DUKKY

by Scott Couvillon | June 12, 2009

Hey marketers,

Nervous about losing your job? It’s understandable considering that 2008 saw significant albeit undisclosed layoffs and 2009 labor projections are especially unkind to the marketing category. A few words of wisdom:

1.) The worst thing you can do is hide out in your office and update your resume.

2.) Set it and forget it media planning and slightly modified legacy programs are suicidal for your career in this climate.

3.) The best path to a positive performance review is to start thinking creatively about channels that increase ROI.

Where should you experiment? We’ve all seen the headlines: the trend in marketing spend is towards online investments. But just going online is not the answer. In fact, the online world can be a treacherous place for marketers. It’s a transactional space where a user’s attention span is tantamount to that of a throat clearing. And branding? Out of the question. With notable exceptions — video content, viral micro-sites, social networks – users are not looking for retail-tainment as much as where to get their tire fixed or the same TV or blouse, cheaper and faster.

If you’ve read farther than just the headlines you know the trend is about more than buzzwords like “online” and “social.” It’s the measurability, accountability and economics of the channel that are so attractive.

So don’t freak out if you’re not an online media expert. You’re not out of a job if you don’t have a Twitter account and only have five friends on Facebook. Measurability and accountability are old-school terms. You’ve heard them before, you’ve understood them for years, they exist in offline mediums too. You don’t have to be replaced by a 23 year-old social media expert.

But you do have to understand how new online technologies can complement your offline strategies. At Dukky we call the strategies that allow companies to interact with consumers online and offline  “channel bridges.”

For example, Duky just launched a platform that allows marketers to put offline currency in the form of personalized gift cards directly into the hands of individuals in exchange for online feedback. Contact begins in direct mail, mobile, e-mail or social networks and moves interested recipients to our online dashboard to do what it does best: track and measure their interest.

We are not the only ones using this approach. Though traditional understanding has for too long had smart people saying dumb things like people don’t go from print to online, web to store or direct mail to an activation center, hundreds of recent studies verify that humans are still human — equal parts freewill and unpredictability. Provide them something of value (a coupon), give them an easy way (online) to provide feedback from “my kids don’t like your cereal” to “I love SKU 765FGH” (okay maybe not that far) and you will come away with two things, revenue AND a better understanding of individuals who desire a relationship with your brand.

And perhaps a third thing. A job.

Love,
Dukky

Image Source: Flickr