Holland-Mark Blog

All hail the empowered consumer.

caroline b. — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 17:40:37 +0000

“Social media” (the myriad of online, interconnected communities and communication portals) has had a profound impact on the way that brands view the consumer. It’s the gospel here at Holland-Mark: this is a new age, consumers are taking control of conversation and demanding that brands, products, and companies listen, take note, and make changes in the way they speak and treat them (us). As a consumer, the shift in engagement tactics and tone is evident. More common than ever are stories like that of Domino’s and Comcast, stories that give huge brands something that’s evaded them for decades: humanity.

On the surface, it seems simple enough: face the truth, admit your faults, and start building real relationships with your market. The complicated underbelly is that these brands didn’t have a choice. The voice of the consumer — the power of the consumer — became too much. Eventually business as usual would be a death sentence. For Domino’s it was a realization that people hated their pizza. Interestingly enough, people had been hating their pizza for years and years, but it wasn’t until social media gave those Domino’s-hating pizza consumers a megaphone that their shitty pizza gave way to the worst-case scenario: the public opinion became the truth. And then people decided they’d just buy Papa John’s.

For Comcast there came a point when size and market share were no match for disgruntled customers who were ready and willing to walk. They were angry, tired of being mistreated, and all too aware of their choice. The alternatives (Dish Network, Verizon) were going to start eating at Comcast’s pie because they were willing to give the customer more than a service, they were willing to add intangible value.

But for every empowering brand experience there is an equal number of disenchanting and disempowering brand experiences. These experiences are made worse by the assumption on the part of the consumer that he/she is empowered, that his/her voice should always matter, that someone is always listening. As a consumer it is exponentially more frustrating to feel powerless in this economy. It seems inevitable that brands, companies, and products who refuse to prove their value cannot and will not subsist. At Holland-Mark we equate this to being imperative to your customer. Getting to and being imperative is about more than providing a good and/or service, but delivering value. And while the extinction of these consumer-opinion-ignorant brands seems inevitable, many of them will choose to die a slow death by refusing to acknowledge the power of the consumer.

In many senses, we’re returning to a simpler time. Before capitalism became about goods for the sake of goods and services for the sake of services, goods and services were valued based on the… value. Monopolies, mega-chains, and monster discount stores distorted the value equation. Brands became entitled and eventually the cost of a good was the cost of the good and did not promise a positive experience. Building brand loyalty didn’t really matter because the game wasn’t about relationships, it was about size and price. That’s changing. It has to. The people have too much power.

Choosing to die a slow death is more than just stupid, it’s shortsighted. Many brands — our clients included — have found that delivering value is more interesting and more gratifying than simply offering a service or product. Being imperative is about building relationships, fostering brand loyalty, and delighting in the satisfaction of your customers. Loyalty translates to brand ambassadors and genuine, word-of-mouth marketing. In place of expensive market research there is good old-fashioned listening, and real-time customer interaction becomes a breeding ground for new product ideas and organic service improvements. The danger of ignoring the customer isn’t just because they’re vocal, it’s because they’re empowered and more often than not they are empowered in ways that can drive business forward. When asked, they are willing to share. When treated with respect, they are willing to share with others. And when convinced of the imperative value of your product, they become a delighted annuity, a rich source of information, insight, and the occasional constructive criticism.

Self-serve(ing): Best of Boston® iPhone App

Anita Tandon — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 17:30:46 +0000

We’ve got a lot of foodies over here at Holland-Mark, which means that every meal decision is a big one. Whether it was the ponderous process of sorting through user reviews or skepticism about the source content, we decided something needed to be done. And thus our first technology innovation was born – the Best of Boston® iPhone app.

Working with our friends at Boston magazine, we developed an iPhone application that allows consumers to search and access content from the magazine’s highly regarded annual Best of Boston® issues. Best of Boston® is the go-to resource for the expert-selected winners in over 70 categories, from suits to sushi.

Through the app, you can access Best of Boston® winners from the last five years, searching by location, keyword, and category. You can even share what you find and save your favorites.

It simply and effectively gets you what you want: the best from the people that know what’s best. Whether you’re a tourist or a local, it’s ideal for navigating Boston.

We developed the app as part of our newly formed Venture Branding practice, spearheaded by partner Mike Troiano. The Venture Branding model has two facets: we have great ideas and take them to market or others have great ideas and we help take them to market.

