My house in Arizona is on the far west side of Phoenix, almost Glendale. The surrounding sports facilities really contributed to my purchase. It’s less than four miles from my front door to the entrance of the University of Phoenix Stadium, the home field of the Arizona Cardinals, the location of the Fiesta Bowl, and the site of the 2008 Super Bowl. That complex also includes Jobing Arena, the current site of the Phoenix Coyotes, several restaurants and movie theaters. It’s known as Westgate, and can hosts tens of thousands several times a month.
Recently, a company erected billboards right by the major freeway entrances for Westgate. Two are traditional Billboards currently advertising Westgate and upcoming concerts at the facility. The other billboards are the more modern, electronic screens, changing graphics every few moments, allowing a driver following the speed limit to see two to three different advertisements as they drive by.
When I’m in town I drive by these billboards several times a week on my way to the gym or an event at my church. I’ve seen several advertisements, and I’m blown away by how awful most of the advertisements are.
The products aren’t bad, but they fail to use the medium well.
The best ads: crisp, clean, minimal words, basic colors, large font.
Most ads: too much text, small fonts, long website addresses, pictures of the person who provided the quote. In other words: bad.
Those ads might work in a magazine, where I can pause, look at the text, and read through the content. But I’m seeing these ads at 65 mph, and I still have to focus on my driving. Quite simply, I don’t have the time to pause, get out my binoculars, and read the text.
Last Friday as I drove past another set of advertisements where I could figure out the service, but now where or how I could get that service, I thought about how I was doing in this regard and how well all of our organizations are doing in this regard. I recognize marketing has always been a weaker component of my business, but this went deeper than that.
Quite simply, I wanted to ask myself, am I using the mediums properly? Again, the bad advertisements could work in a magazine, but not well on a billboard. They might work well on a radio ad, but not as a facebook status.
The promotion of our messages and our products needs to shift for the dynamic world we live in. The cut-and-paste strategy just doesn’t work. Each medium has its own advantages and disadvantages, and utilizing each for its own special purpose could dramatically increase our results. I recently read an online article describing how the big airline carriers still use twitter as a one way medium, while other airlines like JetBlue and Southwest have found ways to make it a two way medium, often-times finding ways to quickly address customer’s concerns. It’s a strategy that is paying off big for JetBlue and Southwest.
Spend some time this week asking yourself these questions:
How can facebook best be used to promote/enhance the experience for our organization/events/message?
How can twitter…?
How can text messaging…?
How can posters…?
How can email…?
How can websites…?
How can mailings…?
How can word of mouth…?
How can auto-calls…?
That list is not all-inclusive, nor should all of the mediums be used for every group or every event. I’m currently organizing the Homecoming Reception for the Alumni Chapter of the Leadership Scholarship Program at ASU. We had mailings, emails, websites, a facebook group, and several facebook messages, but the best way to get people to attend the event was asking a handful of key people to invite their friends, and as people RSVP’d encouraging them to invite their friends as well. In the course of one weekend our numbers shot through the roof. In this case, friendship worked better than any design that appeared on paper.
Again, I’m still working on how to do all of this better. I hope you’ll join me in this process as well all figure out better ways to connect to those we serve.