MARKETING IN HOLLYWOOD IS MISSING IN ACTION

This blog is a direct response to the April 4 Hollywood Reporter article by Peter Bart. It is titled, “In Hollywood, the Glass is Gaffe Full." In it, Peter characterizes the senior executives in the film industry as being locked in a general fear of failure. From my perspective, Peter’s article is pretty much correct in as far as it goes. I will take it a bit further. To read Peter’s article go to:

http://www.variety.com/article/vr1118034799.com 

My experience in the world of film marketing is limited but I can promise that successfully marketing a film is no different than marketing cat litter, cooking sauce or any other product or service. The film market is a service industry that grew up with a lot of bad habits, and remains committed to hanging on to most of them.

From a pure marketing point of view, I see two ways to improve the process. It is a common practice to place responsibility for the Key Art (print materials) and the Trailers (video materials) in the hands of two separate groups. Instead it needs to be integrated and driven by one cohesive Selling Proposition. Having said that, I am sure that every marketing executive in the film industry is sure his marketing is fully integrated…it is not.

Back in the early days of film marketing, the One Sheet and other printed materials were considered critical because they would get reproduced in various sizes and posted all over town. At that time the trailer was more of a production function and the goal was simply to develop one that stimulated interest. The effect of this history is that there are creative groups around Hollywood who produce one or the other but rarely both. This separation internally and externally guarantees an incohesive environment. Marketing 101 says, develop a Selling Proposition that resonates to your target audience and ensure that message is present in all advertising and promotion materials.

Today film marketing is very different in that the printed materials are far less effective and the trailer is now absolutely critical. With a boost from the Internet, I can review trailers on my iPhone in seconds. What we have then, are senior executives instructing junior managers to hire the best outside creatives to develop POWERFUL trailers. It’s easy to develop a POWERFUL trailer. Have you noticed they are all melodramatic hype from start to finish these days? The idea of creating and communicating a Unique Selling Proposition targeted to the correct audience is non-existent.

Here then is the problem. Now, more than ever before, the film industry is subjected to heavy word-of-mouth promotion. That would be a dream come true in the categories I market in, but it’s a marketing tool that needs to be handled with skill.

The marketing goal for the film industry should be to identify all of the target users appropriate for the film and create a Unique Selling Proposition that they find compelling. Secondarily, and of almost equal importance is, never drive an inappropriate target consumer into the theater. Those people are not your friend, they are your enemy and you don’t want them viewing your film.

The operating state of all humans is, “What’s wrong here?" If they don’t love the film, they will be even more enthusiastic about spreading the bad word than if they liked it. It would take a very sophisticated piece of research to identify how many people you lose when you drive one person inappropriately to a film. If film executives had that statistic, they might stop developing POWERFUL trailers and experience a great deal more success.

So, Mr. Peter Bart. To my mind, the senior executives in the film industry have good reason to be afraid. The likelihood is that as our electronic information driven society continues to advance, it will likely get worse.

Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

follow my blog by clicking one of the links below

visit my site, www.pullbizbook.com

FREE, A Celebrity Endorsement

I have been working for several weeks on the repositioning of Ricky Farmer’s business, Precious Memories, Private Pet Cremations. He is the winner of the America’s Marketing Makeover contest on the Big Biz Show. I am the giver of the now somewhat well known makeover. You can follow it on the CBS Radio network as well as syndicated TV stations across America.

  

The reason I selected this business is simply because I thought it is unusual and sensitive enough to create viewer interest. I was right. I’m told ratings are up.

One positioning element I introduced to Ricky’s selling proposition is the endorsement. I did so with good reason. It’s based on an insight we discovered a little over a year ago. One of the exercises we do when working on creating new selling propositions is to take the strongest of each communication element and force consumers to choose between them based on how important each is to them. You may want to check this out with your sales message because chances are you are not taking advantage. If your competition is doing so, you are likely suffering. The good news is that the reverse is also true.

While doing the exercise, we typically include brand names, sub-brand names, generic descriptors, benefits, attribute drivers, key graphics, endorsements and so on. What we discovered is that consistently among the strongest elements are the benefit and the endorsement. This is contrary to the popular belief. If you were able to poll 100 brand, marketers most would say the brand name, sub-brand name or a key attributes are the most important. My experience is that I have not seen that in well over fifty projects where we have conducted the exercise.

My initial thought was to ask Ricky to solicit testimonials from ten of his clients. He did so and they were great. After thinning them out we selected three that we have included in his selling proposition. During the process, I remember thinking several times that it would be great if Ricky had worked with a celebrity who would write a testimonial but never perused it given his business resides in Cleveland, Georgia. Cleveland is approximately seventy miles outside of Atlanta. Here comes the breakthrough.

