With data-rich mobile internet browsing, context determines content. Here are four ways context is changing online marketing.

1. The Rise in Mobile Browsing
The future of internet browsing is mobile. A 2011 report by the Pew Internet Project  found that 44% of Americans access the internet through their cell phones—a number that has only continued to grow in light of subsequent reports. That means that nearly half of Americans could, for example, potentially view mobile promotions for your store while shopping in it.

According to a Pew Internet Project 2012 update, “46% of American adults now have a smartphone of some kind, and for the first time smartphone owners outnumber users of more basic phones.”  Not only does this mean that overall mobile internet usage has climbed steadily since the 2011 study, but the majority of those who access the mobile internet have a high level of connectivity to a variety of apps and tools that you can use to both gather data and to send them promotions wherever they are.

2. What is the Customer Doing?
Since the right message needs to be delivered at the right time, it’s essential to send the right mobile ad when a customer is most likely to be receptive to it. Time of day can play a significant factor in helping marketers correctly position their promotions.  For example, you wouldn’t try to target teens in the middle of a school day with ads, but later in the evening you’ll find a captive audience as they interact with their friends.

Regarding the timing of ads, Jonathan Gardner writes at Mashable, “Our contexts change dozens of times a day: In the morning, you’re an athlete, working out on the elliptical — while at the same time you’re an executive, watching the early business news. Then you’re a cook, making breakfast. Then you’re an executive again, making decisions at the office.”

3. Where are Customers?
The real power of mobile will come into play as location becomes intertwined with mobile usage.  If you know that a FourSquare user has checked in at a downtown hotel, there are opportunities to send ads for local restaurants and cafes for meals with colleagues or meetings. Location marketing will allow marketers to send relevant coupons and promotions to customers when they’re in the perfect spot.

4. Specific Marketing Moments
There may be other opportunities to target customers when they are in the middle of a moment where they could make an additional purchase. By comparing data in a customer’s spending habits, you may be able to catch a limited trend in a customer’s spending.

For example, Tom Wentworth writes at Mashable, “Say a middle-aged husband with no kids prefers action movies, but suddenly orders a barrage of Disney movies from Netflix. Chances are, he has nephews and nieces over for the weekend. He has entered the uncle context. If you anticipate that and hit him with a discount for the nearby amusement park, you may have landed yourself a decent sale.”

Mobile marketing will continue to grow since mobile web usage and smart phone ownership will continue to rise for years to come. The prospect of having location-specific, contextually rooted data on customers provides marketers with a powerful tool they can use to further engage customers with their products and to create new revenue opportunities.

This guest post is written by Lior Levin, a marketing consultant for a company that specializes in a to do list tool.

Ovation began eight years ago using its software to enable theatre owners to recognize incremental revenue by selling preshow digital advertising. Ready-made, attentive audiences of somewhat predictable demographics can be a powerful outlet for local advertisers in search of low-cost, creative message distribution channels.  Ovation distinguished itself by providing failsafes and mechanisms to track missed spots, eliminating generalized or best-guess makegoods that could cut into theater owners margins. In addition to the software, Ovation also provided the professional creative services necessary to develop the spots. In essence, beyond the initial start-up investment and nominal annual fee, the entire operation was turn-key for theatre owners.

While the theatre business segment has been a strong one, last year Ovation owner Mike Svoboda began to consider the potential application of the software product in different venues where like-minded consumers congregate. So began Ovation’s expansion into the only media outlets thriving today:  digital out-of-home.

My contribution will be in several areas: corporate communications and marketing, business strategy, and professional services development.  I couldn’t be more excited; I see these areas in a Venn-like diagram with brand development and stewardship at the intersection, in both internal and external (client) capacities.

I anticipate that we’ll be in “explorer” mode in the digital out-of-home (OOH) arena for awhile. Developing  a deeper understanding of the players, industry and trade groups, and determining our fit. One of my goals will be to see Ovation steadily rise to hold a respectable thought leadership position–i imagine less concerned with technology innovation and more so with consumer relevancy of the content.

