Fax machines?

Radiohead does honesty pricing

Radiohead are the latest to jump onto the concept of honesty pricing, something that I talked about a little while ago.

Their new album, In Rainbows, is bound to be a big seller. But not for the record companies. The band are selling it through their website for any price you like.

That’s right … You can buy their new album for any price you specify. It’s a strategy that will create massive word-of-mouth, while giving back to their fans. Almost everyone who even remotely likes the band will consider buying the album. And it might even turn a few 20 cent cheapskates into loyal Radiohead converts.

The other wonderful thing is that when you visit the site, it isn’t immediately clear that the chooser chooses the price. That is, you need to delve deeper into the site to find this out. Which makes it secretive. A discovery. Which in turn fuels the viral-ness (if there is such a word) of the exercise.
This, in my opinion, is a beautiful piece of marketing.

Who says I can’t be bought?

The key to a good marketing campaign these days is to start small.

That’s what The Ryde, a cool vintage T-Shirt site, have done by sending me some great new T-shirts, including this one and this one.

No doubt, a blogger-relations program is something that anybody should consider as a way of getting their word out about their product or service. But all too often, marketers will just choose a select list of A-List bloggers to reach out to, and hope that they orchestrate a word-of-mouth wildfire in the process.

A-List bloggers probably receive 10 requests like this a day. Even if your product or service is remarkable, the bigger bloggers are less likely to talk about you, because they just won’t have as much time.

My advice - start small. Reach out to C and D list bloggers like me instead. You’re more likely to gain flattery, which will ensure that the buzz will spread. Admittedly, you won’t get the overnight success. But these days, overnight success is pretty rare.

This is the first time anyone has sent me something to review or talk about on my blog. And naturally I’m going to. Not because I’ve been bought or bribed, but because I’ve been flattered. Someone has actually taken the time to reach me on a one-to-one basis, and so of course I’m going to spread the word about The Ryde.

I’ve had a truly excellent experience of this brand, and that’s why I’m letting you know. And I bet there’s others out there who are talking about The Ryde too.

So thanks to the Ryde for these cool T-shirts, one of which I’m proudly wearing today. Make sure you check out their T-shirts too, there’s plenty o’ goodness in their range.

What Everybody Ought to Know About Viral Marketing

This weeks’ Viral Marketing phenomenon is the Cadbury Gorilla. Except that it isn’t.

It’s a funny video of a gorilla playing the drums along to Phil Collins. Who wouldn’t want to pass it on? It’s been posted to YouTube as well. So Cadbury and their agency can expect plenty of people to view it.

But does it sell Chocolate bars? I doubt it. As funny as it is, there is no correlation between forwarding this video on to your friends to buying chocolate bars. So we can’t really call this viral marketing, can we?

Let’s make the distinction between “viral” and “viral marketing”.

“Viral” is easy. A teenager can videotape themselves singing in their bedroom and it can go viral. A Facebook group about Pluto can go viral. And a chocolate bar company can film a funny gorilla, and it can “go viral”. Just make something funny, quirky, and easy to spread.

Viral Marketing is, well, something else.

The term ‘Viral Marketing’ was made popular by Steve Jurvetson, a venture captalist, when describing Hotmail’s practice of adding the phrase “Get Your Private, Free Email from Hotmail at www.hotmail.com”. By making the product part a strong part of the message, and intertwining the product benefit (free, private email in this case), you could assume that this was a viral marketing success.

The days of a free email address being an exciting proposition are long gone. And this example of viral marketing is cliched. So let’s move into the naughties.

Nowadays, marketing philosophers (myself included) will annoy the pants off you by saying, “You have to remarkable to be remarked about” and “You can’t be a viral marketing success with having a product or service that’s truly viralworthy”. Or some similar schtick. But I’m afraid it’s true. As Seth Godin defined it:

Viral marketing is a special case of an ideavirus. Viral marketing is an ideavirus in which the medium of the virus is the product. It’s an idea where the idea is the amplifier.

That said, let’s look at some more recent examples to explain Viral Marketing.

