Friday, April 29, 2016

More Games And Less NFL Draft, Please

Read Name, Lift Shirt, Repeat
Tonight, the NFL Draft started -- the first of a 3-day festival of Not Games that, in my lifetime, has somehow shed its original No One Really Watches This into untold hours of highly watched, well, content.

And while there is a certain Reality Show vibe to the proceedings that must appeal to people who are not me, especially when a highly touted player sees their standing slip, and stews about it on camera in a waiting room... you have to be way too into the proceedings to consider this exceptionally, well, entertaining. And I say this as a world-class football and sports nerd.

Still, well, the market has spoken, and with two networks covering it breathlessly, the goal of every other league is to replicate this success. But what I think the draft really shows isn't the broadcast potential for a long and delayed reading of names, but just how underserved the market is for professional football.

Thirty five years ago, the USFL generated ratings that were higher than MLB or NBA... despite being a brand-new league with no established rivalries, and relatively limited star power. Minor leagues with players that are not at the NFL level (aka, the Canadian Football League and the Arena Football variant) are stable and long-standing, which speaks to, well, profitability. There's even a women's league now, and immense interest at the college and high school level. If this was any other industry and any other market, more inventory from rival companies would flood the market. We are nowhere near satiety, as a nation, in our hunger for football.

But since the NFL is a protected monopoly, and the public buys into the idea that these other leagues -- particularly college -- has to exist, since they always have. As if the business of running a football team has much to do with the business of running a college. But what's really going on here is an unnaturally cautious business and an underserved market.

Imagine, if you will, two or three NFL tiers and separate leagues, with overlapping seasons. Not a minor league, and with teams that are not affiliated with each other, but with a clear tier situation (possibly by contract size) that passes champions up into higher tiers, and sends the worst teams down. Kind of like how most other nations (the English with soccer being the best example) handle wildly popular sports.

So instead of a draft, football fans would have, well, games to watch. Just about every week, with all of the games mattering, played under the same rules, in all kinds of cities, both "major" and minor.  With players that, eventually, even casual fans would have heard of, or maybe followed for a longer period of their lives. The average NFL career is only about four years, mostly because there are hundreds of younger and cheaper players trying to take the jobs of older players every year. Also, well, injuries.

We'd have fantasy leagues all year long. Much more in the way of gambling and live stadium action and commerce. An impetus to get colleges out of the business of football. A significant amount of jobs created, and a strong corrective market force to teams that try to move away for sweeter stadium deals. More live content with prime advertising opportunities, and programs with ratings that will likely outperform other live sporting events. A much more fluid situation that would lead to teams in non-U.S. markets. In other words, a correct market, with all of the good that our capitalistic hearts yearn for.

Instead, we've got artificial scarcity. Cities like St. Louis losing teams, with Oakland and San Diego likely to follow, with no idea if or when they'll ever be replaced. Advertising opportunities that only exist in one season. De facto subsidies of basic cable channels by the entire populace, instead of just the people that, well, want to watch football.

And people spending half a week of their lives to watch a very slow reading of a list of names.

So. Honestly. To anyone who is really into the draft, one simple question:

Wouldn't you rather be watching football?

And if the answer to that is yes, why aren't you asking the NFL to stop being such communists and expand?

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Wednesday, April 27, 2016

5 Ways That Offices Matter

Respect My Space
In the MidAtlantic region where I live and work, the change in seasons has come, as it usually does, with a surge in thunderstorm activity in the afternoon. My company is also in the process of upgrading our office space, so we can turn three locations into one, and become more integrated across teams. It's going to be a really great moment for the company, in ways that I'm not sure many of our people even realize, because many of my co-workers, frankly, haven't gone through this kind of thing before.

I've been at companies that have moved locations, and it's much like moving on a personal level. There's always a reason to go, and you always get enthused about it, because change is always better to take on the rise. Finally, and this is kind of an odd coincidence, the old building inevitably fails you in some way, usually just before you leave. (We'll be in our new location in a few more weeks.)

Anyway, long set-up complete. Today, the power went out after a thunderstorm, and everyone got to (well, had to) go home early. We've also had issues with the wifi, the AC (well, maybe that's just me, I seem to be under a vent), leaking windows that have gotten to a mold situation, security issues in the parking lot, and so on. So while I was driving home today and thinking about if I would do better to log in tonight to clear the last bit or just come in early the next day, it struck me... my office is, honestly, just in my bag, and has been for decades now. I've also worked out of my home for decades as a consultant, or on the road at various locations. So what are the common factors in the offices that have helped me work better, and those that held me back?

