The Changing Face of Digital Media & Marketing : interactive

Global Expansion of Social Networks

Scott Berg — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 19:46:00 GMT

While reviewing the latest e-marketer article on Social Networking I found it interesting that Russia’s growth in people who created a social network profile was at 85.3%. India, China, Brazil follow with growth in the 60 to 70% some odd range.

Frankly those numbers surprised me… let me explain:

1. Technology – the technology pipeline in these countries seems to be developing faster than what I estimated….allowing for stable platforms, etc.

2. Time Spent – if these countries follow the US… look for shifts in media time spent to shift more to the digital side vs. the traditional media landscape.

3. Content Growth – with higher demand and usage will come the increased demand for content… with more video shifting to digital/online for viewing vs. current TV or satellite use.

We live in an increasingly “connected age”…as technology continues to expand, the world gets smaller, the access to information becomes easier and the authenticity of our brands is more important than ever.

Scott

Interview With Chris Curtin -- VP of HP.com & Digital Strategy, HP -- via Fortune's Brainstorm Conference

Scott Berg — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 15:41:00 GMT

As you probably know, Fortune's Brainstorm TECH Conference is going on this week in California. Mark Hurd speaks on Friday with Jeffrey Katzenberg from Dreamworks. In the meantime, I'm posting a great interview done by Tracey Pepper with Chris Curtin, VP HP.com and Digital Strategy here at Hewlett Packard. As we all know, the world is changing fast...Chris has some very unique thoughts and ideas on where HP is heading. Enjoy!!

Scott

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Tracey Pepper talks to Chris Curtin, Vice President, HP.com and Digital Strategy, at Hewlett-Packard Co., at Fortune’s Brainstorm: TECH conference in Pasadena, California, on July 22^nd, 2009:

A former Vice President of Global Media and Technology at the Walt Disney Company, Chris Curtin now serves as Vice President of Digital Strategy for Corporate Marketing at HP. He is responsible for driving the HP brand in existing and emerging digital channels with oversight that includes managing HP.com, where he drives the site’s next-generation activities, including initiating new online customer experiences and rebuilding Internet publishing operations.

Tracey Pepper: At what point do you bring your customer in on the innovation process? Is innovation at HP customer-driven or is it driven more internally?

Chris Curtain: I think it’s both. It’s certainly expected from and by our customers. But innovation is really at the heart of all things that HP does. And it’s not just innovation with respect to our products or service mix, it’s also innovation in our marketing. The very same type of innovative practices that we’ve put into building the TouchSmart or the Mini will be applied to the marketing of those products. From [CEO and President] Mark Hurd all the way down, innovation is a part of what we think we stand to offer, and frankly it’s something that we like to be known for. We have HP Labs, which are incubators for many great things. They’ve done an excellent job of figuring out appropriate handshakes with the businesses for technologies, be they in the cloud or even more practical ones like i-catcher, which helps us better understand why people do what they do on the web and be able to put back against those actions information that’s relevant to what we think you’re interested in.

TP: What types of challenges has HP faced over the last year?

CC: Some of the challenges we face are not dissimilar to challenges that other companies in the Fortune 100 or Fortune 500 face. We’re looking at a tough economy and companies need to be very careful about where they place their bets and investments. Because of that, there’s probably a greater desire to do different things than there is an actual budget to do different things. So making sure that HP understands what is important to a partner, how to move that partner’s business, and ultimately how to show our value proposition are things that we wake up and go to sleep thinking about.

TP: Are there any specific innovations that HP has implemented to meet those challenges?

CC: One thing we’re doing right now is revamping our entire website, HP.com, which exists in 68 countries and is our global footprint for the company. We want to make sure that today’s website meets today’s consumer expectations. We have consumers on the B to C side, as well as consumers on the enterprise side, so we really make sure we have a flat experience on the website, such that the browser quickly reaches the information the consumer is interested in, and that we maintain, not just cultivate a relationship through the website.

