Andrew Chamberlain

Working as I do, on the edge of the digital marketing industry, I get an insight in to what digital marketers, and the journalists who write for them, are thinking. I’m following a story that’s been bubbling away for a while - the debate around whether ISP’s should be able to target users with online ads. For those who don’t know, ISP’s (or Internet Service Providers) are the people who provide you with the connection to the internet, it might be Virgin media, or BT, or Tiscali, or a service provided by one of the mobile phone companies.

The idea is that, if ISP’s track consumer behaviour online they can use this to fire targeted ads at their customers. Not surprisingly, a majority of customers don’t want their surfing habits tracked and used by ISP’s for marketing purposes; they are concerned about data privacy issues.

Industry journal, New Media Age, has been wrestling with this issue and this week they report from their own research which shows that 58% of consumers think on line advertising is irrelevant (I’m surprised it’s not more) and 81% would opt out if they could from their ISP tracking their behaviour. What is interesting is reading Deputy Editor Nic Howell’s mild indignation at the fact that consumers don’t want to be ‘helped’ by more targeted advertising. His argument is that if consumers think on line advertising is irrelevant then they should welcome a more targeted approach. Nic says:

“58% of users think ad’s they see online are irrelevant, yet they are suspicious of relating ad’s to behaviour”

Well of course they are Nic. The belief of a lot of people in the industry is that somehow they are doing consumers a favour by making advertising more targeting, that it will make the ads more relevant - and that’s the argument that they tend to present. But what these guys don’t get is that consumers are never going to buy the line that the ad’s can be there for their benefit: the truth that consumers understand, and most marketers don’t is that generally ads are just a necessary irritation and making them a bit more targeting isn’t going to change that. They pay for the content, that’s what they are there for from the consumers point of view. If the industry tries to use the line that ads can somehow benefit consumers their words are going to fall like seeds on stony ground. What makes this situation even worse is that consumers perceive this to be an infringement of their privacy, and tthey care about data privacy much more than better targeted ads.

The irony is that behavioural targeting can be anonymous and personal, you don’t have to know who someone is to understand their behaviour, and advertisers needs be none the wiser about their customers if behavioural targeting is adopted. But somehow I suspect that the industry wont be able to get this message across; it will be people’s perceptions that count and so far it looks like a lot of people are giving a more targeted approach the thumbs down.

If the ISP’s and their advertising paymasters lose this one, in part it will be their own fault - they have tried to sell behavioural targeting as a benefit for consumers and the consumers have seen this for the bunkum that it is; they will need to change strategy soon or they will lose the chance to use any kind of targeting with an ever more sceptical public.

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On Sunday (13th) cast and crew at Cambridge’s Corn Exchange rounded off a memorable if exhausting production of Oliver! knowing that they had done themselves great credit in putting on an excellent, sell out show.

For some of the performances I was backstage helping, and it’s interesting to see the stark contrast between the world on stage as the audience sees it, with set, costume, lighting and the magic of the theatre brought to life - and the world back stage, with it’s frentic activity, lack of space, organised chaos, anxious breathless actors, and yet also a cameraderie that seems even more magical than the spectacle which greets the audience. I’ve seen artists young and old bond together for what was a great purpose.

By Saturday we had a review from the local paper, you can read it here, and by Sunday I think everyone was exhausted; but as the title of this blog suggests, a successful stage performance is happiness and hard work. Even with my very marginal involvement I loved it, roll on 2009!

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There has been a lot said in condemnation of the murdering tyrant Mugabe, so I won’t add much more; suffice it to say that, when these things happen there is a temptation to assume that this is the norm, the usual. Some might be tempted to think, variously ‘This is what happens in Africa’ or ‘This is what happens in Government’ or ‘none of our business’.

Well morality is everyone’s business, complicated and awkward though it is. When we moralize about others the standards we set have a nasty habit of coming back to judge us. Some of the African leaders meeting in Egypt this week will find it a struggle to lecture Mugabe on democracy, and none of us are immune from the need for integrity when we start to point the finger.

But we must not be afraid to speak out on these issues; to guard the concept that something is objectively wrong, and deserving of condemnation. Mugabe’s actions are not simply regrettable, or disappointing, they are a moral outrage, and should be regarded as such, in any state, in any government.

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I’ve been to the Online Marketing and Media confernce to hear Michael Nutley, editor in chief of New Media Age (NMA) speaking frankly about the state of play in the industry. Nutley had a few words to say about why the great British public find marketing irritating and are now able to ‘tune out’ a lot of marketing messages.

Well of cource people avoid marketing messages, consumers are not engaging with content (on the web, TV, print, or whereever) to see the ads, most people consider exposure to marketing commmunication as a necessary evil and as a consequence do indeed try to screen it out.

