Ads Don’t Trick You, You Trick You

Advertising is constantly accused of employing trickery. In some cases there is a true bait and switch, but  people forget that they are the interpreters of media. Ads are there to sell you things. You are the critical thinker in this relationship.

I play a trick on myself occasionally that I learned from Penelope Trunk. Instead of telling myself I am going to the gym after work, I say I will drive around the block instead of  turning toward my apartment. Then I tell myself I will drive past the gym but won’t go inside. But I always make the right turn into the gym parking lot. 

Once I’m there, I have to go inside to validate my parking and get out. But if I’m going to walk up the stairs to the parking self-serve, I am damn well going to exercise.

I do this because it’s easier to commit to driving two blocks out of my way than to an hour of grueling cardio.

Ads “mislead” you in the same way. They tell you that to lose weight, get shiny hair or find love, you must only commit to buying their product. What they don’t say is that all weight loss is hard work, some hair is too damaged and some people are not great at social interaction. That’s the reality of life.

Are they lying to you? Not necessarily. Bowflex can make you thinner if you use it often and properly. Pantene can shine up your hair if you haven’t fried it. Lavalife can set you up if you are attractive and charming to your prospective dates. But it all begins with the little commitment: buying the product.

Telling you these things can happen is not a lie. The truth of life is that nothing worthwhile is easy. 

You are the critical thinker here. You can say, hey, if I bought a Bowflex it would just sit in my house holding my laundry. Or you can buy the Bowflex and tell yourself you’re just going to go sit on it, but end up exercising.

Or you can buy the Bowflex, hang your laundry, and then blame the company for “misleading” you. You went to the gym, but now you’re leaving without exercising.

Next time you think an ad is misleading, ask this question: Is the ad fooling you, or are you fooling yourself?

Book Review: Nonprofit Marketing

About a month or so ago, I arrived at my first PR job. I came here starry-eyed and excited to start My Real Career.  I came here to a gray desk nestled in a corner, beside a coatrack. I came here, and I found no direction.

To be fair, I knew what I was getting myself into. Right from the interview my employers were clear that I had a desk, but the rest was up to me. And I thought what a great opportunity to explore PR and get work experience! And then I thought oh shit what do I do?

Enter this book. Nonprofit Marketing – Best Practices by John J. Burnett. Burnett is a marketing professor and director at the University of Denver. He has worked with a ton of nonprofit organizations much higher profile than mine, and supposedly respects a zero budget.

Reading this book, I wished Burnett were not a marketing professor. He writes like a textbook. In fact, Nonprofit Marketing is in many ways just a basic marketing textbook. He goes on at some length about IMC, pricing products, distribution channels and market research, none of which are helpful to anyone with a marketing background. I appreciate where he’s coming from because most nonprofits don’t have a marketing professional, which is why they need this book. Still, for my purposes, no help.

There are two chapters in the book that, while not wholly justifying the $27 price tag, do make for interesting reading. By the way, I just checked and the suggested Canadian retail is $47.99.  Please, if you need this book (and didn’t I just prove that you don’t?) get it from Amazon like I did. That’s obscene.

The first of  two actually valuable chapters is: Transitioning to Services Marketing. 

Most nonprofits market a service. Take the Canadian Public Relations Society for example – they market a membership that provides access to the good stuff they hide in the membership only section. Also included are discounts on professional development sessions and conference fees. This is not the same as, say, selling a flashlight. There’s nothing tangible here. 

Here’s the Cole’s Notes version of Burnett’s key strategies for service marketing in this chapter:
Create Awareness – He  suggests cost effective tools like direct mail (actually pretty costly, but whatever), email and targeted advertising (also potentially costly). Burnett has worked for such nonprofit juggernauts as the Red Cross and Easter Seals, so I guess we have to cut him a little slack on his idea of affordability.

Make Promises – Establish the benefits that you share with your customers or subscribers. Take a hard look into your soul and decide whether you can deliver on what they expect.

Maintenance – Burnett lists money-off vouchers, continuity programs, and the mysterious “other credits” as maintenance tools.

Dissolution – All relationships end. Even yours. Don’t piss your customer off or there’s no chance that it could be rekindled.

The above is a pretty good example of how specific Burnett is willing to get in the book, which is to say: not very. The second and best useful chapter of the book is called Raising Funds and Acquiring Volunteers. I’ll let you check that one out yourself at the library. It has some decent tactical considerations that were new information to me.

