Marketing

The QR Code Menu And Covid-19

Peter · October 25, 2020 · 15 Comments

Digital Acceleration Baby: The QR Code Menu And Covid-19

This post is about the increasingly ubiquitous QR Code menu as an indicator of digital acceleration in the time of Covid-19. There are few things I personally dislike more than mobile phone usage at the table. However, your mobile is now a critical element in the restaurant experience.

First, a bit of Nike. A few years ago I had a really depressing meeting with my long-term client Nike about the use of a graphical QR code on their worldwide packaging. I gave Nike a very doable idea about what I absolutely knew was a brilliant, low cost, and potentially powerful global marketing mobile experience. Simply embed a QR code into every Swoosh logo on every box that found its way into every house in every country. Turn every dumb box into in-house 24/7 mobile marketing. Bring Jordan into the home.

Yes, QR codes can be graphical. The digital watermark QR code idea was developed by Digimark, another agency client. The idea was to replace the funky black and white code with an interactive logo, picture, or word. I am talking about having an interactive Swoosh mobile marketing tool hand-carried into millions of homes. Easy, cheap, doable. And why the fuck not? Did Nike buy this idea? No. They just stared at me – “Why would we want to send a digital experience into homes vs. our current “dumb, do nothing paper box?’ I was like. “Are you kidding me?” That was the day I decided after giving really smart ideas to clients over my 30-year global advertising career, including winning programs that delivered lots of EFFIES, that I was done with owning an agency. Frankly, it felt like pearls before swine. Am I being harsh? Sure. Read all about the experience and see the Nike presentation here:

Nike Made Me Sell My Advertising Agency.

The QR Code Menu As Indicator

I first noticed the use of QR codes in Tokyo in the early 2000s. I was standing on a street corner in Shibuya and saw some teens pointing their phones up at a QR code on an outdoor board. I went over and saw that their aiming triggered a digital experience appearing on their phones. Whoa!!!

I said, we gotta have some of that.

Cut to like 8 years later and my advertising / digital agency started working with the tech leader Digimarc which owned the patents for digital watermarking. That is how I came to the idea of creating an interactive “smart box”.

Restaurants. Way back in 2018 there were over 600,000 restaurants and 54,000 hotel properties in the USA. All of these businesses are barely touching the opportunities embedded in mobile marketing.

Why just a menu? Digital check-in? Why not more remarketing? Diner or guest data? And, on.

Covid-19 As Accelerant

Cut to 2020. What more can be done?. Covid-19 is acting as a digital accelerant. More people are buying online, ordering food delivery, communicating with brands online, and now using their phones to read a digital menu. We are studying more online and getting digital healthcare, using exercise apps, ordering in.

Less touching and breathing all around.

As more and more people of all ages are becoming even more slavish to their Androids and iPhones… shouldn’t we be seeing more and more uses of the handy mobile code as a marketing tool?

Side note. China, as an example of the future, has gone like 100% mobile. You even scan and pay by phone for the low-cost bao bun on Shanghai’s food street Fangbang Road. We, MAGA focussed Americans, will get there sooner or later.

Your Digital Agency & The Code, And Big Ideas: GO!

OK folks. Your agency should always be looking for new ideas to excite your clients. What can you do with THE CODE?

Advertising, mobile events, packaging, in-store, on the street… For Burger King or your local pizza chain?

Should I send this blog post to Nike? Adidas, Amazon, any brand with a box at a time when in-store interactions are down?

OH!!!! Maybe your agency should!!!

How To Build An In House Agency

Peter · September 18, 2020 · Leave a Comment

The market vibration is that there is a growing use of the in house agency. To be more specific, this is an in house “advertising agency” since what is brought inside are one or more of what I’ll call “advertising services” that include strategy development; digital marketing; PR; ‘traditional advertising”; media planning, and buying and, most common, high-volume and fast-paced content development.

There are many reasons for a company to bring some or all marketing services inside by creating an in house agency. That said, there is no one size fits all and it ain’t easy folks.

The rather experienced Steven Morvay, he’s held senior positions as both an agency president at Saatchi & Saatchi Direct and senior marketing positions at Borders and HBO, gets both sides of the in house agency equation. Take a listen. This is a smart discussion. Yes, I said that.

[buzzsprout episode=’5489257′ player=’true’]

The In House Agency – The Why Do It?

I am going to go deeper into the growth of the in house agency and its efficacy and issues. But for now, here is a revealing chart from the Association Of National Advertisers and eMarketer about the primary benefits of creating the in house agency. Yes, it is often mucho about saving some bucks.

…..

Show Notes.

Steven Morvay on LinkedIn.

