Bruce Kasanoff's Open Salon Blog

Why Marketing is Dying

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 15:10:37 -0400

In less than five years, traditional marketing will be all but dead. Nearly all customers will carry smart devices, and smart customers will only interact with smart companies.

No technology in human history has been adopted faster than wireless devices like smartphones and iPads.

Tens of millions of these devices are spurring countless developers to innovate. Customers are able to act smarter, because they have far better access to information and empowering capabilities.

Traditional marketing tools like advertising and outbound solicitations look dumb by comparison, and will soon be ineffective and irrelevant.

Many marketing professionals don't recognize the degree to which this sea change is the result of a perfect storm of four disruptive forces that are just now bearing down on us: Digital Sensors, Social Influence, Pervasive Memory and the Physical Web.

A very quick primer on the four forces that will kill advertising.

Digital Sensors are being embedded everywhere, transforming everything from your car to your toaster into a smart device.

Social Influence means that increasingly other people are influencing transactions or even preventing transactions between companies and customers. Imagine a crowd of your customer's friends shouting, "Stop!" just as your salesperson is about to close a big deal, and you get the idea.

Pervasive Memory highlights the fact that every interaction via a digital device leaves a record in databases. When you make an error, everyone will know it. When your prices, quality levels or satisfaction ratings lag competitors, it will be obvious.

The rise of the Physical Web means that we will soon be surfing and bookmarking the real world like we do the Web. The sort of consumer tracking practices that have emerged online - following individuals and recording their actions - won't be tolerated in the real world. Expect a flood of new privacy laws, and much stricter restrictions on the practice of advertising.

Om Malik, writing at GigaOm, today noted that Apple sold four million iPhone 4S devices in its first weekend, and observed that such devices are "in competition with the old way. Thanks to new chip technologies, cheap sensors and fast growing networks, the idea of what is a phone has changed. This is leading to behavior changes and new interactions. They are behaviors of a new connected life. These new behaviors will change many different parts of society and business."

Disruption always comes from the edges of your industry.

Marketers at established firms often misjudge the pace of change, because they focus on their biggest competitors. But your biggest competitor is less likely to change your industry than a new start-up. Disruption comes from the edges, not the center, of an industry.

The only way to compete successfully in the years ahead is to be smarter than both your customers and your competitors. By smart, I don't mean that you hire smart executives, although that might help. I mean that the systems in your company act smart, and that all customer touchpoints act smart.

Unless you work at a disruptive start-up, Google, Facebook, Amazon or Apple... your company is almost certainly not prepared for the storm ahead. You will need help recognizing the threats and opportunities. Among other changes, look for ways to enlist your customers and independent developers, and be prepared to give up some control.

Where will marketing dollars - and talent - go?

Most of the creativity and money poured until now into advertising, positioning and promotion will end up in the products themselves. Instead of making a product look cool in an ad, companies will make the product actually be cool to find, learn, use, enjoy and share.

Customer experience will be the new marketing. Today, "customer experience" is a vague term. Soon, it will be the driver. Customer experience will be the main way to not only set your product apart, but to also gain attention. It will be about substance and style, functionality and form.

This is not just a business crossroads. It is a career crossroads.

Maybe the sky is not falling. Perhaps I am overstating the scope of change. But if I am even partially correct, these changes will impact the course of your career as well as the success of your business.

It is far better to lead a change than fall victim to it.

Snakes, I mean Senators, on a Plane

Fri, 5 Aug 2011 09:08:58 -0400

This weekend, I'd like to see this movie...

Senator Tom Coburn, Oklahoma Republican, is sleeping when the airplane he is on hits a bump, waking him suddenly. He glances across the aisle and notices Senator Orrin Hatch, Utah Republican, who is also just getting his bearings.

"Orrin," says Senator Coburn, "What are you doing on a flight to Oklahoma?"

Senator Hatch squints his eyes. "Tom, you must be more tired than I am. This plane is headed for Salt Lake."

The plane hits a second bump, worse than the first.

"I thought we were bound for Nevada," says a voice behind them. It's Senator Harry Reid.

Senator Tom Coburn

A flight attendant is walking down the aisle. Senator Coburn stops her.

"Excuse me, but there seems to be a little confusion regarding the destination of this flight. Could you help us out?"

"We're headed to Salt Lake, right?" says Senator Hatch.

"No, sir," responds the attendant. "We'll be flying back and forth across America, chasing thunderstorms and turbulence."

The Senators exchange bewildered glances.

Senator Reid stands up. "You're joking, right?"

"I'm afraid not, Senator. Ever since you stopped paying FAA safety inspectors, it's not safe to land a plane at any commercial airport."

"That's ridiculous," exclaims Senator Coburn. "The safety inspectors are still working."

"Well, sir, you're not paying them, and you're not covering their travel expenses either. You expect them to charge hotels and other travel costs to their personal credit cards, most of which have already been maxed out by two years of the Great Recession."