Thanks to some very smart and talented folks I’ve had the pleasure to work with, I’ve long since been a believer in what I call the “content entanglement factor.” While it manifests itself somewhat differently in a Website context, the main principle is very applicable for OOH media: if you hope to effectively reach consumers today, with a goal of influencing their purchase considerations, you must switch from ‘advertising’ mode to ‘content marketing‘ mode. Content marketing is the key to informing consumers, educating them so that they might be equipped to make informed decisions, and packaging your messaging to entertain so that they enjoy the experience.

That’s relevancy+emotional connection, folks. Staples in a recipe for success.

So while the Ovation team has a lot of work in front of them, both internally and externally, I’m incredibly excited about the potential and possibilities that lie before us. Despite the negativity heralded across every trade pub I’m skimming today, I’m feeling like it’s actually a good time to be a marketer.  Ingenuity and passion can create lemonade from lemons.

I’m anxious to hear your thoughts: on my move, on digital OOH, on content marketing, on being a marketer today. Please make some time to comment!  Thanks!

The facet of communication that is niggling at me today involves how it’s possible two parties can arrive at gross misapprehensions after participating in the same conversation.  It’s like Group A departs with a firm understanding of apples in their head, while Group B moves on, thinking about the oranges that were just discussed.

You Apple, Me Orange

Because the groups lack real communication, both end up disappointed and dissatisfied.  Group A (a company) regroups and tries again, because hey, that’s what they do–they send direct mail and e-newsletters and the like.  But Group B (consumers) has choices and frankly would prefer to spend their time and money where they feel they matter.  Like Over There, where someone is listening to them, really listening.  Group B has moved on because Group A wasn’t paying attention.

Repeat After Me

There’s  a depth of fulfillment that a consumer can reach when they’ve come to believe they matter to a company.  The fulfillment stems from a reciprocal relationship that should be nurtured in order to be maintained.  “Nurture” doesn’t necessarily mean coupons, free shipping, or waived late fees.  It’s not only about when things are going right, but also about how a company acts when things are going wrong.

That’s how interpersonal relationships (like marriage) work, right? Together in good times and bad, always communicating. Listening. Paying attention.

Case in point of relationships in tough times:  Zappos during a Q4 headcount reduction and Motrin following release of an ill-conceived promotional video.  Zappos was applauded for its transparency and honesty through an admittedly difficult and controversial event.  Customers remained, and even complimented.  Motrin, by contrast still seems to have learned little, as their follow-through to date consists only of an apology note and removal of the offending video.  Leaving confused consumers saying, “So you heard us shout.  But do you really understand why?”

Listen Up

Good communication is both an art and a science. It requires a talent and innate interest in understanding and learning from those around you. And it involves skills enabling you to hear what isn’t being said, as well as consider the way another might view or feel about a topic.

Say not only what you want to promote, spread, or express–but say it after you’ve figured out what really matters to those you’re talking with.  After  month one, what undeniable value will your product or service deliver?  Features can be rationalized and trivialized circumstantially.  Benefits are subjective and strike at the heart of our emotions.  When something triggers our emotions, we form stronger connections with it, and by extension, the company providing the product.

Did you hear that?

That was Opportunity knocking.   Did you open the door?

This makes the 2nd time in a week that a song–an “old” song, no less–serves as inspiration for my writing. I guess it doesn’t really surprise me, I already knew that lyrics interest me more in music than any instrumental ever could.  Oh, I’m still a big fan of the groove. It’s just that the delivery falls flat without meaningful lyrical messaging.

Music As A Growth Opportunity

Tracy Chapman spoke to me in my often misspent youth, and she continues to be relevant to me today.  Her legendary “Gimme One Reason” is clearly about personal relationships, and while I finally managed to resolve that part of my life 14 years ago (thank you, Scott), the essence of the song is now also something I can relate to as a marketer.