1) Enough space, and make sure there's a mix.

One of my start ups in Silicon Valley, another in Manhattan, and an old-school place in the greater Philadelphia region, put people way too close to each other as a deliberate act, either due to high real estate costs or mistaken ideas about collaboration. It can provoke an intense camaraderie and occasional big wins from unavoidable eavesdropping on telephone calls, but in the long run, it's just disastrous, especially around any excuse to get out of the torture chamber for meals. Too little space makes for people just wandering off to get work done, and a room that people just don't want to be in. Especially if some of these roles are more vocal than others.

2) Many commuting options.

If an office is in a commuting choke point, and there's only one way to get there, with no public transportation option, what you have is an office that's at routine risk for an unpleasant commute... and that's just deadly in the long run, because it just creates a reason for turnover that's persistent and invisible in the actual venue, and contributes to an overall negative tone.

If your office isn't blessed with walkability, public transit options or alternate highway support, what I *strongly* recommend is flex time to avoid traffic. When I worked in the Bay Area, doing a 10 to 7-ish shift meant that I'd get back a full hour of my day, every day... and since the commute was car only, that hour of traffic avoidance just meant that I didn't spend five hours a week thinking about finding a different gig.

3) Don't neglect, or overdose on, the start-up areas and touches.

If you work in a traditional office setting, you tend to look wistfully, or skeptically, at the clubhouse touches of start-up offices. These would be the Foosball tables, game consoles, lounge areas, and so on, and I've been at places where getting my work done was downright difficult due to the buzzing of hobby drone blimps and first person shooter games.

When these touches work, it's because they inspire teams to spend more time with each other outside of work, and to make bonds that limit turnover. (As an aside, if I have one piece of advice for any marketer that needs support from engineers... develop a Foosball game. Mine has done me no end of good over the years.) You can always curtail the fun and games to certain hours, or move on from the hire that has the best Halo skills, later.

4) Health makes wealth. 

When you set aside a quiet room for nursing mothers, a variety of snack and beverages options, flexibility in desks with standing points or beyond the law handicapped accessibility, push for a better health care plan, matching 401K, etc... well, yes, this all costs money, and limit choices that you might make in terms of bonuses, competitive compensation, increased staffing, and so on.

But you also create a situation where distractions to cover these needs just go away, and an undistracted work force makes for efficiencies and less turnover. You also create, and this is a big plus, a company where your people recruit and assist your hiring.

5) The biggest gain from a good office is in recruiting.

Especially if you've been suffering with a weak office, interviewing in a good one just puts stars in your eyes. It speaks to success, to stability, to a progressive and inspiring future, rather than one where you get caught in the weeds of commuting, parking, and so on.

Offices matter, even if you've got a distributed work force, and heavy road miles. If you are only making the decision at a bottom line basis, you probably aren't making your best decision.

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Monday, April 25, 2016

5 Client Retention Lessons from Frank Underwood

He's Hard On Housekeepers
This weekend, in between other chores and my inevitable NBA playoff watching, I caught up to the latest season of "House of Cards", the Netflix political drama / soap opera that's won awards and no small amount of attention over its first four seasons. (Don't worry: I'll avoid any spoilers.) The life and times of Frank Underwood, the show's central character and MacBeth-esque figure, have done Kevin Spacey a world of good, and the show has already been picked up for additional seasons.

That's all to the good. But while I'm still a pretty big fan of the show, and probably will remain so for as long as Spacey and Robin Wright are around to chew the very expensive scenery, I can't help but think that the show has passed its peak... if only because my binge-watching was entirely sane this time around, and obvious drama turns and episodic arcs became, well, a little more predictable. (Don't worry, this will all come around to marketing and advertising soon enough.)

This isn't fatal or even all that surprising. There's 50-odd episodes of HoC in the can now, and at this point, we all know what we're going to get when we fire it up. But it struck me, on some level, as indicative of where you get as a consultant, especially when your client relationship gets more and more seasoned. How do you keep the relationship fresh when there's a world of other people with ideas and experiences that would just love to take your spot, or clients that would never turn down an opportunity to cut down their expenses?

1) Develop new tricks.

One of my issues with Season 4 is that Underwood kept going to the well of direct violence against the women in his life... and while that's entirely correct for the character, it also undermines the core hook of the show. Like Walter White in "Breaking Bad", viewers get pulled into rooting for the protagonist through his occasional virtues (in White's case, righting past wrongs, and in Underwood's, competence in getting his goals accomplished)... but when he uses the same methods, that competence is undermined, and we're just left watching to see what happens, rather than being more emotionally invested.

