The Organ Grinder’s Monkey

I had a call with a friend (and now client) Susan Meyer this morning. She wanted to talk to me about using my services because her products aren’t selling as well as she’d like. As we talked about what she was doing and who her target audience was, a potentially problematic disconnect began to come to light. Namely that while Susan is doing a lot of great online marketing stuff - blogging, commenting in other people’s blogs, writing articles for and buying advertising on websites that are targeting her audience, etc. - the reality is that the majority of her target audience (primarily retirement-age women who are entering a new stage of their lives and are trying to figure out what to do next) aren’t actually spending a lot of their time online.

Oh sure, they’re shopping or using the net for email and other basic tasks - this isn’t exactly a generation of tech dummies we’re talking about. If anything, they’re quite familiar with the Internet and possibly even retiring from jobs that relied heavily on computers. But, unlike younger audiences, they’re most likely not spending a lot of time on blogs and forums, reading online articles and otherwise just hanging out online to the extent that the lowest hanging fruit of small scale online marketing will be effective in reaching them.

Once we got to talking, we discovered that Susan’s target audience spends much more time watching tv, going out with friends, brick-and-mortar shopping and otherwise NOT living online. Ergo, a lot of what she is doing, while smart for someone whose audience is spending a large chunk of their time working or playing around in cyberspace, is not particularly useful in her case.

Which brings us to the next question - what is useful? Susan is a solopreneur. She can’t afford the big, expensive tv ads or newspaper inserts that would be the most obvious and most easily successful routes to get her marketing message in front of her audience. So how do you cheaply and effectively get the attention of a group of people who spend far more time in “meatspace” than cyberspace?
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Tags: Business by Soni Pitts
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Think your business can’t go virtual? Meet Dr. Parkinson.

Dr. Parkinson is a practicing physician in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. But you can’t visit his office, because he doesn’t have one. He services a patient list of 18-40 year old folks in Brooklyn and Manhattan mostly via IM, emails and phone calls. And for those times when only face-to-face will do, he comes to your home or office. He has a snazzy website with lots of easy-to-understand instructions about how his practice works and how to become a patient, and a page of real-life examples of what that looks like in practice. And yes, he also has a blog.

Here’s how it works. Think you may have broken your wrist when your dog tripped you in the park? No problem. Call Dr. Parkinson and he’ll set you up with a nearby radiologist for X-rays, and while you’re doing that, he’ll be setting up a visit with a local orthopedist to get it set. A few hours later, you’re at home getting signatures drawn on your new cast.

No paying out the nose to sit all day in the ER. No getting stuck with whoever is on call, regardless of how much they charge or how competent (or incompetent) they are. Just efficient, personalized care stripped clean of all the excruciating inefficiencies that the medical system is renowned for. And simple phone call is all it takes to gets the ball rolling.

Dr. Parkinson is saving himself a lot of money and trouble. He has no rent, no payroll, no regular commute. And there’s no waiting room full of tired, ill people getting angrier by the minute because he’s running late.

And he’s dedicated to saving his patients money, as well. Patients pay a set fee of $500/yearly for two face-to-face visits, plus unlimited calls, emails and IMs. (Additional visits and other activities are set at reasonable a la cart fees that patients are informed about ahead of time; he even has a discounted fee list for uninsured patients). And since most basic stuff like diagnosing a common cold or prescribing treatment for a sprained ankle can be handled over the phone or through IM, patients aren’t out the expensive office visit every time they need to talk to the doctor.

He maintains a database of specialists, pharmacies, and other members of the medical field in his area, which he uses to ensure that his patients have the cheapest, fastest and best care he can line up. He negotiates fees with other care specialists for his patients and makes sure that if they need meds, they get the cheapest prescription available. He’ll even consult with them to help them get the best health insurance they can afford and that covers everything they need, without any of the pricey, extraneous do-dads they don’t.