However, I could fit all that new info on one sheet of notebook paper, double-spaced. Even if you don’t have a library card, if you have a notebook, a pen and ten minutes, you can own this book too! At least the good parts.

Two out of five.

Do you use anything aside from your own awesomeness to help you out at work?

My Love/Hate Relationship: Twitter

I’ll admit it – I haven’t always used Twitter. In fact,, I was probably one of the last people in the free world to adopt it. This is because I’m a cranky old clam and I distrust new technology. Besides, wasn’t Twitter really just bragging about your uneventful life?

But as the days of my public relations program wore on, the pressure to join up became more intense. Social media, everyone whispered reverently, if you’re not in on it you might as well not exist…

This is completely untrue. 

I venture to say that some people, some companies, are better off without Twitter. For example, my beloved nonprofit organization. My audience is: Albertan police officers who work in schools. Pretty narrow, yes? Does yelling into the void, even with hash tags, really reach my audience? No. Now, if civilians were allowed to get a membership, I would have a larger audience: Alberta parents, teachers, school administrators, youth workers, safety workers and other nonprofits concerned with same. Now there’s an audience that you can actually have a prayer of reaching out to with Twitter.

Social media, particularly Twitter, is alone in the realm of PR techniques in that a very specific audience is to your detriment. If I were running a direct mail campaign to parties interested in my nonprofit (and I did), I could probably find a list of addresses of, say, Alberta youth or safety organization (and I did!). That would pretty much be that. Direct mail has an approximate response rate of two per cent. Of my 100 mailouts, I will get two conference registrations, if life were statistically perfect. Which it isn’t.

Now say I want to run a Twitter campaign to the same end. Well, first I have to actually find all the youth or safety organizations that have Twitter and follow them. Let’s say they all follow me back. If there’s someone actually watching their Twitter-station, I could engage in conversation with them. I can’t get in their face about my conference, that’s a breach of Twitter etiquette. I can @reply them a few times…. Maybe they’re reading my other tweets about my upcoming conference and want to come. Yay!

But in actuality probably nothing happens. They may or may not reply. My name or organization may or may not stick in their head. They may or may not even read my other tweets, depending on a variety of factors.

For a logical and results-driven gal like me, all those maybes and may or may nots are a hard pill to swallow. I’d rather the two per cent outside chance that I get a result than a wishy-washy possible generation of goodwill.

And here we get to what I love about Twitter: goodwill. Twitter is a massive goodwill machine. There’s nowhere else you can listen in on the random chitchat of strangers, occasionally pitching in your two cents, without getting punched in the face. (Remember the Sex and the City where Miranda tries to share  “he’s just not that into you”?)

By engaging in the conversation – which, by the way, is hard work – you can generate goodwill for you or your organization. You can become a friendly face and an inside connection. You can create a relationship that’s valuable to you and your new Twitter buddy. This pays off later, usually in unexpected ways.

So by all means, get your Twitter on. But don’t expect results. Twitter is a strange and intangible thing that will reward you later, maybe. Or not. You have to accept that your only thanks might be tweets like: Can’t wait for drinks with my girlfriends later! Whooo! If you can deal with that, congratulations. Welcome to Twitter.

Dressed to Impress

Yesterday at the movie theatre, after the 7pm showing of Julie/Julia, I visited the bathroom facilities. There, I saw something disturbing. No, this isn’t a gross out story. What I saw was a 14 year old girl wearing the same outfit as I was. A red tank top with lacy trim, jean capris, and a pair of nondescript black flats. Was she dressing old? Was I dressing young? Do I look like a 14 year old Wal-Mart shopper? When you’re wearing the same thing as a barely-teenage girl who thinks thick silver eyeshadow is the height of fashion, you re-evaluate your wardrobe. It’s impossible not to. I came home and looked through my closet.

Fresh in my memory as I did this was going through that very morning looking for a work outfit. I don’t have many business clothes, so 90 per cent of my work fashion choices involve a cotton American Eagle skirt, a tank top and a cardigan. Pants that need ironing are pretty low of my list of Awesome Things I Enjoy. Those that I do have are in desperate need of hemming and currently held up by a series of pearl-head pins.  I have two suits, both grey. I have an oversized black blazer that was a hand-me-down from a friend.

Yeah, I’m a pro.

