"The works must be conceived with fire in the soul but executed with clinical coolness." Joan Miro
"In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities. In the expert's mind there are few." Shunryu Susuki
"Talent without genius isn't much, but genius without talent is nothing whatever." Paul Valery
Today's image: Emotion No. 76 by michelleBlack. Beautiful. Thanks for sharing!
ZenithOptimedia released their global ad spend projections. Here are selected shares:
Media 2007 - 2008
TV 37.9 - 38.2
Newspapers 27.8 - 26.9
Magazines 12.5 - 12.2
Internet 7.5 - 8.7
Radio 8.1 - 7.9
Outdoor 5.7 - 5.8
SES Chicago Buzz: Where's Yahoo!?
Hearing the first estimates of spend for the 08 election cycle at about $4.5 billion. $3 billion in traditional media. $1.5 billion in direct mail, PR and other. This may be the first election cycle where direct mail reaches $1 billion in spend.
Nobel: Al Gore Acceptance Speech
Bonus: What's your Gmail story? Smart, very smart.
T E S T I N G
"A company with a strong message may get its story into the heads
of only a few people, and become rich. Conversely, a company with
a bad message may get its story into all the heads, and become bankrupt."
Rosser Reeves
Does your story work?
Does it pull people over to your product?
You have no doubt heard the radio commercials for HD Radio. Are those messages working? Before we can answer that question we need data. My thought is the best data set would be receiver sales. In the last 20 or so months member stations of the HD Radio Alliance have run about $450 million in radio ads. Given the assumption that 500,000 receivers have been sold over that same period would translate into $900 per set sold. Is that too expensive or the stuff of marketing genius? No real way of telling at this point. I'm making up these sales numbers because the actual receiver sales data is not at hand.
My point here is once we have benchmark sales data we can begin to evaluate the effectiveness of the messaging. As it stands now receiver sales data have not yet been published (to my knowledge). This, in my opinion, is a major error in judgment. While the HD Radio Alliance has, arguably, done a good job of raising awareness, it's time to change up the game and get into driving demand, a new and improved focus on sell through at local retail. In 2008 the HD Radio Alliance should go to work with the goal of producing a meaningful sales result. My suggestion being receiver sales represent the only result of any significance. Until a radio receiver is sold the messaging is simply not working, there is no ROI.
With all respect, it's time for Peter Ferrara and his team to do the right thing. Collect and release the receiver sales data on a timely basis. Begin testing the pull of different creative approaches. Let's find out what's working and what's not working. Let's sell receivers. We need to be asking "How many receivers did we sell last week?" and we need to know the answer in no uncertain terms. We have an urgent need for transparency here. We know $450 million has been invested now we need to know what was sold. Going forward we need measures of effectiveness, performance metrics, a good start would be full and objective accounting on set sales. In 2008 let's agree the fair and proper definition of ROI = radios sold. (FD: iBiquity Digital was previously a client of my employer and I worked on the account)
Making a list, checking it thrice: Making the year end list of media folk (and other rock stars) that actually get it. My list of the eight to watch in '08. Let's start with Rob Barnett. Forget everything the guy has done before his current venture. He's just getting started. Barnett tops my list of ones to watch in 2008. You heard it here last. From his blog...
"I remembered the energy we conjured up to start My Damn Channel and the secret sauce that went into the brew. The key ingredients we left out were doubt and fear. We left those two in the kitchen cabinet - just in case anyone from old media needed to stop by and borrow some spice. We cooked with extra servings of badass and positive thinking - we threw in enough angst to keep us from ever going through the motions - because we know that breaking out of our low-rent kitchen and into profits was a mission worth fighting for."
Bravos, Rob! Keep the audacity dialed up to eleven. Check out Rob's blog here and do yourself a favor, add it to your reader.
Word: w00t named word of the year
of only a few people, and become rich. Conversely, a company with
a bad message may get its story into all the heads, and become bankrupt."
Rosser Reeves
Does your story work?
Does it pull people over to your product?
You have no doubt heard the radio commercials for HD Radio. Are those messages working? Before we can answer that question we need data. My thought is the best data set would be receiver sales. In the last 20 or so months member stations of the HD Radio Alliance have run about $450 million in radio ads. Given the assumption that 500,000 receivers have been sold over that same period would translate into $900 per set sold. Is that too expensive or the stuff of marketing genius? No real way of telling at this point. I'm making up these sales numbers because the actual receiver sales data is not at hand.
My point here is once we have benchmark sales data we can begin to evaluate the effectiveness of the messaging. As it stands now receiver sales data have not yet been published (to my knowledge). This, in my opinion, is a major error in judgment. While the HD Radio Alliance has, arguably, done a good job of raising awareness, it's time to change up the game and get into driving demand, a new and improved focus on sell through at local retail. In 2008 the HD Radio Alliance should go to work with the goal of producing a meaningful sales result. My suggestion being receiver sales represent the only result of any significance. Until a radio receiver is sold the messaging is simply not working, there is no ROI.
With all respect, it's time for Peter Ferrara and his team to do the right thing. Collect and release the receiver sales data on a timely basis. Begin testing the pull of different creative approaches. Let's find out what's working and what's not working. Let's sell receivers. We need to be asking "How many receivers did we sell last week?" and we need to know the answer in no uncertain terms. We have an urgent need for transparency here. We know $450 million has been invested now we need to know what was sold. Going forward we need measures of effectiveness, performance metrics, a good start would be full and objective accounting on set sales. In 2008 let's agree the fair and proper definition of ROI = radios sold. (FD: iBiquity Digital was previously a client of my employer and I worked on the account)
Making a list, checking it thrice: Making the year end list of media folk (and other rock stars) that actually get it. My list of the eight to watch in '08. Let's start with Rob Barnett. Forget everything the guy has done before his current venture. He's just getting started. Barnett tops my list of ones to watch in 2008. You heard it here last. From his blog...
"I remembered the energy we conjured up to start My Damn Channel and the secret sauce that went into the brew. The key ingredients we left out were doubt and fear. We left those two in the kitchen cabinet - just in case anyone from old media needed to stop by and borrow some spice. We cooked with extra servings of badass and positive thinking - we threw in enough angst to keep us from ever going through the motions - because we know that breaking out of our low-rent kitchen and into profits was a mission worth fighting for."
Bravos, Rob! Keep the audacity dialed up to eleven. Check out Rob's blog here and do yourself a favor, add it to your reader.
Word: w00t named word of the year
Congrats & cheers: Sam Tanenhaus who does a great job as editor of the New York Times Book Review now takes charge of the Sunday section Week in Review. MediaVest and Starcom tie, both named Agency of the Year by Media Magazine. MEC Interaction picks up the OMMA Agency of the Year Gold. Microsoft signs CNBC.com, adCenter platform is in - DoubleClick is out. Neal Sabin, EVP Weigel Broadcasting and one of the smartest guys in television gets well deserved NATA&S Silver Circle honors. Radio programming ace Harve Alan on setting up shop, Harve Alan Media will produce solutions from scratch including interactive strategies. Jason Witt named SVP/GM of Digital Fusion, the new MTV Networks digital portfolio.
As close to stealing as you would ever want to get: Rubens 2005. One of those 100% Tempranillo bottles. A nice Spanish red priced at under ten bucks. Another Eric Solomon project. Get yours, while you can. Cheers!
0 comments:
Post a Comment