All you need is love…

Hello tiny humans,

Today I would like to show you somethingto brighten your day. It is a common thought that successful managers do not have heart. Well, in fact most people I know are good people, but even better if they take advantage of their strenght and power in order to help people that need us.

This is what Starbucks has done. For every single person that uploads a video of her or himself singing the Beatles’ single “All you need is love” to their Facebook account, a donation will be offered by the coffee company. The aim: fighting AIDS in Africa. This project is a joint venture between Starbucks and NGO Red and has become the greatest campaign ever done by a company in Facebook.

Good luck!

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

Why?

Hello tiny humans,

I have been thinking a lot about e-Marketing practices these days and broadly speaking, I came out with a specific advice.

I just want you to ask yourselves one question: why?

And do not say “Why not?” because that is not really an answer. Be always sure that you know all the “Whys” that take part in your game. Surely we all know the 4 P’s, the 4 F’s, the 5 Porter forces… and probably we would have a difficult time if we tried to remember the 5 W’s (and one H): who, when, where, what, how and why. Even six-year-old children know and we, managers and future managers, have so many things to care about and so many Market Research and Studies that we often forget that greater successes are achieved by doing the right questions.

And the winning bet is always asking ourselves why.

Why do people need my products? Why do not consumers notice innovation in a specific market? Why is a brand perceived in a better way than the others? Why do consumers use some specific marketing channels? Why…?

And why do my consumers need me to use on-line practices? If you can not really come up with some strong arguments that support the necessity of maintaining your current e-marketing strategies and measures, then you might be wasting time and efforts.

Recent researches showed that the use of Facebook among 18 to 24 year-old people is decreasing while new users (of different age groups) are joining the Facebook net en masse. That is, the core group of Facebook is starting to leave the room while companies and advertisers have just come in. That is only a sign of how rapidly trends change within the Internet.

Social networks obviously raise companies with two main challenges: bi-directional communication and transparency. Companies use the Internet not only to sell their products and services, but also as a way to try to create positive perceptions towards their brands.

But the mystery is: WHY should companies try to encourage or even create this dialogue if they do not really know what to say or how to manage the information they are given? Social networks enable a communication channel between companies and their targets, but most companies do not know how to transform this enormous potential into image benefits or sales. It has been a while since the boom of corporate websites and I can not help but wonder WHY companies still try to gain presence in the Internet without any real need…

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

Tweedle Dee – Tweedle Dum

Hello tiny humans,

Today I would like to introduce some friends of mine. Their names: Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. Lewis Carroll, our maker, took their names from a John Byrom’s poem, which are quite meaningful since “tweedle” means shaking your hands and fingers in order to catch somebody’s attention. As you could surely imagine, they are not as notorious as they would like to be. However they invest a lot of efforts and as soon as they catch some daydreaming wanderer walking through Wonderland they start with their verbal diarrhoea and nonsense tales and stories. When they met Alice, she tried to get rid of them without hesitating. It was not that easy, but she managed to do it.

Lots of Internet users find themselves bombed by a huge amount of e-adverts (pop-ups or introduction messages among others) while surfing the Internet. If I were those users, I couldn’t help but wonder: “why don’t they just let me be?”

The other side of the coin could be GoogleAds. While pop-ups and similar tools are much more likely to upset the audience, advertisements that appear when carrying on a Google (or Yahoo or MSN or…) research are usually much more useful and interesting for users. Actually, it would be easy to think that we are offering what they wanted. However, impulsive visits, purchases and acquisitions are more likely by advertising methods that let the audience notice about something they were not looking for in theory.

The thing is that it is not that difficult. Good blogger can do it. This is a great example: a good friend of mine, a blogger called Jon Hunter, was telling me about his work in search engine optimization, and it shows. If you look for “Game of Thrones DVD” (a future HBO TV-series) in Google, Game of Thrones UK (his blog) is the second result. As always, a picture speaks a thousand words.

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

When it comes to loyalty

Hello tiny humans,

Thinking about satisfaction I realised communication is the key. I know what I want and how I want it and no one can convince me otherwise. Companies have always been trying to seduce consumers, but in a world so full of alternatives, they must add value, differenciation, something more than a traditional message… consumers must DESIRE the product.

And nothing simpler than listening. Dialogue is related to Feedback, improvement, and bidirectional communication. This words should be introduced and internalized in every strategy, in the everyday actions in order to promote and encourage customer loyalty.

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

About lifecycles…

Hello tiny humans,

Today I will not beat about the bush as allways. Some things do not need further ado. Real data: companies have cut their investment in traditional communication sources (TV, Public Relations, etc.) by 30%. Is this a threat or an opportunity?

Well, like all things in live, it depends on who has a say on it. Trying to be objective, we could say that even Marketing practices can be studied in terms of their lifecycle. Due to the growing proliferation of low-cost based on the Internet practices we could assume that there are new solutions for Marketing managers in town. Blogs, Facebook groups, word of mouth campaigns among others may fit with new consuming patterns. Because the number of users and shoppers that trust in the Internet while searching or acquiring a product or service is clearly growing.

