The value of obscurity and the social media inverse rule

There’s a late January article I’ve been saving called Clive Thompson in Praise of Online Obscurity from Wired.com. I came across it again this morning while also reading Neal Kielar’s Agency Babylon blog and his most recent post, Inverse rule of social media use.

Clive’s point is aptly summarized in his first paragraph:

When it comes to your social network, bigger is better. Or so we’re told. The more followers and friends you have, the more awesome and important you are. That’s why you see so much oohing and aahing over people with a million Twitter followers. But lately I’ve been thinking about the downside of having a huge online audience. When you go from having a few hundred Twitter followers to ten thousand, something unexpected happens: Social networking starts to break down.

When we decided to fully embrace social media last July at RSW/US, the number of followers and friends we wanted/had seemed very important, much less so now. Sure it’s still important, but numbers for the sake of numbers did very little to help us engage with new agencies or bring in new business for ourselves.

Per Clive's article:

Once a group reaches a certain size, each participant starts to feel anonymous again, and the person they’re following — who once seemed proximal, like a friend — now seems larger than life and remote.. . When it comes to microfame, the worst place to be is in the middle of the pack. If someone’s got 1.5 million followers on Twitter, they’re one of the rare and straightforwardly famous folks online. Like a digital Oprah, they enjoy a massive audience that might even generate revenue. There’s no pretense of intimacy with their audience, so there’s no conversation to spoil.

Which leads me to Neal’s post, he’s been on a very brief hiatus, comparatively, on his blog and last week posted this:

The availability of a person to engage in social media activities like blog posts (and blog reading, Twitter and Four Square) is inversely proportional to how busy he is with work that does not expressly rely on these tools.

That’s the entire post by the way, and less is indeed more in this case. So what’s the ultimate takeaway here for agency new business?

Social media has its place and it’s important but it’s all part of a new business mix that critically needs to have balance. Find what’s working for you to get more business (if that is in fact why your agency is using social media) and don’t feel compelled to tweet every little thing for example.

Along those lines, we’ve seen agencies on Twitter with one tweet and those that tweet 20 times a day (how?). Neither, in my opinion, is the proper balance. And don’t get me started on automated tweets. I know the process has its supporters, but I find it disingenuous at best.

Off the soapbox now. Clive’s full article is here and although you’ve already read all of Neal’s, he’s got a good blog here.

We killed our website. Now we’re happy.

We recently wrote a post on an agency allowing their FB page to “go dark.” Sid Peimer of the Cape Town agency, BEHP commented on that post, describing how BEHP had taken a further step in the recent past and “killed” their site. Sid was kind enough to guest post and flesh out the experience a bit further. Thanks to Sid, and make sure to check out his site, stratplanning.com (more info below after the post).


We just switched off our website at BEHP (that’s the full service agency where Stratplanning resides). Honest we did – all the evidence is here www.behp.co.za. In its place is a blogsite. The reason is quite simple: the website makes us look big; the blogsite makes us look good. And since I last checked, clients want to work with good people, not necessarily big people.

Make no mistake, websites are a crucial channel in the communications arsenal, serving as the silent salesman available 24/7 to anyone who wants to enter the domain. In our case, we (or maybe just me) felt that we needed to set an example to prospective clients – ‘look how great our website is – we can make one for you as well’. That’s admirable, but not necessarily correct.

To be quite honest, I was against the idea of culling the website - gone was my Linus blanket of our great site (and it was a great site). When I was shown the new site, I gasped in horror and sulked for what must have been at least 12 hours. “It’s so linear,” I cried in horror. But fortunately the proponents of the blogsite appreciated that I needed to be granted the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference. Clearly I needed help on the latter.

But I have come to know the difference. The blogsite works for us on a number of levels:

1. It is simple to add content.
2. The people who create the work like to display it, so they do.
3. It is current – you get an idea of what we’re doing.
4. It still has the most important piece of information: our phone number.

As organizations we all tend to collect communication channels, simply because they’re available and everyone’s doing it. Take Facebook for example. This is a social medium where we celebrate our lives in the company of others. Friends, not customers. Yes, a brand can serve as a friend, and many do have successful Facebook pages. But Facebook is not the free storefront we bought into. So if you have a Facebook page giving you the same angst as the gym membership you bought but never use, perhaps you need to put it down. I’m saying that as a friend.

Reference: The Facebook comment was motivated by this article in the RSW/US ezine which I thoroughly enjoyed.

About the Author
Sid Peimer is a strategic planner, writer and trainer. He lives in Cape Town with his wife and two Jack Russells, occasionally venturing into the city as the strategist for the full service ad agency www.behp.co.za. He also has his own sea-facing website dedicated to strategy www.stratplanning.com where he has appointed himself mayor (and you can find plenty free resources).

