Caring about customers - at home

Yesterday I used my brand-new Kitchenaid electric hand mixer for the first time (baking banana bread - yum!). Inside the instruction manual (yes, I admit that I actually flipped through the instruction manual), Kitchenaid had printed a dozen recipes that involved the use of my mixer - some cream cheese spreads, whipped toppings, coffee cakes, and other desserts.

Now, it's not uncommon for purveyors of foodstuffs to print recipes on the outside of their food packages, for obvious reason: a consumer is more like to purchase a food item if they have a delicious-sounding recipe for which that item is an ingredient.

But why would Kitchenaid bother to print useful recipes in the instruction manual inside the box of a kitchen appliance? In a location where the recipes would only be discovered after the consumer purchased the appliance and took it home?

Could it be that Kitchenaid wants consumers to have a good experience actually using their product? That the company wants their product to be useful to the consumer, not just a wasted expense that sits in a cupboard? That they care about the Kitchenaid brand experience - not only before the purchase, but after?

Sometimes we marketers get so focused on acquiring new customers that we forget to take care of the customers we already have. We spend our time making a product look useful enough for customers to buy, and forget to make it useful enough to use. We work to improve the in-store or online experience, and forget to improve the at-home experience.

As marketers, we ought to spend 80% of our time improving our product - making it more useful and more enjoyable for the customer - and 20% of our time improving the way we communicate about that great product. Sometimes we get this backwards.

It looks like Kitchenaid is getting it right.

Mascots, the Olympics, and Audiences

Yesterday the world was introduced to Wenlock and Mandeville, the mascots for the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Games.

The two were fashioned from drops of molten steel that spilled during the pouring of the last beam for the London Olympic stadium. They magically sprung to life, began to learn the Olympic and Paralympic events, and now roam throughout the world on a rainbow, teaching children about the games.

Or, at least, that's the story that is shown in this short film about the shiny, jiggly creatures.

In reality, the two friends are creations of London agency Iris. The one-eyed, bipedal, androgynous creatures were chosen as non-human, non-animal beings that would appeal to children, and whose "skin" could be changed to reflect different nations, events, etc. The orange light atop the head of each represents the lights standard on London taxicabs; while the single eye can be used as a camera to facilitate social, video, and interactive marketing.

The names point to the contributions that the U.K. has made to the modern Olympic Games: Much Wenlock in Shropshire held games that inspired Baron Pierre de Coubertin to found the modern Olympic movement in the 19th century; Stoke Mandeville in Buckinghamshire was the location of the first "parallel Olympics" in 1948 for World War II soldiers with spinal injuries.

Within a day of their introduction, the London 2012 Wenlock and Mandeville are quite active in public interaction - each is on Facebook (I am Wenlock and I am Mandeville) and Twitter (@iamwenlock and @iammandeville), and, of course, they have their own website. And together they are visiting schools to encourage children to live active lifestyles.

Photo from the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (LOCOG)

Also within the past 36 hours, the duo have received much flak (disdain, scorn, disbelief, derision, contempt) from online audiences. One journalist compared them to a cross between Sonic the Hedgehog and Mike Wazowski; one design critic called them "computerised Smurfs for the iPhone generation."

The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (LOCOG), on the other hand, hopes that the mascots will "chime with children," "connect young people with sport and tell the story of our proud Olympic and Paralympic history," and "help inspire kids to strive to be the best they can be."

It would seem that many adults (or at least, many vocal, online adults) fail to see the attractiveness of creatures. We've yet to hear the voice of the children on the matter.

If the main audience for Wenlock and Mandeville is adults, LOCOG may have missed their target. If their main audience is indeed children, they may have hope yet.

Note to marketers: create for your audience.

Just Plain Fun

I love this idea.

Gatorade and Fox Sports are teaming up to give unsettled high school rivalries a chance to settle the score - a decade after they originally played.

In Replay: The Series, old high school rivals are nominated to play again in re-matches organized by Gatorade and Fox Sports. The two companies provide training, coaches, a venue, and the opportunity to bring closure to old competition.

