Kevin Franco's Weblog

Public School Fail

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 17:42:00 +0000

Report cards are supposed to show you how your child is developing and provide feedback on how to improve your childs' learning experience. This is done through grading (work, effort and test results) as well as evaluating each child's interpersonal and organizational skills. Some of this can be reported as a grade, but some things are less tangible and require written feedback in order to guide our children in their learning journey.

Yesterday, we received the first term report cards from our kids and I really have to question the Calgary Public School Boards' grading system:

Here's how it is supposed to work: The child is graded on his/her accomplishments and effort for each grade/class and the teacher is to comment on what the child has done right and what the child can improve on.

Here's how they do it: The child is graded, of course, but the teachers do not comment on the child, at least they don't use their own words... their comments are selected from a pre-approved list of comments.

Check out the highlighted areas (click to enlarge):
This is not a criticism of the teachers, it is a criticism of the system. And, I'm not knocking the entire public education system, just the practice of this type of written response reporting - we have had nothing but great teachers to date for all of our kids. So, this is not knocking teachers, unless they have a choice in the response, which I am assuming they don't. I'm sure that the database of programmed responses was devised with good intent: keeping comments politically correct, reassuring and positive. From a liability and risk standpoint alone this is a good idea. But these are our kids were talking about here, and we want actual feedback, not a selected response that is a near match to what they are thinking.

When the educators aren't allowed or choose to not string together their own sentence to evaluate their own students, it's downright offensive. If the system is to blame then the system needs to change and allow for teachers to do their jobs - feedback through reporting is a huge component of teaching and without it, you can't expect improvement or expect average students to achieve any level of advanced learning.

Now, if it's the teachers that are being lazy and operating in default mode, then pick another career... obviously you're not taking your job seriously and don't care much for your students' personal growth. I am hopeful however, that this particular teacher did this on purpose to expose this charade in reporting.

Branding Stories

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 05:27:00 +0000

Every brand has a story. Many marketing professionals, including yours truly, believe that communicating this story will lead to a brands success. But, where does the story come from and what exactly is the story?

Here are my quick thoughts on to identify your brand story:

1. History. Your brands history is a story in itself; how did your brand begin, what changes were made along the way, how did your brand evolve - these are all questions you can answer to form the history of your brand and if the history is compelling, can differentiate your brand from others. Brands with good history stories that come to mind are: Nike, Goodyear, Safeway, Ford, Ikea, 3M, Ferrari, Hewlett-Packard, Zippo, Harley Davidson, and Coca Cola. There are many with great brand histories - these companies do a good job of communicating their past as a cornerstone to their brand offering. Even if you are relatively new, documenting acheivements and turning points in your brand, demonstrates history.

2. Beliefs. Your brands beliefs are a story; what is important to your brand, what drives your brand forward, what does your brand strive for - these are questions you can answer to form the beliefs of your brand and lets consumers know what you stand for. Brands with strong beliefs are: Apple, Hewlet-Packard and Sony (Innovation), The Body Shoppe (Natural), Trader Joe's (Fun), Ferrari and Nike (Performance), Rolex (Quality), Bentley (Craftsmanship), Walmart (Cheap). No matter what your belief is, you need to communicate it and be known by it. Consistency in communicating this story helps to solidify what your brand stands for with consumers. A brands beliefs are typically tied to a genuine passion of the company founder or leader.

3. Personality. Your brands personality is an evolving story; how does your brand dress, what mood is your brand, is your brand friendly, is your brand assertive, is your brand trusting, is your brand open to dialogue, is your brand unique - these are all questions that you can answer in the look and feel of your brands marketing materials. Brands that have unquestionable personality are: Apple, Ikea, Google, Hasbro, Disney, Swatch, Kraft, Kellogg's, Yamaha. The personality of your brand should instantly instill feeling and emotion towards your brand. The look and feel or personality of your brand should support and act as conduit for your brands beliefs and history. The colours, fonts, style, copy, imagery, sound and wordmark should all work together to communicate your brand personality. The personality doesn't happen by chance, it should be carefully and strategically designed by a professional.

Communicating these stories can be done several different ways - I can cover that another day though... for now, start thinking about your history, beliefs and personality. These three brand story points will also help to define your brand motto, and vice versa.

There are several ways to approach your brand story, these, in my opinion are the three most important ones and are the base for all others.

What a Bunch of Tools

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 17:17:00 +0000

In the 20+ years that I've spent in the advertising and marketing field, I have come across a lot of tools.

When I was a buyer, I met with more unprepared sales people than anyone should ever have to. Good sales people are hard to find - if you found one, keep him (or her). A good salesperson knows their tools and how to use them. Arguably, the best tool a salesperson wields is their ears. The ability to listen, and I mean really listen, is the key to making a sale or progress of any kind with a client. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm no sales genius, but I did learn that tip from one of the best - I worked under him (or her) long enough to see the real difference between someone who knows and understands his tools and someone who doesn't. Salespeople that can use this tool effectively are the ones that succeed.

And, like the hoards of unprepared sales people not knowing how to sell, the internet is fraught with tools that don't know how to use the tools. Or, maybe it's just that there is this really great tool and everyone can afford it. But, nobody knows how to properly use it. Actually, let's assume that is the case.

The tool is social media, and it's just that; a tool.

So many people believe that social media is the answer to their marketing problems, that it's the end all and be all of their marketing efforts. To me, I see it as the latest gold rush online - it's free to use, so anyone can do it. It's super easy and people are making millions! MILLIONS!!! If they can make millions just by using this free tool, why can't I use it to sell my crappy brand?

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It's your turn to cash in! Here's a surefire way to social marketing success online, and this is FREE advice folks, so be sure to gobble it up:

Just sign up for a Twitter account, make a Facebook page, post some crappy Youtube videos and tell everyone all about it on your blog. So, here's how you do it:

Twitter: simply follow a bunch, like thousands! - remember it's free - of people on Twitter, and most of them will follow you back. Wasn't that easy. Now you have a bunch of people following you. Now, you type your 140 words about your product and the legions of followers will soon be instantly mesmerized by your brand's offering. Told ya, it's simple.

Facebook: go into your Facebook account and click, Create Page. Answer all the fields, upload your logo and you're set. Now just sit back and watch the millions of people on Facebook become fans of your page. You know how easy that is? They are all tuned into your brand's offering now. All it takes is one person to tell another person and the rest is money in the bank - that's how social media works.

Youtube: put a tripod in the chair across from your desk, or if you don't have a tripod, use a stack of hard cover books. Mount a consumer grade camera ontop of the tripod or novels and start rambling about your brand. When you are done, post it onto Youtube, do you know how many people are on there? There's millions, and your crappy one take, poorly lit, barely audible, unprepared ramble about what nobody is interested in will surely make the Featured Videos list.

Blog: you can't go through all that effort the past 30 minutes in setting up your social marketing campain without telling people about it... why not the 3 people who read your blog each week? Posting your weak efforts onto other social marketing spaces so people will check out your other social marketing efforts is retarded. As you type Pubish Post, remember, what you are doing is filling the internet up with more useful information about your brand - you are helping millions (potentially).

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Wasn't that easy? Everyone should be doing this... oh, right: They are.

I've met so many 'social media marketing experts' in the last 6 months, that I cringe when I hear that phrase now. It's rediculous. Now, I'm sure there are some real experts in the field - in fact, I know one quite well and believe me, the years of marketing behind her make her the expert - not the tool.

Social media is just a tool, the same way a hammer is a tool. Thing is, I own a hammer, but I don't profess to be an expert framer. Brands have got to remember, social media is nothing more than a marketing tool. And, some tools are just best left for the trades to use.

What most brands don't get, is that you need to have a marketing plan, a strategy, the playbook for where you want to end up at the end of the game. I may have broken the analogy record here, but a quarterback doesn't keep going to the running play (unless it's NFL) over and over again - a number of tools must be used to tell your brand story and to communicate your offering.

Social media is not the end all and be all... it's just a tool.

