Mary Schmidt Marketing Troubleshooter

I love the Albuquerque library system. It makes me happy simply to walk into one of the many branches, staffed by knowledgeable, helpful people. (I also enjoy walking into the Apple store…hey, we’re gonna have FUN!)

Who’d thunk fusty old book people have anything to teach a marketer?  Well, marketers take heed:

Librarians know they need loyal users, and lots of them.

The staff acknowledges your presence; they’re responsive; they try to help; they’ll occasionally cut you a break, overriding the “rules.” (This is how I know the check-out limit is – ahem – 50. ) Compare this to the last time you visited a big box store or called a “customer service” phone number.

The online system is streamlined and very user-friendly. Once you set up your account, which takes about a minute, the world is yours. You can search on any number of terms and keywords; you can place holds (on books AND DVDs) and they’ll be delivered to your local branch for pick-up. You’ll also get an email telling you the holds are ready for pick-up. The library is my own personal Amazon and Netflix system, rolled into one convenient, free package, accessible at a couple of clicks.

The library buyers know people have a wide variety of tastes and needs. Personally, I really appreciate whomever keeps buying Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Season 8 (Yes, a comic.) I’m equally grateful for whomever buys all those ponderous tomes of military history and sociological research.

…but that Dewey Decimal System continues to baffle me…and I worked in the high school library eons ago…;-)

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No pop-ups. No blaring audio. No floating “special offer” windows. No Google ads. Minimal marketing speak (did my best to avoid using the word “innovative.”)

Aside from my conviction that simple is almost always better, in every aspect of life – I believe that effective web sites require: a. designing for your audience; b. walking your talk. I’m not selling products in quantity; I’m not in the entertainment business; and I know my target clients are busy. They want to know what I know, how I think…and they want to know quickly, not fill out some long form for “free” advice or try to figure out what a navigation icon means.

Yes, I plan a new design at some point – every site needs to be freshened and improved for usability (yes, made simpler), but for right now – I’m going by what existing, new and potential clients tell me about the site: it works. (And, thanks to Wordpress, I can update all my content whenever I wish.)

What are your customers (NOT your web developer or creative agency) telling you about your emarketing? Does it work?

Read More: Seth Godin, No Wonder They Don’t Trust You “The digital world, even the high end brands, has become a sleazy carnival, complete with hawkers, barkers and a bearded lady. By the time someone actually gets to your site, they’ve been conned, popped up, popped under and upsold so many times they really have no choice but to be skeptical.”

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I was considering canceling my DirectTV, since between Hulu, online viewing, the local library, Red Box, and Netflix, I could (probably, do I dare cut the boomer baby cord?) do without it. Netflix worked well during the two-week free trial and I could also catch up on lots of old, classic movies. But, not so fast…

Today I looked at my credit card activity. Netflix had billed me (and I still have their email confirming the cancellation as the free trial was ending.)

Well – that make me cranky, but the major reason I’m not re-activating is communications.

I can’t respond to Netflix. The email I sent in reply to the cancellation came back as – you guessed it – undeliverable.

I can’t email Netflix at all. I have to call them. No thanks. I’ve not got the time to sit on hold waiting to fix their mistake.

Then, I was disconcerted to see my account still “exists” online – “all” I have to do to click on re-activate. If I cancel an account, I want it gone, including my address, email and credit card info (which obviously Netflix still has and is abusing.)

Now, none of this is life-threatening. But – geez, it’s 2010 already – electronic, online billing and communications should be simple; the technology certainly exists. We’re not talking complex transactions here. And, you should always, always, always be available to your customers (Compare and contrast this to a question I sent to a restaurant gift card – I got an answer within the hour!)

If you’re going to do ebiz – do ebiz.

P.S. I called DirectTV and got a better deal. Never hurts to ask.

Email is supposed to be old news, outmoded, “nobody uses it anymore”….and yet…this past holiday season there was wave after wave of junk spewed out to people who never asked for it. A sure sign of desperation by companies ranging from Saks Fifth Avenue to Dunkin’ Donuts. (It’s cheap! We need customers! It’s the holiday gluttony season!) Stats from NYT:

4.1 – average number of email messages sent by large online retailers in the week ending on December 18.
3.2 – average number sent in the week leading up to Christmas.

From the NYT article:

Online retailers are reluctant to send e-mail to customers who are not expected to make purchases, for fear that they will unsubscribe from the e-mail lists.

“It’s very costly to acquire subscribers,” said Chad White, the research director at Responsys. “By sending them e-mails at a time when they’re no longer in the market, you’re going to have people unsubscribing, and that means you’re going to have to acquire new subscribers to keep your list size afloat.”