The first season of Replay: The Series featured the 1993 football teams from Easton (PA) Area High School and Phillipsburg (NJ) High School. The 1993 Thanksgiving Day game between these two long-time rivals ended in a disappointing tie. On April 26, 2009, these same players - now 33-year-olds, not 18-year-olds - suited up one final time to determine a winner once and for all.

Gatorade provided eight weeks of intensive training for the teams (as well as sports drinks for the game, of course); while Peyton and Eli Manning served as honorary coaches for the big game.

The second season of Replay: The Series culminated in a hockey match last Sunday, May 9, 2010, between the 1999 teams of Central Catholic High School and Trenton High School, both from Detroit. The original 1999 game ended in a draw after a player's jugular vein was sliced open by a skate. Eleven years later, that player inspired Gatorade and Fox Sports to reunite the teams for a final match-up.

I love Replay: The Series simply because it's fun.

It's fun to hear the stories of the original fateful (or non-fateful, however you want to look at them) games.

It's fun to see the passion and anticipation of these former high school athletes and their hometown fans.

It's fun to see grown men get back into shape for a shot at redemption.

It's fun to read player bios, follow the training, and watch the final outcomes of the games on the Replay website.

And it's fun to nominate one's own high school team for a Replay via the Replay Lineup Finder on Facebook.

If you want to build love of your brand, connect better to your audience, and strengthen brand awareness, why not do it with something that's just plain fun for people to participate in and to watch? Create a fun and worthwhile experience; people will remember you for it.

Can Social Save Chevrolet?

Several months ago, shortly after it was announced that GM would be selling Pontiac, my friend Savannah asked me to write about marketing strategies that GM could use in order to maintain market share after the divestiture.

Shamefully, I neglected to write such a blog post at that time.

However, many months later, General Motors (or Chevrolet, anyway) is making some marketing moves that give me some hope for the company: Chevy is one of the sponsors for the South by Southwest (SXSW) Festival in Austin, Texas, March 12-21, 2010.

SXSW is an annual pilgrimage for many in the music, film, and interactive media industries. The conference showcases the top talent and thought-leaders from each of these industries (the music side alone features nearly 2,000 musical acts), not to mention that it aggregates nearly 200,000 creative, innovative, artistic, tech-savvy, and entrepreneurial attendees into one city.

Chevrolet is using SXSW as an opportunity to test some new interactive and social media marketing initiatives:

• Gowalla couponing - When smartphone users check in via Gowalla at any of several locations in Austin during the conference, they will receive text messages with free offers from Chevrolet and SXSW. One such offer: a ride from the airport to downtown in (what else?) a new Chevrolet.


• QR & iReveal augmented reality - Chevy will be placing Quick Response (QR) codes on its vehicles that are on display at SXSW. When visitors photograph a QR code using their smartphones, a microsite opens that provides more information about the vehicle. Plus, a mobile application called Chevy iReveal allows users to view 3-D models of several Chevy vehicles.


• "Chevrolet Volt Recharge Lounge" - Chevy provides a "charging station" for SXSW attendees near the northwest entrance to the Austin Convention Center. At the Lounge, visitors can recharge their electronic devices, grab a drink, receive a massage, and check out the 2011 Chevy Volt.


• "Catch a Chevy" - SXSW visitors can ride through the city of Austin in style, by hopping a ride on complimentary shuttles between several SXSW locations - in one of 14 Chevy vehicles, of course.


• "See the USA in a Chevrolet: A SXSW Road Trip" - teams from eight U.S. cities participate in an "Amazing Race"-style road-trip/scavenger-hunt to get to SXSW. Along the way, each team must complete 50 different "challenges" (all submitted by Chevy Twitter followers and Facebook fans). The winning team will be the one that completes the most challenges and interacts the most with their Twitter and other web communities.

Chevrolet seems to be putting forth a good effort to provide a fun experience for SXSW attendees and online participants. And, as Christopher Barger (GM's director of global communications and technology) was quoted in MediaPost's Marketing Daily, Chevy also hopes to use this opportunity to learn from the brilliant and connected visitors to the conference.

