All three concurred that the industry as a whole needs to do a better job of recruiting and developing top talent, with Sorrell noting that the current trend of simply poaching talent from competing agencies is counterproductive to grooming future leaders. Roth chimed in and agreed, but also pointed out that IPG has made diversity a major priority. Sorrell countered by repeatedly asking Roth if there was a Chief Talent Officer on the IPG board and then stated that he felt the holding companies were simply “paying lip service” to the issue. Roth quickly responded: “Maybe you are, but we’re not.”

On the subject of the holding company format, all three executives agreed that acquisitions will remain an important part of the future, though they all stated a preference for more organic, internal growth. Technological and digital advances were also a focal point, with Wren stating that he anticipates a total integration of traditional and digital marketing within two years, doubting that agencies will still have Chief Digital Officers at that time. Roth shared a similar perspective when he stated that digital must be ingrained into the DNA of all parts of the business, but he felt the opportunity for specialists and digitally-focused agencies would likely remain.

The discussion ended with the three sharing their views on what role clients can play in the fostering of stronger relationships. Wren pleaded with clients to trust the agencies and frankly suggested that they should “pat someone on the back instead of prying $5 from their wallets.” In a rare moment of agreement, Sorrell stated that praising agencies when they do good work goes a long way in improving morale. Roth opined that both sides get the most out their symbiotic relationship when they view each other as partners with common goals.

After the CEO panel was a one-on-one interview with Miles Nadal, Founder, Chairman, & CEO of MDC Partners Inc. He followed up on the above discussion by stating that he believes the role of the CEO is synonymous with Chief Talent Officer, and he shared his views on the underestimated impact of social media and being accountable to clients who are seeking a return on the investments they make with their agency partners.

The second half of the morning’s program kicked off with a panel on television programming, with executives from AMC, History and Lifetime Networks, and Science Channel and Animal Planet discussing the future of what is still the biggest and most important screen that advertisers use to reach consumers. All felt that the use of social media to connect with viewers changes the game, though Nancy Dubuc (History and Lifetime) said that a show’s potential social media reach doesn’t determine whether or not it will be green-lighted. The importance of Netflix and streaming video services was also touched upon, though Charlie Collier (AMC) said, “we don’t’ dive in for the pennies,” with Dubuc agreeing that the main focus remains on TV screens and Nielsen ratings.

Geomentum CEO Sean Finnegan took part in a discussion on mobility and place-based business models, focusing on how local marketing is being transformed by emerging platforms. On the topic of new engagement standards, Finnegan stated that the universe of new technologies has added measurement complexity; however, Geomentum continues to focus on the most important metric to its clients: sales and business results.

Next was an eye-opening look at the present and future of gaming as presented by Ken Simon from Microsoft, a UM client. He took attendees through a close look at the “war for the living room,” providing staggering numbers on the reach, ever-expanding scope of the gaming target audience through innovations such as Kinect, and innovative means advertisers can use to appeal to consumers.

The day’s last discussion centered around new advertising guidelines, particularly as it pertains to digital marketing. All speakers agreed that it is of the utmost importance for the advertising industry to properly police itself in this realm, or run the risk of the federal government intervening and constructing strict guidelines that could limit the effectiveness of targeted marketing.

Transformation 2011 provided opportunities to think about the present and future states of the media, advertising, and marketing worlds, and IPG, Mediabrands, and their affiliated agencies were crucial to the discussion.
Special thanks to Jonathan Nierman at Mediabrands for this recap. Check out Mediabrands online at www.facbeook.com/mediabrands

After some opening remarks by 4A’s representatives, the action immediately kicked off with an in-depth conversation with Keith Weed, CMO & CCO of Unilever, an Initiative client. He spoke at length about how digital technology in particular has changed the game, noting that there’s so much going on, marketers can literally make things up on the fly. He gave an advertiser’s viewpoint on the need of the industry to evolve, removing the classifications between traditional and digital marketing to empower brands with the ability to connect with consumers through multiple channels simultaneously. Weed also commented on dealing with conflict between advertisers and agencies, sharing his opinion that the most fruitful relationships often are those that are the most enduring. He even stated that “everyone has failed” if an advertiser feels the need to walk away from an agency partner and begin anew elsewhere.