Nutley touched on what I think is the main reason why most people have a stressful relationship with marketing. He was talking about Nike, the sportswear manufacturer who came up with the idea of ‘Nike +’ an online community for runners. This has been a successful venture for Nike, but these on line initiatives are like getting a pet, you can’t just get bored with it and walk away. To borrow from the popular phrase, online community involvement is for life not just for Christmas (or the lifetime of a traditional campaign). So whilst Nike may well have benefitted in terms of sales, they have also built an expectation that they need to fulfil. Herein is the problem for this sort of marketing, at the end of the day commercial marketing is there to sell stuff; even if a particular marketing campaign is all about brand, the fundamental goal of marketing activity is to make money.

Conversely, the fundamental goal of an online community is to create an environment for quality interaction, and the development of relationship. Sure that might involve buying the odd pair of running shoes, but if a company is spending money on creating the environment and there’s no tangible benefit in sales, someone in the board room will soon be asking hard questions.

It’s because, as consumers, we know that this conflict of interest exists that we get suspicious or even cynical about marketing activity, even the covert brand stuff. We may enjoy the few campaigns that are genuinely witty, funny, or insightful. But we know what the real agenda is.

The challenge for mareters is to account for our suspicions and still delight us, and motivate us to engage and buy. Only the best marketing can achieve this.

Don’t believe the hype

On a more straightforward note, we are told to shop around for the best credit card. That’s fair enough, and in such a business brands can be discarded for the irrelevance that they are, but behind these cards are one of the  payment processing companies (Visa, Mastercard, AmEx etc.). For most consumers the significance of these brands are nil. And yet Mastercard are spending big money on sponsorship and advertising during Euro 2008, with amusing little bits of fluff like this. Maybe they are really trying to reach the retailers, I don’t know. Meanwhile, for us consumers getting the card that has the right benefits will laways be much more important than who is processing the payments.

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By which I mean Nearly All Marketing Is Rubbish (NAMIR) which brings a broader scope to my series.

I want to highlight anything in marketing that I think is especially bad (not just the slightly bad, of which there is legion) but the particularly bad, and maybe also what is good.

It was interesting to see the ‘Drench’ ad which I thought was a rare good ad, making it in to the ‘most recognised ads’ chart last week at 3rd place, so there’s one highlight amongst an awful lot of nonsense.

I was intrigued to see what the chief exec of an integrated marketing agency said in ‘Marketing’ magazine this week

“We are a nation of self-obsessed cynics and all we really care about is what price we are paying and the level of service we are receiving.” Adam Leigh, The Communications Agency

Ouch. Well he’s half right; we do care about price and service, and there’s nothing wrong with caring about these things, after all when you cut through all the marketing bull these are the things we care about as consumers, and quite right too. It’s about the price we pay and the experience we have, that encompasses the quality of the product or service, it’s reliability, after sales service, and so on… the experience of the product or service we are buying. It’s not about the ads or the marketing or the brand development.

I can hear the marketer in me howling - ’sometimes the brand is the experience!!!’

Yes, rarely it is, that’s true. There are a few brands that really have some integrity behind the promise they give, just a few. You can maybe think of some, here are three I just thought of:

• Marmite
• Apple
• Google

These are really strong brands, if you don’t come from the world of marketing believe me people get really excited about this sort of thing. You might disagree with these, you might be able to think of some yourself, but for every one of these there are a hundred brands that are shallow and fake and need to be treated with indifference.

In a world where the smart consumer is king, some marketing still works well, but not much. If I see any that’s really good I’ll let you know, and if I see anything I think is exceptionally bad I’ll call that out as well.

In the meantime as the phrase goes, don’t believe the hype!

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I have really enjoyed watching ‘the apprentice’ on BBC. Based on the series from the US with Donald Trump in the chair this one has Alan Sugar - near billionaire and no nonsense East End lad made good. Alan is flanked by two steely looking professional heavies - one of whom, Margaret, is normally the model of competence and respectability - I think she’s a corporate lawyer. But then one of the rounds involves hiring out some very fast and mean cars and Margaret can’t help but have a go. Check it out here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/apprentice/videos/vid/338.html

Nice one Margaret!

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So I am going to start an occasional series looking at marketing in general and advertising in particular. Let me declare an interest, I work in the marketing business, and I see a lot of material created by marketers and some created for marketers - and there’s a fair amount of nonsense out there.

The point of my occasional blog on this subject will be to identify those rare gems - the good ads, the good marketing campaigns; and these things are rare, there’s a sea of guff out there both products and ads. I am no friend of lame advertising or marketing. On the ‘products’ side you’ve got:

• desperate brands that need to be filed under ‘commodity’ and need to be bought on price and features only - most financial services products come under this category
• stuff that you need to get independent advice or do research on, and then buy - mobile phones, insurance, computers
• a whole bunch of supposedly cool internet sites that are trying to get traffic and bombard you with popups and banners and so forth, and loads of social network sites trying to get on the myspace/bebo/facebook bandwagon.

On the ad’s side you’ve got all those gimmicky car and beer ads, sports wear ads, endless bits of direct mail that can be smoothly transferred to the recycling with the minimum of fuss, and of course the worse thing of all, the unwanted sales calls in the evening, that’s the one that really get’s me - as if anyone wants to be sold double glazing or a new phone service in there own time. I could go on…but I won’t.