Creation Theory

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 01:06:00 +0000

Having a planning meeting with my staff a few weeks ago has really solidified our focus.

For me, it reaffirmed some assumptions on my part regarding the path I chose to follow about a year ago... by all accounts, we are on the right path.

Managing a creative company can be difficult. Sure, it's easy to keep staff interested and focused on work when there's fresh, creative projects coming through the doors consistently. Believe me, this is much easier said than done - creative projects are the holy grail in our business, it's what all creative people live for and they don't grow on trees. But, with an excellent reputation and a team of creative super-hero types, we should be able to make it happen. We are know highly sought after for such work.

But this is was not always the case. It took a lot of hard work from each and every one of our staff, doing jobs that included repeat orders, changes to existing work and the dreaded maintenance work. And, while these are all easy tasks, creative people need to be challenged mentally and stimulated visually or they get bored and lose interest.

Doing repetitive work and 'maintenance' type work can be lucrative, but is very tedious and uninspiring. In the case of web site maintenance, having us do the changes are a double edged sword - we don't want to do them and they are costly for us to do them (for the client in dollars and for us in time)

So,...

Over the last year, we have been slowly building the engine that will service a new focus for our clients - investing thousands of dollars into becoming experts in the Content Management System (CMS) known as Joomla!, social media marketing and customized PHP development. This enables us to move clients into a space where they can manage their own smart web sites - this means they no longer have to contact us to make changes and allow them to directly engage with their customers through the web site using a little thing called web two point oh.

Hiring a company to make a simple text change used to be necessary and expensive, this is no more. I always felt guilty about charging 15 minutes to do something that the client should be able to do in 2 minutes, but the reality was it would take us about 20-25 minutes to do a simple task like a text edit. We have to create a docket, schedule the work, explain the work to whomever was going to work on it, they would have to find the file, edit it, proof it, save it, upload it, back up the revision, close the docket, then off to someone else to invoice the customer. Maybe it wasn't so lucrative after all, but I digress.

We want to focus on creation, not maintenance. Sure, this means a loss of income for us from a maintenance standpoint, but it's better for both parties - the customer gets to make changes when they want and without incurring cost and we get to spend that newly freed up time to spend on new creative projects. Win, win.

Now, there are some drawbacks to having a customer manage their own sites from a content perspective - you see, after all is said and done, a web site is a marketing tool, and putting any tool in untrained hands can lead to an ineffective use of the tool. Companies that do well online typically have marketing focused people making the changes to their site or are selective in the information that they change.

For instance, a company should use their CMS to edit and update product information, staff and contact changes, and pricing - then rely on creative companies to do the copy writing and build the 'splash' pages that sell the brand - this combination will save money and keep the site 'on brand', 'on message' and on budget.

Maximize this powerful tool we call your web site - if you wouldn't ask your Assistant to the Temporary Human Resources Filing Clerk to edit your corporate brochure, why are you asking them to edit your site. (no offence to the assistant to the temporary human resources filing clerks, I couldn't do your job either!) Put the right tool in the right hands... unless of course, they are left handed - just be sure it's the right person doing the writing.

We will no longer enter into maintenance contracts with companies unless they are part of a project - meaning we are moving to a more project based and brand based business model. We have a great team at Francomedia and we want to grow with them, take on larger projects and have some fun in the process. This fresh approach along with our advanced skillset should help accomplish this.

This applies not just on the web side of things - nothing can kill the creative spirit quicker than working all week long on a series of business card ads with different phone numbers for each town they run in. Sometimes these things are necessary as part of a larger overall project, and we will oblige gladly, but we won't take that kind of work on all by itself.

At our planning meeting we talked about the type of work we wanted to pursue and the types of clients we want to work with. What it came down to was let's work on projects that are challenging and fun, for clients that are open to new ideas, respect our abilities and are fun to work with. Enjoyment is the number one reason I do what I do and what really drives our staff to do great things.

So, our new focus is on creative projects, not just any though - ones that we want.

Bottomline: we do world class creative work for world class clients - for we are a highly creative company and our only competitor is close mindedness.

Here Comes the Fall

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 15:21:00 +0000

I said in my last posting that fall is my favourite time of the year, and it is, both personally and professionally.

While hockey starts, bugs die and we start thinking of skiing, things ramp up at work. Business starts picking up after the summer slow down (which this year we didn't experience to the same extent as previous years) and clients get back from vacation and back to business.

It usually means new, exciting projects and that's what I live for...

Giddy up!

Master of the Domain

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 16:34:00 +0000

The end of August always leaves me feeling a bit cheated as the summer comes to an end. The leaves begin to turn yellow and the sun is going behind the mountains a lot earlier with each passing night. This feeling does not last long however, because I soon realize that it's the beginning of hockey season and the much anticipated death of all bugs, at least until Spring.

Fall is my favourite season but Winter is a close second.

Getting organized and cleaning up is the order of the season and doing so makes me feel good.

While getting things organized at the office, I had a quick peak at the domain names that I manage and own. I have about 100 in total. Seeing as how I have to pay for these every year, I need to review them every once in a while to determine that they are still useful or relevant to what I'm doing. Some have some real promise, others were bought on a whim with some ambition of doing something huge in the world of marketing - in either case, they're all valuable to me, for now.

Lately, I've noticed that a more and more clever marketers and business owners have taken advantage of the use of domain names in their marketing. Taking a creative slant on the domain and using offerings, descriptions and claims as domain names for otherwise existing brands is nothing new. I've been doing it for the better part of a decade, but I have begun to notice a few more companies begin to use this form of marketing for projects and brands and it makes me smile, I love to see smart marketing.

Here's an example of it in action: I have a stair company as a client, and while they do great work in building stairs, their name is sometimes hard for people to nail down, especially when it comes to typing in an exact match for the URL. The company is Spindle, Stairs & Railings and they are the top stair builder in Canada. Naturally, a web company would register the company's name for the URL (http://spindlestairsandrailings.com) - this is a must, but from a customers perspective, how are they going to remember which words are plural and which are singular? How we solved this and made it easy for the customer to find and remember their service, product and URL is that we created greatstairs.com. Not only is it easy to remember, but it reinforces the quality, service and craftsmanship in their product in a very succinct URL.

In the case of my company, Francomedia.com, we have registered a few domain names to coincide, promote and track things, here are some of them:

CreativePanacea.com - I think it says it all. We use this as a testing site for web projects under construction right now.
Franco-Design.com - We place this in the code of some sites, just to see how many web designers are checking us out.
BirdieNumNum.com - We use this for our staff e-mail - a conversation starter and is very memorable.
FrancoMarketing.com - This allows for diversification in our offering and we can put a unique product on it's own URL down the road.

Of course, most of our domains point back to http://www.francomedia.com, but I think you get the point on the usefulness of having multiple domains names.

I can see this method of marketing becoming mainstream very quickly as more and more businesses catch on to the fact that it will help drive more traffic to their site and to their bottomline. And, like the unique 1-800 identifiers that businesses have in order for customers to remember their numbers, domain names have become equally important in their marketing.

A unique 1-800 number is equal to having a unique .com address... and for the record, 1-888 is to 1-800 as what .info is to .com - they all work, but 1-800 and .com are the cream of the crop and more desirable. So, if you have an idea for a domain, buy the .com before anyone else.

Seeing as how domain names are pretty inexpensive to register, I recommend registering as many as you can afford. Make sure they make sense, make sure they are relevant to what you are doing otherwise, you're just name squatting (not that there's anything wrong with that) and you're not getting any use out of your domains.

Buy them up and point them all to your main domain and you're set to go. They will be ready to use for anything you want at any time. Then one fall day, you can go through your list of domains and determine which you are going to capitalize on over the next year and which ones you are tired of renewing.

On a side note, I have also registered domains for each of my children as I see this uniqe URL for the kids as an investment, when they go to get jobs, their resume may reside there, or they can use them for their blogs or a personal web site or whatever. Or, they can sell them to other kids with the same name.

