Marketing Archives

Pay for Performance – Good Idea, or Not…

I just read a piece in The Economist about a movement to pay advertising agencies for value, not hours, and how this trend is catching on. Currently, the American Association of Advertising Agencies estimates that about 10 percent of compensation agreements are value-based, according to this article. (Not sure that figure supports the suggestion that this is a trend that is “taking off”…)

Anyway, my initial reaction in reading this was: “Well, why not? Why should agencies just be paid for being “creative,” and racking up what can be enormous fees? Continue reading “Pay for Performance – Good Idea, or Not…”

Think Carefully About Suboptimizing Your Brand!

One of the keys to establishing a strong and meaningful brand is consistency. A surefire way to become inconsistent is by “suboptimizing” your brand by focusing on the parts, rather than the whole. Or, in other words, by having a tough time deciding “who you want to be.” Continue reading “Think Carefully About Suboptimizing Your Brand!”

Your Best Customers Are Your Best Customers

We’ve all heard it before, but somehow in our ongoing quest to add *new* customers, we have a tendency to forgot to focus attention on the ones we already have.

Datran Media, an e-mail services company, recently asked marketers to rank what advertising goals they considered most important for 2009. The results were: Continue reading “Your Best Customers Are Your Best Customers”

When Awareness and Preference is Not Enough.

Not many people remember a product called Zima and that’s the point of this post. As a marketing professional I’ve always been interested in new product introductions and advertising campaigns in general – how well do they work? how long do they “run” (suggesting that the positive effects are continuing to produce results or, if nothing else, that the agency and client haven’t “pulled the plug” prematurely). Continue reading “When Awareness and Preference is Not Enough.”