TiVo and American Idol Predictions
So, I’ve spending a long time thinking about TiVo and its applications to the future of television. Last year, I waxed on about how TiVo could localize television advertising by providing hardware-based coupons to consumers in specific areas.
In the heat of the continuing American Idol juggernaut, I had another idea. I caught myself doing something interesting during the performance last night. I wanted to skip the commercials, so I watch the show an hour after it has aired. I noticed that I would skip the performances I didn’t like, and I would re-watch the ones I loved. Often, my distaste for a particular performance was so instant, I would start skipping within the first 10 seconds.
Looking at my TiVo privacy policy, I saw that they allow for the aggregation of anonymous content to help enhance the service. If that’s so, why couldn’t they track the skipping and rewatching habits of 5,000 users who watch American Idol post airing, and use the aggregate data around each contestant to predict their potential position in the voting lineup? Of course, for this to work, we’d have to work with the assumption that American Idol voting follows the general likeability of a performance, and that discounts for personal favoritism couldn’t be included. Or, could they?
What if we tracked each TiVo user’s behavior anonymously across multiple weeks, and created a weight-based system for their specific proclivity for a particular artist. For example, if user A rewinds every performance of Paris Bennett, but the majority of other users tend to skip her, we can under-weigh this user’s affinity to Paris in order to calculate the aggregate. I think.
The applications for this, by the way, are enormous. Because even though it is fun to predict who is going to get kicked off, the more powerful information is that of who continues to get the most viewership, and therefore (using our assumption,) the most number of votes. This means that the executives at TiVo could know well beforhand who is potentially going to win the entire prize...which, for marketers, could mean contacting their managers and getting endorsement rights well before the finale, for example.
Or, betting in Vegas. Do they have a line on Idol?
The New, New Web
I was in a brainstorming meeting with a client, where we’ve been given an amazing opportunity: to completely blow up and re-create from scratch, a massive, highly-trafficked, news and content oriented Web site. Halfway through our definition of new features and functionality, I suddenly realized the true meaning of the word “inertia”.
See, progress always comes in the face of massive amounts of pushback. Sometimes, that pushback is almost implicit. We don’t tend to realize what we don’t know, so we try to find comfort in imagining the change of something familiar, in order to create something new. Usually, this works fine, but what’s one to do when the original that one imagines from is so flawed, that some of its fundamental paradigms must be questioned? Ah, therein lies the rub of true innovation...to admit that we’ve been sorely wrong.
If you read that last pargraph and are still scratching your head, let me explain.
The Web was originally created as a stateless method of exchanging information using a standard client. It was designed primarily for the text-based hyperlinking of files and details within a scientific community. As it became a vehicle of more general communication and information sharing in the general masses, we tried to force-fit several new features into a limited design concept. We added the ability to use images and color. We wanted prettier layouts than was originally designed, so we added the concept of laying out content in tables. We needed the browser to remember what it had been doing, we we created a way to remember sessions using “cookies.”
But then, we realized that the nature of the Web required that interactivity be not just designed by the content provider, but also by the user. So, we added personalization, and the limited ability of the user to enhance his or her own experience. People started self-expressing using personal home pages, and the volume of information that ensued required the advent of robust search engines.
The Web had evolved, and it had become clear that the fuzzy outline of a new paradigm that was visible in some locations needed to be clearly defined. We needed to document the characterstics of exciting new applications that were making their way into mainstream media. Thus began the official definition of Web 2.0, a term that came out of a closed-door brainstorming session between O’Reilly and MediaLive International.
Web 2.0 is what’s called a meme—a unit of cultural information that represents a basic idea that can be transferred from one individual to another, and subjected to mutation, crossover, and adaptation. There’s also a lot of backlash about the term being more of a marketing buzzword. But in the end, if it allows to collate and make sense of a certain systemic change in the way business needs to be conducted and human-centered applications need to be built, then marketing buzzword or not, I see a lot of value in the usage of the term.
While there still is a lot of discussion around what Web 2.0 really is, what can really hit home, is to show by a few examples, the evolution of Web 1.0 to Web 2.0.