Overwhelming Summer

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 00:44:00 +0000

Lately, I've had so much on my mind and nothing to say.

It's been over a month since my last posting and I feel bad about it, but hey... it's summer and a guy's allowed to kick back once in a while and take a much needed break.

So, let's recap the summer so far:

4 golf games (2 tournaments, 1 absolute blast)
9 hockey games (7 wins, 2 losses)
12 days over 30º
22 days under 20º
2 stampede parties
1 week on Vancouver Island
3742 kms
1 garage cleaning
3 lawn mowings
Countless rain showers
Countless beers

I plan on getting back to writing in September... I will have lots to write about, I had better, I got a whole book to fill.

Mmmm.... Peanut Butter! Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 05:02:00 +0000

To understate the fact, I enjoy peanut butter, maybe more than the average person and I admit this with a mix of pride and some reservedness as there is still some stigma attached to any addiction.

Peanut butter is not my only love. I also love radio.

Radio's early days were fraught with experimentation leading to it's primary reason for existence, entertainment. I'm excluding it's other uses like news and communication because what I love about radio is it's awesomeness as an entertainment vehicle.

The early part of last century saw radio becoming the central component in a home for entertainment. Every home was plugged in and listening to their favourite shows acted out on the airwaves. Some of these shows are still played by a few radio stations and many of these are still more entertaining than TV. You get to combine the use of your imagination to visualize the happenings without the awkwardness of having to read a book.

Back then, radio was the hub. And for a while it stayed that way until television showed us visually what was happening.

In a way, this 'hub' style entertainment is exactly what Apple is trying to recreate with iTunes. For those that are plugged in and using iTunes to it's max, you know that you need not go any further for any entertainment - rent movies, download courses, music, TV shows... and sync your communications. Early adopters are in love with this, but it's still got a long ways to go for mass acceptance and use.

Growing up, there was only one radio station in town. There were actually 6 stations but with 1140 CKXL on dial nobody listened to anything else. XL as it was affectionately termed had the highest ratings of any station in North America as it related to the population, or market share. It was the king of the airways and enjoyed that spot for well over 10 years.

What was XL's secret? Well, they were a popular music, AM station, but they weren't confined to a single genre - they played everything from country, pop and disco to heavy rock and parody songs all in the same hour. Bottom line was they just played good music, they didn't confine themselves to a restricted playlist of a single genre. They had great on air talent and great marketing, they were involved in the community and didn't take their success for granted (not outwardly anyways).

So, what ended their reign? There were a few factors, first and biggest was the advent of AOR (album oriented rock) which in turn popularized FM radio - a much better platform for music listening (hurray for stereo!) - this pretty much ended most AM music stations throughout North America. The second was the increase of competitors (more stations) and the third was the poaching of their much loved on-air talent. With more choice in the market and B-sides to listen to, the audience was fragmented and diluted. They still had a core listenership, but there was just too many pieces of the Calgary radio pie and everyone was fighting for the extra slice.

Now, I'm not an expert in the radio or peanut butter business, but I did spend a few years working in radio and a few years working in the food industry. So, my insight is perhaps a little broader (or narrower) than most.

What I can say is that radio is a funny business, and I mean funny peculiar, not funny haha.

Radio and peanut butter react to market changes in a similar manner in that they change their product without considering what made their product popular in the first place. However, in the case of peanut butter, changes usually are made slowly, in increments over long periods of time, whereas radio changes are usually done overnight and are very dramatic.

Some of these changes appear to be knee jerk reactions, panic decisions that are based on some numbers and not on what the products or core values are.

In Calgary, some radio stations change their formats more frequently than I change my Facebook status. The decision to change a station format is generally based on audience loyalty (or lack thereof) which is determined by the measuring stick called BBM. Obviously, ratings are important as they determine advertising rates and sales - which is why stations rely so heavily on their verdict.

In my opinion, the method of gathering data by BBM is dated and renders inaccurate results of the actual market. I've participated in these surveys for TV and there is no accurate way of monitoring exact use unless it's electronic and synced to the device that is being monitored. At best it is a partial sampling of some of the listeners in a market.

The only saving grace is that BBM is what all stations use, so they're all playing with the same deck of marked cards. The BBM is comprised of surveys filled out by listeners who jot down what they are listening to in a diary... yeah, by hand - you can imagine how accurate this is. This type of survey is great if it's 1972... hopefully there's some better way to accurately measure listening habits of people, what with the interwebs and such. In fact, I believe an electronic version is in the works, and I trust BBM is leading the charge in this so they can remain the leading authority on all radio ratings, as they do have a great reputation in the industry.

So, radio stations use the BBM reports to measure their market share and make a lot of their programming decisions based on the findings of these reports.

Here's how it plays out:

About two years ago, a new station starts up and promotes themselves as Calgary's newest music source, their format, meaning what their positioning statement and their playlist is comprised of is considered 'good music'. And, after 3 or 4 BBM reports with no measurable impact (no upward swing in audience) they revise their format and try to target a niche that is open, they call this new format 'classic alternative'. For 1 maybe 2 BBM reports, they operate under this clever new format (if you are an avid music listener you may consider this format a bit limiting and somewhat laughable) and realize that it isn't helping so they change their format again, this time a complete change up, to 'Top 40' - which these days is mostly pop, dance and hip-hop.

So, what this means is that for about 2 years they hooked listeners with the promise of one type of music (good music), slightly modified it in hopes to increase their share of the market and then completely changed their offering.

In measuring the performance of a radio station, Average Quarterly Hour (AQH) ratings are important, but so is loyalty (that's where most of the AQH comes from). Changing formats does nothing to increase loyalty, in fact is has the exact opposite effect. The listeners that were happy listening to Green Day and Pearl Jam are for sure not tuning in now that Britney Spears and Fergie are playing. This means that they are starting at ground zero with their audience base and discarded the loyal listeners they earned in the process.

I genuinely feel sorry for the marketing people at these stations, for months they work on branding and positioning a station as THE place to be for XXX then after two bad BBM reports, they are repositioning to be YYY.

This is a black hole to which no amount of marketing can escape.

It happens all the time in radio. And, it's the stations that consistently change their formats that are always the ones struggling to keep up in the ratings game.

Marketing and brand building comes down to a being authentic, being true to the brand and what it stands for. And, if it's a good idea don't waiver - don't stray from your brand motto, you can make subtle changes and modifications to keep up with the market, but never make and about face change - that is almost certain death for a brand. (insert link to new Coke here)

Some good examples of local radio stations that have stuck to their guns over the years and remain successful because of it are as follows:

CJAY 92 - Classic Rock and has been for a couple of decades - they continue to be in the top half of the ratings game year after year. Many stations have tried to knock them off their perch, but have given up after a few bad BBM's and changed their format - this only strengthens the loyalty of listeners to CJAY.

COUNTRY 105 - Western Canada's country music powerhouse, not because they're the only country station, quite the contrary, it's because they have remained true to their original vision - sure some of the announcers have changed and the playlist has adapted over the years with the whole country music genre, but it's still the same great brand as it always was.

CHQR 770 AM - Calgary's talk radio station and has been for some 18 years, the talk format is definitely the best use of AM radio. The format of a talk radio station is very similar to a TV station in that people will tune into their show, not necessarily the station - this helps and hurts the ratings - but they've got a huge loyal audience.

Kudos to these three local stations for staying true to their brand.

When you think about it, who would want to invest any time in becoming a fan of a new radio station when you know that the first sign of a ratings drop they will change format? Radio is no different than any other brand, make adjustments to your current product, don't drop it and try to reinvent yourself unless the brand idea is no longer relevant (like a disco station would have been in 1982).

When it comes right down to it, commercial radio is no different than any other product in the grocery aisle. You build a brand through loyalty and delivering on peoples expectations consistently. Sure change is inevitable, but it can't stray from what your core values are as a brand. Be true to your brand motto always.

I still love peanut butter and I still love radio, especially now with Satellite Radio.

