This year, Knotice was excited to have space on the show floor. We also sponsored, designed and created the mobile site for CTAM in NYC pre-show promotion and “at the show” information

On Thursday, our own Bryce Marshall (speaking) shared the stage with Robert Ladd of Charter Communications – part of a well-received m-commerce case study presentation that featured Charter’s’ use of the mobile channel to drive sales and improve customer relationships. (Keep your eyes peeled for more nuggets of detailed information and statistics from the case study soon!)

Overall, it was nice to see the cable industry embracing what digital marketing has to offer. Other sessions ranged from targeting specific audiences to social media, to using cloud technologies to engage consumers, and more. Many thanks to Frank Sheridan and the others at CTAM for putting together such a great event.

Direct Marketing as a Strategy

The holistic view of marketing channels was a core theme of one of the more interesting sessions, titled “Direct Marketing as a Strategy (Not a Tactic)”. The speakers and examples focused on some channel-specific iterations of direct marketing, both offline and online. And again and again, they reinforced the foundational message of the session, that direct marketing has a rightful seat at the strategic marketing table alongside branding and awareness messaging across broadcast channels.

Simply put, direct marketing is strategically important for cable and broadband marketers, and the time is right to institute direct-marketing disciplines and capabilities at a level above the tactical. Why? Because direct marketing represents a crossroads of two fundamental concepts:

1. Addressable messaging, to an individual or household
2. Data-centric targeting and optimization

So when you think about these two concepts as they apply to cable and broadband businesses, a few other important points come to mind:

1. Cable and broadband marketers have a fantastic luxury: ongoing business relationships providing plentiful data about their customers; and a finite, defined audience of prospects.
2. Direct marketing goes way beyond the postal address, now extending to the email address, the mobile phone number, the Web browser cookie, and even the IP address of the set-top box. Because of this, addressable messaging can be truly diverse, comprehensive and immersive.
3. Customer interactions across all of these addressable channels can be measured and analyzed to capture even more valuable data.

The Importance of a Multichannel Marketing Database

But for direct marketing to rise out of the fog of tactical emphasis and into the realm of marketing strategy, an important piece is missing: the multichannel marketing database. Without the comprehensive marketing database solution behind all of this targeting and messaging, critical communications may misfire and the chance to connect based on customer data learned will be lost. A system of record is necessary, where customer and prospect data sits alongside cross-channel activity and response metrics to provide a full understanding of what consumer actions have been taken, the value of these actions, and how to replicate positive and profitable experiences more consistently, and with lower overall cost.

Conceptually, the application of direct marketing as a strategy is long overdue in cable and broadband marketing. However, direct marketing cannot be elevated to a strategic level simply by manufacturing more direct marketing tactics across more channels. Conversely, the intelligence, capability and measurement must be consolidated. The implementation of a direct marketing strategy first requires the underlying foundation to make it powerful and efficient – and this is precisely the role of the multichannel marketing database.

Think about the products offered by MSOs – cable television, Internet access and phone. MSOs segment and target their offers to their customers based on service level they currently have, and what they might also need based on serviceability attributes. But MSOs have access to additional web analytics and email analytics data that, when combined with service level attributes, make it possible to identify customers entering specific buying cycles.

In short, a customer’s service level can be used to determine the “offer strategy” and what to market to them when. If a current subscriber has Internet and HD video, they are likely serviceable for telephone and eligible for video upgrades in the form of premiums, tiers and DVR.

When Web and email analytical data are integrated, a window of opportunity opens up.

• The customer regularly opens their email newsletters and On Demand email promotions.
• The customer visits the customer portal weekly to view upcoming On Demand releases.
• The customer has visited the “premiums” information page of the corporate website within the last month.

This data suggests that it’s a good time to change the direct digital marketing focus. It’s a good time to incorporate a video up-sell offer, which can then drive equivalent monthly revenue over a telephone cross-sell offer strategy, for example.