A prime example is photo sharing. In Web 1.0, sites like Kodak Gallery provided the basic ability to organize and share photos. In Web 2.0, applications like Flickr creates a true collaborative environment for public and private photo galleries.
Another example could be reference encyclopedias. In Web 1.0, researcher-driven resources like Brittanica Online allowed for the anywhere-anytime searchable access to volumes of data previously only accessible through massively heavy books. In Web 2.0, Wikipedia is a globally accessible, volunteer-written-and-reviewed collection of articles that forms an encyclopedia that almost anyone can contribute to.
And those aren’t all. Evite.com has given way to Upcoming.org. Personal Web pages have been abandoned for blogs. Editorial “directories” have made way for “folksonomy”, or tagging. On the visual side, the use of CSS and standards-compliant browsers have created the ability to design beautiful and managable Web sites where information display can be controlled by the user. Play around here, and see how easy it is to manipulate screens to fit exactly what you want. Corporate entities such as AT&T and MSN have also jumped on that same Web 2.0 bandwagon.
Such a list can go on forever, as discovered by the O’Reilly brainstorming session. An in-depth technical discussion of Web 2.0 principles is beyond the scope of this blog, and there are people far more qualified than I who can teach and inform about its nature. What I’m interested in summarizing, however, is the marketing impact of this shift to the Web as a platform for user-controlled information.
As marketers, we’re trained to push information to the right people in the right place, at the right time. We spend hundreds of millions of dollars in analytics that are supposed to help us narrow down prospect lists by attitudes, propensities, and desires. We spend millions on TV commercials and full-page ads with murky measures like “reach” and “frequency.” We’re pan-handlers of information whether we like it or not, and while it worked well in the past, there are just too many voices in the atmosphere for our impact to be the same as it once was.
But now, with the Web as a platform, we have the ability to supplement our marketing programs with high-impact tactics that use the participatory and “pull” nature of the Internet. Search engine marketing is the single largest driver of eCommerce economics today. Over 60% of Top 100 eCommerce traffic comes from paid search placements around specific keywords and phrases. With RSS, we can syndicate our content and advertising proposition to locations that our target customers are more likely to be. Mobile techology allows for instant customer gratification of news and information. The Cluetrain Manifesto was right. Markets are conversations. The new Web allows us, as marketers, to get right in there with all those loud, gossiping folk, and amidst the rapid exchange of popcorn and soda, find a way to sell a bunch of stuff.
Which brings me back to inertia. Corporate entities that have previously relegated the development of their Web platforms and applications to IT departments will do well to re-consider that notion. The responsibility for Web strategy should be brought into the marketing department, preferably as a core component of the overall marketing mix. If techies are the only ones singing praises of the new Web, its possible that you’ve been ignoring that particular water-cooler suggestion. Don’t. Listen carefully, because it is, in fact, the voice of the future.
Culture Points: A New Parameter in Customer Intimacy
Two months ago, I was a 30-something educated Indian male living in Lincoln Park, working in marketing, with subscriptions to Esquire and Cargo, on the Giorgio Armani mailing list, who received the Hold Everything and Red Envelope catalogs.
Two months later, the majority of my demographics remain the same, as do my subscriptions and other attitudinal measures.
However, I’ll be damned if you could now sell me 10% of the things I would have used my disposable income for without a second thought, back in April.
Know what changed? I got married.
As marketers, we’re not unfamiliar with the concept of using life events to trigger marketing campaigns or offers. We have successfully used graduations, weddings and births as surfboards for new products and services. But in the context of true relationship marketing, I don’t think we have really considered how much really changes in an individual’s life around these life stages. We don’t use them as ongoing platforms—instead, we typically use them as peaks for our own messaging. In fact, if your relationship marketing engine monitors these life stages and makes attitudinal adjustments in the calculation of LTV and other CRM measures, I want to know about it—it would be the first time I’ve encountered such a practice.
So how have things really changed? Let’s dig a bit deeper.
Two months ago, these are the things I would have done that I absolutely would not (or am not allowed to) do now:
- Buy a $2,000 Giorgio Armani Black label suit.
- Take a weekend gambling trip to Vegas with the boys at a moment’s notice.
- Spend $180 on a Steven Alan cotton shirt to wear around the house, thinking it was cool just because Apartment Number 9 sells it.