4 links ad agencies ought to follow to help new business efforts-RSW/US roundup for 3/9

Because there’s more great stuff out there than anyone can possibly get to, we thought we’d point you to some of the noteworthy pieces from the last week or so:


Again, huh? Apple is clamping down on so-called cookie cutter apps, the type of low-level apps that many brands and marketers have put out to reach the millions of iPhone customers.

Words to live by. Deliver a Better Presentation by Reminding Yourself It's Not About You

Gene Autrey and Aerosmith said it best. Razorfish and R/GA are betting that a combination of the recession and march of digital to the forefront of corporate challenges gives them an opportunity to move beyond selling Web sites and banner ad campaigns

No, no that can’t be. Twitter Quitters Say Twitter is Boring

Agency New Business Proposal Basics-6 Steps

We’ve talked about the agency pitch before, but when I came across this Marketing Profs post by Doug Stern and Jaclyn Landon, I thought about the fact that we haven’t really focused a post on writing great proposals. Doug and Jaclyn’s post is called Six Keys to Writing a Great Proposal and they preface their steps effectively below:

However you got there, you're looking for ways to create a proposal that sets you and your company favorably apart. Ways that capture the great things you have to offer. And do you no harm. Here are six suggested best-practices intended to not only maximize your chances to stand out and land the job but also manage the risks.

The six steps, abbreviated, are below, and you should click on the link at the end of the post to see the entire piece (you may have to register, but it's free.) Final note: as the title of this post mentions, some of these steps may be elementary to many of you, but I find it never hurts to revisit the basics.

1. Be responsive
If your proposal is the result of an RFP, you've been given a recipe. Follow it precisely.
Well, at least be very cautious about how much you improvise. Remember that you're getting points for showing how well you color inside the lines—and how well you listen.

The paradox is that RFPs often ask (or expect) you to demonstrate your creativity, problem-solving skills, and the like. And you want to break out of the pack, somehow. The trick is to find the middle path, one that fills in the RFP's required blanks while showing that your right hemisphere is alive and well.

No RFP? There's more freedom if you're not working within the framework of an RFP. There's also more responsibility.

2. Use plain English
Not all RFPs are the same. But even the most technical Web-development or civil-engineering proposal had better be readable and engaging. That's especially true if techies and non-techies are sharing the buying decision, which is often the case.

So write the way you speak. Avoid jargon, unless it's responsive to something in the RFP (and even then, use it sparingly). Let yourself connect with your reader the same way you would if you were face-to-face.

3. Use your whole brain
Being responsive is a given. Using the right words will help, too, by making sure your proposal gets read and is remembered well.

So pay attention to the way your proposals look and feel.

• Consult a graphics professional to design a template for you. • Use pictures that help tell your story. Studies say that an arresting graphic is the first thing the eye goes to on a page. Extra points go to any image with people in it. • Write captions for any images. They're the second thing we see on a page. • Use "boxed" callouts, another eye-catching device. Direct-mail experts understand this tactic. • Use the back cover. That's where magazines sell their most expensive ad space.

Do any one of those suggestions, and you've gone a long way toward setting yourself apart.

4. Don't overcook it
It's tempting to really make it less about you and more about your prospect. The keyword here is "caution."

You may, for example, believe it's a nice touch to put the prospect's logo on the cover of your proposal. But that can easily backfire unless you're using the same high graphic standards your prospect uses.

5. Buy smart
Maybe you can justify buying some of the great proposal software out there. When chosen wisely, proposal software is a great tool, with easily customizable templates that save valuable time spent formatting proposals.

But it's not a one-size-fits-all solution. A little research up front will help you find the best software for your needs, saving you time and money along the way.

6. Remember the context
Proposals are often just table stakes. They get you in the game and, maybe, keep you in.
Winning means scoring well on a wide range of criteria—price, chemistry, trust, and a bunch of other tangibles and intangibles. A written proposal levels the playing field (a little) and promotes apples-to-apples comparisons among the competition.

A great proposal will serve you well, especially if you say you strive to be the best at everything you do. If the reality of what you submit doesn't align with your claims, then you're really selling upstream.

In other words, anything less than outstanding fails. It fails to set you apart. It fails to demonstrate your excellence. It fails to give you an edge at a time when you don't know what cards everybody else is holding.

Click here to read Six Keys to Writing a Great Proposal.

Social media experts and what agencies should know

David Armano is SVP at Edelman Digital, and he had a great post a while back that still holds up well today. (We linked to it in our roundup this week, but it’s good enough to expand on.)