On another project, one of my sons was working with a famous quote from Buddha. He was considering using it as an inspirational element. It suddenly occurred to me, that if properly used, a famous quote might be a great way to convey a meaningful and relevant thought by a famous source. A quick call to our attorneys and we realized that all those well-known quotes are considered “public domain”. Moving forward, we found these three that seemed appropriate for the business of “Private Pet Cremations.” Which one would you use?

1) The value of a society is based upon its kindness to animals. -Albert Schweitzer

2) The greatness of a nation can be judged by the way its animals are treated. –Gandhi

3) The love for all living creatures is the most noble attribute of man. –Charles Darwin

I thought number three was far and away the best but we chose number one. Number three was eliminated because the majority of our team were concerned that Darwin would be viewed negatively in that part of the world. Chalk it up to a fear of religious intolerance. I guess it is possible but I loved what he said. I guess what is most important here is that the cover of Ricky’s brochure will contain the Schweitzer quote so he has what can be considered a celebrity third party endorsement and it will cost him nothing.

Now, go Google “famous quotes your category” and see if you can put a celebrity to work for you. Good luck!

Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

follow my blog by clicking one of the links below

visit my site, www.pullbizbook.com

The second biggest challenge in life is...

Last summer, I was asked to speak at the Penn Club in Manhattan and gladly accepted. It is the alumni club for the University of Pennsylvania, one of the eight Ivy League colleges located in Northeastern United States. As time went on and the committee that was in charge of such things shared my book “Pull”, they decided to expand the event to include all Ivy League college clubs. As a graduate of Arizona State University whose heritage and prestige pale by comparison, I was rightfully flattered.

As the time to appear approached, I decided that the speech I have been giving was solid but wanted to add more power to it to increase its perceived significance. To do so, I created four of what I refer to as bold statements. Each was designed to stimulate thinking and lead into a marketing distinction that I would further detail for the audience. In retrospect, I felt they all worked well and am working to strengthen them further. One, however seemed to have a great deal of impact and I share it here.

I was cruising along about half way through the seventy minutes I had allocated for the session when I said,” It may well be that the second biggest challenge in life, staying alive being the first, is staying relevant. It was easy to see that the audience was waiting for me to explain this one. In retrospect, I think this statement is not only accurate; I think it is also critically important to the well-being of you and your business.

Earlier in the speech I had recommended that there is extraordinary value in treating your Selling Proposition (sales message) as if it is a personal conversation between you and your customer. It is in fact so, and the “second biggest challenge” statement I made was designed to apply to their products or services. The analogy worked and they got it easily.

In life we watch people get old and assume that age, over time, has made them irrelevant. Nothing could be more inaccurate. Inactivity, not age, is what makes them irrelevant to those around them. Activity that is aimed at creating “what’s next” has worked for my hero, Hugh Hefner and he is well into his eighties. Many may argue the significance of his influence but few would argue his relevance. There are others of course. It is clearly a matter of choice and growing old has nothing to do with it.

Your product or service in your category is no different. If you are constantly looking at and creating “what’s next” for your category, others will be at the effect of what you have done. If you sit and admire your success, others will create “what’s next” and you will be at the effect of what they have done. That I can promise is painful compared to the joy and success of being the one doing the creating.

The issue here is that most marketers’ sit on the success they create. Inherent in that inaction is that everything is somehow just fine until it no longer is. My experience is that it is very difficult to get a successful marketer to create what’s next in the face of success. Can you see that this guarantees failure?

The more I think of this, I am going to remove the “It may well be” from this statement. It hereafter will be, “The second biggest challenge in life, staying alive being the first, is staying relevant.” Feel free to pass it on.

The learning here is, when you are successful, sit down light up a cigar, pop open a bottle of champagne and take the day off. Its perfectly okay to come in to work the following day, around 11:00 will do. At 2:00, after a self-indulgent lunch, you have two choices. You can continue admiring your success or you can begin working on “what’s next.” I strongly recommend the latter as the former will insure failure in your future.

Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

follow my blog by clicking one of the links below

visit my site, www.pullbizbook.com

AMERICA’S MARKETING MAKEOVER

On my last blog I introduced you to our winner Ricky Farmer from Cleveland, Georgia. Ricky is the very proud owner of a business titled “Precious Memories”. The generic descriptor that follows closely is Private Pet Cremations. Yes, I picked this business to do a marketing makeover on national TV and radio and now I am in the thick of dealing with it. It is a little more complicated than I anticipated.

First off, I had no idea how the project would alter the life of the owner of the company. Once the announcement was made, the regional media swung into action. They have asked for interviews with Ricky, Sully and myself. So far, Ricky has been great but the attention and the pressure of the show and the media are mounting. Stay tuned.