These days I listen to Little Steven's Underground Garage on Sirius - with DJ's like Little Steven and Andrew Loog Oldham you are treated to some great inside stories and some 10 minute intro's into songs - it's back to being an entertainment source for me and I can't wait to turn on the radio to hear what's going on...

Mmmm.... Peanut Butter! Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 22:49:00 +0000

Both radio and peanut butter have humble beginnings, making their big splash this side of the border. Marconi used Newfoundland to receive the first Trans-Atlantic broadcast and Edson patented peanut butter from his residence in Montreal.

Canadians are awesome. (insert smiley face emoticon here)

A number of years ago, in the grocery aisles where I grew up, there were three dominant brands available to consumers: Skippy, Squirrel and Empress.

Empress. What can I say, it was the Safeway store brand before there the invention of no name or generic products. It was a decent enough product, and half the price of the others. You knew better than to ask for allowance when there was Empress in the pantry cause things were tight if we were eatin' store brands. Quality was always good, but flavour was a bit lacking and this was true of most of the house brands, the jams that Empress made however were top shelf. Today, the Empress brand is reserved for jams only, other products along with the peanut butter moved into large tubs with lousy packaging that equal the taste.

Skippy was the fun one, it had colourful packaging, and was noticably sweeter and smoother than the others - their secret was the use of icing sugar rather than granular or liquid sugars. The packaging was marketed to kids, and as a result, it was the top pick amongst us kids. The Canada Corn Starch Company manufactured this under the Best Foods banner until it was sold to Unilever in the 1990's.

Squirrel peanut butter was a novel treat from time to time as it gave you one of the first unique packaging experiences known - when you opened the jar you were greeted with a whole peanut, sitting on the top of the peanut butter. The first scoopful was always a treat - the rest of it was so-so, mostly because it wasn't the kids first pick. I may be wrong about this, but I believe Kraft had this under their umbrella and manufactured it for many years before finally selling to Best Foods in the 1990's. CCC, AKA Best Foods, quickly liquidated many of their lines which included the unloading of Squirrel and Skippy to Unilever.

When Unilever acquired both Skippy and Squirrel, they decided the consumers only needed one peanut butter or they only wanted to manage one peanut butter with the accounts. Customers wouldn't notice, or if they did they wouldn't be vocal about it - luckily I didn't have this blog then. They did it slowly, they slowly killed off the number two seller in the category. Some companies in the food industry would die to have number 1 and number 2 sellers in a category - there certainly must have been other issues to arrive at the decision they did to nix the poor squirrel.

So, Skippy came out on top and its name would carry on down the sales trail - but how exactly would they 'off' good ole Squirrel? Well, they decided to do somewhat of a merger of the two brands - a sort of brand integration 'til the end. I actually would have advised the same tactic at the time. They merged the two brands by calling it Skippy the Squirrel and in a collaborative effort between wordmarks and fonts the slowly worked the squirrel out of the brand. It was the Skippy formula with the Squirrel peanut on the top... for a while.

Whether through customer feedback or just sheer lack of understanding of their brand legacy, they changed the formula and dropped the whole peanut. And, over time, the packaging featuring the little mascot squirrel and the name squirrel started to shrink, and each time you purchased a jar, it got smaller and smaller until one day they were gone entirely. Gone from the shelf, but not from our memories.

I used to love having a peanut butter sandwich... raspberry jam was my all-time favourite, but strawberry jam or honey worked out nicely too. And, if my dad taught me anything it's that the amount of peanut butter is at the very minimum twice as thick as the complimentary spread - dad always made the best peanut butter sandwiches, not sure if mom was spreading it thin as a means to make the jar last longer or she just didn't know any different. I never told her this fact because she would change it for sure and there would be no difference between the two - then dad's wouldn't be looked forward to as a treat.

These days, a bit of me gets disappointed when I eat a peanut butter sandwich. I get excited about the idea of a PB and J, I lay out the bread 4 up on the counter with the tops of their crusts touching. My mouth waters as I make the sandwiches, but when I take the first bite, something is different. It's not the same. Is it that I am old and loosing my taste buds? I don't think so. I think the formula has been changed ever so slightly over the years, a bit here and a bit there... enough to make my childhood treat, my comfort food, my sit back and relax snack, a distant memory.

Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy the sandwich, it's just different. It's not the same as it once was. And, it once was great.

Kevin's helpful shopping tip: if you're looking for real jam, it should read 'jam' on the label, fruit spread is not an acceptable substitute in my book.

Steadfast and True

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:28:00 +0000

Business is booming right now for us. It's encouraging to know that all the hard work my staff and I have put into making Francomedia a great company has not gotten washed away or eroded with the global recession we are faced with.

Quite the opposite in fact. Despite the downturn in the economy, we have posted two record setting months; April and June. And, I think that's just the beginning.

2009 hasn't all been great though, we did operate for 2 months at a loss and 2 months of just breaking even. I was expecting 3 or 4 months of down time and although I didn't really budget for it, I managed to keep everyone employed while things got back to black.

What I didn't count on was the swell of clients coming to us from agencies that have been taking advantage of the market conditions prior to the winter. When I say taking advantage, I mean over-charging. The market turned in October, and when things get tight, the first thing many companies do is look to cut some dead weight and reduce expenses. They begin to analyze their spends a little bit.

When they see that their ad agency charged them $200 to burn a CD of their own web assets they begin to question the relationship and the value they're getting - and justly so. Soon, they begin to shop around for another agency or service provider.

We have been on the receiving end of more than a few of these companies that were looking for some 'fresh ideas' and honest billing.

Luckily, we've built a solid reputation in the market place for being very creative and we operate cleanly. Meaning we are fair and honest with all our clients. Sure, we could have taken advantage of things when times were good, but that's not in our make up - that's not who we are. Making money has never been our primary objective, we've always put the work first. 'Be creative and serve the clients needs and the money will follow' - that's what I've always believed.

It may not be the best business strategy, I understand a business needs to be profitable and make money, it's just not our sole purpose. Making money is a necessity and a benefit of what we do, our purpose is creation. At times it's tough to balance and sometimes we give clients ridiculous deals just so we can do something creative.

So, the tide is turning and our reputation is prevailing. More and more companies are coming to us and looking for some good old fashioned, honest, creative.

We are happy to oblige.

Contesting

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 18:11:00 +0000

Contests are a great way to promote your product, service or brand - if done correctly.

In any marketing, be it an advertisement, a web page, a vehicle design, apparel, logo or a contest, the messaging and purpose has to be relevant and on brand. What you do in anything related to marketing must not stray from your brand motto or your brand's core beliefs.

Recently, we have been putting a contest together for our tiny, little boutique creative shop. The contest has a purpose - to promote the win of a creative award for the design and concept of a custom envelope and stamp. And, the contest is relevant - to win the contest, you have to collect the very thing that we won the award with - our custom stamps.

Structuring the contest this way informs people about the win and gets them to notice and focus on the envelopes and stamps that may have been background noise up until then. Our goal is to promote to our customers and people who deal with us that we are an award winning creative shop that specializes in out-of-the-box thinking and design.

You can read about this contest here.

The goal of a contest is not to give away a specific prize but to promote your offering or brand. If the prize does this, that's great but not every business can do this. In our case, we are awarding lunch for the winner and eleven of their closest friends, delivered by our staff. This will award the winner, but also allow for interaction with our staff and their staff.

You want to give something away that is meaningful and/or has some relevance.

Immersing people in your brand and having them engage with it makes for a successful campaign. Just having people enter to win with no interaction can be misguided unless you are collecting data to follow up with at a latter date.

At the end of the day, people need to remember what your offering is and what you do. When planning a contest, think about this carefully, will your contest accomplish this?

I think ours will.

The Marketing Platypus

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 15:30:00 +0000

Everyone has heard the analogy that a camel is a race horse built by committee. If a committee builds a camel, business owners who want to do things themselves usually build a platypus.

There is no more definitive proof of this than when you check your mail at the end of a busy day and see the unaddressed admail in your mailbox. You see some of the most unprofessional misfirings in marketing. Many times, I bring these into the office for the entire group to see (and get a good chuckle). Nothing says home made logo, like a home made logo.