One thing we’ve been doing is showcasing the successful things our partners are doing because many companies want to understand what their competitors or peers are doing with respect to IT and technology in general that could benefit them. So we post case studies on our website. For example, UPS came to us and said, ‘We’d really like to buy an all-in-one printer and scanner.’ We worked with them and today UPS can scan label packages, free, via HP technology. That’s good for the business and it’s good for the environment, which is important to both of us. It’s a real success story. So we highlight that by putting it on HP.com. Then other companies will come to us and say, ‘We’d like to do the very same thing with you guys.’

TP: How has the perception of what HP does changed?

CC: Well, the whole paradigm of printing and printers is changing. We’re going to have touch-screen printers and you’re going to be able to do many things on your printer that you may have associated historically with your computer. It’ll be more of a smart device that enables printing, but there will be many more elements to it, like getting your directions off of your printer, and printing those directions via your printer. In some ways this economy has been great for competitiveness because people have gotten better pricing and competitors have really sharpened their game in order to be top-of-the line and stay relevant.

The Internationalist Awards for Innovative Digital Marketing Solutions

Scott Berg — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:25:00 GMT

I have the honor of working with some of the leaders in the Digital Marketing world regarding a new Digital Marketing Solution Awards Event. Some of those names include Rob Norman, CEO of GroupM, Rishad Tobaccowala, CEO of Denuo and Chief Innovation Officer, Publicis Group. As you can tell these fellow judges are the cream of the crop – and the leaders who I and many of you look to for leadership and thoughts.

That being said…I’ve attached some information below on how to enter and participate.

A big thanks to Deborah Malone and the staff at The Internationalist for helping to drive this unique digital award judging.

Scott

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"We have moved from language-based or analog marketing to a system now dependent on 'ones' and 'zeros' or digital codes. Our way of creating marketing solutions must also now transform dramatically.." -Scott Berg, HP's Director of Digital Strategy and Jury Chairman

www.internationalist-awards.com

Marketers, today, need digital answers, but formulating the right questions is often challenging. With dozens of new forms of non-traditional advertising, the digital options can be overwhelming. Our industry can benefit from examples of best practices. Marketers today need digital solutions that bring results.

The Internationalist Awards for Innovative Digital Marketing Solutions will be the first international awards to be given based upon the geographic footprint of the campaign, specifically: a global campaign, a regional campaign, a local execution of a multinational campaign, and a local campaign worthy of international adaptation based upon world class standards.

These Awards are an outgrowth of The Internationalist's Awards for Innovation in Media and an acknowledgment of how today's marketing strategy is affected by the growth of Digital. They also reflect the way companies market their products. No other awards offer these types of international categories. Most are by product group (food, auto) or type of media (TV, print).

It's simple to enter-- just answer 5 critical questions about insights and solutions, the show up to 3 examples of the work. There are only 4 international entry categories.

CALL FOR ENTRIES DEADLINE is SEPTEMBER 8, 2009.

Winners will be announced in Autumn 2009. A Grand Prix will be announced, along with Gold, Silver and Bronze winners in each of the 4 international entry categories.

Winners will receive:

An Award statuette for office display.
The Internationalist will feature a story on the winners in its next edition.
All winners, including Honorable Mentions, will be showcased on www. internationalist-awards.com. A search feature will enable people to better access case study highlights.
Oxford University's SAID School of Business will use the winners as teaching case studies in their marketing program.

For more information on Judging, the Jury, Fees, and How to Enter, go to:

http://www.internationalist-awards.com

Created in January 2003 by Deborah Malone, The Internationalist was launched to connect the people and ideas in international advertising, marketing and media. Today The Internationalist has become a trusted source for international best practices, and is dedicated to the business needs and challenges of international marketing professionals as they participate in multinational branding and campaign building. The Internationalist is now IN PRINT, ONLINE and IN PERSON- all to better serve the needs of this community.

When Will Things Get Back to Normal?

Scott Berg — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 15:23:00 GMT

During the past 6 months, I can’t tell you the number of times someone has commented about “when will things settle down” or “I can’t wait until things get back to normal.” And although I’m a bit nostalgic about wanting things to settle down and “get back to normal” I’ve come to realize this is the new norm for the media, digital and advertising industry. So what is the new norm? Tough question to answer, but here’s my stab at a few of the general themes.

