Glade’s sweet smell of good social media PR with Edelman

This week I was happily invited to join some other Colorado-based bloggers for a few adult snacks, refreshments and the opportunity to build a basket of goodies to take home. It was a great evening, put on by Glade’s parent company, S. C. Johnson’s wonderful PR team from Edelman in Chicago, to promote their Sense & Spray product.

This event demonstrated Edelman actively identifies good people for brands to work with, and can put together an event that suits all parties. Edelman has fantastic staff, for a start. The company also teamed with social media expert, Ann-Marie Nichols, to ensure they are hitting the right targets.

If you ask me, Ann-Marie and Edelman are smart operators. After meeting/catching up with them on the evening, my belief is that the bloggers were hand-picked to represent ethical, good quality content providers who actively engage with their readers. Women who are authentic. At a time when companies are seeking out mommybloggers more than ever, there are now bloggers who do nothing more than run around the USA for the opening of every envelope. Smart companies, like Glade and Edelman, see beyond what I’ll call “the usual suspects.” (Yes, I’m biased. I was invited.)

Edelman’s staff were well equipped with plenty of information for us to take home in the best format – a USB drive. The activity of putting together our basket of goodies allowed us to chat about the product informally, and we also had fun coming up with possible names for a new Glade scent. (Yes, someone said Bacon. I said Aussie Bush. Ambiguity FTW.) I was so lucky to have Jen Goode so kindly say yes to drawing by freehand (magic marker) one of her lovely penguins on my mug.

It has pride of place on my desk and reminds me how special women entrepreneurs like her are. I have always loved Jen’s designs and you can check the penguin ones out on her blog, and buy a whole range of stuff featuring them. She also does other designs too. She’s an amazingly talented woman in so many areas. I feel so lucky to have actually met her too now.

The event was a great success for Glade. The bloggers discussed myriad issues beyond and including the product, and we all came away feeling positive – and that associated value rubs off. Edelman gets it.

But the goal kick for me was the extra mile Edelman went for me. Here’s the thing:

We were all offered a basket to give away on our blog. Awesome. However, I asked if it would be okay for me to give it away to anyone, anywhere – given some of my readership is in Australia. Glade is a global brand, but I completely said I understand if that’s not okay. I just needed to be clear on my blog. On the spot, the Edelman ladies said “Absolutely, we will make it work. We will send the basket to anyone who wins.” So I’m stoked. I love that foresight and appreciation of my needs.

And I’m excited to give away this lovely basket of goodies to you, even if you’re an AUSSIE!

What you'll win! (The mug will be a fresh one that you can draw on. Great if you're like Jen Goode!)

The basket contains a snuggly IKEA blanket/picnic rug, Swiss Miss mix with mini marshmallows, eye cover, ceramic mug and some permanent markers to decorate it with, and the wonderful new Glade Sense & Spray plus a refill that we have had now in our bathroom for a few days. It smells great and with the refills costing under $4 each (USD), and them lasting about a month each, even graduate students and startups can afford it (ahem).

HOW TO WIN!

To enter is easy – Leave a comment below with your recommendation for a new scent for Glade, focused on Australia. It can be funny or serious. The winner will be picked by Harry and Charlie on Wednesday and I’ll contact you via Twitter/email (make sure you leave contact details). I’ll also announce the winner on the blog. Go for it!

NestleFamily, breastfeeding and social media

I have a great amount of data from the recent NestleFamily twitterstorm. Luckily, I was able to see the storm coming. As a few of the attendees began tweeting about meeting up a few days prior to the start of #NestleFamily, I could see that there was going to be some fallout. My interest had been piqued a few months earlier with the Nestle “What’s for Dinner” junket that received some backlash (which I was a part of, albeit briefly).

Even though I was prepared for it, I doubt anyone saw the enormity and longevity of the community’s outrage. The tail of it is still going. This was a key happening on Twitter, and it had far more impact than the Motrin Moms speedbump. I would argue that Twitter’s community has morphed again as a result. Focus on the types of junkets mommy/daddybloggers who call themselves “PR friendly” accept, and what it says about who they are doesn’t happen in a vacuum. There were real responses from the community. Many negative. This great post by cynematic discusses this responsibility further.

My research

I manually copied thousands of tweets using the #NestleFamily hashtag. I also created an online survey that people were invited to complete during the twitterstorm. I’m very excited to have that data. The 66 completed responses are authentic, grabbed at the time it was all happening, and the qualitative survey responses are about as true to real emotion as you can get – people were telling me what they were doing at the same time as doing it. That’s not easy to get when questioning people about their about online activity. When I write it up it will be a chapter in my thesis, and probably a paper/conference presentation as well. I’m going to write up a short version of the results and post it here on my blog soon.

The most positive outcome has been the amazing work done by Annie, aka @PhDinParenting, who took the opportunity to ask some very pointed questions of Nestle. Nestle has been responding to her questions, so good on them. And Annie has posted their responses in the best, most transparent means possible. She then adds her own analysis and research, with links that are exhaustive, informed and inspiring. It is her work that represents the future of real journalism. It’s why I say that the future of journalism is social.