As a consultant, if you are all about one method -- analytics, creative, copy writing, design, list management, etc. -- you are going to eventually seem limited. Good craftspeople have more tools in the belt, and make sure that the task matches the means.

2) Don't play the game everyone else plays.

The best moments in HoC come when Underwood or his associates use creativity or a greater vision to out-maneuver their adversaries, because being in the presence of people who are good at what they do is, well, captivating.

In marketing and advertising, if everyone else is selling impressions on prestige and branding, consider a paid acquisition model -- because if those numbers work for you, you've moved from an idiosyncratic choice to one that's a business imperative. If your client insists on sticking with a practice that you know is a loser, think about steering into the skid to truly show the extent of the mistake (assuming, of course, that you are also able to run a test cell with a less ruinous message, to limit the damage and ensure the learning). Move away from single metric measures of success or failure, because life is rarely that simple, and it will give you more ways to achieve. And so on. While choosing the lesser of two evils is sometimes necessary as adults, it's also not the way to run a business.

3) Candor can devastate. Use it carefully.

The "showiest" aspect of HoC is when Underwood breaks the fourth wall and addresses the audience directly about his inner motivations, in moments that none of the other characters hear, or react to. It's part of what leads to the whole MacBeth aspect of the show, along with Underwood's ambition and single-minded need for power, but what it also does is makes the audience complicit, an insider, someone with extraordinary insight. Only Underwood gets this power, even though there are plenty of scenes where he's not on screen, and these moments rarely disappoint.

Candor can intoxicate, and the right client can make you feel like you can fully "level" about what's going to happen in the business, or why something is going down the way it is... but it can also unsettle, since it can show that you only see one outcome. Especially if that outcome doesn't come to pass, at which point even the most impressed client has to wonder about your skills. My advice, learned from a long time in the trenches: be candid when you are completely sure of something. And try not be completely sure too often.

4) Control the pace.

In the current season, Underwood is undermined by the calendar of events in a political campaign, and has to take more drastic actions to put the odds back into his favor. As consultants, we usually have to deliver by certain deadlines, show results in time for Q4, and so on. But that type of thinking can leave opportunities on the table, and prevent more lucrative and successful initiatives, especially when you are trying to change what a brand means to the end user.

My experience says that if you can be direct and upfront about the desire to go beyond your limitations, you can often win more business and a longer rope. And even if you aren't able to get what you want right away, you lay the groundwork for winning it later.

5) Think from other perspectives... but never assume that such thinking will be airtight.

In the season finale, Underwood has to adjust when a risky ploy goes sideways, and the reason why is highly instructive. Since they know the background of the person they are dealing with doesn't quite jibe with his current situation, a leverage play is used to get him to do what they need... but the pull of the new position is stronger than what could be reached through realpolitick. While the outcome wasn't entirely shocking, and on further reflection seemed like a weak moment of plotting to my eyes, it's still instructive.

One of the easiest mistakes to make in marketing and advertising is falling for the Naturalistic Fallacy, simply known as "what is true for me is true for all." It's fine to put yourself in the shoes of a client or prospect, and work to find a solution from a different starting point. Just be aware that this is an easy way to make howling mistakes. So make sure to get "sanity checks" from outside perspectives, especially from people who are unafraid to tell you uncomfortable truths. It could save your business.

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Friday, April 22, 2016

Lessons In Brand Marketing: The Life Of Prince

Signature Super Moment
First things first; I'm a lifelong fan of the late and very great artist, going back to high school days with cassette tapes played until the music warped in my car's deck. Since the news came out on Thursday, I've been alternating between joy in viewing so much unearthed archival footage, and reliving all of those hits, and coming to grips with the loss. But you read me for marketing and advertising, and how the man handled his affairs has some lessons for and against our field.

First off, the easy stuff; his uncanny discipline in creating, and success in exploiting, his personal brand. From a signature color to the symbol he used when he became TAFKAP (The Artist Formerly Known As...), he always gave the media what they needed to write about him consistently... and then he gave them reams and reams of content, through a tireless work ethic, an ability to reinvent design looks, and more. From feuds with his label to scandals with any number of people who were convinced that he symbolized the downfall of the culture (and to be fair, that ventilated outfit at the MTV Awards while performing "Gett Off" is as red meat as it gets to goad the goad-able), there was a very long period of time when the sizzle nearly drowned out the steak. Like David Bowie before him and Madonna concurrently, Prince reinvented himself while not losing his core audience, and never limited himself to a single market. This was a global business, and one that ran with a relatively minimal amount of scandal, considering his field and subject matter.