Technology will drive new media models -- for instance, HP’s own MagCloud allows anyone to be a publisher, thus, opening up a new way to go to market for both small and large publishers.
Buzz will rule/Listening will be critical – just look at the Dominoes situation and the recent Swine Flu discussions occurring on Twitter. Not only does marketing need to listen to customer’s requirements, complaints, etc. but PR will need to be much more active in the listening and decisions they make related to response. Getting in front of a story is moving from hours to respond to minutes.
Advertising budgets will continue to fracture – given more avenues to reach the customer and the need to purchase additional tools, metrics to react and manage the communication ecosystem.
Media plans will migrate to communication plans – is Twitter a media type? What about blogs? Who knows? Who really cares? The bottom line, companies will use these different channels and the media plan will reflect these new realities.
Campaigns will morph into communication ecosystem management – being able to influence, analyze and put metrics around the entire purchase funnel on a consistent basis will drive companies to manage the ecosystem vs. coming in and out of the market with campaigns. This will be a necessity given the need to manage and forecast financial performance on a more consistent basis.
Media properties will either “thrive or die” – all you have to do is look at the news daily to see companies merging, selling to someone or shutting down. I don’t think this will be limited to just traditional media…the next phase could start impacting online sites, content distribution platforms and toolsets.
“Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is” – companies will begin to require true performance aka sales as a measure of a media channel or properties worth. Let’s face it, everyone says media works during the sales pitch… if that’s the case, guarantee it. If you hit targets you get paid, if you don’t hit them, you don’t get paid.
Media representatives and properties will become consultants vs. sales focused – see #7 as the reason why.
The workday will be 24 by 7 vs. 8 to 5. See above.
Change will be the only constant…we will all be faced with major differing challenges every single day – our worth will be determined not only by our financial performance to the companies bottom line, but in our ability to manage change.

Welcome to the reality!

Scott

Contacting Our New Media Planning & Buying Agency – Omnicom Media Group

Scott Berg — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 21:42:00 GMT

Many in the media community have been calling or emailing me asking who to contact at our new media agency OMG. The team at OMG, have requested you go to the following web site to register, that way they can respond to the large number of media partners who are contacting us during the transition.

When you complete the form you will receive an automatic reply. The OMG/HP media team will get back with you shortly thereafter. Please keep in mind OMG officially takes over the HP media buying and planning June 1^st.

http://hpmediahub.omnicommediagroup.com/

Scott

New Blogging Stats from e-Marketer

Scott Berg — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 17:00:00 GMT

Saw this recent post from e-Marketer on blogging …. the statistics are staggering. E-marketer estimates that in 2009, 96.6 million internet users in the US will read a blog at least once a month. That’s amazing… to think that many people want to interact with once another.

In 2013, e-Marketer estimates the number to increase to 128.2M or 58% of all US internet users.

For those who think social media is a fad – I would recommend you “wake up & smell the coffee.” People are communicating in a completely different way through the world’s largest connection engine – the internet.

Scott

Forbes CMO Network Interview – Michael Mendenhall HP CMO

Scott Berg — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 22:53:00 GMT

An interesting interview from Michael Mendenhall on our marketing focus during this downturn in the economy and his take on digital. Take a look… would love to hear your comments.

Scott

2009 Digital Media Trends – Update & Scorecard

Scott Berg — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 17:28:00 GMT

Late last year I posted my 2009 Digital Media Trends. I thought it would be a good idea to see where they stand as well as add in a few other trends I’m starting to see emerge.

It’s the Economy Stupid...

More newspapers and print publications will go out of business -- I hate to actually say this one is dead on. All you have to read are the following articles on the demise of newspapers across the US.

San Francisco Chronicle Might Shut Down

Denver Rocky Mountain News Shuts Down

Derby Daily Reporter Shutting Down

Taconic Group Newspapers Shut Down

Accuracy: Dead On

Weaker online sites will see advertising revenue sales fall – the economy is not only pushing pure “print” revenue down, but newspapers online revenue as well as “pure play” digital advertising is taking a hit as budgets get tight.