YO – Hypnotism coming.

Remember to subscribe to Advertising Stories. Remember to subscribe to Advertising Stories. Remember to subscribe.

A nice thing for me… Feedspot has recognized Advertising Stories as being a top 15 advertising podcast.

Is Your Advertising Agency Famous And Unignorable

Peter · August 24, 2020 · Leave a Comment

My friend Michael Moszynski, Founder and CEO of London’s global advertising agency LONDON Advertising, recently sent me an agency Press Release with the headline: “LONDON Advertising ad campaign sees its awareness surge an impressive 50% and overtake Adam & Eve in Populus poll.” I’d say that LONDON Advertising is able to say “yes” to the question… “Is Your Advertising Agency Famous And Unignorable.’

LONDON Advertising got to fame and unignorability by running a real broad awareness advertising campaign for the agency (and working on being famous for years). Yes, you heard me right. They actually used real (LOL) advertising to up their image and awareness in the UK. I’ve written about this campaign here: Does Your Advertising Agency Advertise Itself?

Help You Getting Your Advertising Agency Famous And Unignorable

#1. How did LONDON do it? Read their PR and think about your agency

Here is a quote from the press release (gotta love that England still has Lords)…

In a Populus poll of awareness of UK ad agencies among over 2,000 members of the public, LONDON Advertising demonstrated the power of its ad TV and Outdoor campaign to promote its own brand with an outstanding set of results.

Lord Cooper, Founding Partner of Populus, said:

“Amongst the public, brand awareness of LONDON Advertising rose by an impressive 50% in just a month. LONDON Advertising is now 6 times more well-known than highly established agencies like VCCP. The increase in awareness of LONDON Advertising was the only statistically significant change in the month between our two polls, so their campaign clearly cut through. Among the critical sub-group of consumer opinion influencers, LONDON Advertising now has the highest awareness of any of the agencies covered in the poll, at 27% – its campaign taking it past Adam &Eve.”

Here is the press release sweetly shouting about LONDON. Results of LONDON Advertising advertising campaign

#2. How do y’all get to famous?

Quick story. A while ago I moved to London to work at the original Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising Worldwide on Charlotte Street. I quickly found out how famous Saatchi was when I got in a cab and told the driver the address. He said, “Oh, you are going to Saatchis.” From then on I’d just say that I was going to Saatchi. If you said your agency name to an Uber driver (let’s pretend she does not have the app for a second) would she know YOUR address?

OK. How to get to famous? Three “simple” but, ya know, like, important things.

Make being famous and unignorable an objective. A second on the idea of being unignorable… Imagine the alternative?
Is your advertising, digital, social, PR or whatever agency marketing designed to be famous and unignorable?
Show the world that you are (!) unignorable. Shout it. This is precisely how Maurice and Charles Saatchi did it. They made damn sure that the world thought that Saatchi & Saatchi was famous. This was an objective. This was LONDON’s freakin objective, too.

Oh, while you are at it, how about your personal brand? Are you famous? Did you see the video on my Home Page? For some of you… yes, I ripped off the name association idea from the great conceptual artist Chris Burden. Steal like an artist.

Need more fame???? Contact me.

Free Ten Point Advertising Agency Assessment

Peter · August 20, 2020 · Leave a Comment

Here Is Freebie Just For You: My Ten Point Advertising Agency Assessment

How is your advertising, digital, social media, PR agency doing? When I owned my Portland advertising & digital agency it was hard for me to tell how I stacked up vs. other agencies. As my friend Jon of Portland’s The Good, a conversion rate optimization consultancy, said on our recent podcast interview,

“It is hard to read the label from inside the jar.”

So, to help you, I am offering, for a limited time (true) a ten point advertising agency assessment. FYI, when I owned my own agency, I took all of the advice I could get. Even when I ran business development at Saatchi & Saatchi, I wanted third-party opinions and advice.

So, Why Offer An Advertising Agency Assessment – For Free?

If you work at an agency or in marketing, you know that making a high-value offer is usually a productive lead generation marketing tool. As part of my own marketing (side note, I practice what I preach) I am running a google PPC campaign that targets advertising agency leadership. Here is my ad agency leader offer landing page (it should at least be instructive as a look as my marketing). As I have often pointed out… this is a Corleone offer. It should not be refused. If you run an agency, go for it.

The offer is driving some incoming interest for my services at a time that many advertising agencies should be reevaluating their agency business and marketing plans. Right?

Levitan’s Ten Point Advertising Agency Assessment & Check-Up

This advertising agency assessment is based on my forever years of experience running major accounts and business development at Saatchi & Saatchi; CEO of two Internet start-ups; my own advertising agency and this business development consultancy. I have worked with dozens of agencies. I have seen what they look like from outside the jar.

