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Metrics Don’t Matter

In typical Area 224 style, a whipsaw title followed by some unexpected takeaways.

Bloomberg Businessweek Cover
Image of BBW Cover, adjusted for oilpaint effect

I received the latest Bloomberg Businessweek over the weekend, and, when I saw the cover (photo over there), I figured this was going to be an article worth reading.

It was.

The article is called “Everywhere Sports Profit Network,” penned by Karl Taro Greenfield. Here’s a link.

Suggestion: read it, even if you don’t like sports. (Actually, read it ESPECIALLY if you don’t like sports.)

[NOTE: For my money, some of the best writing on the planet is in this magazine. A bold statement, sure, but, if you’re a student of the business game, BBW is becoming a must-read. The other must-read is referenced in this article.]

There are some great tips on business contained in that article about ESPN – and I want to give you three takeaways. Plus, as a bonus, you’ll be able to glean why metrics don’t matter.

1. Every Stinking Platform Network

We could have said “Social” or swore in place of the word “Stinking.” But the point here is that they don’t think of properties in terms of whether or not they will translate to the small screen (or website or radio or magazine), they instead think of translating the property to everywhere possible.

Take this example from the article:

“The company has moved aggressively into new media and platforms, without regard for how they may negatively impact the old…

“ESPN’s $5.6 billion deal with Major League Baseball…is typical of the kinds of multiplatform rights packages the company now seeks to acquire. Not only will ESPN continue to televise regular-season and playoff games through 2021, it also gets radio rights, international rights, unlimited highlights and, most important, the right to stream all that content through its mobile applications.”

What does this mean for you, business person?

It’s not necessarily about “mobile,” or “social” – it’s about…well, it’s about thinking creatively about everywhere and everything and how it gets used.

Repurpose. Repurpose. Repurpose.

What you have sitting on the shelf may not be valuable to you right now – but if it gets repackaged, shared in a different way, or presented to a different audience – there may be something there.

2. The Event IS The Thing

When I was reading the article, I couldn’t help but think back to the 2010 World Cup. (Soccer.) ESPN decided to send its big talent to South Africa to cover the event – even though a couple of their big names weren’t soccer reporters.

WHY?

Think about NBC’s Olympic Coverage (covered here a couple weeks ago.) Now think specifically about Ryan Seacrest. Whether or not the guy knows boo about sports is beside the point: he brings that “Big Game Feel” that you want. If Ryan Seacrest shows up, there’s now the imprimatur. It is now a Big Event.

ESPN continues to go out of its way to make events into EVENTS.

[I know what you might be thinking: “Dave, it’s ESPN! They spent Billions on Baseball!”]

But that doesn’t mean that your next THING can’t be an EVENT.

In fact, as the article reminds us, this is the network that started in trailers and showed a lot of Australian Rules Football.

Over time, they created a look, a feel, a brand. There’s a “lagniappe” element to it – originally that something extra was…well, everything. Now, it’s a rabid, everywhere-sports-are-there’s-ESPN element.

3. Inject Personality

Metrics from Compete
Which Metrics Matter to You?

Here’s where we bring back the title of this article. Metrics Don’t Matter? No, they DO matter. Just…the RIGHT metrics.

Bill Simmons (The Sports Guy, Editor-in-Chief at Grantland) has a personality. Sure, it’s not without its foibles – as all personalities are.

But without his personality and years of allowing that to shine through, there’s no Grantland.

And Grantland contributes to an ESPN metric called “users per minute:” the number of mobile users visiting ESPN. This reached a height of 102,000 in June. (60,000 of those were from Grantland.)

You’ve got to have a vision – which Simmons had for Grantland (sports, pop culture, etc.) – and you’ve got to have the personality (and personalities) to pull it off.

“Personal BRAND” may be a whole bunch of BS to you. And, in some respects, that’s okay. But Personality – that can be translated, and effectively so, into your business.

THE POINT: THE RIGHT METRICS MATTER

ESPN translates a combination of all three elements above – Multi-Channel Storytelling, Events, and Personality – into some crazy numbers on all the metrics that matter to THEM.

The fact that Compete.com – pictured over there – has Yahoo Sports (WHAT?) as the top-ranking sports media site is, frankly, of no interest to ESPN.

And the fact that some site ranks you as the 56th most popular social media consultant in Idaho shouldn’t matter to you, either.

ESPN is keeping advertisers happy with engaging content, but they’re only doing that AFTER they’re able to have an engaging value proposition.

YOU can keep your stakeholders happy by…

  • ASKING what business problem you can help them solve
  • CREATING a valuable way to solve it
  • COMMUNICATING that value through whatever it is that makes your business unique.