Costly? As in buying unqualified lists of unsuspecting recipients? And, a company should be more than “reluctant” to send out junk. “Acquire new subscribers to keep you list size afloat?” It’s not the size that matters, it’s what you do with it (as several emarketing studies have shown. You get better results from smaller lists, in both emails and direct snail mail.) And – hey – what about focusing on quality, not quantity? What about the real customers? What about establishing a relationship? One cold email blast looks pretty much like any other (and those pretty images are usually deleted by my Gmail spam filters anyway.)

Of course, the critical element in all emailing is permission. If I didn’t ask for it, I didn’t want it. And – sorry, really, well-meaning folks I sat next to at lunch yesterday or met last week at the seminar – but allowing me to unsubscribe (to something I never subscribed to in the first place) doesn’t let the senders off the hook.

(I think I may have finally gotten off the spam lists for Saks Fifth Avenue and Dunkin’ Donuts for my personal gmail account…Oh? And Dunkin? I’m a Krispy Kreme fan…;-)

01/14/10 – and for those of you like Chad who thinks companies wouldn’t do something because it’s idiotic, here’s an ‘09 post Web-Way Robbery (rebates & More!)

Whenever I speak on marketing strategy & tactics,  I always at least touch on social media. Here in Albuquerque, many are still working out how to participate in Web 1.0 or 2.0 “Can’t I just ‘throw up’ a site in Dreamweaver?”… “What’s a ‘blog?’”… “Hey! I can buy lists of blogger emails for my next PR blast!” Groan (Email Blasts = Spam.) So, Fuggadabout Web 4.0 (whatever that is anyway. “Symbiotic?”)  Which brings us to Facebook and Twitter. The Q&A usually goes like this,

Biz Owner: “I was told by the ’social media expert’ that I HAD to be on Facebook (and/or Twitter).”
MS: “Why?”
Biz Owner: “Because it’s a great way to reach my customers.”
MS: “Did you ask your customers?”
Biz Owner: (Cue crickets chirping.)
MS: “Do your customers use Facebook or Twitter?”
Biz Owner: (Crickets take it up a notch with the greatest hits of the 80s. “Come on feel the noize”)

Before we all roll our eyes at the clueless biz owner…you know what? That biz owner may never really need to be on Facebook or Twitter…or even blog. Or, she may need to be, but she simply can’t do it, for whatever reason. Better to not do something in marketing than to do it badly (and the social web can be particularly merciless.  Make a misstep and it’ll reverberate [sometimes quite literally] around the world.)

Social media can be a great way to build relationships (note I didn’t say “do marketing”…;-) but it also isn’t for everyone. The key word here is “social” – which is always difficult. You’ve got to be open. You’ve got give up control of your message (the control was pretty much an illusion anyway).  You’ve got to listen to people with whom you don’t agree. …and, you’ve got to have something interesting to say (and be comfortable saying it.)

P.S. If you “found” that social media expert because he sent you a cold (and clueless) email blast from his aol address…you need to find another social media pro to actually help you. If he doesn’t even understand basic email etiquette, he’s no “expert.”

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I’m prejudiced (since I love dead-tree publishing in all its forms)…but…as Elissa Altman notes, “it is no surprise that the counter-intuitive is what bubbles to the surface.”

The reason traditional publishers are having problems is that they’re thinking…traditionally. MUST Sell LOTS of ad pages. Large print runs. Mass marketing mediocrity (Is it me…or have “women’s magazines” all started to look alike, with the same articles?) Grudgingly (and badly) participating in the online world. (“Those damned bloggers!”)

And then there’s the new thinking. Focus on niches. Just-in-time printing. Incorporate the Web from the beginning. Two examples:

1. Canal House Cooking. High-style quarterly publication for people who love to cook and appreciate quality (and will pay for it.) Instead of going the traditional publishing route, with all its pitfalls, they’re managing their own destiny – from printing to marketing.

NYT: Along an Old Canal, Artful Neglect Finds A Home
“…by designing and photographing it themselves, then outsourcing the printing to China when every local printer they approached turned them down flat, the women hope to both make the numbers work and preserve the publication’s homespun qualities. They have about 400 subscribers so far…”

Make that 401, as soon as I finish writing this post. (And, you can probably imagine what I’m thinking about those clueless local printers.)

2. Flea Market Style They’re focused (title says it all.) They’re starting with a blog. They’re only printing as ordered (minimum 25 copies.)

Here’s hoping somebody will resurrect Gourmet, with the new thinking. Just let me know where I can send my money.