My question to Nestle

I kept largely out of the limelight on this twitterstorm so as not to taint the data I was collecting. I did, however, want to find out Nestle’s views on the dismal rate of breastfeeding in the USA. Nestle promotes its substitute milk in the USA, and with the USA’s very low rate of exclusive infant breastfeeding at 6 months of age, I wanted to find out what they thought about it all. I submitted the question as follows:

As a premier substitute baby milk manufacturer and marketer in the USA, I’d like to know what your opinion is about the fact that the rate of exclusive breastfeeding in the USA lies at just 12%, when the WHO says it recommends 100% exclusivity for the first six months.

Your Nestle site states that WHO is the “gold standard” so I’m assuming you would agree this statistic is troubling.

Why do you believe this statistic exists? Do you think it can change? And if so, how?

It took a few weeks (I think Nestle lost my question, and then located it when I enquired again about their response), but their response is here:

Thank you for contacting us. We apologize for the delay in our response and we appreciate your patience.

At Nestlé Nutrition we support the positions of the American Academy of Pediatrics and WHO that exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months of age is best. The most recent statistics from the 2008 CDC Breastfeeding Report Card (2006 data) show that the national average from exclusive breastfeeding is around 13.6%, which is below the Health (sic) People 2010 goal of 17%.

According to the CDC Infant Feeding Practices Study (IFPS) II (http://www.cdc.gov/ifps/ , there are many reasons why mothers might stop breastfeeding, ranging from difficulty with sucking and latching to worries about producing enough milk. http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/122/Supplement_2/S69#T2

We believe that optimal infant health is truly the goal and we advocate for more infant feeding support and education for mothers, regardless of whether they breastfeed, formula feed or both.

We are encouraged by the improvements reported in breastfeeding initiation and duration and will continue our efforts to educate and encourage mothers to give their babies a healthy start. That includes providing education and resources for her, and if she cannot or chooses not to breastfeed, or chooses to supplement her breastmilk, we provide high quality, iron-fortified infant formula-the only safe and healthy alternative to breastmilk.

Robyn Wimberly RD,LD.
Nestle Nutrition Contact Center

So there you go. I have my own thoughts on this response. The final paragraph, to me, is just disgraceful – it’s written very poorly. It seems to be saying that Nestle’s substitute formula is the only “safe and healthy alternative to breastmilk.” I know that those words “safe and healthy” are definitely not something I agree with. But I’m a breastfeeding advocate, ex-journalist and PR queen, and am used to spin. I have done the research. I know what I know and have made up my own mind. The US Government has initiated the Healthy People plan, but where breastfeeding rates are concerned it is failing – and it doesn’t reflect the WHO “gold standard” referred to on Nestle’s own site. There are holes all over this response. The last paragraph made me wince. I think Annie does a brilliant job of dissecting these responses and calling out the holes. I’m not going to do that here. I recommend you read all of Annie’s work, and if interested in more, you can read my short research blog piece on Breastfeeding in America, see the Ignite presentation, or email me for the full papers to see how the numbers stack up. And then make up your own mind.

So what does all this mean?

Now, I know that this storm has ended up being thrown in the “too hard” basket by many people on both sides of the fence, as well as those who sit on top of that same fence. Statistics are being used pragmatically. Manipulation of data is rife. There’s aggravation, and it becomes personal for many who feel attacked by even discussing it. For many, it sucked the ‘fun’ out of Twitter.

But the fact is, this milestone proved the resilience of the microblogging community. It’s opened a conversation that will bind the community even more solidly. It’s given us a view of people that we didn’t know before. People to both connect with, disconnect from, and understand better, even if they disagree with us. If Twitter were really nothing more than messages about eating candy and frozen dinners, then this storm wouldn’t exist. People have taken it upon themselves to get better educated about something they might not have known about before. They were provided links and questions. They had the opportunity to follow up, and go deeper into the issues than they have ever been led by mainstream media, and Nestle ended up without the buffer of media to spin their messages to.

Key Learnings

For the community: Mainstream media is no longer an excuse for not knowing about stuff. The depth of information you have is up to you and your attention span. That’s a hard responsibility to own. In Nestle’s case, I congratulate anyone (including some attendees) who tried to find out more information or followed it up, no matter where you ultimately sit on the ‘issues’. I challenge those who simply sought an easy path and blindly continued tweeting Nestle-friendly inane statements on Twitter, without addressing any of the twitterstorm. It won’t, in the longer term, help your credibility in the community. The really influential people in this equation can be easily identified. And that’s awesome.

For companies: You don’t get to own your messages any more. Social media represents a revolution, not an evolution. It’s another tool in your promotional strategy, but you have to be ready for the real conversation. The one where your comments get called on. The one you don’t direct. And you will never have the last word unless the community deems it to be okay.