Go. Read the article, and make some magic happen for the metrics that matter for you.

 

Remake Your Own Song

Two pieces – one old, one new, and both with a hook for you, your brand, your job, and where you’re headed next.

Lindsey Buckingham
Photo by Neeta Lind - Used with Creative Commons License

If you know me via Facebook, you know that I have a tendency to over-share music. (If you don’t know me on Facebook, here’s a link to the Dave page. And a link to the Area 224 page.) I’m not an expert – but I know what I like and I’m more than willing to share it.

Two songs lately got me thinking – is it time for a remake?

Lindsey Buckingham Remade His Own Song

Fleetwood Mac’s Lindsay Buckingham is a music industry veteran. At age 62, he is still going – sometimes with the Fleetwood Mac folks, and sometimes just by himself.

Rolling Stone Magazine, in its 2011 ranking of the “100 Greatest Guitarists of All-Time,” included Buckingham – barely, ranking 100th.

One song of his – well, technically the band’s song – is called “Big Love.” The original video from Fleetwood Mac has an over-produced 80s sound to it.

httpv://youtu.be/rjKL469SpR0

Very bland, 1980s pop rock. Right?

A funny thing happened, though, once Buckingham started performing the song live, by himself. The song took on a completely new, raw, powerful, dare I say brilliant sound. Like this:

httpv://youtu.be/naAWX6OsHVI

What did we learn?

By taking away several unnecessary elements of the exact same song, it became more awesome.

Here’s what you can ask yourself – no matter where you are in the world, as a brand strategist, as a job-seeker, as a student of the game or someone heading off into something completely different, what can you take away to make something more…awesome?

  • Are you adding 3 steps to a process where only one step is really necessary?
  • Are you creating more hoops to jump through – for clients, for prospects, for site visitors?
  • Is there a way to practice “addition by subtraction?”

Gotye Remade His Own Song

Gotye
Gotye by eastscene, used with Creative Commons license

You’ve heard. The song. It’s everywhere.

Gotye. “Somebody That I Used To Know.”

Almost as many views on YouTube than residents of the U.S.A. (300,000,000 and counting.)

You can brush up on your Gotye knowledge if you’d like – here’s a link to the Wikipedia entry, where you learn, among other things, that he’s Belgian (so he’s GOT to be a good guy).

As for the video – here’s a link – if you’re one of those who haven’t actually seen it.

httpv://youtu.be/8UVNT4wvIGY

No matter what you think of the song, you can’t escape it. And, if the song itself can’t be escaped, neither can the remakes.

We’ve seen this happen before – dozens upon dozens of remakes, on YouTube, from artists looking to showcase their own talent by singing Somesong That You Used To Know. (Google the phrase “Gotye Remake.” I dare ya.)

Sheer brilliance can be found from…well, Gotye himself, who mashed up dozens upon dozens of the YouTube remakes, creating a song called “Somebodies: A YouTube Orchestra.”

httpv://youtu.be/opg4VGvyi3M

So, in one instance, an artist strips his own song bare. In this instance, the opposite – a crowdsourced piece of…awesome.

What Can You Learn from Gotye?

Back in the days when yours truly was a radio sportscaster, I’d have to deliver the same story at 6:05, 7:05 and again at 8:05. In the morning. I’m a morning person, so that part wasn’t a problem – but there was always the threat that you were delivering the same exact story over and over. If the Nets beat the Knicks 101-95 last night, the score won’t change in the next newscast.

But the story could. In fact, I learned, it SHOULD. It had to.

There’s another angle to explore. There’s another side to the story. Even when you’re talking about the same thing, there’s a different way to say it.

  • Your company’s pitch: can it be more succinct?
  • Your mission statement: can you cut out the BS?
  • Your resume: does it do you justice?
  • Your relationships: should you move from the text message to the Google Hangout, or from online to off?

Go. Remake Your Own Song.

Content, Community, Engagement, Influence, Milk Duds

We’re out to prove a point with today’s post: Content, Community, Engagement and Influence are overused terms.

Milk Duds
Photo by vox_efx - Used with CC License

If you think about it, saying that your company or your department needs a “Content Strategy” makes lots of sense. Since everyone is talking about Content, you should be talking about Content, too. (Content with a capital “C,” of course.)

“XYZ Company will use Content to Build Community, Drive Engagement and reach out to Key Influencers.”

Congratulations, that will be $5000. (Actually – we charge $5000 a day for sessions with companies to help them better market their products and services. If this was the result of the day-long session, you’d get your money back.)