Of course, successfully [re-]building a brand requires more than an outstanding social media effort. The promotion that Chevrolet is doing at SXSW is just part of one of the "4P's" of marketing. The others - product, price, place - are just as important for creating what Barger calls "a better experience" for customers. Chevy needs to invest just as much - if not more - time in creating remarkable vehicles for their customers, as they do in creating a fun interactive marketing campaign.

Brands do not live by social media alone. But if Chevy can put the same amount of effort, service, and ingenuity into its products as it does into this promotion, I have reason to believe that this brand, indeed, will live.

Empty Restaurants and Dying Malls

Recently, some friends and I decided to have dinner together at an Italian restaurant in our town. This particular restaurant was a local favorite; however, I had never eaten there before, and my friends had not eaten there since it moved to its current location one year previous. So all of us were quite excited about our dinner plans.

Until we got to the restaurant.

We walked into the restaurant shortly after 6:00 on a Thursday evening; the place was empty. As is, zero customers. None. Zilch. The lights were on, the tables were set, the servers and chefs were there and ready to go. But my two friends and I were the only non-employees in the place.

That seemed rather odd, since it was already an hour into dinnertime, on a not-quite-weekend night. And at a well-known local restaurant. There was no explanation for it - the room had not been reserved for a large party. It was simply a regular evening. With no customers.

After consulting for a moment or two, my friends and I bade a polite goodbye to the hostess and decided to patronize another restaurant for the evening.

Why? Why did we decide to leave?

Robert Cialdini would explain it as a principle that he calls "social proof."

Social proof is the idea that we as human beings - and especially as consumers - infer truths about a situation based upon how others act in that situation.

You attend a get-together at the home of some new acquaintances, and notice that all of the other guests have removed their shoes as they entered the front door; you presume that removing shoes is the policy in this house, and so you remove yours, too.

You walk down the street and notice numbers of people gathering at one particular location and staring up into the sky. You assume there must be something unusual to see in the sky, so you stop and look up, too.

Social proof tends to be especially strong in unfamiliar situations in which the proper behavior is unknown. When we are not sure how to act, we take our cues from the actions of people around us.

In the case of my friends and me at the restaurant, we took our cues from the absence of people around us. We thought it unusual to find a restaurant empty at 6pm on a Thursday; and while we didn't know of anything specifically wrong with the restaurant, we presumed that there must be some reason for customers to be staying away. For lack of better answers, we felt it safer to stay away as well.

Social proof can be a powerful force, for good or ill. If you are a new business, and you give free t-shirts and hats to your all of your customers for the first six months, others who begin to see your logo everywhere will likely infer that you must be a good brand (everyone is going there, after all), and be prompted to investigate and learn more about your company. If you have an excellent product or service and all of your customers continually rave about your brand to their friends, those friends will likely try your product the next time they have a need which your product might solve.

Conversely, if you are a restaurant with zero customers in the middle of a given night, then those potential customers who arrive may likely decide to leave. If you are a shopping mall with 20% of your storefronts empty, then mall shoppers (and potential tenants) may likely infer that something about the mall prevents it from attracting enough customers to make the retailers profitable, and may likely stay away themselves.

How can your organization noticeably provide excellent experiences to all of your customers, such that others will be positively affected by their social proof?

Coca-Cola: Sharing a Little Happiness

Coca-Cola recently made a few little tweaks to one of their vending machines:



Okay, so maybe they made more than a few tweaks.

But what has Coca-Cola really done here?

For the cost of a few "extras" and some apparent manpower, and with the element of surprise, they have brought laughter and happiness to potentially thousands of college students. Plus, they continue to bring joy to tens of thousands of other people, as those same college students share the story with their friends, and as viewers watch the video online. (On YouTube, the video already had 81,924 views on Thursday, January 14, 2010 at 8:55 AM Central Time. The video was posted on January 12, 2010.)

Do you want your brand to be known as a brand that brings joy to people? What can you do to brighten their lives?

Selling Products? or Experiences?

Are you in the business of selling a product, or selling an experience?