"Yes, but they are responsible professionals, and they are supposed to fulfill their responsibilities, no matter what," countered Senator Hatch.

"Respectfully, Senator, so are you, but you left Washington without paying our public servants. And with 100 United States Senators on this plane, it's just not safe to land anywhere."

The plane hits another bump. The whole plane starts shaking wildly. Senator Coburn looks green. Senator Hatch reaches for the sickness bag.

"Did you say the entire Senate is on this plane?" shouts Senator Reid.

The attendant nods. They look around. Their colleagues are all there. No one is happy.

The PA system comes to life.

"Good afternoon, Senators. This is Samuel L. Jackson. I'll be flying this plane until you quasi-professionals get tired of fleeing from your responsibilities and tfighting like spoiled children. In the meantime, please remain in your seats with your seat belts fastened, because we are coming up fast on one mother of a storm."

High school filmmakers tear down walls

Thu, 12 May 2011 08:05:31 -0400

Almost three years ago, our son came home from a summer filmmaking program and wrote a script for a musical video he called “School for Boy.” He was 14.

Jeff had plenty of motivation and energy at first. He wrote the script, about a girl whose father was headmaster of a private boys’ school, in what seemed like a week. He wrote the lyrics for ten songs, and sang each tune into a recorder, with the idea being that he would recruit musicians to help.

In the months that followed, he tried to enlist others’ help in getting the musical produced. He even typed up a formal overview of the project, including the script, and gave a copy to the instructor of his filmmaking class at his high school. He was seeking help in recruiting actors, musicians and other talent.

Nothing happened. Jeff didn’t know how to maintain the creative energy necessary to power such a project, especially when he was competing against established theater and music programs.

It hadn’t occurred to teachers or the administration that film could break down the walls between the arts, and make true collaboration possible.

For his junior year, Jeff transferred to Interlochen Arts Academy, which is 1,000 miles away from our home. We are two weeks away not only from graduation, but also from the first screening of “Hero Club,” a 23-minute musical he wrote and directed along with fellow Interlochen student Keaton Manning. I haven’t seen it yet, but the film sounds like a Glee episode, except with seven original songs and actors who aren’t famous, yet.

The plot revolves around high school students in a town that a) seems to have a lot of crime, and b) where the students solve all the crimes. Or at least that’s what they want you to think, because the students seem to care more about glory than justice.

To get this film made, Jeff had to learn to be a successful student on his own, establish a common vision with new student Keaton, and persuade the Motion Picture Arts faculty to let the pair stick with that ambitious vision.

But Interlochen, for all its rules and regulations, really is “where art lives,” as their tagline says. Jeff just called this morning to say that with the enlistment of a Visual Arts major to work on the film’s opening sequence, every major at the school has contributed talent to the film.

Theatre and Comparative Arts majors are the actors. Five, count ‘em, five musicians wrote music to go with Jeff and Keaton’s lyrics, and another wrote the score. Between the performances of the songs and the score, Jeff believes that every instrument taught at the school is also represented.

Dance majors provided choreography. Creative Writing majors, for reasons I don’t fully understand, even sung part of one song. Over fifteen Motion Picture Arts majors worked on the film’s crew.

Even at Interlochen, it took a while for both faculty and students to realize the degree to which filmmaking can tear down the walls between departments. The exception was Motion Picture Arts director Michael Mittelstaedt, who all along has been preaching about the collaborative power of film.

This morning a client of mine who lives in a small western Pennsylvania town told told me how blown away he was by the quality of a film his eighth grade son made. Art doesn’t just live at Interlochen; there is talent and creativity in every school. But what’s missing at most schools is a faculty commitment to the sort of amazing, highly professional collaboration Jeff found at Interlochen. This isn’t about school funding; it’s about collaboration.

Jeff and Keaton found actors, musicians, dancers and artists of all types were eager to be part of a film. But they didn’t have to go outside of the system to make a movie; they worked smack in the middle of Interlochen’s system, having to meet countless deadlines, and to constantly prove why they shouldn’t scale back their vision. They also benefitted greatly from regular workshop sessions with their peers, working first on the idea, then the script, and finally successful edits of the film itself.

I know one thing for certain: Jeff’s generation will benefit greatly from being able to work effectively in cross-disciplinary teams. This is where the world is headed. This is not only what success demands, but also what makes life worth living. I’m a fan of anything that tears down walls and brings diverse groups together.

In the meantime, I can’t wait to see Hero Club, and I hope someday you’ll see it, too.

2011 Word of the Year: volatility

Wed, 22 Dec 2010 13:12:16 -0500

Looking forward to 2011, I’m guessing the word that will best sum it up is: volatility.

Most people in the developed world are caught between two forces: inertia and change. The former is because once we establish a business, or build a house, or develop a city – we think it will last forever. The latter, of course, is reality: everything changes.

