LET’S FACE IT, YOUR AUDIENCE DOESN’T CARE ABOUT YOUR COMPANY AND ITS PRODUCTS

In college, I was taught to write for my audience. My journalism, advertising & PR, marketing and interactive media professors preached this seemingly simple rule to us like it was one of the commandments. From those gurus of a targeted message I learned that I had to, first, study and understand my audience, then, learn to speak its language and finally, “sell the dream, not the product.”

To me, all this is common sense. But every day I encounter ads, news releases, websites and, believe me, even blogs – and more- that fail to communicate to and with their audience. They deliver generic one-size-fits-all content that is either too vague, product oriented or ego-feeding. It seems that folks at the big companies often cannot distinguish between user manuals or product specs and an effective product description. They also overlook the differences among various types of media and push the same content to TV, radio, magazines, and the Web.

Let’s say I’m shopping for a new car. Well sure I’m concerned about safety, seating, gas mileage, horse powers, so on… But I’m also a girl. So when I go to the [CAR BRAND]’s website and get something like: “5.4L… blah-blah-blah… Triton V8… blah-blah-blah… power-deployable running boards… blah-blah-blah,” I have no idea who this Triton guy is and what power-deployable running boards are supposed to do. But I need to know right away what this car can do for me. Will is save me gas and money? Will it stop fast enough if I notice a red light a little too late because I was fixing my make-up? Will it fit my girlfriends and their boyfriends in together with our mountain bikes and camping equipment? This is what I want to know. And guess what, if I can’t find this content on your website/blog/[your choice], I’m going to your competition.

So, after doing a little research I was able to distinguish 4 major mistakes that companies make when developing content:

1. One-size-fits-all content – companies fail to distinguish different types of customers they might have and create content that, at the end of the day, doesn’t target any of them.
2. “Look at me, I’m so good” or ego-feeding content – companies write about how good they are at what they do instead of how they can help their target market solve its problems. Financial institutions are especially guilty of this one.
3. Product-specs content – this is my car example. Again, instead of telling the audience how this particular product can satisfy the audiences’ particular need, companies talk about what the product does and what it is made of. IT companies and car-manufacturers do this mistake especially often.
4. Vague-language content – this is when companies talk about how ground-breaking, innovative, robust, user-friendly and so on the product is. Ok, so what can it do for me?

Poorly developed content usually includes all of these mistakes to some extend. So, next time your are writing a copy – for your ad, news release or website, think about your audience, its needs and problems and how your product can satisfy these needs and solve the problems.

SOCIAL MEDIA VS. TRADITIONAL MEDIA OR HOW TO CREATE A SUCCESSFUL MARKETING STRATEGY

In his recent post ANALYSIS: Value of quote in the Wall Street Journal with a link to your blog and product, David Meerman Scott compares a traditional media hit - a quote in a Wall Street Journal, to a good blog post. He writes that when it comes to increasing website traffic, well-written and interesting blog posts seem to be more effective. According to Scott, while there are certainly many intangible benefits of a traditional media hit, social media has more impact on website traffic and online visibility.

While this might me the case, the power of traditional media is undeniable. First of all, it builds your credibility, which is essential for smaller and new companies. Second, it broadens your reach. Not each of your potential, or even existing customers, reads, comments or even trusts blogs. To give you an example, in my Writing for Interactive Media class we had this huge discussion about blogs and, to be more specific, their credibility. Almost half of the class said blogs were very unreliable sources of information. And those were people studying to become interactive media and online marketing experts!

Anyways, while your blog/website content is crucial to drive new traffic and keep people coming back for more, one traditional media hit can significantly boost your credibility and reputation. I think, in a good marketing strategy all media outlets work together to support and enhance one another. For example, in his new post Social Media Engagement Turns Lemons into Lemonade Todd Defren tells how one comment from a client of NEAT Receipts helped the company get a cover story in FORTUNE for Small Businesses. This is great example of a successful strategy.

