Marketing Archives - Page 8 of 29 - Otis Regrets... or not

Twitter Bios: the 160 character sales pitch

Here is a great project for your copywriting class or inhouse brainstorming session: give everybody five minutes to write the best possible Twitter bio, which has to be 160 characters or less, including spaces.

Your Twitter bio is what shows up in another user’s inbox when you follow them and they make a split second decision about whether to follow you in return. The New York Times had a nice sidebar piece in which they join Slate and the Washington Post in anointing Hillary Clinton’s bio a superb example of the craft:

Wife, mom, lawyer, women & kids advocate, FLOAR, FLOTUS, US Senator, SecState, author, dog owner, hair icon, pantsuit aficionado, glass ceiling cracker, TBD …

It states her qualifications, though not in a pompous way. It veers off into some relevant light touches (Hilary’s lack of hair savvy and her predilection for pantsuits are well known non-presidential attributes) which are amusing without being frivolous.

A bio like that promises that the tweets also will be interesting, and that you may meet other cool folk by following her. It’s much more effective than a straightforward statement of qualifications, or an unabashedly promotional bio like the one Lady Gaga is currently running: BUY MY NEW SINGLE ‘APPLAUSE’ AND PRE-ORDER MY ALBUM ‘ARTPOP’ HERE NOW!

Before writing this post I checked my own neglected bio for @otisregrets and found it pretty terrible:

Results-focused ad copywriter; blogger about writing, marketing, customer service, technology and more.

I gave myself the five minutes and came up with:
I write direct response ads, web pages, emails, direct mail & whatnot. Gold Echo & Caples Silver Cup winner. Guilty pleasure: streaming bluegrass videos at work.

Some work qualifications hopefully written in a casual way… but I don’t like the personal aside because it might imply to some that I bill for time when I’m actually not working. (I don’t.) So I tweaked it to:

I write results-oriented ads, web pages, emails, direct mail & whatnot. Gold Echo & Caples Silver Cup winner. Read my blog for marketing tips & off-topic rants.

The blog’s a good call to action since that is indeed where I want the reader to go next, and the throwaway about “off topic rants” will hopefully garner curiosity. I’m sure I can do better but I only had 5 minutes. Let me know how you do on your bio.

Money in your mailbox

“Money in your mailbox” was the mantra of many a get-rich-quick offer in a simpler and sunnier era, promising greedy and gullible people they could run a successful mail order business from home. Simplicity has fallen on hard times, as has the United States Postal Service, and interesting direct mail examples are increasingly rare. But I hit a hot streak recently and will share them with you.

LLSouter — *Outer envelope of Leukemia & Lymphoma Society mailer*

First up is a package that literally has money in it, “How can 5¢ save a child’s life?” from the Leukemia & Lymphoma Association. This is a worthy but small organization and they went to the big agency that makes the address labels and a junior copywriter was assigned to the job. I know the copywriter is junior because they never answer the question!

The letter starts, “I’ve included a nickel to make a point. You and I both know that a single nickel won’t go far in the fight against blood cancers. But even nickels can quickly add up. And if you invest these nickels in blood cancer research that is searching for clues, you could save not only one child but thousands of patients.” Then the nickel is referenced in passing on the ask sheet: “your generous gift, along with this nickel…”

LLSInside — *Letter intro from LLS package*

The copywriter wasn’t comfortable with the (probably mandated) concept so they disparage it. No, a nickel really can’t do much. I’m just enclosing it to make a point. But what if they’d told us about one thing that actually does cost a nickel in research and used that as a stepping stone? And said I want you to send as many nickels as you can spare… and keep this one or pass this along and tell another person about the need. Take the time to make the reader think and visualize, instead of going through the motions.

DiscoverOuter — *Mystery outer envelope from Discover*

Next up is one of those cleverly art directed packages that you want to open out of curiosity. What’s new is the peel off sticker next to the window that says “important information”. It looks like somebody working at their desk literally printed that off from a sheet of Avery labels and stuck it on the package. The placement of the sticker calls attention to a plastic card inside, its corner just visible through the envelope window. So I have to open it and discover… it’s a “proof of special invitation status” from Discover. They want me to take out a personal loan; if I was in the market for a loan they certainly would have gotten my attention.

