Thanks to my friend Peter Frings for pointing out this one …
I’m going to an exhibition in London tomorrow called mediapro, whose website headline is ‘the future of integrated communications’. Not sure it believes its own copy though. First it says that “integrated marketing communications is finally at the tipping point of becoming a realistic ambition” – so, erm, not quite with us yet then? And then it admits that the exhibition is “divided into four sub-events”.
You’ve not really grasped this one chaps, have you? Do let me know if I can help …
Interesting to see how some retailers are starting to experiment with foursquare (the people who made the news recently with their concept of becoming the ‘mayor’ of a location by checking in the most often). It’s still too clunky though. Apart from having the software on your mobile phone (which means having the right kind of phone in the first place), you still have to log in to the programme, and then ‘check in’ to the location. And whilst the GPS on your phone might narrow things down a little, it seems to me it’s neither quick nor seamless.
What you could do is create a unique QR code for point of sale material in each of the locations. Bingo – point your camera at the QR code, and it will log in and check in as a single process. Job done. Well, assuming you have the right kind of mobile device …
picture: centralasian
In the last stages of building a supporter database for a fundraising client. The platform is internet-based software-as-a-service (SaaS), so the infrastructure cost is tiny, there’s no hardware. Almost all of the value is in the intellectual property – the way it’s built, the user guide, the thinking and experience that informs it, and the programming ability to make it work.
Another project for a financial servcies organisation provides an online collaboration tool for viewing and approving proofs. The cost of the software (again it’s SaaS) is just a few hundred dollars a year; for this client the real value lies in i) finding it for them and showing them how it works so much better than their current process, and ii) tailoring the implementation for their own situation.
It’s not long ago that the total cost for these projects would have been a multiple of the purchase cost of some expensive software. Now it’s the cost of some very specific intellectual property. For the client, the value is in those parts of the project that make it work in their own office, now, with as little risk as possible, and negligible long-term financial commitment.
It’s a very different mind-set, both for the client, and for the service provider.
Picture: James Cridland
Just added a new case study to the Neon Nelly website. We’re working with SolarAid and their agency Whitewater on a new approach to donor retention. Our part of this has been to provide the personalised URLs and landing pages, and we’ve used this as the base for developing a whole new way of reporting that brings together online and offline responses at a personal level. Powerful stuff.
Picture: SolarAid blog
OK, so there might be a better name for this, but …
One of the big challenges for marketers who want to understand and drive integrated marketing activity, is how to join up offline and online response analysis. Both sets of reports can be detailed and illuminating. Generally though it’s incredibly difficult to work out where the overlap is. You know that 4.35% of your mailing responded, and you know who they are. You know that you had 47.3% more hits on your website in the days after the mailing landed, and you know an awful lot about what they did on your site. If only you could join the two sets of information …
… then you could really tell the incremental impact of your offline marketing; you could prove the difference it makes to use on- and off-line communications together in the same campaign; you could link directly to the call centre for more meaningful follow-up …
After a bit of thinking and a lot of testing, it turns out that you can do this. And you can do it without having to spend a lot of money for fancy tracking tools. In fact, the technology is all out there, open source, free. All you have to do is use it. I’m showing this to clients now, and it’s really exciting.
Now all I have to do is think of a clever name for it.
Picture: IBM events