Search Revenue Falling

Online Video Ad Revenue Decreasing

Digital Shops Begin to Feel Effects of the Economy

Accuracy: Dead On

Sponsorships will take a beating….

RBS Sports Sponsorships

Sports Sponsorships Take a Beating

Accuracy: Dead On

Social Websites will see a decrease in ad revenue –

Accuracy: Too early to tell

Community development will be a priority – marketers will engage differently with the end customer by developing stronger communities and/or engaging with current standing communities.

Accuracy: Too early to tell

Rise of the “Un-Badged Employee” – most people use reviews before making a product or service purchase… but in an economic downturn, that input revs up to make sure the purchase is what the consumer wants. Check out this article.

Accuracy: Dead on

SEO will become more important – with decreased budgets, SEM will also feel the budget pinch, so advertisers will focus more attention on SEO to decrease costs and increase search page placement.

US Search Spending Falters

Accuracy: Too early to tell

Again, mobile will struggle – tough to tell right now… but keep your eyes/ears tuned in the coming months.

Mobile Marketing Watch Newsletter

Accuracy: Too early to tell

Google will continue to gain share – ok this is a “duh” prediction, I admit it. But with Yahoo in turmoil, the recent layoffs, Microsoft not making headway on revenue in the online space… Google will extend it’s lead – either by sure will might and force or through acquisition.

Google’s Share Extends

Accuracy: Dead On

Online Upfronts get more momentum –

Accuracy: Too early to tell (but if I was a betting man) – I’d say I’m way off on this one. Prices are falling as demand craters… who wants to get locked in on long term inventory when the short term rates continue to fall.

Digital television platform (aka Canoe Ventures) will get serious attention – Certainly the new administration pushing back the digital transition date didn’t help, but frankly with the advertising world in a tail spin right now, Canoe still holds promise of better targeting….although I think most advertisers wished it were live and ready to go today.

Accuracy: Too early to tell

CRM and database marketing will make a comeback – well I’m not seeing it yet… although my email box is deluged daily with a great deal more email than ever, but I can’t attribute that to better CRM or just desperation on behalf of marketers. Plus, with the economy in the dumper, big tech projects are harder to sell unless they can guarantee a result.

Accuracy: Seems I was a bit too optimistic

Media inventory costs will decline – regardless of whether you’re buying upfront or not. This one is definitely on track… with the networks taking a bath on inventory, newspapers having difficulty selling pages prices are falling. What’s concerning is we’re only in March…what will this look like in July?

Accuracy: Dead On

Scott

Latest Video from Michael Mendenhall -- CMO of HP

Scott Berg — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 18:44:00 GMT

Thought I'd post the latest video posted on Marketwatch.com with our CMO - Michael Mendenhall.

http://www.marketwatch.com/video/asset/0692809B-0367-4F75-9545-73D6C5DFAC8A

Scott

It’s Going to Get Worse Before it Get’s Better

Scott Berg — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 15:44:00 GMT

And you’re saying to yourself, duh Berg – think of something a bit more original.

First, check out this article on e-marketer, which predicts newspaper revenue will slide another 15.9% in FY09. The article goes on to say “The future for print media companies is online, as evidenced by the growth in Web readership of sites such as The New York Times. Small and local businesses that once depended on newspapers to get their ads in front of customers now have other more measurable options such as paid search advertising.”

And I agree with the statement in general… but let’s dig a bit deeper at what the newspaper industry faces and the tough choices they need to make.

ISSUE 1: CPM’s for online are much lower than CPM’s for print. So they’re just not going to make as much revenue per CPM for online then they would for print.

SOLUTION: Either increase the number of the visitors to the site (and make it up in volume of visitors) or provide such unique value they can charge more for an online CPM. First, make your content free as the NYT.com did a little more than a year ago to boost online visitors. Second, distribute your content outside your web site to aggregators, etc. Third, make your content easy for bloggers to utilize, so they can distribute the content for free.

