Read on Twitter
I have this list in the notes in my phone of random thoughts about marketing that I keep for blog posts, talks, wittty Tweets, etc. but let’s be honest, I’m never going to do anything with them. So I’m going to give them away.
It turns out there are 36 of them. I am turning 35 this week, so over the next few days I am going to Tweet out 35 of them in the order they appear on my phone and keep one for myself to work on this year.
I’m sure a lot of these ideas are stolen from people smarter than me, so apologies in advance.
1. The goal of every marketing campaign should be 100% conversion. If you don’t get that, you’ve messed up somewhere.
2. Why people didn’t convert, ranked: 1) Targeting. 2) Timing. 3) Channel. 4) Content. 5) U/X and design.
3. If you ask people what they want, they will lie to you. The answers you get are aspirational to the person they wish they were, not truthful about who they are in that moment.
4. Display ads are the Donal Trump of marketing. In fact, display ads are the main reason we GOT a President Trump.
5. We spend a lot of time nit picking designs, but a lot less time thinking about that first two-second impression that will draw a person into your ad. THAT is the real design challenge. To engage at the 2-second level AND the one-minute level.
6. People lie to you when you ask them what they want, your data lies to you about what people actually did, but in every lie there is a kernel of truth that the smartest people can extract.
7. Optimization can be a really great way for your audience to self-select. The problem is you are almost always optimizing to the wrong group. If you want long term customers you shouldn’t optimize for short term revenue
8. If you have to sell sex you’ve ran out of things to sell.
9. Measuring opens < measuring clicks < measuring conversions < measuring email revenue < measuring campaign revenue < measuring lifetime customer value
10. ROI is almost always measured on too short of a time frame. Don’t scrap something good because it doesn’t affect the first quarter of revenue.
11. Economics and marketing have a lot more in common than most marketers think. 3 important things for marketing: 1) opportunity cost, 2) competitive advantage (where your channel mix is essentially a trade policy), 3) tragedy of the commons
12. Utility is a standard economic measure of how much positive ju ju a person gets for making a particular decision, which can be measured against the cost of that decision. That is, in essence, the "value prop" that content strategists always talk about.
13. Opportunity cost: Every action, idea or strategy keeps you from doing something else. So even net-positive ROI actions can cost you money by preventing you from doing something even more valuable. "What could we be doing instead?" "What future actions does this prevent?"
14. Competitive advantage: Figure out what you are best at, and do more of that. Do less of the things you are less good at. Basically, play to your strengths. Every brand does not need an Instagram account.
15. The amount of time it takes a person to make a purchase is part of the total cost of the item. Same for the complexity. Time and cognitive load are implicit costs.
16. Hot Take: Amazon kinda sucks at a bunch of eCommerce stuff, but they make up for it with scale.
17. Marketing budgets are a backwards idea. If you don't spend as much as you can until you don't make your intended ROI you are just leaving money on the table.
18. That being said, you could probably cut your marketing budget in half and still make 80% of the money you do now.
19. A great way to learn empathy is to build personas. You are literally putting yourself in other people's situation and trying to understand what they are going through. I think we should teach that in schools. And to cops. And to politicians.
20. When someone is really connected to a brand, they don't care about small typos or little design flaws.
21. It's sometimes easier to make something 10x better than to make it 10% better.
22. There are no bad brainstorms, just bad brainstorm leaders.
23. Dogs are the new "sexy women" of advertising. AKA what lazy agencies fall back on when they run out of ideas.
24. "Is there data to support that" is really just a way for someone to say they don't agree with you.
25. Meetings are a great way to look busy without actually doing anything.
26. There is a big difference between breaking with best practice, and breaking best practice without knowing it.
27. Data that is over six months old is almost worse than having no data at all.
28. Random career advice: try to make your boss look good to their boss.
29. Using too many acronyms and buzzwords doesn't make you look smarter to your audience.
30. Big changes = big wins. Small changes = small wins.
31. Whenever I get stuck, I reach for the Seinfeld approach: how would I get my audience to do the opposite of what I want. It's a fun way to break out of a rut. Good for brainstorms too!
32. Assumptions need to be re-tested every couple of years. Especially if they are core to a business. Content preferences, timing and channels all shift very quickly.
33. Trust is absolutely the biggest thing a marketer can have with their audience. Never burn that bridge.
34. Selling in ideas to stakeholders is just as important of a skill as selling to customers.
35. You can't be the hero of your own story. The customer doesn't care about you. They care about themselves.
Phew! That's it. Now back to tweets about dogs and baseball. Thanks for following along.
one more for turning 36: how to be good at strategy
1) Find out what your audience wants
2) Give it to them.
It's as easy as that!
1) Find out what your audience wants
2) Give it to them.
It's as easy as that!
Another year, another tweet.
37. Create a strong ethical backbone to your marketing that matches your brand values, then don't do anything that would compromise those ethics.
37. Create a strong ethical backbone to your marketing that matches your brand values, then don't do anything that would compromise those ethics.