His post is titled How To Spot Social Media Snake Oil, and he lays out 5 things to look for when you’re considering working with a social media expert. He’s also got a handy chart called the “Professional Prism of Trust,” where he places social media experts right after bankers and snake oil salesmen.

As funny as I find that, in all fairness, it’s easy to bash some of these so-called experts, but as we all know, there are some excellent social media sources and experts out there, and David’s post is a nice primer on what to look for to save yourself some heartache while we’re still in the wild west days of social media.

Below are his 5 points, click on the link at the bottom of the post to see each point in it’s entirety:

1. My last job was selling junk bonds
As I mentioned in social media's dirty little secrets—there's a bandwagon to be jumped on. As you do background checks around the people you choose to partner with in social business, you should be able to see ties from the past to what they are doing now.

2. I'm an expert, just see the testimonials
Actually there really isn't anything wrong with self identifying yourself as an expert in a field or including things people said about you.

3. I can guarantee you X number of followers...
Anyone who starts their pitch by promising friends, followers, or even positive word of mouth is suspicious. This tells you they''re looking to "sell you" a quick fix which is probably in response to the hype of people placing such a big emphasis on metrics such as this.

4. Social media will save you
No it won't. Anyone framing social media as the solution to the world's problems is either drinking Koolaid or looking to make a buck.

5. Build it and they will socialize
Be wary of anyone selling a point solution that promises instant social interactions, conversations, collaboration etc.

David’s entire post here.

4 links ad agencies ought to follow to help new business efforts-RSW/US roundup for 3/2

Because there’s more great stuff out there than anyone can possibly get to, we thought we’d point you to some of the noteworthy pieces from the last week or so:



No, not that. What Managers and Freelancers Can Learn From the Grateful Dead.

Yes, when will that happen? The debate over when and how Twitter will offer marketers paid placement among its 50 million daily tweets heated up last week when rumors emerged that Twitter will finally unveil its ad platform this month.

Cross marketing for Healthcare. Traditional cross marketing was for businesses that were complementary, with like-products and audiences. That old-fashioned rule has been thrown out the window. So, how should this work in the healthcare world?

Do tell, they’re thick as thieves these days. So how do you separate the social media snake oil from the vinegar? It's not easy, but here's a few pointers:

You got the meeting, now what: 4 critical agency new business steps

It’s pretty well established that we at RSW/US operate as a lead generation/business development firm. We work with the objective to set qualified meetings with prospects our clients want to work with. But what happens when those qualified meetings are set, and we are at the point of “hand-off”: sending you in to meet with those prospects?

This is a critical point at which the upfront efforts of prospecting convert to the in-person process of selling. Are you prepared?

It’s natural for marketing services firms to go into these meetings armed with portfolios, planning to exhibit past experience and superior creative. And, it’s vitally important to remember, these prospects have needs of their own, objectives to achieve, problems to solve. Certainly, your past experience may be relevant, and it will establish a foundation for your credibility. However, what prospects will be seeking is the ability you have to understand their situation and your ability to support their efforts to reach their goals.

Sounds intuitive, right?

Perhaps, but think about an often used approach in a prospect meeting: introductions are made, and the presentation ensues. You make the presentation, show the best of your best work. The prospect nods agreeably and pleasantly, and tells you that the next steps are to “digest what we’ve learned, and give you a call in a week or so.” Is this the best-case scenario you are seeking?

The first meeting with a prospect is very critical in beginning to build a RELATIONSHIP. Resist the urge to jump into your presentation once introductions are done. In this first meeting, it’s important – and very productive – to follow a process that involves these steps, which are interactive – and actually are ACTIVE LISTENING elements:

• Listen: In this first meeting, it is okay – and VERY important - to let the prospect do a lot of the talking. Even more important is to LISTEN. Let them lead the discussion at least for a while.

Providing them the opportunity to speak reveals to you where their needs lie.

• Acknowledge: From Psych 101, this is the “active” part of Active Listening. As the prospect shares the background of their organization, what’s brought them to the point of this meeting, where they envision their future heading, acknowledge, non-verbally and verbally that you are listening. Do maintain eye contact; don’t fiddle with your presentation materials, laptop, projector, or heaven forbid, Blackberry. Nod to show understanding. Confirm you understand what they are saying by re-phrasing key points of what they are sharing with you, and verify that you are processing their thoughts accurately.

This behavior shows respect by exhibiting your focus on the prospect and their needs; it lays the groundwork of trust for an effective working relationship.

• Explore: Ask questions. Pull out relevant key points, and seek further insight to build your understanding. Seek further background on the history of their organization, product or program. Ask how a mentioned campaign performed. Wonder out loud if they were to do it again, what would they change?