Don’t think influence, think resonance

The new buzzword in social media appears to be Influence. According to conferences, some marketers it’s what people want. To influence others.

This is a mistake. It demonstrates a very shallow, one-sided view.

(cartoon from xkcd.com)

Talk to most people in social media for example, and they’ll tell you the truth. What they’re doing is looking for, and responding to resonance, not influence.

What all of us seek in social media is Resonance.

The influence part happens afterwards.

In social media, you can’t influence someone unless they want to be influenced.

Guess what… if traditional media had understood the need to find real resonance with its market, it wouldn’t be in the situation it is today.

Resonance. It’s what creates meaning. Just like the rice here.

Personal brands and the Unique Selling Proposition

After the Creative Revolution in the 1960s, advertisers began to try to find communications that gave people a reason to buy their product. That developed into the Unique Selling Proposition or USP – the ‘thing’ that makes people choose your product. It still applies. Every successful product has a USP. Over time this went from features to benefits. You’ve probably heard ’sell the sizzle, not the steak’. Sell the benefit. In a marketplace full of things that do the same operation, to stand out from the crowd you need to have something that sets you apart. And that’s your sizzle.

The USP for M&Ms: Melts in your mouth, not in your hand.

For example, there are heaps of dishwashers. They all wash dishes. It’s hard to be known as a product, based purely on that. It doesn’t set them apart. But sizzling benefits like being ‘whisper quiet’, or ‘economical’, or ‘green’ will make the difference for the consumer in a target market. Make no mistake, these benefits might be common to more than one product – but the first to market with it as a sizzling quality, to make it a USP, will get to own that benefit.

In the 21st Century, if you are one of the many who believes you, personally, are a brand (do a search on personal branding and you’ll see what I mean) then the USP has never had more importance.

How do you sell yourself? What’s the one thing about you that makes you different and desirable? What’s your USP?

There are no doubt lots of people who can fulfill a good bit of your job. Code a website, write a story, answer a phone, collect a debt, change a nappy.

But there needs to be something about the way you do it that sets you apart. What’s your USP? Too many people don’t easily identify the things that they’re really great at – better, in fact, than most others. It’s time you did. What’s your sizzle?

It’s harder for women to get to recognise their sizzle than for men.

Research has shown women, in particular, are bad at identifying the things they’re really great at. A female A grade math student will say she’s “okay at math”. Whereas a B or C grade male math student is more likely to say they’re “great at math.”

It’s ironic that in the 1960s, Mary Wells, the first woman to own an advertising agency, was the first to think of branding beyond an obvious USP in the four walls of advertising.

Mary Wells, image from www.wowowow.com. Their photo essay on Mary Wells is great.

She extended the branding across all the marketing effort, so the flavour of that USP was on the lips of everyone experiencing any part of it. Ms Wells decided communication was something that happened all across the marketing effort. Of course she was right. The first step is identifying your USP. The second is to celebrate it across everything you do. The way you behave, dress, communicate. It’s all your own brand.

A good number of mommybloggers have accomplished this. They can sell their sizzle. But far too many very deserving women are not doing it.

Grab your sizzle, sell it up. Because you’re awesome. You have a USP. Time to identify it, claim it, and use it.

Airlines don’t understand mums and marketing

There’s something magical about arriving at the airport with all your luggage and just two of your kids for the upcoming 28 hours of travel between countries, and reaching the check-in counter to find out every bag comes in just under the 23kg weight limit. Score.

And there’s something even more special about being handed your boarding passes and passports, turning around and seeing the 11yr old has just decked the 9yr old, and he is laying on the floor groaning loudly, holding one leg to an audience of passengers who are surely thinking ‘Oh My God, I hope they’re not sitting next to us.’

5 minutes in, 27 hours, 55 minutes to go.

How to make a flight a dreaded experience

We flew back to the US yesterday on United Airlines. Apart from the following treasured moments, we arrived safely:

a. Wholly inedible ‘food’ which really was probably the worst I’ve ever had on the long haul part, and food that’s more expensive than eating at Spago for the domestic route. (And far less tasty. Yes, I’ve eaten at Spago. Once. It was wonderful. I’m classy. I am. Stop laughing.)

b. Lack of in-seat entertainment which is very entertaining for my spoilt kids who were expecting personal movies and tv, yet had to watch tv shows like Desperate Housewives on the screens in the aisles instead. (I do remember my own childhood flights to the UK when there was just one movie for the whole flight, and the headphones never worked. I tried telling them that but they didn’t care and then they got more annoyed. They did manage very well in the end. But I digress).

c. Being checked into three seats on the US domestic part of the journey which were single seats in equidistant, very distant seats which I find very difficult to believe was accidental because we checked into the domestic flight, getting boarding passes an entire day before (see earlier part about children punching each other). There is no way there weren’t three seats together when I checked in. Mind you, I was easily trumped by a poor woman with five kids under five, who had all been seated all over the plane. That’s just completely stupid. I was momentarily tempted to tell the attendant not to bother reseating the kids, but just to reseat this other mother and myself somewhere and bring us a bottle of bubbly.

