Tag Archive for "Grass-roots marketing"

Posts Tagged ‘Grass-roots marketing’

Breaking Through the Clutter

Nov 11, 2011 | tags: bike industry, Channel Signal, Grass-roots marketing, New media, Outdoor Industry Association, Outdoor Recreational Industry, Outdoor Retailer, Snowsports Industry Association, Sporting Goods Manufacturing Association, Strategy

Bots(robots), affiliate marketing sites, discount sites and link farms are all making the conversation very crowded for brands trying to get their message heard online. All the entities have one purpose and that is to sell product. Some of it is discounted. Some of it isn’t. Some are names of sites you have never heard of, and some are names like Amazon.

Recently, we were asked by a leading brand in the outdoor and ski markets to search for it and see what we find. Well, it wasn’t pretty. Channel Signal search engines, which have blacklisted over 10,000 authors and sites, still came up with a ton of junk surrounding this brand.

Why? Because the company had not delivered good online content and sales pitches (selling primarily discounted product) had taken over the brand’s identity.

We searched Twitter…could barely find any content about the actual brand.
Blogs…junk everywhere.
YouTube…better content here.
Online traditional media…not much.

To be clear, all of this sales noise is not all bad. A retailer, Amazon, posted 1,900 customer review ratings in the past year on a product produced by the brand with an average rating of 4.8 out of 5 stars.

Now, if you figure 20 percent of the customers who bought from Amazon wrote a review, that means about 10,000 sales in one year. Not bad from the online retailer.

However, the brand is being drowned out by the sales pitches. Can’t really call it noise because it does move product.

What to do?

First a brand must sharpen its identity online. Advertise to your target market about where to go…on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, your blogs, etc. In short, drive consumers to where you want them to go for your content. Then…

Fill these places with good content. Not content that sells stuff, but content that educates consumers. How to layer? Why a hat is important. Goggles and what they can do for you. Breathable socks. And make this information directly applicable to your product lines.

And then, build online relationships with your retailer partners.

1. Support online retailers with content they can push out and reprint on their own sites.

2. Train retailers to understand how to do things like embed a YouTube video, update their blog and utilize basic search engine optimization techniques.

3. License content correctly for reprinting/republishing through retailers with photographers, writers, video producers.

By building a grassroots content strategy through retail partners, brands can deliver better content online, serve their customers and drive sales with key accounts.

So, break out of the noise by building your content and building your partnerships with retailers.

Paul Kirwin, Founder and CEO of Channel Signal

An Orca Sparks a War

Mar 3, 2010 | tags: Channel Signal, Grass-roots marketing, Marketing, New media, New media. outdoor recreational industry, Outdoor Recreational Industry, Snowsports Industry Association, social media, Sporting Goods Manufacturing Association

A few days ago I got a call from a lawyer who has ties with Sea World. Not direct ties but close enough to be concerned.

So the conversation goes like this…
Lawyer: “Are you aware of what happened yesterday at Sea World?”
Me: “Yup. Read about it.”
Lawyer: “I want to suggest that they call you because this is an incident that could blow into a crisis. They need Channel Signal to monitor this.” Me: “Thanks. We would love to help. Based on a little searching around it looks like its heading into crisis now.”

Well, we didn’t get the call, and the message was, thanks we have it covered.
Good for them. Hope it goes well.

It’s not.
All major news outlets carried it. Predictable. Major animal rights sites were on the offensive. Predictable. And Sea World and animal entertainment advocates were on the defensive. Predictable.

And here are the unanswered questions which brought heat to the debate:

1. Why was this whale in question (Tilikam) involved in the shows after killing other people?
2. Is the use of predators for entertainment just a game of chance?
3. Why did the shows resume so quickly.
4. And are these predators merely prisoners for fun and profit?

Pick your side and pull out your firearm.

CNN sponsored a raging screaming match between an orca trainer and an avid environmentalist. Other news talk shows followed. Actors and actresses got involved. PETA has set up a Free Willy Facebook Site and already has over 6,000 followers.

Twitter, Facebook, and the blogsphere lit up about the poor handling of the situation.

And standing in the middle of this traditional and social media storm is Sea World.

A couple of things to remember here.

When an incident blows into a crisis, immediately start monitoring…on both sides of the issue.
1. Learn what is critical to answer and answer those questions…rapidly.
2. Address and even attack false statements rapidly.
3. And have people available 24/7 for all questions from all quarters.
4. And don’t stop listening, and responding until the crisis is past…well past.
5. And no attitude.

Now, I realize that, according to reports, the Sea World team is tight and losing a trainer to another family member (Tilikam) has to be devastating.

But, that is why you bring in a communications team that knows what they are doing. To protect the Sea World team. Provide guidance. Get to the facts. And appoint an authentic Sea World spokesperson.

