Zoom In & Zoom Out

As a marketer, have you ever felt disappointed by a “well prepared” campaign? Have you ever got lost in the complex business world? If yes, please take a few minutes to watch the following video: Power of Ten.

Do you get a little point of what I would like to say? 

In today’s business world, the competition is so stiff that you cannot only think yourself. Here I highly recommend marketers take advantages of the principle of Power of Ten when make decisions: Zoom In & Zoom Out

Zoom In

I’m not going to talk SWOT here, but in the 

real business world it is definitely necessary for marketers to pay attention to your competitors, follow the news or even be informed with the government policies. Since any of theses things could make a big influence on your own marketing effort. It’s not only we say integrated marketing, but integrated world. So here I suggest marketers anytime you would like to make any decisions, please stand on a broader view of the outside world: are you on the right track? 

Zoom Out

Currently nobody can doubt that customer becomes the central of marketing strategies. But do you really have a clear understanding of your customers? Have you ever thought carefully or conducted any research about your customers? What are the differences with your competitors' or across your segmentations? If not, why don’t you go back to check it? Remember get a right target, you get one half of success. 

Five Things You Should Tell Your Clients

Working for clients to solve their problems is the objective of marketers. However, it is not a rare case when clients have different opinions with what you think. Sometimes what makes the situation worse is the client has a hard interference in your work. In order to avoid such conflicts, I think it's important to let your clients know the following important things before you get started. 

1. You’ve Got The CHANCE.

It’s never been a traditional media world, and you don’t have to pay millions of dollars to buy television ads or get published on a famous magazine. You saved the money! But you get a more effective way to marketing your products directly to your target audience. You have your owned media: official website, social media pages, blogs, forums, apps and etc. So you've got the chance. Take advantages of these low cost platforms and create consistent marketing effort, then you will success in advance of your competitors. 

2. Customers Come First.

It’s not the time to think about your brand, your product or any marketing strategies before you get a deep understanding about your customers. It’s the time that customers come to the central topic. They have so many options that they don't have to care about you unless you provide them what they need. 

3. Nobody Cares About Your Product.

Before you make your decisions, please keep in mind that nobody cares about you or your product; they only care themselves. But it doesn’t mean you don’t have any chance to win your customers. You do! It’s pretty easy. Get to know your customers and provide what they want. Take "solve problems" as priority when designing website or creating content marketing.

4. You Only Have 9 Seconds.

You’ll never get a chance if you don’t knock the door. People are rush and impatient. You only have 9 seconds to attract their attentions. Who are you? What is your personality? Rather than use jargon phrase or big words, the best way is to provide what your customers want. What’s more important; show your prospects the way they are fascinated.

5. Numbers Don't Make Sense.

   I’m not saying you cannot get anything from a millions “likes” or “shares”. But, remember what you really what to receive is people’s responsiveness. Do you impress them? Do you offer any ways for customers to react? A link? A purchase button? Or a referral chance? I cannot say profit is the ultimate goal for any company, but before you do anything, it’s really really important to think what are your objectives.

I believe the above five things could at least narrow the gap between clients and marketers a bit, after all these are either the truths or the general thinking about the current business environment. 

We Don’t Have "Entertainment Moment Today", But We Cannot Be Absent…

Less than one hour after the earthquake in Ya’An, China, where hit by earthquakes twice in the latest five years, WangYi News updated its “Earthquake Feature” all over their website across platforms. In the golden position of their front page, there are Deaths, Disaster Area, Situation, Reactions, On the Spot, Details and Witness. In order to morn the death, they made their web page black tone. 

I use WangYi App in my iPhone a lot. One of the must-see is “Entertainment Moment Today ”. It’s about short jokes or funny stories related to the news happened in each day. But what I see today is"  Moment Today" with the sub-tittle “We don’t have entertainment moment today, but we cannot be absent”. In the “short story” from a first person statement, they said: 

"Nobody slept well in the early morning today, everyone is caring about the earthquake. What made us alert is not the earthquake, but earthquake again. Like most of you guys, what I am able to do is to reload the weibo (Chinese Twitter) and update the news. Like most of you guys, I donated money to the disaster area and hope it could help a bit."