Let's take cupcakes as an example. A company could see themselves as a seller of cupcakes. They could choose which flavor(s) to sell - vanilla, chocolate, or a combination of flavors and icings and decorations. They could choose a price for their cupcakes. They could choose their delivery method - in a storefront, to grocery stores, or as an online retailer? As individual cupcakes, or packaged together? Then they could choose to promote their brand: "we sell cupcakes."

Or, a company could approach their cupcake business like Cupdates does.

Cupdates is "a cupcake delivery and catering business, serving the Hampton Roads [Virginia] area," according to the Cupdates Facebook fan page. But they aren't in the business of selling cupcakes. They are in the business of selling cupdates - "sweet and memorable experience[s] that [are] created when two or more people gather together to share in the delight of eating a beautiful and delicious gourmet cupcake." (again, from their Facebook fan page and their website.)

What is the difference?

Most cupcake purveyors think that they are selling cupcakes to customers who want cupcakes.

But most customers don't want to eat cupcakes just any old time, and most customers don't want to eat cupcakes alone.

They want cupcakes as a treat - as part of a joyous occasion. Cupcakes are most delightful when they are shared with friends and family in celebration of a birthday, or holiday, or party, or event.

And so, Cupdates doesn't sell cupcakes. They sell something more compelling and valuable for customers - they sell the experience of enjoying, with friends, the delightful creativity and wonderful deliciousness of a gourmet cupcake.

It is as the saying goes, "a person doesn't want a drill; he wants a hole."

When a company shifts perspective from selling drills to selling holes - or from selling cupcakes to selling sweet experiences - it becomes more able to solve the customer's real need, and enjoys more flexibility in the way it meets that need. The company also takes on another level of responsibility. When you sell experiences, you are no longer responsible for just the product. You are responsible for the delivery, the customer service, the life of product. You are answerable for the solution to the customer's problem, not just for a product you provide.

What might have happened to American railroad companies if they had seen themselves as in the business of transporting people, rather than the business of running trains?

What will happen to Cupdates as they see themselves as selling "sweet and memorable experiences," rather than selling cupcakes?

And what would happen to your organization if you begin to see yourselves as providing experiences, rather than providing products?

Innovative Boost to Tourism

Need to boost tourism in your corner of the world?

Try this: Pick the most distinctive thing about your location. Hire somebody to take, essentially, a six-month vacation in that place, doing all of those fun, distinctive activities, and blogging about it for six months. Don't search for this fortunate fellow in just your local area. Instead, place classified ads in newspapers around the globe, inviting anyone to apply for the Best Job in the World. Require them to submit their applications via online video. Invite the top applicants to fly to your site for interviews. Pick the best one and set him to work.

And get $98 million (USD) of publicity for your location in the process.

That's what the tourism board of Queensland, Australia did with their "Best Job in the World" campaign this year. In January 2009, they announced their position with classified ads stating this:

The Best Job in the World

Position Vacant: Island Caretaker
Location: Islands of the Great Barrier Reef, Queensland, Australia
Salary: AUD$150,000 six-month contract
Responsibilities: Clean the pool, Feed the fish, Collect the mail, Explore and report back
Applications close: 22 February 2009 Interviews: 4 May 2009 Announcement made: 8 May 2009
Work begins: 1 July 2009

Anyone can apply.
www.islandreefjob.com


The website received over 34,000 applicants. 15 finalists spent four days together on Hamilton Island in the Great Barrier Reef, taking tests in snorkeling, swimming, eating island barbecue, and blogging. The winner, Ben Southall, 34, a charity worker from Petersfield, UK, began work 2 July 2009.

Since the job began, Ben has been staying in a multi-million-dollar three-bedroom beach villa with pool, exploring the island, snorkeling the reef, posting photos, videos, and blogs, and earning AUD$150,000 (USD$134,000) in the process.

With 34,000 applicants alone (not to mention other visitors to the site and followers of Ben's blog) and estimated USD$98 million in free publicity from news media around the world, I would imagine that Tourism Queensland will be doing pretty well for quite a while.

To see a video recap of the campaign, visit http://adage.com/u/lvfdVaM.