*HRC package after opening by 11 year old*

There’s a story behind the next package, another anonymous package which has been torn into pieces. My 11 year old asked why I was recycling this without opening it and I pointed out the clues: “personal and confidential” but with a standard mail indicia indicates it’s a piece of junk mail. But he insisted on opening it (by ripping it apart). And lo and behold, it’s an affinity offer to supporters of Human Rights Council, a LGBT political action group. It’s not that long ago that all mail referencing the recipient’s LGBT status was delivered anonymously to protect their privacy but I am going to guess that any HRC member today would be proud to announce their affiliation. This is one anonymous mailing that should NOT have been anonymous; Nationwide Insurance could have multiplied their response by putting something simple like “A special announcement to HRC supporters” on the OE. But I’m guessing this is a standard format that is used by Nationwide for all kinds of affinity groups so that possibility never even crossed their mind.

Finally, a word about the sheer incompetence of the USPS which has to be a factor in the decline of direct mail. Back in the day when I was direct mail manager for a department store, we had to hire a “postal consultant” because it was impossible to communicate with the post office directly about the most efficient and cost effective ways to make sure our mail got through. Time and time again, the USPS has shot itself in the foot with oblique self-serving practices when it could have thrived if it treated itself like the business it claims to be.

This envelope is an example. It was rejected and returned “postage due” 3 weeks after mailing. It’s not overweight, so I took it to my local post office and asked for an explanation. They said it’s probably because of the cardboard square inside, the UPC from a product box, which I was returning for a rebate. It made the envelope “non machinable” and when it got stuck in the automated feeder it was kicked out, where it sat in a pile for a few weeks till somebody processed it. Turns out there is a 20 cent surcharge for “mail containing a rigid object”. Bet you didn’t know that. Metal’s obviously rigid, but what about a piece of cardboard? I guess if the automated equipment rejects it, it’s rigid. The machines have taken over; too bad they’re not more discerning.

Specifics sell… this example shows why!

National Parks — Beginning of the National Park Foundation’s email

Unfortunately, it’s an example of what NOT to do: The National Park Foundation saw the terrible wildfire currently out of control in Yosemite as a great opportunity to raise money for its cause. It’s exactly the same tactic used by The Salvation Army, The American Red Cross and many other charities which often have their best efforts on the heels of a disaster which triggers’ readers empathy and desire to help.

Unfortunately, as the NPF email was on its way to the coder some bone head saw the proof and said, “wait a minute, what about all the other parks? If they’re not in California, maybe they don’t give a hoot about Yosemite!” And so the “ask” was expanded to mention acts of vandalism, including green paint being splashed on the Lincoln Memorial.

I didn’t even realize the Lincoln Memorial was a national park, and it seems to me responsibility for cleaning it off (or keeping vandalism from happening) should rest with the local police. They then go on to tell us that there were 2,000 acts of vandalism in national parks last year and that the parks are underfunded. There’s also a reference to the fact this is the parks’ 97th anniversary and that the Travel Channel will match your gift. And they close with the unacceptably vague promise that a gift will “provide critical resources that directly aid and enrich our national parks and the work of the National Park Service.”

What should they have done instead? Leave the kitchen sink in the kitchen! In this case, a vastly stronger email could have been created by focusing entirely on Yosemite, saying how this makes us realize how precious our parks are and how much they need our support, and bringing in the Travel Channel match as exciting news that makes your gift go twice as far. Tell us very specifically what our contribution is going to do. Then get out.

And that anniversary announcement? Save it for the 100th, for goodness sake. Assuming this Foundation actually is doing good work, I hope they’ll be around that long. Meanwhile, this one goes straight to the Badvertising Hall of Shame.

Back by popular demand at DMA2013

My panel discussion on K.I.I.S. (Keep it simple, stupid) marketing was asked to return to the Direct Marketing Association’s annual conference based on our being one of the top-rated panels at last year’s event. DMA2013 is happening in Chicago and we’ll be the last session before the wrap-up lunch presentation on Wednesday, October 16. I love Wednesday sessions because they happen after the trade show is over and the Echo awards are done, so anyone who’s still around has a serious reason for being there.