A platypus isn't good for much if you're competing with race horses, or even with camels for that matter. This sounds contradictory, but in marketing, sui generis is usually what you are after, but being unique in the amateurish and nonsensical arena won't get you on top. There are times when an unpolished or kitschy approach can work for marketing, but this takes planning and strategy, not just blind luck and a duck beak.

A while back I wrote a blog called, Heed the Advice, it spoke to the fact that you have to listen to the advice of experts. This came from a lesson that I learned and was not meant to be an endorsement by any stretch, unlike this posting (insert smiling or winking emoticon here).

There are some things you might like to experiment with or do as a hobby, all too often we see companies that treat their marketing this way. Marketing is not a hobby, you either live it and breath it or you don't. Having said that, there are some business owners have a knack for it, understand the importance of marketing but, they know when to bring experts to the table to execute or refine their ideas - there's no coincidence that these are the very same business owners that are successful in what they do.

If you are serious about growing your business, hire a marketing professional - but before you do, make sure they can make race horses. Have a look at their track record, make sure they can build successful campaigns and bring creative approaches to the table.

At the end of the day, we build race horses for customers. Sometimes we end up with a camel but never a platypus.

From the opening credits of Dogma, a film by Kevin Smith:

Remember: Even God has a sense of humor. Just look at the Platypus. Thank you and enjoy the show.

P.S. We sincerely apologize to all Platypus enthusiasts out there who are offended by that thoughtless comment about Platypi. We at View Askew respect the noble Platypus, and it is not our intention to slight these stupid creatures in any way. Thank you again and enjoy the show.

Marketing is like Self Help

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 21:46:00 +0000

Most people in their life have found themselves at one of those self-help type seminars put on by people like Steven Covey, Tony Robbins and the like.

And, most people walk away from these events energized and full of hope that they can be a better person, or at least remember 1 of the 7 important things they have heard. They learn 'tips' and 'tricks' on how to be more focused, more congenial, more positive, more everything.

The thing is, none of this positive self-help is news to anyone in the audience - there is nothing revolutionary being said and everyone knows it all ready. For the most part, it's common sense stuff. It's a good reminder of stuff we already know to be true but perhaps aren't acting on.

Whether it's the new infusion of thought, or the 12 coffees consumed during these seminars, people seem to come out of these seminars charged up and ready to change their lives for the better. And, for a couple of days they may even implement some of the philosophy and teachings. But it is soon forgotten because the two things they remembered to do, didn't really make an impact so they stop doing them.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to downplay the importance of self-help - it's good stuff, and we all need reminders now and then.

My point is this; these seminars teach many 'tips' and 'tricks' to be a better person, and doing one or two of them really will not make that big of difference in any one person's life - it's when they start doing several or all of these things that you start to see improvement. If you are committed to it and stick to it.

And, folks, that is exactly how marketing works.

Marketing success is the sum of its parts. It's not just doing a newspaper ad, or re-vamping your web site or cleaning up your logo. Everything must be firing on all cylinders if you truly want results. Nothing should be overlooked. Any one part of an automobile is not an automobile - it doesn't take you to point B until everything is is assembled together.

Remember, everything is marketing.

If you truly want to create a memorable or remarkable customer experience everything must be looked at, everything must be on brand and true to your brand motto. For when everything you do and say, reflects the core message or is relevant to your brand, that is when you are really marketing - then it just becomes a game of promoting.

So many companies believe that their logo is their brand. Let me tell you this, people don't interact with your logo, they interact with you or your staff. They go through your web site, hopefully you do a job in immersing them in your brand by giving them a great experience in your store or office. The logo just helps them remember their experience - the logo should reflect the brand and set the expectation, as in all your marketing.

What you see is what you get (WYSIWYG) is used a lot in our industry, mostly for printing and proofing. In marketing, you must step back and look at your business through a customers eyes. Their perception is reality. What they see is what they are expecting to get. You set the expectation in many ways, think about what a dirty logo'd vehicle tells people that have never dealt with you. Everyone has seen third rate business cards, the impression and perception formed immediately (first impressions) is that your firm is as crappy as your business card.

Cleaning your company vehicle and getting professional calling cards are not earth shaking ideas. In fact, common sense already told you that these were good ideas before I even told you. But, if you don't implement them they won't help. Now, on their own they are not going to save a company, or increase profits, or double your sales - they are just two little things on a list of hundreds.

The bottom line is, you need to follow through on everything to be better, in life and in marketing.

Remember, marketing is everything.

My Famous Business Card

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sun, 24 May 2009 18:16:00 +0000

Chances are, that if you've met me in person, you have one of my famous business cards already.

OK, maybe famous is stretching it, but they are certainly unique and on their way to being semi-famous or quasi-famous... if even on a very minor scale.

In April of this year, Francomedia won the Platinum Hermes Creative Award for the design and concept for these very creative business cards and ever since, we have been getting more notice and plenty of buzz about our cards.

The cards themselves are pretty clean and simple, save but a few creative features to each card that speaks to each employees individuality/ specialty. What really makes them remarkable is the complex process to create them - it's the final result and effect that makes them truly sui generis.

Earlier this week, our cards were featured on Card Observer, a site dedicated to creative and unique business cards. Shortly after our posting on that site, we received word that a blogger named Yanda out of Singapore wanted to cover the cards and feature them on their site as well.

It didn't take long for other web sites to pick up the information and start sharing the news about our cards. At time of this writing, we have found a few different sites that are showing our cards: Such as this one and this one and this one and this one and this one and this one and this one and this one.

Needless to say, this has increased traffic to the Francomedia web site in a huge way.

When I look at the cost to produce our cards, compared to other business cards, some would say I was crazy for doing it, as each card comes close to $5. However, if you look at the fact that these cards have resulted in getting my company international attention online and local press in two magazine articles, I would have to say that it was well worth the expense.

Everyone I hand these cards out to, comments on them and reacts positively. Well, except for one lady who asked about their longevity in a landfill to which I replied, "You're not supposed to throw them out!"

I guess no matter what you do, there will always be one person with a different, albeit skewed, perspective. I assure you, the cards are recyclable, so if you do feel you must dispose of the most creative card you've ever gotten, don't irresponsibly throw it into the garbage, I urge you to recycle it or re-use it.

In marketing, in business, in advertising, ...hell, in anything - doing something truly unique and creative will get you noticed... and that's what it's all about, right?

The Time it Takes

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sat, 16 May 2009 16:32:00 +0000

Doing a good job takes time - doing a lousy job takes no time at all.

It's easy to go through the motions but that's not what I'm about. I'm a marketer and slapping things together doesn't help anybody. Things need to be thought through, in concept, in planning, in design and in execution.

I recently heard Roger Grant from Identicor speak on the subject of branding and naming (he is one of the only professional name generators in the country) and he said, "have a look through a trade magazine at all the ads... it's more about fitting in than standing out." I thought this was brilliant. It really sums up what we're about, standing out.

Life isn't middle school and your brand isn't trying to fit in - you need to get noticed and you want to be talked about. Hell, using that analogy, a brand with pimples might make you a household name.

Being different, or remarkable is what any good marketer does - we help you stand out.

If you really want marketing that helps your brand stand out and generates engagement then you have to understand that it takes time + planning + experience. I am always willing to spend the time needed to ensure that the right ideas are put forward, and sometimes even invest time and money into projects that I am passionate about.

If you want band-aid solutions and knee-jerk reactionary planning, I'm not your guy. I don't settle for mediocrity and I won't dedicate time to something I don't believe in.

Great brands and good marketing don't just happen and they're not born of a single event, but rather through planning, thought and design.

Presentation Synergy

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sun, 03 May 2009 18:28:00 +0000

I made a 45 minute presentation to about 50 business people. The group was called the Synergy Network, made up of successful entrepreneur types from all fields.