Our work with Boston magazine on the Best of Boston® iPhone app is an example of the former; our work with Chris Lohring on the creation of Notch Session Ales, an example of the latter. Whichever way it works, we get to play with smart people and create viable brands and businesses. What could be better?

If you want to check out the Best of Boston® iPhone app (just in time for the weekend), click here. And let us know what you think.

The Irrational Truth

Chris Colbert — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 15:33:04 +0000

: Image via Wikipedia

All major decisions in life are made emotionally. It’s a statement once made by Bob Minihan, Holland-Mark’s ECD during the late 90s. And it’s true.

Who you marry, who you hire, the job you take, the house you buy — emotion is the central driver of the decision. For all of our fixation on the rational, the functional, the tangible, at the end of the day it’s feeling that brings people towards our brands, gets them to stay, and prompts them to come back. Now there’s a role for the rational stuff, for the facts, they’re just secondary to the need for visceral engagement. And if you want proof regarding the power of emotion and the supporting role of proof, two different but affirming bits of research.

The first is a University of Michigan study referenced in a recent article by Joe Keohane at the Boston Globe. The research asserts that when people are presented with facts that refute their belief about something, the absolute proof actually makes them believe what they believe more absolutely. Oh my. It turns out that we hate to be wrong more than we value the truth. The emotion of losing is simply anathema and we will override all logic to avoid the feeling. Double oh my. The study and Joe suggest that this Maslow-motivated psychology (neurosis?) also makes us willing to accept bad information, facts we fundamentally know are not true, if they support our beliefs. Makes you realize why people don’t seem to care about the quality of user-generated content as source material and the lack of fact-checking behind it (including this post I suppose…).

The second study referenced a while back in Scientific American reveals that when people meet other people (or brands) for the first time they subconsciously assess two things, in this order: warmth and competence. Feelings first, then facts. In our brand strategy work we extend that construct one step: emotion, facts, emotion. You are attracted by what you feel, you seek facts to confirm those feelings, and then you move forward with those feelings as the overriding context for your relationship/association with the brand.

All of this points to the need/opportunity to position your brand and engage emotionally. Regardless of what you’re marketing and who you’re marketing to, the doorway you want to offer into your brand should be emotionally crafted. Emotion motivates, facts validate.

Think about it. Or don’t.

Posted via email from holland-mark posterous

We Never Grow Up (psychologytoday.com)
Ethical Thinking Should be Rational AND Emotional (psychologytoday.com)
Pleasure: the impossible moment of delight (telegraph.co.uk)
Oh Those Divas and Manipulators (psychologytoday.com)
A Matter of Discomfort Intolerance (psychologytoday.com)

Network Imposition

Chris Colbert — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 13:40:10 +0000

Since the inception of the first primitive forms of email, the appearance of the world wide web, and now the rise of social media, there has been an inference that the ability to reach more people, more often, any time at no cost is nothing but a wonderful thing. We’ve moved to a world where being linked-in and linking, friending and being friended, tweeting and re-tweeting, is viewed as somewhere between a cost of doing business and an essential aspect of a fulfilling life. But like many new forms of societal exchange it comes at a price. This new standard is causing people to forget the unwritten rules of friendship and personal association and in doing so create what I call “network imposition.”

I first experienced network imposition last fall on a crisp November day, my birthday. From the moment I arose to the time I retired I received a multitude of wall-based birthday wishes and direct emails from my 300 Facebook friends. The only problem is that most of these people really aren’t my friends. I have never supped with them. In some cases I have never met them. Or if I did meet them it was thirty years ago and I have no idea who they are today. And they don’t know me. But more importantly if they truly were my friends, wouldn’t they call me on my birthday? Or send me a card? Hell, how about a gift? Is the sending of a generic “happy birthday” to someone you don’t really know because it’s easy to do so a genuine and heartfelt act? To me it seems like an imposition. Now in this case it’s pretty much my fault. After all, I’m the one that said yes to Facebook friendship with these people. So the clear way to clear up the problem is to remind myself of my definition of a friend and to consistently apply it when people try to friend me or I friend others. In this post from Google they discuss how even the moniker of “friends” is not a helpful one and the need for all of us to be more mindful of sharing content at a micro-social-network level.