So this morning I went through my closet. Am I getting rid of my tank tops and jean capris? No. It’s probably too much to expect teens to start wearing the ill-fitting graphic tees with faux-suede lace I remember from high school. Maybe I should be flattered, because kids today are more fashionable than ever. Even though that kid is probably at home now, mortified to be caught looking like me. My professional wardrobe, however, needs a serious overhaul.

Unfortunately, I have next to no extra money, especially since I just blew $1000 on new furniture to pretend my apartment is actually a different apartment. So I’ll bust out my suits for future job interviews, and continue wearing my tank top/cardigan/skirt combo at work. (Luckily, business casual is the order of the day there.)

Do you have an extensive work wardrobe? Do you iron a lot or does your momma do it for you?

Antiquated Media: Direct Mail

Oh, direct mail. Does anyone even know who you are anymore? Gone are the days when I had a six to one ratio of Occupant mail to my own. When I do get Occupant mail now, it’s usually from some weird mail order husband factory or my MLA. Perhaps they are one and the same. (I know your game, Laurie Hawn.)

I guess most of the world has dropped direct mail like a hot potato, usually in favour of a social media plan. Kids these days, etcetera. You know what though? NOT ME. I am bringing direct mail back like a pair of shiny gold leggings. Not for any noble reason. Certainly not because, with the lack of Occupant mail lately, my lone whisper into the wind of Canada Post will stand out. (Though: bonus!)

I do it because I work at a non-profit with a very narrow target audience that’s not necessarily computer-savvy. Oh, and direct mail is free for me. That’s right, gloriously free. You see, my host organization sends out all my mail with theirs at no charge. So as long as I’m willing to do the tri-folding, hand-addressing, cursing and white-outing, I can buy all the direct mail I like for the price of free. Did I mention my non-profit has an operating budget  worth even less than my battered ‘99 Saturn? Yeah, free is good.

So begins my second experiment. I have had an unexpectedly enthusiastic response to my direct mail plea for silent auction donations. I expect to follow this up with the mother of all free follow-up methods: the lukewarm phone call. If you need an overachieving PR flunkie to mine every worn-out method in the book to save your budget? I’M YOUR GAL. I’ll keep you posted on how this goes.

I hear you out there saying:  So Jill, what’s up with your last experiment? Remember social media?

Way to call me on my bullshit, reader.  PR is pretty hard to blog or tweet about when you have no job! Still, my blog is actually seeing regular traffic, which is bewildering. I hope that indicates I’m saying something of interest here, and not that a prince in Nigeria is about to offer me untold millions. I haven’t updated my LinkedIn to reflect my newly acquired job/source of blog fodder. I haven’t really been doing much with Twitter except trying without success to get in on the conversation everyone is apparently having. Worst net citizen ever. In my next post I think I’ll tackle my love/hate relationship with Twitter.

But by god, I can send mail.

What do you think? Is direct mail a dinosaur that is doomed to die in a brave new world? Is my DM campaign destined for failure? Weigh in below.

The Great Social Media Experiment

Everyone these days is telling you you have to “get out there.” What they mean by this is that you should be using social media. But where is “there”? And how do you get “there” from “here”? It’s not enough to set up a Twitter page and call it a day. You need a purpose, an audience, and a plan.

Perhaps, on the urging of a friend, you now have a Twitter account. Welcome, whatistwitter95! You also now have one tweet: “Okay, I’ve finally joined Twitter!” You have four followers, you vaguely understand what RT stands for, and you’re feeling like a tech-savvy rock star. Now what? How can you turn this meaningless stream of tweets into something meaningful to you and your career? Now add a blog, LinkedIn, Visual CV, Digg, Flickr and the countless other “must haves” and you have…a big mess.

I recently went to a social media seminar where a member of the internet communicatins team for the Government of Alberta, Nikki Van Dusen, said something great. “Social media is not the field of dreams.” Sorry, but just because you build it doesn’t mean they’ll come.

In my short experience, I have found that the key is not to be on every social media site known to man. Ask yourself: what is this doing for me? Many people advise you to get out there and play around with every new site, and that is sound advice. It helps you decide if that media is of any use to you. I don’t think you should feel pressured to  have a regularly updated Flickr account if there’s nothing that technology can do for you professionally. Personally I have this blog, a Twitter account, and a LinkedIn account. I think that’s more than enough to keep track of and to help expand my professional network for now. I’ll let you know if I eat my words.

What are you doing to “get out there”?