They also said:

“Entertainment Moment Today” is to make our life relaxed, but we also have to be optimistic when we have problems. In this moment, we are here as always, and we hope everyone does well. We believe everything will be fine. 

At the time when I am writing this poster, “  Moment Today” received 9,145 follow ups, which is three times than the comments in ordinary day. 

I believe this is a great newsjacking, as the top News App, WangYi could donate to the disaster area, actually they did ($800,000). But what they could contribute more is to call on everybody, not only update the latest news, but also spread the optimistic belief to the public. I think they did!!! Their fast reactions to the news made them the top search result in the Baidu Search , and without doubt, their sympathy to the death could receive a great respect from the public. 

As a WangYi reader, I can tell I’ll be one of the more loyal readers from today.

P.S. Newsjacking is the process by which you inject your ideas or angles into breaking news, in real-time, in order to generate media coverage for yourself or your business. 

                                                      ---David Meerman Scott

                                                                                               

Nobody Cares About You. They Only Care Themselves.

If you are a web developer or a marketer of a brand,

What do you THINK makes a good web User Experience?

Most of you may say: good design, faster running or call to action.

However, if you are a customer,

What kind of User Experience do you EXPECT?

Maybe you would say: easy to explore, save transaction
or enough information. 

Yes, I understand! I'm a customer for most of the time. How about we say like this:

“A good web User Experience (UX) is offering what I need. “

Isn’t that true?

Think about the reasons why you explore a website. Maybe for brand research, may be for purchase. Whatever you are looking for, you are always LOOKING FOR something.

But you might say, “Sometimes I even don’t know what I want exactly. I may just want to buy a product because of the brand”.

Don’t worry. A good web UX will do everything for you.

I’m not a game person. But if I use Google search “Sony Game”, what appears to me is like this: 

 

Then I clicked the PlayStation®, what jumped into my eyes was the rolling page showing latest games. Then if scroll down, I can see "Top Downloaded Games", "Featured Game and Media" and "PlayStation Community". These are good offers for game players.  

However, as a non-game person, I came here just for exploring and learning about the products. As is known, Sony is a game platform developer rather than a single game provider; there are many things to do across their products. Luckily, Sony provides a menu bar on top of each web page I’m on. From there I'm able to check all of the PlayStation products they offer, check the games across platforms, get an experience of the new game trailer, and join discussion forums. 

As a game player, If you go to Latest Games on PlayStation 3, say God Of War, you will not only see the descriptions and reviews of the game, the purchase button, but also see the suggested “More God of War”, “Products I may also like” and some related discussions about the game. 

What a great website! They provide everything you need regardless of your role: a real game player or an outsider. 

Here I would like to suggest for all the marketers: Web Design is important, but what's more important is the content you offer. Only by providing what customers need, you will make your website difference. 

Remember: Nobody cares about you. They only care themselves. 

When A Brand Smiles...

If a person smiles to you, won’t you feel better? Unfortunately, more and more people tend to have a “screen face”, a word Kare Anderson refers to no emotions in facial expressions. People currently are impatient and rushed, both in life and at work.

However, if a brand web “smiles” to you, will you stop for a while? When interviewed in Revolution, Kare regards brands as humans. That means as people fascinate with different personalities, brands stand out with different attributes. So here is the question:

How does a brand communicate as a person？

The answer is pretty easy: just be lively, energetic and inspiring. Humans are Humans. They like to be noticed, learned and engaged.

So a suggestion for online marketing efforts is to interact with users. Forums, social media, and open-minded questions are all great ways to “talk” with people. Online marketing objectives are more than numbers of footprints, but also quality of the “conversation.”

As a saying goes: The best 
listener made the best conversation. SIMCITY is a good listener without any doubt. Their official website impressed me greatly with simulate city background.  Besides, they have a pretty thoughtful content with everything users might want to know. To give users a comprehensive experience, they also have pictures and videos. They even create communities for users to discuss with each other. It’s like a multi-way conversation since SIMCITY are able to get a better understanding of their customers.