Once again, Dawn Wolfe of Autodesk and Philip Reynolds of Palio+Ignite will join me and show what happens when, instead of technical jargon or corporate posturing, your advertising connects with the reader or viewer or web browser based on a simple appeal to the things that are important to them. The rules of “back by popular demand” are that the framework of the topic is the same, but the examples and case histories used have to be completely new. Come sit in… it will be an interesting and hopefully entertaining hour.

What’s a new customer worth, Fidelity?

A death in the family caused us to contact Fidelity Investments, where the deceased’s assets were held. Fidelity told us we’d need to sign a form for redistribution of assets, and it would arrive in five business days. When about two weeks had elapsed, and no form, a family member called Fidelity and was told a/they had no way of tracking the form or even verifying it had been sent and b/mailing the form was unnecessary since it was available online. We then downloaded the form, completed it, and were done. 19 days after the original request (so 15 business days) the forms finally arrived in the mail. Two days after that, a second set of forms arrived in the mail.

There were three people involved on the recipient end. One of them had previous experience with Fidelity through a lump sum disbursement of a retirement account and commented “Fidelity… I should have known.” The second had no previous experience with Fidelity and is unlikely to establish a relationship on the basis of this experience. The third was me, who has had his business at Fidelity for many years and has always been delighted with the service and so was baffled by this Keystone Kops routine.

So, is there a double standard, where existing customers are treated better than potential new customers? In a perfect world, that’s the way it would be. But how much does it cost to gain a new customer? Wouldn’t it have been better to woo these two prospects rather than driving them away?

In a word, yes. Customers die, change their focus or get lured away by a more aggressive competitor. You ALWAYS need new business, and if you can acquire it at low cost that gives you more resources to use for pampering existing customers. Fidelity should get its departments talking to one another so fiascos like this aren’t the face of the company to prospective customers.

How to be a good tech writer

The other day a marketing colleague asked me to write him an email which he’d pass along to his CEO, about why I should be hired to write technical copy. Feel free to use these selling points in your own self-marketing, assuming of course they apply.

The first thing I believe about tech writing is that you need to understand the product—-not necessarily on a programmatic level, but the problem it solves, and why it does this better than other options. I’m not a scientist but I love to learn how things work.

Secondly, I believe that technology buyers are people with the same personal motivations as those buying consumer products. They want to be secure, avoid conflict and achieve recognition and in an indirect way technical products help them do this. They get promoted because they’ve contributed to the bottom line. They get to go home on time instead of staying to placate angry users.

Finally, I always ask to interview the sales team so I can understand the objections that are typically raised and the hot buttons that get prospects excited about the product. I go to CES most every year (and attended Comdex before that) and spend most of my time hanging back near kiosks to watch sales engineers do technical presentations.

I believe these steps are missing in a lot of the copy I read for technical companies which reads like a laundry list of specs. I spent most of my career working in the Bay Area, and my work was typically lead generating direct response that was tested against other messages and I usually won.

To my fellow copywriters, I’ll add that I won consistently not so much because I was a dramatically better writer, but because I was diligent in my preparation. As Yogi Berra may have said, half of success is showing up.

Too much of a good thing from Values.com?

HenryFordValuesBillboard — Values.com billboard in Latham, NY

I pass this billboard frequently on a busy highway in upstate New York. It has multiple inspirational headlines stacked like cordwood: Driven/ Innovation/ Pass It On/ Values.com. To the left, a photo of Henry Ford (we know it’s him because there is a caption that says Henry Ford), driving (not being driven in) an early horseless carriage. The net effect is too much of a good thing, and I see it all the time, so I finally had to write about it.

Part of the problem is that the placement is a stone’s throw from Troy, NY, birthplace of the Arrow shirt, the cast iron stove, Uncle Sam and The Night Before Christmas among innovations. It sticks in our craw that they chose a non-local for their innovator. But the bigger issue is the multiple inspirational sayings when just one or two would do. It’s like too much candy on Halloween.

I headed over to Values.com to learn more about exactly what inspires them to inspire. It’s an interesting website. You can’t join them or give them money or get money from them; they’re doing this because “We believe that people are basically good and often benefit from a simple reminder.” Fair enough, and a good reason they deserve a little gentle nudging to make sure those reminders are effective.