d. The lack of real assistance for a woman with four children travelling alone, whose 3yr old would NOT stop screaming for about 3 hours in the last quarter of the long haul flight. She was forced to stay in her seat with that kid because she couldn’t leave the others. I knew that. I’ve got lots of kids and have usually travelled alone with them. One kid will cry, or take a particular liking to the novelty of the plane’s bathroom and insist they have to go constantly, or need something from the one bag in the overhead bin. It’s a drama. Something simple could have made her journey easier. Such as a flight attendant saying, “what can I do to help?” instead of ignoring her.

Sidebar: I’ll never forget the Qantas flight Jed and I took while I was still nursing Charlie, about 6 years ago. The dinner came, and there was no way I could cut it up – my arm was indisposed with nursing child. I said to leave it with Jed and I’d get to it later. The Qantas attendant decided that was okay and she’d do it if I preferred, but how about if she cut the dinner up, and just left the dinner and a fork (rather than the whole tray), and then I could manage it while it was still hot? She was awesome. I remember that still. Six years later. I even remember what the flight attendant looked like. That’s good branding.

Market your flights to mums

This is a trip that costs about $US1000 a seat return – minimum. There are a couple of hundred people on the plane, who’ve all paid at least that amount. This is not a bus. People are tired, stressed and emotional. Being an attendant on these flights is hard work. But it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a flight attendant go beyond the most basic of service effort and everyone’s flight would have been better if that kid had stopped screaming.

On our trip over another woman was left standing in the queue with her three kids. The flight had been delayed. It was 2am. The smallest kid was asleep. She had carry-on luggage. She was really struggling. And the attendants all ignored her.

Yes, I helped her as I could, and Charlie even offered too. If an 9yr old gets it, why don’t the airlines?

When we finally boarded that flight, the ground staff said the standard “how are you?” I said “good, and you?” His reply was “tired.”

Well stuff you.

My reply? “At least you’re getting paid.” I should have added ‘and don’t have to sit on the plane for the next 16 hours with kids, and haven’t just had a 3 hours flight to get here, and then waited 9 hours for this delayed one.’

Sheesh. I wonder who’s more precious? My kids completely expecting video on demand in their seats, or these airline staff who seem to think we owe them something more than the price of a ticket.

Instead of focusing on leg room, loyalty programs and discount prices, it would be great to see an airline focus on really going beyond the call of duty to make your flight the best you’ve ever had. If an airline marketed to mothers, they’d see these women are the decision makers, who travel with their families (more ticket sales), and to be honest, it’s the simple things like offering a pair of hands when needed that will make a mother like you more.

Or maybe that’s just too hard. Too much to ask.

The Startup Kid

Running a startup isn’t easy on anyone.

The glorious trails of successful entrepreneurs are littered with the scars of broken relationships and bitter resentment of cold dinners and missed birthday parties.

It takes a special kind of relationship to weather the storms of startup life.

At Darling Harbour, Sydney.

It takes a special kind of kid too. A kid who will understand that daddy or mummy can’t make it to every school function. That we can’t afford summer camp.

It takes a special kid who will say okay through his tears as he’s torn from his Australian home, his dogs, his school friends, because he knows that what we’re working on isn’t a normal sort of job like his friends’ parents have.

This week we have begun graduation celebrations for Harry as he completes year 5. I got to make a dedication to him the other day at school, as did all the other parents in his class to their kids.In typical startup style, I did this one alone because Jed’s in Silicon Valley at the moment. The Kleenex was really getting passed around that circle.

Why so much Kleenex? It was his teacher’s fault really. She got us to close our eyes and think of when we were having our child, their infancy, and years in elementary school. And then open our eyes and take our turns to speak from the heart to our child in front of everyone (you could pass if you wanted to, but nobody did – this is Boulder, after all ).

Now, I cry at the drop of a hat. I can’t walk into that darned school without automatically tearing up it seems (sigh). But for this dedication, while others were a bit of a mess, I hardly cried at all.

And while it surprised me at the time, I know why.

Harry is an incredible kid. He was made for the startup life. I won’t be a bit surprised if he ends up living it himself. (Good grief, I hope he scores a partner as well as his dad did ). Harry’s adaptability is remarkable. Many kids would have resented the move to the US, and that would have been understandable. Not Harry, even though he misses Australia very much.

Harry's idea of cleaning up his room

He’s no angel though. He has a cheeky side and he’s a daredevil. I was told of his decision to ride a waterfall while hiking, stopping just short of a massive drop – nearly giving everyone watching a heart attack. And we will never forget him barrelling down Eldora mountain on a snowboard without a single turn and nearly hitting a bus in the car park – grinning afterwards.

Everyone who knows us as a family will agree that Harry is the one who most wears his heart on his sleeve. He hugs everyone. Repeatedly.