Fareed Zakaria, Editor-at-Large of Time Magazine and CNN on-air personality, then took the podium for a fascinating look at how events are transforming the world. He cited three big trends in particular: political stability around the world thanks to the end of the cold war, the extraordinary level of economic convergence globally and the resiliency of the worldwide economy, and technology and connectivity linking people together virtually in real time. He ended his remarks with the poignant opinion that the USA “globalized the world, but that it has forgotten to globalize itself.”

Robert Groves, Director of the U.S. Census Bureau, took the stand next, leading attendees through some of the most interesting findings from the data collected in 2010. He pointed out that while the U.S. population continues to rise, its growth has slowed significantly. However, foreign-born residents are flooding into the U.S. at astronomical rates. Marketers in the room were certainly taken aback by some of the figures he presented, but the changing face of America is also a huge opportunity for the growth of brands.

UM’s Jacki Kelley then took part in a discussion on communication planning, verbally sparring with other members of the panel and drawing applause when pointing out that some agencies, such as UM, are already leading the communications planning charge and being compensated based on results, as opposed to impressions or other outdated measurement metrics. Kelley also remarked that listening to client partner insights is crucial when developing communications and overall marketing plans, a fact she has learned from sitting on both sides of the client/agency table.

Immediately following that breakout session, Mediabrands Chief Digital Officer Quentin George helped spearhead a lively discussion on improving targeted marketing, stating that it makes advertising more relevant for consumers and more efficient for brands. Yet, he also noted that targeted marketing is an augmentation – not a replacement – for traditional media planning, as this highly-specified way of appealing to consumers is still in its infancy. Many issues – most notably privacy – are still being worked out both by the industry and governing bodies such as the FCC.

Much more is going on Wednesday, including a panel discussion on agency and advertiser collaboration featuring holding company CEOs Michael Roth (IPG), Martin Sorrell (WPP), and John Wren (Omnicom). Mediabrands Communications will bring you the highlights on Thursday.

Special thanks to our Mediabrands reporter, Jonathan Nierman, for this recap. Check out Mediabrands on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/mediabrands

If you have ever read Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, you will know what a perceptive and persuasive treatise on the viral power of social trends this book really is.  Through an eclectic set of superbly chosen anecdotes, Gladwell engagingly unveils this phenomenon, from the retro rise of Hush Puppies footwear to the disturbing epidemic nature of teen suicides.

But do such findings really apply to a brand’s advertising and marketing?  Can we see an outwardly perceptible relationship between the few, influencers who have the capacity to influence, and the many, general consumers of a brand or product.  If so, can we readily quantify that relationship?

To help answer this, we recently interrogated the word of mouth study, Talk Track, by the Keller Fay Group.  We found clear evidence that the relationship between influencers and general consumers talking about a brand varies by market category in quite a predictable relationship.

Each year, Talk Track asks 36,000 consumers about their daily word of mouth goings-on and how often and in what ways they talk about brands. Talk Track also classifies people by the size of their social network and the amount of advice they provide to others in a specific market category.  Consumers placed in the highest social network and category advice levels are called Conversation Catalysts, as an effective proxy for a category’s influencers.

Taking the fifteen market categories that Talk Track monitors, we can place them on a map to determine if there is a visual relationship between general brand mentions by consumers and Conversation Catalysts or influencers.  We call this type of map, the WOM Opportunity Grid (see Figure 1), and it shows a clear relationship between the two criteria:

Figure 1

As we can see, the map implies a connection between, on the vertical axis, a category’s share of total mentions (for all brands in all categories) and, on the horizontal axis, the penetration of a category’s Conversation Catalysts among the general US population.

The individual blue dots on the map represent each of Keller Fay’s 15 market category’s spanning the full range from Media & Entertainment to Household Products.  We can see the best line of fit, the regression line, as the dotted blue line that dissects the map, running diagonally from bottom left to top right.  And we can also quantify the relationship or fit between these two factors where correlation is 81%.   In other words, as conversation levels increases there is, on average, an 81% proportional increase in influencers and vice versa.