That's not to say that everything was a Gold Experience. Most of his attempts to make it in film, or to recreate the "Purple Rain" success, were bad misses. His relentlessly prolific output exhausted casual fans, and the label battles meant an eventual saturation release experience, with good materials lost in the clutter. He never really adapted to the Internet age of music, and lost relevance and reach by staying away from streaming services. Litigation efforts that prevented his catalog from gaining new fans, and an old-school attitude towards not using his music in commercials, cut back on his relevance to newer audiences. While no one ever doubted his genius, pop music changed, and he, well, didn't.

Here's the thing, though... very little of that did any long-term damage to the brand. Because the plain and simple of marketing is that the quality of the work will overwhelm matters like last-mile creative failures, delivery and distribution mistakes, pricing issues, personal foibles and the other flotsam and jetsam of a real life.

What we do for our clients is important for the success of the enterprise, especially when it comes to finding new markets, monetizing to proper levels, positioning for the future, and so on, and so on. But this isn't alchemy, or the reverse. If you've got the goods, the marketing and advertising can succeed, even if it's sub-optimal. If you don't, all of the tap dancing in the world won't keep the curtain up.

And, well, with a catalog of dozens of hits in a variety of tempos and instrumentation, and a signature sound and acumen that's unmatched by anyone in his field or era, Prince's legacy is secure.

But, sadly, just not as long as it should have been.

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Tuesday, April 19, 2016

Better Call Another Ad Strategy

The Ad Model Is Also Uphill
A study hit my feed recently, in which a social media researcher blasted a big hole in the idea that second screening for premium broadcast content was, well, something you actually want to advocate or support, as a marketing and advertising professional. This is something of an anecdotal field, because one person's premium content is another person's meh who cares, especially in an era of niche audiences, but the point is still valid. The stuff that people really care about isn't what they live tweet, because they are too busy, well, watching it.

On some level, like a lot of research, this comes down to an Of Course moment, because it matches our own day to day experiences. Prior to writing this, I finished up the second season of "Better Call Saul," the acclaimed AMC drama and spin-off of "Breaking Bad" that's a personal favorite. As the ending came down, despite the laptop in my hand, a side desire to keep abreast of my baseball fantasy team and the NBA playoffs, along with my buzzing smart phone with other accounts firing...

Well, I only had eyes and ears for the principals of that show, and I'm pretty sure you could have set off the fire alarm in my home, and I'd have still stayed with it. Despite having the ability to pause the proceedings at any time, as I wasn't even watching the episode "live."

But here's where my experience gets unfortunate for the show's producers. I have no recall of any of the "BCS" advertisers. And I really *want* to remember them, because that show is just the best, and I want its monetization strategy to succeed. But, well, it doesn't. Second screens exist to distract the audience from the ads, and even my deep fondness for the show can't beat the hard-wired desire to ignore untargeted broadcast ads and remain productive during down time. Especially with deadlines pending and other tasks to complete. I'm busy. And when you've got a second screen, everyone can be.

Which turns into yet another moment that makes sports the be-all and end-all of broadcast, because it's the only content that is simultaneously engaging and yet has clear diversion moments that you can't really avoid. Not to mention the criticizing fun of live-tweeting a game, which does happen, in spades.

But the bigger point is still in play, which is that the age-old marketing and advertising value exchange of getting involved with prestige shows... might be a terrible play. Well, I'm not sure it's a defensible play, honestly. In terms of ad recall, the NBA tie-ins for the rest of my evening's viewing experience were much higher in my consciousness, even if they were not well-regarded. I didn't want to remember those ads, but since there were so much more of them, and they were much harder to avoid, they're in my head. Not to mention the simple fact that a game is going to last two hours, versus "BCS" one. The entire second season of "BCS" was matched by just my weekend of playoff hoop.

Which is the kind of message that few in the field are going to want to admit to, because the alternatives -- saturation messaging on second-tier networks and platforms, and frankly down-market moves like product placement -- just have little appeal. But data isn't something that leads to a human grease element, personal taste, or unprovable benefits. In the long run, it's hard not to see how the commerce goes elsewhere, the content doesn't get more into a pay for play model, or the product placement doesn't get way more over the top. We may be in a so-called golden age of television programming right now, but what works from an artistic level really isn't working from an advertising one.

Because what we're doing now just seems like an increasingly indefensible business model, and unprotectable from market forces. The well-viewed 30-second spot at the end of an act break isn't sacrosanct, and neither is the next move to supplement it.