He is honest and open. But he can’t sleep if he’s feeling bad about something – he has to get up and talk it through. And he has a strength of character and self-belief which overcomes every obstacle. He’s never said “I’ve had enough.”  He just keeps going. It’s that tenacity that is so inspiring and awesome.

And I can’t cry about that. I can’t cry about changes at all – for Harry the world is his oyster, and he’s loving the adventure. He doesn’t care that much about stuff he hasn’t accomplished yet – he’s just going to keep trying. And he’s not concerned about being the best at everything. He just wants to give it a go.

Last week his performance on drums at the big 5th grade concert that combined musicians from 3 schools was incredible. He was on time with every beat. He enjoyed it. And he’s such an individual, he wore his lucky hat too

I can’t wait to see what he tries his hand at, and surprises us with, in Middle School. They’re gonna be lucky to have him. As are we.

Congratulations, Harry. We’re so proud of you, and grateful for all you give back to us every single day.

Talking with your teens about sexting

What to do about (drum roll) sexting? Approaching the topic of sexting in a way that best meets a receptive outcome from your teenager is paramount. And grabbing their mobile phone to go through every message is not generally going to get a positive response. Unless…

Did you originally say to your teen “Hey, I’m gonna go through your phone occasionally to check up on you?” If you did, then it’s reasonable that you would act on the promise. But if you provided the phone to the teen without any indication you’d be doing it, then I believe your teen will think you’re being unreasonable. And how about if the teen bought the phone with their own money?

Awkward.

We all want to raise a kid who is responsible, independent, and who cares for their own, and others’ well being. While they’re little you can best do that by telling them how to act, showing them how it’s done (by demonstrating it yourself) and monitoring them as you encourage them to do the same.

When they’re teens, it’s time to let them start doing that on their own. In my opinion, in order for teens to demonstrate their own responsibility and integrity, they need to have the opportunity to do it. That’s hard to do when the media’s telling you scary stories about sexting. You need to put something in place, but still work from the standpoint that you trust your teen (if you do and want to continue to).

That’s hard to do, I get that. And every parenting situation is different, I get that too. But it’s apparent this is something many people are struggling with. So here are a few idea-starters to get you thinking about a more positive way of approaching the topic with your teenager.

1. Have a contract.

With every piece of technology there is an inherent basis of responsible use. Whether that’s with the equipment itself (such as don’t throw the phone around) or with the manner in which it’s used (such as don’t send 500 messages a day, and watch your language). A great way of demonstrating you mean what you say is through having a contract dealing with both of these areas. You could create one yourself, or ask the family to contribute to what they think should be in it. And then everyone who uses the equipment gets a copy to sign. Let me be clear – this contract is something everyone adheres to. It’s not just for the kids. You don’t get to throw your phone around and expect them not to. You have to follow through.  Not only that, but the contracts, when signed, should be displayed in the person’s regular space at home as a subtle reminder.

You might think this is a little ‘out there’ – but when you think it through, you’ll see that it’s a transparent way of linking to all that stuff you taught your kids when they were younger. It just gives them some control and treats them as a more independent, free-thinking person. And hey, you need to make it clear they don’t have to sign the contract. It’s optional. And so is the phone.

Then if someone breaks the contract with any kind of irresponsible use, it’s easier to demonstrate why there’s a problem. It gives you a foundation to work from that everyone understands.

2. Demonstrate how things live forever online

Having a great relationship with your teen doesn’t mean you unequivocally know they’re going to do the right thing all the time (you can’t). It does mean that you’re prepared to let go a little and trust that they want to be responsible, and will be pretty likely to be, even without you standing behind them with a rolling pin (tempting though it might be). Also, let’s assume that your teens can make a logical progression of thought and have interest in their own well being. With all that in place, this becomes a no-brainer. (As much as a no-brainer and teens can be, anyway. )

Have a chat and say you’ve read stuff about sexting (read up a bit first – nothing loses respect more than not knowing what you’re talking about). Say you get it. This stuff can be fun, and it’s shared only between people you trust. There’s never any idea that something bad will happen or that someone’s going to be mean.

But people get angry. People fight. Have you ever slammed a door or said something nasty to someone you cared about? No matter how much you want to take it back, and apologise, it still got said. But words tend to ease with time. Images and text, however, don’t.

Stuff lives forever online.

Let’s say someone gets angry and posts a compromising picture somewhere online. They can regret it and take it down, but it’s still up there in search engines.

Try two projects:

a. Put a picture of something that is personal, but that you’re comfortable with online somewhere. Leave it there for a few days, then take it down.

Then search for it. Use everything you like. Treat it like it’s a treasure hunt. Treat it like you’re a journalist and you’re writing a story about that picture. What kind of lengths will you go through to find it? How hard is it? Then once you’ve found it, how easy is it to then forward it to every person you know?

b. Think of all the people you know who have a web-based email account. (A lot, right?) Then think of how many contacts they’d have in that account. (Again, a lot. Hundreds each, possibly.) In fact, you’ve probably got a web-based email account yourself. Go to www.spokeo.com (or a similar site). Using your mail account you can sign up and find out what everyone in your address book has posted across lots of different social media sites.

