Lairig Marketing

CMO Council Survey #463: Social Insecurity

Gluttons for punishment, that CMO Council. Releasing another survey ripe for a Lairig Marketing smackdown.

This one is titled “Variance in the Social Brand Experience,” a clumsy turn of phrase for two reasons. First of all, “social brand experience” is nothing more than breast implants for “social media marketing,” but that’s a discussion for another day.

Secondly, the title implies that consumers are experiencing varying levels of satisfaction from what brands do on social sites. Not at all. This survey actually exposes a vast difference between marketers’ perceptions and consumers’ reality when it comes to social media.

To wit:
“According to marketers surveyed, customers like or engage because they want to be heard (41% chose this vaguely worded reason), or are looking for news or information about products (40%)…”
Versus surveyed consumers, who said they became fans of brands on social sites in order to:
“…Be eligible for exclusive offers (67%), interact with other customers (60%), play games and contests (65%).”

Surprise! The Crest brand manager thinks you’ve become a fan of his Facebook brand page in order to learn exactly how aluminum hydroxide works, when you really just want $1-off coupons.

This discrepancy should be enough to knock every social media practitioner down a peg or two, but it’s hard to see how it will when a CMO Council spokesperson spins like this:

“The social brand explosion has created a wave of loyalty among social consumers who are eager to show their support and share their experiences with others online, but this loyalty comes at a cost—from savings to games—that consumers see as their social currency…”

Ugh. Gag me with a coupon. Here is a better interpretation, without the buzzwords and B.S. – “Just give ‘em free sh&t.”

Too bad, because there is a tiny bit of wheat with this chaff. Only 17% of marketers in the survey claimed to have integrated social media into their other marketing tactics.

Humble opinion, but achieving full integration is the ultimate hurdle for social marketers. The low-hanging fruit is just about picked clean.

With that, then, here is some free advice for Facebook, as it rushes to get its IPO done before either or both Greece and Groupon default. During the investor road show, pitch how you are going to help companies achieve the vision of fully integrated marketing.

Because social networks cannot live by banner ads alone.

It’s Back. It’s Back. “Bravely.”

We flipped a coin, and lost. Lairig Marketing is back. Fifty days have passed since we closed up the blog shop, early last December. In all that time, absolutely nothing new has been written in the marketing-sphere.

In fact, it has gone exactly as we said it would in 2011’s final post: All Facebook, Twitter, Google, Apple, and P&G. And, oh yeah, for the sixth year in a row, this will be The Year of Mobile.

It is so bad, we’ve unsubscribed from Ad Age and AdWeek. If it weren’t for George Parker, there would be no reason to open the computer each morning.

Maybe it’s time to get an academic perspective on marketing. Let’s consult with the #1-rated Marketing MBA program in the U.S. – Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management.

Oops.

Last summer, Kellogg’s new dean embarked on a long journey to remake the school. And just like the “new CMO” phenomenon we see so often in the private sector, she spearheaded the development of a new marketing campaign. Complete with a new tagline.

Ready?

“Think Bravely.”

Grammatically suspect, Kellogg’s tagline is one part derivative (see: Apple, circa 1997), and one part off-kilter. As cynical as this might sound, people don’t get an MBA for the experience. The school each one chooses is based on which will deliver the best outcome. How would a Kellogg committee of its best and brightest miss this?

Lead Bravely, maybe. Or Manage Bravely. Or Get Rich Bravely. Whatever.

The "Kellogg Marketing Makeover" team didn’t stop at just a tagline. A manifesto was developed, along with a video touting the school’s new point of view. It would seem the team consulted the famous bullshit generator.

Here is Kellogg’s new brand mantra: “We believe business can be bravely led [ed.: then why not Lead Bravely as the tagline?], passionately collaborative, and world changing.”

They couldn’t stop themselves. Alongside the new brand video is this: “Intellectually Vibrant. Innovative. Socially Engaged.” (Can a person be engaged without being social?)

Perhaps in a later post, we’ll dissect the buzzword-filled, nonintuitive and often contradictory script for the “Think Bravely” video. Or how, in another video on Kellogg’s website, the dean summarizes the new brand essence as “thinking outside the box,” a term so old it now induces derisive laughter when said in a business setting.

For now, though, let’s end with this question: Why didn’t the dean focus on the data that indicates less than one of every five Kellogg MBA grads takes a job in Marketing?

We have enough “innovators” and “collaborators.” What we don’t have enough of are “brave” marketers.