Again, this behavior exhibits your respect for your prospect’s world. As importantly, the interaction and conversation over what’s been said so far continues to build trust; this conversation also lets you become acquainted “as people” as both you and the prospect begin to learn how each other thinks.

• Respond: Save your presentation for last. And, resist the urge to show every last exhibit. That’s okay if the preceding elements of the meeting call for showing the WHOLE presentation. It’s important in this step to zero in on the key points the prospect expressed in terms of their needs. Relate elements of your presentation to those specific needs. As you present your capabilities and work, make reference to needs the prospect expressed, their past campaigns, their goals. Connect your experience and examples of your work in a way that shows you understand the prospect’s objectives.

In saving your presentation for last agenda item, you will be able to show the prospect how you can make your capabilities and experience RELEVANT to their needs. Rather than the pleasant “we’ll digest this and call you in a few days”, you are likely to get further conversation – more questions about your experience and thoughts. You are more likely to enter into a dialogue that will extend beyond the meeting, leading more quickly and effectively to the relationship and assignments you are seeking.

But, this isn’t all. Stay tuned for more on turning those new prospect meetings into new business.

Post by RSW/US New Business Director Jane Browe

Patience Darling

Consistency is the mother of all virtues when it comes to agency new business prospecting. Consistency of messaging, consistency of methodology, and consistency of outreach. This is not only important leading up to the meeting, but it is also critically important after the meeting – as you work your way to close.

I was recently on a monthly update call with an RSW/US client of four years. We had just set three highly qualified meetings for him in a span of just two weeks. He astutely pointed out that all three of the prospects had been on our list for about a year and a half and despite our best efforts, we hadn’t busted through.

Fortunately, as with all RSW/US programs, we created a thematic email series after an initial volley of mailings and “politely persistent” calling and emailing against these prospects. With each program we stay in touch with real value-added insights and thought starters. These three prospects had been receiving the email series for about a year, never having once opened an email.

For whatever reason, all three took action on the same release. After some prompt follow-up calls from the New Business Director – and some good conversation about their need states – we opened the door and brought the client to the table. The client is now in the final stage of a short-list review for one of the prospects.

Point is…stick with it. I know you don’t have a ton of time, but there are ways you can keep the heat on without killing yourself. Build up a good list of prospects in a tightly defined space. Develop an on-going, themed email campaign, and then make sure you keep the content fresh, tightly tied to your value-added theme, and relevant to your prospects’ worlds. Then make sure you have the mechanisms in place (time set aside once a month) to touch base with those who take action on your campaigns (“clickers” and/or “openers”).

And the beauty of this is you might already have the content. Your blog. I’ve talked a lot about activating social media. Here’s a perfect way to do it. Why create content anew when you have what is hopefully value added content sitting right in your backyard. What do you think we do? Same thing – for both our program and the programs we manage with our clients.

So…keep it simple, don’t over-think it, and by gosh, stick with it.

An agency, gasp, lets Facebook go dark!

Tired of hearing how important social media is to your agency new business efforts yet? Well, it is, don’t get me wrong, but it seems to come from all sides doesn’t it? (Yes, even from us.) I came across something interesting this morning however, and I wanted to share it.

Park&Co is a branding and marketing agency based in Phoenix, AZ. Last month, they made the decision to have their Facebook page “go dark.” I posted their reason why, directly from their FB page, below:

Park&Co's Facebook effort is going dark. I know you rely on us for tons of compelling industry and agency news but I'm sorry to say you're going to have to wait awhile before you see us again.

Before panic sets in let me explain. It's not that we don't have time or we don't think the medium is valuable, it's that we're done posting underwhelming news and links you can find a number of other places. And let's be honest, you don't sign on to Facebook to see our next birthday celebration photo or snarky quip.

Facebook is a valuable medium and one that a bunch of us here at Park&Co love and use regularly. But we love it because it's a place to share and connect with friends, to see what's happening in their lives and to broadcast the highlights from ours.

So until we can come up with a really good reason to have a Facebook page for the agency (and we're working on it), we're going dark. Despite our Facebook darkness there are still a bunch of places you can connect with us starting with our website - http://parkandco.com/

I like this a lot, for a variety of reasons but mostly because the folks at Park aren’t falling victim to the “you’ve got to engage in social media right now or fall behind” mentality. (They’re not forsaking social media mind you, they’re still blogging away for example.)

And there are two other reasons I like their current FB plan. The first is, if I was a client, or prospective client, I would respect this move as one based on strategy and not herd mentality thinking and it’s the type of thinking I would want for my own business.

