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Digital Experts - Understanding the Shift

Yesterday, while my six-year-old was at school, my four-year-old logged onto her brother’s Webkins account, and cleaned him out.  She spent all his Kinzcash on shoes and dresses which she emailed to her Webkin as presents from her brother.  So tonight, the Mosteller family is having a discussion about digital identity theft.  With our children.  Who are FOUR and SIX years old.

It may or may not seem odd to y’all, being blog readers, that I pretty much daily find myself interacting with folks who either don’t quite understand, or don’t quite believe the magnitude of the shift from traditional forms of interaction to digital forms.  Sure, every ad agency on the planet understands dollars and people are shifting to digital in gigantic buckets.  But there’s an underlying sense you can feel in a lot of places that says, “Ok, so digital is going to be another, very important deal for us – maybe equal to tv – maybe even a bit bigger, etc.” 

That’s misunderstanding the shift.  On a very big scale.

We gravitate toward the media we’re most familiar with.  There’s an acknowledged understanding that those who grew up on tv understand tv, and those who grew up with the web understand the web better than others.  That’s simplistic, but a common take, and I regularly hope to prove an exception, but that’s another discussion. 

What’s not as widely acknowledged, however, is just how important digital communication will be to those who not only grew up with it, but who grew up preferring it – or using it almost exclusively.  There is a truly profound shift ahead of us.

If you, your clients, or your agency are having trouble grasping the significance of the Mosteller Family Meeting tonight, I can help arrange a conference call with two expert consultants.  But please book early.  They go to bed promptly at 7:30.

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Buckets. A simple illustration.

Which one is best?

I just gave a talk about emerging media to one of our clients, and I used empty paint cans to make two points.

First point:  It's impossible to know which can is the best until you know what's inside.  Content is everything.  So when an advertiser (or an agency) wonders:  "Should we do a microsite, or a banner campaign, or should we try to use Facebook fliers, or is there a way to deliver video on mobile?"  they're missing the point.  Entirely.  People don't forward a YouTube video to all their friends.  People forward a YouTube video that's so funny it made them pee in their pants to all their friends.  Content is what matters.

Second point:  I asked the room to vote on their favorite beverage.  They unanimously agreed on champagne.  Then I asked them to come up with a "safe" beverage.  They settled on milk.  I, personally, like Diet Dr. Pepper.  So I "filled" one can with champagne, one with milk, and one with DDP.  Then I asked them which can they wanted.  They, of course, wanted the one with the champagne.  So I immediately did what most advertisers do -- I gave them the bucket full of Dr. Pepper.  It's not about what you want to say.  It's about what your prospects want to hear.

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Time Wasters.

One of the biggest ones - dealing with spam.

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Rigging the results

They don't really want to know what you really think.  Not really. They want you to say you were "very satisfied."  So the number of people who say they're "very satisfied" goes up.

Makes for great ad copy.  Makes great support for a local manager's raise request.  Which is why I cropped her contact info. It's one thing to go trolling for faulty numbers.  It's another thing altogether to place so little confidence in the intelligence of your customers that you'll be this blatant about it.

Here's a thought: Nix the free week.  Spend that money on actually improving the experience.

All in all, it was an ok place.  Not a palace, not a dump  -- it was exactly what we needed.  The kids loved it - especially the lazy river pool.  I got frustrated with intermittent wireless, but hey, that's just me.  I'll say I'm very thankful to my mom and dad for trading one of their weeks somewhere else to give us a vacation.  But I probably won't select "very satisfied" in every category.

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Digital is not a discipline.

The following is a post I wrote for the BB Digital Blog, Survival Guide.  Some good stuff being posted there by senior staffers. Check it out here.  Here's what I wrote:

Digital is not a discipline.

That probably seems like a weird thing for an Interactive Creative Director to say, but truth is, it’s not.  Not a single discipline, anyway.  At least, not when you look at the way the people use digital things.

It might be easy to look at digital as a discipline because there has traditionally been a relatively definable group of people who know how to make digital stuff.  And, truth told, until a few years ago, there was a relatively definable group of people who even knew how to use digital stuff.  But in today’s agency, and in today’s world, both of those groups have exploded in size, and neither is as definable anymore.  The users have become, – to one degree or another – everyone you’d ever want or need to advertise to.  The makers, too, now come with increasingly diverse backgrounds, and almost none of us wear pocket protectors or exist solely on Red Bull.  Yet, more often than not, I still hear digital addressed as a single discipline.  As in, “Ok, we have the concept now, how do we do this in digital?” Unfortunately, that can trip you up. 

Because a website isn’t like a mobi site, and a mobi site isn’t like a banner ad, and none of that is an embedded video, which isn’t a flash game or an SMS, and that’s just getting started.  Heck, almost never is this website like that website.  And I’m not simply talking design. The key to it all is in the last sentence of my first paragraph.  You have to look at the way people use different digital things to determine what the discipline actually is – for that particular thing. At that particular moment.  For that particular user.

It’s always about the user.  And the user uses a digital thing differently, depending on how, when, and why she’s using it. Sometimes, people go to a site for pure information.  Sometimes, for entertainment.  Sometimes to buy, sometimes to compare, sometimes to communicate with friends, and lots and lots of times, they just happen to find you when they’re looking for something kind of related to what you do.  Users don’t take a one-size-fits-all approach to the way they use things online.  And here, websites are only an example.  Online advertising is different, still.  Targeting the mindset of the user at a given moment is key – not simply targeting a demographic.  That goes for creative, as well as placement.  Mobile is, again, different. Different reasons for users to use it, different interface, and a completely different mindset, depending on whom, exactly, you want to get your message to, and how they happen to be using their phone when you want to deliver that message.

