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Seth Godin offered a crucial reminder in his blog yesterday.
Marketers make overkill a habit.
Desparate to generate incremental sales, they add, add, add.
More special offers. More rewards. More messages. More links. More banner ads. More, more, more.
But, he warns, "Once you overload the user, you train them not to pay attention."
"More" doesn't spur sales. It kills them.
That's especially the case when it comes to copy.
Overkill kills.
In a recent conversation with Blogworld founder Rick Calvert, I mentioned the tribe of critics who insist that access to live events like his should be free.
Rick responded, "Yeah, the 'hippies.'"
Free access to content, a founding principle of the Web's early developers, is soon to go the way of Flower Power. (You can learn why from two terrific articles on the topic, one in Atlantic Monthly, the other in Wired.)
Since babyhood, the Web has been captive to this principle. It was "digitally correct" to provide content free; boorish to ask dough for it.
But with the ascent of mobile apps, the model is about to flip.
We're soon to see most Web content become subscription-based. And the subscriptions will be pricey, to boot.
Capitalist pigs, one. Hippies, nothing.
It was nice while it lasted.
Here's a news flash.
The Mighty Copywriter has become the nation’s first independent copywriting firm to provide clients ReadSmart®.
ReadSmart® blends IT with neuroscience and applies its formula to marketing.
The technology is a copywriter’s dream come true.
ReadSmart® makes thousands of minor adjustments to copy that result in more memorable messages. It can be applied to direct mail, collateral, books and other documents to boost comprehension, retention and response.
ReadSmart® increases reading comprehension by 24 percent; reading speed by 23 percent; reading enjoyment by 38 percent; and—best of all—persuasiveness by 39 percent.
You still need me to write the copy, however. So I'm not worried about being replaced by a computer.
Yet.
Ubiquitous marketing guru David Meerman Scott, author of 2007's instant classic, The New Rules of Marketing and PR, has hit it out of the ballpark again with his smart new book, Real-Time Marketing and PR.
I cannot say enough praiseworthy things about Scott's 200-page treatise.
In it, he makes an iron-clad case for why today's marketers—if they want a fighting chance of staying competitive—have to go real-time.
"Scale and media buying power are no longer a decisive advantage," he writes in the opening chapter. "What counts today is speed and agility." (If we were taking things a tad slower and checking grammar, that last sentence would read, "What count today are speed and agility." But I nitpick.)
Readers will find much more in Real-Time Marketing and PR than clever arguments favoring the wider use of social media.
Between the covers are important lessons in how to:
- Profit from the public's curiousity
- Grab more mainstream media attention
- Interact with customers the way they want you to
- Engage friends and enemies—and win the hearts of both
- Analyze your online reputation
- Tap the "wisdom of crowds"
- Come out ahead after a "PR crisis"
- Transform your organization, so it can begin marketing in real-time
Much of the advice in Scott's book is anathema to die-hard fans of strategic planning, risk management, and command and control.
That doesn't make the advice wrong-headed. In fact, the many examples of real-time marketing successes—and blunders—Scott offers should convince you he's onto something.
We mustn't let overplanning, caution and bureaucracy stand in the way of connecting. "We need to unlearn what we've learned in the last half century about communication,' Scott writes.
Pick up Real-Time Marketing and PR. Let the unlearning begin.
Twice in a two-week span, I've witnessed a conference producer slight Canadians in the course of introducing the keynote speaker.
First incident. The conference producer said, "Our keynote speaker has a strange last name. But, then, he's Canadian."
Second incident. The conference producer said, "I want to thank a first-time sponsor. They come from Montreal. Their participation today proves even Canadians can be innovative."
Do both these guys share the same public-speaking coach? What does the coach have against Canadians?