And second, I just like what they left for everyone on their FB page for the time being. I don’t fish, but it’s just good stuff:

In the meantime, with our focus based solely on providing as much value to our clients, readers, followers, and yes, even "fans," enjoy this wonderful fishing video...

Park&Co's Facebook page here and main site here.

Thanks to eMarketer

eMarketer featured our most recent survey in their February 22 article, Will Pure-Play Agencies Survive?:

The shift in marketing dollars from traditional to digital media may be well under way, but companies are happy with their full-service ad agencies and generally unlikely to adopt a digital-only shop for their online campaigns, according to research from RSW/US, which works with full-service and specialized agencies for lead generation.

Two-thirds of marketers told RSW/US they were highly satisfied with their primary agency, awarding a rating of at least 7 on a 10-point scale. Even more said they would use their primary agency again.

When it came to digital expertise specifically, however, clients were unimpressed. Less than two-fifths of respondents rated their full-service agencies 7 or higher in this area, consistent with RSW/US’s 2009 findings. Even so, relatively few companies, small or large, used an exclusively digital agency for their online and social marketing campaigns.

More in the full article here.

Why Facebook is giving your agency the runaround

I was reading an article by Maggie McGary recently on the social media today site called Why Businesses Should Think Twice Before Investing Money or Time in a Facebook Page and I felt it deserves mention on our blog. I’ve shortened Maggie’s initial paragraph a bit but will let her kick off this post.

Not to be all "what if"--but the more integral to companies' social media efforts Facebook becomes, the more leery I am about the idea of putting business eggs in a basket over which one has no control. . .Facebook pages, while clearly a business offering, are still dependent on individual profiles. This is a HUGE liability which is virtually never discussed.

Ok, so say you're the individual who initially set up a huge brand's Facebook page. First of all, congratulations to you--you've basically made yourself indispensable to your company or agency because if you go, the brand's page goes. Seriously. The ability to transfer ownership of that page to anyone flat-out does not exist.

I think Maggie has hit the nail directly on the head here. Since the day I set up our FB page this past July, it’s not only been unreasonably difficult in regards to the personal profile connection, but just doesn’t even make sense. Maggie also mentions the instances of FB business pages inexplicably being shut down because the admin’s personal page has been deleted. In some cases perhaps warranted, but in the example she gives, not at all.

Having said this, there are some work-arounds, and I encourage you to read the comments for some of those if you're interested, as I’m not going to list them all here, but when it comes down to it, at best it’s incredibly inconvenient and time-consuming and at worst a pretty big flaw, if I can use that term.

As an agency principal, if you weren’t aware of this potential issue, make yourself aware. We know a lot of agencies that have taken time and effort to establish and maintain FB pages and while many of these are well aware of this potential problem and know the ways around it, I would bet just as many don’t. Maggie answers a few of the commenters to her piece, and I think it’s worth posting it below as the final word:

The bottom line is that, yes, there are hoops you can jump through--like business accounts or setting up an additional account in the name of one person in the business, but the issue still remains that Facebook has ultimate control and no accountability--no matter how much money a company may be spending on Facebook ads.

Right now Facebook feels that they're untouchable because they've got so many users--but plenty of companies have been there before and fallen. Facebook will be no different unless it stops fooling around with the layout of the home page and starts addressing one issue that ultimately matters to its survival: keeping the money coming in.

Click here for Maggie’s entire article.

Thanks to Second Wind!

A big thank you to our strategic partner, Second Wind, for spotlighting our recent survey. Per their site's home page:

Second Wind Marketplace partner, RSW/US, published their annual A Client’s Perspective on Agencies survey earlier this week. A key finding: agencies that claim digital expertise were ranked at between 1 and 5 on a scale of 1-10, with ten being excellent. This disconnect between agency and client perceptions of agency digital skills is harming many account relationships. “The agency that can help clients understand how to use social/digital and how to integrate these [media] effectively into more traditional initiatives will, in the end, win the day,” says RSW president Mark Sneider.

Second Wind’s site and our survey download are here and if you’re an agency principal and not currently a member, they’re well-worth checking out. From their site, Second Wind offers a vast collection of industry tools, knowledge and collaborative venues to help meet the daily needs of your business. Second Wind currently serves thousands of agency principals and employees in North America and several foreign countries.

5 links ad agencies ought to follow to help new business efforts-RSW/US roundup for 2/15

Because there’s more great stuff out there than anyone can possibly get to, and half the country is still snowed in, we thought we’d point you to some of the noteworthy pieces from the last week or so:

Wow, that’s a lot of scissor use/printer ink. Coupon Use Hits Record Highs. Per a story on Inc. last week, After nearly two decades in decline, the coupon is back.