Exceptional Customer Service Strikes Again

The story you are about to read is true.

Some of my marketing consulting work recently required me to have some informational booklets professionally printed. I sent the booklet to the printer in two batches - in the first batch, I ordered only one copy, so that I could show it to my client for approval before running the rest of the copies. After I got my client's opinion and made a few changes, I ordered a larger batch of the booklet.

For the first batch, I used a local printing company - let's call it Company A. I had never before worked with Company A, but I had heard of them and was willing to give them a try. Company A was professional, and turned out a great-quality product to me within my four-day deadline. I felt badly that my four-day deadline was a bit short, but I was under a time crunch myself, and was relieved that Company A was able to print my project, with great quality, on time.

Sometime after this first booklet came back from the printer, a friend of mine recommended that I try another printer in town, with whom he had had excellent previous experience. He suggested that I investigate whether this second printer - Company B, let's say - could print my booklet at a lower price than Company A.

I showed my first booklet to Company B, and, sure enough, their price quote per copy was 14% lower than I had paid for the booklet from Company A. Eager to try to save money without sacrificing quality, I placed the order for the second batch of booklets with Company B.

When I placed my order with Company B, my deadline was, unfortunately, even shorter than that for Company A - three business days, rather than four. With Company A, the graphics I sent were able to be printed without any manipulation. With Company B, their designer had to fix a few things for me. Company B then had to show me a proof. I then made one more change. Company B printed another proof. I then gave the okay, and Company B printed five times as many copies as Company A.

My order from Company B was ready for pick-up the very day after I had placed the order.

Company B delivered my project three days earlier, for 14% less per copy, and with more work on the part of the vendor, than Company A.

Guess which vendor will have all of my printing business from now on?

Had the lower price been the only benefit that Company B provided to me, I would have been equally satisfied with both Company A and B. Company A gave me a great product and met my professional expectations; they were satisfactory. Company A was simply a bit more expensive on this project - no hard feelings. On my next print job, I might have gotten bids from both Company A and Company B, and simply selected the less expensive vendor once again.

However, my experience with Company B was so exceptional compared to my completely satisfactory experience with Company A, that it left me with an unequivocal loyalty to one vendor over the other.

Is your organization like Company A? Do you provide a great product? Are you professional? Do you meet your customers' expectations? Do you satisfy your customers?

If so, beware that a Company B doesn't come along and start providing, not only a great product, but an outstanding product. Not only meeting, but exceeding your customers' expectations. Not only being professional, but being servants. Not only satisfying your customers, but delighting your customers.

If your organization currently looks like Company A, I would recommend doing everything in your power to become Company B - quickly.

Volkswagen and the Theory of Fun

I feel slightly behind the times. Within the past five days, I have received links to this video series from three different people. When I did a Google search for the series, the first results page was full of blog references to the initiative. As much as I dislike following the crowd and talking about the same thing as everyone else, I must say something about this.

It is spectacular.

It is called the "Theory of Fun," and it is a new initiative by Volkswagen to persuade people to act responsibly.

The idea is that adding fun to a specific action will cause people to participate in that action - perhaps even changing their behavior over the long-term. This video shows how Volkswagen induced subway travelers in Stockholm, Sweden to take the stairs rather than the escalator, by turning the staircase into a working piano:



Climbing stairs is not the only thing that Volkwagen has made more fun. To see how Volkswagen put some fun into both recycling and throwing trash into the trash can, visit www.thefuntheory.com.

Volkswagen is also encouraging consumers to generate their own ideas for how to change behavior for the better by making things fun. People can submit their own videos from now through November 15 for the chance of winning 2,500 Euros.

Isn't it a brilliant idea? Changing behavior by making things fun? Of course, over the long-term, people should choose to do the right thing (i.e. exercise, recycle, refuse to litter) simply because it is the right thing to do. But why not use fun to start people on the path of building those good habits? It is like the scene in Mary Poppins in which Mary convinces the children to tidy up the nursery by turning it into a game. "Just a spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down," Mary would say.