By going virtual, Dr. Parkinson is not only saving himself and his patients a lot of time, money and inconvenience, he’s also providing a better standard of care for them and a better standard of living for himself. Neither he nor his patients have to “sit and soak” in a stifling office full of contagious, grumpy people and their bored, hyperactive and/or effusively germ-shedding children. Patients don’t have to take time off of work or pay a babysitter to get basic care (although they would still have to do so for visits to outside specialists). He is ensured of a steady base pay that won’t fluctuate unpredictably, plus additional fees for additional visits. And, since the majority of his work can be done virtually, he is able to spend as much time as he needs with each person.

I seriously want this man to be my doctor. Unfortunately, I live several states away, so I’ll have to wait until someone around here gets wise to the world and follows Dr. Parkinson’s lead. In the meantime, I wanted to introduce you to Dr. Parkinson so that you could see that the number of careers that can’t be improved by going virtual, targeting a niche and doing everything you can to beat the expectations of your clients is getting smaller every day.

So, if you were putting off moving your business online because you think it can’t be done, perhaps it’s just that it can’t be done online the way you’re currently doing it. Time to rethink your approach.

Oh, and if you’re a doctor in Asheville, send me a ping when you’re ready to go virtual.

Tags: Business, Changing the World by Soni Pitts
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Do you really need to know SEO?

If you do any sort of commerce over the web, from heading up a full-scale international corporation to running an eBay store in your free time, you probably have a blog (or are thinking about it). But what good is a blog that no one can find, or that scores poorly in the search engines? Not much, beyond any cathartic relief you get from writing it.

SEO (search engine optimization - the art and science of making your site easy to find and creating good search engine mojo) is a basic skill that everyone who has a web presence of any kind needs to have under their belt. Even if you’re not the one managing your site, you should at least understand what’s going on so you can tell if your webmaster is getting it right or screwing things up royally.

But for bloggers, who are almost exclusively one-(wo)man-bands when it comes to creating and managing the content and structure of their site, not knowing about and understanding how to use SEO is like being a race car driver who doesn’t know how to drive a stick-shift - you’re won’t get very far without a great deal of luck, and even then it’s going to be a hell of a bumpy ride.

The Blogger’s Guide to SEO

In The Blogger’s Guide to SEO, Aaron and Giovanna Wall have created a great e-reference for beginners and old hands alike who want to learn more about the basics of SEO and how to apply these concepts to their blog. By understanding and implementing these ideas, you can learn to maximize the searchability, ranking and exposure of your work, and avoid some of the most obvious pitfalls.

This quick read is a great primer on blog SEO for newbies - it offers a deep enough overview to provide real, useful value without getting bogged down in unnecessary detail or confusing hardcore methodology. The writing is concise, easy to read and informative without being dry or overly academic (and, more importantly, without dumbing down the topic into trite, superficial fluff), and the content is broad enough to cover all the bases without chasing after all the shiny bits of esoteric SEO foil that often attract enraptured geeks, but that are meaningless to average readers.

Time to play with my new toys!

In fact, I like this little guide so much that, since I’m pretty much at the stage where I need to start implementing SEO techniques here anyway, I’m going to use it as a template for doing so. Over the coming weeks, I’m going to go through the tips and ideas they outline and either apply them (and blog the process) or write about why I’m not going to, both as a way to get this thing off the ground but also to test out their information for ease of use and effectiveness (when possible).

Of course, that means things like link structure, categories, page titles and the like may get changed around. Luckily, this blog is so new that I don’t have too many readers to worry about discombobulating; this is a good reason why it’s important to implement this stuff early in the process. But if you are visiting on a regular basis (God bless you), keep an eye out for housekeeping posts that will point out any changes that could affect your viewing pleasure.

Consider it a slow-motion review by way of a live field test. It’ll be fun! Plus it means I have a valid excuse for monkeying around with the site. (Not that that’s ever stopped me before, mind you.)

BTW, if you use any of these tips and ideas for your own site, drop me a comment or email to let me know how it went and what your thoughts were on the process. I’ll put any such submission up on the blog so that everyone can benefit from your experiences.

