The consumer left turn will make or break a marketing campaign. People are online going about their business. They don’t intend to engage with marketing. They may be checking sports scores,reading email,or updating their facebook status. En route to these actions we try to intercept them,engage them,and provoke a left turn in their day – redirecting them from their original intent.
The consumer left turn is difficult to execute. It is about integration not interruption. Historically,advertisers have used interruption to get consumer attention. Television commercials are an example of how marketers have interrupted entertainment to sell their wares. The commercial is a temporal interruption controlling the entire screen for 30-seconds. It is not desired by the consumer,and has been an effective method until late. Now the DVR allows consmers an option to time warp passed the intrusion.
The art of the left turn is about integration. The left turn is about targeting,synergy,and value. For decades advertisers got away with spamming consumers. With commercials it was TRP tonnage. With banners it is about millions upon millions of impressions. The advertiser hedged that if exposure was high enough,there was no way people can ignore their message. And there is truth to this concept. To this day I can visualize those banner ads with the dancing silhouettes of people. There were annoying,yet visually memorable —however,I am pressed to tell you who the advertiser was. This is were frequency theory falls apart: effectiveness it is not about exposure,rather it is about consumer acceptance. If a person does not accept the message,it will not resonate (even though there may be a hula dancer silhouette etched deep in the recesses of their cognitive matter).
Forget the tonnage —think about targeting. Of course,this is not a new concept. As marketers we know how to target our messages,and yet many times we are unsuccessful. Many times we target sites based on where our consumer target indexes high. However,we do not tailor the message or experience to individual sites. We may generate exposure with the core target,but the results fail to follow.
This is why synergy and targeting need to go hand in hand. Synergy is contextual nature in which the experience fits within the consumers path. Synergy can be draped in the contextual nature of a site or program. For example,many advertisers effectively use the Weather Channel site to market their message. One of my favorites is from the marekter of Off!. The marketer amped up their message when mosquitoes activity was high in the local area. Many allergy medicines use a similar approach.
I realize the Weather Channel example is obvious,and I don’t pretend that generating synergy is easy. So lets discuss something a little more difficult to execute. The current marketing activity en vogue is to do something on facebook. Most marketers are using interruption tactics. Very few gracefully integrate into a person’s facebook experience,because it is difficult to come up with a synergistic brand idea that fits into facebook experience. The reason for the lack of synergy is that it takes time to generate consumer insights where a brand can be relevant. It is much easier to create and ad or widget and interrupt their facebook experience,hoping for success. However,as Scott Paul once told me,“Hope is not a strategy.”
Finally there has to be more than just synergy. For example,on a football site any marekter can take their product banner and add a football with some goal posts (maybe even a little game where you kick the ball through the posts). Cosmetically it may fit better in the context of the page,but the reality is it will not provoke a left turn. This is where the message,the experience must contain relevant,strong consumer value propositions to initiate a left turn. The stronger the value propositions,the more likely the consumer will take left turn (btw: The core value propositions are Knowledge,Save Money,Convenience,Social Network,Award,Entertainment).
Think about this concept from a consumer perspective. When was the last time you clicked on a banner (non-work related)? If you don’t want to take a left turn in your day, how can you expect your target consumers to deviate from their day?
On a final note,I am always on the hunt for “Left Turn”campaigns. If you come across one please email me at LeftTurnIdeas@ericbowe.com.