Digital encompasses conceptual thinking, design, and development. Pretty much everyone in the business knows that much.  But, truly, that’s the tip of the iceberg.  It can also mean using filmmaking skills, game theory, pure storytelling – even things as diverse as crowd control, or the social skills you might find useful at a cocktail party.   In short, digital uses all the same disciplines any form of communications might use.  Plus some that are unique – not just to digital – but unique, even, to different types of digital projects.   

If digital is anything, it’s a landscape.  A broad, diverse landscape that includes lots of different environments.  To traverse it, you’ll need two things:  (A) One or more of a gazillion different vehicles; and, (B) probably most important: A really good guide.

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Vacation

Just back from Myrtle Beach, and here on my last day of vacation, I thought I'd toss out a few observations I made while on the trip.

1. I'm positive the early pioneers did not travel with two young children in car seats behind them in the covered wagon.  If they had, there would be no one living in California, because they'd all still be on the way there.  Children in car seats on car rides = (estimated trip time) X 150.

2. One hundred twenty (120) items is the current standard to qualify as a respectable Myrtle Beach buffet.  Anything less than that, and even having a live mermaid or wait staff in pirate suits won't save you.  Count condiments if you must, but get to that critical 120 number.

3. Buffet or pancake house.  Your choice.  Period.

4. Think about the signs you put on the door of your business.  On a Charleston convenience store:  "No Concealed Weapons Allowed."  Presumably, then, walking in with a shotgun is ok.

5. There is no limit to themes for mini golf.  But the two most popular pretty much always have something to do with pirates or dinosaurs.

6. Skee Ball should be televised, like bowling, IMHO.

7. I will always love uber-touristy places, especially of the old-school variety.  It has everything to do with growing up in a place where buildings are shaped like oranges, and a great day on the beach always includes spin art.  It's in my blood.

Ok, back to work.

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Summer

It's Labor Day.  Last day of summer.  Except, not really.  But you knew that.  The last day of summer, really, is in a few weeks.  Some years, it's the 23.  Some years, the 22.

All around me, though, the signs that summer is over are manifesting.  The kids start school tomorrow.  The Dawgs played their first game Saturday (a fine 35-14 showing against a tougher-than-usual first game opponent, Oklahoma State.) Pools are closing.  Summer Fridays are done. Etc.

Except, I'm not ready.  Truth is, I'm never really ready for summer to be over.  Guess that's because I grew up where it never really was.  Ok, I grew up far enough north in Florida that I had a winter coat.  Used it, too.  And my parents have a fireplace.  Anything below 50 degrees, and it might be just cause.  But I never really saw leaves turn until I went to college in Athens.  Never saw snow fall until then, either.  And growing up, I never stopped sweating or going to the beach until well after Halloween -- so, forgive me if I'm not quite ready to call summer over on Labor Day.

If summer is vacation, then it's definitely not over.  Hasn't started yet, to tell the truth.  We've been so slammed all summer, I've barely had weekends.  One summer Friday, I think.  But I probably worked that Saturday, so, never mind.  Because of that, next week, we're yanking the kids, and going to the beach.  Ought to be quiet, what with summer over, and all.

So I've got the scientific evidence.  And I've got my own gut.  There's a problem, though: For everyone else, summer is over.

Here's the advertising point:  Lots and lots of ads (and sites, and spots, and campaigns, and PR initiatives, etc., etc.,) are created based upon my current personal mindset about summer.  You believe X.  The facts say X.  But everybody else -- the market -- believes Y.   Base your message on X, and you're almost guaranteed to fail.  But how many times have you done it?  Or seen it done? 

Opinions, of course, can be changed.  Over time.  With a ton of effort. And money. And some campaigns are designed to do that.  But the catch is, you have to start from Y.  No matter how much you know X is the real truth.  Because it's not.  The real truth is, Summer is over.

 

 

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Tennis

My kids want to learn tennis.  Jackson is getting better on the return wall.  Georgia is still a bit young to grasp the whole concept, but she does have a Dora tennis racquet.  I'm happy to teach them anything I know.  Tennis is one of the few sports I didn't suck at when I was younger (baseball, surfing, water skiing, sailing, shooting stuff, and tennis.  I can't throw a football across a room.)  So we were at the return wall last night.

And now, knowing I can, in fact, give limited tennis instruction, my wife wants some tips.  So I watched her hit a few forehands off the wall, and noticed that her technique is constructed -- incredibly -- just like a lot of advertising campaigns.

Her first stroke is strong and confident.   But she's not prepared for the second.  Or the third.  And those strokes are taken with her arm only -  no follow-through - and they frequently get the ball squirrelly.  There's rarely a fourth stroke, because the ball, by then, has become unplayable.

Like I said -- like a lot of campaigns.

Frequently, ideas come hard out of the box.  And just as frequently, there's not enough preparation for what's going to happen when the ball gets returned.  So instead of a second or third or fourth power stroke, agencies and clients find themselves back on their heels, swinging without follow-through.  And wondering why the whole thing gets squirrelly.

A great idea is the foundation for all great advertising.  But in today's world, advertising (and by that, I mean any form of communication with your market) is almost never a one-shot deal.  It's a two-way conversation now.  Which means one great idea is never enough.  It's also not enough to simply plan all your great ideas before you start, and execute without judging how that first idea was received, and how that ball has been returned.

Know the fundamentals.  Plan potential moves, but be ready to change those plans.  Stay on your toes, so you can move when the ball doesn't come back to where you thought it was going to.  Know the fundamentals.  You can't say that enough.  Get into position fast.  Because the second and third swings are just as important as the first.

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