Photo credit: Scyza

Tags: Reviews by Soni Pitts
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Sometimes, the best marketing strategy of all is simply to do the right thing at the top of your lungs.

From her site, fagbug.com (warning: music - click speaker icon above Rock You icon to toggle):

“On the 11th annual National Day of Silence (April 18, 2007), Erin Davies was victim to a hate crime. Because of sporting a rainbow sticker on her VW Beetle, Erin’s car was vandalized, left with the words “fAg” and “u r gay” placed on the hood and driver side of her car. Despite initial shock and embarrassment, Erin has decided to embrace what happened and film a documentary about her 58-day cross country tour around the US and Canada in her car known worldwide as the fagbug.”

Today, Erin is touring in her bug, has met with people from across the country, has received official sponsorship from VW and on the 1 year anniversary of the vandalism plans to paint Fagbug to match her rainbow stickers.

Along the way she has been welcomed, harassed, stared at, talked to and asked by various parties to stay and to leave. Her car has been repeatedly re-vandalized and repaired, and she has received both threats and support. This is a woman whose bravery should make us all look a little harder at ourselves, especially when we choose not to step up and say something when it needs to be said. And it’s a lesson in just how far you can go if you commit to doing something that’s really important to you and accept the help of others along the way.

Tags: Changing the World, Conversation Economy, Society and Culture by Soni Pitts
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Wow. Just…wow.

Is it breathtaking cinematography? Oh, yes. Is it great advertising? Certainly. Will it sell more beer? Eh, probably not.

This is what’s called “name recognition” marketing, and it’s designed to implant or keep a brand’s “memespace” in your head. Only the biggest companies can afford to do this (this ad cost £10m to make, and is tied in with a host of other interactive activities, according to this article), and there’s no real data showing how much effect any one ad (and its attendant costs) produces. So it’s not a viable strategy for smaller biz operators by a long shot.

But boy, is it ever beautiful when done right. Consider it art, supported by corporate donations. Enjoy.

Tags: Advertising and Marketing, Business, Reviews, Society and Culture by Soni Pitts
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In the world of marketing, you run across a lot of hype. And the fear of coming across as hype-y keeps many business owners from doing the marketing and advertising they need to stay in business.

You might not hear about this on the street, but there’s actually a fierce discussion going on in the marketing world over the value, or lack thereof, of hype. On the one hand, you’ve got some marketing wonks waving around stats that irrefutably show that hype copy beats out non-hype copy. On the other, you’ve got folks who feel that all that hype is undignified, unnecessary and insulting.

So who’s right? They both are.

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Tags: Business, Conversation Economy, Copywriting by Soni Pitts
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Sorry for the hiatus, but I’m currently trying hard not to die from the common cold. Currently spending my time holed up in bed trying to sleep it off (hey, if you’re going to be sick, you might as well be unconscious). We will return to our regularly scheduled programming when my brain quits trying to mimic 30 lbs of concrete in a 10-lbs container. (Now, with new and improved SNERK-O-RAMA sound effects!

In the meantime, somebody should know that there’s a spot on the market for luxuriously soft - and hyper-absorbent - cloth handkerchiefs (perhaps made of some high-tech and fast-drying, yet machine-washable, microfiber material) embedded with germ-destroying silver nano-particles, for those of us who loathe blowing our way through a small grove of trees, but hate the thought of pockets full of soggy, germy (and sometimes rough) plain cotton hankies.

Somebody get to work on that, aight?

Tags: Housekeeping, Announcements and Related Fussing About by Soni Pitts
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The battle between long copy - the traditional sales-letter format that strikes some people as smarmy and too sales-y - and short copy is a perennial hot spot for discussion in the business world.

From a marketing perspective, long copy is something of an enigma - no one admits to liking it, but it out-sells the alternatives by as much as 70%, a fact that has more sensitive business owners tearing their hair out in frustration. Why is this?