Lyrics | Tracy Chapman lyrics – Give Me One Reason lyrics

What Tracy Chapman Can Teach Consumer Products Companies

“Gimme just one reason why I should stay…”

People need a degree of routine. Of normalcy, of familiarity. Absolutes to count on. Hey, that’s why brand marketers even exist–to exploit leverage subjective (even irrational) associations people inherently make with products they interact with.  Purchase decisions are not made on the club floor, and consumers are not trolling to switch allegiances. But that does not make it okay for a brand to abuse these truths and forget the thousand little ways to say “Thank you for your patronage.”

“You got to make me change my mind.”

Um, maybe covered well enough above.  C’mon, guys.  I have less money to spend today on goods than I did a year ago. I’m concerned about making choices that might have significant effects on my family or situation later.  How can you make me feel more confident, more rational, about taking a risk? Or, how can you validate this decision to buy that long ago stopped being a conscious one?

“You know that I love you. And there ain’t no more to say.”

I’m tired of talking. And maybe even of being talked to.  I want to be engaged. And I want action, passion, momentum. To be involved in something.

Sure, maybe in the end all I’m really talking about is whether to purchase Diet Dr. Pepper or Diet Coke.  But there’s a compelling story to be written here, and a consumer willing to be convinced. Sure-shootin I’m not going to stop buying caffiene. But which brand is showing a little consumer love?

Do you understand me at all?

Do you speak my language?

I had the great fortune of having a live & in-person meeting this week with someone whom I’d previously known only virtually.  That is to say, we had connected via Twitter, LinkedIn, and even email.  It took awhile for our “first date,” (she’s a busy gal) but as with some budding acquaintances, I had an inkling that we’d hit it off.  Score!.

Lynn and I are both passionate about communication and helping create meaningful relationships between consumers and brands.  There are a lot of ways to do that, and we each bring a little something different to the table in terms of skill sets.  But what helped us really connect was the fact we were speaking a common language.

That language was consumerism.  And I believe it’s one every good marketer or communications pro should speak fluently.

Are you really talking if no one is listening?

Don’t look at me like that.  Consumerism isn’t a bad word.  It’s a reality of global economy (we can thank the industrial revolution) that people need things, they want things. And they want choices.  Options.  Search for what suits them best.  The era when companies could manufactur products without investing in consumer insight is gone.  The time when messaging could be sprayed Gatling gun style all over their targets is over.  Targets have clued in, tech’d up, and are filtering out.

Truth is, the power is with the people–the consumer.  For oh-so-many reasons, companies have to rev up (Heaven help those that are at “START”) their methodologies for monitoring, responding, and reaching their consumers (reaching includes offering relevant goods/services). And the initiatives have to run the full customer lifecycle, from awareness-building to retention.  The strategies will differ, but the fundamental core principles have to place the consumer at center stage.

Roger That

Time, cost, and interaction experience are all key decision-making factors for consumers when purchasing goods or services.  But companies that understand the consumer viewpoint–needs, wants, convenience, added value, psychological nuances–are in prime position to advance their brands by meeting the emotional needs of their customers.

We all know a few companies that indeed are listening, and channeling what they’ve learned into business and cultural changes within their organizations.  Hats off to them.

Wonder when some of the others will bother to learn the consumer language?

We’re talking.  All you gotta do is listen.

I’m Yours To Lose (30 Seconds or Less)

Wearing my Consumer hat (it fits the best), I’ll unequivocally state that my online expectation is that any site I visit will enable me to do what it is I need to do.  Whatever that need may be.  It’s like, the cost of entry for being allowed on the ‘net.  It can be as simple as listing the phone number or as complex as completing a transaction of some sort.  That’s what your site is for, right?  To tell me everything–as a consumer–that I’d want to know about you as a [service provider or product type here].  It’s your one shot to impress me, virtual-like, to give me your “elevator speech.”  The RTB, or Reason To Be.

I’m thinking this idea of “your site must let me do what I came to do” isn’t particularly novel; in fact I’m sure its not.  But that said, why, then, do so many sites still stink?  Because when a site stinks, I bounce.  And I rarely give them a chance later to redeem themselves.  Why waste time?  Google will give me alternatives, lickety-split.

