Tag Archives: Nielsen

May 2, 2013 · 11:00 am

What The School Dance Shows Us About Marketing

Remember what it was like when you were a lot younger (ok, so not THAT much for some of you) and you’d head to a dance at school? There are the kids who would dance with anyone and everyone. There were the wall flowers who hid along the sides. Then there were whose who really wanted to dance in the worst way (well, not DANCE badly, but wanted desperately to participate!) but didn’t really know what to do. You could almost smell the desperation. They didn’t really have the skills to engage with the kids with whom they wanted to dance but they very much were sending out the signals that they wanted to.

High school dance, 1941. Worthington (Ohio) Hi...

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I was reminded of that as I read about how many marketers are planning to spend a lot more money on “social media advertising.”  Frankly, I consider that an oxymoron.  Social media, to me, is about engagement and conversation and not about using a megaphone to talk about yourself.  Nielsen put out the research a couple of months ago and it found that a majority of advertisers surveyed said they are going to increase their paid social media advertising budgets for 2013. In some cases they’re cutting back on display ads and it’s always a good idea to spread the ad investment across channels.  However, I’m a believer in using the resources to support social media efforts and not to buy ads on social platforms if a brand has to make a choice.

There was an AdAge study that showed the use of Facebook Ads is to drive brand awareness more than anything else.  That’s the equivalent of hanging by the gym wall – people can see you but there’s not much going on in terms of making engagement happen.  It isn’t until we lose our fear and go talk with someone (preferably about THEM!) that the invitation to dance can happen.  When people sense that desperation it makes them think they’re the lowest common denominator when an attempt at engagement occurs, whether it’s a dance or an ad campaign.

Nielsen said this: “Advertisers are doubtful or unconvinced about the effectiveness of paid social media advertising, indicating that the growth of the medium is being somewhat hampered by a lack of relevant, universally employed metrics.”  I don’t think that’s the entire story.  I think that doubt is spurred in part because it’s a square peg (ads) in a round hole (a social setting).  It’s the desperate kid standing by the gym wall shouting irrelevant nonsense.  As marketers we need to engage in that setting if we’re desperate to dance.  Chat someone up – see if there’s compatibility.  Maybe even dance a bit.  Who knows where it can lead.  Standing by the wall yelling “I really want to dance with someone!” isn’t going to work.  At least it never did when I was at those dances many years ago.  How about you?

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November 15, 2012 · 9:24 am

The Money Pit

Way back in 1986, Tom Hanks made a film called The Money Pit.

Cover of "The Money Pit"

Having moved into our second suburban house a year or two before – this one an old farm-house – I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry as the movie told the story of how a little crack in a wall is the first sign of a much bigger problem to come.

I thought of that as I read the latest version of the Nielsen Cross Platform Report. You can read it for yourself here and see if what I’m about to discuss reminds you of the same thing.  Nielsen found that TV viewing hasn’t dropped much from last year at this time.  In fact:

In Q2 2012, Americans spent more than 34 hours per week in front of a TV set. We watched traditional TV, DVDs and played games. Most of the content from these activities was delivered to us on the TV set in a traditional manner, over broadcast, cable, satellite or telco connection, and a growing amount was delivered by Internet connection. Americans also added another 5 hours in front of the computer screen using the Internet or watching video content.

No cracks there.  Except as I read through the report, a couple of things stood out.  First, Nielsen estimates tablets are in 20% of homes and rising.  Close to 40% of Americans who have them now use their tablets or smartphones while watching TV at least once a day.  They’re still watching even if their attention is now shared.  Crack?

Here is something else.  The amount of time spent watching traditional TV is substantially lower among people under the age of 35.  Those under the age of 25 watch roughly 22 hours a week while those over 50 watch twice as many hours.  The missing hours are spent watching on game consoles and mobile devices.  Given the desirability of the younger demos to marketers, this might be another crack in the house of traditional media.

Finally, the number of cord-cutters (homes with broadcast TV only and broadband internet), while still tiny (5.1 million homes) was growing while cable and broadband subs were shrinking (80 million to just under 78 million).  That kind of reminds me how we used to view cable TV‘s small audience gains in the early 1990’s while we, the big broadcast TV networks, had huge viewership.  That was a crack in the wall then, just as this might be now.

We’re still in that farm-house home, many repairs and a lot of money later.  The big media businesses aren’t going anywhere, but they might need to be thinking about the repairs to come.  The next few years will be interesting as they patch all the cracks.

How have your viewing habits changed?  What does that imply for your marketing or for your business?

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November 13, 2012 · 10:46 am

Service Vs. Social

When you’re connecting with your friends and relatives on Facebook or other social media, do you think of it as marketing?  I don’t.  I’m not certain what I call it but if marketing is the communication of a product’s value I’m definitely not trying to convey my value as a person to others.  Not consciously anyway.

Why I’m asking the question is our old friend “social media marketing.”  There was another study released a week or so ago, this one by the good folks at NM Incite (which is a joint venture between Nielsen and McKinsey so they ought to know!).  It covered customer service via social media and found (as summarized in this article) that:

The majority of Twitter and Facebook users — 83% and 71%, respectively — expect a response from a brand within the same day of posting. Some 71% of consumers who experience a quick and effective response are more likely to recommend that brand to others, compared with 19% who do not receive any response… The biggest issue: 36% report having problems solved quickly and effectively, while only 14% report that the company responds quickly but does not resolve the issue, and 10% report never receiving a response at all.

That data is presented in the context of a positive experience leading to positive posts which can be shared across other social spheres.   In other words, marketing.  What I find interesting is that this information  along with some additional thinking on social, is more about serving the brand’s own needs than those of the audience.  As I postulated at the top, while I’m very happy to help out my connections in any way I can I’m not monitoring social media with a marketing mindset.  Unless and until brands can approach social as we non-digital, non-corporate entities do (read that as humans), brands will always be seen much as we do a social connection we made at a party many years ago and with whom we have little or no bond.  Those connections are kind of creepy and I, for one, always wonder why I even have them.  A lot of folks “unfriend”, hide or block those people and you might not even know it if you are the one blocked.  Ouch, especially if you’re a brand.

If we’re going to use social media to connect with consumers, I can’t think of a better reason to do so than customer service.  Yes, that can be a gateway to shared, positive experiences, just as it can precipitate a storm of bad comments if done badly.  It’s not something I’d approach with a marketing mindset if you’re trying to humanize the brand.  Unless, of course, all of your real friends use their accounts mostly to sell you insurance, real-estate, or used cars.  Then you just might need a few new friends!

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