Bloghound

  Hillary Clinton is extraordinarily intelligent, ambitious, and tenacious, but many people just can’t connect emotionally with her. As Prof. Drew Weston, author of The Political Brain, says:

“After party affiliation, the most important predictors of how people vote are their feelings toward the candidates.”

Here’s my view on Hillary’s failure to connect, excerpted from Beyond Buzz:

Bill Clinton gave an inspiring, emotionally charged, off-the-cuff speech at Coretta Scott King’s funeral, peppered with one-liners that the audience boisterously applauded, including “You want to treat our friend Coretta like a role model? Then model her behavior.”

According to many observers, Senator Clinton’s remarks were more formal than her husband’s, delivered in a measured, restrained, and deliberate style. The contrast between the two Clintons was vivid, as was the audience’s reaction. They cheered Bill, while they respectfully listened to Hillary.

“I think Bill Clinton delivers inspiring addresses,” explained Theodore C. Sorensen, one of John F. Kennedy’s best-known speechwriters, wrote in The New York Times. “Hillary is more likely to deliver learned lectures.”

A few years back, I had lunch with the late MIT professor Michael Dertouzos who had just returned from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where he had heard Mrs. Clinton speak.

“She was absolutely brilliant,” he said. “Her understanding of complex issues and her ability to get up and talk about those issues was remarkable. I don’t think anyone else at Davos came close to her in being able to articulate such cogent perspectives on today’s social, political, and economic issues.”

Yet, because Mrs. Clinton speaks formally, in full paragraphs and with little emotion, it’s often difficult to see things from her point of view and to connect with her as a person. Like many CEOs and marketing programs, Mrs. Clinton’s knowledge is substantive, but because her style lacks emotion and the language of conversations, it often fails to move us.
To succeed in a conversational world, we marketers (much like Hillary Clinton) need to reset our style so people can more easily understand our points — and get who we are as people.

I recently came across two companies that block employees’ access to blogs. (”Don’t want people wasting time while at work.”), yet are trying to encourage employees to read newspapers more often. Yikes!

I listened patiently while the executives explained the value employees would get if they would only read the newspaper every day — and how much more valuable that would be than “surfing the net.”  I then told them — both around my age — that the first thing I do in the morning is to open my blog reader — not my newspaper.

Then I shared how blogs are replacing trade magazines, go into more depth than many newspapers are able to, and are becoming the preferred way of learning, keeping current, finding and networking with  new people, hearing about emerging trends.

Blocking blogs is like saying you don’t want your employees to learn or help you find great talent or help you grow the business.”Really?” they asked. “Really.”

Two small breakthroughs in opening up senior executives to the social media age. But hearing their views makes me think we have a long way to go in educating the people who control the controls.

Pope Benedict plans to text thousands of young Catholics during World Youth Day in Sydney in July; the church plans to also set up a Catholic social networking site and use digital prayer walls. The goal: make the Catholic church more relevant to younger churchgoers.

Good for the rather conservative Catholics to use new ways to connect — especially in view of the declining number of members of the Catholic Church in many Western countries like the United States and Belgium. According to a recent Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life study:

Catholicism has experienced the greatest net losses as a result of affiliation changes. While nearly one-in-three Americans (31%) were raised in the Catholic faith, today fewer than one-in-four (24%) describe themselves as Catholic. These losses would have been even more pronounced were it not for the offsetting impact of immigration.

The question for the Pope, as it is for all marketers,  is whether using social media tools can help  attract and keep members without also changing the message and experience.

Jerry Yang of Yahoo yesterday blogged (“OK, so now what?” ) about Microsoft’s decision to withdraw its offer. I give Yang credit for writing something and allowing comments, which is more than most CEOs do.

But Yang’s post doesn’t sound genuine; it sounds like something the corporate PR folks wrote in a committee. Too bad. In today’s world, people want the real language of the person behind the ideas. After reading the post my reaction was, “Does Yang really care — or is this just a PR move?”

A better approach would be to give the CEO a few of the major points that communications thinks should be conveyed — and then let him express it in his own words and style. Who cares if the words and grammar aren’t perfect. Neither are real people.

One of the biggest mistakes in selling is not making easy for a customer to make a decision.

That’s some of the advice from Mahan Khalsa, vp of the Franklin Covey Sales Performance Group, in an interview in this month’s Sales & Marketing Management.

I found two points especially interesting.

1. The sales reps job is no longer getting information — or simply developing relationships; it’s about providing intelligence and insight to the prospect. (I’d add that most of marketing should be focused on this today.)

2. Most sales presentations don’t make it easy for the client to buy. We forget to address: what does the client need to believe, intellectually and emotionally, to comfortably and confidently make the decision?

