Wizard of Ads Partners

and the Smell of Fresh Paint

by Roy H Williams - Hear Memo

Commercially speaking, where are things happening in your town? Move to where the action is. Follow Best Buy, Home Depot, Starbucks and the other Big Boys who have already done the research.

Nothing draws a crowd like a crowd.

Media costs are escalating and the public is hiding from ads. These are just two of the reasons why a great location is more important today than ever before.

Expensive rent is the cheapest advertising your money can buy.

Is Walgreens able to afford great locations because they do a big volume, or do they do a big volume because they always secure great locations?

A high-visibility location communicates leadership. It implies that you do things better than your competitors.

The goal of advertising is to become familiar to your customer, to become part of their world so they think of you immediately when they need what you sell. All else being equal, customers choose the familiar over the unfamiliar. A great location makes you familiar to the public.

Are you in retail? Cut your yellow page ads dramatically or altogether. Add these dollars to your occupancy budget. (The yellow pages are a service directory. Don’t waste your retail exposure dollars there.)

Cheap rent is seductive and insidious. It ensnares even the brightest people.

Two weeks ago I was listening to a man tell me about his business when I abruptly told him that his problems were the result of a bad location. He hadn't yet told me anything about his location when I made the statement.

“What makes you think I have a bad location?”

“I knew the moment you told me which parts of your company were profitable and which were struggling.”

“But I didn’t think the location would matter for a business in my category. We’re a destination. We don’t need drive-by traffic.”

“How much do you spend for occupancy and how much are you spending for advertising?”

“Two thousand a month for rent. Seventy-five hundred a month on radio ads.”

“What would it cost to be where the action is?”

“About four thousand a month.”

“Take the extra two thousand from the ad budget. Four thousand for occupancy and fifty-five hundred on the radio will make you a lot more money.”

Your location tells the public what you believe about your company in your heart.

How proud is your location?

Roy H. Williams

PS – Real Estate developments are changing. Want to know how?

It's as easy as A.B.C.

By Roy H. Williams

You’re attracted to art
1. when it stands for something you believe in,
2. when it shows you a reflection of your own core values, or
3. gives you a glimpse of your inner face.

You're drawn to a brand for precisely the same reasons.

A cultural icon is a contemporary archetype, mass-appeal public art, the symbol of a worldview. Cultural icons embody the zeitgeist, the spirit of the age. They reveal the mind of the time.

Learn to read the choices of your customers and you'll be able to better serve them.

The cars your customers drive reflect choices they have made. Their clothing and accessories reflect additional choices. What do these choices tell you? They decorate their homes and offices with choices that virtually shout their innermost thoughts and feelings. Are you paying attention to any of this?

"Show me what a people admire, and I will tell you everything about them that matters." - Maggie Tufu, The Engines of God, page 398

A well-served customer is not easily stolen.

Bill Bernbach once said, “Nothing is so powerful as an insight into human nature, what compulsions drive a man, what instincts dominate his action, even though his language so often camouflages what really motivates him. For if you know these things about a man you can touch him at the core of his being."

We buy what we buy to remind ourselves – and tell the world around us – who we are.

"I am irresistible, I say, as I put on my designer fragrance. I am a merchant banker, I say, as I climb out of my BMW. I am a juvenile lout, I say, as I down a glass of extra strong lager. I am handsome, I say, as I don my Levi's jeans." – John Kay

Do you want to write persuasive ads, speeches and sermons? Use words and phrases that reflect your customer's core values. Connect to his or her worldview.

A knowledge of trends among your customers in
art (music, hairstyle, clothing, jewelry, etc.)
brands (cars, bikes, computers, magazines, etc.) and
heroes (the cultural icons they admire)
will be the only clues you need.

Your business has only 3 or 4 customers living at thousands of different addresses. Your marketing should be crafted to reflect the preferences of each of them.

The concepts I've shared today will help you better understand persona-based ad writing, an important element in Persuasion Architecture®, the marketing technique perfected by New York Times bestselling authors Jeffrey and Bryan Eisenberg.

Captain Jeff Sexton is a master of persona-based ad writing. He'll be one of your instructors when you come to Austin to learn how to Write for Radio and the Internet.

That class, August 26-27, is just 4 weeks away. Are you coming?

Business isn't going to get better until you get better at attracting it.

Come.

Aroo.

Roy H. Williams

6-Word Stories

"For sale:
baby shoes,
never worn."
– a famous 6-word story commonly attributed to Ernest Hemingway but it’s not likely he really wrote it.

"With bloody hands, I say good-bye.”
– a 6-word story by Frank Miller        

"Longed for him. Got him. Shit."
– a 6-word story by Margaret Atwood    

"machine. Unexpectedly, I'd invented a time"
– a 6-word story by Alan Moore        
     
"Tick-tock tick-tock tick-tick."
– a 6-word story by Neal Stephenson

Come to the Wild Fiction Workshop August 6-7.
We'll publish you.
(And your story gets to be longer than 6 words.)