Here are sample steps to change the marketing focus using direct digital channels:

• The scheduled customer email newsletters and On-Demand feature promotions include dynamic content, reinforcing the value of premium networks and DVR technology for serious movie buffs.
• More scheduled and triggered promotional offers focus on multi-room DVR and HD upgrades over telephone service cross-sell.
• An adjustment in offer strategy for this customer is reflected in targeted premiums and DVR offers across the corporate website and customer portal.

Having easy access to data makes it easy to offer effective, relevant messages to customers at the moment they are most receptive. It’s the data that makes the difference – and the software to power the process for a robust direct digital marketing strategy.

AT&T is, of course, claiming that they are jumping on to the high road first. The company, and ad agency BBDO (Omnicom), introduced a new campaign during last weekend’s Master’s entitled, “Rethink Possible.” Interestingly, rather than promoting solely wireless services AT&T is also grouping together its various services, from wireless capabilities to UVerse. Many believe Verizon will respond in kind by promoting their wireless capabilities alongside its FIOS – especially considering the news that Verizon has changed advertising agencies.

Beware the specter of a truce. The entertaining and aggressive Marco-Polo-style dueling campaigns may be retired, but the competitive spirit lies dormant only long enough to allow the public to recharge. Like political campaigns with plenty of negativity, consumers grow weary of too much negativity in their advertising. AT&T and Verizon are wise to put the brakes on for the upcoming handful of quarters. The Fall promises plenty of contentious political advertising as mid-term elections loom in November. The carriers are wise to grant the public a brief respite. However, I would not be surprised to see the re-emergence of more aggressive advertising from the carriers in one year’s time.

The constant carrier jousting signals two important developments for direct digital marketing. First, the importance of owning the most mind and market share in mobile marketing has never been higher. The more customers each has, the more power they have to control which mobile marketing campaigns are approved or not approved. The second important development is in how each company is promoting its multi-channel services at one time. Like the direct digital marketing software landscape, where the best software delivers multi-channel capabilities in one platform, the battle that once waged exclusively between wireless capabilities may begin to look more like a battle between large MSOs. Verizon is promoting FIOS, and AT&T is promoting UVerse, as part of an overall effort to dominate households, rather than individual bills within a household.

Consumers, like marketers, respond to efficiency. Pushing the efficiency message makes a lot of sense for these two huge companies. As consumers are thinking more about consolidation – bundling features and bills together with one provider – marketers must do the same. This advertising battle is a perfect representation of what is happening with direct digital marketing. Sure, mobile marketing is important as an individual communications channel. But combine its power and data in the same software platform that delivers email and dynamic Web content and true efficiency and consolidation is born, the type of improvements that consumers clearly respond to.

The question begs, marketers: What are you doing to be more efficient and respond better to consumers?

Cable providers are in a rush to figure out the logistics of making programs available to customers not just through TV but also through computers and mobile devices. The idea is to create the same wealth of content customers receive for their monthly cable expenses, but make it available across all three of the screens customers use most. The goal is a completely channel-neutral content accessibility strategy.

The potential user experience is compelling, but the consumer will not patiently wait – the development of this experience has to be a top priority. A generation of consumers under 18 already spends more time with Hulu, YouTube, and their iPhones than they do with a TV. The cable TV brands we know well are virtually meaningless to this generation. The youngest consumers will not look to or accept content from brands with which they have no association.

With a shift in the logistics of content delivery inevitable the consumer needs time to adjust their perceptions about how a cable company delivers content. The average consumer does not associate Time Warner Cable or Comcast with “online episodes of How I Met Your Mother or Deadliest Catch.”

Bottom line, the general consumer needs to undergo behavior modification. The cable companies need to build awareness, create smooth transitions from one screen to the other, and guide customers to adoption. Pointing customers to the right content at the right time manufactures the ideal customer experience.

The expansion of content availability provides one very distinct, potential opportunity: Customers must be logged in to access content. This enables a completely trackable media environment where each access point and interaction provides a wealth of data that is mined to identify behavior patterns and preferences, and then develop insights to create a more dynamic and user-friendly experience.