So why is Volkswagen doing all this? First off, getting masses of people to start taking care of the environment is a wonderful, rewarding, and wise thing to do. A clean planet is good for everyone. Secondly, engaging in social responsibility and creating free fun for people builds goodwill toward the Volkswagen brand. And third, if people start being more environmentally conscious, perhaps they will become more interested in purchasing environmentally responsible cars.

Do you have a cause that fits with your brand, like environmental responsibility fits with VW? If not, get one. Explore the basic need being filled by your products and services. Find out what your people are passionate about. Discover the root principle behind your mission statement. And make that your cause. Your company should not just add more "stuff" to the world; your company should make the world a better place.

Once you have a cause that fits with your brand, see if you can make it fun for people to participate. Walmart could encourage kids to "save money. live better" by giving them free musical piggy banks. Schoolteachers could make studying fun by creating educational games for their students. Hospitals and restaurants could encourage people to wash their hands by installing synchronized, dancing, multi-colored lights over the sinks in the restrooms. Your human resources department could encourage employees to turn in their paperwork by singing every time someone places their papers into the inbox.

Find your cause, and make it fun for people to join in. You'll be helping society, helping your customers, and helping your brand, too.

Go Forth on a Levi's Scavenger Hunt

Yesterday Levi Strauss & Company launched a venue for destiny-seekers to heed the brand's call to "Go Forth."

The venue is the new Levi's scavenger hunt game, Go Forth, which leads players on a search for $100,000 in buried treasure belonging to the late Grayson Ozias IV. Grayson Ozias IV (G.O. Fourth - get it?) was a friend of Nathan Strauss (nephew of Levi Strauss), and disappeared in 1896, after leaving behind a series of wax cylinders upon which are recorded clues that lead to the treasure. Levi's will release these clues over a seven-week period; players visit levis.com/goforth to read the clues, deduce the cities to which they point, and discover the treasure.

While Grayson Ozias IV may be fictitious, the $100,000 treasure is not. The first player to solve the puzzle will win $100,000, and may vote for a U.S. nonprofit to receive $100,000 as well.

With the "Go Forth" game, Levi Strauss & Company and their ad agency Wieden + Kennedy are creating a fun blend of alternate reality and social media. The site, in addition to providing the game clues, also features a comments board and the @GraysonOziasIV Twitter feed. And according to MediaPost's Marketing Daily, Levi's is also promoting the game through its Facebook fan page, Twitter, ESPN Magazine, and online ads.

Bravo for Levi's and their foray into role-playing games. They are providing a free venue for customers (and potential customers) to interact with their brand and with each other, while promoting the spirit of 19th-century American pioneering upon which the company was founded. Creating positive brand experiences and allowing people to build relationships sound like great ways to sell jeans.

Living Life Like a Butterfly

My friend Sarah and I picked a perfect day to sit outside for lunch.

Today in Abilene, Texas, the breeze was cool, the sun was shining, the sky was blue, and the monarch butterflies were passing through on their fall migration. Sarah and I just happened to eat lunch together outside today, in a spot where a couple hundred monarchs were fluttering about.

The butterflies were breathtaking to watch, of course. And, more than that, they fascinated me.

Here they were, in the midst of a few-thousand-mile flight south to Mexico for the winter. But these butterflies were not soaring by, as Canadian geese zoom past during their own annual migration. The butterflies' migration looked nothing like an American family road trip, with no stops allowed except bathroom breaks.

Instead, the monarch butterflies seemed to be taking their time. Sarah and I watched as they simply fluttered around this cluster of bushes and trees in Abilene, Texas, almost as if they lived there. Had someone been visiting Abilene today and seen these butterflies, he would have assumed that he had stepped into a permanent butterfly garden - not that these beautiful insects were just passing through.

I want to go through life like the butterflies do.

I want to live life with a destination in mind, with an innate purpose and goal which I press on to achieve. But I do not want to travel toward that destination single-mindedly, like a Canadian goose. I do not want to zoom through life, non-stop, trying to reach my goal without delay.