ISSUE 2: Fixed costs for printing a newspaper. A big old printer to print those newspapers costs a ton of money to run – labor, electricity, purchase cost, financing, real estate, etc. Not to mention the variable costs of paper, ink and maintenance.

SOLUTION: Start making the tough choices – get efficient with those fixed costs, eliminate the ones you can and get much leaner. Then focus on the “digital” property and invest the savings to make your content the best, web access the easiest, etc. You still need reporters – but as opposed to having a paper deadline of x time, these folks work a 24 by 7 shift and upload data to a data center.

ISSUE 3: Provide a better digital product. Let’s face it… most papers that have a web site… don’t easily migrate to new technology. If you don’t have an active blogging program, a social community site, robust search programs, widgets, mobile content, etc. then get in the game.

SOLUTION: Provide the above… but more than that… upgrade and provide new exciting reasons why the consumer and advertiser should continually come back to your site.

Even if you do all the above, the competition is fierce and much of the financial damage has already been done. FY09, and I predict first half of FY10, will be extremely difficult for the media industry. When local newspaper chains begin to file for bankruptcy protection… I think that will be the signal of a bottom. But it’s going to be a rough and very unpleasant year. Let’s hope the stimulus package Congress and the President is pushing is the medicine we need to cure the patient.

Scott

What To Do About the Meltdown in Media

Scott Berg — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 01:44:00 GMT

Apocalypse is one of those words that I remember from bible study as a kid. The word itself just sounds scary – even if I didn’t know what it meant it would freak me out. But it seems everyday we’re hearing about media companies making massive layoffs, shutting down publications, cutting costs and the like. Even the agencies are cutting staff because of client budget cuts and the need for leaner expenses on the income statement.

So as a client what should you do? Here are a couple of thoughts:

Lock in Low Prices. Just like the stock market – you buy low and sell high. So why not negotiate hard with media suppliers for lower CPM’s and lock those prices in for 2-4 years and with the ability to further reduce if thing get worse. When the economy does turn-around, you’ll get a higher ROI aka make more money.
Renegotiate. Why not renegotiate your contracts with agencies and suppliers? Think about it… if your media/marketing spend has gone you’re paying more fixed and variable costs as a % of media/marketing spend. So renegotiate the costs and contracts in order to keep those “non working dollars” as low as possible (or at least even). While you’re at it, why don’t you put in some clauses that put some of the supplier/agencies income at risk? If your company or campaigns do well… the agency does well.
Step up the SEO. Get your webmaster to increase the SEO terms on your web site so you’re not paying for terms that your own website should drive.
Fish Where the Fish Are. Dig deeper into your database and determine who those best customers are and start using a Recency, Frequency, Monetary Value model to determine who is likely to response. To learn more about RFM I recommend you read the book “Libey and Pickering on RFM and Beyond” by Don Libey and Christopher Pickering.
Get Closer to Your Customer. If you haven’t been talking to your customers – get to it and start. If you’re not talking to them, odds are your competitor is.
Listen, Listen, Listen. Do I need to say more? If your customers are telling you they want x from your product… give them x. Stop listening to 30 person focus groups and start listening to the entire web, including blogs, social media, etc. There’s a number of software available… many free some that you have to invest in. Check out a product from a company called Aubice.
Look Deep into Your Organization for Recommendations. I’ve often found the best ideas from the deepest parts of the company. So start having lunch and coffee with a new group of folks and start asking them for their ideas.
Get Even Leaner! You’ve probably had to cut budgets, perhaps even some headcount… but start eliminating or reducing costs. Couple of areas to think about: Ad Serving Costs, Agency/Supplier Costs (see points 1 & 2), get rid employees who are deadwood and replace them with many of the outstanding professionals looking for employment, conferences (do you really need to go?), stop traveling all over kingdom come and use technology and the good old phone.
Shift Channels. If your customers costs are getting out of hand – for instance they’re calling your call center a ton…. Perhaps you should start to direct them to the web where they can self serve themselves.
Lead. If you’re not stepping up to make the tough decisions… start. If you’re planning on “keeping under the radar” until the current economic environment turns, then I’d recommend you refresh your resume.