And the winner is...

"In the average one-minute speech, the typical student uses 2.5 statistics. Only one student in ten tells a story. Those are the speaking statistics. The "remembering" statistics, on the other hand, are almost a mirror image: When students are asked to recall the speeches, 63 percent remember the stories. Only 5 percent remember any individual statistic."

Page 243, Made to Stick, Why some ideas survive and others die - by Chip Heath & Dan Heath

Are you making your ads and presentations memorable by telling stories?

"Any conversion process is like a leaky bucket - you pour water in, and water spurts out all the holes. You can keep adding more  and more water to the bucket, or you can patch up the holes. Clearly, patching the holes first makes much better sense. Create the delightful experience first then drive the traffic."

Waiting for Your Cat to Bark by Bryan & Jeffrey Eisenberg with Lisa T. Davis

Keep these five tips in mind when developing a campaign to cement your brand image.

By Roy Williams

"Brands are built on consistency, and the roots of consistency are patience and attention to detail. It's going to take a lot longer to build your brand than you feel it should."

Before we get started, let me warn you: This is going to hurt a little. Creating branding ads that resonate with your audience is certainly not the easiest thing you'll ever do. However, following my tips will help you simplify the process.

Having read hundreds of mission statements, I remain convinced that they're worthless as a source of brand essence. If you peel back the idealism and happy talk, you'll find that what companies say in their mission statement is quite different from what they actually do on a daily basis. This is also why most branding ads don't work. To be successful, your brand must be built on what you actually deliver.

Look at your policies, procedures and daily management practices: What behaviors are you measuring and rewarding? Examine your purchasing and pricing practices; these impact your brand far more than anything you might say in your ads. Finally, look at your décor and lighting through the eyes of your customers, and listen to the sound of your store through your customer's ears--you'll begin to glimpse the truth of your brand. Examine the soul of your company through your daily actions, not your beliefs, and you'll soon write branding ads that will ring like a bell.

The keys to successful brand writing are these:

1. Find out what your customers are saying about you. Bad ads are filled with phrases you like to say about yourself. Good ads are filled with what your customers say about you when you're not around. To be successful, your branding ads must sharply echo "the word on the street" about your company. Jeff Bezos, the CEO of Amazon, got it right when he said, "It has always seemed to me that your brand is formed primarily, not by what your company says about itself, but what the company does." You'll discover the truth behind your brand when you can explain why customers come back to you.

2. Substantiate your claims. Overstatement is passé. Today's customers are equipped with a sensitive hype-meter whose needle jumps at the slightest sign of "big talk." So be sure to offer proof to back up what you say, even if that proof lies only in the customers' past experience or in their long-held assumptions. Branding isn't just about the facts: People buy brands with their hearts as well as their heads. Brand loyalty is built on the fact that our purchases remind us--and tell the world around us--who we are.

3. Double the verbs; whack the adjectives. Search for evocative words. Sniff out overused phrases. Stimulate customers' minds with thoughts more interesting than the ones they were previously thinking.

Count the verbs in this famous branding ad I wrote a few years ago: "You are standing in the snow, five and one half miles above sea level, gazing at a horizon hundreds of miles away. It occurs to you that life here is very simple: You live, or you die. No compromises, no whining, no second chances. This is a place constantly ravaged by wind and storm, where every ragged breath is an accomplishment. You stand on the uppermost pinnacle of the earth. This is the mountain they call Everest. Yesterday it was considered unbeatable. But that was yesterday. Rolex believed Sir Edmund Hillary would conquer Mount Everest, so for him they created the Rolex Explorer. In every life there is a Mount Everest to be conquered. When you have conquered yours, you'll find your Rolex waiting patiently for you to come and pick it up at Justice Jewelers. I'm Woody Justice, and I've got a Rolex for you."

4. Link your "first mental image" and "last mental image." The psychological principles of primacy and recency mean that in any list, the first few words and the last few words will be the easiest to remember. Great ads focus on a single point and contain that point in both the opening and closing statements of the ad. When possible, link your last mental image to your first mental image, and you'll elevate customers' ability to recall your ad. The Rolex ad was focused on you and your accomplishments. The watch was merely a symbol of those accomplishments. "You are standing in the snow...I've got a Rolex for you."

5. Be consistent. The consistent use of the same colors and fonts is often called "branding," but true branding extends far beyond a visual style signature. The brand essence you've translated visually must now be translated into an auditory style signature in your radio and TV ads, as well as throughout your store. Does the auditory style signature of what your customer hears while "on hold" agree with the balance of your brand essence?

Brands are built on consistency, and the roots of consistency are patience and attention to detail. It's going to take a lot longer to build your brand than you feel it should. Here's the bottom line: If you think you're going to be able to measure brand progress at the end of 12 short months, you're dreaming. Brand development isn't measured in months, but in years. Twenty-four months is the soonest you can hope to begin seeing fruit from any brand orchard you might plant today.

