Building a Strategic Promotional Plan

A goal is a dream until you make a plan. And the plan needs to be strategic otherwise it won't work.

A strategy is a direction - a way of heading. This is not something that already has the tactics in place. Think of a chess strategy, or war strategy - these don't have any step-by-step procedures in place that if a single thing goes wrong the whole strategy falls apart. That same thing is true of any strategy, including your promotional one. The strategy isn't a tresure map. It simply outlines the direction. A strategy will rarely change, but the tactics you use to implement the strategy might - and probably will - depending upon what happens along the way.

No matter what kind of business you're in, you need to operate strategically, and that includes the promotional activity you undertake. Too many times a 'promotional plan' is hit and miss. It's buying an ad somewhere or running a competition. If there's no strategy behind the tactics, then it's like throwing fistfuls of money into the air. Here's an outline of the basic steps for creating a strategic promotional plan. It will ensure your promotional activity is targeted, reflects the overarching goals of your marketing plan, delivers awesome ROI, and gives you the best opportunity for success. It works for every kind of business, whether you're a CEO of a startup, a Fortune 500 company or a mommyblogger wanting to take the next step.

Step 1: Situation Analysis:

If you're an operating business, you'll probably have done a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) as part of your business or marketing plan already. That's where you'll have looked at the overall place of your product and its distribution in the marketplace. If you're smaller in scope, you might not have thought too much about it before. That's not a problem - this is where you start to think of yourself as a company! In your strategic promotional plan you'll want to do a specific SWOT analysis on how your promotions are working, should work and how you want them to work. Look purely at the SWOT of your product's promotions and its relationship to competitors promotions. Remember that promotion is a communication, nothing else. It's about messages and activity directly tied to those messages. Outline what is great about your communications, what isn't, what opportunities there are and how these could be threatened.

The second part of the situation analysis is identifying, in the most specific way possible, who you are as a company and product, what budget you're able to work with, who your audiences are and where you're at in the market and as a business. The more information you have at this point, hard as it might seem to face at times, the easier the other steps become and the more likely you are to reach your objectives. You'll probably need to do quite a bit of research.

Step Two: Identify Your Objectives

Once you've identified where you're starting from, then you need to identify where you'd like to go. In the strategic promotion plan, you need to have an promotional objective in mind (click on that link to define what types of things could be considered promotional objectives). You might have one or more objectives.

Because promotion is a communication activity, in developing your promotional objective don't make the mistake of aligning it with anything other than a communication goal - something you can see as being directly tied to communication. If you fail to do that, and you're employed as a communicator then you're creating an environment in which it's hard to prove ROI (return on investment). And to put it bluntly, you'll need to prove ROI to keep your job, let alone get a bigger budget or more business from the client.

For example, don't say a promotional objective is to increase sales. There are far more factors in play in your marketing plan than just communication that impact sales (such as what the product is like, the price point, your competitors, the economic environment, and so on). In your promotion plan, we're only looking at things you can directly achieve with communication.

Ensure your objective is SMART - Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-focused. Something like "Achieve 1,000 people to log onto the website and sign up for the alpha invite before 10 August, 2009" is a good promotional objective. Ensure your promotional objectives are directly achieved with communication, and that they support the overall marketing goals. Never think you'll be able to prove your promotions were directly responsible for an increase in sales - unless you can prove nothing else changed in the environment, business or marketplace. However, your promotional activity should be one aspect which contributes towards an increase in sales. And that activity should have SMART attributes which allow you to prove they were successful promotions (even if other stuff goes haywire).

Remember that Achievable and Realistic are two different things. Sure, sending out 500 samples a week to people in the mail might be achieveable if you never spend time with your family, but is it realistic? Begin with brainstorming some objectives that you'd like to achieve and then start adjusting and tying them down with the SMART criteria.

Step Three: Choose your Tactics:

Think of tactics as tools in your kit that will allow you to implement your strategy, and get to your objectives. There are four general categories of tactics, these are: PR, Advertising, Sales Promotion, Personal Selling (which includes Word of Mouth and online communities - take some time to review each of the links). Some of these have cross over points and grey areas, and when done well, you should use some in combination or at different points in order to achieve your objectives. For example, very rarely do you use a single way of transport to get from one place to another (you might walk, then take a bus, then walk again for example), and the same is true of choosing promotional tactics. You need to select promotions that are directly aligned with your strategy. Think of what each of them will do for you, and then put them together so they become a plan.