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Monday, April 18, 2016

Breaking The Boomerang

Solution: No Basement
This weekend, I was talking to some friends whose children are nearing college age. As we chatted about choices and what lies ahead, they dropped the bombshell that, as soon as the kids were in school and away, they were planning on selling their home and going to something smaller. Apparently, they had been waiting to do this for a very long time, and they had only stayed in their home for this long to avoid disrupting the kids' education.

This was delivered without winks or humor, in the earshot of the affected kids. They reacted to the pronouncement with the practiced shrug that you only really perfect as a teenager. But knowing the parents in question as I do, I know they are absolutely serious, and that this is what is going to happen. This is a family that's going to go from a 3-bedroom house to a 1-bedroom as soon as they can, for the clear and simple reason that the house they pay a mortgage to hasn't increased in value, and they have no great faith in the idea that their kids are going to go to school and get out without long-term debt.And that, if they have the option to return after school, they will.

This is where you can pivot, if you like, to a political point about various presidential campaigns, or something about the housing market, or the cost of education. But as the goal of this column is, as always, to discuss marketing and advertising concerns, we're going to pivot to aspects that may be of value in your day to day. Namely:

1) Millennials are going to be co-habitating longer. When I was in my 20s, I spent about five years in the range of having housemates, before my relationships got serious enough to transition to, well, housing with benefits. Maybe that time doubles, or even stays that way after marriage. Which means that your direct mail efforts to that demographic are going to continue to draw lower effectiveness, since the churn isn't going to stop any time soon. That's independent of the demographic not really responding to direct mail in the first place.

2) The small house movement isn't going away, either. While my friends might not be willing to house their offspring into their 20s, and may be aggressively moving to prevent it, that also means that products with a big footprint are also going to be fighting market forces. Combination appliances, space savers, furniture that moves or folds or has additional storage... these are all on the side of the angels. Along with, well, storage service areas.

3) Disruptive technologies that save money, and generic brands, will continue to gain market share. While the affluent might still buy on brand or for a premium experience, Millennials and their parents aren't going to go back to old and more profligate ways of spending. They can't.

4) Retirement isn't seen as an out, either. No one in this demographic class seems to think they've got a pension, good 401K plan, iron-clad stocks or bonds, or anything beyond lottery dreams to get them into a traditional view of one's golden years. Maybe their kids eventually get to prosperity and can help, but pragmatism and just getting through the next year, then the one after that, is seen as far more relevant.

5) Technology makes diaspora much easier. In the past, people like these would be bound to an area from their friends and family, along with their property holdings. Now, thanks to social media, even those who have been in the same place for a long time do not feel obligated to remain there. When long distance phone bills no longer exist, and everyone can stay in touch in ways that were not popular even a decade ago, scattering for low housing costs and a more pleasing population density holds far less sting.

If all of this sounds sad and limiting, I won't disagree with you. My own children aren't as close to their college years, so maybe I haven't been as worn down by their teen age behavior as I will be later... but the idea of forcing a move so that I can prevent their return seems draconian.

But give me another five years, and more time where my home remains underwater, and maybe I get there, too.

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Friday, April 15, 2016

Craft Risk, Or Drink She

Not A Joke, Honest
Not to put too fine a point on this, but there's a story that showed up in my social feed this week that I feel like I need to discuss. It is a story that I'm not sure that I can easily share with you, or one that I should just jump into.

So if you are squeamish about body issues, move on, by all means, move on. We'll have something far more palatable for you next Monday, on our normal publishing schedule.

Still with me? OK, you're brave. Here we go.

There is a craft beer start up that is using crowd sourcing. The goal of this project is to mix bacteria from a particularly salacious model, seen above.

Well, to be more accurate, bacteria from discharge in her nether regions. They'll mix that into the beer to create an, um, unique product.

No, seriously.

And no, I'm not linking to it. I'm sure you'd be able to find it all on your own.

Since the project launched on April 1 and would seem to be a fever dream from the worst of bro culture, many hoped this was just some publicity stunt and bad joke... but, well, no, it seems to be moving forward. According to my sources on this (for the record, I'm not much of a beer drinker), there's been beer made with all sorts of other human biological contributions, so maybe it's just me that is considering this beyond the pale. Or, at the very least, worthy of public health regulation and censure, because you would have to think that this might put the drinker at risk for something. I'm not a scientist, but I'm also pretty sure that adding in bacteria for marketing sizzle is also being done for health reasons.