Think of when you try and apply for a job. This is better than Facebook for a human resources person. And it lives forever. Look yourself up. What would a human resources rep think of you right now?

By working with your teenager you’re showing them you trust them to act as responsibly as they can. You’re also giving them the opportunity to initiate conversations, to take control and showing them why it’s important.

I’ll finish by reiterating that this situation is different for every family, and I totally understand that. That said, I believe this is just one, positive way of approaching a very delicate subject, and it could bring you closer together rather than threaten your relationship. Sailing the tumultuous ocean of teenage parenting is challenging. I’d like to ride this wave with our teens instead of against them.

Building a Strategic Promotional Plan

A goal is a dream until you make a plan. And the plan needs to be strategic otherwise it won’t work.

A strategy is a direction – a way of heading. This is not something that already has the tactics in place. Think of a chess strategy, or war strategy – these don’t have any step-by-step procedures in place that if a single thing goes wrong the whole strategy falls apart. That same thing is true of any strategy, including your promotional one. The strategy isn’t a tresure map. It simply outlines the direction. A strategy will rarely change, but the tactics you use to implement the strategy might – and probably will – depending upon what happens along the way.

No matter what kind of business you’re in, you need to operate strategically, and that includes the promotional activity you undertake. Too many times a ‘promotional plan’ is hit and miss. It’s buying an ad somewhere or running a competition. If there’s no strategy behind the tactics, then it’s like throwing fistfuls of money into the air. Here’s an outline of the basic steps for creating a strategic promotional plan. It will ensure your promotional activity is targeted, reflects the overarching goals of your marketing plan, delivers awesome ROI, and gives you the best opportunity for success. It works for every kind of business, whether you’re a CEO of a startup, a Fortune 500 company or a mommyblogger wanting to take the next step.

Step 1: Situation Analysis:

If you’re an operating business, you’ll probably have done a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) as part of your business or marketing plan already. That’s where you’ll have looked at the overall place of your product and its distribution in the marketplace. If you’re smaller in scope, you might not have thought too much about it before. That’s not a problem – this is where you start to think of yourself as a company! In your strategic promotional plan you’ll want to do a specific SWOT analysis on how your promotions are working, should work and how you want them to work. Look purely at the SWOT of your product’s promotions and its relationship to competitors promotions. Remember that promotion is a communication, nothing else. It’s about messages and activity directly tied to those messages. Outline what is great about your communications, what isn’t, what opportunities there are and how these could be threatened.

The second part of the situation analysis is identifying, in the most specific way possible, who you are as a company and product, what budget you’re able to work with, who your audiences are and where you’re at in the market and as a business. The more information you have at this point, hard as it might seem to face at times, the easier the other steps become and the more likely you are to reach your objectives. You’ll probably need to do quite a bit of research.

Step Two: Identify Your Objectives

Once you’ve identified where you’re starting from, then you need to identify where you’d like to go. In the strategic promotion plan, you need to have an promotional objective in mind (click on that link to define what types of things could be considered promotional objectives). You might have one or more objectives.

Because promotion is a communication activity, in developing your promotional objective don’t make the mistake of aligning it with anything other than a communication goal – something you can see as being directly tied to communication. If you fail to do that, and you’re employed as a communicator then you’re creating an environment in which it’s hard to prove ROI (return on investment). And to put it bluntly, you’ll need to prove ROI to keep your job, let alone get a bigger budget or more business from the client.

For example, don’t say a promotional objective is to increase sales. There are far more factors in play in your marketing plan than just communication that impact sales (such as what the product is like, the price point, your competitors, the economic environment, and so on). In your promotion plan, we’re only looking at things you can directly achieve with communication.

Ensure your objective is SMART – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-focused. Something like “Achieve 1,000 people to log onto the website and sign up for the alpha invite before 10 August, 2009″ is a good promotional objective. Ensure your promotional objectives are directly achieved with communication, and that they support the overall marketing goals. Never think you’ll be able to prove your promotions were directly responsible for an increase in sales – unless you can prove nothing else changed in the environment, business or marketplace. However, your promotional activity should be one aspect which contributes towards an increase in sales. And that activity should have SMART attributes which allow you to prove they were successful promotions (even if other stuff goes haywire).

Remember that Achievable and Realistic are two different things. Sure, sending out 500 samples a week to people in the mail might be achieveable if you never spend time with your family, but is it realistic? Begin with brainstorming some objectives that you’d like to achieve and then start adjusting and tying them down with the SMART criteria.