The good thing is that those practices are not only cheaper than traditional ones, they enhance bi-directional communication. There is nothing as beautiful as realising that your consumers are the first driving force of your communication team.

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

Where was the shortcut?

Hello tiny humans,

I believe that most of Wonderland visitors find themselves wondering where a good instructions of use manual of my lands could be found. I understand their worries because I know that, in the end, we speak different languages (although we do not realize it until it is too late to walk back). To illustrate that point:

CC: All ways here you see, are the QUEEN’S WAYS!
A: But I’ve never met any queen.
CC: You haven’t? You haVEN’T? Oh, but you must! She’ll be mad about you, simply mad!
A: How can I find her?
CC: Well, some go this way, some go that way. But as for me, myself, personally, I prefer the shortcut.

Today I would like you to think about what we find easy and what we do not. For me, it was obvious that there was a shortcut to see the Queen right in the middle of the tree where I was standing. Alice simply could not read this signals. Why am I saying all this?

Usability means designing a process, object or logic based on the user’s psychology in order to make it more efficient to use (it takes less time to accomplish a particular task), easier to learn (operation can be learned by observing the object) and more satisfying to use. In a brand-saturated market, companies start realizing the benefits of researching and developing their products with user-oriented methods (instead of technology-oriented methods). In the user-centered design paradigm, the product is designed with its targeted users in mind at all times. They might even take part in the design team.

Jakob Nielsen stated: “Studies of user behavior on the Web find a low tolerance for difficult designs or slow sites. People don’t want to wait. And they don’t want to learn how to use a home page. There’s no such thing as a training class or a manual for a Web site. People have to be able to grasp the functioning of the site immediately after scanning the home page—for a few seconds at most.” This sums up perfectly the performance all Web sites should pledge.

Regarding eCommerce websites, the meaning of web usability is usually narrowed down to efficiency: providing shorter, clearer and easier path for users to buy and/or performing other transactions becomes the main point.

Personally, there lies the problem. This way of thinking should be minimum requirements, not a way to for companies to differentiate themselves from competitors. This is kind of disappointing, specially when lots of tools are available for companies to use. Eye tracking, evaluation methods (parallel design, cognitive modeling methods, GOMS, Human Processor Model, etc.), ISO models, tree testing or activity analysis among others illustrate my point.

In conclusion, whenever you find yourselves dealing with the design of a product, service or process, make sure that all these questions have an upheld answer ASAP:

• Who are the users, what do they know, and what can they learn?
• What do users want or need to do?
• What is the general background of the users?
• What is the context in which the user is working?
• What has to be left to the machine?

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

What Rabbit?

Hello tiny humans,

I would like to remind you the day I first met Alice. She was lost in Wonderland, searching the White Rabbit, wondering about what way to go…

CC: Oh, by the way, if you’d really like to know, he went that way.
A: Who did?
CC: The White Rabbit.
A: He did?
CC: He did what?
A: Went that way.
CC: Who did?
A: The White Rabbit.
CC: What rabbit?
A: But didn’t you just say – I mean – Oh, dear.
CC: Can you stand on your head?
A: Oh!

Have you ever noticed some tourists presence, frozen in the middle of the Borne streets (a touristic area of Barcelona) looking to all directions with a map in their hands and without any idea of what way to go? Well this is a quite common feeling among the (few) visitors that we receive in Wonderland, since we are not really famous for our hospitality.

I thought that in your world that never happened, or at least when you are supposed to understand the needs, behaviors and manias of the people and, furthermore, to be able to take profit (in an economic way) of that knowledge. I am going to make myself clearer: if managers know that their clients are looking for something specific (something they have even told us out loud) why do not they value this information?

Getting to the point, it is a common knowledge that in the Internet, all e-Products can be classified in one of these groups:

• Search Products. Amazon would be a fantastic example. Based on objective criteria (price, delivery, number of references, devolution policies, etc.), customers can compare different companies. Where does the difference between Amazon, Fnac and Play.com lie? Devolution ease, price and delivery respectively.
• Experience products. They might be difficult to deal with since they are based on the experience of consumption of the product. How can we deliver the experience of trying on new clothing in the Internet? Pictures are not enough. Madrid Fashion Week found a way by offering multimedia sources (videos and sound) to see the pieces of clothing in movement.
• Information Products. I mean those that can be purchased and downloaded by the Internet. I-Tunes illustrates this concept: music, videos, games and other applications can be easily bought and downloaded.

Knowing what kinds of products we are dealing with is essential in order to keep our competitiveness in the market and to offer the right website with the appropriate features.

Anyway, any website, regardless of which kind of product it is offering, must be clear and logic, easy to read and friendly user. So think about the dialogue I reminded you at the beginning of this post and imagine that I was a corporate website and Alice was a visitor looking for a product called… let me think… oh yes… the White Rabbit. If this product was among my product range I should be able to rapidly offer information about it (price, features, delivery and purchase information and instructions of use among others). What if The White Rabbit was not part of my portfolio? In that case, what I would never do would be saying something like: “No results were found.” It was like me saying “What rabbit?” to Alice. It would be, at least, inappropriate. The reason is that visitors would feel like I said: “Ha ha ha! I’m afraid I can’t be any help. Go search somewhere else!”