Begin with the four big categories and the links I've attached to them. Then make a list of what reasonable types of activity you could consider to use, given your budget and situation, that will help you implement your strategy and get to your objectives. PR could include conferences, speeches, media activity, etc. Sales Promotions you might consider are sampling, competitions, etc. Personal Selling includes training your internal staff, internal recognition programs, and these days, word of mouth and user community. Spend some time brainstorming different things. Let me repeat, these four different areas of tactics are very broad and do not have defined constraints. They are, however, foundational points for sparking your thoughts about different activities you can do to communicate messages to different target audiences, and receive information back.

When you have chosen some tactics, put them in order of when you'd like to undertake them. There has to be real consideration given to when is the most effective time to use a particular message and a particular tactic with your market. Remember that promotions are defined as short-term activities. Ads get old fast. So do competitions. Happy Meal toys get rotated every month. Effective promotions don't run for an extended period. Make them short, targeted and focused for great results.

That's how you create a plan that is strategic. If you needed to go from your house to your kids' school, you wouldn't take an aeroplane, even though it would probably work. It's not a well considered tool for the job. In fact it could backfire - how would your kids' friends feel? Your neighbours? Choose the correct tools for the job, to move you along the strategic path toward your goal.

It is really very useful to use a timeline for this. Put a beginning date and the end date (which will align with achieving your objective). Then mark in what activities you're planning to use, and when you'll use them. Again, the more specific you are with activities, how they're going to work with each other and especially, what each of them has been chosen to achieve as part of your strategy, the more likely you are to be successful. Don't do something just because it's easy, or the latest trend.

Step Four: Monitoring and Evaluation

This is the trick step. I should probably have started with it! From the very beginning of your planning to after the objective has been achieved you'll be monitoring how your plan is going. That way you'll know if you're sliding off the path at all. It's far easier to identify where things are going wrong if you do it regularly than looking back over the experience at the end and wonder what happened. You'll also be able to make alterations to your tactic selection to get back in line with your strategic path if that's necessary.

When you choose your tactics, it's based on the information you have on hand right now. Also, it's done with some expectations about how effective other tactics you choose are going to be. Just say you decided to run a competition as one tactic to get yourself an additional 100 people to try something or visit your blog - and it ended up falling flat. Well, when you're actively monitoring and evaluating your plan on a regular basis, you could decide to change your next tactic to pick up the pace and get you back on track. You'll also probably review future competitions and see what you need to change about them or whether to ditch them altogether. You'll be listening to your audience, but keeping your eye on what your objective is. Your strategy won't change, but your tactics might - and probably will - as you move along.

Planning your promotional strategy plan will take you some time, energy and thought. Far more so than simply placing an ad somewhere, or running a random competition. But the outcomes will be infinitely better. So what are you waiting for? Get strategic!

Where's the vision in your startup?

What's your vision?

Recently there have been discussions over 'how long is too long' from developers a little less than happy being part of a startup that is not yet paying them 'what they're worth' or even getting involved in a startup that doesn't pay them from the outset. Startup widows are also holding their spouses accountable for not having 'made it' yet.

The problem with this thinking is that the focus is on the payout, not on the journey or the goal. Their focus is on a timeframe. What's acceptable, what's not.

What's your vision?

Deciding to get into the startup life is like jumping off a cliff. You prepare really well, you're excited, and the people around you admire your decision. But after that, you're relying on your own vision. And that's where people begin to lose it.

When we decided to launch our startup in the US, I wish I had a dollar for every person telling me how 'lucky' I was. I find that weird. Lucky? No. Gutsy? Yes. Committed? Yes. Adventurous? Yes. Passionate? Yes.

I share a vision. (Please check out the difference between a corporate mission statement and vision statement here.)

So what's my vision?

My vision is one in which we create technology that makes a real difference to peoples' lives and changes how they view technology and communicate with each other. We're going to provide the tool that restructures the way people create and interact with technology and communicate with each other online. (Oh yeah, this is a change-the-world thing!)