Step Three: Choose your Tactics:

Think of tactics as tools in your kit that will allow you to implement your strategy, and get to your objectives. There are four general categories of tactics, these are: PR, Advertising, Sales Promotion, Personal Selling (which includes Word of Mouth and online communities – take some time to review each of the links). Some of these have cross over points and grey areas, and when done well, you should use some in combination or at different points in order to achieve your objectives. For example, very rarely do you use a single way of transport to get from one place to another (you might walk, then take a bus, then walk again for example), and the same is true of choosing promotional tactics. You need to select promotions that are directly aligned with your strategy. Think of what each of them will do for you, and then put them together so they become a plan.

Begin with the four big categories and the links I’ve attached to them. Then make a list of what reasonable types of activity you could consider to use, given your budget and situation, that will help you implement your strategy and get to your objectives. PR could include conferences, speeches, media activity, etc. Sales Promotions you might consider are sampling, competitions, etc. Personal Selling includes training your internal staff, internal recognition programs, and these days, word of mouth and user community. Spend some time brainstorming different things. Let me repeat, these four different areas of tactics are very broad and do not have defined constraints. They are, however, foundational points for sparking your thoughts about different activities you can do to communicate messages to different target audiences, and receive information back.

When you have chosen some tactics, put them in order of when you’d like to undertake them. There has to be real consideration given to when is the most effective time to use a particular message and a particular tactic with your market. Remember that promotions are defined as short-term activities. Ads get old fast. So do competitions. Happy Meal toys get rotated every month. Effective promotions don’t run for an extended period. Make them short, targeted and focused for great results.

That’s how you create a plan that is strategic. If you needed to go from your house to your kids’ school, you wouldn’t take an aeroplane, even though it would probably work. It’s not a well considered tool for the job. In fact it could backfire – how would your kids’ friends feel? Your neighbours? Choose the correct tools for the job, to move you along the strategic path toward your goal.

It is really very useful to use a timeline for this. Put a beginning date and the end date (which will align with achieving your objective). Then mark in what activities you’re planning to use, and when you’ll use them. Again, the more specific you are with activities, how they’re going to work with each other and especially, what each of them has been chosen to achieve as part of your strategy, the more likely you are to be successful. Don’t do something just because it’s easy, or the latest trend.

Step Four: Monitoring and Evaluation

This is the trick step. I should probably have started with it! From the very beginning of your planning to after the objective has been achieved you’ll be monitoring how your plan is going. That way you’ll know if you’re sliding off the path at all. It’s far easier to identify where things are going wrong if you do it regularly than looking back over the experience at the end and wonder what happened. You’ll also be able to make alterations to your tactic selection to get back in line with your strategic path if that’s necessary.

When you choose your tactics, it’s based on the information you have on hand right now. Also, it’s done with some expectations about how effective other tactics you choose are going to be. Just say you decided to run a competition as one tactic to get yourself an additional 100 people to try something or visit your blog – and it ended up falling flat. Well, when you’re actively monitoring and evaluating your plan on a regular basis, you could decide to change your next tactic to pick up the pace and get you back on track. You’ll also probably review future competitions and see what you need to change about them or whether to ditch them altogether. You’ll be listening to your audience, but keeping your eye on what your objective is. Your strategy won’t change, but your tactics might – and probably will – as you move along.

Planning your promotional strategy plan will take you some time, energy and thought. Far more so than simply placing an ad somewhere, or running a random competition. But the outcomes will be infinitely better. So what are you waiting for? Get strategic!

What kind of Twitter identity do you seek?

There are some very interesting psychological theories used in Marketing and Business which explain why people behave the way they do. Put simply, people buy different brands and products to fulfill external and internal needs. These needs reflect their sense of self. And people can generally be placed in one of three categories:

1. Affiliation needs – people who primarily want to ‘belong’. For example, think of teenagers and their need to buy the latest fad.

2. Leadership needs – people who want to be seen as innovators and want to be seen as cutting edge. A good example is all those people looking for the latest and greatest new phone!

3. Achievement needs – people who buy things to demonstrate they’ve ‘made it’. Often, buying that sportscar or a First Class plane ticket fulfills that need.

My current research on discourse analysis on Twitter suggests you can identify people working to fulfill these same needs on Twitter! With just text to convey how we want to be seen by everyone, the things we decide to Tweet and whom we tweet with demonstrates us ‘working’ to fulfill one of these needs.

Someone with an affiliation need on Twitter will use lots of hashtags. Ways of belonging. They will identify themselves as part of popular movements on Twitter. They want to be part of a particular crowd. Mommy bloggers. Lots of RTs and @ conversations with people they want to be associated with.

Someone with a leadership need will probably not ‘life stream’. Instead they’ll stay on one topic and tweet links to specific cutting edge stuff in their field. They will talk with just about anyone as long as it’s on the topic they want to be seen as a leader in. They don’t stray from that path. It’s like they’re almost the Twitter expert on a particular subject.

Finally, someone with an achievement need will want to be recognised as having ‘made it’. These, I claim, are the type of people who un-follow bulk numbers of people so they can appear accomplished. They’re more likely to be focused on follower numbers than anything else. They might life stream about their accomplished lives, and even lead calls to donate to ’people less fortunate’, to further identify their separateness from them.