Oh, Joe, you’re not that bad. Joe Hall at Marketing Pilgrim calls himself a heartless bastard in regards to his Twitter and Facebook presence, suggesting “ a lot of what mainstream social media users take part in is a waste of time.”

Banking Innovation? Yes please. Tom Brzezina, (Michael Flora agency) on his tentative hopes for real innovations to come.

Bigger not always better? Clive Thompson over at Wired discusses moving from a few hundred Twitter followers to ten thousand, and the inevitable social networking breakdown.

Advertising’s most recent grand experiment. Mark Evan’s insight into new social media niche agency, Powered, created to “compete with digital agencies, public relations shops and an emerging crop of specialists to occupy the lead role in helping brands deal with social media.”

Digital Prowess of Traditional Firms Unimpressive

In Monday's Adweek Andy McMains cites results from our latest study that key marketing decision makers aren't terribly impressed with the digital/social skills of traditional agencies. 

Based on previous studies we've conducted and based on insights gleaned from talking directly with marketers on the Agency Search side of our business, I believe the problem is less about agencies' ability to "do" digital and social and more about their ability to "activate" these new mediums.  Any agency can claim to know how to take creative and build a nice banner ad or help a client start a blog or Facebook page.  What clients aren't seeing enough of is agencies activating digital: planning digital in the context of a broader traditional program.  I just left Napa Valley where a number of agencies selected by RSW/US, presented to a major wine marketer.  One of the agencies built an entire program around digital/social and one of the questions asked by the marketer was "so how are you going to drive people to all of this activity?".  They frankly didn't have a really good answer.  The creative looked nice, the ideas were unique, but in the end, there was little meat on the bone relative to strategy and how this program was going to suddenly get consumers (some of whom were older) to embrace a digital/social program.

Another agency took kind of an interesting approach.  They built their campaign concepts using digital as the initial platform, then adapted it to more traditional mediums.  They recognized the need for simplicity and directness in digital, so rather than force fitting campaigns into a medium that isn't well suited for lots of explaining, they worked it the other way around.  In doing so, they showed the client that they were thinking about both mediums - how they could work best together - and how to effectively integrate them from a messaging, activity, and equity standpoint.

Digital/social is one piece of a much bigger pie, so agencies need to think about it strategically and not just tactically.  Are there targets that are tougher to reach within the context of a clien'ts consumer pool that digital/social lends itself well to?  Does digital offer the ability to add reach to a program that might otherwise be limited from a budget standpoint?  How can we use digital so it motivates consumers to take the kind of action the brand needs and deserves?  There are many more questions that need to be answered when thinking about how to best use digital/social in the context of a larger plan.  I think spelling these out prior to presenting your digital/social program is one way to show the client you're thinking about the issues, thinking about how to best use digital/social - both in terms of the opportunities it offers and the limitations inherent in the mediums.

Simply put, don't just "do" it..."activate" it to the benefit of your client and their brand.

4 links ad agencies ought to follow to help new business efforts-RSW/US roundup for 2/10

Because there’s more great stuff out there than anyone can possibly get to, and half the country is snowed in, we thought we’d point you to some of the noteworthy pieces from the last week or so:

Busted: Another "Consumer-Generated Ad" Myth: Exhale, Madison Avenue. Uninitiated content-generating user masses are yet to create a winning Super Bowl spot. There are a lot of things agencies should be worrying about -- like, what happens if clients start budgeting $200 for spot production after reading the Times. But the whole "random consumers are taking over Mad Ave" myth isn't one of them. Ad lab

RSW Comment: In response to a NY times that began, “Be afraid, Madison Avenue. Be very afraid.” Nice refutation of that piece.


Google Buzzes Facebook—and the World: And now we see why Google wanted Yelp and AdMob so badly last year: to help power Google Buzz into the mobile future. Google knows that mobile Internet devices are the fastest-growing way we go online and that the market for smartphone ads will explode very soon. It has to own this market if it’s going to stay the most dominant online company on the planet. Chris Thompson, The Big Money

RSW Comment: Google just keeps churning out these new applications (if that’s the right label here.) We hear about “gamechangers” every day, so let’s see if this will be another Sidewiki. Article is worth a read though, to see Google’s Facebook aspirations in regards to the smart phones of the world.


Is Reading Blog Posts Worth Your Time?: Many of you might say, “I put advice into action all the time. Why, just last week I read a post right here about how using social media would help my blog, and I went and got right onto Twitter and tweeted all day. And it worked!” Good for you. But did you do it the next day? Did you do it the day after that? James Chartrand, Copyblogger

RSW Comment: The always worthwhile Copyblogger presents some interesting thoughts on how blog readers use, or don’t use, the information they read. As James points out in the post, “The next time you read a blog post and think to yourself, “I should be doing that,” take action.” Good advice.