I'm into equity - not the financial type, but the equity of access and use that will make people want to create content instead of just consume it. I want it to be easier for them. I lust for the day people do more than just search for things online. I lust for the day that everyone - you - truly feels able to produce content and interact with it because they can fit doing it into their day. I lust for the day that it makes as much sense for them to create content and really interact with other peoples' content as it does right now to Google something.

The prospect of being a founding part of the company that makes this happen excites me.

You'll note that no aspect of this vision includes a timeframe. Even though I want it to have happened 'yesterday' purely because I am so darned excited about it, I haven't said 'we have to make this happen within xx years or else I'm out'. It also doesn't include a financial payout. Sure we have to live, but it's amazing how your expenses tend to meet your means. Ramen noodles taste good ;). Free public education is good education. Without wanting to sound like a Monty Python skit, I am proud to say I have really actually walked two miles in the snow with bags of groceries, and I didn't die. The bus is usually my transportation, and sometimes if I'm lucky, a friend's car.

It's about what you're willing to do to see your vision come true. It's living the dream and enjoying the journey. It's the reality of working with a startup.

As I've said before, startup life is like nothing else. It's not a job. And when it feels like a job, when you start measuring 'success' by time and money, it's time to do everyone involved with the startup a big fat favor and get out - because it's not just about you. It means you don't share the vision. Maybe you really never did.

World Championships Speed Stacking

Yesterday we went along to the World Championships. Of course, if we didn't live half an hour from the venue, I doubt we'd have gone along. That said, all four of my kids have had fun cup stacking. It's a bit addictive. I even enjoy it. It's great for working on hand-eye coordination, fine motor skills, teamwork... all that good stuff.

Please note *our* focus is not on being the fastest in the world. It's more about beating your own best times, in a type of drag-race against the other team. In my view, only one person gets to be the fastest in the world. (At the moment it's a guy named Steven, who is incredibly fast.) But if that's all the focus you give to it, then you're ripping yourself off from the fun that can be had in simply doing it to get better at it.

It's this approach which I think makes the kids keen to try new things - sports, meeting new people, etc., and takes the pressure off them to do it better than anyone else. Enjoy our little video!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sci5b_hm10M]

A win for the little guy? Ashton Kutcher plays tag with CNN.

By now even your grandma knows about the race to a million. Ashton Kutcher, old-media celebrity turned digital insider with various multimedia projects and Twitter groover challenged CNN to a race to a million followers on Twitter.

And after a nice little campaign, last night he won.

It was really fun to see the video of him crossing the victory line. He was really, truly excited. That's impressive.

What's more impressive is that Ashton (I can call him by his first name, 'cos you know... we're both Twitter sluts ;)) decided to use the opportunity to do two things:

First, promote the charitable cause (Malaria No More). He got a bank cheque made out in readiness for the win, and showed it up close on U-stream. He is knowledgeable and focused on his charitable work. (Granted, in his excitement over his win the splashing of champagne on a bank cheque for that amount of money is a little... well... off).

Secondly, and more importantly, he made the race into a statement about the democratization of media. About the power of the people. About 'big media' no longer determining who gets attention. Ashton repeatedly says that the revolution is happening. That we can change the world. We own the tools to create the content, consume the content and connect with each other. Anyone who can get to a computer with the internet is playing in the same playground as CNN - and they no longer have a guaranteed audience. And old media can just *suck it*.

Some naysayers and skeptics doubt that Ashton truly represents the 'little guy' in this equation (after all he's a movie star right?). For example, Mark Glaser, otherwise known as @Mediatwit said: "This was NOT about the little guy at all. It was about a celeb getting little guys to follow him. If a real nobody got 1m that would be big."

What Mark's missed is that a key part of Ashton's victory rant was his comment that 'Hey, you can unfollow me. And that's cool.' Ashton gets that's what happens. That's what this is about. Six hours after he logged off last night, he was recording a segment on Oprah and said these things again ... and again. Let's not forget he's also always talking directly to the Twitterers sending him messages. He's authentic, transparent, on the ball and insightful. (So's his dearly devoted wife, but that's another post.)

So while the focus on playing tag for Followers on Twitter gives a bad impression and certainly doesn't reflect the overall scheme of things in social media, the goal and opportunity for further influence created by Ashton and the point he's made are undoubtedly positive in ways no other old media celebrity could achieve. He's gained my respect, and the respect of other commentators. And I've never actually been a fan of his at all.