I want to travel toward my goal like a monarch butterfly. Moving from place to place, with the same path and purpose and focus as the Canadian goose, but enjoying the trip along the way. Slowing down enough to savor each moment, each location, each season. Taking time to get to know people and experience places as I go. Realizing that each stop along the journey might be just as important, and as meaningful, and as beautiful, as the final destination.

Are you living life like a goose, or like a butterfly?

Starbucks and Disappointed Hopes

I don't mind Starbucks. I wouldn't say that Starbucks coffee is my favorite, and I can think of other coffee houses that have great atmosphere, and sell fair trade, and are going green. But Starbucks is fine.

There is one thing that always disappoints me about Starbucks, though. It is this:

When Starbucks advertises its drinks on posters, table tents, etc., it shows steaming hot Pumpkin Spice Lattes, or cool-and-creamy Mint Chocolate Frappuccinos, served in beautiful china mugs or glass stemware, with swirls of caramel syrup or chocolate shavings or cinnamon flakes.

Have you ever been served a Starbucks espresso drink in a china mug with cinnamon flakes on top of the foamed milk? Has anyone?

My Starbucks coffee has only ever been presented to me in the mostly recycled/recyclable paper cups (or plastic, for cold drinks), and always with a lid that hides any cinnamon flakes that might have been sprinkled on my drink by an extra-thoughtful barista. No matter if I plan to stay in the Starbucks store for hours, sipping my drink and chatting with friends or reading, my coffee still comes in the to-go cup with a lid.

Why? If I intend to drink my coffee inside the store, why can't Starbucks serve my drink to me in the manner in which it is advertised? In the nice china mug, with the swirls and flakes and cinnamon dust?

I should think that it would be easy to ask customers, "for here or to go?" when they place their orders, and to serve their drinks accordingly. Using mugs and glasses for in-store orders would surely save trees and landfill space, although I admittedly do not know how much the extra dishwashing would affect water usage. And if a "for here" customer had not yet finished her drink by the time she was ready to leave the store, she could easily request a to-go cup for the remaining coffee.

Please, Starbucks, stop using your ads to raise my hopes for a delightful coffee-drinking experience, only to dash them with another paper or plastic cup when I visit your store. The idea is to "under-promise, over-deliver"; not the other way around.

The Home Depot and Edutainment

Majesco Entertainment Company recently released a game for the Wii, featuring home improvement retailer The Home Depot. The game, "Our House: Party!" features 175 mini-games in which players (up to four) complete home improvement projects in order to make their homes the best in the neighborhood. These projects include tasks like construction, demolition, plumbing, wiring, landscaping, decorating, and, of course, racing through The Home Depot store to get the necessary power tools.



Majesco also released a similar version of the game - "Our House" - for Nintendo DS. In the DS version, players start as contractors who must build customer's houses in order to save up enough money to build their own home.

The first brilliant thing about these games is that they're just plain fun. (Or at least they sound fun! I haven't tested them out yet.) The second brilliant thing is that, in the midst of all that fun, Majesco and The Home Depot have combined education (learn, loosely, how to do various projects), branding (The Home Depot, of course!), and entertainment. The game provides instruction and fun in a positive brand experience for The Home Depot's potential customers.

The Home Depot creates other positive brand experiences, too, without forcing customers to pay them a dime. In addition to the caricatured "do-it-yourself" projects of the "Our House" and "Our House: Party!" games, The Home Depot shares scores of free, real-life "how to" videos on their YouTube channel. And, as I understand, anyone can visit a Home Depot store during their project workshops for hands-on instruction in home improvement.

These are the kinds of things that attract customers to a brand. Give people something useful, teach them, provide them a service - for free. In the process you will be building trust, building rapport, and building relationships with people. And then, when those people really do need a product that you sell, with whom will they prefer to spend their money? You've proven yourself trustworthy in a service that does not earn you money; now those people will be ready to trust you with a service that does.

How can your organization provide an honest-to-goodness, helpful, positive, fun brand experience for people, before they ever have to spend a dime?

Good mobile web? Someone needs to step up.