In more recent months I’ve begun to experience another and perhaps more conflicted network imposition: the email solicitation from someone I know through business to support a personal charity fundraising effort. This is a little awkward. As much as I believe in giving, and giving back, the dynamic at play here puts a bit of undue pressure on the recipient of the ask. If we don’t contribute are we devaluing the business relationship? If we do contribute, how much is enough? Should our company be making the contribution because it really is, in an indirect way, all about business? I’m not asking people to stop soliciting me but to remember the unwritten rules of personal engagement and which network I am really in. In fact if I had my druthers we would all step back and realize that there are various types of networks within our networks with different “rules of engagement.” Friends should be treated as friends. Business relationships are just that. People you don’t really know should not be treated as people you do. And if there’s any doubt about what is right or just, don’t hit enter. Because if you do it will most likely be an imposition.

Posted via email from holland-mark posterous

Helping Start-ups Tell Their Story

Mike Troiano — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 12:58:55 +0000

MassChallenge is a great program to encourage the development of start-ups in Massachusetts, and we’ve been involved with it from the beginning. A couple of weeks ago they asked us to pull together some kind of workshop to help contestants tell their stories more effectively, and we’re going to start the two-week program today.

A start-up is a kind of passionate hypothesis, put forward by true believers with the conviction to work long hours in service to a vision. Entrepreneurship, for me anyway, is the process of corrupting that vision with the external reality… adjusting it to the inevitable successes and failures along the way, sometimes ending up in a place very different from the one you set out for.

Because of this, selling is the most important thing a start-up does. Selling grounds you in reality, shapes your vision, and — in the best case — extends your runway. Unlike marketing, selling adapts in real time. Every sales meeting should end with reflection on what worked and what didn’t in your story, evolving your pitch deck the way a stand-up comedian refines his material.

There’s a turning point in the life of most successful start-ups, though, where the rate of this iteration drops sharply. It’s the point at which you “find the button,” meaning you begin to get confirmation from the market that you are indeed solving a problem the world will pay you to solve.

It’s at that point your marketing needs to grow up. You need the courage to dump the cluttered, clumsy, and uncommitted appeals that have given you the flexibility you needed in the first phase. You need to adopt the clear, compelling, and concise messaging you’ll need to be successful in the next one.

Our One Simple Thing™ offering is all about helping brands achieve this clarity of message. Here’s how I’m going to explain it to the MassChallenge finalists today…

MassChallenge OST Workshop

View more presentations from Michael Troiano.

Speaker’s Note – The OST Workshop Worksheet I’ll be referring to today is available here, I look forward to hearing from those of you taking advantage of our office hours next week.

The Importance of Brand Clarity

Mike Troiano — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 14:45:57 +0000

An actual client talks about the impact of our One Simple Thing™ approach to distilling a brand down to an idea regular human beings can hold in their heads:

The project was delivered by our partner Mark Edwards, with great skill and insight. Bravo, Mark.

Top 100 global brands (theworldison.blogspot.com)
When Should You Use Your Own Language (chrisbrogan.com)
What Chris Brogan and Gary Vaynerchuk Have in Common, and What You Can Learn from it (techipedia.com)
Brandividual: Passionate, Personal, Connected, Generous, Real (conversationagent.com)
Building a Brand vs. Building a Business (theworldison.blogspot.com)

Summer Outing 2010

Mike Troiano — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 00:42:50 +0000

Our annual Summer Outing was last Friday, and a great time was had by all.

It a was a beach party in Truro, MA, and despite the rain that canceled our closing bonfire, we managed to make limoncello from the weather lemon.

A few highlights…

Thanks to those that made it happen, especially Amanda and Jon!

“We make brands imperative.”

Mike Troiano — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 15:46:52 +0000

Work on our new Web site about to begin in earnest, centered on bringing the approach that’s come into focus over the last few months to the Web.

Starts with a clear statement of what we do, thought I’d bounce a draft off you folks and get some feedback. Here’s what we have so far:

Holland-Mark is a marketing services firm focused on making brands “imperative.”

We believe that consumer and business-to-business buying habits have changed permanently in the aftermath of the Great Recession. Where people once bought what was “interesting,” today they buy only what is “imperative;” what they truly feel they need or expect a return on investment from.

While advertising can make products “interesting,” marketing communications alone cannot make a brand “imperative.” Imperative brands have four attributes in common:

Relevance of Offering – A product aligned with the evolving true needs of its target audience.

Clarity of Message – A truthful, relevant, motivating and distinct statement of its core value proposition.

Consistency of Communication – Reinforcement of the above at every point of contact with the brand.

Driving of Engagement – An ongoing, mutually beneficial relationship between the brand and its primary external constituencies.