Scott

2009 Digital Media Trends

Scott Berg — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:21:00 GMT

About this time every year, I make my predictions on what I think lays ahead for the media industry. And again, this year, I’ll do the same, but with a slight focus on the Digital side of the world.

It’s the Economy stupid!

More newspapers and print publications will go out of business – as you’ve probably read, Tribune recently filed for bankruptcy. And with the current economic climate, print advertising will continue to suffer the woes they’ve been feeling the past 5 years. The problem… not only are advertisers shifting to digital, but the cost per thousand for online is usually significantly lower than other forms of media so it’s not a just a matter of gaining share, but they’re caught between a rock and hard place as it relates to raising prices.

Weaker online sites will see advertising revenue sales fall – reason? Advertisers are seeing advertising budgets decrease or be frozen… thus the pie is getting smaller.

Sponsorships will take a beating….unless they can offer a unique customer experience or become very digitally focused. Between NASCARs challenges, the NFL re-evaluating sponsorships, etc. The days of putting signage up in an arena or naming rights are gone. The next phase of sponsorship is customer engagement and digital experience.

Social Websites will see a decrease in ad revenue – for all the above reasons (see point a), but more because marketers are realizing that community development is critical.

Community development will be a priority – marketers will engage differently with the end customer by developing stronger communities and/or engaging with current standing communities.

Rise of the “Un-Badged Employee” – when people are look to purchase a product or service they usually ask around if anyone has any experience or recommendations. So marketers will start to drive more influence communications to key individuals who act as “brand ambassadors” and recommend the brand to others. Apple has been doing this for years, but it’s becoming more commonplace. If you don’t agree, just look at Amazon.com or CNET.com.

SEO will become more important – with decreased budgets, SEM will also feel the budget pinch, so advertisers will focus more attention on SEO to decrease costs and increase search page placement.

Again, mobile will struggle – although mobile applications are becoming more widespread and the use of data is becoming more commonplace, the issues of separate network carriers, too many media rep companies, and the general confusion of what you can/can’t do with mobile will keep it from gathering steam in the US.

Google will continue to gain share – ok this is a “duh” prediction, I admit it. But with Yahoo in turmoil, the recent layoffs, Microsoft not making headway on revenue in the online space… Google will extend it’s lead – either by sure will might and force or through acquisition.

Online Upfronts get more momentum – in order to secure inventory and reduce costs look for more advertisers to commit to online upfronts. Which begs the question, what about the television upfronts? Hell if I know. The past 3 years I’ve been predicting a shift in the amount of dollars going into the upfront and I’ve been wrong… suppose I’ll stick to that prediction this year because as my boss Chris Curtin is famous for saying “a broken clock is still correct 2 times a day.” Perhaps I’ll hit paydirt this year!

Digital television platform (aka Canoe Ventures) will get serious attention – as Canoe begins to roll out it’s digital tv platform, more advertisers will begin experimenting and targeting advertising in the new nirvana state of advertising.

CRM and database marketing will make a comeback – yes you heard me right, the data geeks will reign again. With Canoe Ventures, integration and analysis of click stream data, advertisers will become even more focused on eliminating inefficient advertising and marketing and getting the right message to the right person.

Media inventory costs will decline – regardless of whether you’re buying upfront or not. See point 1. The glut of inventory will put marketers in a stronger position to negotiate further cost cuts and added value. Look for the auto industry to cut spending so dramatically that prices could fall 30% in some media categories over the current levels.

So here are my thoughts… what do predict???

Scott

First, I Apologize….

Scott Berg — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:18:00 GMT

It has been about 6 weeks since my last blog post, which is out of the norm for me. Usually I post once/twice per week. I hope all of you will forgive me and get you updated on a variety of things.

First, I moved from being HP’s Worldwide Media Director back to the Corporate Marketing Dept as Director of Global Digital Strategy. So you might be asking yourself… what the heck is this thing called Digital Strategy? And, why would you move to it?

