pr

Do you have a back-up plan for success?

Amy Rohn on December 7, 2010 ·


What’s your back up plan? Not a back-up plan for when everything goes South, but a back-up plan for success?

We heard this question on a recent road trip the LSB PR team recently took to Green Bay to hear Peter Shankman speak at a meeting.  If you don’t know of Peter, his background is in PR and he has become a social media expert and entrepreneur. He is a compelling speaker with a smart common-sense approach to social media and marketing and I recommend that you go hear him speak if you get the opportunity.

I was struck by many of the things that Peter said, but none more than his admonition to have a back-up plan for success.

Are your prepared for success?

What if your campaign goes viral?  What if that prospect finally calls…you know the one.  The one you’ve been waiting for.  The game-changer.  What if a really really big media outlet picks-up your new product?  Are you prepared?  What is your back-up plan for when these things happen?

Peter’s advice was especially resonant given an experience we recently had at LSB.  If you read this blog or know anything about us, you know we are specialists in jumpstarting brands.  Brands that are new to the world and those that are stalled.  So, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that we had the opportunity to learn about a newish brand that was faced with the opportunity of a lifetime.

Will your server crash?  Will your supplies last?

They were weeks away from a game-changing media hit.  A big one.  A “they-don’t-get-any-bigger-than-this” type of placement.  It was an opportunity any CPG brand would kill for.  But for this company it could also prove to be an opportunity wasted.  They weren’t prepared for success.  How could they possibly leverage this opportunity if the end-user experience was sub-optimal?  They needed product, the website was not prepared for an influx of traffic and the list goes on.  I don’t know if this company was able to scramble and get their ducks in a row, we ultimately didn’t end up working with them.

On a separate front, a print ad campaign that LSB launched last year for our client, Saris, makers of CycleOps bicycle trainers led to a 400 percent increase in web traffic to their site.  If they weren’t prepared for success, that could have brought down their server and lost them potential customers.  Fortunately they were prepared for success and were able to translate their success into a banner year for company sales.

The lesson learned is a good one.

In this world where things change in the blink of an eye, where a PR hit, or a celebrity endorsement or a chance YouTube video can change your fortunes overnight, it is critical that you have your next move mapped out.  If you don’t, you not only lose momentum and opportunity but you lose potential sales, customers, advocates and profits.

So, what about your brand?  Do you have a back-up plan in place for success?  Do you have a story about opportunity lost or leveraged?  We’d love to hear it.

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Critics and Creators

LSB on April 7, 2009 ·

There’s been a lot of hoopla lately around Wisconsin with the introduction of a new tagline for the State. The tagline, Live Like You Mean It, has met with the kind of reception usually reserved for people coming from Illinois in Hummers. In the interest of full disclosure, we didn’t create this tagline.

The interesting thing about the hoopla isn’t the grumbling and pessimism around it. I expect that from almost any tagline. After all, how many of us in this business have presented a tagline to a client only to have it die a fiery death? The thing is, those corporate taglines are shot down by a handful of people and then never see the light of day. This poor Wisconsin tagline was shown to the whole world. It didn’t have a chance. So, no, the pessimism wasn’t that surprising or interesting. What was interesting was how the Web and traditional media, like radio, conspired into the perfect storm. Disc jockeys threw the first pebble and then it turned into a good Old Testament stoning.

Web sites and blogs have popped up all over just piling on. The whole thing has exposed a part of human nature that is really ugly. The part where we’re like pack animals that turn immediately to attack when we sense weakness.

Why is this? Because it’s so much easier to be a critic than a creator. Creation means you put something out in the world for everyone to see. Creation is a building process and by its nature is open to critique. Critique is often a destructive process and like all destruction requires much less effort.

Less effort to be the critic with the snarky, brash and oh-so-rude comments. And the online world has created a place where it’s just a click away. No letters to write, no stamp to lick. No counting to ten before you flame something. In fact, it’s become quite fashionable to act this way. The anonymous nature of it means you can say things that you would never say face-to-face.

But let’s stop a second. After reading all the blogs, all the vituperous, venomous critique, did anyone offer a viable alternative? The answer is no. We’ve had Drink like you mean it. Eat cheese like you mean it. Plus 101 variations of _____________like you mean it. But nothing really helpful or frankly even cogent.

The fact is, you can count really great taglines on your fingers.  Just Do It was a head-scratcher when it first came out. “Just Do What?” people asked. People needed to see the advertising that explained it before they even understood it. Think different (from Apple) was roundly criticized for being ungrammatical by people who missed the point that it was meant to be ungrammatical, that was the different part. Duh! Once again, it was made clear by the advertising that defined it and ultimately transformed it from an ungrammatical command to a corporate mantra.

Like those iconic taglines, I suspect that Live Like You Mean It will begin to resonate and take hold once there is an advertising campaign that defines what it means.

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