It’s funny how one’s mind can connect a series of “dots.” Running along the other day, I heard an NPR story about 15-year-old Ashton Stark who thought electric cars were “kind of cool.” Unable to afford a $40,000 electric car he, along with his father, converted his Grandpa’s 1972 VW bug into an electric car using golf cart batteries.

Wow.

“How cool is that? Sustainable really means something to the younger generation. And they give new meaning to do-it-yourself,” I thought to myself. Unable to afford green, this boy made green. Boy, did that put some bounce into my stride — what a bright future we’ll have if sustainability continues to morph from “cause” to “way-of-life.”

Continuing along, my mind wandered from Ashton’s story to a study by Johnson Controls I’d recently read. According to the study, when Gen Y’ers consider potential employers, they weed out those who aren’t green. In fact, ninety-six percent of them insist on an “environmentally aware or friendly workplace” and another fifty-seven percent expect their employer to perform above and beyond standard regulatory compliance. This study was backed up by the Voice of Customer insights one of our clients shared with me — if you want the best people, you better be able to demonstrate some pretty green corporate genes.

Eureka!

I stopped in my tracks. Yes, I’ve written before about the importance of transparency and content marketing for your current and potential customers. But good content doesn’t just matter to those people looking to buy your products or use your services. When you (or I) connect the dots you see that good content is also about building the personal face of your brand by attracting a top-notch sales clerk, delivery person, technician, engineer, chef, marketing officer or CEO.

For Gen Y’ers, work is an extension of their personal life — they’re looking for a work environment and culture that fit who they are. That means before they buy your product, try your services, consider a job interview or accept your job offer — they’ll be looking at your web site, your Facebook page, your Tweets and your LinkedIn profile. They’ll take a good long look at your press page, your white papers and your case studies — and an even longer look at what others are saying about you.

So, let your mind wander once in a while. Let it connect some dots. You may be pleased to discover new audiences, new opportunities and new ways to use content.

Even if you live under a large rock you’ve probably heard of the Old Spice Guy, the dashing, bare-chested spokesman in the Old Spice Body Wash television commercial. Wearing only a towel and a smile, the Old Spice Guy informs the women in the audience that although their men aren’t as handsome and suave as he is, their use of Old Spice will at least allow them to smell like him. And “anything is possible,” he says, “when a man smells like a man and not a lady.” The commercial’s simultaneous celebration and parody of machismo is funny and clever. And now, thanks to a new series of more than 220 very short YouTube videos, the Old Spice guy is a phenomenon.

Lots has already been written about the genius of that social media strategy, which encouraged fans to send the Old Spice Guy comments and questions via Twitter and Facebook for a chance at having him respond (bare-chested and in a towel, of course) in a personalized video. The results—the company’s Twitter followers jumped from 3,000 to 46,000 in less than 48 hours and the videos have received more than 21 million YouTube viewings—constitute further evidence that social media works for businesses.

But there’s a more basic lesson advertisers can learn from the Old Spice phenomenon. It’s about staying the course and sticking with the plan. Giving your advertising a chance to find its voice and gain momentum.

You’ll hear a lot about how the Old Spice Guy is advertising’s “overnight sensation.” But that’s not true. The company and its advertising agency began evolving toward the concept in 2007 with a series of commercials featuring “B” movie actor Bruce Campbell parodying traditional 1960s maleness. Those commercials got some viewer attention, won some awards, and helped elevate the product to number one in its category. But they didn’t achieve the word-of-mouth status of Old Spice Guy. The commercial that introduced him ran for the first time on Super Bowl Sunday of this year. Even then, and despite the approximately $30 million investment, the Old Spice Guy did not instantly become a phenomenon. It took six more months and a brilliant social media campaign for the idea to reach critical mass.

It’s natural to run an ad and expect your phone to start ringing the next day. But that’s not how advertising works. You have to give an idea a chance and continuously explore ways to exploit and extend it. If you don’t believe me, listen to the Old Spice Guy. He’s on a horse.

Steve Coss is a Creative Director at TMA+Peritus: A Strategic Interaction Agency. Find them online at www.tmaperitus.com, offline in their offices in Wausau and Madison, or follow them on Twitter@ twitter.com/tmaperitus.

I think I’ve found the absolute teen Dream Job. No, the absolute Dream Job for anyone at any age. Being paid to shop and to show the world what you bought and why you bought it. That’s exactly what the teen stars of YouTube “hauls” do. They produce show-and-tell videos about their latest “haul” from the mall. Almost 159,000 hauls have been posted to the channel. And this week, JC Penney joins teen-oriented companies like Forever 21 and American Eagle in using this YouTube phenomena as a core marketing strategy to capture their part of this fall’s expected $50 billion “back to school” consumer spend.

