Corner The Market

Monday Morning Water Cooler Chit-Chat Trophy

Well, it’s that time of year again… advertisers are ponying up for a chance to win over the hearts and minds of the 100-million-plus football fans who will be tuning-in for this year’s Super Bowl featuring the New York Giants and the New England Patriots. The price of admission?… A cool $3.5 million for 30 seconds of airtime.  As in year’s past, I’m shocked that this level of spending continues to go unchecked.

During the last 45 Super Bowls, Budweiser has been the most visible and memorable advertiser – routinely winning the “Monday Morning Water Cooler Chit-Chat Trophy”. From the halftime Bud Bowls, to the iconic Clydesdales, to the True “Wuzzup”  guys…  the Budweiser brand has left an indelible mark on the Super Bowl and the advertising world.

However, a recent poll of 1,500 likely Super Bowl watchers predicts that the King of Beers will finish dead last in terms of its ability to receive a solid return on its investment for this year’s game.  Which may explain why Budweiser’s sales continue to drop every year despite the annual ad spree they devote to the Super Bowl.  As the category leader, you would think that Bud would benefit from all of the demand they must be generating from these multi-million dollar ad buys!  No such luck.

This year, my friend Jim Lenskold put together a neat measurement tool for evaluating the potential ROI of Super Bowl ads for a couple of different product categories including automotive, consumer goods and internet domain providers. After adjusting the inputs to the tool for a few minutes, it will become painfully obvious to you just how ridiculously hard it is to setup a scenario where you can generate a positive ROI from a Super Bowl ad…

So, if you feel like playing “Monday-morning Quarterback”, please shoot me a message with the top-3 Super Bowl ads you think will show a positive ROI this year.

As consultants and former CMOs for some of the largest B2B companies in the world, TopRight has come to the realization that fragmentation and lack of cohesiveness in marketing is more the norm than the exception. It is also clear that when this inherent weakness is fixed, it can unleash marketing power never before imagined.

Fragmentation is a serious structural issue that if left unaddressed can become an insurmountable barrier to achieving high performance. It leads to duplication of resources, continuous re-inventing of the wheel, inconsistent and incorrect branding and messaging, disjointed processes and lack of connection to the corporate mission. The messaging inconsistencies alone can hinder a company’s ability to drive one compelling, powerful voice that is critical to stand out in a crowded marketplace.

The severity of fragmentation varies widely from company to company and is typically the result of three key factors – the type of products and services and how localized they are; the extent of autonomy that CEOs give their business unit leaders; and complacency or apprehension by corporate marketing to rock the boat.

Is your marketing organization fragmented? I’d encourage you to start right away with assessing your organization and download the white paper that outlines a 10-step cure.   Good chance you’ve only satisfactory completed less than half of the 10 steps.  Whatever stage you’re at, move with speed and purpose to address the gaps and begin down the path of building a high performance marketing team that is a catalyst for profitable growth.  It’s amazing what a marketing function can do when you harness the power of consistency across the organization.

The fast-paced, complicated reality of our daily lives is enough to deal with for most of us… so why would you want to “augment it”!  Well, with a highly mobile and connected customer base, marketers are stretching their product imaginations even further.   Next generation smart phones and mobile technologies are enabling marketers to relevantly connect customers with brands in truly unprecedented ways.  The emergence of Augmented Reality and it’s neighboring platform, Sixth Sense Technology, are literally opening up a multi-dimensional window into how customers and brands will interact in the future with regard to:

1. Customized content
2. Personalized experiences
3. Emotional connections

All enabled through the convergence of hand & voice control, sound, video, graphics and GPS technologies.

Whether you are presenting your Business Card or buying Heinz Ketchup the Augmented version of reality delivers an enhanced multi-sensory experience.  For strategic, creative thinkers in Marketing, this opportunity opens up a whole new world for Spatial Design, allowing us to flow in and out of brand vignettes and making reality a little more fun.  Let us know what you think: how will augmented reality be applied to the art and science of marketing??….

We’re in the midst of a remarkable marketing evolution at this moment in time. The multitude and complexity of communication mediums and technologies that are being used to speak to the market is revolutionizing how the work of marketing is performed. The days of campaign-oriented thinking – the traditional approach of “start-stop-measure-tweak-repeat” – are over. Today, marketers wanting to effectively build brands and drive revenue growth must facilitate a continuous, meaningful conversation with their target audience or they risk becoming irrelevant.

Download our latest white paper to learn more about the distinctions between campaigns and conversations and how you may need to change your perspectives on direct marketing – and if you’re a B2B marketer there are a few additional recommendations just for you.