us of the insignificance of an upcoming event or task and causes us to underprepare. Fortunately, I already had two readings of this essay under my belt, so I was comfortable with the material, if not the format of the presentation.) I had met Caroline at previous NYC readings and enjoyed her a great deal, so I looked forward to seeing her again. Alissa McElreath and Jean-Anne Sutherland were blanks, though, and their essays were so good I felt somewhat intimidated.

On Friday, the four of us met briefly before proceeding to the lecture hall where the presentation was to take place. Jean-Anne and Alissa were as warm and human as Caroline, and I felt immediately comfortable with them. The readings went smoothly, which was gratifying as well.

The Q&A session, though, and the spillover into the following day’s lunch, provided the real surprises. The audience was, as expected, intelligent, informed and thoughtful. But the questions were not academic or literary. Instead, the women, and a few brave men, responded emotionally to the essays. They shared their own struggles with parenthood and the academy and asked searching questions about the balance between love and obligation, love and ambition, and love and domestic equity that served as the basis for intense group discussion.  It was a moving and deepening experience.

I realized, afterward, that when I describe myself as “shy,” what I really mean is that I am uncomfortable with small talk and petty competition. In times of deep emotion my shyness melts away, and I am completely engaged and available.

When I hear the term “mingle” I think, uncomfortably, of cocktail parties, and of the expectation of a few minutes of superficial chat with each person encountered. This always feels like ring of hell to me. But last week’s event made me think of Donne’s assertion that “more than kisses, letters mingle souls.” Essays do, too—and they can serve as gateways to authentic face-to-face communion of the best kind.

The next time I'm invited to speak on a topic I care about, I hope I will remember this experience, swallow hard, and say yes.

Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself, she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. Her book,  Getting Unstuck Without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity (Seal, 2007) is now available in bookstores. Send your questions to her at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.

 

Linktopia

Linktopia Monday and (with the help of Judge Page) we look at magazines, Amazon and the brains of your readers.

Magazines are thinking about raising subscription prices.  What we found interesting was this comment on perception.

“It’s amazing how price-sensitive people are,” said David Ball, the vice president for consumer marketing at Meredith, which owns magazines like More and Fitness. “Honestly, we’ve tested raising it 50 cents and we see a drop-off — sometimes startlingly high.”

Interestingly, whether consumers pay $5 or $50 for a subscription does not affect their perception of the magazine, according to a study conducted four years ago by the media consultant Rebecca McPheters for publishers including Time Inc., Condé Nast, Hearst and Meredith.

The full story is here

Were you aware Amazon via your smartphone could do this?

...BlackBerry and probably every other phone now has an app that literally lets you take a picture of something, send it to Amazon and back comes a picture and order information about how you can get the product rushed to your door. If you happen to be an Amazon “One Click” subscriber ordering is virtually instant.

Keep reading here here.

Finally, are you using the full power of a potential reader/customer?

If it's true that we constantly make inferences about the world around us (as in "He said x and y, so he must be thinking z.") and if it's true that these inferences feed the narratives that can make ad campaigns meaningful, then how can we -- as marketers -- elicit the most powerful stories? Continue reading here here.