This map and its findings have two major implications for marketers:

1.     If a brand is to maximize its conversation potential, it is not enough to focus simply on creating that conversation with consumers, a parallel communications strategy should often be embraced for influencers.

2.     Where a brand and its category fall on the map is critically important for that brand’s conversation, face-to-face marketing and social media strategies.  Plainly, it is not a case where one overarching conversational strategy will fit all brands in all categories.  Brands in categories in the top-right hand quadrant, high mentions/high influencers, have a very different – and much easier – task to develop consumer conversation levels than products in categories in the lower left quadrant, low mentions/low influencers.

How do we identify and reach influencers?  For an influencers’ strategy, it not just a case of reaching them but actively nurturing them as well.  For example, the major media survey, MRI, has specific proprietary questions to identify what it terms category influentials.  Taking the travel category as an illustration, MRI indicates three magazines, Travel + Leisure, Condé Nast Traveler and Arthur Frommer’s Budget Travel, are particularly relevant at reaching travel influencers.  Online has similar opportunities such as Trip Advisor.  By proactively harnessing these media, one would not only aim to reach out to travel influencers, but also via competitions or promotions or other invitations to be involved, start to build a direct dialogue with them and establish a highly customized, relationship marketing strategy.

In such a short column, we can only quantify and explain the core issues.  Macro approaches and solutions that are individually tailored to a brand’s conversational aims and needs also follow some clear guidelines.  If you are keen to know more, I would urge you to attend to the Word of Mouth Marketing Association Summit on November 17-19.  Among others, Brad Fay of Keller Fay and I will talk about tangible and practical solutions to the issue of amplifying a brand’s conversation levels using the approach outlined here.

This was the question taken up Thursday afternoon by the Advertising Week panel “Judges’ Choices: Effie Winners that Stood out and Why.” The small panel was moderated by Matt Seiler, CEO of UM and Chairman of Effie Worldwide, and the relatively intimate setting allowed for a bit more interaction than we are used to at Advertising Week. And although we would love to say that it was interaction with the audience that made this panel the best one yet, we’re not going to give ourselves that credit.

Throw five intelligent, self-aware, and creatively-driven people on a stage and engage them in a dialogue and you’re bound to come out with some marketing principles to live by. This panel rarely felt like we were eavesdropping on the behind-the-scenes conversation of the Judges at the Effies, because it wasn’t consensus that the panelists were aiming for. It was intelligent, skeptically-productive dissent. Every time one of the Judges came to a well-stated, evidence-supported conclusion, another piped in with an equally pointed piece of wisdom with which to temper it.

Enough. Let’s talk about what they said. Seiler suggested that each of the judges come prepared with a favorite case study from the Effies. They were to describe the case study, play the video, and explain why it worked. After the individual presentations, the audience would vote on their favorite. Here were the judge’s selections:

Ilana Bryant, Global Chief Strategy Officer at StrawberryFrog, presented the case study for Earth Day: http://www.effie.org/winners/showcase/2010/4616.

Todd Cuningham, SVP, Strategic Insights and Research at MTV, presented the Ford Fiesta Movement video: http://www.effie.org/winners/showcase/2010/4279

Mark D’Arcy, President and CCO of Time Warner Global Media Group, spotlighted the partnership between CNN and Facebook that allowed viewers to watch the 2009 Obama inauguration live: http://www.effie.org/winners/showcase/2010/4578

Shiv Singh, Head of Digital for Pepsico, presented the 2010 Grand Effie winner, the “I’m in” Campaign for the Detroit Public Schools: http://www.effie.org/winners/showcase/2010/3956

The judges then went on to describe what they liked about each other’s favorite entries: what they thought worked, what they thought could be replicated. Media ideas that break convention, no-bullshit presentation, avoidance of buzzwords, leaving out what doesn’t matter, a clearly-stated objective – these were all strategies that achieved the judges’ unanimous support. But a spirited conversation was sparked by the observation of what appeared to be a trend in the winners: campaigns that spurred social movements.