Do some sites stink because they [the site owners]:

• look at the Web as a piece of their Contact Information, a perfunctory element of diminished capacity and something that’s just “done” (irrespective of “done well”)
• never consider looking at their site from the end-user perspective, as their consumers might
• use jargon or slang either by poor planning or to project a false-feeling air of “cool” that can fall flat in Web context if not carefully planned
• think the whiz-bang Flash or “big reveal” IS their Web statement.  That’s what people come for, the animation.  Wrong.
• don’t plan for every online scenario, and then some
• lack the resources, knowledge, or time
• don’t understand that to a consumer, their Web page IS their brand, their product.  I.e, a site that is complicated, shallow, or unnavigatible is automatically discounted
• don’t realize that content is alive; it requires nurturing and maintenance to stay relevant and ready
• list continues…

Due Diligence

By no means an exhaustive list (I have more work to do tonite after this gets posted), but to suggest a few things site owners work on, to deliver immediate (if topical) value to their site visitors and circumvent The Big Bounce (I encourage you to add to this list by posting comments):

• Ensure your branding is obvious and strong.  There’s a chance I clicked on the wrong link or guessed at your URL.  Reassure me I’m where I meant to be.
• Ditch the “under construction” fluff, it feels insincere.  Either you have a site or you don’t.  And I can’t imagine why you might not have a site.
• Take care with the visual design of the site.  Clearly, aesthetics are part of the appeal for me, and as the web literally IS the element of your brand I interact with, it should be harmonious (consistent) with other elements I might experience.  But factor in the inherent and contextual constraints and some adjustments might be appropriate between your mass media design execution and your web design execution.
• Provide as much concierge-like navigation and wayfinding support as possible.  Make it easy and intuitive for me to find my way around, and find my way back.  Remember that depending on their search term, visitors might not start at your home page but rather an interior page.  Include bread crumbs, strong and clear main navigation to help me process where I should go to accomplish my site goals.
• Sounds trivial, but its true:  Tell me how to reach you.  And I suggest every way possible.  Offering a “contact me” form is great (be sure the mail box for the form is monitored closely), but sometimes I don’t want to take the form route, and want to actually email a real person.  Provide a directory or listing and I’ll feel validated.  I might be worried about what black hole the forms fall into.
• Review your content.  And then review it again, after someone unassociated has read the content.  Back to the brand item mentioned earlier, it’s likely that your brand has a voice–a unique tone– for your consumers, and ensuring your content maintains that continuity of voice throughout all touchpoints for  a specific audience is key.  Stylistically, content read on page A sould “feel” like the content written for page Q.

Content Enganglement Factor

Content is a broad and glorious label, one that in my experience refers to a number of site assets, including body copy, headlines and subheads, multimedia, audio, video or other interaction element, photos, graphs, charts, graphics, sidebars, panels…Well-planned and executed content just hangs together beautifully.

Content can kll the bounce, cold.  Intentional and deliberate Web copy written in a appealing tone of voice, respectfully sectioned or broken up (yes, I’m guilty myself) and replicated as appropriate throughout the site…that’s as sweet as chocolate.  It tells me there’s a story to be told by your brand, and you’re inviting me into the dialogue.  You want to share, not shout.  There can be an implied level of friendship in Web content that can’t easily be crafted in other media…possibly because the Web is an interaction, an exchange–and its through exchanges that we prove our mettle.  When consumers become entangled, they’re engaged, they’re active and not passive.  Passive means you’re easily forgotten.

Companies PAY to get active consumers entangled.  As with most things, once entangled, its harder to depart, to shed the warm & fuzzy blanket you’ve come to enjoy.

In case you haven’t checked out GeoVoices, I thought I’d bring over a little of the material I’ve posted there and save you a trip.

My GeoVoices blog post: Your Consumers Are Driving The Bus – Are You Strapped In?

BusinessWeek book review that the above post relates to:  Are We Consumers, or Are We Consumed?

Have you read the book “Buying In:  The Secret Dialogue Between What We Buy and Who We Are?” The book extends the notion about how closely intertwined brands have come with our personal identities.  Author Rob Walker suggests that “. . .consumers interact with brands, defining and controlling them as companies struggle to keep up.”

