Profits down – Blame your ad agency
July 30, 2009
IN this economy it’s becoming more and more of a trend to blame your ad agency for virtually every single sales and revenue problem. The problem has always been showed to magnify itself during a recession, but due to the severe nature of this one, the problem has grown into an epidemic.
You seeing a significant drop in sales? It’s because your ad agency is doing a crumby job getting the message out. Having a problem getting people in the door or on the phone? It’s because your ad agency isn’t marketing to the right people. Online sales are showing negative sales? It’s because your agency didn’t optimize your site right… ok .. well maybe the last one is very possible.
However overall blaming your ad agency for the short comings of your sales isn’t exactly fair. Somewhere in October of 2008, life went from a mild recession to the worst economic outlook since the great depression. The markets collapsed, unemployment websites went down under extreme levels of traffic, people started to lose their homes in record numbers.
In all honesty your advertising agency isn’t to blame for those issues. That’s the new reality for the next several months … maybe years.
Blaming your marketing firm for horrific sales isn’t exactly fair nor is it even proper, but it is a growing trend. Reports that advertising agency reviews are up 35% over last year this time is a prime example.
Some CMO’s hire ad agencies to cover their rear during a recession, during a recession generally there is less risk taking. A typical CMO will hire the biggest BDA they can find to present to the higher ups that “I’m doing my job, I went with a big firm”.
Other CMO’s go out and find a smaller agency, and tell the higher ups… “our sales are down, we need a radical change”. These CMO’s however are much fewer in number.
The point is that when things go bad, firms normally blame the firm that can be pawned off as “directly responsible” for the disruption in the sales channel, and generally that falls right in the agency lap.
So how do you fight this? For one you do a better job with less resources, that means spending less money on TV and more online. It means doing more powerful creative. It means utilizing blogging, SEO, SMO and other online tools to help get the word out.
It doesn’t mean spamming the daylights out of forums, it means setting up something that is useful to others and capitalizing on that to increase your overall marketing power.
Simple example, let’s say your client is a car dealer, well setup a virtual test drive… give it a proper domain name… and make a game out of it. Complete with a “race car X vs car Y”
If the game is cool, people will link to it… I for one would love to see a Jeep vs a Ferrari on an offroad course with a first person view from the steering wheel.
The other defense is simple, get the track record of competitors that are traded no Nasdaq or NYSE, and show that they are hurting too…. it proves that the recession isn’t to be blamed on the ad agency.
Why companies don’t care about the Yahoo / Microsoft Deal
July 29, 2009
Lets face it, the response from digital ad agencies has been highly muted regarding the Bing / Yahoo deal whereas Yahoo will just be serving up Bing results (similar to 10 years ago when Yahoo just served up Google Results)
However much has changed in the past 10 years, for example Yahoo and Bing combined don’t even amount to a fraction of what Google’s market share is. Perhaps the better way to phrase it is that no one cares because no one uses those search engines.
If you’re a college student looking for help to do a report, do you turn to Yahoo to do your online research? Do you turn to Bing to start your search?
It’s been rumored that out of the 5% market share that Bing has, a full 70% of those searches are because the end user just doesn’t know how to change their default search engine in IE “It’s the search engine that came with the computer” attitude, meaning that it’s 5% market share is actually closer to 2%.
One of the online tech jokes revolves around “what you can tell about someone from their personal primary e-mail address”
If it’s Hotmail (Microsoft), it means that they are mostly in their mid 30′s
If it’s Yahoo (Yahoo), it means that they are mostly in their mid 20′s to early 30′s
If it’s Gmail (Google), it means they are in their teens to mid 20′s.
The chances are that’s true as well. Most people establish an e-mail account as their primary web based e-mail address. They tend to keep that e-mail address for most of their life, as their work address changes, their ISP address changes, most everything else changes other than that single e-mail account that you give to your most trusted friends.
In the search game however, it’s clearly dominated by Google, with Yahoo and Bing combined showing something along the lines of 17% market share. Both companies combined are still in the teens in terms of market share. This begs the question, with both companies now using the inferior search engine, will that 17% become 7% within a year?
And for us consumers…. now we have only 2 major providers of search… how’s that for choice…
#twitter turns into Google
July 29, 2009
Clearly Twitter is turning themselves into a search engine, abit a weird one. Search was always a highly popular feature, but now with the website redesign, Twitter is virtually a search engine to search 140 character tweets. Will it challenge in search? The chances are slim to none that it will in a traditional sense, but it will challenge Google News due to it’s real time nature.
