Another Cart, Another Horse Before it

January 31, 2014 by Leave a Comment

Confused businessman sitting on a solid rock with so many question.“Watson, what do you think the best marketing tactic for a business is?” The Effective Detective asked, as he turned away from his frost encrusted window.

“Sir? I think I am missing some data here,” I replied, feeling like I was being led into a trap.

“Excellent Watson! There is hope for you after all! Pray tell, what is the missing data?” The Detective exclaimed.

Well…” I started out slowly, watching The Detective’s face for indications that I was going in the wrong direction, “what kind of business are we talking about, sir?”

“A good start Watson! How can you possibly know what tactics to use if you don’t even know the business? Every Door Direct Mail would be a horrible choice for an online business, no? There is another piece of missing data though, is there not?” The Detective responded, almost gleefully.

” Even if you know the business, the market could easily vary, even within a certain business type,” I ventured.

“You’ve hit the nail on the head, Watson! Who the market is, where you can meet them, and how you can reach them, these are the true drivers of your marketing tactics. It sounds obvious and yet, how often have we seen people creating Facebook pages when their market doesn’t use Facebook, networking at events where neither their market, nor good referral sources are in attendance, and of course, sending out emails with content that has no appeal to the people they are sending to. It pains me to admit I’ve done the same occasionally,” The Detective ended with a sigh.

“I think this is a landmark day then sir, you, admitting a mistake?” I pushed gently.

“Careful Watson, of course I admit to my mistakes, since they are so few and far between, it does no harm, but back to the point at hand. We could end the discussion here since the point is so simple, but there is a bit of nuance to using mis-directed tactics,” The Detective responded, then gave me my usual lead to ask him to continue.

“OK sir, I’ll bite. How could you possibly make using the wrong tactic work to your advantage?” I asked.

“Ah Watson, the trick is in knowing what you don’t know,” The Detective began, “if you are certain of your market, then using the wrong tactic, simply because it is popular or cheap is simply bad business. But what if you aren’t sure of your market, or at least you aren’t sure where they are or how to reach them? Then, running small controlled tests with some of these tactics may actually help you identify where your marketing should be focused, and certainly where it should not.”

“Taking baby steps before you start running sir?”

“That is one metaphor Watson. Another one, although I despise sports metaphors, would be how a football team starts out a game with a few running plays, and a few passes to see where the defense might have a weakness, before committing their game to runs or passes, or risking the big play that could backfire on them.”

“An interesting concept, sir,” I said, not sure I was supposed to come up with a new metaphor or to just put the game to rest.

“The important thing is that you must analyze the results. As usual Watson, the clues are there, but you need to get and look at the data to find them. Now let’s get back to work shall we?” The Detective finished.

“As you wish, sir.”

Filed Under: building the road, content, Marketing Tagged With: , , ,

Squirrels

June 3, 2013 by Leave a Comment

too_much_data“Watson, do you remember our discussion regarding too much segmentation?” The Effective Detective started today’s discussion.

“Of course, sir. It is hard to forget any of our discussions,” I replied.

The Detective cast a sidelong glance my way, briefly trying to decide if I was being sarcastic, then deciding  he didn’t care, and continued.

“I have realized there is a similar issue that requires some examination,” The Detective began.

“Which would be?” I asked, encouraging him to continue.

“We all know we are all deluged with data on a daily basis, Watson. What we often don’t realize is that even when we narrow down the data points, we may not be, how shall I say this? narrowing it down correctly.”

“You mean we are looking at the wrong data, sir?” I asked, concerned.

“Not actually wrong as in incorrect, Watson, I would describe it more as data points that are distractions versus ones that take us closer to our destination,” The Detective assured me.

“I am afraid you have lost me, sir. Distractions? If the data is correct how could it be a distraction?” Now feeling a tad confused by the direction the conversation was taking.