Now, I'm not one of those people that is afraid of speaking in public. As long as I am prepared and have written the material, I can get up in front of anyone or any crowd of any size. Come to think of it, I think that may just be the key to making a great presentation. Writing about something you are passionate about and rehearsing it again and again (and again) that is.

Let's not get ahead of ourselves here... I'm not saying that I made a great presentation, it was good, but it wasn't great. And there are a few reasons why. For starters, it was my first real public presentation, going into a room as a guest speaker where my presence was advertised. No pressure, I'm a professional, right? Another reason was that I was just too busy leading up to my presentation and despite keeping a clear schedule, I could not escape the usual interruptions of running a small business.

So, let's just say if I were to make the same presentation this week, I would look a bit more comfortable and wouldn't have rushed through a couple of important parts. Remember, all parts in a presentation are important, otherwise they shouldn't be included.

My presentation was about how I started Francomedia and how I became the Idea Hooker... a story which did garner a few chuckles from the audience (it was meant to). I then spoke about identifying your brand motto and gave two real world examples of how Francomedia exceeded their clients expectations through immersive marketing. The two examples I showed were the Alternate Reality Game or ARG we developed for The Node Gaming Centre called 'Experience the Node' and the unique packaging experience we designed for VoodooPC which we called the 'Out of Box Experience'.

When it was all said and done, I was happy with the outcome. I got to meet some interesting people and hope to do some business with some of the contacts soon.

It didn't hurt that I had the whole team of Francomedia behind me in putting some kick ass graphics up on the screen and helping me fine tune the speech... Thanks guys, you always make me look good.

When Marketing Backfires

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 03:57:00 +0000

On two separate occasions Direct Energy sent a solicitor to my door to get me to combine my gas and electric bill onto just one bill.

Sounds like a pretty good idea, but the pushy people (actually downright rude) and tactics they employed to explain this left me feeling less comfortable with Direct Energy as a provider of any service.

Just to clarify things - I was happy with the status quo, meaning two bills weren't bothering me and I was happy with both Direct Energy for my gas and Enmax for my electricity.

As a rule, I don't like door to door solicitation. But, I try to put on my least bothered face and listen for a few seconds, at least until they get their pitch out. The fella Direct Energy sent asked if I was paying two bills and I said yes, then he asked me to get them.... 'scuse me? I'm two thirds through Dancing With The Stars!

I explained I wasn't interested in doing this at my door step and asked if they had a web site. Then I could check things out when it was convenient, or not at all (that's convenient too).

The salesman pushed for a close saying today's the last opportunity to save $20 per month on my bill and that all of my neighbors have signed up tonight and I'm the only hold up. At this point, I said I'm not interested in saving $20 per month (I just want to get rid of him now). He responded with, and I kid you not, "that's dumb, everyone of your neighbors has signed up...". Now aggravated, I ask him to please leave my property and that I will be closing the door.

He leaves, I go to the web site to complain. I contact Direct Energy and try to complain but am told that the person that was at my door was from a different company of the same name. Hmmm.

Fast forward two months.

A lady comes to the door, says she's with Direct Energy. I say "Oh good, the last person you sent was very rude." To which the fast thinking lady responds with, "I'm the supervisor, I can help you."

So far so good I'm thinking, but then she asks to see my two energy bills - it's a sales pitch. I politely turn her down, she wasn't as relentless and rude as the previous chap, but still a bit pushy. Pushy enough to cause me to act.

The next day, I do a web search to see who their competitors are in the combining bills market. As it turns out, Enmax has a product called EasyMax that does this very thing. Now I've heard of EasyMax before but didn't understand what it was (either I wasn't listening because I was satisfied with the status quo or they didn't market it effectively to me). I signed up right there and then.

So, Direct Energy tried bullshit marketing and sales tactics to get all of my energy bill business and ended up losing the half they had in the first place.

I guess their marketing worked - it got me to take action on a problem that I didn't know I had. It just kind of backfired on them. Direct Energy lost my business because of their marketing - a result that was the exact opposite of what they had planned for.

So, if you're going to learn something from this, think of this old saying, "you attract more bees with honey than with vinegar". And, remember, the people you are marketing to are people too and they will likely respond and react the same way you might... treat people with respect.

What Works?

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 04:20:00 +0000

Everyone wants to know what advertising or marketing works, and rightly so, they want to invest some money in their brand so they can reap the rewards that extra sales and profits bring.

So, what's the answer? What does work?

When it comes to advertising and marketing... everything works. And, it's not the size, it's how you use it.

You've probably seen big campaigns that front line staff don't get behind and they never seem to take off. That's because advertising on it's own can be ineffective - your advertising sets the expectation - when the customer makes contact the brand, you better be what they expect (or better) - otherwise you are throwing away your money.

I always stress continuity, with my staff and with my customers. Having continuity is important for the story of the brand to be told and for expectations to be met.

It's like this:

Advertising and marketing set the expectation. This is done through a brand promise which is set forth in ads, signage, identity, decor etc. Consumers see this promise and decide whether or not to engage with your brand. This decision is based on fact and emotion - your advertising needs to prey and deliver on both.

Staff and product deliver the expectation. This is done through interaction with employees (or other peoples employees) and hands on experience with your product and/or brand. When the consumer decides to engage with your brand, they become a customer. If what you've promised in your brand promise is not delivered then you have lost a repeat customer. The ability for your brand to grow past a single transaction is difficult and requires more advertising to get single transaction business.

So advertising works. If you have a good brand strategy, you can milk every ad for more than a single transaction. But that takes continuity and good marketing sense.

Learn why your customer uses and trusts your brand and you will better understand their expectation... even though you have been setting it, you may find the results differ from even your own expectations.

So, when it comes to your advertising and marketing - make sure the carpet matches the drapes.

The Actor Within

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 03:54:00 +0000

What does graphic design and marketing have to do with acting? Not a whole lot, but there is one parallel between the two that I'd like to explain.

Whether you are sitting down to design a logo or develop a marketing plan you have to put yourself into the customers shoes. You have to think like a customer and become that customer, even for just a brief moment in time so that you can understand their motivation. Just as an actor must do to perform a role.

This takes some understanding of who the customer really is or could be. At an ad agency, design firm or a creative house like ours, you really have two customers: The client, and their customer.

Believe me when I tell you - our efforts have to be on the clients customer, not the client in order for any advertising or marketing to succeed. Unfortunately, there are times when things get changed to the point where it only satisfies the client. This makes for a happy client, but this is short lived and when the campaign hits the streets and the results come back to kick them in the ass... we get the blame.

If your designer or creative team does their job, does the research and makes an effort to truly understand who could be using your product, they will do some 'acting' and become the customer for a short period of time. In this time, they will create something truly special, something that will motivate, interest and compel this customer to be separated from their wallet long enough to purchase your product or service.

Just as there are great actors, there are great designers. A great designer can quickly understand the motivation of the end customer and create something unique and compelling.

When reading this it doesn't sound that difficult, does it? But when you take into consideration that the designer must also keep the clients' branding elements familiar and consistent, that it must stand out and be better than their competitions' ads and that it must resonate with the customer it really becomes complex.

In the creative business there are many revisions and changes, that's the nature of the beast, but when you are getting strong push back from your designer on a change to the creative, ask yourself; is the requested change for you or your customer?

The answer to that question isn't always in favour of the designer, they can be wrong... they can be bad actors, or have bad directors or just have a crappy script. The point is to illustrate how important it is to look at changes to ensure they are to better the creative to better target the customer.

Targeting the customer is always right.

Through the Fire & Flames, Dragons' Den Pitch

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 00:06:00 +0000

For the past 9 months I have been working on a side project with a client/friend of mine - we've called it Arenacam and it's fully operational.

The idea behind this endeavor is to allow parents and grandparents the ability to view minor hockey (...or ringette ...or figure skating) from the comfort of their PC. This means that dads that work late can still catch little Johnny's first goal and soldiers that are stationed overseas don't have to miss a game.

Arenacam streams live video from centre ice over the internet.

Pretty cool, eh?