- Decide on what condiment must be best in the grocery aisle based on how expensive it is.
- Buy new underwear because I hadn’t done enough laundry.
- Eat out just about every night.
- Add randomly to my TV show DVD collection by buying large quantities at a time, and sometimes ending up with doubles.
- Buy the “locker and laundry” option at my gym so that my clothes were fresh every time I went back.
Now, here’s the important bit: These changes I’ve listed aren’t happening just because I’m now married. True, my demographics have altered because there’s a check-box against the “married” question now. And its also true that marital status is an important demographic differentiator. But the real reason these changes are happening because I’m married to a specific woman with specific values, specific demographics and attitudinal factors. The list above might be completely different were I married to someone else. Meaning, lifestage triggers and resulting CRM value calculations can’t be made on a single customer record just based on a change in his or her specific lifestage; every individual’s information within the relationship equation must be considered. In my case, my wife’s attitudes and psychographic information plays a huge role in my ongoing consumer habits. As, by the way, does my cultural background.
Hang on, you might say. Cultural background? That sounds a bit hokey.
See, being Indian, there are very specific values we ascribe to a marital relationship. Those dynamics would be completely different were we two busy New York attorneys who grew up in Manhattan and the Hamptons. As they would be different if we were high school sweethearts from Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Our cultural idiosyncrasies surface most when we go through a life change that triggers a deep-seated value. Don’t believe me? Think about the Indian kids you see in your kids’ schools. Think about their parents. Think about how they behave, and what they seem to hold dear. Compare that to another culture, perhaps your own. Don’t you see a difference? Obviously, this is not a right or wrong, goor or bad comparison. But as marketers, we have to start considering what these changes actually signify, and how our customers’ lives will be different as a result of them.
For example, here’s what I would now do that I wouldn’t have even considered two months ago:
- Buy organizing furniture from Target.
- Buy vacation airline tickets two months in advance.
- Buy groceries for $1,000 every month.
- Look for a florist that was on my drive home from work.
- Buy things because they “smell nice.”
- Send birthday cards to everyone I know.
- Keep a watch on every major store sale, both online and offline.
So, this is my hypothesis: I believe that every consumer goes through what I’m going to call “Culture Points.” Culture Points are events in a consumer’s life that drastically change their buying attitudes and purchase propensities. Culture Point value calculations and measurements will require a new analytical methodology that merges multiple customers’ attitudinal and demographic data along with cultural parameters that are unique to the consumers involved. To start with, Culture Points could be integrated very easily into marketing data by proactive pop-up surveys on Web sites, or by simple survey questions at the end of a catalog purchase call. Eventually, I’d like to see Culture Points as standard marketing tools that are used to adjust personalized offers and more importantly, customer LTVs within a CRM environment.
The Search for Love: A Marketer’s Perspective (Part 1 of II)
As a marketer, I’m always fascinated by the promotional aspect of things. My search for love and the perfect partner gets me thinking about the anthropological implications of self-promotion, marketing, and truth in advertising. It also allows me to search through my own cultural biases, and explore how being Indian—a core part of my identity—has affected my perceptions. In thinking through these themes, I’ve realized that some of the hardest marketing in the world happens at that individual level—when emotions are heightended to the point where brand perception—in this case, of you—literally depends on every action. Finally, I relate all this back to brand marketing—and how corporations can benefit from the lessons that Internet dating within an ecosystem has taught me.
Tracking retail customers while shopping in-store.
Brickstream is a funky-cool tool that allows retailers to track the physical path of multiple customers through their retail stores. Analyzing these browsing/buying paths (much like a click-stream analysis on a Web site) then gives retailers the ability to find out what parts of their stores are least (or most) frequented. They also get information about where gridlock seems to most happen, or customers happen to linger the most.
According to a trusted source, the company plans to add biometric recognition, that in theory, could be tied to a credit card or loyalty card transaction. This in turn will allow the retailer to track the browsing patterns of in-store buyers, and allow for more targeted offers through direct mail or e-mail.
This all sound a bit too big-brotherish? Watch Steven Spielberg’s Minority Report for a visual depiction of such technology.