That is why it is really useful to generate alternative searches in case of the output of looking for “The White Rabbit” was “No results were found”. Saying “Did you mean ‘The White Rabbi’?” or “Perhaps you would be interested in ‘Alice in Wonderland’ or ‘Pet Care for Beginners’” is highly appreciated by customers, specially by those who have not a long experience looking for information or purchasing through the Internet.

So, to sum up, never say “What Rabbit?”

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

The Queen Ways

Hello tiny humans,

Alice was playing an awkward and crazy cricket match with the Queen of Wonderland when I realized that watching that old fat woman playing the most boring sport ever was not really a good way to spend the evening. That’s why I decided to interrupt…

CC: You know? We could make the Queen “really” angry! Shall we try?
A: Oh, no, no!
CC: Oh, but it’s loads of fun!

I did not really want to give Alice any trouble, but it is something funny that temptation always has my phone number and Queen’s ways are not the best ones…

Why should we keep on trying old strategies? We must currently thrive in a cruel, challenging and changing environment. In the past, marketing was understood as a path to successfully increase profits. Nowadays, it is (or should be) a way to seduce our target market. It is not a matter of “quantity”, “sales” or “mass targeting”. These words have become a reminiscence of the past. “Quality”, “communication” or “successful impacts and messages” have taken their places.

As society evolves, so does our way of communication and the way we perceive brands, commercials and products. And, what’s more, individuals are not only a passive agent. As I mentioned in my last post, consumers have a clear influence on the brand image and awareness. As Einstein (one of the wisest and smartest minds in human history) stated, madness consists in continuing to do the same thing, hoping for a different outcome. New strategies, best practices and market-driven behaviours must be adopted in order to successfully catch customers and consumers attention and seduce them. In a world of increasing competitiveness, “smart” is the wining bet. “Smart” for fast and effective and “smart” for elegant and attractive.

These new strategies and practices must enhance “bi-directional” communication standards. If we know what our brands and products actually offer to our target, we will be able to react to their unsatisfied needs, proposals and future changes. And, what’s more, we can become their first option…

In my world, the Queen usually says: “All ways are the Queen ways”. In yours, consumers would probably answer: “Not anymore”. What happens when a company keeps on doing the practices that do not offer its customers what they need? They feel disappointed. And, the same way we react when our beloved disappoints us, we need to “talk” about it. Do you remember those “compromising e-voices” I spoke about in my last post? They would feel like children inside a patisserie.

My advice: do not give them cause to criticize you. Nowadays, brands are more exposed than ever to their customers voices. The Internet (obviously) has had a say on this.

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

What we can’t control

Hello tiny humans,

I would like you to remember the first time I talked to Alice. She was lost in Wonderland, desperately looking for the White Rabbit…

Cheshire Cat: If I were looking for a white rabbit, I’d ask the Mad Hatter.
Alice: The Mad Hatter? Oh, no no no…
CC: Or, you could ask the March Hare, in that direction.
A: Oh, thank you. I think I’ll see him…
CC: Of course, he’s mad, too.
A: But I don’t want to go among mad people.
CC: Oh, you can’t help that. Most everyone’s mad here.
[I laugh maniacally and start to disappear]
CC: You may have noticed that I’m not all there myself.

What would have happened if Alice was a brand and I was some freak blogger? Well, I might not be that a compromising e-voice in order to create a shift in public opinion against any brand, but our current reality is undeniable: managers and employees are not the only sources of changes in the perceptions we have about brands.

The Mentos – CocaCola Geyser is a great example to illustrate that point. Individuals (consumers, customers, bloggers…) can express their views on the performance of a brand or firm, their values or procedures. And, through the Internet, they can do it without limits (or almost). The consequence is that they have an influence on what people think about a company, a person or a government. A brand’s positioning, image and awareness can be affected by the voices in the Internet.

As long as this happens, companies will not be able to utterly control their brands. As I have mentioned, a company’s image depends not only on its performance and commitment to our society, but also on how stakeholders see its performance.

At this point, depending on how change-reluctant we are, I can see a big problem or a huge challenge. The problem would be the same one Alice went through: what if I don’t want to go among mad people and most everyone is mad here?

Since asking ourselves the previous question means focusing on the problem, I suggest that we face this as challenge: how can I control what people say about me and my brands?

It is not easy, but that opens up a huge space to creative managers. Creating or sponsoring related blogs might be effective tools in order to take advantage of the potential of the Internet and “channel” these expert voices. Plus, they are not that common yet. What Mentos (the first International Geyser Championship) did was, in my opinion, a fantastic example of how to take advantage of what we can not control.

From Wonderland with Love,

The Cheshire Cat

From Wonderland with Love…

Hello tiny humans,

The purpose of this blog is to have fun while compiling all Cheshire Cat’s teachings and express what he would say about e-Marketing practices if he was given the opportunity. Every post will start from one of his memorable quotes and gather together some pieces of e-Marketing knowledge.

Is there anything else to say?

NOTHING WHATEVER!

I hope you enjoy this creation!

The Cheshire Cat