Maybe you're more of a free market uber alles person, and wouldn't want the government to step on innovation. I used to work with a guy who subsequently bankrolled caffeine-infused jerky, which has made it all the way into big box retailers all across the U.S., so good for him. The market will decide.

But let's get back to the potable. The very nature of it reminds me of a moment during a golf round. I was playing with rented clubs at a really nice course in Southern California, and was paired up with an eccentric and outgoing rich guy. We bonded well enough, and eventually made our way to a par 3 on the back nine. I pulled out my 5-iron and hit it fairly well, but the ball wound up short and to the right. My playing partner then told me to hit another, but to try his club, and handed me a 5-iron from his bag. Which felt really good in my hands, and produced a pretty shot with more length and a sweet bounce up on the green.

Handing the club back to him, I thanked him for the experience... and was told how much the club cost. If true, it was something like 50X more than any iron I'd ever used before or since. I'm not entirely sure, because at the moment when I got this information, my brain short circuited with the deep desire to never, ever touch this club again, for the fear it would break in my hands and be the most expensive second of my life.

That's the nature of gear that's wildly beyond your price point and comfort level. If you really like it, you might not be able to live happily with anything less. When I've taken my wife out for test drives in the past three months, we haven't looked at cars that are dramatically beyond our price point, because, well, the same reason.

So, to finish up on this, and hopefully provide the final word on this sort of enterprise, a final question to anyone who might want to bankroll or try this concoction...

What, exactly, would a positive end result be?

Since the three most likely reactions -- disgust, delight and apathy -- all put the user in a position that's much worse than where they were before the experience?

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Wednesday, April 13, 2016

What Drives You

Not A Problem
Occasionally in pitch sessions or interviews, I'm asked about how I've accumulated the work experience that I've pulled off. I'm happy to tell the story, of course, because you can't really do this gig unless you're able to tell a story... but the one that I share with clients isn't entirely the full ride. If I can beg your indulgence for a few hundred words, I'll give you that, and also what's really driving this train.

Six months before I proposed to my wife, she suggested that we do a seminar together. It was the kind of thing that I would never have done on my own, and never did again... but what I got out of it was substantial and lasting, and I still use aspects of what I learned to this day. With the change in both of us, I proposed on Christmas Eve, and we set the date for mid-May.

Our wedding, you will probably not be very surprised to learn, was a festival of marketing, and great humor. We're not formal people, we had a great deal of similar friends and family, and so we had lots of touches like business reply postcards for the invites, logo merchandise, and a themed URL (Wedding Fun Now, Dot Com. No, seriously.) We actually turned a profit on that, and saved the money for a down payment on a house.

Three months after the wedding, we had found a house a few miles away from where I worked. My job was secure, for a business that had been around for half a century... but I got a job offer to join the dot-com economy on the West Coast. My wife gave me the green light to not just put off a home purchase and move, but also drove out with me in a rented U-Haul with our pets and possessions, despite having her own contracting gig that required her to fly back East after the trip. Our lives got even more interesting when, after the flight back, she learned that she was pregnant with our first child. Whom she carried for the first two trimesters, alone, before we were able to reunite.

Six years, three rentals, three start ups and two kids later, she had a fresh network for her business, a deep fondness for the Bay Area... and a husband who had limited prospects for ever affording a house anywhere closer than several hours away from anyone we knew. So she green-lit another big dramatic move, this one landing us halfway between Philadelphia and New York. That was ten years and four start ups ago now, along with the start of my consulting business. (We now own a house, and one of these days, it might even be worth more than we owe on it.)

So what I've become, over the course of my adult life, is a consultant who has been able to learn a ferocious amount from too many start ups in too many consumer categories... because I've had the base and support that's made it all possible. In all of those jobs, I've been able to bring high focus to the work, not just because that's how I'm wired, but because my wife has given me the freedom to do that. Along with the confidence to always know she had my back, and that she trusted me to do what was right, in the long-term, for the family.

It's her birthday today, and what I really wanted to do for her was get her a new car that we've been researching and planning since the start of the year. That plan was compromised by forces beyond our control, a tax bill from several years ago, that exists due to a mistake from an old employer, unrelated to my consulting work. It will likely resolve in our favor, but in case it doesn't, we have to put off the purchase. It's just, honestly, the worst.

Just like 15+ years ago, when we postponed home ownership, she will support a decision that requires faith in her spouse.

And just like then, she'll make me understand, in ways that are simple and profound, why she's the best thing that has ever happened to me.