Two MediaPost publications reported last week on a Yankee Group study that assessed the overall quality of mobile websites. Yankee Group researchers evaluated 27 major mobile sites on criteria including design, usability, and ability to adapt to multiple devices and networks. The findings were disappointing: the average score was 52 out of 100 - a failing grade.

The highest scorers among the group, which included popular news, sports, and search sites, were as follows: Google search (81), Yahoo search (76), Google News (73), Yahoo News (73), MLB.com (71), Rivals.com (58), and ESPN.com (57). When translated into academic grades, the highest scorer (Google) only achieved a B-.

Given that smartphone usage continues to grow massively (Nielsen reports that smartphone adoption has increased 72% quarter-over-quarter this year, to 26 million subscribers in the second quarter of 2009), this mobile web failure is a sorry state. But it means that there exists lots of opportunity for companies to fill that space by developing mobile sites that are truly outstanding.

Imagine how much of the mobile web audience could be captured by a company that offers an A+ mobile site, at a time when the top competitor (Google) only scores a B-. Imagine the kind of fan base that company could build if its mobile site communicated essential information in a clean, simple, easy-to-read, easy-to-navigate format, optimized for any mobile device.

How can companies do this?

1) Simplify. Tell mobile users what they want to know; do not overwhelm them with information. In your writing, be succinct. In graphs and charts and design, use as few strokes as possible to accurately communicate the information. Use space wisely, without crowding. For inspiration, read up on books about clean design and simplifying your life; or browse through top design magazines and "best of the web" lists.

2) Detect. Determine whether the user is accessing your site from a desktop/laptop or from a mobile device. For users surfing on mobile phones, automatically route them to the version of your site that is optimized for mobile. You might do this by providing customers with a separate web address for your mobile site (my alma mater uses http://www.acu.edu for desktop, and http://m.acu.edu for mobile). Or, for an even better user experience, take Carl Howe's recommendation and invest in device detection on your mobile site; this will allow you to provide users with a site that is optimized for their specific mobile platform.

3) Target. Customize users' experience based upon their location. Use the GPS data from their phones to give them information relevant to their geographic area. Unless they state otherwise, treat their mobile web experience like local search. If they are looking at music, show them concerts near them. Looking at food? Show them restaurants near them. Weather? Show them local weather. Sports? Show them the local teams. And then provide easy access to information from other regions as well.

4) Research. Ask users what they want in a mobile web experience. Ask them to critique several mobile sites; ask them what they like and dislike. Ask them what their favorite mobile sites are, and why. Ask them which information on your site should be displayed on a mobile device, and which information is irrelevant. In order to provide a great customer experience, you must know what experience your customers want.

The mobile web space is wide open for companies that will optimize their sites for the mobile user experience.

Subways: Boring or Beautiful?

Last week, New York City's Metropolitan Transit Authority unveiled a project that will make subway riders' commute a bit "brighter."

That project is the newly completed art installation by the late Conceptual artist Sol Lewitt. The piece, entitled "Whirls and Twirls (MTA)", is an arrangement of brilliant porcelain tiles on the wall above the staircase at the 59th Street-Columbus Circle subway station. The piece is the first of three Lewitt works commissioned by the MTA; the other two are compass rose floor designs. (Read more about the work at www.nytimes.com.)


Photo by Ángel Franco, New York Times


The piece rather reminds me of another bit of art and culture that was added to the NYC subway recently - without the direction of the Metropolitan Transit Authority. One evening in November 2008, Improv Everywhere, a volunteer group that "causes scenes of chaos and joy in public places," opened an "art gallery" on the 23rd Street subway platform. See their video below:




Both of these initiatives took a typically dirty and dreary part of New Yorkers' daily life - riding the subway - and made it interesting and beautiful. They brought joy (or in the case of Improv Everywhere, "chaos and joy") to the public. At no cost to the public.

What can your organization do to brighten up the lives of your audience? How can you add beauty and delight and surprise and laughter to your customers' experience? What part of your product or service is taken for granted as dull or distasteful, and what can you do to change it?

And don't make your customers bear the cost of this change. Take it out of your marketing budget. The repeat business of your delighted customers and their friends will be more than enough recompense for any extra expense.