Citing the Ford Fiesta Movement, the Earth Hour campaign, and the Detroit Public Schools “I’m in” campaign, the judges suggested that “going forward, great media campaigns should always be thinking on a movement level.” Seiler observed that these days, marketing effectiveness is measured by whether people are actual doing something – action is required. Bryant brought up that “people are looking for a movement in the sense of a community.” It is for this reason that cause marketing and social media-focused marketing have become popular awards winners simultaneously: the judges agreed that “doing good” has emerged as a theme behind “movement marketing,” and “movement marketing” in 2010 is all about taking advantage of social media.

But D’Arcy brought up a savvy counterpoint: the “bullshit threshold” of the public is creeping steadily higher with every movement-level campaign. Brands must remain meaningfully engaged in what they are professing to the people, lest they get caught in their audience’s “spam filter.” Singh jumped in to join a conversation he’s no doubt had many times about the Pepsi Refresh campaign. “Meaningful deeper impact is what really matters,” he said; 1.3 million dollars to social causes can’t be argued with. Cunningham added that it was all about authenticity, and campaigns supporting a brand’s real identity. “Companies are under full transparency now. Start with what your brand is about, and then align with it.”

Over and over, the judges found themselves referring the Dove campaign for Real Beauty—an exceptional example of cause-marketing, but a campaign that lacked the community-driven “social” component that is now required in 2010. One wonders what that campaign would look like if it was launched today. Might its message ultimately be weighed down by focus on tweets and mobile-app readiness?

Throwing around the idea of cause-marketing-based social movements had all the judges talking past the set end time. Bryant closed the conversation: “Not all movements are cause-marketing based,” she reminded the audience. “They’re just culturally relevant.” She reminded us of the movement that got Betty White on SNL. “Think above your product. But it doesn’t have to save the world.”

With local retail taking a huge hit in the wake of the recession, temporary storefronts have become suddenly accessible to even the smallest of brands — more specifically, to artists.  Pop-up stores that were once the exclusive territory of large media companies are now available for artistic occupation. Some artists are taking this opportunity to go hyperlocal with their marketing, bringing the gallery to the street level.

Smartspaces is just such an endeavor.  Ellen Scott, founder of Smartspaces, writes that her “vision is to create a sustainable, scalable platform for public art in storefronts.” In a retail space on lower Broadway, formerly occupied by the U.S. East Sportswear Inc., Ms. Scott invited artist Lisa Kirk to exhibit “Revolution!”

Kirk’s occupation of the former retail space is essentially a marketing initiative for a fake fragrance brand called Revolution. As if you couldn’t tell from the packaging (shown right), Revolution is a symphonic blend of scents like smoke, gasoline, tear gas, burnt rubber, and decaying flesh.

Don’t worry, Revolution isn’t a real fragrance, even if it’s marketed like one. This is art, after all.

In the long history of advertising, we’ve seen marketing take cues from artists time and time again. Artists developing their own pop-up shops represents the opposite: art taking a page right from marketers’ playbooks.  Build a shop, offer consumers multiple touch points.  Allow consumers to share their experience, and offer exclusive purchase opportunities.

For Revolution, passersby can catch a glimpse of this “brand” as it’s brought to life in the two shop windows, take a virtual tour by calling a phone number or buy an actual bottle of this revolutionary fragrance just up the block at the trendy Ace Hotel.  All this brand exposure adds up to a pretty solid marketing initiative, on a pretty low budget… if the brand were real.

Many agree that art is subjective, but media is certainly not.  Artists around the world are starting to explore the use of vacant space in the form of pop-up stores: Brooklyn, the UK, Berkeley, Virginia, and even Winona, MN, to name a few.

The ways that artists will continue to occupy, react, and expand on viral marketing techniques remains to be seen. Though the genre of the pop –up store was born out of the world of media, it’s bound to get schooled by our friends in the art world.  Look what art did for Campbell’s soup…or was it the other way around?