The way we behave on Twitter reflect identity work where we want to be seen by the community as one of these types of people.

What Twitterers can you think of that fits one of these categories? Where do you fit?

Breastfeeding in America

Recently many Twitterers (and their associates) contributed to my survey on American women’s attitudes to breastfeeding and its representation in the media. I promised to share the outcomes of my research and the survey, which this post seeks to do. For those interested, the entire paper (30 pages plus 15 page complete survey result appendix) is available by emailing me or asking on Twitter and I’ll get it to you straight away. If you’d like to see the summary of survey responses, this link takes you to the final Survey Monkey summary.

American Breastfeeding Rates

America has a dismal breastfeeding rate. The World Health Organization and the US’s own CDC recommend babies be exclusively breastfed for the first six months of their lives, and then breastfed with additional food until they are two years old and beyond. The American Government then worked with the CDC in 2000 to develop the Healthy People 2010 initiative. It includes breastfeeding goals which fall short of the WHO and CDC’s own recommendations – that rates of breastfeeding be targeted to 75% initiating breastfeeding at birth, with 50% at six months and just 25% at one year.

Each year since 2000, American media has been fed press release diatribe on how successfully this plan is being implemented. And mainstream media have unquestioningly spurted it back at the general public. Headlines like “Breastfeeding rate soars” (USA Today 2002) and Reuters 2007 story headlined “US breastfeeding rates rise to record high” disguise the real issue – that even after 8 years of a government promotion to increase breastfeeding in America, 25% of women never even try. In 2005 only 11% of American women exclusively breastfed for 6 months (as opposed to the WHO recommendation of 100%) and in 2007 a quarter of women who initiate breastfeeding at birth have introduced formula within the first week of their child’s life.

So what’s the problem?

Media loves boobs – as long as they’re shown in a sexual way. We’re all familiar with advertising and other images of breasts. For example, this 1993 cover image of Janet Jackson on Rolling Stone won critical acclaim. The story focuses on Jackson and her embracing of her sexuality. The focal point is her breasts.

But a full 13 years later, BabyTalk magazine’s cover created outrage. No less than 700 complaints were sent to the editor over a cover promoting breastfeeding. So getting it straight, a magazine committed to mothering and babies, getting flak over a cover which promoted – mothering and babies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In my paper I explain how I believe this has occurred. The movement of women into the public sphere has seen them embrace their femininity in a new way. There’s a whole “look, I’m in the boardroom and I have breasts” ferocity which has been associated with feminism. Women don’t like being confronted with images which remind them of the roles their mothers had. Feminism’s abject failure through the 1980s and 1990s was its devaluation and disempowerment of the importance of nursing.

Yes, I argue that the feminist movement has contributed to a sociey where even women more readily accept images of breasts that celebrate them on a sexual rather than a mothering level. This is reflected in media too. TV programs such as Sex and the City, Desperate Housewives and Ally McBeal feature women who embrace their sexuality and power as successful. Women who hold traditional mothering roles are less successful, frustrated, angry or just plain stupid.

And then to have the audacity to bring those breasts, feeding infants, into the general public? No wonder women in general lead the call for ‘discretion’ and ‘hooter hiders’.

The survey

I hoped to get about 30 responses. The survey went viral and in three days I received 128 responses. More than a third of respondents added extra information to each of the basic four questions asked. Women have strong views. In my paper I relate this passion to religiosity. The religion of breastfeeding meets all the academic standards of definition. No longer is breastfeeding normal, usual practice. And I find that distressing.

While 95% of respondents did not believe media has any influence over their own ideas about breastfeeding, more than half believe media should show it more often. Clearly, women believe media has an influence over someone (if not themselves). One key response was along the lines of “media doesn’t influence my ideas about breastfeeding because it’s not shown in media.” My assertion is that this absence has just as much influence as if it were shown.

Moving forward

So what does this mean for feminists who embraced the bottle as their key to freedom from the ugliness and backward past? It means that the general public can look at American women and say “hey, are you women so stupid that you need to be told to breastfeed? And after eight years, you still aren’t getting the message?” It means that heck, if you’re an educated woman you need to recognise everything about you that’s powerful, not just breaking through the glass ceiling.

 

If media showed breastfeeding as part of normal life on television and other media. If it made it present and normal – not a focus of a storyline, but just part of the everyday life of families with babies on tv, then could we begin to see this overtly sexual obsession with breasts change? Could we begin to see women being more accepting of their breasts as being a special part of a relationship with their child, not just as part of the relationship with their sexuality? If, in a similar way to Hollywood reducing smoking in movies, we began to insert breastfeeding into them… what would happen? And what about the international impact this could have? Hollywood movies are seen worldwide.

Certainly our only hope can be to improve on dismal American breastfeeding rates – and who knows where it could end.