Perhaps a tagline is more actionable than a resolution. It’s definitely more of a big picture thing that should help guide and inspire all actions for the year, rather than just a laundry list of wants. You have any ideas? Here are some to start:
2010: The Year We’ve Been Rounding Up To Since 2005
2010: Let’s Be More Social And Less Media
To see more, visit here: http://joshuakelly.com/taglines-for-2010/
Made to accompany the holiday card from FINE Design Group, the 1-page YourTurn2010 site invites you to share a meta-resolution. I helped with the (hopefully) inspirational copy that greets you:
What Are You Waiting For?
Forget that old cliche about treating each day like your last. Try treating every moment like someone’s trying to stuff you in line at the DMV. Or in your doctor’s waiting room reading a 6-month old copy of TIME and listening to Muzak while the lady next to you hacks contagiously. You know all those things you wish you were doing in these long moments? While they cook your burger? While the traffic light’s frozen red? We dedicate 2010 to doing those things and not just thinking about doing them when you have nothing else to think about. Because it’s not really the fact that sometimes we have no choice but to wait that bothers us; it’s that sometimes we do have a choice and we waste it. It’s not the third of our lives we spend sleeping that’s wrong, it’s all that other time we spend sleepwalking. So we say, pretend this year your number has finally come up! Step to the front of the line. Do the things you’re called upon to do. Serve yourself. Better yet, serve someone else. But whatever you do, give the time you have on Earth the best service you can. Happy New Year.
It may just be coincidental, but I sense a renewed enthusiasm for that old staple of American cuisine, the only meat that’s good at every meal, as a condiment, and perhaps as a men’s fragrance. I speak, of course, of bacon.
Bacon’s surely never been entirely out of style, though various diet trends and movements have likely impacted it as a commodity. But there’s something about the indulgence of it, the comforting nature of it, and the reactionary tendency to embrace it as a nose-thumbing to the nagging culture of vegetarianism or environmentalism, or any kind of ism. It’s good ol’ fashioned bacon. And right about now, I keep seeing indications that it may be the cure for what ails us all. With apologies to the pigs, it almost seems like bacon is a trend.
As the economy flounders and we retreat into simple pleasures, and foods that deliver high calorie to cost ratios, bacon seems more relevant than ever. Visit the Royal Bacon Society site to see the extent of the enthusiasm for “meat candy”. Indeed, watch the inevitable list of 2010 trends for topics where bacon serves as a metaphor.
In closing, I give you yesterday’s launch of the “Save Your Bacon With Norton” campaign (with microsite by FINE Design Group), where those who submit their stories of backup woe are eligible to sooth their aching tech souls with a year’s supply of that most sublime of food products.
[Shout out to the trendwatching bacon-lovers at Symantec, and to the king of all bacon lovers, Bacon Matt at Ste Michelle Wine Estates.]
The new Silverado Vineyards website is a dramatic and seamless site for a classic Napa name. I like the image of the spring flowers in the home page rotation, which reminds me that someday my lawn will thaw. Nice job FINE Design Group.
A consequence of the ability to measure certain things easily online is that most people now measure easy things. Anyone with a Google account can figure out conversion rates and traffic sources. What’s happening is that people in many markets are realizing the limits of mining for keywords and clickthroughs – everyone and anyone knows how to do it.
So we’re on to the next phase, which turns out to be old news: marketing is about getting and keeping good customers. And the best measure keys on an understanding of the Lifetime Value of A Customer, or at least the value of winning their favorable brand perceptions and behaviors past the next click.
There is some truth in the idea that there’s no such thing as brand loyalty anymore. But it’s more accurate to say you can’t assume loyalty anymore; you have to work for it continuously. And it’s also clear, as a result, that a small but loyal customer base is more of a valuable asset than ever.
If all you’re measuring is sales and traffic, you are not doing marketing. You are not measuring customer acquisition and retention; you are measuring dollar volume acquisition and retention. A good score there will keep you employed through your quarterly Board meeting. Congratulations.
But think now about the question of what happens when you adjust your view to consider the next purchase, the next year, or a lifetime. What asset are you building? What value are you creating? What relationships are you solidifying? How does that change the way you approach your interaction with customers and potential customers through design, technology, social media, social responsibility, metrics, advertising, customer service, and even how you hire and train staff?
The answer is, it can change everything.
What’s magic is that the further out you think, the greater the chance that the interests of your customers and the interest of your organization, and even greater social interests, intersect and align. The more likely it is that you will be competing for customers, not competing against your own interests.
You could argue that the most important role of marketing in any organization is to get people thinking longer term, about getting and keeping customers and growing a meaningful, profitable company.
So adjust your sightlines forward a notch and we’ll explore further in Part 2.
P.S., A related read on Seth Godin’s blog: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2009/11/embracing-lifetime-value.html
LinkedIN