By contrast, a recent ClickZ article by Pete Blackshaw, “We Marketers Still Have Control!” asserts that today marketers have more control over their audiences than ever before, due in part to technological advances allowing sophisticated data-gathering, precise targeting,  message delivery, and on-the-fly modifications  that just wasn’t possible for earlier generations of marketers. 

Folks, we’ve evolved from the cigar and three martini lunch to the triple-shot skinny tall gulped down with a soy energy bar.  We’re not in Kansas anymore.

I find these two positions intriguing, and not necessarily mutually exclusive.  Case in point: a gal whose office is down the hall from mine used olive oil from the company kitchen to eliminate the squeak from her door.  Consumers are creative, and solution-oriented.  When faced with cereal but no milk, we resolve morning hunger with cold pizza instead.  Likely not what Pizza Hut had in mind when developing the menu line (they’ve yet to introduce a breakfast pie, but with their flavor innovation track record, I’ll bet that’s going to roll out any day now), but hey, it works for a great number of us.  Methinks Maslow fits in here somewhere.

I think the very nature of a consumer is to accept a product (or service), internalize it, shape it to fit our needs.  If it works, we stick with it.  If it works well, we herald it.  If it’s great, we blog about it.

Which leads me to play devil’s advocate on this topic of brand control.  The blog world is clearly a platform, a venue in which the brand has some inherent limited reach and efficacy.  The Web is pervasive and the universe is vast; an audience for a negative (or a positive) comment can range from 1 to one million+ in numbers and the impetus for the original communiqué could be a single experience where the brand (or brand representative i.e., cashier, volunteer, customer service agent, etc.) failed to meet expectations.  Hey, we all have bad days – maybe the volunteer was asked the location of the cafeteria for the thousandth time and had simply grown weary.  But now the negative experience has been commented out for all the world to read.  How does the brand contain that cat now let loose from the bag?  Minimize casualties?

Fortunately this social forum {blog, Web site, etc.} allows reentry, and the brand could choose to address its faux pas publicly, and directly.  Opening oneself up and proactively encouraging brand interaction – even allowing consumers to openly criticize, comment, or suggest paths not in keeping with your brand strategy – might seem somewhat counterintuitive.  But Dell and a lot of other respected companies are doing it successfully.  Maybe in that sense, they’re providing a forum for all, and letting the audiences moderate themselves.  Sounds like there’s honor (not to mention good will) in being bold enough to expose vulnerabilities.

I found this article particularly compelling because I’m a long-time marketer; it’s been my job to exploit consumer needs (real or perceived) and perpetuate compelling messaging to incite trial and mechanisms to encourage affinity with repeat purchase.  I’m clearly also a consumer, and quite a conscientious one; I evaluate product placement, packaging, merchandising schemas, displays.  When I realize I like brand X instead of brand Y, I really try to identify the variables that influenced my decision.  Is that product/service really superior to the other one I tried?  Is the hook really a product innovation, or merely a marketing innovation (“new look, same great taste!”)?

Now that you’re thinking (about that new enriched water, that new blouse that won’t ever wrinkle, or that knife that will slice tomatoes AND paper), let’s consider healthcare instead of consumer products.

With the case of my children’s doctor, for instance, I have the freedom (insurance-wise) to choose either one of the two major local systems.  And I’ve held a couple of different career positions in the area, so I’ve had occasion to be affiliated with both systems.  So when I have a choice, which do I choose, and why?

I’m with [System One].  Are they the most technologically superior?  Are they the Most Wired?  Do they have service-leading clinical trials?  I confess, I just don’t know.  Those aren’t the needs I face today.

I do know that my pediatrician has given me his email address and encourages me to drop a line if I have a question.  I know that his nurse always returns my call promptly and is courteous and respectful when she speaks to me, no matter how trivial (or bizarre!) my inquiry.  His office even readily accepted not one, but all three of my children into their practice (“Sorry, the doctor is no longer accepting new patients.”) when we relocated back to the city after several years away.  He values the time of a working, commuting mother of three and recognizes that when I call asking for a prescription to treat pink eye that I know what I’m talking about – there’s no need to bend my schedule into a pretzel to bring the oozing, crusty little guy in.