Ricky is proving to be a great character with his southern accent and blatant honesty. Given his unique business and the nature of the project, I suspect coverage of the makeover will continue as it evolves. 
You can view the show where we introduced Ricky at: http://www.chambersmarketingcentral.com/ 

         

Beyond that, I have been working with Ricky and have found him to be extremely grateful and eager to participate. I exposed him to a long list of positioning elements, selected several I consider appropriate and asked him to respond by working up lists of options for each. I, too, am working on them but want to see what is on his mind and this is a great way to find out. Below is a copy of his Yellow Pages ad, which I am using as a point of departure. It will give you a sense of where he is now.

           

Ricky’s brand name is a communication element that I am not recommending he change. On the other hand, I will be looking at the effect that may be attained if we subordinate the word “Precious” to the word “Memories”. I will consider it after we complete the work on copy.

Ricky’s Generic Descriptor, Private Pet Cremations was where we started. “Pet Cremations” works to define his service but “Private” is not clear. He used it because he wanted to communicate that he never cremates more than one animal at a time. Such is not the case with his competition. Replacing the word “Private” with something more meaningful will be important.

I asked that he develop ideas for a benefit and he nailed it in seconds with “Peace Of Mind”. I am not likely to improve on that.

Ricky is currently working on a new Tag Line, a photograph and is looking for an endorsement. I will share these next week.

This is great fun particularly as I become more and more aware of how significant it is to Ricky. Makes me push for excellence. I love it.

Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

follow my blog by clicking one of the links below

visit my site, www.pullbizbook.com

THE BIG BIZ SHOW

You may have noticed I’ve been silent for the last few weeks. Here’s why. After beach volleyball, basketball is clearly my favorite second sport. Approximately six weeks ago’ I caught an elbow across my face that broke my nose, gave me two very black eyes and required a bit of surgery. Ten days later, just when it seemed safe to go back on the court, I broke my left hand. It too required surgery to reassemble. While the nose thing did not affect my blog, the loss of my hand did. Yes, I am rethinking my basketball career. Happily, now I am back and with lots to share.

I frequently do guest appearances on radio and TV shows as an “expert” marketing guy. One of my favorite shows is the Big Biz Show, which is a West coast radio/TV simulcast that is broadcast across the US and select foreign countries. It airs daily from 12PM to 2PM. The show is hosted by Bob “Sully” Sullivan and Russ T. Nails, who cover the financial world with a humorous twist. It’s fun and frankly a great place for me to freely express my thoughts and experiences.

A couple of months back, the host Sully asked if I wanted to do anything special. My answer, almost without thinking was, “Let’s do a marketing makeover with a small business.” My thinking was that it will be fun, because I never get to work with small businesses, and I had the idea that if other small businesses could observe the process, we may well stimulate the economy, if only in a small way. Sully jumped all over it. We decided to launch it at the beginning of the year.

For the past three weeks we have been accepting applications from all over the United States. On Wednesday, with me in the studio, we will announce the winner and set the stage for the business transformation that will be covered over the next few months.

To add to the quality of the makeover, I have solicited the help of two very highly respected marketing experts that I frequently work with. They will serve as my coaches.

 My goal was to find a business that fit two criteria: A business owner and a business, both of which have a lot of character… I got lucky. Tomorrow we will introduce the world to Ricky Farmer the proud owner of a pet crematorium in Cleveland, Georgia. Ricky, is a “hoot”. It should be fun to follow.

You can follow Ricky’s marketing makeover on The Big Biz Show. To find out when it airs in your area, go to http://bigbizshow.com/.  We will also post the broadcasts on http://www.chambersmarketingcentral.com/  and I will share what is going on behind the scenes on this blog.

Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

follow my blog by clicking one of the links below

visit my site, www.pullbizbook.com

THE BIGGEST FRANCHISE EVER, FINALLY GETS IT RIGHT

Well, the biggest in many important contexts. This one may surprise you. First off, it is in the entertainment industry. When I say that, you may think of Star Wars, or Avatar, or Star Trek, or Cheers, or Friends, or any number of those high profile films or TV shows that seem to have run forever. If so you would not only miss it, you would miss the category. Over the years I have been involved in the entertainment category and have worked on many well-known brands. Some of the most impressive performers I know of have been in the video game category. Check it out.

Call of Duty, Black Ops was recently released by Activision and in its first twenty-four hours grossed $360 million. That’s one day. I am fairly confident, that this out-performed all other introductions and it is just getting started. To date, the franchise is well over three billion and is rapidly approaching four. As a marketer, I am very impressed. I am even more impressed that those who market it finally figured out that there is a more significant and meaningful way to position video games than what they have overused in the past.

If you talk to the gamers who have purchased Call of Duty’s past iterations, they will quote you its performance attributes.  All of the conversations that take place - and there are many among gamers - are always about the game’s features. If so, how do you elevate the conversation to something more meaningful? You do it by using its benefit.