• One of the best example I’ve ever seen of viral marketing is the BlendTec blenders. They put a few videos and website together (check out www.willitblend.com) to prove that their blenders can can blend ANYTHING … ipods, broomsticks, iphones, you name it.

• Threshers wine chain in the UK offered a 40% off discount voucher online last Christmas … it started small but in the end was downloaded by millions of people.

• Movember - now there’s a clever viral campaign. The annual “Grow a moustache in November for charity” campaign is classic is viral marketing, because every willing participant is sporting a ridiculous (yet charitable) set of handlebars for an entire month.

The three above are all valid examples of viral marketing. The spreadworthy nature of the blendtec videos was the blender. The spreadworthy deal at Threshers was Threshers. And the message that the mo’ spreads is Movember.

As people spread the message, they spread it about thing that was originally intended to spread. That, my friends, it viral marketing.

And I’m reluctant to mention Facebook. But Facebook has been an example of Viral marketing too. Because the benefit of being on Facebook (”I keep in touch with my friends”) is linked to the sign-up effect of Facebook (Hooly-dooly, look how many of my friends are already on facebook”).

Now, I’m not suggesting that Viral Marketing is easy. The internet has made it soooo much easier to spread a message. But still, Viral marketing isn’t easy. Far from it.

But if the product (or at least the offer linked to the product) is talkworthy, and you link it to a medium that it easy to spread, it just might spread.

The million dollar question? How could Cadbury have made their online gorilla viral campaign a VIRAL MARKETING campaign?

That’s the subject of another post. Stay tuned.

10 rules of effective green marketing

Hugh Hough of Green Team has posted the 10 rules of effective green marketing over at the EcoAmerica blog.

This is a terrific list for companies who are just starting to make the move into green marketing. If your business is thinking about becoming green, and how to market yourselves, this is a good place to start.

Here it is:

1. Forget “green.” Okay, you don’t really want to forget it, but you do want to think beyond it. Being environmentally responsible is important, but today’s Awakening Consumers are looking for more. They’re looking at how your brand addresses all three pillars of sustainability: environmental impact, social impact, economic feasibility.

2. Walk before you talk. Don’t make any sustainability claims until you can back them up. Completely. This may seem obvious, but you’d be amazed at how often marketers want to cut corners and make claims they’re not ready to. And that’s a recipe for disaster.

3. Just the facts, ma’am. Don’t tell me what a great corporate citizen you are, tell me what you’re doing, and I’ll make that determination on my own. Simply stating the facts surrounding your sustainability efforts allows you to talk about them without coming across as smug or self-congratulatory. No one likes a show-off.

4. Let someone else tell your story. Nothing is better than a credible third-party endorsement. This is where a partnership with a respected non-profit that shares your values is especially beneficial. Allow your partner to tell the world what you’re doing together.

5. Keep it simple, make it relevant. Your sustainability initiatives should feel like a natural extension of your brand. Several years ago, Green Team did a campaign highlighting Jaguar Car’s partnership with the Wildlife Conservation Society to save jaguars in the wild. Jaguar helping jaguars. Its simplicity and relevance made it successful.

6. Look inside. It’s critically important to engage your employees in your sustainability initiatives. With that in mind, look to the people within your own organization for ideas. This is how the partnership between Yoplait yogurt and Susan G. Komen For The Cure came to be. The cause was initially embraced by Yoplait employees on a grass roots level, then ultimately adopted by the brand itself.

7. Money isn’t everything. Sure, financially supporting a sustainability campaign is important, but don’t just write a check and walk away. Look for synergies between your brand and the cause. Involve people on both sides. Involve consumers. Be creative.

8. Tell the truth, the whole truth. Corporate transparency is now the way of the world. Consumers, especially Awakening Consumers, don’t expect you to be perfect, but they do expect you to be honest. Admit your flaws, and let people know what you’re doing to fix them.

9. Be genuine. Sustainability initiatives and sustainable marketing has to be real and authentic. It needs to be embraced by everyone involved with the brand, from the person who answers the phone to the CEO. It should be part of your brand’s DNA, not some superficial, jumping-on-the-bandwagon gesture. To help avoid this, think long term, and think big.