In recent years, technology is advancing in ways that can be difficult to comprehend. Here again, there are opposing perspectives. Some folks like to be overly optimistic or dramatic about the implications (“this will change everything”), while others don’t recognize changes even after they have happened (can you say Blockbuster?). Billions of people now carry mobile Internet devices; I can remember when analysts were debating why anyone would possibly need a personal computer in their home.

Here are some pretty certain realities that most are ignoring:

- In the United States, our governments have made promises they will not be able to keep. There will be dramatic changes in the way states operate. Taxes will go up, services down. Constituents will be furious. There will be defaults. It will be scary.

- Our weather will get crazier. Human activity is influencing our climate, and we lack the solidarity and strength to deal with this fact. The developing world is, well, developing, which means more cars, more factories, more forests burned down. Natural disasters will increase in frequency and scale.

- Jobs will become more fleeting in nature as some companies grow faster than ever (i.e. Groupon), while others disappear suddenly. As volatility increases and the economy gets worse before it gets better, companies will remain loathe to make long-term commitments. They will hire people when needed, but security will be harder and harder to find.

- Retraining and lifelong education will start to become as important as high school diplomas. None of us possess the skills necessary to keep us competitive over a ten year period, never mind an entire career. Our notion of going to college then working will continue to give way to working and going to “college” simultaneously — and continually.

- Business models will come under increasing pressure as both humans and all our devices become increasingly interconnected. Already in 2010 we started to see customers who – thanks largely to their ever-connected smart phones – had better access to product information, competitive offers, and expert opinions than the companies trying to serve them. Smart customers served by “dumb” companies is not a sustainable business model.

This sounds pretty bleak, doesn’t it? Hard as it might be to believe, I am not pessimistic about our future, only about the near term. Each of needs to make a personal decision regarding whether we are going to accept change and deal with it rationally and honestly. We need to decide whether we are mature enough to work with people who don’t think precisely the way we do. Most importantly, we need to decide whether 2011 is the year in which we tackle tough challenges, or push them off until they become disasters.

It would be nice if we started right now, but I suspect that most aren’t quite ready – which is why I am thinking that the watchword for 2011 will be volatility.

Stuck in Stupid Space?

Thu, 2 Dec 2010 00:12:39 -0500

Have you ever been hanging out with a group of friends or peers, and suddenly had the sinking realization that you are stuck with - how shall I say this politely - the losers?

Now you know how I felt last night. Bear with me for a few paragraphs while I meander a bit.

New reports say that there actually may be over 300 sextillion stars with trillions and trillions of planets orbiting them.

Out of 300,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 stars, it's a pretty good bet that our civilization is neither the only one, nor the most advanced.

This raises again an old and obvious question: where are all the others? Why don't we see space ships whizzing through space, and why don't we hear signals - or even noise - from other civilizations?

Perhaps the answer is related to another puzzling question. Scientists are starting to realize that there is more invisible dark matter in the universe than there is the stuff we see and that comprises our reality.

The Chandra X-Ray Observatory website explains that many different lines of evidence suggest that the mass of dark matter... is about 5 or 6 times greater than the mass of ordinary baryonic matter such as protons and neutrons.

This is why last night I had that awful sinking feeling (not coincidentally as I was about to watch a mindless TV show): what if dark matter is intelligence, and we are stuck on the stupid side of the universe?

Futurist Ray Kurzweil likes to talk about the Singularity, the point at which human development advances so quickly we can't see past it. He expects that in less than 50 years human and technological intelligence will blend, and that this combined intelligence will literally start to spread across the universe.

But if something like this is inevitable, with 300 sextillion stars out there, it probably has already happened.

What if those civilizations advanced enough to travel past their planets, to communicate and interact with others, are only visible to others of equal or greater intelligence? See what I mean? Turns out we failed that test. This would explain why we can't see or hear them.

What if we live on the wrong side of the tracks?

There may be a bright side. Once you realize you are stuck on the wrong side of the tracks, you can at least aspire to move to the other side. Until now, we may have been blissfully living in ignorance. (Smarter than ever! Almost as cool as Star Trek! Google rocks!)

In my limited understanding of history, it seems that in nearly every generation, humans believed that they had all the secrets. Yet, the next generation almost always proves us wrong.

I'd like to believe that constant partisan bickering over both trivial and vital issues represents the antithesis of advanced civilization, not the pinnacle. Can you imagine an advanced society that can't agree on almost anything?

Read the newspaper. War, poverty, drugs, turmoil. These are the type of ills that ought to be quarantined on a planet rather than allowed to spread beyond it.

If the new estimate is correct, there are roughly 42 trillion stars for every person on Earth. The average human lives for about 2.5 billion seconds. Even if you devoted your entire life to counting "your" stars, you wouldn't come close. In fact, it would take you 16,800 lifetimes to do it.

There's life out there. Lots of it. Some of it really smart. Maybe we ought to stop acting like spoiled kids and start working together. I'd really like to experience life on the smarter side.