Khalsa’s advice:

• Start with the end in mind. Within the first few slides the client should know what decision you want them to make.
• Identify the 3 -5 beliefs that the decision makers need to check off to make the decision, then organize what you say to address those beliefs.
• Gain a decision on each belief after address it vs. waiting until the end for Q&A. When the beliefs supporting the decision have been successfully addressed, the final decision is much easier.

The novelty of blogging is about to wear off, said Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz at this week’s Web 2.o Expo in San Francisco. It’s becoming just another way to communicate.

The bigger point, said Schwartz, is having something provocative to say.

“If you say undifferentiated things that are expected, then you shouldn’t expect anyone to care.”

Amen. So many businesses are obsessed about how to use blogs or social networks that they overlook the fact that you have to have something interesting to say. The point of my book Beyond Buzz is just this:

in today’s “talk” world — online and in person — having an interesting or provocative point of view is as essential, maybe more so, than traditional marketing and communications “messages,” elevator statements, value props, etc.

A provocative point of view gets attention, gets people involved, and speeds understanding. As Schwartz knows, if you want to get interest, be more interesting.

Getting management to buy into innovative marketing approaches can be tough.

Here are six facts to support change, based on performance data that Copernicus Marketing Consulting has collected from more than 500 marketing programs (consumer and B2B products and services.)

1. 84% of programs are resulting in declining brand equity and market share.
2. Customer satisfaction averages just 74%.
3. Most acquisition efforts fail to reach break even.
4. No more than 10% of new products succeed.
5. Most sales promotions are unprofitable.
6. Advertising ROI is below 4%.

For more, see the Harvard Business Review article, “Don’t Blame the Metrics” by Kevin Clancy and Randy Stone.

Tonight I’m going to hear the brilliant designer Stefan Sagmeister speak at RISD. His topic is the same as his new book: “Things I Have Learned in My Life So Far.”

He came up with the book concept while taking a year off, and then came back to work with a whole new perspective. Here are the 20 things he’s learned so far.

1. Helping other people helps me.

2. Having guts always works out for me.

3. Thinking that life will be better in the future is stupid. I have to live now.

4. Organizing a charity group is surprisingly easy.

5. Being not truthful always works against me.

6. Everything I do always comes back to me.

7. Assuming is stifling.

8. Drugs feel great in the beginning and become a drag later on.

9. Over time I get used to everything and start taking for granted.

10. Money does not make me happy.

11. My dreams have no meaning.

12. Keeping a diary supports personal development.

13. Trying to look good limits my life.

14. Material luxuries are best enjoyed in small doses.

15. Worrying solves nothing.

16. Complaining is silly. Either act or forget.

17. Everybody thinks they are right.

18. If I want to explore a new direction professionally, it is helpful to try it out for myself first.

19. Low expectations are a good strategy.

20. Everybody who is honest is interesting.

And here’s the talk he gave at TED.

When I called Andersen Windows today to make an appointment to get an estimate for replacement windows the sales representative asked me if my husband would be home for the appointment. “I don’t know. But one of us will juggle our work schedules to be home at that time.”

“So your husband will be there?” she asked, pushing it. “We’ll give you a $100 discount if your husband is there with you.”

What?! I’m so offended by Andersen’s approach. Am I the weak little Missus with no buying and decision power? (On the other hand, it might be that we women ask the good questions and bargain tough — and Andersen’s market research has found that the guys are pushovers.)

Nonetheless, the sales angle has backfired. I’ve shared this story with several people today, and now with you. Word of mouth at work.

I went through crazy hoops buying my first house as a young single woman 26 years ago. ( A network television affiliate even came out to do a spot because I was such a novelty.) House decision sexism was bad then. Today it’s unforgivable — especially as part of the sales process of a well known brand like Andersen.

   The buzz is that CBS may “divorce” itself from anchor Katie Couric long before her contract expires in 2011. What went wrong?

Maybe it has nothing to do with Katie Couric or the fact that people are tuning out of  television for their news.   Maybe it comes down to a Viagra problem.

Watching the evening news — CBS or the other networks — we are bombarded with ads for one medical ailment ad after another. Penile erection, bladder control, constipation, bone loss, arthritis, diabetes. What kind of customer experience is this? Terrible. Erections and constipation happy messages while trying to make dinner, and maybe catch up on the news.

CBS, like most companies, has different silos responsible for different functions, and no one organization is looking at the customer’s experience. CBS News is responsible for Katie & Co., while the advertising group is bringing in the television dollars — and the Viagra ads.

In many retail companies, marketing is responsible for branding while operations oversees the stores, and never the two shall collaborate, often creating a mixed message and uneven customer experience.  Similarly, customer service isn’t usually part of marketing, yet the customer service group often has more influence on customers than advertising, promotions, or pricing.

I hope CBS doesn’t put the blame for poor ratings on Katie Couric, a fine journalist. CBS has bigger issues; the customer’s experience matters more than the ad revenue. If the first is bad, the second will become disastrous.