Answer is simple… everything is going digital. We all know about the internet and I’ve written before about HP’s focus on the digital spend and owning the marketplace. But so many other things are moving digital as well …. The next big one…television. I always like to “skate to where the puck is going” as the legendary Wayne Gretzky use to say.

So my focus will be to drive our overall company into new realms of digital. From the social aspects, to expanding search, to partnerships, to mobile.

The journey is well underway, but frankly, I think there’s more change ahead of us than behind us. So the fun is just starting.

Scott

Michael Mendenhall, CMO – Hewlett Packard and his Masters of Marketing Discussion

Scott Berg — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 21:34:00 GMT

Our CMO, Michael Mendenhall made a presentation at last weeks ANA’s Masters of Marketing Conference. And as I listened to the video and read the article on AdAge, what struck me was everything he’s talking about is related directly to change and innovation. Not just a one time fix or shift, but the ongoing transformation of business models, agencies, skill sets, etc. and how that impacts our brand and the way we interact and work with our customers.

They say the only constant in the world is change… Michael’s insights certainly bring that into focus.

Scott

CMO’s Annoyed by Agencies and Networks

Scott Berg — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 17:09:00 GMT

Over the past couple of days I’ve received a number of phone calls and emails regarding presentations made by Gary Elliott, VP-Corporate Marketing and Michael Mendenhall, our CMO.

I’d like to add a few thoughts in 2 separate posts… first let’s talk about the article in AdAge regarding the ANA panel that Gary Elliott sat on.

Gary Elliott was quoted in the article in a couple of areas:

“The overall message, I would have to say, with HP, is that I don't think any of these [agency] relationships are satisfactory enough that we would continue them without having some degree of experimentation," said Gary Elliott, VP-corporate marketing at Hewlett-Packard. "We've been experimenting with different agency relationships where we're looking at agency partners and vendors in ways that connect them loosely with each other. We're looking at models where we have everything with one of our key partners." What's lacking in agency relationships now is speed to market, Mr. Elliott said. "I don't think with our current system we're achieving that. ... We're going to pilot a number of different relationships where we go direct with media companies." My thoughts: 1. Business Model – as I’ve blogged about before the media, marketing & advertising business model is changing. It’s not all about advertising and media anymore. It’s about developing projects that have mutual benefit between two companies. I point to the deal HP just did with MySpace as a great example of this. Agencies are still focused on creating ads and placing the media. And for some companies, that’s what they want them to do. But for larger advertisers we must have more. Every single agency presentation I’ve sat through always shows how the “campaigns” they’ve worked on generated revenue. And all of us in marketing say we generate revenue for the bottom line through branding and direct…the problem is there is more to branding and direct than ads and media. A company the size of HP with distinct businesses and different needs for each business requires us to think creatively and continue to explore the best way to structure our agencies to meet the needs of each unique business. 2. Technology -- And what about the way we transact business… we still use an antiquated system to do the upfronts each year…but search terms are being purchased via an auction model every single day through Google and Yahoo! We must learn how to utilize new forms of technology to drive and increase our speed to market. We no longer market 8 hours a day… our customers are doing business/choosing brands/making purchasing decision 24 hours a day. And they’re utilizing all different forms of technology to do it – from mobile, interactive TV, the internet, search, etc. And believe me, I’ve experienced the pain when a media network incorrectly distributes online creative or radio/tv spots in the wrong place or within inappropriate content. These “mistakes” impact our brand in the consumer’s eye which ultimately makes our job of selling product harder.

Relationships – the world is built on relationships. Look no further than linkedin.com, Facebook.com, or MySpace.com to understand how important relationships are to folks. It’s my job to ensure that HP is given an opportunity to look at unique ideas from media partners before any other competitor and/or advertiser in the marketplace gets a chance. And that’s done by having strong, solid relationships with the major media players in the marketplace.

Hey, you might not have liked what the Advertisers said on the panel… but remember this…it’s them and other CMO and marketing professionals inside companies who have to justify budgets and drive revenue to executive management and ultimately the company shareholder. Try sitting in that chair for while and I guarantee you’re view of the world will change. Scott