There’s a section on the website called “Billboards” and on it you can create your own values billboard and look at it online, or look at billboards others have created. Each has one photo, one headline and one value and works a lot better than Values.com’s “Driven” effort. Give it a try. (But be sure your inspiration is not something naughty like “beer” or you’ll get a server error.)

By the way, what the website does not say is that Values.com is apparently funded by evangelical Christian Phillip Anschutz, who according to Wikipedia has also funded a think tank that criticizes evolution and a ballot initiative designed to overturn local and state laws that prohibit discrimination against individuals on the basis of sexual orientation. If I were Mr. Anschutz, I would identify myself and make my case on the website rather than leaving it to the curious visitor to go googling and draw their own conclusions.

Headline hijinks revisited with Bose, Wall Street Journal and Coke Zero

We’re back as promised to that corridor of horrors where tyro copywriters go to die. But this time we’ll focus on the context in which your headline/outer teaser is read and include a couple of positive examples.

First, some badvertising from Bose on the back of a Sunday newspaper insert… about as broad a demographic as you can find. “If you think watching TV is exciting, wait until you really hear it.” There are two things wrong here. First, the copywriter assumes universal agreement that “watching TV is exciting”. If it’s not a head-nodder then the reader is lost. But do we all agree that “watching TV is exciting”? Not likely. Second, there’s an intellectual contortion required to stay with the writer’s train of thought. When you switch from one action mode to another (watching… to listening) that’s some heavy lifting for the reader to do in their mind’s eye. Not likely they will stay around for the body copy, and neither shall we.

wsjwelcomeback — Wall Street Journal “welcome back”

Now look at this envelope from the Wall Street Journal: “Welcome Back”. Apparently I renewed after a lapse but don’t remember doing so; naturally, I’m going to open the envelope to see what I agreed to. And when I get inside it turns out this is their standard “professional courtesy discount” offer; they WANT to say welcome back and maybe I will feel a little guilty about getting an offer that maybe I’m not entitled to so you can guess I’ll jump on that. The two simple words “Welcome Back” do a brilliant job of framing the conversation and getting me involved.

CokeZeroDontRead — Coke Zero “don’t read” banner

Same thing with this Coke Zero banner that ran during the NCAA championship game: “Don’t read this banner. There’s basketball on.” Well, of course I’m going to read it because I can’t not do so. But in this chest-bumping environment I will give you huge points for the apparent cool factor. Yet it actually ties perfectly into their tag line, “enjoy everything”.

The copywriters on the WSJ and Coke Zero projects thought about the environment in which the prospect is viewing the ad, and meet them on their own turf. The Bose copywriter asked readers to switch from what they’re doing to what the writer wants them to think about. Which is better and more effective?

No thank you to Citi “Thank You Points”

I used a Citi “Thank You” card as my main purchasing vehicle for maybe 10 years. Its attraction was that it credited travel points for miles on any airline (at the time, unheard of) and I amassed some 300,000 points and paid the $75 annual fee each of those ten years. Then, about a year ago, I happened to have a question about my account and the telephone rep told me that virtually all my points were expiring in 90 days. I could purchase travel for a future date but if I didn’t buy something before the deadline they were gone.

So, my wife and kid went to visit friends in Germany in high season at a ridiculous price and we used more points on a family vacation. There were still tens of thousands of points left over so I transferred them to a new, no-fee Thank You card and cancelled the paid card. A few months later that card’s points are about to expire so I have been scheming to get some value out of them. It’s an expensive time to book travel so I’m looking to buy gift cards for places where I spend money. Meanwhile, from Citi’s perspective, I’ve transitioned from a presumably profitable customer paying a high annual fee to a fee-free and soon to be ex-customer.

While I’ve been spending way too much time negotiating with the Thank You folks, I have wondered whether there are any useful marketing lessons to be gleaned. Certainly the strangest policy is to let points expire without notifying the customer. It’s not like you get an AAdvantage statement where you can see that you need to book travel before a certain date to keep your old points; the whole procedure is invisible unless you log onto their website. Why in the world don’t they send me notices that warn, “your points are about to expire, here are some great offers from our partners”?