Google’s fast, but it’s not real time for the most part, even Google News is delayed by some extent. 2 posts yesterday for example went up on Tribble Ad Agency that have yet to be indexed in Google News. But generally they are syndicated within a few minutes, In Twitter’s case however the content is put directly on Twitter’s servers, hence allowing for full realtime search as compared to Google that has to send out a spider to read the content on non-google server.
Now it real life applications, we’re talking only a few minutes different in terms of speed, but those few minutes tend to mean much in breaking news situations, in that case you’re looking at
Why Dad is always right – E-mail regarding Unemployment
July 28, 2009
Sometimes it’s just worth it to listen to your parents….. They tend to shoot out one liners that are the exact truth… and it’s hard to see it from the inside…
—–Original Message—–
From: Roger XXXXX
Sent: Tuesday, July 28, 2009 11:46 AM
To: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Subject: This is so badAccording to unemployment figures released today by the state Department of Labor & Industry, the county’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for June is 10.4 percent, the highest since the January 1996 rate of 11.1 percent. That figure tops both Pennsylvania’s rate of 8.3 percent and the national rate of 9.5 percent.
http://www.republicanherald.com/news/county_jobless_rate_up_to_10_4
————-
REPLY:
———–From: Francis XXXX
Sent: Tuesday, July 28, 2009 11:52 AM
To: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Subject: RE: This is so badNo good,
They need to make something in this county that other people need.
You can’t have the McDonald employees shopping at Wal-Mart and the
Wal-Mart employees eating at McDonald.
A major % of the money circulating between the two will go to the
Franchise out side the county/State
WPP Group plc hires Julie Roehm
July 28, 2009
Julie Roehm’s Experience * Marketing Consultant * MJM Creative Services * (Public Company; WPPGY; Marketing and Advertising industry) May 2009 — Present (3 months) — HOT STUFF going on via her Linkedin Profile
This is the definition of classic.
For a quick History Lesson…. well George Parker has one hell of a history lesson regarding her
The fact is that Julie Roehm was fired from Walmart for taking joy rides in an exotic car from an advertising agency (which she then awarded the Walmart Business to), having wild sex with an employee (not her husband) and other crazy issues.. her stunt of course left her with no job, the ad agency being fired… and lawsuits..
But clearly, WPP group and Sir Martin are willing to look this over….
NBC Entertainment CEO starts ‘Warner Brothers meets BBDO’
July 27, 2009
But his new company, which does not yet have a name, will be designed to take advantage of the other role Ben Silverman played at NBC, in bringing creative talent together with advertisers. Silverman, citing a production company and an advertising agency, likened the new venture to “Warner Brothers meets BBDO.” The New York Times is reporting.
Heh, He’s leaving NBC to start a new venture that he feels will be a “Warner Brothers meets BBDO.” He sure that’s the best way to phrase it? It’s not like Warner Bros sent out a cattle call RFP request to Tribble Ad Agency (a blog not an ad agency) to handle it’s media buys (not kidding, it happened)… or BBDO forcing their employees to take 2 weeks unpaid
Is he really sure he wants to make his new firm stack up to those models?
Enjoy…
GM launches New… Perfume line called Cadillac – WTF?
July 24, 2009
We all know that General Motors (AKA: Government Motors) is bankrupt and struggling, but instead of focusing on electric cars, or at least a car with incredible efficiency, they are allocating resources to their new perfume department.. The new fragrance line will be called Cadillac.
Evidently Detroit and Washington feel this is the proper way to move forward with GM’s restructuring
It is unknown at the time who the advertising agency of record is, but boy are we aching to find out what agency is going to promote this bomb.
Enjoy the BS, because it’s only your Tax Money at work….. considering us Taxpayers own the majority of General Motors….
Microsoft Profit down 17% on Ubuntu, Google, Apple threats
July 23, 2009
Microsoft profit is down 17%, and cited is long term threats that are materializing on it’s doorstep, Ubuntu Linux and Apple and the newly announced Google OS
Ubuntu Linux has been making serious inroads in the netbook market as a desktop of choice for many lower powered machines called netbooks, The Google OS is vaporware for now… but the threat exists. Apple is fresh with cash from all those iPhone, iTouch and iPod sales that it’s now a cash machine that has market share in the desktop market.