Never has a dose of healthy skepticism been so good for us all, but I will just occasionally see something that appeals to me. So I am going to start with an ad that I’ve seen a couple of times, and I even remember the product its for - a bottled water called ‘Drench’. I’m no fan of bottled water particularly, it’s just another product that needs to be treated as a commodity and bought on price, but in the this case the ad delighted and intrigued me. You can see it here:

The smart people at Drench even give you an easy way to put the ad in a blog, that’s impressive. The idea that we all need water to keep our brains functioning well is well and good, but what really lifts this above the crowd is the way it works as a wonderfully retro piece of mesmerizing art; a puppet from the 60’s combines with a dance track from the 90’s and the synergy works remarkably well. It’s the best thing out there at the moment.

So I award my first NABA (Not a bad ad) to Drench and the team from Clemmow Hornby Inge. Brains from Thunderbirds, never has he looked so cool.

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To the Lake District, and more specifically the Lakes School of Writing course at Eusemere House on the shore of Ullswater. If you are a budding Christian writer this really is a great opportunity to get with some like minded people, to learn something about the craft and, once you’ve been a few times, to catch up with some old friends. I am hoping to attend the next course in November for all these reasons and also because the course will be hosted by Nick Page who is good value every time; also because this might be our last chance to be based at Eusemere house, former home of Thomas Clarkson the Abolitionist MP

This time round we had some very good practical teaching and advice from Jan Greenough, Dave Hopwood, and my friend Ali Hull from Authentic Media.

Maybe the most significant thing was what I learnt about my life since moving on from being a pastor in June of last year. Since then I’ve been on a long journey, one that I think might last for a number of years. As a scale of time to achieve something I find ‘years’ very strange; I can understand days, or weeks or even months, but years? I left the ministry on good terms with my church and perhaps not so good terms with God, and yet he has been gracious to me as I have moved on from that time. I have not wanted to think about any of the gifts I may have had when I was a pastor, and yet I find God using me a little bit with people. I’ve been reminded of the fact that we have gifts whether we are in pastoral ministry or not; indeed I was reminded of this three times this week by people who have no connection with each other. I can, after 11 months look back and see that at least I have started my journey, I have covered some distance. So, on we go!

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Hi everyone,

If you’ve tried to reach my website over the past few days you will have seen a page telling you that if you were the owner of the site you should contact UK2 immediately. Well, that’s what I did when I saw it, and it turns out that there was some ‘abusive’ use of my website, and this blog. I’m really not sure how that’s happened, apparently I had: “IRC-demons from my Cpanel account”

Very strange! Anyway, my mate Barry is looking in to it, and UK2 have restored the site.

A.

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I’m reproducing a contribution to a blog that I put on to a forum in a national newspaper today. This is a subject I feel quite strongly about, partly because it should be of concern to anyone with kids, and partly because it’s the genesis of a writing project that I am working on at the moment.  The blog theme was the fact that some parents leave their kids at school as a kind of surrogate baby sitting service. There was some discussion about the difficulties parents have when the economic climate is hard. Here’s my view:

===================================

It’s time we faced some truths about this issue.

First, we need to accept that it really is a good idea for parents to spend time with their kids, and that means engaging with them. There’s nothing wrong with putting the little ones in front of Pingu or Disney from time to time, but don’t confuse it with real engagement with them. It’s that real engagement, the creation of relationship with your child, that is the precious thing.

Second, it’s really really, really hard work sometimes to engage with the kids. It can be boring, it can be tedious…but if you accept my first point, you have to accept that it’s hard work to engage sometimes with them, but do it anyway. I think dad’s really need to hear this one. You don’t have to pretend that ever moment with them is a delight, but you do have to engage. And yes, work is actually an easier option that being with your kids, but don;t take the easy way out. Get home and engage with them.

On this subject, let’s dispense with this idea that every interaction we have within our family is some kind of nirvana - it’s only like that in the adverts. And I am not even talking about the problems of arguments in the family, I am talking about the day to day business of engaging with each other.

In my experience there’s a particular example of this that needs to be dealt with. I can only speak as a dad, so I do so here; you are a dad, you come home from work, you are tired. You have a small child, or children. THe truth is, it’s going to be hard work a lot of the time to summon up the energy to deal with them. Never mind, get a drink, get changed, and get in there. Ten minutes with them, fifteen minutes with them, every night. Go and engage with your kids. Yes it’s tiring - do it anyway.

Now there’s a third issue which is around the fact that families are busy and often, if there are two parents, both work. My wife and I have both had work for periods of time so I speak from experience. It is a tough act to deal with, I know, but don’t turn it in to an excuse. If you both want to or have to work that’s fine, but make sure you still have time with the kids. Anyone can do that; there’s no why you can’t, just choose to do it. Don’t stay late at work, you rarely need to; come home and get with the kids. If the cost of living is rising, cut back on something else.

So, let’s admit that for our ‘me’ focused, ambitious generation, spending time with the kids might not come easy and it’s hard work, but especially for dads the message is this - do the hard work, engage with the kids - regularly, and put effort in to it. It’s the best investment you will make in life.

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