When it’s time to pop the big question, many marketers wonder where their ad dollars are best spent.

TV used to be, and still is in many markets, the first thing that comes to mind. But as reach and frequency and models of CPM continue to diminish, the savvy marketers are wondering how to keep their consumers engaged.

Yesterday I asked my colleagues what engagement meant to them. The response was overwhelming. My goal is to use these insights to help create what I’m calling The Marketer’s Engagement Diamond.

Here’s what they had to say:

I’m getting married
Getting involved with something
It’s a function I’m attending

As a consumer it means how long I stay interested in an item and/or product.

Personally, from a consumer POV, I would define it as a relationship of sorts – loving what a brand does; loving what effect it has on your life and lifestyle; putting your stamp of approval on a particular brand; communication (or at least the perception that I COULD communicate) and listening to what I’m saying; continuous innovation to better suit my needs; added value for my loyalties.

As a consumer it means to get inside my head and ‘get me’. It means being really connected to me emotionally and intellectually.
A brand can engage me when I realize they have connected with me their first.
Then, it’s up to the brand to be creative in how they will surprise, delight and entertain me.

Committed, invested interest

To me it means that I’m involved.

Means marriage to me… I think we should try to be funnier. Humor is the only things that really engages me in advertising.

Engagement to me means I move from passive observer to active involvement.

2 way communication… somehow the customer interacts with you directly… an actual conversation… exchange of contact information / method is assumed

It can be as simple as taking customer input (usually a complaint) and turning it into a special experience that converts them from a consumer of your goods to loyal advocates. Something any organization can do starting now.

Engagement is interest, motivation to follow up on what the brand is doing; level of trust; advocacy.

Connecting with me in a way that inspires me to respond – physically (thru purchase), emotionally (thru equity in brand – could be positive or neg)

Engagement. Super involved, like a relationship.
The point where it is hard to back out of the purchase. (Or Marriage.)

I finally got an invite to test Hulu.com and here’s what I get:

“Unfortunately, this content is not available in your country.”

If this Canadian can’t watch it here, don’t you think this Canadian will “steal” it from somewhere else if the studios and government agencies are too caught up in their boardroom MOJO when, in reality, all this Canadian wants to do is watch season 4 of The Office and get this, be willing to pay for it.

There’s so much good content out there. Hats off to Hulu trying to bring me a piece of it.

Unfortunately, some folks are too busy counting their money to realize the rest of the world would like to watch.

Original Post
By Collin Douma

Jan Leth, CCO for Ogilvy & Mather in New York, shared the following anecdote:

In honour of their 45th anniversary, Six Flags Theme Parks decided to give away 45,000 free tickets to celebrate the big day. Ogilvy’s creative team received the brief, complete with the typical fair: some ads, a promotional website, banners, etc. Of his own accord, the assigned Creative Director posted the event on Craigslist and five hours later the 45,000 tickets were gone.

It’s hard to understand how to react.

My gut reaction: the Creative Director did exactly what they should have done. They looked beyond the media, put their expertise into a very creative solution and got the job done.

On the other hand, advertising is typically billed by the means and not by the end. How do you bill hundreds of thousands of dollars for a five minute execution?

Food for thought as the industry continues to shift.

Do we bill the means and deliver the ends, or do we bill the ends, whatever the means?

What do you think?”

First response
By Jason Dojc

I remember that story and I think the following cheesy joke would answer that question.

An automated manufacturing plant shuts down unexpectedly and after hours and hours of searching, the technicians couldn’t figure out what the problem was. So they called a 70 year old retired engineer who was part of the team that built the plant. When he arrived, he took a few minutes to survey the situation, walked up to a loose bolt, tightened it and plant started running again.

The foreman asked him how much he wanted for his efforts. The old man pondered and said $3,000.

“3,000 dollars!!” exclaimed the foreman, “It took you 10 minutes to fix this!”

“10 minutes to tighten the bolt, 60 years of engineering to know which bolt to tighten.”

You bill for access to your expertise.

Jason

Second response
By Joe Szabo

This is a very good point-

I don’t buy into the foreman’s wrench story so much – the intellectual property equation isn’t the same – but I see where you’re coming from.

Social media strategies must be facing a similar problem. I’m seeing a proliferation in the Seeding Business (Dove used a shop out of the UK for Onslaught and Amy). Not sure how they bill clients, but the idea is you pay us, we’ll get your message out there.