The wildcard isn’t Apple however because Apple has been there for decades, nor is it Google’s OS (yet) as it’s not scheduled until 2010 at the earliest, the problem at hand is actually Ubuntu Linux, as it is being sold like wildfire on the netbook market as well as the OS of choice for many early adopters of Linux as a desktop. Mostly because it’s free and resource light as compared to Vista… and early reports are saying it has a smaller footprint that Windows 7.
Meaning that Microsoft is trying to complete against something free. Nevermind the Office market that is being crashed with Openoffice.org and Google Docs…
It’s not even worth mentioning the third iteration of MSN called Bing.. Something is up people, and it’s not looking pretty for Redmond.
Saatchi & Saatchi 9 months late for I Love NY Campaign
July 23, 2009
The below is directly from someone involved with the campaign, this is in regards to the 17 million dollar rip off that Saatchi is bilking the state of New York for. Because of course, the new logos and surrounding campaign are worth 17 million.
An insane amount of tax money is being spent on AdWords due to lack of SEO skillset, 9 month delay on Saatchi-driven website, tourism on the decline, etc. etc
Weird thing, they want us to advertise on others landing pages… for free.
Directly below is the documentation that will be sent out to everyone in the program… enjoy
Dear TPA Partners,
As many of you know the new design for iloveny.com will enable us to sell advertising on the site. Our objective is to offer advertisers another medium to reach consumers who are interested in traveling to New York State.
Our plan is to roll out the advertising in phases with the first phase being a free pilot program with you our closest partners. We will use the pilot to collect data on 1) user response to advertising on our site, 2) engagement metrics, e.g. click through rates etc and 3) operational metrics, e.g. optimal number of ads, placement and rotation.
For this pilot we are offering the following:
1. All Regional TPA the opportunity to advertise on their respective region page (page 7 in attached pdf)
2. Bonus: all TPAs who participated in the ILNY interactive co-op have the opportunity to advertise on the main landing pages of the site (please see pages 1 – 6 in the attached pdf).
Following are the specifications for the banner ads:
300 x 250 Banner Ad (Standard Flash or Gif, Jpeg)
Max File Size: 30k
Animation:
· Up to 30 seconds, loop 3x
· No iframes allowed, unit must be standard or Javascript tags if third party served
· Rich Media can have 100k secondary load file size
· All flash files are required to have a backup gif or jpeg file
· May contain video.
· Auto-expand/auto-retract on initial load.
· Mouse Over/Mouse Off: When the user passes a mouse over the creative, the panel expands; the panel retracts when the mouse is removed.
· Include text tease to expand the ad within the fixed position space.
· Sound must be user-initiated
· Maximum file size for expanded panels: 100KB
The ads are due on August 7th. Please send them to xxxx. All ads are subject to approval by I LOVE NEW YORK.
And the goodies, you gotta read the Advertising PDF for I Love New York. Do you feel that that PDF is worth 17 million dollars of taxpayer money considering it’s nearly a year late? Inquiring minds want to know…
The Press Release that killed Yahoo and Grew Google
July 22, 2009
The below Historical press release, located on Google’s servers is dated June 26, 2000. This exact press release is what forced the rise of Google and the fall of Yahoo.
At the time, people were noticing that Google results were identical to Yahoo results, but without the influx of massive advertising on their dialup accounts from the Yahoo.Com website (circa 1999-2000) .. hence Google grew into a powerhouse at the expense of Yahoo.
Enjoy the History Lesson - think about while you are reading it. No IPO, No Google Maps, No Google Nexus one… nothing of the sort. Perhaps it would have grew.. but not that fast… and not that exact way as the The butterfly effect can’t be emphasised enough.
—————————————-
Yahoo! Selects Google as its Default Search Engine Provider
Yahoo! to Integrate Google’s Advanced Search Technology into Yahoo!’s Network of Properties
SANTA CLARA, Calif. and MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – June 26, 2000 – Yahoo! Inc. (Nasdaq: YHOO) and Google Inc. today announced they have entered into an agreement that makes Google, one of the fastest growing search engines on the Web, Yahoo!’s® default search results provider. Under the agreement, Google will provide its underlying Web search engine to serve as a complement to Yahoo!’s popular Web directory and navigational guide (
). Yahoo!, a global Internet communications, commerce, and media company, expects to integrate the services within the next 30 days.