JC Penney retained six teen girls from across the nation to create their new back to school haul videos (jcp.com/teen). The haulers were given free transportation, lodging and JCP gift cards and let loose in a store near Penney’s headquarters in Plano, Texas. And now they’re showing — and telling about — what they purchased at JCP to gear up for the new term.

Any person with a webcam can become a haul video expert. Tennessee “haulers” Elle and Blair Fowler are the teen pioneers of hauling and have attracted such a following of their peers and the moms of their peers that they’re now in high demand by marketers of everything from fashion to cosmetics.

Haul videos can focus on the results of shopping at a specific retailer or for a specific product category. Imagine the opportunity to take the haul concept beyond the teen market.  Why shouldn’t a marketer or retailer of “all things baby” recruit a team of moms to talk about the latest product trends and actually demonstrate product features? Wouldn’t a grocery chain want a team of people-who-love-to-entertain to post videos that feature their supermarket shopping haul for a specific event they’re hosting – even sharing the recipes that necessitated the trip?  How about having some of the most avid DIYers haul about their last shopping spree at the hardware, building supply or paint store?

Since marketers are taking the original authentic YouTube phenomena to a more commercial consumer-generated concept, under Federal Trade Commission guidelines, paid haulers must disclose in the video if they got free products or other compensation from retailers.  So the real question is: Will commercializing consumer-generated content, like hauls, come to have the same trust as non-commercialized YouTube content or the same mistrust as traditional advertising?

What do you think?

Retailers are facing a conundrum: consumers want a variety of brands to choose from so they can pick the ideal product to meet their needs, but they’re becoming increasingly frustrated by the overwhelming variety out there. A recent study showed that 70% of those surveyed find brands confusing.

Just think of your last visit to the shampoo aisle: on the one hand it’s nice to have choices; on the other hand, all the choices start to “look” the same. Unless you have a shampoo that really does right by you (and thus you are a brand-loyal fan), you probably end up selecting a shampoo based on price. And that’s not good for the supplier or retailer because lower prices mean lower margins.

Now you may not be the next Procter & Gamble, but chances are you face similar challenges. You need to differentiate your brand in a sea of competition so that price alone is not the deciding factor between you and the next guy.

In “Detox the Branding Business,” authors Christoph Burmann and Jan-Philipp Weers outline what consumers find so confusing about brands today. These points are important to consider when considering how effective your own brand is.

• Brand parity. Consumers can’t tell the difference between one brand and another. The end result? The product is seen as a “commodity” — and that leads to price-only based decisions.
• Brand differences are relevant. Brands don’t do a good job of illustrating why “what makes them different” is relevant to the consumer.
• Trust. Inconsistent or insincere messaging undermines a consumer’s trust in the brand.

So how can you make your brand stand out from the crowd? Be clear about what makes you different and why that matters to your consumers. That means clear messaging that isn’t filled with marketing speak, but that speaks the language of the consumer and directly addresses their needs and interests. And that may mean varied — not inconsistent — messaging that speaks to the different needs of your varied consumers.

Be consistent. Be transparent. And consider the channels on which you address your consumers — be it in print, on your website, TV, radio or social media. Just where do your consumers go to get their information? Figure that out and then get yourself on that channel. Broad brand marketing with one generic message broadcast on every available channel will surely miss the mark.

Confusion isn’t your friend. But brand variety can be — if you have the one brand that speaks directly to the needs of your consumers.

Every spring I make the pilgrimage to our garage – well, not exactly a pilgrimage as much as a walk through the door – to take inventory of the massive amount of junk that has accumulated over the years.  Amid the motor oil from the last century and trimmers and hedgers that haven’t seen a blade of grass in years, there they were.  Four different saws.  The last thing I remember sawing was the base of a Christmas tree, not exactly a job fit for four saws, and hardly falling into the logger category of work.  In fact, the only logs I saw are the kind when I’m horizontal on the hammock.

But they did remind me of one of my favorite adages.  A saying that rings true in just about anything we do.  Measure twice, cut once.  I’m not sure who said it, most likely a carpenter or a surgeon, but one thing’s for certain – it doesn’t apply to social media where we’re more prone to saying, “Just keep doing it, don’t worry about measuring it.”  But all that has changed in the blink of an eye.  So, if you’re a CFO, an analytics geek, or a marketer trying to grapple with social media and ROI, your ship has come in.  And the captain of that ship is none other than TV ratings behemoth Nielsen Corporation who led the study in tandem with Facebook.