If it were that gosh-darn easy to put together a Fill In The Blank Strategy for your company, everyone would be doing it, and you’d see literally thousands of companies out there making things happen with Content, Community, Engagement and Influence. But it’s not, and here’s why:

Developing a Strategy for ANYTHING without an Eye Toward Business Objectives is a Recipe for Disaster.

Your Content Strategy? Guess what, if you’re putting out white paper after white paper, writing countless press releases (or, preferably, using PitchEngine), and doing corporate videos interviewing key executives, there’s your Content. But it’s not your Content Strategy, it’s your Content Tactics.

Building Community is Great! We’re seriously all for it here at Area 224 – yes, we’re building a community around 12 Minute Marketing, and yes there will be more information on that in the days to come. But that community needs a common thread – not just an idea to “build a community.”

The Brand Builder, Olivier Blanchard, has a great piece on Social Media and Social Business Myths. Read them all, but #1 is the one we’ll point you to.

If you’re building a Community around your Awesome Product…Make Sure Your Product is Awesome FIRST.

Engagement is even more puzzling these days. Scott Stratten wrote a book last year called UnMarketing and the subtitle was “Stop Marketing. Start Engaging.” So, magically, everyone did! They stopped Marketing! And they started Engaging! (If you can’t sense the sarcasm there, take a look at my Twitter background. My eldest child asked me the other night “why is there a unicorn on your Twitter background?” For reasons like this, my dear.)

Actually, the story in the UnMarketing book about the guy at the Wynn who stopped his carpet cleaning duties to give a genuinely friendly greeting to Scott and get him to return? Uh, that’s engaging. In that they guy likes what he does, likes people, and genuinely wanted them to enjoy their stay.

Segueing to Influence in 3…2…1…

Does it matter that Scott is an Influencer? Not one iota – and that’s probably the biggest pain in the a** about this whole Content, Community, Engagement, Influence discussion:

Your Own Potential to Influence in Your Business Trumps That of Any External Influencer.

You’re passionate about something. That something gets shown somewhere in your business – now the potential to Influence comes through. Right? Does It?

We’re not going to claim to have all the answers here – we think we’ve built a dynamite Business Marketing and Coaching Course called 12 Minute Marketing, but there’s no way that our course, or any other course out there, is going to do you a bit of good unless you, frankly, give a crap about your business.

So…what’s the point behind the Milk Duds?

There’s a restaurant in Chicago called Lou Mitchell’s. They give out Milk Duds when you leave, after you pay the check. It’s a nice touch.

The Milk Duds are not their Content Strategy. The Milk Duds might help them build Community. The Milk Duds could make them ace a test on Engagement. And hey, Influencers LOVE Milk Duds, right?

It’s the food, the atmosphere, the ambience, the kitsch, all that stuff rolled into a bucket. That’s their Business Strategy.

Avoid the Buzzword Bingo and Focus on Making a Real Difference, on Real Passion.

Go!

 

3 Ways Martha Stewart Can Change Your Marketing Life

Happy August 3. Did you know it’s Martha Stewart’s 70th Birthday? What Does that have to do with Marketing?

Happy Birthday
Thanks to freakgirl for the photo, used under cc license

To celebrate Martha’s Birthday, how bout borrowing from her playbook? Here are three quick ways you can make things happen with your business – using a few “Good Things” as inspiration.

Martha Loves Editorial Calendars

Open up any one of Martha Stewart’s magazines and you’re bound to find a calendar of some sort. And her calendars are not just covering the minutiae of her life – “water plants” on Friday the 5th – but giving you hints as to what is going on in the outside world.

So you know, for instance, that Labor Day is coming up in early September. This helps you plan ahead with things that might need your attention now.

When was the last time you looked three weeks, or three months out to see what was happening with your business, your industry?

Martha Thinks “Omnimedia”

Remember how crazy an idea it was to name her firm “Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia?” Even back before Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, Martha was everywhere. Magazines, books, web sites, a store where you can buy stuff with her imprimatur.

Seemed novel back then – taking pictures of a video shoot so you can use that information in your own magazine?

Seems rather brilliant now.

Martha was probably one of the first pioneers of the Content Revolution. Leverage. And leverage some more.

Martha Doesn’t Quit

Comeback after comeback, Martha Stewart does not let up. Sure, there may be less of a focus on her personal brand than there used to be – but the empire is still going strong.

Of course, she is very good at what she does – living the good life, home economics, celebrating the Good Things, some combination of that.

She no doubt had a vision of success and keeps moving toward that vision. She made course corrections along the way, pulled the plug on things that weren’t working well, and kept moving forward on things that were working well.

And she shows no signs of slowing down.

What can you learn from Martha Stewart? Keep these three ideas in mind – and, with a little talent and a little luck, you’ve got a chance at going pretty far.