Twitter Is Still Growing Rapidly: According to new stats out today from Royal Pingdom, Twitter saw an all-time high of more than 1.2 billion tweets in January. Perhaps this is what CEO Evan Williams meant last month when he said that the site was hitting records “across all the metrics that matter.”-Adam Ostrow, Mashable

RSW Comment: Well, doesn’t look like Twitter’s going anywhere for a while does it? Adam does point out however, these stats don’t recognize automated bots, which seem to proliferate Twitter as of late, so these stats don’t quite tell the whole story.

Adweek piece on latest RSW/US Survey

Thanks to Adweek for their article on our latest survey, "A Client's Perspective on Agencies," 277 marketing decision makers surveyed on how they think agencies are performing and how to best win their hearts.

We’ll be posting over the coming week with our thoughts on the survey results. An interesting quote from our owner, Mark, in the piece:

"Simply doing social and digital, such as creating Facebook accounts and developing banner ads, isn't going to be enough as marketers get hungrier for better direction -- and results -- in the digital/social world," Sneider said. "The agency that can help clients understand how to use social/digital and how to integrate these [media] effectively into more traditional initiatives will, in the end, win the day."

Click here for the Adweek article.

Click here to download our "A Client's Perspective on Agencies" survey.

Agency New Business-Tom Petty Was Right

Tom Petty was right, wasn’t he? The waiting is the hardest part, especially when it comes to agency new business. I was reminded of this, yet again, when speaking with an agency principal this week and it also tied into a piece I read the other day.

This principal mentioned they were in the same boat as many agencies, that is, the cobbler’s children story, where new business tends to come last. In this principal’s particular case, she had a very good local and regional reputation and referrals tended to be the bulk of her business.

A good “problem” to have, certainly. But she knew there needed to be more than just referrals, thinking long-term, and started to address this by creating an attractive postcard mailer (which she very graciously emailed and shared with me.) However, the postcard was sent out and nothing really happened.

A lot of questions of course, as to the target list that was being mailed to and how the simple postcard could have been made to stand out more effectively, for example, but specifically I asked how they followed up on the card and the answer was, some follow up but not necessarily as organized or thorough as it could have been.

This made me think of a recent article, Is Your Lead Generation System Causing You to Lose Clients (see link below) and the quote below:

It's simple to drop someone from your target list; having dropped them, they are
out of sight and out of mind. Your sight, your mind, that is. But they have
memories of you. Did you simply drop them? Did you not return the last call?

Now, a caveat in regards to the above quote; unfortunately, not many prospects are waiting by the phone once they receive your mailer and are then put off when you only call them back once or twice. But the quote still makes a good point-prospects do remember a good piece and we’ve heard examples where prospects say they remember the piece very well and there was a voicemail, but they were travelling and never heard back.

So you see where I’m going at this point I hope. You can’t send out the mailer and follow up with one call and be done. It doesn’t work that way. Be reasonable in the initial list you’re building before you send something out to prospects, break it down into something you can manage and follow up respectfully but consistently over months, not just days or weeks.

Yes, Tom is right, waiting is the hardest part, but waiting by itself won’t get you far, take smart and effective action and your efforts will pay off

Click here for Is Your Lead Generation System Causing You to Lose Clients? by Charles H. Green

Social Media and Retail-Crosstown Traffic

Jordan Mccollum at Marketing Pilgrim has a piece on the Hitwise December numbers and I thought they were interesting, as well as potentially helpful to agencies with a retail focus. Per the graph below, downstream traffic from social networks to retail sites is up 37%.

As Jordan asks:

So is it more because users are recommending deals to their friends, or is it because of retailers’ presence on social networks?

Good question. Seems inevitable with these numbers consistently trending upward that big brands will continue to focus more dollars on social. As ever, the comments after the piece were also interesting. Take for example these two extremes:

Great statistics. I think that social media will grow enormously in next 12 months. Because people have this feeling that social media sites like Facebook or MySpace represent more personal information, then you can ever put into the About me page or the blog or website.

And then the other example:

I just cannot see how/why Social advertising works…most are teenagers wasting time. I focus on search.

Showing yet again, just how much social media is still the Wild West.

Read Jordan's piece, Social Network Traffic to Retail Grows here.