Read More: Elissa Altman, Taking Back The Cookbook

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Following on my recent post, “PR” is dead. Long Live People.

I decided to try to be considerate, whatever…Instead of simply deleting PR emails unopened, reporting as spam or adding the sender to a black list, I’ve started replying, asking to be removed from the lists. And, here’s a response:

No one has ever complained before [No, they simply delete your stuff or report as spam] and I still managed to get great placements for my client in martha stewart, brides, first,forbes etc. I’m a freelancer btw and have several email addresses. I don’t have a company registered or anything. Don’t worry I will delete your email. That statement was extremely rude and disrespectful. BTW, I think you need help with your website. Its very “amateur”.

— Original Message —
From:”Mary Schmidt”
Sent:Thu 12/3/09 3:12 pm
To:”XXXXXXX”
Subj:Re: CHEAP DECOR

Please take me off your email list. It appears you may be new to the ways of emarketing, since you’re still using a gmail account as your biz address, so you may unaware of it, and have the best of intentions – but you are in essence spamming me. Not the sort of impression you want to create on behalf of your clients.

Sigh. This from a person who doesn’t capitalize client names (I’m sure Martha is thrilled) and doesn’t even have a web site (or a “registered” business?!) And, I’m being “rude and disrespectful” because I don’t want to be spammed. As for my web site, yep, it’s simple, but – gee – nobody’s complained before, including my clients who keep calling me over the years…and I even know to capitalize their names…;-)

AOL – um, Aol. – just unveiled their new logo (which will have changing backgrounds, such as the cute fish).  Some call it lame, others like it. I’d be more concerned – if I were an Aol. marketer (or stockholder) – with what’s going on behind the logo.

What’s happening with product development? How are we addressing the perception that we’re “your Dad’s Internet”… or “the My Little Pony of Internet brands?” [I don't think the fish is gonna help with that one]…or that our (old people) users are “clueless?” (aol. still have millions of ‘em, and some must have at least one clue…but how to keep them when they get two?) And, how are those “creative” images going to play in other countries? (AOL has made cultural missteps before, such as in Latin America.)

Not to mention that period drives old English majors crazy. It’s. just. wrong. to misuse a period. like that….;-)

The period is an important addition, according to Maurine Sullivan, chief of staff for AOL. “The period is really a pivot point to show the breadth and depth of our content and products that we are focused on delivering,” she says. It shows that we are standing behind the AOL brand, and the period invokes that.”

Wow. That’s a lot to ask from one little dot…

Related Post: Would You Do Business With BobJack258@aol.com?

Many people are still leery about doing business on the Web, with some justification. “I don’t want to give my info to Paypal.” Yet, they give everything to Amazon and they often get sucked into all kinds of online flim-flam, such as…
From TechCrunch: The Post-Transaction Marketing Wall Of Shame: Hundreds Of Well Known Ecommerce Sites Rip Off Customers

Rockefeller is holding a U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation full committee hearing on Aggressive Sales Tactics on the Internet and their Impact on American Consumers. He released a report on his findings in advance of the hearing.

Consumers are usually offered cash back if they just hit a confirmation button. But when they do, their credit card information is automatically passed through to a marketing company that signs them up for a credit card subscription to a package of useless services. The “rebate” is rarely paid.

Intelius is one company that is using these scams to go public. But scores of even more well known ecommerce companies use these scams as well, including: 1800flowers, Buy.com, Classmates.com, Columbia House, Expedia, Hotels.com, Fandango, FTD, Hotwire, MovieTickets.com, Orbitz, Priceline, Shutterfly, Travelocity, US Airways and Vista Print.

Yet another example of “just because you can doesn’t mean you should.” (and why marketing often doesn’t get any respect…and shouldn’t in cases such as this.)

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(Thanks to Facebook friend, Jeffrey Eisenberg, for posting the original link.)

I admit – I’m addicted to Google. Instead of digging through files, the phone book, or my own contact list – I pop up to the top and enter the name of the company I need to call. (I type wicked fast – “Albuquerque” goes by in a blur.)

Today, I searched on a word (which is also the full name of the company I needed)…and the company’s competitor (who also use the word in their name) came up, very first result (and not a sponsored link.) No sign of the company I really wanted to call (and these otherwise smart folks also tout their web marketing expertise…hmmm…) So, why didn’t I find them?

Apparently, someone decided to get “creative” (It’s BRANDING!) with the company name (a very common three-syllable word)..inserting a hypen (grammatically incorrect), capitalizing some other letters and adding an exclamation point. If I want to find the company, I have to enter the name EX-ACTLY! as they have it in their Lo-GO!

Wonder how many people bother?

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