And some of these people on the communication team should have news training because first and foremost this is a news story. The facts…that’s what reporters want. And if they smell that facts are being withheld, then they will dig harder and look for angles.

And reporters will then report those “angles” and that information will be picked up by the blogs. And mis-information becomes fact.

Sea World finds its very business model now being questioned. Will parents risk a show knowing that something terrible could happen? Will people find it detestable that these carnivores are kept in tanks for life, when in the wild they travel over 100 miles a day in open ocean? And is this just about money, since the show opened 3 days after the tradegy?

Free Willy has taken on a whole new meaning for Sea World.

And some of this could have been avoided with a communication strategy laid out in advance. And a new key to that strategy is 24/7 monitoring of the crisis so that opinions are quickly uncovered, and then covered with facts.

Before Social Media, you could count on a crisis having a limited shelf-life. After all, the media had new things to cover and its attention was taken elsewhere.

With Social Media, every crisis has a long tail. So, Sea World and its handlers will be dealing with blogs, tweets, YouTube, and Flickr for the forseeable future. And with every new fact about the story will be thousands of opinions.

“We’ve got it covered.”

Clearly, Sea World underestimated “it”.

And what it would take to “cover” it.

Paul Kirwin, Founder and CEO of Channel Signal

When the Funnel Becomes the Bucket

Nov 20, 2009 | tags: advertising, bike industry, Channel Signal, Climbing, Grass-roots marketing, Influencers, Marketing, New consumer, New media, New media. outdoor recreational industry, Outdoor Industry Association, Outdoor Retailer, public relations, snowsports, snowsports industry, social media, Sporting Goods Manufacturing Association, Strategy

Recently I wrote that the distribution of information had always been a funnel but it had now turned right side up. The mouth of the funnel is wide open and consumers are publishing because it is easy and they have opinions. The good brands are building these funnels, advertising their communication portals (Facebook,etc) , attracting consumers, collecting opinions, engaging, finding their voices and constructively inviting/channeling consumers further down into the brand storyline. During this process the brands are quietly measuring their effectiveness, learning, and becoming much better communicators as consumers elect to engage more deeply. They are collecting excellent data on Influencers, athletes and active consumers as the information travels down the funnel.

In recent conversations I have been painfully reminded that many me-too brands in the Outdoor Industry are not building solid funnels but building buckets with holes and no bottom.

How? Well, these companies crow that they have a Web Site, Facebook Page, are on Twitter, YouTube, and Flickr.

And consumers are initially engaging…entering the bucket. But they are not directed or invited to go anywhere. They just sit in the bucket, quickly draining to the bottom…without direction.

And then an analyst from Channel Signal investigates. We find that they had good sign-up for the Facebook page, a decent following on Twitter, and that YouTube and Flickr had good traffic, but that it fell off quickly.

Why did the traffic fall off? Because these companies did not allocate the resources to engage. Employees were not assigned to respond to consumers, and direct them to the next point of interest. Consumer questions and comments went unanswered. They were not invited to go to Facebook or the Website, or YouTube, or a User Group. And because there was no natural momentum of engagement, no funnel, consumers were stranded and then took the easy way out….quickly out the bottom of the bucket. They were invited to the conversation and then nobody talked to them.

So they didn’t stick around. And they took all of their knowledge about the brand with them.

A study by the Chief Marketing Council shows that 38 percent of the 480 executives in the industries surveyed say their companies have no programs in place to track or propagate positive word of mouth among customers. And only 29 percent rate highly their ability to handle and resolve customer problems or complaints

All that money to make products that attract consumers. All that money to sell into retail. All that money for advertising to attract consumers. All that money to set up conversation channels. And then the pay-off…consumers responding online by engaging in one of the channels. And…

And silence. All that wonderful potential data about consumers and what they like and don’t like about your brand and products…out the bottom of the bucket. And all those potential Influencers, gone.

Never to be captured again.

Say goodbye to measuring ROI.

Paul Kirwin, Founder and CEO of Channel Signal

Three Things Companies Must Remember

Oct 11, 2009 | tags: Grass-roots marketing, New media, Outdoor Recreational Industry, public relations, social media, sporting goods industry

Choose only communication channels that best match your goals.
If the news turns sweet or sour, monitor and measure across your channels to find the real issue. Only then do you respond with the corporate answer.
Engage when the news is good, engage more when the news is bad.

Okay, let’s take these one at a time.

1. Choose only communication channels that best match your goals.

Just because Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, and Twitter exist doesn’t mean that your company should employ them as communication channels. Remember when all the buzz was about the power of newsletters. Well, 95% of those companies who launched newsletters found them to be a lot of effort for very little return.