The benefit is what the consumer gets out of using the product. This year BMW has introduced “Joy” as what its consumers get out of driving and owning BMW’s. You have no doubt heard George Zimmer at Men’s Warehouse saying, “You’re Going To Like The Way You Look.” That too is all about the consumer. If you get a chance to view the commercials running for Call to Glory, look close. The ultimate form of expressing a benefit in a selling proposition is to literally inject the consumer into the message. More important, inject the consumer experiencing the product in a way that is meaningful to them.

All humans are upwardly mobile and typically respond to experiences that they aspire to. In this commercial, unlike all others that have gone before in this category, we see a hardcore battle scene where the shooters are not military soldiers or super heroes. They are instead, secretaries, accountants, waiters, supermarket clerks and so on. Activision marketers were smart enough to put you and I into the action. Additionally, they used a couple of celebrities, but I promise you the celebrities are irrelevant in this sales message. In fact, I would have left them out and saved the money.

The learning here is familiar to those of you who have worked with me or read much of what I have written about positioning. Most of the selling propositions you and I encounter in life are missing any component of a benefit. Look at your sales message and change it to evolve around your consumer benefit, and you will be the one to benefit. If you think you already have done so, then develop a higher order benefit and change your message. Remember that all consumers want the same thing…to be happy. If you want to move to a higher order of benefit use something happier.


Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

follow my blog by clicking one of the links below

visit my site, www.pullbizbook.com

We all have to get old but we don’t have to get irrelevant.

You may have noticed, as I have, that as people get older they tend to slow down and become resistant to change. As they do so, they seem to become more and more irrelevant to those around them who have not slowed down, and to those who are younger. This is so pervasive that I say it qualifies as a fundamental law of human nature.

The nature of most clichés is that they are strongly rooted in truth. There is one I would challenge and it is, “Familiarity breeds contempt”. I say familiarity breeds complacency and in turn irrelevance on the part of the one you are becoming familiar with. This may have a lot to do with the rate of divorce these days, but that is not where I am headed.

Irrelevance is never good. I have a friend whose doctor has decided that owning a computer and using the Internet is just not something he needs to do. If I were a patient of his I could not but wonder if all other aspects of his life are governed the same way. That’s not a doctor I would choose because my perception is that he has become irrelevant…scary.

There are exceptions to this, of course. There are those who stay current and are typically found leading others into what we consider old age. I could name a few but I don’t want to tag them as old even though they are. By the way, I have also noticed that these relevant people are typically healthier than their irrelevant peers. Health alone may be incentive enough for you and I to work on maintaining our relevance.

Beyond maintaining good health, I have observed that simply maintaining one’s relevance may well be an access to becoming famous. There is a direct correlation between fame and older people who maintain their relevance. Think about that. My definition of fame is on a scale of worldwide recognition to that of recognition of any kind beyond the people you personally know. If you were the oldest person on the planet and were fully functional and participating in life fully, you would experience some level of fame. You would stand out from those around you.

More often than I should, I receive marketing assignments that are solely based on irrelevance. How you know you are irrelevant is that others no longer pay attention to you, or pay as much attention as they did when you were younger. In the world of marketing we measure relevance by “share of market.” So there is a significant value in asking yourself, is my product or service becoming irrelevant? If you are not in a constant inquiry to discover or invent what’s next for your product or service, the answer is likely YES.

You cannot control the fact that your product or service is aging but you are literally responsible for it not becoming irrelevant. Can you see that “Established in 1953”, or “Since 1953”, in this context is a killer. I get asked about adding that to sales messages now and then and it sends shivers up my back every time. There was a time when adding statements like that had value. Take it from me, that time is gone. If it returns, I will blog it.

During my career, I have been handed a significant number of assignments that were based on a period of marketing inaction that led to a diminished share of market. In the consumer goods marketing world, the awareness of this problem is frequently triggered when a retailer indicates that they are about to drop the product.

The single most effective and most economical way to grow your business is typically thought of as adding to your line of products or services. Nothing is further from the truth. By far, the most effective way is to simply upgrade your sales message (your selling proposition) on a regular basis. If every six months you change your sales message and in doing so add perceived value, you will drive your competition batty. You will constantly stimulate your current client base and encourage those who are not currently purchasing your product or service to do so.

The learning here is that it’s ok to savor success in your personal and business pursuits. It is wise, however, to begin an inquiry into what’s next in both, well before it becomes obvious that it is needed.

Cheers, 

Keith Chambers

Keynote Marketing Speaker
Creative Marketing Consultant
(310) 473-0010
www.chambersgroup.com

follow my blog by clicking one of the links below

visit my site, www.pullbizbook.com