What is permission, anyway?

We are stuck for too long on the official definition of e-marketing permission. Just the fact that someone is not unsubscribing doesn't mean they like receiving our emails and could still be considered as 'warm', let alone 'hot', prospects.

So, whatever email marketing database you have, cut the third of it out. Feel free to think about that third as 'silent unsubscribes', people who simply can't be arsed to go and unsubscribe from your lovingly crafted emails.

That could explain a lot of response figures and could bring the real picture about what is happening with email today closer to the surface. Namely, that it is losing even more of its initial power than we thought.

How to find out who the 'silent unsubscribes' are? Ask them. Do a survey among your subscribers and you will find out, give or take a few percents. Do an in-depth, face-to-face interview and you will find out that even those that told you in the survey they are 'OK' to receive your emails actually don't read them.

Maybe it is time for us to change the definition of permission and to start grading it: 'basic permission' (only a legal minimum), 'active permission' (i.e. people who really read your emails) and 'request-level permission' (people who would actively go and ask you to send them the email again in  case they've missed the last issue). How many of each do you have in your database, do you know? Any strategies to migrate your recipients through the tiers?

I know you have permission to talk to them, but think again. 

Good product - bad interface design

Consumer electronics companies seem not to be able to get their heads around user experience. If the machine is good, the interface sucks, and vice versa. It's intellectual laziness and a missed chance for winning new customers.

I bought a new Panasonic HDD/DVD recorder the other day, a device that is new to the market, an improved model over the old - already coveted - machine and with lots of good reviews. It has everything, including a very decent 1080p upscaling (sorry, I'll explain another time). I was happy. Until I've accessed it's menu.

It is mild to say that it is drab. It's a total and utter letdown. It looks like something designed on Spectrum, to be used on early Teletext. It is such a dissapointment to my eye accustomed to slick interface designs of the type that TomToms, or modern PC operating software have. Even my Sony TV has a very decent one. But not Pana. Uh-huh.

It's a shame. Apart from manuals (the most neglected marketing form of the modern era), user interfaces of consumer electronic devices are the place (and the time) to excel in branding of the type that a good website would provide. In other words: information architecture + interface design + usability. It is often a starting point for using the device, a difference between great and lousy customer experience.

To develop a decent set of menus today shouldn't (and it doesn't) cost the Earth. It just requires marketing thinking instead of leaving this to techies. In the same way that most successful websites of today are run by marketing guys, not the labcoats. Even where labcoats are still running the show (e.g. Google), they are ex-labcoats-turned-marketing-men.

The modern consumer electronic devices are so complex today that using them is simply more than just a product exercise. It is a service proposition as well and that proposition is most obvious in manuals and device menus. DVD players (in all variants), set-top boxes, mobile phones, cameras and sat-nav systems - even TVs - are essentially computers, are becoming even more so every day and there is no reason whatsoever why they shouldn't be treated as ones. Which means logical, intuitive, well-named and explained menu options, all wrapped up in good and inspiring design.

Do it well, and advocacy follows (provided that the product is good, of course). Do it badly, and it's an opportunity for a dissapointed moan. It could be that tiny difference between a successful and the less successful product.

It's something that so many companies still don't get, and that Apple understands so well.

Is meta-data the last planning application in digital?

An important distinction for un-initiated: this is not about meta-tags and search engine optimisation. It is about marking (oh, well, tagging, then...) content on the site (and its accompanying search and browse functionalities) so it makes sense to visitors. Working recently on re-launching a big entertainment site made me realise that this is a planning job, actually, but not the one that is obvious to many. Read on...

How to describe meta-data? Here's an example: you go to a site such as Play.com and would like to buy a DVD for a rainy night in (or music to listen to when you drive, or ... you get the idea). But, you can't search by those criteria. You can search by genre, artist's (or director's) name, title or price. But, no moods. Or precious moments.

This is due to the way how product items were 'described' when they were inputed into the system. This 'description' of the category(ies) the product will belong to is known as 'meta-data'. More often than not, it is the realm of the IT department and deemed as only one technical phase in the cataloguing process. It is also more likely than not to be controlled by the wholesaler (who is supplying the actuall retail site with goods). Maybe even based in Jersey, for tax reasons.

The beauty of well-done meta-data is that it is so intuitive and human. It goes down particularly well with so called 'hunter' and 'explorer' audiences, people who are coming to the site with not a specific product in mind (e.g. title), but with a need that is defined by a specific ocassion or a broader category (for 'hunters'), or who are just browsing (such as 'explorers').

However, to be able to 'meta-data' correctly, one needs to know the audiences and their needs - as well as ocassions - quite well. And it's a planning job. So, one quite unexpected consequence of this wonderful, but significantly underused tool, is that planners now have a chance to extend the definion of digital planning. To reframe the current IT mindset surrounding meta-data into something resembling what traditional planners have been doing so well for so long: cleaning windows between brands and their audiences, so they can see each other much better. Or, to extend the metaphor further, turning windows into mirrors, so that the brand reflection matches that of a customer.

Imagine the briefs to creatives: find the best meta-dating (another silly digital marketing verb?) for the 'assisted browsing' structure for the given site and given audiences. A campaign unto itself, with a possibility to be turned into a differentiating tool. That can even be patented in the States!

Looking forward to finding more music for trainspotting on various sites in the near future...

Engagement is about attitude - not the channel

That is why everyone whose ears are fine-tuned to the hum of engagement will have the right to claim digital as their rightful place to be in the new - ultimate? - landgrab that is currently sweeping across our cozy industry.

In the environment of the attention deficit syndrome, 'quantum' media channel counts, media-agnostic customers and de-owning of content,  anybody who understands how to hook customers through various channels will win. Easier said, than done. Well, here's an idea: forget about channels as the place to start. Start with an attitude. Or, better, manage to put engagement at the heart of your new attitude towards creating marcomms. If you crack attitude - which, for many agencies, is difficult in itself - the channels to use become obvious, as well as what to do and say in them.

It's about attitude first, strategy second and technology last.