We thought so too. Which is why when we decided to pitch it to the Dragons' Den, a CBC TV program - one of the best shows out there in my opinion - I've watched it for a couple of seasons now.

We only learned of the auditions being held in Calgary a few days ago and did not have a whole lot of time to prepare and, considering that we only just got the working model in full operation a couple of weeks ago and have just proven the technology behind it, you can understand why we don't have all the marketing materials together for it yet (but I know a company that can help us out with that!). But, we through some quick materials together and for the first time, put our ideas about marketing and revenue generation down on paper for the pitch.

It's time to see how we can market it and make millions. We built the Ferrari, now it's time to take it out and see what it can do.

If you haven't seen the show, there is a panel of experienced (read successful) business people with money that you pitch your business or idea to and if they like what they see, they invest their hard earned money in you. It's a great concept. And, because the panelists are playing with their own money, they don't pull any punches and get right down to brass tacks. These panelists are the Dragons, you take your idea to their den - some walk away with a deal, most get burned.

Today, I pitched Arenacam to a pretty young lady, who is one of the producers of 'the Den and a University of Calgary professor, who, as I later learned, is a very highly thought of Professor, fondly known as Doctor Bob. This was the audition panel. Call them Dragon understudies, panelists or producers - they hold the ultimate hammer as to who appears and doesn't on the show. (was that enough sucking up?)

I opened the pitch with, this is the greatest idea since Hockey Night in Canada. It was a deliberate nod to the CBC and to illustrate it's potential as an idea within the hockey genre. I explained the idea which they quickly understood and liked. This was great - everyone was in agreement that it is a great idea... in fact, I've not heard a negative comment about the idea, from anyone I've told.

The only negative on our pitch was the fact that we don't have a revenue stream or sponsors at this time. Dragons want to know how they're going to make money - and rightly so. Both my partner and I believe in the idea and wanted to prove that we could make it work first before selling it to sponsors. Selling something that might work is a lot harder than something that does. We're confident that it can make money - we just don't have that part of the business worked out yet. You know the whole cart and horse thing, which comes first? The idea beats out the cart and the horse - you don't need either without first having an idea.

Brett Wilson, one of the actual Dragons and an icon in corporate Calgary, dropped in and spoke to our small group, which may have been about 15 people. He explained what he was looking for when he looks at investing, he said, 'it always comes down to people' - he invests in good ideas brought forward by dynamic people, 'you invest in their braintrust'. This gave me hope. That is what our project is after all - a great idea and I like to think that my partner and I are dynamic or at the very least, copacetic.

He also mentioned that what it takes for success are three things: Brains, Courage (my word, not his) and a Wallet. He assumes the role of the wallet for the show, but with his track record you know he doesn't lack the other two.

Our pitch was for the Dragons to fund a rapid expansion - put arenacam into 150 arenas, 10 in each of 15 major markets across Canada. A bold ambition, yes, but certainly feasible and would secure a nationwide network for advertising sponsorship. The cost of this expansion is unknown at this time, but the Dragons needed a number. We came up with $1.5 million, realistically, it's probably a million too much, but it's easier to go down in your price than up. In retrospect, I shouldn't have offered any price this early in the project, but the Dragons, they feed on numbers.

After being grilled on the numbers for what seemed like way too long, it was over with the promise of a review of the web site and that they would let us know. I was expecting the golden ticket a la American Idol, but it's not that kind of reality show - they don't disclose if you're in or out. It's hard to say if our idea will make it through to the next level - don't call us, we'll call you always leaves you with that feeling that you weren't exactly what they were looking for, but I am confident that our idea will win the hearts of the producers at the CBC when they review the auditions prior to the season.

On a final note, the panel agreed that Arenacam was a great idea - whether or not it's worthy of the Dragon's eating it up on national TV is yet to be determined. But they did like the idea.

I will keep you posted. Fingers crossed.

Crowdsourcing Dilemma

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 04:04:00 +0000

OK, as promised... a little more than a year ago, here is my article about crowdsourcing:

It has taken much reflection and weighing in on the debate to arrive at my stance on the subject. I will do my best to explain the two sides and why I've sat on the fence for so long before falling off.

For those of you that are not part of the in crowd:

"Crowdsourcing is a neologism for the act of taking a task traditionally performed by an employee or contractor, and outsourcing it to an undefined, generally large group of people or community in the form of an open call. For example, the public may be invited to develop a new technology, carry out a design task, refine or carry out the steps of an algorithm, or help capture, systematize or analyze large amounts of data."

What's ironic is that the definition above was derived of crowdsource labour, from one of the most well-known crowdsourcing projects online, known as Wikipedia). I first heard the term in 2007 while working on a project with Hewlett-Packard and VoodooPC. I was intrigued, fascinated and disgusted by it... but still thought it was totally hot.

So, why has it taken me the better part of two years to formulate an opinion on the matter? Well, I guess it's because the whole idea of crowdsourcing is pretty sexy and has a lot of positive attributes, so many that it can't help but strike at the heart of an idealist like myself.

You see, when you scratch the surface of crowdsourcing, you see collaboration, alliance, cooperation, association, collusion, joint effort, participation, teamwork & working together... all for a common goal. It's very Star Trek like in it's altruism. Even when you dig deeper, everything looks rosy. But, there is a dark side, but not always - and herein lies the dilemma.

The good side has a bad side and vice versa, but a la Star Wars VI... there's still some good in you father.

So, what we have on the other side, the dark side to this utopia of getting things done is unpaid labour, unrewarded, unsalaried and uncompensated workers. Sounds like more of an untopia to me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not all about the money, but money does let you reinvest in your creative team and infrastructure for the next project. Now the dark side has some redeeming points too. What are the redeeming points? Well, businesses can get unpaid labour... etc., etc., ...but there's also the idea that you can get the best ideas/solutions put forward by having a large number of people work on an issue, problem or challenge.

Some companies have gone to great lengths to protect participants intellectual property and compensate 'winners' in their crowdsourcing. One such company is Idea Bounty. The premise here is that a company comes forward with a brief or challenge and a bounty (some cold hard cash, dead presidents, moola) and offers it up to the best creative idea for their product/service/brand. What is currently running on their site is a contest for Red Bull - come up with the best new consumption ritual and you win $5000. Kudos to this group - they have done a very good job of making this whole practice look respectable.

Cool, eh? No. Not really.

Aside from hundreds or maybe thousands of people contributing their intellectual offerings free of charge, what's wrong with this picture? Well aside from the obvious pitfalls of cherry picking and going with the idea the client thinks is the best, the client foregos the consultation, debate and counsel that a creative professional may bring to the table. One of the past winners on this site won $3000 for an idea he put forth for use by BMW. So, he got bragging rights, and a few thousand dollars and the client walks away with an idea that could make them millions of dollars in profit. Doesn't sound all that bad, now does it? But what about the guy that came in second? Third? ...etc. Did they not contribute good ideas as well? Were their ideas worth $3000 less? Anyone worth anything in the creative field is surely not going to stoop to this level of chance - the client will receive second rate ideas from third rate contestants, heck, let's call it Creative Idol, and the client plays Simon.

To illustrate this point, let's take my front lawn as an example, it is dissected perfectly in half by my sidewalk with two equal halves of lawn and garden to be landscaped. How would it sound if I got a different landscape company to landscape each side of my lawn with the promise that I will pay the one that I felt did the best job at the end of the day? Do you think I will get the best landscapers out to my property to try to get this 'job'? I think not. When the last grass blade has been cut and it's time to pick the 'lucky' recipient of a pay check, I would be forced to pick the better of two lousy jobs.

It's hard to criticize this practice without recognizing the positive benefits to the company holding the bag of loot, the contest holder - for they have little to lose and at times, a lot to gain. But this is exactly why it has been so hard to come to my realization that this practice, in the 'commercial' sense is just plain wrong. It does nothing to further industry, education, morale, or growth, in the end, it does nothing but award individual effort in a one-time setting. A hero for the day, and a bum the next.