Our media consumption patterns may be known in microscopic detail but the motivations behind those patterns are largely assumed.  This assumption results in the overlooking of small shifts in our aggregate media consumption patterns each year. Over time, these shifts can cascade into an avalanche of change that seems to come from nowhere.

For example, how many marketers still didn’t know what blogs were three or four years after the term was first used in 1999; or thought Twitter, created in 2006 and which at time of writing is at over 14 billion tweets, wasn’t an issue until quite recently; or to this day may never have heard of Gary Vaynerchuk, arguably the Paul Revere of the social marketing revolution.

In their monograph, Media Generations, Professors Block and Shultz of Northwestern University posited the view that our primary media habits are predominantly shaped by the media we experience at an early age.  They encapsulated this in the phrase: You are what you grew up with.  They expanded on the idea as follows:

…the experiences of childhood, especially in teenage years, impact the shape and course of later life…  That is, the way media and marketing communications are learned during childhood determines the patterns for the rest of one’s life, even though new media and technologies appear… Boomers use the Internet, but they use it differently than do Millennials who grew up with it.

The notion that exposure to a medium at an early age leads to an innate familiarity with that channel makes eminent sense.  Yet our implicit literacy of a medium probably stretches beyond our simply being immersed in that channel at an early age.  Focusing on the three mass media that have emerged since the middle of the 20^th century – TV computer and mobile phone – aka the three screens, we can unravel how each screen engages the various functions within our brain.

Neuromarketing proves the three screens of TV, computer and mobile phone are handled by the brain in quite different ways, ways that consumers cannot necessarily identify themselves. Our brain’s ability to process an experience is far more advanced than our ability to verbalize that experience. Neuromarketing reveals our brain processes an event at 300 to 500 thousandths of second after the experience whereas as our conscious brain, the thinking of which we’re all aware, starts to engage at about 500 thousandths of second and beyond.

At a recent Advertising Research Foundation meeting, Dr A.K. Pradeep of Neurofocus, a leading neuromarketing research agency, isolated the essential differences in how the three types of screen communicate.  By scrutinizing consumers’ precognitive responses, the responses before conscious thinking fully engages, Dr Pradeep was able to demonstrate the relative communications strengths of each channel:

• TV is superior for emotion and action
• Computer online is better for dynamic content and personal or private communications
• Mobile is excellent at helping drive memory

Part of the strength of TV and computer screens is that their larger size helps draw out “human elements and fine details.”  By contrast, mobile’s smaller screen demands an intensity of focus which can result “in a significant boost in memory retention.”

So if we can largely explain our innate media habits by the phrase You are what you grew up with, why aren’t we following this principle more assiduously in our industry media research? The main studies of both MRI and Simmons don’t track under 18s, so emerging media trends could still be missed. Even the groundbreaking Nielsen-sponsored Video Consumer Mapping Study, which looked at the consumer’s use of all three screens in great detail, didn’t include teenagers.  In contrast, Target Group Index, the major international multimedia study available in over 60 countries, routinely surveys individuals aged 15 and over, and in some countries as young as 12.

Shouldn’t the USA be quicker to embrace teenager-driven insights into burgeoning multimedia trends?

So what did happen, you ask?  Surprisingly little.

I fanned over 30 brands and I did hear from most of them, so I guess they can check that box.  Mostly though, I was pretty underwhelmed.

The bright spots were some of the smallest brands.  My favorite childhood ice cream stand, Dairy Joy in Weston, MA had surprisingly robust Facebook posts – including one on an unseasonably warm day a few weeks ago – “Take advantage of the gorgeous weather and grab a cone of your favorite flavor from Dairy Joy!”.  If only I’d been back in my hometown – I definitely would have stopped by.

Another of my small favorites is Organic Valley, the organic farming co-op.  Their posts were much more like the random thoughts of my friends than marketing messages–links to interesting articles on organic food, pictures of their cafeteria menu items and unique seasonal recipes.

Some brands perplexed me.  A weekly magazine that I subscribe to posted links to interesting articles in their latest issue.  It sort of made me wonder why I was paying for the subscription, when they were going through the magazine, pointing out the best articles and allowing me to read them online for free.