So, if you want to know how I've managed to keep moving forward, and to always be in a position where I'm learning something new, and striving to be better?

It's because I've got someone who brings that out of me.

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Sunday, April 10, 2016

Thinking About Cell Phone Guns

Reach Out And Touch Someone
By now, social media has had weeks to deal with the land rush business involved in the gun that looks like a cell phone, seen at the top of this piece.

As a marketing and advertising consultant who has worked on a sizable number of client concerns that went against my own personal beliefs, I'm not going to get into how I feel about this. As a pro, you have to take the mindset of an attorney, argue the best case in the court of the marketplace, and trust in the verdict of the public. Doing anything less limits not just your billings, but also your opportunities to learn for future clients. I've learned some truly breakthrough points from clients that I rarely discuss. It's just the way of the work.

So what's really telling here isn't the existence of a weapon that looks like something else... but that it's the first of its kind. As the market demand shows, there's a strong desire for many enthusiasts to carry a firearm without anyone knowing they have one. We've also established that due to effective lobbying, restricting the hobby is rarely a legislative possibility.

So the question isn't whether or not there will be cell phone guns. More, it's a question of when the piece will be both, and much more concealable.

But let's go further, really. Why should things that a user wants to conceal look like, well, what you'd expect them to look like? Putting the same phone tech into something that looks like a compact mirror would seem to be easy, and a natural for a younger demographic, especially in a school setting. Make it more like a tape measure with a slide out screen for hard hat types, and yes, that's another seemingly simple transformation to firearm. I'd be surprised if an adult toy that allowed for a more discrete pass through an airport security checkpoint would be a tough product to sell.

Oh, and if you can combine all of these capabilities into one device?

I want to make ads for that product.

And have equity in the company that makes it...

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Friday, April 8, 2016

Lurching Towards Progress

It's easy to see how the Internet has had a coarsening effect on modern culture. Just looking at the comments section, or a walk through social media, could convince you that we've never been less thoughtful as a species. But for every trollish moment and churlish experience, other points towards enlightenment come to the fore. I thought I'd share a few with you here, just to encourage.

1) The end of gratuitous laddie embellishment.

I used to work in marketing for music instrument retail, and there was no more embarrassing part of the business than the periodic photo shoots and "booth babe" use. While it was defensible on a pure mercantile and demographic level, it also seemed incredibly limiting, since the only way the field was going to grow would be to, well, become more welcoming to the very people who were likely turned off by the practice.

This is more or less what's happened, since the Web makes the use of models pointless... just like in "Playboy." This week saw the news that two of the larger surviving guitar magazines had done away with the practice. With those sort of models available to all whenever they want them, adding them to guitar shots has become passe, and amen to that. Oh, and as a further aside? Walk into an MI store now, and you'll find a much more welcoming environment towards women, and a great deal of different sized gear for different sized people.

2) An inexorable force towards, well, freedom.

While the Web has done no end of ill for professional journalism due to the considerable issues involved in monetizing content, it's also a clear factor in the uprising against repressive regimes across the world. From the Arab Spring to the Panama Papers, from Wikileaks to (perhaps) small campaign donors mitigating the impact of dark money PACs in the U.S., the Web has been the key leveling factor in systems that were previously thought infallible.

3) Activism can be done 24/7/365, and from nearly anywhere.

Fifty years ago, if you had an issue with something that was happening elsewhere in the world, your ability to do anything about it required extraordinary commitment, as well as personal flexibility in one's professional life. Now, social media makes action, even if it doesn't seem terribly sincere or effective, something you can do at any moment you've got a connection. It's not a coincidence that an expansion of personal rights, social boycotts, and buy-one give-one businesses have all exploded in the past decade.

4) Data has never been better, and it's always getting better.

This falls right into the wheelhouse of marketing and advertising, but for me, one of the great parts about working in adtech is that the data is always getting more exact and more telling. From greater verification to more esoteric calculations and ways of thinking about the numbers, there's clear inspiration from analytic-driven fields like sports and financial markets... and, honestly, more creativity than you might imagine. That kind of thing is only going to keep growing with the IoT and mobile-first use, of course.

5) Building your personal brand, and crowd-sourcing, has never been easier.

Mostly because staying in touch with friends and colleagues is something we all just do now, because it's really no trouble at all. And as a personal aside, some readers might remember a column where my niece did a personal piece of marketing to crowdsource her expenses in fighting off thyroid cancer. This week saw the return of a clear prognosis, and the transition to far more appropriate points of concern for an 18-year-old, such as college and the prom. Progress indeed.

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.