Direct digital marketing is essential to the behavior modification process. Direct digital communications are ideal because they allow marketers to focus on the three devices through which customers are consuming content: the computer, a mobile device, and even interactive TV.

Behavior modification is about creating opportunities for the customer to find, explore, experience, and embrace a new content and technology relationship. The flexibility to manage timely communications across digital channels is possible thanks to a wealth of customer data to drive segmentation, targeting, and event-triggered messaging.

Here are a few quick examples of how smart direct digital marketing strategies expedite the mass adoption of a trackable, user-friendly media experience:

• Timely text messages remind a customer to view a favorite sports highlight show while waiting for a flight
• Emails alert a customer that episodes of a favorite program are available for viewing online
• Dynamic and interactive TV content promoting new Fall programs that appeal to a customer based on past viewing habits
• Automated email or text messages remind customers of unwatched programs and movies on their DVR (hint: these should be sponsored!)

The current competitive and platform challenges for the cable operators are real. But the opportunities for a “TV Everywhere” concept to deepen relationships with subscribing customers are immense. Direct digital marketing plays a critical role in making the dream of a content-consuming utopia a reality.

Marketers at CTAM are looking for wins – from the big, mountain-sized wins as well as the quick, daily wins. The search for the easy marketing wins is why is it great to talk about the value of and straightforward solutions for onsite targeting and testing.

The guys in the high corner offices can strategize about media platforms, and the content distribution rights, what is free and what is paid for, and the disappearing young male TV viewer. The marketers in the trenches worry about providing relevant and timely experiences to customers and prospects through the corporate website, microsites, and landing pages.

The technology, tools and concepts are straightforward with onsite targeting and testing – no high corner office types needed here. The IT team deploys some simple code snippets on the website and then they are out of the equation (the math is simpler when IT is not a factor).

Get those marketing synapses firing and quickly recall all of the straightforward, undeniably successful marketing and communications practices that are employed across direct mail, email, telemarketing, etc. Include those basic tenants in the web experience across the .com site and .net customer portal. IT is the 101 things like:

• Is this website visitor a customer? If so, talk to them like their business is valued and offer them more opportunities – include offers for services they do not already have, not offers on those they already do have (for less than what they are paying now).
• If they are a customer, in addition to seeing the great offers for additional services, perhaps they want a simple “Thank You” and a small but valuable demonstration of your affection, like a coupon for a free movie or a gift card to a local restaurant.
• What services are available for prospective customers in a given footprint (and which are not available in their town, yet… but will be soon)?
• Which offers are most compelling across demographics groups? Is it the savings and convenience of a bundle, the enviable speeds of the broadband Internet, or the economy of the basic, “lite” packages?
• Are there special offers that are just for that customer’s area? Can the website provide this information without requiring a zip code first?
• In those battleground markets, where customers have seen their neighbors switch to AT&T and Verizon… and now they have serious doubts about the quality and value of their service, too… they are on the fence. Some positive reinforcement of their purchase decision is helpful to get them off the fence and keep them off?

Yes, the website can be the frontline tool to satisfy customers and prospects needs with the right offers, the right information, and the right communications at precisely the right time. This is what onsite targeting enables. Lots of little, daily wins adding up to one very big thing: success.

The right solution leverages great software and enables both Operators and Programmers to easily and efficiently manage tune-in reminders and alerts for dozens or hundreds of events (On-Demand movie releases, new episodes airing, etc.) across multiple categories (Action movies vs. Romantic comedies) delivered to their opted-in customers… automatically.