And about that website. You can check your points from your Citi card login which takes you to a rather promotional and unhelpful website, but there is a shadow thankyou.com website that you will never see unless you establish a separate log-in with a username and password that have different rules from your Citi card login. Yet this secret handshake is required for certain privileges, such as redeeming for Amazon purchases which they offered me recently (that’s how I found out about the separate website). And I don’t consider myself a web troglodyte. What happens with people who barely know how to log on, or still do their business by phone?

Thus, when I got an invitation to take a survey and say how happy I was with Thank You Points, you can bet I swooped down on it like a hawk on a chicken. A few days later I got an email from a certain [redacted], inviting me to call her and explain why I would not recommend Thank You to a friend. Apparently she had tried repeatedly to reach me by phone, which is peculiar because my cell is listed in my Citi contact information and there is no record of calls from unidentified callers. I called her back and left a message, also emailed her, and she did not return my call or respond to the email. But I was more than ready to share my opinion, so I am doing it here. [UPDATE: she finally did call me. See the comment for an update, plus why it took so long.]

What can marketers learn from all this? First, the points expiration seems ridiculous, but any expiration must be treated as an opportunity to contact your customer. Not doing that is just crazy. It’s lost revenue and lost good will.

Second, byzantine websites that require the user to decode your intentions are not okay. (If you want to book travel, the main reason I got the card, that link is buried in the bottom menu of the page of “rewards” below bubbly cross-promotions.) If you aren’t willing to meet your customer’s needs with clean and logical navigation, they will go find somebody who will.

Third, don’t play games by telling me you’ve tried to contact me when you haven’t and then not responding to my calls and emails. That’s middle school stuff.

To be fair, I haven’t reported some nice transactions with Citi folks on the phone trying to solve these problems but neither have I described every problem I’ve had with this program; there’s lots more. Also, full disclosure, I bought Citi stock when it was in the toilet and have made enough to pay for the points I lost. But not for the aggravation.

Headline Horrors (outer envelope teasers that don’t)

Fresh Air camp appeal — What buses? Where are we going?

It’s been far too long since we’ve visited the Badvertising Hall of Shame… that corridor of horrors where unfortunate marketers teach us by example what NOT to do. Let’s begin with this outer envelope teaser from Fresh Air Fund.

This is a seasonal appeal I used to struggle with when doing work for Salvation Army… the “send an inner city kid to camp” fund. It seemed less urgent than putting food on the table or rescuing a child from the streets, and it was complicated because you’d have to create a word picture of why this was important before the reader got away. No missteps are permissible.

So look what Fresh Air Fund has chosen as its teaser: The buses are leaving soon… please hurry! What buses? Am I supposed to be on one? Why on earth does this not say instead, “The bus is about to leave for camp without me… please help!” (Singular better than plural because it’s more specific, and let’s mention the reason for the appeal for chrissake.) Also, while camps are universally recognized as a good thing buses are not. Seems like a terrible choice for the opening salvo in this appeal. Next.

Personal and Confidential OE — Do you believe this?

From… I don’t know who because I never opened it… I have a blind outer with nothing but PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL printed above my name. Maybe I notice the “standard postage” indicia that spoils the illusion, but maybe I don’t; they’ve done a good job of designing something that looks like a real meter imprint.

But, look what’s above my name: PREPARED FOR: Okay, that’s too much and it’s also discordant with PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL which suggests a very individualized letter, maybe a collection notice, whereas PREPARED FOR suggests a mechanized process like maybe a refund. Either would have been good on its own, together they cancel each other out. The blind outer has lost its intrigue so out it goes.

Pella 72 hour sale — When did the 72 hour sale begin anyway?

Finally we have this from Pella: OPEN IMMEDIATELY: 72-hour event ends soon. Well, is it 72 hours or isn’t it? If it is, it ends in 72 hours, not “soon”. The contradiction completely bursts the bubble of urgency and anticipation. Also, since this is clearly a piece of advertising mail, there needs to be more reader context, eg “Hurry! You’ve only got 72 hours to save” or “Open for your private invitation to our 72 hour preferred customer sale”.

That’s enough for today. Three examples in which the client or product manager is wondering why their mailing was not more successful, when in each case the fault lies with the copywriter who is probably making mischief on another campaign right now. I’ll have a couple more good ones in my next post.