The sheer tenacity of Best Buy in the face of overwhelming customer criticism has actually given me a whole new respect for the brand.  Dozens and dozens of angry posts to their wall each answered in a calm, helpful manner.  I suppose it isn’t an ideal situation, but I do applaud them for acknowledging what is going on and responding to it.

Most brands just annoyed me posting little more than the equivalent of an email subject in their status.  No sooner had I fanned a site than my live feed was bombarded with the equivalent of email spam – “Exclusive today, enjoy 20% off + free shipping on any purchase”, blah, blah, blah.

The Big Money’s recent Facebook 50 annual ranking of companies making social media work points out that Facebook has become a very handy way to coordinate free promotions on a nationwide, even global level.

Quite frankly, if this is all that brands are going to use Facebook for, then I say count me out.

If you’re reading this, it’s probably because you’re one of us marketing types—the blind optimists who spend our days thinking about where to find consumers, how to capture their interest and, ultimately, win them over. But, the reality we never fully accept is this: the consumer (who is actually a real person with a whole life of his or her own that doesn’t involve us) is not sitting at home all day, forlorn for lack of attention from brands, waiting to be found. It’s a sad love story gone wrong.

So what’s my point? Well, as a fellow blind optimist, I think there is still hope. I think creative media thinking can win the proverbial girl’s heart, ride off into the sunset and have brands and consumers living happily ever after. We all know that it’s harder to push someone into your camp than it is to give him a little pull when he’s already leaning your way. Well, for any category there are particular moments—beyond the obvious ones—when consumers are leaning your way and are just waiting for that little invitation to come in. I like to think of these as “magnetic moments.” Yes, we all know that the days of interruption marketing are over and right now it’s about right time, right place (blah, blah, blah), but, in my interpretation, magnetic moments are more than that. They are a mood, a context, a state of mind (and, yes, a time and a place, too) where your category has become more emotionally charged for consumers. Either consciously or subconsciously, by choice or by circumstance, their energy (and attention) has temporarily been directed your way.

Think about your own experience with the personal finance category, for example. Of the 24 hours in your day and the 168 in your week, you’re probably spending almost none of them thinking about your credit card or checking account. All the while, financial services marketers are making plaintive overtures about how their products can fulfill some bigger promise to you as a “money management tool.” But, then comes the time you take out of each week or month to go through your bill-paying routine. Or perhaps it’s the moment just after or when the mortgage bill comes due. Whatever it is and whenever it is, these are the points where all of a sudden you’re transported into your money frame of mind—you’re feeling the pain of your financial ways and resolving to improve them. At that one point, you might finally allow yourself to listen to how one of these “money management tools” could play a bigger role in your repertoire. That’s a “money moment” for you–a.k.a. a magnetic moment any financial services marketer crafty enough to catch you in that frame of mind.

In the age of interactive, conversational media and utilities, I think there is an opportunity for a brand to help, inform, edify and uplift through its media experiences in “money moments” like these. When the possibilities of media (and what can be turned into media) are boundless, the only limit on our ability to engage consumers is the bounds of our imagination. If we can find these magnetic moments, surely we can find a way to put media there. There’s proof that a lot of brands are thinking this way and are doing better for it. A few examples I’ve really come to like are these:

• Zappos: Yes, shoes can be a highly involved category, so maybe their job is easier, but that doesn’t stop them from thinking really hard about the shoe moments in peoples’ lives. Whether you are a shoe lover or would just as soon go barefoot all day, there is one moment for all of us that is now forever associated with shoes. Yes, the airport security line. A subconscious shoe moment, but Zappos is there with ads in the security bins. Pretty brilliant, I think.
• Charmin: Doesn’t get more low involvement than toilet paper, right? If you didn’t think very hard, it would be easy to conclude there are no magnetic moments here. Well, think again. Maybe there is one…the dreaded, grimy public restroom – an experience that really helps you reflect on the importance of nice fluffy, soft toilet paper. Charmin is there. They’ve sponsored the iPhone app that helps people find survivable public restrooms wherever they might be.
• Max New York Life Insurance: Halfway across the world, an insurance company in India is showing us how to stretch the concept of magnetic moments even further. Insurance is often thought to be a “necessary evil”; but in truth, one could consider it welcome protection against the fragility of life. That said, we rarely think of it this way. So Max New York Life found a creative way to get that very point across. They found Indian consumers when they were tending to other fragile their lives– their eggs. They advertized on egg cartons. A pretty elegant way to remind people of the fragility of life. Nice work.

