One more time…can marketing be a conversation?
Joseph Jaffe delivered the Society for New Communications Research keynote speech last night. During his presentation he was making the case that marketing can be conversational.
As I have written before, I do not believe that marketing can be conversations. First off, and as David Weinberger suggested in an interview I did with him last year, I do not trust marketers to carry conversations without screwing it up for the rest of us.
I also do not think that all aspects of marketing can be or should be conversational. Think about new product innovation as an example. Sure, you will benefit from getting ideas and feedback from your user base and especially you prospecting base, but at some point the marketing product manager needs to act as a benevolent dictator and make decisions on what goes into the next generation product – and that may include features that did not pass the user popularity filter, or features that may not even come from the user base at all. The same is true for pricing – where coming to a price based on user feedback may in fact mean leaving a ton of money on the table.
Markets are conversations – marketing is not…
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April 23rd, 2008 at 7:34 pm
My heart agrees with you. Fundamentally I think that marketing is inherently the act of someone screaming every more loudly at someone until he/she buys their product. But then I think of the millenials who really do have conversations about brands, and realize I might just be getting a bit old fashioned in my thinking.
April 23rd, 2008 at 7:45 pm
Well, Francois, the market will reward those marketers who ARE adept at the kinds of interactive engagements that the market experiences as authentically conversational. Some will fail dismally, as you suggest. Others will quickly learn the new melody and begin composing unique lyrics. I’m looking forward to having conversations with the smart experimenters.
April 23rd, 2008 at 7:53 pm
Tom – I agree that some will succeed, but I am afraid that the majority of them who will do it wrong will pollute the waters for the rest of us.
Katie – I agree that conversations about brands do happen. I also think that most marketers are mistakingly thinking of those as brand-driven conversation, when in reality they are user-centric conversations in the context of a brand. But what this says is that markets are conversations, not that marketing is or can be. Maybe I am off in my thinking…
Thanks for taking the time to comment on my blog.
April 23rd, 2008 at 10:23 pm
[...] Emergence Marketing posted a thought about how marketing is not a conversation. [...]
April 24th, 2008 at 1:53 am
Sorry, I cannot agree with you on this one.
One online example that comes to mind is a case study I did with Microsoft a few years ago. Microsoft was going to discontinue support for a version of some software. The company blogged the dropping of the support because Microsoft could not provide the support and make a profit. Customer’s reacted by saying, hey we want the support and we will pay extra. Microsoft said, okay, kept the support, making the customers happy, and Microsoft profitable on the support. That’s a conversation to me.
April 24th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
Francois, why did you not raise this pov in the Q&A or afterwards when we spoke?
We should continue this discussion another time when I can help you see the error of your ways.
Until then I’m off to bed in Copenhagen.
April 24th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
Hi John – thanks for commenting on my blog. Markets are conversations – there is no question about that. You gave a good example of a company listening and responding to the conversation.
What I am trying to say is different. Marketing departments in most companies will continue to be measured on traditional metrics – awareness creation, PR, lead generation, sales, etc. What I am saying is that in order to achieve those goals in a conversational style, most will screw it up and develop real bad habits. Look at communities like the P&G Vocalpoint community. Is P&G engaging in conversational marketing or are they recruiting shills that are commercializing (and thus potentially destroying) personal relationships?
April 24th, 2008 at 6:42 pm
Hi Joe – I should have brought it up as it would have made for a good discussion. I twittered about it a little and then felt like I wanted to think this through myself before making a statement. But as I digested the whole thing in the next 24 hours I came down to the same conclusion I did 6 or so months ago and decided to write about it.
I would love to continue the conversation when you are back. It was good seeing you again in person!
April 25th, 2008 at 3:47 am
you do have a great point there. I often think it is a matter of confusion about goals and strategy. We all know the end goals are sales, but that does not mean you have to use a sales strategy to get there. Rather a marketing strategy can be used. That’s what great about social media, by listening, you understand what customers want and need, and can choose to provide a better product if it is profitable, but through listening customers evangelize your company and so you achieve higher sales. I know this happened with Macromedia’s blogging efforts from my 2005 case study.
April 28th, 2008 at 11:45 pm
Francois,
I appreciate you commenting on my response to your post. Also appreciate your insight. What I love most is that we in fact created a conversation… Great stuff.
April 28th, 2008 at 11:45 pm
Francois,
I appreciate you commenting on my response to your post. Also appreciate your insight. What I love most is that we in fact created a conversation… Great stuff.