DIGITAL UNIVERSE IS EXPANDING AT EXPLOSIVE RATE

I came across this press release couple of days ago while doing research on the IT Industry. Sponsored by EMC Corporation, IDC – a company that measures and forecasts digital information, published its study on explosive growth of the digital universe and how it is affecting individuals, societies and businesses. Here are some cool facts:

• In 2007, the digital universe was 10% bigger than originally expected - 281 billion gigabytes (281 exabytes)
• Digital universe is expanding at the rate of 60% a year and "is projected to be nearly 1.8 zettabytes (1,800 exabytes) in 2011, a 10-fold increase over the next five years"
• The amount of information generated about an average person on daily basis (“names in financial records, names on mailing lists, web surfing histories or images taken of you by security cameras in airports or urban centers”), or “Digital Shadow,” now surpasses information that individuals create about themselves, or “Digital Footprints”
• In 2007, the digital universe was equal to almost 45 GB of digital information for every person in the world
• eWaste (mobile phones and other electronics and PS) is becoming an environmental concern; it is accumulating more than 1 billion units a year. Oh, Wow!

So what are the reasons of such an explosive growth of our digital universe?
According to the press release, “accelerated growth in worldwide shipments of digital cameras, digital surveillance cameras, and digital televisions as well as a better understanding of information replication trends” are the reasons. Add to this “Internet access in emerging countries, sensor-based applications, data centers supporting “cloud computing” and social networks ,” and what you’ll get is the digital universe that already has more units of information than there are stars in the sky!

I strongly recommend reading this press release and checking out a cool little gadget from EMC that let’s you track your “Digital Footprints.”

WIRELESS INTERNET CARD – MISSION IMPOSSIBLE

When my boyfriend’s dad called this morning and asked for help with choosing a wireless Internet card provider, both, Peter (my boyfriend) and I got on our laptops. His dad was particularly interested in T-Mobile, so, we ‘googled’ “T-Mobile Wireless Card,” expecting to spend only about 15 min of our precious time on “serving the duty.” But nothing came up…

Well, sure we got some search results, but none of them provided any info on what we were looking for: coverage, prices, plans for existing customers and, most important, how wireless cards work (to give a decent explanation to Peter’s not so technology-savvy dad). Besides, none of the results gave links to T-mobile’s official website except for a paid ad (which, by the way, took us to a page that had no information on wireless cards, whatsoever!) and a press release dated back to 2002.

After about 20 minutes of fruitless efforts, we came to the conclusion that T-Mobile keeps its wireless Internet cards top-secret and does not provide such service to us – average mortals.

Search results on other companies were no different. Sprint surprised us with a paid ad leading a web page with a promotional offer that expired in September, 2007. Verizon was somewhat better and provided a short flash-animated guide on how to install the card… Hmmm… We haven’t even purchased yet…

Only AT&T was on top of the search-results list with the link that read “Wireless Internet and wireless laptop solutions AT&T wireless ....”The company dedicated the whole section of its web site to wireless Internet solutions with an abundance of “Learn more,” special offers and customer support links.

Social Media: Connecting Lives

As I have previously mentioned, I was born and raised in Russia. I moved to the States after graduating from high school to pursue higher education at The University of Tampa. It was about 5 years ago. Back then, the only means of communication with my friends and family I had were my phone, email and instant messengers.

I lost connection with many people because it was either too expensive or time consuming to stay in touch. Many of my friends from high school or rock climbing team had moved, changed their addresses and phone numbers. You know how it happens… But this summer, I discovered one Russian web site called VKontakte– something like Facebook or MySpace - that rocked my world! This relatively new (only about a year and a half) social utility has become so popular so fast that I was able to find most people I’d ever known or met, including some of my teachers and coaches. Now, I can share with them my everyday experiences and thoughts through pictures, wall posts and messages. I feel like they are part of my life again. To me, this is amazing!