Wednesday, April 6, 2016

The IoDad

The IoDad Believes In Belt Holsters
How will the Internet of Things achieve true market penetration? By allowing consumers the ability to make their lives better, easier and more convenient... or by amplifying their original selves to levels that they were previously unable to attain.

Which is why, honestly, it's going to be Dad-driven.

I'll cut to the chase, because there's venture capital to woo. (Or maybe a YouTube viral comedy video to make. That's a pretty common intersection, actually.)

If you gave me the ability to:

1) Have every light turn off when someone leaves the room

2) Sound an ear-splitting alarm when dishes are left in the sink, especially when there's room in the dish washer

3) Turn off air conditioners and space heaters when there are no humans in the room

4) Record and play digital video clips when people (well, OK, children) fail to put items away, especially laundry, because laundry

5) All while calculating the expense involved and/or saved as a running tally, either to be deducted from an allowance or college savings account, with that tally...

6) Pushed to any available screen, via a Dad-only smartphone app that's on an old school belt clip, because nothing says IoDad more than holstering stuff on your belt

7) With the ability to auto-play speeches about the electric, heating, air conditioning or environmental reason why such things are important, and

8) Back it all up with a countdown clock as to when various family members will head off to college / military...

Well, um, just take all of my money already and give me this thing.

Then, take all of my family's money to take it away...

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.

Monday, April 4, 2016

Five Points From A Road Trip Vacation

Not if the kids aren't looking
A few points to share with you all from my recent vacation, as it loosely pertains to the stated life goal of marketing and advertising. We promise that more coherent and full-form work will result as we get back in the swing of things, assuming, of course, that you found the previous work to be coherent, and in full form.

1) Shockingly, South of the Border still exists, and will punish you with relentless outdoor advertising... that children will totally miss.

The tourist trap that beckons I-95 commuters, with the questionable taste in Mexican-American humor and the omnipresent road signs? Still doing land office business, at least in terms of outdoor buys. Perhaps the costs of outdoor ads in the Carolinas makes it a slam dunk, but judging from the impact in my own car with my own kids -- locked into phones, iPods, and in the case of my budding eldest child, a ukelele -- it's not a winning investment in the future. Only the parent drivers noticed, and we're not exactly the target market to pull over for that destination.

2) The Internet of Things is such a slam dunk for theme parks.

This year, we revisited Universal Orlando, because the youngest is very much into the Potter... and truth be told, the whole family is pretty much down with those books and movies. You can now buy your budding witch or wizard a wand that is IoT connected, which means it will activate various actions in the themed areas, which is pretty cool, even in beta. Soon enough, of course, the tech will allow a much more definitive experience than just the same thing that other kids are doing, and the day when you can use it to skip a ride line or six, well then... maybe you won't wince so much at the cost for a stick of your kid's own. (Oh, and the memories, of course. Those essential memories.)

3) Seven days, one hour.

My little family are not culture snobs; we enjoy all kinds of mass market stuff, really. But in the week we were all sharing the same hotel room, the television was on for all of one hour -- the crossover episode of "Supergirl" with a guest appearance from the star of the CW's "The Flash" -- and then went right back off. Mostly this is because I wasn't watching sports, and knew that on demand would have everything I missed back home waiting for me, but still. If you are looking for evidence that the next generation isn't much into tech that isn't personal, here it was, in microcosm. And it's not exactly a new development.

4) Mapping tech makes all of this so much easier.

GPS saved us hours with alternatives to main highways in both directions, and also made getting around town, sometimes in torrential thunderstorms, much less stressful. I remember vacations without mapping apps, and I'm so glad that we never have to have one of those again.

5) Old school fun still works.

As good as the IoT and craft of Universal is -- and honestly, we had a fine time, though not, of course, a fine value -- there's something to be said for more traditional approaches. Two of the other three days for us were spent at Fun Spot, a park where you can enter and park for free and ride attractions that don't take very long at all, and Wet and Wild, the first waterpark in America. (It's closing at the end of the year for a Universal rebrand.) No screens, promotional tie-ins, must-have souvenirs or cachet to saying we went there... but the good times were as valid or better, and the overall day, probably superior. And so was the board game we played in the hotel room as a family, the time we spent in the car -- necessary to afford the other stuff -- and the overall bonding. It's good to get away, and it's better to be back. Onward!

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Feel free to comment, as well as like or share this column, connect with me on LinkedIn, or email me at davidlmountain at gmail dot com, or hit the RFP boxes at top right. RFPs are always free, and we hope to hear from you soon.