PS - Wikipedia, although a crowdsourcing initiative in my belief, is not of the commercial variety and therefore holds true (for the most part) of what crowdsourcing should be limited to; the growth and development of ideas for the common good, not for Red Bull.

Still Fishing After All These Years

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 18:19:00 +0000

2009 started out great, but the last two weeks we have begun to see things slow down with our existing clients as a result of the economic shitstorm we are facing.

On the plus side, we have managed to secure some great new clients and interest in our boutique creative shop is still growing.

This doesn't change the fact that most of the world is grinding to a spending halt.

However, I believe we are in a good position to weather the storm, our pricing is still well below the majority of competing advertising agencies and we operate very efficiently. We are diverse in offering and skilled at all - we can take on most any project that is thrown our way and we make things happen.

In addition, we have a solid reputation in the marketplace and finding new customers has never been hard. We will still be picky about the jobs we do, but we will be actively looking for work - which is a first since 1997, when my first shingle was hung.

When this turmoil is through, I think we'll see not only the strong survive, but the innovative and adaptive as well. The things we did 6 months ago will likely not pay the bills 6 months from now. Change is always inevitable, but the change we will see over the next year will not be subtle or kind. The strategy is to be strategic. Long term plans are out the window, the new reality is short term plans with long term goals.

Bob Dylan was a genius when he predicted this: "...the times they are a changing." How could he have known about this over 40 years ago?

So, here we are, back into problem solving mode, where change has forced us to go back to providing even more creative ideas and focusing on what we are best at; results. Isn't this what our clients are looking for anyways?

Alfred E. Newman said it best, "What, me worry?"

We have an awesome group of staff, I didn't just hire them to make me look good, I hired them to make our clients look good - and they never disappoint.

So, no, I'm not worried, I'm excited about the coming months, it's not going to be an easy go, but what doesn't kill us makes us stronger... well, except for maybe mononucleosis.

Heed the Advice

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 11:09:00 +0000

Too many times we see customers come to us for advice only to disregard it to do things their own way.

I'm sure every professional has to deal with some unwillingness to take advice. I believe our profession, the creative profession and more specifically, graphic design, is at the far end of this chart with maybe lawyers and doctors at the other end. You see, most people tend to follow the advice put forward by their doctors and lawyers, but when it comes to marketing and design, everyone has an opinion. And, this is where things break down.

Opinions are like... well, you've heard the saying. Everyone has one, and when it comes to design and creative, most peoples opinions are based on their personal feelings and what they like and don't like. When you come to a professional, you are getting opinions and advice based on expererience, training and knowledge... that's what you pay for. If Deirdra, your personal assistant, doesn't like blue because it reminds her of her first bike that was supposed to be pink, it's not a good enough reason to change the packaging design that was put together by a group of trained professionals - they chose blue because that's what will make an impact with the customer and cause them to take notice and action. There is a lot of thought that goes behind colour choice.

The same goes for fonts. Many hours are spent on font selection alone, in fact, a lot goes into selecting the right font for a treatment, one that will create the ambience, feeling and characteristics of the message and the brand. Some people think that you just scroll down the list and pick one of the 25 fonts that they see in their Word program. Truth be told, a typical designer has access to over 5,000 fonts and picking the right one is not only important but critical to the success of a design. Then there is the time in adjusting leading and getting the kern just right only to hear, 'did you try ariel?'

When a designer sits down to begin a job, they get into character, at least I did when I designed. I would get myself into the head of the customer. I should point out that a customer is the person buying the product or service, this is different from the client, who we deal with directly. Understanding what will motivate the customer to do something is half the battle in coming up with the design. If you can be the customer, even for a few hours, you can truly do something impactful and meaningful... something that will result in sales. And, sales results is the byproduct of our opinions and advice.

Don't get me wrong, we have some very good clients that listen closely and follow our advice when we give it. This usually works out in their favour and that's when we get a thank you card and maybe some donuts. These clients should be commended, following others advice is not always easy, especially if it puts you in a place you've never been before.

It's frustrating to go through all the motions only to have the work or ideas not acted on as they were intended for. Quite frankly, it's a waste of our time - remember, this is time we're getting paid for, so ultimately, it's a waste of money.

It's sometimes tough for business owners to accept or or take outside advice. Sometimes, it requires a leap of faith.

So, when my accountant began asking me to change elements in our accounting, including software and hardware, I was a bit leary about making changes to our procedures. Then I remembered the clients that didn't listen to us and... well, needless to say, we're going to do whatever he tells us to do, afterall, he's the expert, right?

As I stated above, we charge for our opinions and advice, it's taken years to know what we know and we share the pertinent points for a fee. But, you're probably here looking for something pro bono, well, here it is: Listen to and act on advice given to you by the professionals you hire.

Changing the way we do things with our accounting is a scary proposition, especially for me, but I know and trust, that I'm in good hands.

Las Vegas Tip

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 05:42:00 +0000

I remember thinking several times while we travelled throughout Las Vegas that things have changed.

For years people have said that Old Vegas is gone. In some weird way, I didn't want to believe it.

In the nineties many of the properties invested in theme park rides, heck - MGM had a theme park! But there was still a feeling of Old Vegas in the air, many of the old hotels were still standing, the Sands, the Frontier and the Desert Inn still had lights flashing.

When the new century turned over many of the hotels turned into mega-resorts that defy description, they have to be seen to believed - they are just so massive and outrageous. These new hotel/casinos while impressive in their own right are completely different from the glitz and sparkle of the old casinos. They are too sophisticated. The old casinos had rudimentary lights (lots, and lots of em) that flashed and sparkled and drew you in - now they draw you in with replicas of famous landmarks from around the world.

Again, don't get me wrong, it's impressive, it's just not the same as it used to be.

On our most recent trip, not one person opened a door for us at any casino - just 10 years ago, there used to be someone in a suit waiting for you at every entrance, you flipped him a buck and a smile and he opened the door for you.

But when we went to a show and there was no máitre d' to take us to our seats, no one to spiff with a tip to move you up front, I knew things had changed. Every show I've ever been to in Vegas was seen from the front row with a few extra bucks attached to the ticket - a nod by the máitre d' along with the passing of the buckage seemed to always work, until now.

I entered the theatre, tickets in hand with a twenty neatly folded around each ticket and handed them to the person at the door - she looks at me and says, you won't need that, you're tickets are right up there (pointing to where the seat numbers were on the tickets) I was shocked. And, at that moment, it confirmed in my mind that Vegas had became less about extraordinary and more about just ordinary... they had taken the excitement away from so many parts to the essential Vegas experience, and the feeling of successfully applying grease to move you into the VIP area was the last straw.

On the plus side, you can save all tips you used to give out and stand in line for a buffet meal - they charge for those too now.

People used to go to Las Vegas for the experience and the new Vegas with it's endless shopping malls and masstardization is less about feeling important for a few nights, a very large part of the past Vegas experience in my opinion, and more about churn. Get people through the lines, like cattle, and move 'em in, move 'em out. Rawhide.

Next time I may just opt to go to the casino down the road - same old, same old.

Marketing in Las Vegas

noreply@blogger.com (Kevin Franco) — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 03:12:00 +0000

Leaving for Las Vegas in a couple of days... I enjoy the absurdness of this weird and tacky place and try to check my conscience at the boarding gate on departure.

There is no place on earth (that I've heard of) quite like Las Vegas, everything is done to extreme. It's extravagant, wasteful, reckless, care-free, casual, exploiting, unnecessary, immature, racy, ludicrous, seedy, flashy, dangerous, unnatural, fake, delusional, perverse, tempting, profane, chaotic, aberrant, ferocious and carnal.

And I love it.

The part I love best is they market these 'features', these differences, these experiences for what they are. It's Sin City after all, and you've got a lot to live up to with a name like that. Remember, you can't fake different.

There is no more profound experience than Las Vegas. And, it is exactly what's promised by the advertising. They create and set the expectation and deliver by the plane load.

I will take with me a voracious appetite for the things hinted at above and a giant note pad.

What can I say, I appreciate (and succumb to) great marketing.