10. Have fun. We’ve created ads for a global warming campaign that are laugh out loud funny. Humor may not be right for every topic or communication, but how many doom-and-gloom people do you like to hang out with?

Hat-tip to Ivan for the link.

Facebook Tip#2 :: Listen

Facebook is the new and hip social media tool right now, just like blogs were before it.

But the rules of Facebook and blogging are the same - With social media, you need to listen before you talk. So before you commit to doing anything on Facebook - be it a group or application - you need to do some listening.

So start by doing a search for your brand on Facebook, just as you would a Technorati or Google search to see if anyone has been blogging about you? What do you find?

If you’re an evil company, like Exxon, you’ll find a lot of “Boycott Exxon Mobil” groups. If you’re a good company, like say, Cooper’s Beer, then you’ll find a real community of Coopers addicts.

It’s the same rules as Blogging 101, except that it’s another place online where you need to have your ear to the ground.

Second step is to engage in the conversation. If your customers know that you’re listening, and are prepared to take heed of what they have to say, you’re well on your way to knowing how to ride the choppy seas of Facebook and new marketing in general.

A good example of a big company that has listened to their customers on facebook is Cadbury. After seeing the petitions of thousands of Facebooks users to bring back their Wispa bar, they have done just that. I’m with Shel - I think that this is a very smart move by Cadbury. They have listened to their customers and responded accordingly (And have had a lot of positive press coverage as a result).

Sound familiar?

Hugh Macleod at PSFK

PSFK have posted another video from their London conference. This time it’s with Gaping Void blogger Hugh Macleod, who talks about his work with the now famous Stormhoek wines, which I have spoken about before.

Hugh was the first person to coin the phrase ‘Global Microbrand‘, referring to a tiny brand that now has easy access to the world because of the internet. In today’s Long Tail world, Global Microbrands are thriving, and this video shows just one of the ways that we can now get a product out to the world with the use of social media.

Click here for the link.

We’re going to see more and more of these, and it’s one of the most exciting things about the state of marketing today: that tiny brands have just as much chance of winning that the big ones do.

Honesty Pricing

John Moore at Brand Autospy has posted about the Terra Bite Lounge, a “coffee shop where there are no prices for the coffee drinks, pastries, and sandwiches. Instead, customers pay whatever amount they feel is appropriate.”

Here in Melbourne, we have a restaurant, ‘Lentil as Anything’ that uses an honesty system when it comes to their pricing, too.

Both restaurants have been in operation for some time now, and the system seems to work for them.

You don’t hear of businesses like these too often, but I think that the Honesty Pricing system could work for a lot of businesses. Providing you are offering a product or service worth paying for, I think most people would do the right thing and pay a fair and reasonable (if not generous) price.

Seems like a quick way to turn your business into a Purple Cow, too.

Does anyone out there have other examples out there of products or services offered on an honesty pricing structure?

The Onion’s take on Facebook

I quite like The Onion’s take on Mark Zuckerberg:

(Thanks netzkobol.de!)

Do you use del.icio.us?

I probably spend more time on del.icio.us than any other web application. Tonight, after almost 2 years of using it, I’ve just posted my 1000th link.

Do you use del.icio.us? From the about page:

del.icio.us is a collection of favorites - yours and everyone else’s. You can use del.icio.us to:

• Keep links to your favorite articles, blogs, music, reviews, recipes, and more, and access them from any computer on the web.
• Share favorites with friends, family, coworkers, and the del.icio.us community.
• Discover new things. Everything on del.icio.us is someone’s favorite — they’ve already done the work of finding it. So del.icio.us is full of bookmarks about technology, entertainment, useful information, and more. Explore and enjoy.

del.icio.us is a social bookmarking website — the primary use of del.icio.us is to store your bookmarks online, which allows you to access the same bookmarks from any computer and add bookmarks from anywhere, too. On del.icio.us, you can use tags to organize and remember your bookmarks, which is a much more flexible system than folders.

Del.icio.us truly was one of the pioneering web 2.0 apps. I use del.icio.us to save links, but it’s also a great tool to search for anything on the web. It’s simple to use but stands the test of time. It has changed my life!
Check out my 1000 links if you have the time.