4 links ad agencies ought to follow to help new business efforts-RSW/US roundup for 2/1

Because there’s more great stuff out there than anyone can possibly get to, we thought we’d point you to some of the noteworthy links from last week:


Online Branded Communities: Misguided and Missing the Point: If you ask brand managers the purpose of online communities, the reply you’ll most often hear is “customer engagement.” Among marketers, this term is more prevalent than Frisbees at a dog beach. But the real question is this: Are brands providing meaningful and engaging experiences to their customers through their online communities? Kathy Baughman & Steve Hershberger, AMA Marketing Power

RSW Comment: We’ll let you click the link to ge the answer, but important to realize , per the post, “half of the brands in the study were still in the social marketing experimentation stage.” Some interesting best practices in the rest of the post.


Why Your Voice Mails Are Ignored, and What To Do Instead: “I leave voice mail messages all day long for prospects,” the salesperson bemoaned. “Why don’t people call me back?” I didn’t need to listen to his calls to give an answer. The same reasons apply to all telesales people leaving voice mails. Pick any three (or more) of the following reasons. Art Sobczak, Telesales Magic

RSW Comment: Traditional prospecting methods often get overshadowed by social media, but Art’s tips can compliment the mix you, ideally, are already employing for new business.

175 Million Users Per Day Log Into Facebook: Half of all registered users still log in to Facebook every day, says Sandberg in the interview. That’s 175 million people. And that doesn’t include Facebook Connect logins, only those people that visit the Facebook website. The numbers start to become a bit staggering but the one nagging question is revenue and profitability. Frank Reed, Marketing Pilgrim

RSW Comment: Well that’s the real question isn’t it? Who is paying attention to all those ads on FB?

Is Your Lead Generation System Causing You to Lose Clients: It's simple to drop someone from your target list; having dropped them, they are out of sight and out of mind. Your sight, your mind, that is. But they have memories of you. Did you simply drop them? Did you not return the last call? Did you cancel some meeting or event? Did you give the screened-out client any indication that they had been screened out? Most firms don't have any particular approach to screening out prospects; they simply stop doing what they were doing. Yet the same people would never drop a social relationship-Charles H. Green, raintoday.com

RSW Comment: Some valid points on lead generation and the screening process.

The Bigger They Are...The Harder They Hurt - Part II

Recently wrote a post on the glories and challenges of having disproportionately large clients.  Great to have them because they can generate a lot of solid revenue, but oh so tough if/when they disappear.

The story of two principals on two different paths.  Spoke to one yesterday who is "so busy with his big client that he doesn't have time to think about new business" and another one about two weeks ago who said "so busy with this big client...but your post on the dangers of getting sucked in are real...let's talk".  They've since become a client of RSW/US.

Too busy for new business?  I don't care if it's us, or someone else, or you....have we not just been through a near depression.  Have not most of you had to lay off some, if not nearly all (as I've seen with some agencies) of your personnel? 

I don't care how big that client is...or how busy you are.  There are little, simple things you can do to keep a low level of new business activity running.  No time to manage a full blown program, call us, we can help.

Here are some ideas for you...things you can do to keep it going, at least at a low level:

1. Build a list of prospects.  Something the admin can do.  Buy the city's book of lists and start there.  Have him/her call and get names of the key marketing people in the organization.  And the list doesn't have to be huge...but it should have some mass.  Start with 100;

2. Post once a week and push out the post via a value-added email to your prospects.  Maybe to give the email release a little volume, add links to some recent articles you've picked up that you think might be interesting.  Do this the same time every week, so people expect it - or aren't surprised when they see it;

3. Use a system to push out your emails that enables you to track who opens and clicks.  Vertical Response is one mechanism.  There are others, like "Emma" that can do the same thing.  This way, you're only spending time calling on those that take action on your email;

4. Take some action on those that take action - after they open a few times.  Call a few days later to "follow-up and just check in".  Send them a piece of your work.  Drop them a hand written note stating that you would love the chance to speak and will call sometime soon.  Create a mechanism that become rote...something your admin can do (if it's a mailing) or organize for you (Mr. Smith...here's your call list this week).   Do something to provide some consistency.

5. Keep it relevant.  Put your prospects' names/companies in your google news tracker and/or create a tweet deck to follow them on Twitter and/or have someone look them all up on LinkedIn and capture key elements of their profiles.  All good stuff to have to make the reachouts more personal, relevant, and substantive for you (and them).

Ok...so think about it.  What I've described takes a weekend day to organize.  It take 15 minutes a week to post (I've just written this post in 14 minutes at 5:35am), it takes a couple hours every few weeks to place calls or send notes to those who have consistently taken action on your emails.  And it takes the time to set up the team to do the jobs you need to support the effort (e.g. research upfront, pushing out the emails, collecting the opens, etc.).

Maintenance of the outreach is key here. 

Organized methodology is key here. 

And value-added messaging is key here. 

All things you can do to keep a low level of connect...just force yourself to make the time.