The report, titled “Advertising Effectiveness: Understanding the Value of a Social Media Impression,” essentially states that there is quantifiable lift when social media is used in conjunction with advertising.  This was no slouch of a survey; it analyzed data from more than 800,000 Facebook users, 125 ad campaigns and 7 different brands.  The study is quick to point out that advertising needs to be viewed in both a “paid” and “earned” context, which explains why the report begins with a listing of where respondents trust their selected sources of information.  Not surprisingly, the top of the list at 90% is friends and peers, followed by consumer opinions posted online and brand Web sites at 70%, then editorial content at 69%, brand sponsorships at 64% and TV at 62%.  Newspapers (61%), magazines (59%), radio and billboards (55%) are others on the list.

The study was based on the three different types of Facebook paid ads in an effort to measure recall, awareness and purchase intent.  The three ads are:

• Lift from a standard “Homepage (Engagement) Ad”
• Lift from an ad that featured social context or “Homepage ads with Social Context”
• Lift from “Organic Ads,” news-feed stories that are sent to friends of users who engage with advertising on a brand

Here are the results when paid ads were used in conjunction with social media, as opposed to just placing a paid ad or message: For the homepage ads, there was a lift in recall of 10%, in awareness a lift of 4% and in purchase intent a lift of 2%.  For the homepage ads with social context, recall was up 16%, and awareness and purchase intent up 8%.  Finally, in the category of organic ads, recall was up 30%, awareness up 16% and purchase intent up 8%.

The takeaway is this.  Don’t just advertise and don’t just do random acts of social media.  Concentrate on a blend of paid and earned media because both are measurable.  And by the way, what ranked lowest among respondents’ trust in selected forms of information?  Text ads on mobile phones at 24%.

Driving down the highway earlier this week, I noted a truck with the logo that made me look, shake my head — and then look again. The logo? The earth with a large blob of paint being poured over it that said, “Cover the earth.” Wow. My thought train went something like this. Global deforestation. Oil spills. Global warming. And paint covering the earth. Not a mental association I’d be keen to have my brand be part of.

With the likes of Puma giving the old shoebox the boot in favor of greener packaging and companies like Panera opening non-profit pilot stores (even if it is in an upscale neighborhood), you have to wonder. What decade is the company living in? Perhaps I’m comparing apples to oranges — a logo versus public relations initiatives. Yet a logo says a lot about a brand and can color your impressions of the company — including their public relations efforts.

As a child, when I’d comment on how “lame” a TV commercial was (back in the days before you could bypass ads thanks to Tivo), my dad would say, “Ha — but they got you to notice them. So the ad worked.” I disagree — especially in the case of the paint-covered earth. Being noticed isn’t always a good thing, especially when your reaction is, “Can you believe this?!” 

My thought is this. Change can be a very good thing. A brand (and logo) refresh is worth considering. It doesn’t have to take years to implement — and in fact it shouldn’t. And rebranding is something you can and should take ownership of. Eyesore or inspiration? Your choice.

At TMA+Peritus, we believe that all marketers must own their brands.

We also believe that the process of branding must be simpler, faster and more affordable.

If you agree, read what else we believe.

Download The Brandscapers’ Manifesto.

What’s not to like about LEGOs? Most of us have spent more than a few hours playing with them.

A brand recognized around the world, and one that inspires global brand loyalty — something a competitor like Mega Blocks does not — there’s much to be admired. Who would think that LEGO was a master of content marketing? Or that they successfully started content marketing about 20 years ago with their Bricks Kicks and Mania magazines?

Spend a few minutes on the LEGO Club site and you’ll learn a lot about content marketing. Not only does the site appeal to kids, it packs a punch with parents too (just like the LEGO bricks themselves). The LEGO club site allows LEGO fans to “connect” with one another — they can see each other’s Cool Creations or find a calendar of family-friend events that are all about having fun with LEGOs. They can sign up for emails, become a BrickMaster, submit a news story (i.e., become a brand ambassador), get building tips and ideas, share photos of LEGO creations, enter a Comic Captions contest, or get the inside dirt on cool designs and new products. They can also download LEGO screen savers, wallpapers and activities (like “build your own shield” designs), play a wide range of games and view comics and movies. Everything a lover of LEGOs could possibly desire.

How did I discover all this? I have my sister to thank for sharing the BrickMaster idea — on Facebook no less. I couldn’t resist — I had to check it out. Coupons, six sets of LEGOs and an annual magazine! My kids loved it.

And once I was there, we were blown away by the Design by Me function: you can download digital software to design and produce your own LEGO creation, including the nifty little catalog that helps you build it. Better yet, they encouraged kids to “honor their moms” with a custom-created LEGO set. Not only could I get a great Mother’s Day gift, what a great birthday gift for my kids and their friends! We are hooked.

And it doesn’t end there. We kept exploring and found the My LEGO Network — yes, a social networking site for children that let’s them share everything that’s LEGO to them — they can create their own web page, share designs and ideas, and even trade virtual LEGOs.