There are three basic steps:

1. Establish simple but powerful templates for the opt-in landing page (where customers select which types of reminders they would like to receive) and for the reminder emails. The email templates should include all standard information, with room set aside for dynamic insertion of event details and images.
2. Compile the event information – the movies, pay-per-view events or episode air dates – into a simple excel spreadsheet. This can include all of the upcoming events for a week, a month – even a year! The file is uploaded into the software (check out a screencast about this entire process here). The event information should include not only the day/time of the event or program airing, but also the 160-characters for the SMS, and specific images and copy for the email.
3. Once the event file is uploaded, the software solution dynamically updates the opt-in Web page with the new programs and events, so consumers can opt-in for various event reminders. The consumer can also select their preferred communication – email, text message, or both!

As the date and time of the scheduled event approaches, the consumer receives the appropriate reminder – email, text message, or both. With a month’s worth of event details established in advance, it is easy to automate a month’s worth of timely, impactful reminders.

Tune-in promotions are certainly nothing new. What is unique is delivering a fantastic consumer experience – giving consumers the option of what reminders to receive, and how they would like to receive them – while creating real cost and resource efficiencies for the marketer. It is as easy as 1-2-3.

Applying their talents for creating compelling sales messages, calls-to-action, and fluid, fun, and addictive user interfaces, creativeLIFT delivered an exceptional application. For our part, Knotice’s brilliant development team and technical project managers provided a robust infrastructure tapping into several of Charter’s systems to allow for the order customization and shopping cart checkout. The total package is comprehensive but still flexible, with iterations used today for landing pages and sundry other tasks and applications.

And, about that resounding success. The Bundle Builder application proved its value to the consumer – and to the client’s bottom line – with some enviable statistics indicating true lift. (Stats are from the spring of 2009.)

• 8% conversion rate, representing a 400% lift over the legacy buyflow application
• 83% of orders are for greater amounts than average orders with the legacy buyflow
• 28% increase in products per order, from 1.85 to 2.37

The Bundle Builder is a perfect example of how a superior concept can act as firm bedrock for organizational collaboration and execution, transforming an online experience from a liability to an asset. Most importantly, the application and its tremendous success illustrate how a fantastic consumer shopping experience can make all the difference.

It is no surprise that the Bundle Builder application is a finalist for the prestigious Mark Awards, which recognize marketing and sales achievement within the Cable, Broadband and Telecommunications industry. The Mark Awards will be presented Monday, October 26th, during the CTAM Summit in Denver.

We have our fingers crossed, but delivering tremendous bottom-line results while delivering a consumer-friendly experience seems to be the win-win scenario that defines marketing excellence.

Are Cable and Broadband companies recession-proof?
As much as any industry, possibly. It’s interesting to note a lot of the commentary coming out of the credit crunch and global economic crisis indicates (though not necessarily in a positive tone) that many households will keep their cable turned-on right up to the moment they are foreclosed… or bailed out. In the emerging climate of bailouts, what’s the incentive to cut household budgets – especially for a product like cable or internet access?

Look for families to bunker down this winter and budget their time and money as media consumers, not materials consumers.

Who owns the relationship with the content consumers?
The next year may be very telling as to whether there is a shift in how content producers – Programmers – get digital content into the hands of the consumer. Marketing consultant Jeffrey Rayport respectfully challenged Operators to improve the ways they offer digital content to their customers, to improve the customer experience that “enables users to create the context” for video-based online content consumption. I don’t believe that Programmers will wait forever for Operators to improve the experience and will quickly discover their own ways to distribute and monetize the content. The reality is that the strongest content brands in digital content belong to the Programmers like HBO, Showtime, FX, and Discovery.

The lines between content creation and distribution are blurring, and if Operators can’t improve the experience they will lose the rights to place their brand on the consumption of this content.

Are the “3 Screens” competitive channels… or collaborative?
A gut reaction may be to assume that interaction with one of these screens poaches eyeballs from another. However this assumption is not confirmed by recent research and observation of content-hungry consumers. We are entering a brave new era. (Green energy conservation advocates avert your eyes.) Applications are on and drawing power and content simultaneously. As I write this post I am watching the Cleveland Cavs in HD, running Outlook and Firefox on my laptop and have my smartphone by my side (I’ll be Tweeting in a bit).