I can’t recall why I tried [System One] in the first place, way back when.  But I can easily tell you why I’m with them today.  And my REAL point is – I do that (tell people) almost weekly.  I talk easily, frequently, thoroughly, and passionately about which doctor I recommend.  Didn’t you know?  Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends.

What’s my recommendation worth to you?

Blogger’s Annon.

Hi, my name is Heather Rast.  I’m a blogging neophyte.  I’ve been blogging now for 12 days.  I’m already an addict.

Anyone that knows me is aware that I enjoy creative writing.  Snappy messages in greeting cards, funny anecdotes in emails, and then there’s my hobby.  Yes, I’m also writing abook (who isn’t?).

I’d been dying to actively participate in a blog where the conversations could be real and candid, reflect some personal element without being a recount of the day’s activities (do I really need to tell people that I yelled at my kids about Pop-Tarts this morning?).  The topics would talk about consumers and communications, blow a kiss at the healthcare vertical, and encourage a hug or two from respected peers.

So far, I’ve talked a little and (blush here) even proffered a chaste kiss or two.  Have received a couplea hugs, but since I can be touchy-feely, I’m definitely wanting more.  I’m a little insecure, folks, so please give up the hugs (post comments, in case you were’t following the ‘relationship’ analogy).

Imagine my surprise when I checked my personal email today to find a LinkedIn connection invitation from Larry Mickelberg, and a short comment re: my previous post (see Surface Texture).  How cool is that?  It’s like a stepped program:  1) read an industry pub 2) dig a story 3) blog about said story and interesting quote 4) receive a connection invitation.  Snap!  It’s like that.

So beyond my pleasant and immediate surprise that a VIP at a large prestigous firm asked to make my acquaintence, I was also caught off guard at, well, the immediacy of it all.  I guess I shouldn’t have been, when I really dissect it:  blog is public, complete name and title and company were referenced; I list my LinkedIn profile on my “About” page, etc.  Talk about connecting the bunny trails!  Or maybe its the convergence of the trails.  Hm.  Will have to ponder that.

So some take-aways, I think are as follows:

1. A blog or networking site is public and accessible to all.  Or at least you must presume so.  Like a person accepting an alcoholic drink at a restaurant, you must take your blogging responsibly.  Do so with regard for your forum, your audience, and your referral entity or person.
2. Say what you mean, but be very comfortable with your words and the context and tone.  I’ve been in more than one situation where an email of mine was misinterpreted because someone inferred something that I didn’t mean to imply.  Or they mistook a particular style to be an indication of my interest level.
3. Attribute properly.  I guess it was old habits from college that made me include all of Larry’s deets, but what if I hadn’t?  What would the implications, or possible ramifications, have been?
4. Consider the space.  I’ll go vulnerable here, but this was my first personal experience with some downstream effect due to user-generated media.  Conceptually, I have understood the power and place, but this is my first personal experience (well, except for some inclusion in my employer’s blog, geovoices.wordpress.com.  but there I’m one of many voices and IMO don’t get enough podium time ). This revelation brings a whole new dimension to my grasp of “what if?” and how clients can grab hold.

I’ve always had a passion for consumers – what motivates them, inspires them, the ways they learn, the way they process, their decision stages/cycles.  I like helping position products (nowdays, services) and craft messages to precisely align with the unanswered need or desire that consumers have.  When you think hard about it, marketers are pretty much puppet masters without the evil chuckle.

Anyway, I think I need to go draw a graph or a chart, or throw together a picture – something to help cement how a blog post  (nay, an article mention) (both posting and reading are singular activities, but in the big picture are involving much larger audiences) evolved into a new connection between two individuals.

Powerful stuff.  Anybody know how we can harness this potent power for our clients in a way that adds value, relevancy, and authenticity to the proposed relationship?

Gotta go.  But I’ll be blog again tomorrow!