Here are the ten points I will assess just for you:

Your business plan: How hard do you look at and possibly adjust your business plan? How will you generate maximum revenues and profits in our strange 2020? Do you make adjustments? Do you understand your Total Addressable Market (TAM)?
Your advertising agency positioning: This is a tough and hard look at your primary brand proposition. You can read about my general perspective on the value of a kick-ass positioning on this website.
Your 8-second website: This is probably one of the first ways that anyone sees your agency. How do your ranks vs. your competition? What do you say that will get me to pay attention in my 8-second look-see. In many cases, you only have around eight seconds to make me look at you and stick around vs. the other 3,999 advertising, digital, etc. agency websites that are screaming for attention. Here is my blog post about the Best Advertising Agency Websites.
Your business development plan and activity: How have you managed your plan over the past year? My whole blog of close to 800 blog posts discusses how you should market your agency.
Your outbound, account-based marketing: I’ll just ask you… you do this right? If, so, how?
Your social media activity and authority: Are you an active blogger, thought leader, podcaster? How do you look on LinkedIn; Twitter; YouTube; Instagram; and ae you a category leader? What do your stats tell you?
Your client list: How does your client list look to an outsider? Do one or two clients account for too high a percentage of your revenues? Do you know how to position your client list for business development?
Your intellectual property: Do you have any IP? Something that will differentiate and add sustainable value to your agency? You can do this. I know how to make this happen – efficiently.
Your ‘findable’ quotient: Can I find your advertising agency if I do a search for you? You should be everywhere I might search for you (your competition will probably be there)Yes, I have written about this.
Your creative vibe: Yes, clients have brought their marketing inhouse. It is easy. For example, just get some social media type folks to do the work. But, but, most inhouse client resources suck at being creative thinkers and doers. How does your creativity stack up and how do you prove it?

That’s It, Folks

If you need my educated third-party, very honest, no bull shit assessment… go for it. This is a limited time offer. Give me a shout.

OK, One More. Have you listened to the smart and entertaining Advertising Stories podcast?

Instant Social Media Content For Your Brand And Advertising Agency

Peter · June 16, 2020 · Leave a Comment

I’ve updated this blog post about, well, I’ll repeat the title for you, and especially Google. Instant Social Media Content For Your Brand And Advertising Agency.

OK, I admit it, there is no totally instant social media content. But, there is fast. In fact, fast and good. In fact, there really is fast + good + cheap. Which, as you might suspect, will make a brand and any advertising agency very happy.

I have used a few different methods to accelerate the generation of my more than 700 blog posts. Try a few of these on for size.

TikTok

I am going to write about TikTok in detail in the very near future. TikTok which, given its size and growth, is the most underutilized advertising agency business development social media platform. Hmmm. Why?

Here is what I think. Some possible agency excuses not to use TikTok…

TikTok is too young.
Too international.
Too new. As in, why should I bother? Um, remember when you didn’t use Instagram?
None of my clients have asked about it.
Worse… I do not have a TikTok account.

Interviews

Interviewing an expert, or even a consumer in your client’s or client industry or target market can take as few as 5 minutes up to say 45. A 45-minute interview will deliver approximately 8,000 words that you could cut up into 4 2,000 word blog entries or whatever you like to do with social media content, ur, I mean highly valuable insights. My book on presenting and pitching has multi interviews that I also amplified into blog posts. You bought the book so you’ve read those interviews and will now win more pitches – right?

I was recently interviewed for the Working Without Pants podcast. After Selling Your Agency, was published, I sent it to Rev.com and now have an 8,000-word transcript I will soon edit down into bite-sized blog posts. One will be a foundational blog post on how and why to sell your agency.

Do Videos

Easy… just turn on your webcam (or iPhone) and talk. I mean, you are an advertising agency, right? You can do this and start to own some SEO juice on YouTube. Less easy, but easy enough ideas: Go on the street and do some interviews (social distance yourself, please) or do a webcam interview with a genius (remember you can turn that into copy via an audio transcription company like REV.com.)

Rip Off A Podcast

Here’s a post I created by responding to the Adage interview with Lindsay Slaby. I took the interview, sent it to rev.com for transcription, and commented on what Lindsay was saying. Easy, smart, and brilliant. All around. Here is the blog post that was created by borrowing some content from Ad Age, Ad Age Small Agency Conference Podcast.

Do Your Own Podcast

I have a new Advertising Stories podcast. I interview people. They talk to me. I, well do not steal, but I do get lots of smarts out of their mouths. Plus, the entire process is essentially free.