I also like what Jim Tobin of Ignite Social Media says in his presentation. One of his clients said to his management team when they wanted to engage in all sorts of social media. “It’s like a puppy. Are you gonna feed the puppy? Take care of the puppy? Nurture the puppy?”

So, do you have the resources and commitment to employ all of these channels? Respond to all of the questions, comment on posts, and generally be in four conversations at once? I think not, no matter how big you are. So, focus on what communication channels hit the target, write great content, engage, and do it well. To start, choose no more than two.

2. If the news turns sweet or sour, monitor and measure across your channels to find the real issue. Only then do you respond with the corporate answer.

Ad Age wrote an excellent synopsis on the Motrin Mom problem. As you’ll recall, Motrin created an ad aimed at young Moms carrying their babies around in slings. Message: take Motrin because you probably have a sore back or hips from lugging junior around. It back-fired and Motrin yanked the ad after only a few days.

Research indicates that: 1). not that many people were paying attention. Twitter, where much of the firestorm lived, is responsible for only .15% of the Internet audience. The ad received less exposure than a one 30-second spot on a cable news network. 2. 35% of the audience that was paying attention was offended by the television ad. So, 65% of the interested audience was positive or neutral on the ad.

Measure before you react. Don’t react because your VP of Marketing has 10 emails in his inbox lambasting an ad. Get a bigger more accurate picture.

3. Engage when the news is good, engage more when the news is bad.

Many companies fall all over themselves to respond when the news is good. ” Thanks so much.” ”Working hard to develop good products.” ”Appreciate your loyalty to the brand.” Many employees respond because it is very hard to make a mistake. Senior management simply hears of the good news and grins.

However, when the new media news turns bad, everyone in the company is called into a meeting and kept there for hours and hours. “What is our response?” “We must speak with one voice.” And once it comes out of committee the response is canned, wooden, legal…and useless.

When the news is bad, make sure it is bad. Measure while you are initially responding. Find out where the bad news is coming from and learn who the Influencers are. While doing that, measure the entire Internet with regard to that issue so you get a 360 degree read.

Tell the truth. If you are getting to the bottom of the issue, tell the Influencers. Tell them when you will get back to them. And when you do, have real information.

If you made a mistake, communicate that. And quickly follow that up with what steps you are taking to correct those mistakes. If you didn’t make a mistake, then find where the misinformation is coming from

and take action with that source. If you are not at fault…be a rock, but continue to communicate.

And have several people carrying the message into the market place. Remember, companies are groups of people. Portray yourself as a large concrete building talking with one Wizard of Oz voice and you will receive even more heat.

Be human.

Paul Kirwin, Founder and CEO of Channel Signal

What Does Selling to Ourselves Mean? It Means Change.

Jan 28, 2009 | tags: Grass-roots marketing, New media, Outdoor Industry Association, Outdoor Recreation, Outdoor Retailer, Snowsports Industry Association

See the Changes

She has seen me changing

It ain’t easy rearranging

And it gets harder as you get older,

Farther away as you get closer.

Words and Music by Stephen Stills

I’ve had people contact me about what “Selling to Ourselves” means. So I thought I would elaborate as it pertains to the outdoor recreational industry, and then address the changes that are necessary.

Selling to ourselves means:

Manufacturers selling to the same retailers in the distribution system.
Retailers buying from the same larger brands as a safety net during a recession.
Brands employing the same marketing tools to reach the same outdoor enthusiasts.
Retailers marketing to their tried and true set of customers.

What happens then?

No new retailers (brick-mortar & online) entering the outdoor recreational space.
Fewer new innovative small manufacturers. Money is hard to get, expensive and tough when the market isn’t growing.
New consumers are not attracted to the market because it is shrinking
Interested new consumers have fewer places to buy.
New consumers have less choice when they do shop.

And the consequences?

Ever accelerating decrease of sales for manufacturers and retailers. (Once you start circling the drain, its tough to stay out.)

And the solution?

More grass-roots local events to get communities involved in hiking, snowshoeing, boarding, skiing, etc. Take the sports to the people. Make it local. Make it family. Make it authentic.
Build a new media marketing program that loads smart relevent content into the blogsphere so influencers and consumers can learn, become intrigued, and react.
Build relationships with influencers so they take your brand to their consumers.
Make all marketing programs interactive.

In the spirit of this article being a short-read, I’ll need to stop here. However, the point is that companies can employ grass-roots event marketing to cost-effectively engage new consumers. (Do it where they live.) And companies can engage new media to carry powerful brand and product content onto America’s home computers, causing conversations in a much bigger consumer market.

How does it all start?

By listening to what’s out there now.

Paul Kirwin, Founder and CEO of Channel Signal