“Our Web directory and navigational guide is critical to the essential set of services that we provide to those who use Yahoo! as an important part of their daily lives. Yahoo! is focused on meeting the needs of these individuals by providing them with high-quality, relevant search results,” said Jeff Mallett, president and COO of Yahoo!. “Yahoo! selected Google because they share our strong consumer focus. Google has clearly demonstrated its ability to scale with the rapid growth of the Web, making it a particularly good match for Yahoo! as we continue to expand our global presence. We are very pleased by this agreement.”
Google is widely recognized for its award-winning advanced search services, which use powerful technologies to determine the importance and relevance of Web pages. Most recently, Google was a recipient of The Webby Awards’ prestigious Best Technical Achievement award, as well as its People’s Voice Award. Google was also selected as “Best Search Engine on the Internet” by Yahoo! Internet Life; named as one of the “Top Ten Best Cybertech of 1999″ by TIME magazine; earned the “Technical Excellence Award” from PC Magazine; and was chosen “Best Search Engine” by The Net. In addition, Google recently was named the No. 1 search engine in a search and portal site tracking study conducted by NPD, a leading independent research company. Google led all search engines with 97 percent of its users indicating that they would recommend Google to a friend.
“Google’s search services help individuals find the information they’re looking for on the Web with unprecedented levels of ease, speed, and relevancy,” said Larry Page, co-founder and CEO of Google. “Through this relationship, Yahoo!’s vast audience will now benefit from increased accuracy and rapid return of high-quality, relevant search results.” “We’re extremely proud that Yahoo! has selected Google to complement its existing directory and navigational guide,” added Sergey Brin, Google cofounder and president. “This is a significant milestone for Google and a strong validation of our business strategy.”
Yahoo!, the most popular navigational guide to the Web, was founded on the principle of building a directory around subject-based, demographic and geographic content. Unlike search engines, which use automated “spiders” to electronically crawl the Web to capture and store sites in the search engine’s index, Yahoo!’s staff of experts appropriately categorizes Web sites into an intuitive hierarchical organizational structure. Yahoo!’s directory features content and services within relevant context that can be browsed quickly and easily. The Google search engine will complement these services by providing Yahoo!’s vast audience with additional search capabilities on the Web. Page views generated from Google search results on Yahoo! will become part of Yahoo!’s advertising and merchandising inventory.
About Google Inc.
Google Inc. provides the best Internet search experience, and accomplishes this for millions of users daily by delivering a powerful, fast, and easy-to-use search service for finding the most relevant information. Google powers 76 portal and destination sites worldwide, including international customers in 20 countries: Austria, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Italy, Mexico, Poland, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Scotland, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and Venezuela. A growing number of companies, including Netscape and The Washington Post, rely on Google to power search on their Web sites. A privately held company based in Mountain View, Calif., Google’s investors include Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sequoia Capital. For more information about Google, visit
.
About Yahoo!
Yahoo! Inc. is a global Internet communications, commerce and media company that offers a comprehensive branded network of services to more than 145 million individuals each month worldwide. As the first online navigational guide to the Web,
is the leading guide in terms of traffic, advertising, household and business user reach, and is one of the most recognized brands associated with the Internet. The company also provides online business services designed to enhance the Web presence of Yahoo!’s clients, including audio and video streaming, store hosting and management, and Web site tools and services. The company’s global Web network includes 22 local World properties outside the United States. Yahoo! has offices in Europe, the Asia Pacific, Latin America, Canada and the United States, and is headquartered in Santa Clara, Calif.
###
Yahoo! and the Yahoo! logo are registered trademarks of Yahoo! Inc. Google is a trademark of Google, Inc. All other names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective owners.
Safe Harbor Statement Under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. This news release contains forward-looking statements or predictions. These statements represent our judgment as of this date and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results or events to differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking statements. Potential risks and uncertainties include, without limitation, those associated with economic conditions, government regulations, delays in integration and product development, or other problems. These and other factors are discussed in more depth in both companies’ filings with the SEC, copies of which may be accessed through the SEC’s World Wide Web site at
.
Press Contacts:
Shannon Stubo, Yahoo! Inc., (408) 530-5144,
sstubo@yahoo-inc.com
Cindy McCaffrey, Google Inc., (650) 930-3524,
Recognized by Advertising Age Magazine as top Power 150 news outlet for Advertising and Marketing.
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