An established generation of consumers, me included, is very comfortable consuming content through multiple devices simultaneously – with no consideration of the channel other than to evaluate which content is appropriately consumed over which screen. This precisely is what Jeffrey Rayport means by context.

The Operator may own distribution right now through the TV and Internet (and soon the mobile phone, for many Operators building their own wireless networks). However, this ownership is not a birthright. As consumers look for a friendlier, more flexible digital content experience there will be no loyalties to the distribution brands – only the content. Right now, it’s the job of interactive marketers to provide as many access points to content as possible, while remaining loyal to the needs of the distributors and helping them improve the content consumption experience.

Mobile

I always say there are two truths about Mobile marketing: 1) it’s been around for a while, and 2) nobody is really sure what to do with it. Beyond that, it’s a crapshoot.

Marketers are intrigued, and others are compelled, if only by marketing peer pressure, to squeeze a square peg in a round hole. Trying to figure out how to make mobile work for their company, to engage their customers with mobile, is an ongoing challenge. Having worked with MSOs – and mobile – for years, it’s true that there is little low-hanging fruit for mobile adoption. But, once the MSO starts thinking in terms of delivering true value to their customers through the immediacy of the mobile channel, the floodgates of opportunity open up.

MSOs have a huge opportunity to promote their Movies On Demand, Pay Per View and even new programming through mobile text messaging, allowing the customer to request an alert sent to their phone within hours or minutes of the programming event. This can influence eyeballs…and incremental revenue. Perhaps more compelling is using the mobile text message to confirm the details of an installation appointment (again, just hours before the appointment. If they aren’t home at that point… they better get moving!) or to provide breaking news on service outages. When the timeliness of the message is the most vital component, there is no better channel than mobile. The MSO needs to work harder to define the message and the valuable content that customers need and want in this very timely manner. Any content that does not meet these criteria will not only be patently ignored, it will also compromise the value of the channel for the marketer.

User-Generated Content and Emerging Social Networking Channels

MSO “users” (i.e., the customers) have been generating vast amounts of online content for years – unfortunately this is primarily in the form of vitriolic forum posts, blogs and viral emails and videos (the napping cable technician made famous on YouTube, for instance). Recently many MSOs have learned the valuable lesson: This content is being generated anyway, you may as well stop ignoring it. Leaders like Comcast are using Twitter to interact positively with their customers in a very personal, 1-to-1 manner…with positive results. Other MSOs are actively soliciting feedback from customers through dedicated blog spaces, social communities, and through existing customer-interface points like email newsletters. It’s apparent that if an MSO enters this arena with thoughtful and genuine interest in interacting with customers and addressing their issues, the results are overwhelmingly positive.

Database Enhancement

This should fall in the category of “no-brainer”; but, for many years, the concept of an online marketing database has been an afterthought. The smart marketers see tremendous value in taking relatively easy steps to build an online marketing database that is wider, deeper and richer, allowing them to communicate with customers and prospects at the highest levels of relevancy.

• Email appends are incredibly valuable to fill in the gaps in the email database – acquiring valid addresses for non-HSD households, and primary email addresses for the HSD customers.
• Opt-in campaigns help fill in the email database gaps even further, especially within the universe of serviceable non-customers. If an MSO’s website is only converting a small percent of visitors who are serviceable non-customers, don’t you want those visitors to opt-in to receive special offers and news?
• Offline initiatives – train CSRs to capture that email address. We’ve seen a couple MSOs make this a top-tier priority, investing seriously in training and incentives for call center representatives. What helps more than training? Providing the CSR with legitimate reasons to ask for the email address – such as the promise of a receipt/confirmation email of the customer’s order or service appointment.
• Customer knowledge is critical, and a marketer can never have too much. MSOs who append additional data to their known customer records such as demographic or psychographic models, create buckets based on personas and other data points, or layer predictive models on top of their segmentation tactics to gain a decided advantage in driving more conversions with fewer overall impressions.

Do you believe there are more trends than what I’ve listed? What are they?