Brand Experience Agency - Groove 11 - GrooveLab

Groove Move

Groove has decided to move our illustrious blog, GrooveLab, to WordPress.

To our thousands of loyal readers, we hope you'll join us there, and subscribe to the new blog feed as soon as we set up said feed. We also hope you'll enjoy the cleaner interface, improved filterability, and the fact that I just invented a word, filterability.

For now, going to the old blog page on Typepad automatically redirects you to the new one on WordPress. So all you have to do is bookmark the new page when you land there, and you'll be all set.

See you on the other side.

What Happened to Originality?

Amazon started selling the Kindle a few years ago and made a few videos to show its features. This is the opening screen.

Today I saw a TV spot for a new e-reader on the market, Barnes & Noble's nook. Here's a still from their spot:

Now, if you were introducing a new product that was very much like an established one, and wanted to tell people why yours was better, or different, why in the world would you do this? Wouldn't you want every one of your very expensive 30 seconds to showcase your product in an original light?   sigh...

Love Your Brand

It pains me to watch newspapers go out of business. I have a soft spot for the written word on paper, delivered daily. As an undergraduate, I dreamed of being a writer. My journalism professor gave me a shot. That shot turned into the most-read column in the university paper, four years running. I took great pride in being a columnist. Truth be told, I loved it. Every Thursday, I loved walking along the student union, watching as folks eagerly turned to "Rod's Thoughts" (the name of the column). I even considered it as a career path, but moving to Bakersfield to make just above the poverty line was too much for a 22-year-old who craved the city lights along the Bay and the allure of global travel at a big-time marketing agency (that has sense faded, in a been-there-done-that sort of way).

It's pretty much a certainty newspapers will not exist in the coming years. If they'd focused on their brand much sooner, and changed their business model as well, newspapers would've had a better shot at staying relevant in the digital age. Newspaper brands had a bond with readers; a trusting relationship. People depended on them to deliver objective, nonpartisan news. They paid no attention to the relationship they had cultivated for decades with their loyal readers. They made no attempt at transferring that bond from ink and paper to digital. The loyal fans of their brand would've followed. Newspaper forgot the business they were in, which was not a distribution model, but rather a relationship model. People follow people. This is why cable news outlets are led by personalities. We're a relationship economy. Always have been, always will be.

Had newspapers taken their brand seriously, had they cultivated their core loyalists, sustained the relationship with each one, had they brought them into the fold, had they delivered a quality product via digital and not gotten caught up in the ink/paper/distribution model, they would've survived. Let's hope at lest a few do.

Let this be a warning to any organization: take your brand for granted and people will leave you.

Feeding Your Head

I spent last Friday getting fed. It was exhilarating to hear intelligent people speak about the economy, innovation, management, the state of government, and sustainability. Groove 11 was an exclusive sponsor of the annual Chief Executive Council meeting. Mark Hurd, CEO of HP, spoke, as did Reid Hoffman, founder and chairmen of LinkedIn. Many others shared amazing insights as well.

Coming away from this day, I was once again reminded how important it is to continuously learn; to put yourself in environments that may be slightly outside your comfort zone. Stretching is the only way. In today's economy, standing still is a sure way to get run over. The person or organization that is not learning won't compete effectively. Mark Hurd spoke about how at HP being the best is the benchmark. Anything short of that is not acceptable. He's spot-on. Excellence is a learned behavior. Over the weekend, I renewed my subscription to The Harvard Business Review, after a one-year hiatus. My head will not go without feeding.

The Event Business Needs to Lean Forward

Last week I attended the 8^th annual Event Marketing Summit in Chicago. It was good to see former colleagues and get a first-hand look at how the event industry is managing the worst recession since the 1930s. As expected, the big boys – George P. Johnson, TBA Global, Momentum, and Jack Morton – are fine. Revenue is down 20%-30%, but they’ve stayed close to their clients and are creating and executing decent programs. The big takeaway: virtual. Every program has an online and offline element. It’s much more than a microsite or twitter feeds; for the most part it's Facebook. In some cases, gaming has taken on a role, primarily with internal training programs. Cisco GSX global sales meeting moved to a 100% virtual platform and won the prestigious Grand X award (agency: George P. Johnson).

Removing the buzz of combining virtual with events, the content was flat. There was a lot of “This is how I’ve done it” and not enough on “This is what’s coming next.” This reminded me of something a partner at Groove 11 noted regarding events, “Once an agency gets called, the decision has been made, and it’s time to execute.” This leaves little room for strategy or innovation. It becomes, as a former client used to say, about making sure all the plants are in the right place.

It’s a shame. The event space has the potential to be a powerful force in defining the brand experience. It is, after all, the business of a brand connecting with consumers in real time. Innovation should be paramount. Here are 3 ways to infuse the event space and the agencies with some much-needed “juice.”

Strategy – You must start with strategy. What’s the game changer? The business objective for the event?And how is it connected to the integrated marketing plan? Too often events are still an afterthought, left to explain how execution was flawless. Not interested. Tell me how your strategy affected real change and moved the business forward.

Culture – Move your agencies away from a reactive culture to a proactive one. It’s about the people, stupid. Everything else is a commodity (or will be in a matter of time). The team with the best people wins. Event agencies still tout their “buying power” or “global reach.” They’re important, but ideas that change the game are what matters now. Organizations will hire the brightest people sitting across the table from them, not the name on the side of building.

Technology – It’s your friend. I was taken aback by how many agencies are subcontracting the technology piece. Bring it in house. It will force a culture change, no doubt, but how else can you leap ahead?

In fairness, some agencies are doing the above better than others, but none is hitting all three well. Strategy is expensive, culture is hard, and technology is difficult. I’ll be keeping an eye out for the agency that nails it. My guess is I won’t find it at the 9^th annual Event Marketing Summit.

The Difference Between Individual Contributor, Manager, & Leader

All organizations need strong individual contributors, managers, and most definitely leaders. What’s not articulated is what it takes to be successful in each role. How does one transition between them? Speaking from experience, it doesn’t happen seamlessly. Simply put, “What got you here won’t get you there.” Meaning the skills that made you successful in one role are not the same skills that will make you successful in the next role. I struggled with this early in my career as I was tapped to take on larger roles with little preparation, and have seen others do so as well. It’s an easy trap to fall into, as the rational thought is, “I got promoted due to my successful history. I’ll simply keep doing the same and success will follow.” Nothing could be farther from the truth. The key is to know which skills to take with you and which to leave behind, and most importantly, which new skills to acquire.