All of these are pretty simple one-off tactics. But what they say to consumers is pretty powerful. What they say is: “I’ve thought about you. I get you. I understand you more than any of those other brands. And I know you don’t think of me often, but when you do. I’m there.”  If you think hard enough, there are probably magnetic moments you’ve never considered that give you an opportunity to show consumers you’re armed with a little more insight and media creativity than the average brand. Simple tactics, but they are clearly the product of some insightful thinking from people that started by stepping back from solving the marketing problem and first walked a mile in their consumer’s shoes to find those precious few moments when consumers’ energy—for better or worse—is tuned into their category.

At UM, we remind ourselves to truly get to know our consumer before we put our media/marketing goggles on this. We do this through research, talking to consumers and listening to the story that the data tells. With this insight in hand, we use creative media planning tools such as consumer archetypes and consumer journeys to truly understand our consumer and our category within their broader context of consumers real life. Simple, tried and true tools…but what they do is help us be a consumer first, recognize that we only have a small fraction of their attention and find those magnetic moments where we can form a more charged connection. Our hypothesis is that the more your media experiences are around those magnetic moments, the more curiosity and interest your brand will provoke, and the more surprising your results will be.

-By Will Wiseman, SVP, Global Strategy Director

OK, so how does it work?  Cliffs Notes version: A client trades unwanted goods, say, 750,000 pairs of last-season’s sea foam green pumps with the orange heels that never did quite catch on, for barter credits which are equal to the full value of those pumps (better than writing them off at 10 cents on the dollar).  These barter credits are like a coupon, say “20% off all Media.”  The client then buys media (typically TV) through the barter company, and pay 80% of that bill with cash, the remainder of the bill they pay via their barter credits.  Client does better on the sales of the pumps, and saves money on their media buy.  What happened to the pumps?  The barter company and the client agreed up front as to what venues the barter company can sell them to (e.g., “Any retailer outside of the U.S.”).

Folks barter all sorts of things: Jets.  Beer.  Honey-glazed hams.  Mini-vans.  Buildings.  You name it.   And as a result, they get rid of unwanted goods…and save money on their media buys in the process.

So if all this is true, then why does barter still own a reputation that falls somewhere between a cheap used car salesman in a polyester suit and a snake oil salesman?  I think most of it is due to the purveyors of barter in years past who, on occasion, were known to sometimes gild the lily a bit…and that’s a nice way of putting it, since “barter deals gone wild” could typically cause fear and loathing among those connected to the deal (not for the barter companies themselves of course, they made out just fine, but the agencies and clients were left to pull their hair out).

What’s a barter deal gone wild?  A marketing client who never informed their financial folks what they were up to, the sea-foam green pumps have been undervalued by the barter agency and the deal seems wrong, the media agency never ensured the barter agency was on the hook to deliver a specific media buy, so now the client’s ads are running in overnights, the barter agency is not clearing the desired weight, the CMO is screaming and the finger-pointing is rampant. Oh, and the pumps just showed up for sale in a big box store – degrading that designer’s brand value and by the way, he is on line four and wants to talk.  Oh yeah….

That fictional nightmare aside, I believe that barter can be a very effective tool for not only reducing media costs for clients but also in terms of aiding top-line areas where assets are on the verge of being liquidated at cut rates.  Pay less for your media + get more for goods you needed to get rid of anyway.  What’s not to like?

The key is to have the right people involved in the deal from the beginning, and to ensure that the parameters of the deal are clearly stated – ambiguity in barter deals, as in life, can be the root of many problems.