Now if only he'd teach all those other celebrities. You know the ones who need to get rid of their clueless PR hoons and tweet real conversations with other real people .... Are you listening Hugh Jackman? Oh that's right... no you're not.

What kind of Twitter identity do you seek?

There are some very interesting psychological theories used in Marketing and Business which explain why people behave the way they do. Put simply, people buy different brands and products to fulfill external and internal needs. These needs reflect their sense of self. And people can generally be placed in one of three categories:

1. Affiliation needs - people who primarily want to 'belong'. For example, think of teenagers and their need to buy the latest fad.

2. Leadership needs - people who want to be seen as innovators and want to be seen as cutting edge. A good example is all those people looking for the latest and greatest new phone!

3. Achievement needs - people who buy things to demonstrate they've 'made it'. Often, buying that sportscar or a First Class plane ticket fulfills that need.

My current research on discourse analysis on Twitter suggests you can identify people working to fulfill these same needs on Twitter! With just text to convey how we want to be seen by everyone, the things we decide to Tweet and whom we tweet with demonstrates us 'working' to fulfill one of these needs.

Someone with an affiliation need on Twitter will use lots of hashtags. Ways of belonging. They will identify themselves as part of popular movements on Twitter. They want to be part of a particular crowd. Mommy bloggers. Lots of RTs and @ conversations with people they want to be associated with.

Someone with a leadership need will probably not 'life stream'. Instead they'll stay on one topic and tweet links to specific cutting edge stuff in their field. They will talk with just about anyone as long as it's on the topic they want to be seen as a leader in. They don't stray from that path. It's like they're almost the Twitter expert on a particular subject.

Finally, someone with an achievement need will want to be recognised as having 'made it'. These, I claim, are the type of people who un-follow bulk numbers of people so they can appear accomplished. They're more likely to be focused on follower numbers than anything else. They might life stream about their accomplished lives, and even lead calls to donate to 'people less fortunate', to further identify their separateness from them.

The way we behave on Twitter reflect identity work where we want to be seen by the community as one of these types of people.

What Twitterers can you think of that fits one of these categories? Where do you fit?

Why I Stopped Following Guy Kawasaki

Twitter is a curious beast. It has morphed as it grows, due to the community of people who use it. And in researching the online social sphere for my graduate thesis, there are some key aspects of how people use Twitter that are indicators to how this is going to go.

Twitter is a tool used by a community. The tool of Twitter is no different to any other tool. The tool of Twitter exists as an infrastructure, and becomes what it is because of how the community uses it. Just as a knife can be defined as a weapon because people sometimes kill very effectively with it, so Twitter is a community because people interact on it.

Over time we've seen Twitter move on from being a post-modern, Web 1.0 Facebook-style status update of 'what are you doing'. That whole status update thing had the whole broadcasting ethos of me! me! me! It was about telling the world about me and not really caring that much about what everyone else thought of it.

But Web 2.0, and beyond has seen Twitter's 'what are you doing' develop to people actually asking each other 'what are *you* doing'? And 'doing' for the Twitter community now really means 'thinking' and 'wanting' and 'needing' and 'hoping for', etc.

The community online uses social media to really connect with each other. To connect with people who you feel an affiliation with, or can learn from, or just feel close to. Not to broadcast.

And this is why I've stopped following Guy Kawasaki.

I'm sure Guy is a nice guy (sorry). He's done a lot of good stuff, written some books that people rave about and stuff. He also gives a good party by all accounts. He certainly believes he's extremely influential, and some other people do too.

so where's the problem? A while back on Twitter @Guykawasaki was really him. He'd tweet stuff and interact with people. But as time has gone on, Guy's Twitter account has morphed - much like most of Twitter. However, I'd argue the morphing that Guy has sought has been detrimental to his personal brand, and non-reflective of where the community of Twitter is heading. He's introduced ghost twitterers, for which has received a lot of criticism - and he doesn't seem to get what the issue with that is. He spends a lot of time on Twitter defending himself over this (it gets tiring). He's also focused on the numbers and believes that putting out what he terms "good content" (ie: links to stories and 'interesting things' on the web that he has located and simply aggregates, not that he's created) is all Twitter needs to be.

All of this means the stream of "Guy Kawasaki" really is about as authentically Guy Kawasaki as the fake accounts of myriad celebrities. When I started following Guy, that wasn't the case.