The point is this — we just kept exploring and never found an end to content we couldn’t wait to devour. And we keep going back.

I know what you’re thinking — “I’m not LEGO.” No, but if you can produce content that helps your customers and prospects solve a problem, anticipate a need or address other interests germane to your service and product offerings — they will come. And come again. That means supplying them with original content you’ve created and also sharing third-party content that you know will tweak their interest. It means helping them learn and making it fun and easy to do so on a wide variety of traditional and digital platforms — be it catalogues, websites or social media channels.

Get creative with your content. Build it. Share it. And “LEGO” of it in the digital sphere.

In the 1994 movie, Dumb and Dumber, there’s a classic exchange between Lloyd (Jim Carrey) and Mary (Lauren Holly), which – for me – has always put marketing in perspective.  It went down like this:

Lloyd: What do you think the chances are of a guy like you and a girl like me ending up together.

Mary: Well, Lloyd, that’s difficult to say. I mean, we don’t really…

Lloyd: Hit me with it! Just give it to me straight! I came a long way just to see you, Mary. The least you can do is level with me. What are my chances?

Mary: Not good.

Lloyd: You mean like one out of a hundred?

Mary: More like one out of a million.

Lloyd: So you’re tellin’ me there’s a chance.

Just like everyone analyzed Tiger’s recent mea culpa speech, let’s take a closer look at this exchange, particularly as it relates to content marketing.  A great content marketing campaign always begins with a defining and discovery process about your target audiences – what their needs are, what kind of information they’re looking for, and how they like their content delivered.  As you can see in Lloyd’s opening line, the demographics are completely inverted.  The lesson here is know thy audience, and probably yourself, too.

Now, let’s take a look at Mary’s first sentence.  In content marketing, if something is difficult to say, step back, compose your thoughts, get rid of the marketing and sales-speak, and speak in a language that is genuine and understandable.  This holds true in whatever the content format is – blog, case study, white paper, videos and the like.  If it’s difficult for you to say, it will be even more difficult for your audience to understand.

Back to Lloyd.  Never interrupt the conversation, particularly online or in open or closed social networks.  Your business is not the most important voice; you add value about your company by adding relevant content.  It’s always a good idea to listen before you leap.

Back to Mary.  If you’re going to weigh-in with compelling content, don’t be vague.  “Not good” is vague.  Tell it like it is, share your insights, support your proposition, and wait for the conversation-loop to return to you.

And again to Lloyd.  It’s actually a good strategy to find out where you stand – against your competition, others in your community, or even as a rating of your products and customer service.  It might not always be great, but at least you know where improvement is needed.

And again to Mary.  Obviously, you always need to be honest in your content, but it goes deeper than that.  Your content needs to solve a problem, you need to be the expert without coming across as “the smartest guy in the room.”  In content marketing it’s all about thought leadership, not leading people on.

And finally to Lloyd.  If you don’t define your audience’s needs at the start, chances are you won’t have a chance; unless, of course, one out of a million is a chance you’d like to take.

You’re going to hear a lot about content marketing in 2010 and 2011, and if you’re not hearing it from your marketing team, you might want to ask them why.  In my upcoming column in Central Wisconsin Business, I go into detail about content marketing, and how to do it, but essentially, it’s the practice of putting content first, ahead of the platform for distributing content (Web sites, brochures, videos and TV commercials to name a few), which is so old school.  It’s an approach that delivers relevant and compelling content to segmented audiences in a manner that actually makes them look forward to receiving your messages.  Oh, and by the way, it’s a lot less expensive than traditional efforts.

So, here are a few content marketing truths to consider: Forget your primary Web site as your most important communication tool.  It’s not.  It’s your blog, and the content on your blog is who you are and how you’re perceived.  And if you don’t have a blog, you don’t have a voice.

Nearly 90 million people generated content last year, and that’s only counting people and companies that did it at least once per month all year.  It seems to me that any company could and would benefit from a content marketing strategy, particularly when you know your audience is waiting to receive your great content.

It’s important to remember, patent laws aside, your competitors can mimic everything you’ve got with the exception of your brand.  And guess what?  Content is a huge part of your brand.  Your research, white papers, case studies, your insights, they’re all part of who you are, and they can’t take that away from you.

It’s a buyer’s market out there, and not just because of the recession, and it will be for a long time.  The entire sales motion is completely inverted from what it was.  Compelling content will allow you to be part of the sales mix, and your understanding of the industries you serve, and the entire notion of content marketing, will differentiate you from the pack.  If you don’t believe me, remember all those trade publications you read, or you used to read?  For the most part they’re thinner than ever.  Why?  Because you’re getting content elsewhere; so why not be your own publisher?