The right people – Means client finance people to evaluate the financial side of things.  This also means client marketing people, their media team and the agency media folks as well.  And depending on the situation, even more people may be required to participate in the discussion.  Each situation is different, but be sure to err on the side of keeping more people than less “in the loop.”  A good barter agency can help here.

Deal parameters – The barter company and the media agency should work closely together so that the barter agency knows very clearly what they are expected to deliver in terms of media inventory – they should be fully briefed as to the specific details on everything so that there are no issues with “burning credits” or poor inventory.  FYI – A good barter agency will simply walk away from a deal they cannot deliver on for the client.

I work at UM in New York and I’ve done several deals with our sister barter shop–Orion Trading.  Those deals have been simple, straightforward and resulted in significant benefits to the clients.  “You do barter the way it should be done,” I like to tell Orion’s President and CEO, Brian McMahon.  Now, I should tell you that Brian is partial to plaid sport coats… but they are not polyester…

Barter.  It’s not a scary thing anymore.  Know the deal.  Communicate fully.  Then go for it.

First, the good news: Research and intelligence firm Mintel has found that “optimism is steadily balancing out stress and hardship as people around the world discover ways to transform their lifestyles, regain control and lighten the mood.”

People are demonstrating that they still want to enjoy themselves. In the US, three in five have traveled domestically in the past year, but to save money, more travelers are opting to visit family and friends. The result has been a boost to the trend towards playfulness and simple fun—behooving marketers to build these values into their brands.  In fact, many marketers are already off and running, releasing quirky, light-hearted new products that offer consumers a way to escape by engaging with their brands.

Now, the harder news: While a more playful attitude may be on the rise, upon reviewing its 2009 trend predictions, Mintel observed that trust remains a paramount concern. At a time when consumers feel particularly distrustful of the financial industry and food purveyors among other companies, brands who want people’s trust must not only display the values consumers care about, but also interact with people about these values on an incredibly intimate, almost human level.

Nine out of 10 consumers recently surveyed by Faith Popcorn’s BrainReserve agreed they are “opting for a simpler life.” Per a September 23 NYT article, “Americans seem to be again entering a period of social change where we’re recalibrating our sense of what it means to be a citizen—not just through voting or volunteering, but also through our purchases.” The idea that we can serve by spending more responsibly has gained steam. “Americans,” the article says, “are starting to put their money where their ideals are.”

Take, for example, this summer’s wildly successful “Cash for Clunkers” program. “It was a potent concept mixing financial incentives with the emotional appeal of unloading a burdensome possession and getting something new in return”—all while helping the environment.

Now, an array of smart home furnishing retailers and manufacturers are hoping to “capitalize on similar motivations by introducing trade-in programs for everything from outdated entertainment centers to used mattresses.”

Ruby & Quiri, a family-run home furnishings center in New York, offers consumers a $25 gift card for every piece of used furniture turned in, or $50 for upgrading to an energy-efficient appliance. The “clunker” is picked up and donated or recycled when the new item is delivered, providing consumers with a headache-free means of “doing good.” Similar programs have sprung up across the US, with variations from 1-800-Mattress and even a “Cash for Teakettles” program from Chantal Cookware Corp.

While “genuineness” may seem to come easily to a family-run outfit such as Ruby & Quiri, it is not completely elusive for companies which operate on a larger scale. As brands take on personas, astute media agencies (such as UM) can bring those personas—and their intrinsic values—to life through interaction with individuals.

Brands need to start opening up the way consumers already have in the online world. After years of one-way conversations, brands may first have to deal with some pent-up anger, but over time, engaging consumers will lead to more balanced relationships focused on cooperation and co-creation. Part of a brand’s newfound appeal might just be the humanity and vulnerability that is demonstrated through a willingness to reveal themselves and be open to feedback from the masses.

“Foreverism” (the concept that conversations, relationships and products that are never done and born of a “beta” mindset) means operating in a more humble, transparent and perpetual beta mode, both as an organizational mindset and as a product development and customer experience philosophy. But consumers will not want everything to last forever. Brands will need to think hard—understanding which offerings should be primarily transient vs. other experiences consumers prefer to be more lasting.