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Tags: Business, Conversation Economy, Copywriting by Soni Pitts
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[This is the first article under the category The Monkey’s Guidebook for Clueless Marketers. I’ve created this tag to denote how-to’s, basic instruction, concepts and other “marketing 101″ stuff. Got a topic you’d like to see covered in the Guidebook? Let me know!]

Tag, you’re it

When you’re working on your marketing and branding strategy, one of the things you have to consider is your tagline. For those who don’t know, a tagline is that snappy little tidbit of text that serves as sort of a subtitle to help your audience translate what you do into what you can do for them.

But the right tagline is more than just a verbal flourish at the end of your logo. An effective tagline can create a viral “earworm” that has staying power and delivers a clear, compelling and positive message to your audience, enhancing your image, strengthening your brand and piquing the interest of prospective customers. OTOH, a crappy tagline can do more harm than good by creating confusion, attracting the wrong prospects, inviting derision or ridicule or just making you look stupid.

This is very important, so I’ll say it again: Your tagline is the lyric sheet to your business’ beat. They may not be able to hum the melody, but they’ll know the words and whether those words work against you or for you, very little short of omnipotent entities will be able to knock them out of your audience’s head once they stick. It will be the way people remember you and it will affect whether or not they’re interested in doing business with you on an emotional level. So get it right, or at the least try very hard not to get it wrong. (A boring, but inoffensive, placeholder tagline that isn’t demonstrably bad can be a neutral way to avoid screwing up if you’re having trouble coming up with just the right words. But do keep working on that. You don’t want “boring” to be the first thing someone thinks about your business.)

Now before we go any further, let me just say that the tagline for this blog, currently “Street Savvy Marketing on a Small Scale” is still in deep beta and falls under the heading of boring, yet hopefully inoffensive, placeholder text. In fact, if you’re reading this at any point after I posted this there’s a good chance it has changed since then, maybe more than once. This is a new venture and I’m still working on hammering out something I really like.

As with many marketing messages, finding just the right combination of words that conveys the concepts and mental pictures you want to express can be a long and sometimes hair-pulling experience. But to save you some time and aggravation, I’m going to riff off a few bad examples, offer a few pointers and show you what works, what doesn’t and why.

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Tags: Business, Conversation Economy by Soni Pitts
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D’OH!!!

Color me monkey-butt red. Yanno that Trendwatching briefing I posted about on the 6th? The one decrying the death of the pet goods economy, the surging interest in boring hotels and the *shudder* advances in in-utero marketing? Yeah, it’s a hoax. A fake. A spoof.

I got this email on the 7th, but I hadn’t checked this particular inbox before I left for my week long, internet-free vacation. So I’m probably the last to know. Except for you, of course:

We hope you enjoyed the very special trend briefing we sent you yesterday. If you didn’t, then please pour yourself a strong cup of coffee and take another close look. It’s a SPOOF. Fake. Not to be taken at face value. Even most of the sites we referred to are, well, ours—and entirely fictitious.

We thought it would be fun, just for once, to mock overzealous marketers, crass consumerism and—above all—ourselves. So please don’t ditch your pet, stay in ugly hotels, pollute the earth, paint your walls turquoise or start marketing to unborn babies, OK?

Rest assured that we’ll back with ‘real’ trends in December, the kind of trends you’ve been getting from us since 2002. If you can’t wait that long, check out our Trend Database or our 2008 Trend Report. All real, all authentic, all useful.

Best,

Reinier Evers
Founder, trendwatching.com
reinier@trendwatching.com

Thank God. I was really starting to worry about a world filled with green backlash, mass pet abandonment and prenatal branding. Thank goodness it was only a bad dream, Auntie Em.

But still. It was a cruel, cruel trick. Oh, and uh, if you know anywhere I can offload a like-new turquoise SUV with handstitched seal-fur seats and chihuahua trim, drop me a line will you? It’s, uh, for a friend of mine. A really, really gullible friend…

Tags: Business, Housekeeping, Announcements and Related Fussing About, Trends by Soni Pitts
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