The same could be said about the success of Evolution. Would that campaign have been as successful if You Tube was removed from the equation? Doubt it.

I think it comes down to doing what’s right for the brand.

Our clients usually tell us: “We have XX, and we want to do this.” True value comes when we ask the right questions: “Did you think of doing that?” rather than “Yes, we can do this” and taking the money.

And that’s what we should charge for, no matter what it takes to “Do that” successfully.

OK, I saw it on YouTube, but I’m still happy to know there are brands that can deliver this kind of experience.

Amazing video interpretation of what it’s like experiencing a ZUNE.

Some folks at Beyond Madison Avenue were saying that the ad took 45 seconds to display product, which is bad for product recall. Fair point. But what about experiencing what it would be like to be inside a ZUNE looking for a file, be it a song or video or whatever a ZUNE does?

That’s what this spot does. And does well.

It let’s our imagination sore, as if being in a Stanley Kubrick movie. It sells the experience – not the product – through interpretation, how we would use it, what it would feel like, etc. I know when I’m searching for a certain song, I get all tingly inside knowing what will happen when I find it. How I will tap my fingers or wiggle my pelvis. Yea, I wiggle sometimes. Music does that to me.

I’m never going to buy a ZUNE but this ad makes me realize its potential and the experience derived from handling a ZUNE. That I have to respect.

Yesterday, in light of the American Thanksgiving celebrations, David Armano asked his community what they were thankful for.

It was an attempt to change the format on his company’s blog (not to be confused with his personal blog)… shifting it from essay-style to something more conversational.

It was heartlifting to write what I was thankful for, but when I read all 60 responses, I was flabbergasted.

Yesterday I was thankful for the experience I had in Budapest. Today I’m thankful for how human David made the internet feel.

There are 2 trends that I predict will help shape our future in advertising.

The first is web 3.0.
Web 2.0 was all about providing platforms and forums for users to create UGC, blogs, viral stuff, etc. We gave the consumer a voice. And when consumers have that kind of power we end up seeing a lot of “really bad” content. Web 3.0 will change that. Content will be the next killer app.

Take the latest Guinness ad, for example. They spent $21 million producing that 90-second ad. Why? Because it’s entertainment value. OK, they stole the idea from Honda but it’s still entertaining.

And then there’s Firebrand. A site where you subscribe to watch your favourite ads.

Facebook and their social shopping experience is putting the power into their members’ hands. The brands that I choose to become a fan of are brands that have entertained me / given me value in the past. As soon as those experiences become lost, I’m no longer a fan. And all it takes is one click.

The second is EXPERIENCE
Most ad agencies are too busy executing rather than planning experiences… running around writing bullshit briefs, always being a YES man, hardly ever taking into account what the experience should be as opposed to what we can afford it to be so our margins are good and in some cases, meet monthly revenue targets set by corporate.

The successful “experience agency” will pay heed to this quote from an IBM report:

Two thirds of the advertising experts IBM polled
expect 20 percent of advertising revenue
to shift from impression-based to impact based
formats within three years.

The good news is we’ve been been preaching this for some time now. However, we have work to do. We need to shift our thinking from Ad Agency to Experience Agency. To do this, we need to bring “design thinking” to “strategy thinking”.

This will achieve better results because consumers are more engaged with the whatever message we’re delivering. In some cases, and it’s happening more often, design will become a part of product design, thus giving a consumer greater engagement and a better experience.

A couple of weeks ago I bought my son’s first mattress.

I wound up at Leon’s after a few attempts at other mattress shops. I was reluctant to go because I bought some kitchen appliances from them 8 years ago. Leon’s was great, don’t get me wrong. The appliances, however, not so much. As a result, it left a bad taste in my mouth about them as a brand, even though they had nothing to do with the sub-par quality of the appliances they sold me.

When I arrived the place was buzzing. I found my guy, Tony. Within minutes, Tony had my order in the system and at the check out counter to settle my bill. It happened so fast. Next thing I know a kid from shipping is tying Jack’s mattress onto the roof of my car. He read my mind. So much so that I had to tip him. You know the feeling…

Yesterday, I was reminded about my amazing experience at Leon’s – I received a hand-written Thank You card from Tony. Hand-written. For a $300 mattress. Nice.

The Ikea store in Sweden is using interactive projection technology to attract attention to its beds.  Check it out.