My next step is to teach my mom how to use VKontakte so we can stop paying enormous amounts of money for 2-hour phone calls :)

YOUTUBE GONE WILD

I’m a rock climber. I’ve been climbing for about 8 years now and was on the Russian National Climbing Team before I moved to the States. Living in Florida, I don’t get to climb outside often because, as you know, Florida is FLAT. But I do go to the climbing gym on the regular basis and take climbing trips with my friends whenever I get a chance.

Many people who have never tried rock climbing assume that it is all about upper body strength. It is not! Normally, the whole body is involved in the process. But muscles aside, one must know the techniques and have the ability to “see” climbing routes. Meaning, one must know how she/he will climb the route before even getting on the wall or rock.

I just came back from a climbing trip to Alabama, where few other people and I camped out at a very popular climbing place called Horse Pens 40 or HP 40. Just to give you an idea of how far from ‘civilization’ we were - most people from our group didn’t have any cell phone reception… Except for one girl.

There is this one route called (ironically) The Beach in HP 40 that I’ve been working on for the past year. But whatever I did, I couldn't finish it. One night my friends and I were talking about that Beach problem, and the girl who had cell phone reception also happened to have an iPhone. It didn’t take us long to get on YouTube and find a video of a person climbing The Beach. (Hallelujah! My climbing riddle was finally solved!) So, there we were in the untamed wilderness of Alabama, sitting by the campfire, eating marsh mellows and watching YouTube videos on the iPhone. Pretty New Age, huh?

My point is, virtually any video can be found from any part of the world. What an opportunity for us, common people, and for them – organizations, businesses, corporations...

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COLOR, COLOR OR COLOR?

Who would think that there is the whole science behind colors!
While it is not a secret that we tend to assign certain meanings to different hues, tints and shades, I was surprised to learn just how powerful colors are when it comes to influencing our lives.

Color has always been important for me – just take a look at my condo and you will know what I am talking about. Walls in there are avocado-green, butter-yellow, beach- and nostalgia-blue... you get the picture :) I’ve never had a problem experimenting with paint. But yesterday, something happened that made me rethink my ‘relationship’ with color.

As I was working on my GooglePages online resume (and, by the way, it is yet to be finished), I couldn’t decide on a color scheme for the web page. Should it be green and white, or grey and orange, or may be red and light brow?.. hmmm… Having little experience with colors in the professional world, I turned to the wizards of the World Wide Web for an advice and guidance.

First, I had to decide what exactly I was looking for. Did I want to present myself as an expert and professional? Did I want the visitors of my webpage (in other words, my potential employers) to feel welcomed? Did I also want them to have a little fun? Yes, I wanted all that! So, I googled “colors, meaning, job,” and here is what I got.

In the article on InfoPlease David Johnson talks about psychology of colors. He emphasizes that different cultures assign different meanings to colors. Here is what some of the most popular colors mean in the US culture:

Black – authority and power. Also, submission (this is where little black dress comes from). Black can also symbolize evil. Personally, I think that black is very stylish and will probably use it as one of my font colors.

White – innocence, purity and …sterility.

Red - the most emotionally intense color. Stimulates a faster heartbeat and breathing. It is the color of love, passion and aggression... so no red on my resume :)

Blue - one of the most popular colors. Peaceful and tranquil, blue can also be cold and depressing. “Fashion consultants recommend wearing blue to job interviews because it symbolizes loyalty,” writes Johnson. So blue it is! Besides, it is my favorite color.

Green – calming and refreshing. Dark green is masculine and conservative; it symbolizes wealth.

Yellow – cheerful, sunny and optimistic, it is an attention getter. But be aware, it may cause people loose their temper.

Purple – connotes royalty, luxury, wealth and sophistication. It is also very feminine and romantic.

Brown – solid, ‘reliable’ and genuinene. But brown can also be sad and wistful.

So, I decided to go with the darker blue and black pallet and add some lighter font colors to brighten my resume up.

To those of you who are working on or already have your online resumes, blogs or personal web pages, I recommend dedicating some time to researching and perfecting your web pages color schemes.

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