“Elementary my dear Watson, even the simplest data analysis – is this good, is this bad? requires time. If you are looking at data that, while quite correct and accurate does not advance you toward your goal, it is a distraction. For example, obsessing over the number of hits your website gets, and ignoring if any of those hits sign up for your list  or buy products that you had for sale. Wondering how you can increase your Social Media Klout without checking to see if all of that Klout is resulting in sales,” The Detective took his characteristic pause, and I, seeing a chance, jumped in.

“Weapons of Mass Distraction, sir?”

The Detective rolled his eyes, but couldn’t hide the smile from turning up the corners of his mouth. “A bit of a cliché, but still accurate, Watson. There is actually nothing wrong with looking for hits, likes, or whatever, the issue becomes when you become distracted by them and lose sight of what the real goal is. You must look at any data in concert with your goals, for example,’ my hit rate is up but my sign ups are flat’, then you can consider issues with the copy, or perhaps you are simply getting hits from sources that are not in your market. The data only informs you when looked at together. By itself, some of this data truly is just a distraction,” The Detective finished and gave me that look that told me it was time to move on.

“Something we should all consider, sir.”

“Quite so, Watson, Quite so.”

Filed Under: building the road, data, list building, Marketing, sales, Social Media Tagged With: , , , , ,

Too Much Of a Good Thing

May 13, 2013 by 1 Comment

pie_chart“Do you know how to destroy the usefulness of a technique, Watson?” This time it was The Effective Detective who began our weekly discussion.

“By misusing it, sir?” I replied.

“Close, Watson. You are still, on occasion, quite vague. There are many ways to ‘misuse’ a technique. I am looking for one way in particular,” The Detective’s response came back with a barely disguised tone of irritation.

“Over use perhaps?” I ventured.

“Perfect Watson! Even if it was a guess,” The Detective shot me a sideways glance. “It is possible to fall into the trap of thinking that if a little of something gives me great results, than a lot of it will give me fantastic results,” The Detective paused briefly.

“Was there a particular technique you were thinking of sir?” I encouraged.

“Yes, Watson, thank you for asking. There is one technique that is often used to a point where the data it provides becomes meaningless. That one technique is segmentation,” The Detective paused uncharacteristically here; usually expounding a bit more on the subject before giving me an opening.  However, even with the limited amount of exposition from him, I had formed a question or perhaps a challenge.

“But sir, isn’t it important, in fact, critical, to have as much information as possible?” I asked.

“An excellent point Watson. That said, there are two dangers in overuse of segmentation.

“The first should be rather obvious. It is possible to segment your audience to such a point that the segments shrink down to a size that renders them unusable. Unless you have a high ticket item that you are marketing to a group that you intend to try to reach at a premium price, who you have a high confidence level of engaging with,  segmenting down to less than fifteen or twenty individuals is most likely not going to produce results equal to or greater than the labor and cost  involved in producing those results.

“The second, and perhaps less obvious, but still deadly, danger is segmenting into sections that will have no effect on your message. If the appropriate age for use if your product or service is anyone older than sixteen years old, dividing your audience into a standard set of age segments like 18-24, 25-34, 35-54, 55-64, 65+ will largely be a waste of time in terms of getting that information, and a colossal waste of time and energy in crafting multiple messages for the different groups,” The Detective took his more characteristic pause here, and my mind raced to come up with an observation or question.

“So one only needs to segment down to the level where the message will resonate most strongly!” I exclaimed in a sudden moment of clarity.

“Precisely, Watson! Well done.  A more specific age example would be  if your product or service is aimed at adults aged 35-64, then you shouldn’t care if they are 35-54 or, 55-64, that breakdown isn’t needed. A tad simplistic I admit, and age is certainly not the only demographic you could over-think,  but you see the point.”

“Indeed I do, sir. So the trick then is finding that balance between too little segmentation, and too much.” I responded.

“Quite, so. That however, is a discussion for another day.”

Filed Under: data, list building, Marketing, segmentation Tagged With: , , , , ,