These requirements correspond with Holland-Mark’s four core offerings:

Sync™ – A management consulting offering which shapes a product or service experience to align more closely with the right market opportunity

One Simple Thing (OST)™ – A brand strategy offering which distills messaging down to a singular thought which is true, relevant, motivating and distinct

Every Point of Content (EPOC)™ – An audit of the 360° experience of a brand to ensure consistent alignment with OST™

Content Hub – A social marketing program which enables client organizations to engage effectively across social media channels.

So what do you think? Do you get that? Would you pay for it?

How To Sell

Mike Troiano — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 00:36:39 +0000

Having a chat with my team tomorrow morning about the most important but under-appreciated skill in business: Selling.

I graduated from Cornell with a degree in advertising, and promptly leveraged my Ivy League credentials into 28 rejection letters from the best agencies in Boston and New York. (I still have them all. Bastards.) My dad convinced me at a truly low point in my life that a marketing guy “who could actually sell something” would be something of a novelty, so I shouldered my pride and took a job selling kitchen knives door-to-door.

I learned more about sales and marketing that summer — knocking on doors and selling knives across kitchen tables — than I ever did in college. When I did land that first gig in New York, a big part of the reason was that very story.

25 years on I’ve graduated to selling things across conference room tables, but little else has changed. Here are the five best pieces of advice I have for people who need to do the same.

1. Invest in Relationships.

Chris always says agency new business leads come from three sources: Breakfasts, Lunches, and Dinners. He’s got a point.

How many new people did you meet this week? How many cards did you collect at the events you attended? How many acquaintances did you check in with, just to say hello? That guy who e-mailed you looking for a job… did you offer to have coffee with him? If not, you should have. When he gets one — and he will — I promise he’ll remember you.

People who sell do all of these things, and the very best do them with genuine altruism and a desire to help others. In the end your ability to surface opportunities is a straight-line function of the number of people who are thinking about you this week, and job one is to make that happen among as large a group as possible, week in and week out.

2. Look for Problems, not Opportunities.

It’s rare to “find” opportunities. Fact is, most opportunities are made, by people who are very good at uncovering problems.

So look for problems. Walk in other people’s shoes. Make their problem yours, and really apply yourself to the problems best suited to your unique talents and experience. It may take some time, but good things will happen. Trust me.

3. Get the First Meeting Right.

The only “sales meeting” you really have is the first meeting. You have five objectives in this meeting, in this order:

Establish warmth – Demonstrate you’re not a dick. To do this, it helps not to be a dick.
Establish competence – The first question on the table in every meeting is “Why should I listen to you?” Bring some content to the dance: a slide or better yet a story that shows you to be someone worthy of attention in your prospect’s busy schedule.
Find and confirm pain – “Pain” is what sales guys call The Problem, as it is perceived by the prospect. Have you asked what the problem is, exactly? Can you restate it, in a way that makes them go, “Yes, exactly!” If not, slide after slide about how great you are wastes everyone’s time.
Gather inputs for buying vision – “Buying Vision” is what sales guys call the mental picture of what your customer wants to buy. This inevitably will be different in small but important ways from what you want to sell. Closing that gap is what sales is all about.
Get a concrete next step – Finally, leave with an action item. I hate when people come back from a pitch meeting and talk about what a “great meeting” it was. What’s the next step, Ziglar? If there’s not a clear one, it was most definitely NOT a great meeting.

4. Close.

I’m not talking about high pressure tactics here, I’m talking about following up to see where things are. Ask for the business. Show in your words and more importantly through the sustained intensity of your interest that you want the gig. If you don’t do that, you don’t want it, and nobody gives their business to someone who’s disinterested in it.

5. Deliver.

Finally, you need to deliver the goods. It’s a small world, and everyone that matters in it is on LinkedIn. Deliver on your promises and do right by people, and one day you’ll turn around and be someone worthy of trust.

And there is no more useful sales tool than that.

That’s all there is to it, folks. Now get out there, and shake it.

Bryant University: The One

Mike Troiano — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 20:26:03 +0000

We created this video to communicate Bryant University’s One Simple Thing™: “The One”

“The One” represents Bryant’s unique commitment to unite the best of both the liberal arts and business education into a single collegiate experience. It’s the essence of what sets them apart, and the basis for a sweeping brand makeover we’ve been happy to play a part in.

Anyway here it is, let us know what you think…