And Guy, the fact is we use Twitter differently. I'm into conversation. Looking at my stats, I tweet an average of 13 times a day, and 70% of those are @ tweets. Connections and personal resonance is my focus. I'm not as into the numbers as you and all those traditional marketers and journalists and old-school bloggers with 'number of eyeballs' perceptions are. I have a relatively large number of followers and am extremely happy about that because it gives me the opportunity to talk with lots of different people, find out what they're doing, how I can assist them, and vice versa. (To clarify: I gain followers in the old-fashioned way. No 3rd party tools, or requests for follows being broadcast. You won't see me tweeting about my following as being a big thing for me.)

I'm interested in people individually. And I sincerely believe that's where the future of online communication lies. Not in trying to elevate your own name by broadcasting what you think is 'good content' (no matter who created it), but by having conversations with people, everywhere. We're not living in a Web 1.0 environment any more.

So time will go on and Twitter will continue to morph. I feel old school. The general real life community has heard of Twitter. People talk about "getting a Twitter" (which is strange phrasing to me). Mainstream traditional media is not only covering Twitter but is getting stories from its community.

The thing that's driving everyday people to Twitter though, is not to just receive traditional mass media. The thing the people want is connections with other people, and real life celebrities such as Ashton, Demi and Kevin are using Twitter to connect with their fans. They have conversations with them. Really. That's why they're coming. That's why Twitter's growth is 30% a month. Connecting individually with resonance is everything.

Resonance, Not Reach

Creating a brand LoveMark in the 21st century has never been easier. Yet, the concept seems to be alien to so many companies.

Many brands think they've got a loyal following. But what they really have is passive brand loyalty. People who buy the product all the time, but don't really have a loving, committed relationship. It's a marriage of convenience. Your brand is not a LoveMark. And you're fooling yourself if you think those sales figures are just going to continue without putting some work into your relationship. There's always something shiny coming around the corner, or a challenge to be met and if your customers aren't willing to go the extra mile for you, then you're DOA.

Advertising used to be about reaching as many people as possible with your message. Reach. CPM. It was all about how many eyeballs you could get to. And that's what brands thought would bring them some sort of relationship with people. But it's a flawed system that doesn't work. The old "50% of my advertising works and 50% doesn't - but I don't know which 50% is which" simply isn't good enough for today's effective marketer, working on a slashed budget and still needing to demonstrate real ROI.

I put it to you that Reach is not what you should be focused on (in fact, it was never the real focus, but we got lost because that's all traditional media could measure and create sales on). It's not primarily about Reach.

It's all about Resonance.

To explain Resonance to students, I say it's like hitting the sweet spot on a tennis racquet. You get the best power, best direction, best result - with 'just-right' input. Hitting a ball with the sweet spot on the tennis racquet is Resonance. And the perfect chord on a guitar is Resonance.

Social media offer brands an opportunity to create a LoveMark because they offer a capacity for Resonance that traditional formats, focused on CPM, could never offer. CPM tries to achieve Resonance by throwing lots and lots of tennis balls at a racquet, and hoping one or two make the sweet spot. There's stacks of lost message. And stacks of lost money.

Resonance in advertising is all about making your product the perfect and only fit that the buyer can see for them. In fact, it shows the product as being built specifically for them. It's all about the individual consumer. It's not about how many thousands of people you can get your message to. It's about getting it to the right people.

By using social media as a tool, Resonance happens when your brand speaks to people online. Personally. As part of a conversation. When you're speaking to someone it says you care about them. How do you think rock stars get so successful? Name any teen heart-throb: David Cassidy, Robbie Williams, Jesse McCartney, even (good grief) the Jonas Bros make girls feel they are performing just for them. They sing songs that say "hey, I'm so lonely and you could be the one." Rock stars who do that have Resonance down pat. And now it's easy for any brand to do the same.

Social media offers brands the opportunity to become a LoveMark for people and eliminate a great portion of the passive brand loyalty that they're built on. Good brands, like Zappos.com are in the space, making personal relationships with people a priority. As time goes on, I hope more companies rediscover the importance of Resonance over Reach. If you build resonance with one person, then they'll be singing your praises day in and day out to people who care about what they have to say. And that's a CPM you couldn't put a price on.