Hey, I told you this was going to hurt a little. (Notice how the last mental image-pain--is linked to the first mental image in this column?)

Good luck with your brand.

By Roy H. Williams

(Uh-oh, am I about to light an email fire I can't put out?)

Hear the memo, read by the Wizard himself. 

Here is where the ad money goes in Australia. 

Traditional wisdom says, “Advertise in the newspaper. Everyone reads the newspaper. There are lots of radio stations but only one newspaper.”

The problem with traditional wisdom is that it’s usually more tradition than wisdom.

Take a look at the chart at the top of this page and you’ll see that the total, combined ad revenues for
(1.) the internet with all its banners, pop-ups, co-registration schemes and Google Adwords accounts, plus
(2.) the ad revenues from all the billboards sprinkled across the 3.54 million square miles of these United States, plus
(3.) the combined revenues of all of America’s radio stations
is less than the combined ad revenues of America’s few hundred newspapers.

I hid a big surprise for you in last week’s rabbit hole. Did you see it?

Let me summarize for you what it said:

If you
(1.) make exactly the same offer on radio as in the newspaper, and
(2.) spend exactly the same amount of money with each media,
(3.) across precisely the same span of time,
radio outperforms newspaper nearly 14 to 1.

As I explained in the detailed report, we fell into our discovery by accident.  Our original plan was to buy newspaper ads since we assumed the newspaper would reach a larger percentage of our target than any other media.

Our assumptions were based on a faulty perception. That’s traditional wisdom for you.

When our test indicated that radio was outperforming newspaper nearly 14 to 1, I began to wonder, “With all the billions of dollars spent in media each year, why has no one ever comparison-tested the media in a series of controlled experiments?”

There I go, assuming again. A bit of research led me to uncover a study conducted 37 years ago (1971) by the Research Committee of the National Advisory Council on Radio in Education. On page 155 I found, “For the test, the manufacturer of a shampoo selected territories in which his sales had been equal and satisfactory over a period of years. An advertising campaign with increased appropriations was prepared, and at the end of the test period, sales increases were used as the gauge of the merit of the medium. In territory No. 1, where newspaper advertising was used, the sales were increased by 3 percent; in territory No. 2, where radio only was used, they were increased 40 percent.”

Gosh. 40 percent versus 3 percent is nearly 14 to 1, right?

Why has there never been a scientifically controlled, nationwide test funded by the radio stations of America?

Frankly, I was comforted to learn that my organization was the second, rather than the first entity to discover that radio outproduces newspaper nearly 14 to 1.  If we had been the only people ever to discover that little nugget of information, I would have been plagued by doubt.  I'm big enough to admit that my confidence was bolstered by the fact that another organization arrived at virtually the identical conclusion when I was just 13 years old.

But the greater question remains,
“Why has there been no scientifically controlled test?”

I ask the advertising agencies spending all those billions,
“Why has there been no scientifically controlled test?”

I ask the major advertisers of America,
“Why has there been no scientifically controlled test?”

And I ask you the same question in this week’s e-Poll. 
We’re anxious to hear your theory.

PS.  Today's rabbit hole is too weird for words.
        I definitely wouldn't go down it if I were you. (If you are game, click the image at the top of this article.)

By Michele Miller, Wizard Partner

1.  Buy smart advertising that will get you the most Frequency.

2.  Re-invest your growing revenue into an expansion of advertising.

3.  If people think your ads are annoying, that’s not a bad thing.

Chapters 44, 58, and 59 in Secret Formulas of the Wizard of Ads discuss in great detail what it takes to create an effective long-term branding campaign on radio and/or TV.

In essence, sleep is the great eraser of memory – in order for yours to be the business that customers think of first and foremost when needing your product or service, they must come in contact with your ad approximately *three times per week. In the advertising business, it’s called a “Frequency” of 3.

*From the Editor: We are assuming the ad is of average relevance. An ad we rate as a 1.0. The higher the relevance or stickiness of an ad, the less frequency is required. This is where a strong core message and good writing makes up for lack of ad budget.

As a Wizard of Ads partner, I work day-in and day-out using this principle with my own clients, to great success.  Yet it was only recently that I became the puppet rather than the puppeteer:

In the last ten years, the population of greater metropolitan Phoenix (AZ) has grown from 1.3 million to 3.8 million.  There are literally thousands of realtors, but only one who has had the smarts to make a valley-wide impact.

As an independent realtor, Russell Shaw started advertising approximately five years ago with what had to have been the most miniscule of budgets.  Instead of pouring his money into newspaper advertising (the traditional media of realtors nationwide), he chose television, which can be expensive.  But Russell was smart.  He figured out that the best use of his budget was to buy one ad per night during the 5 o’clock news hour.  Every single night, that one ad would air at the same time.  And since folks tend to have a favorite local news network, he was repeatedly planting that seed in the same minds.

The message in Russell’s ads is acceptable; Russell himself is annoying.  I’m talking a syrupy delivery with a nasal voice quality that has caused me to dash for the remote more times than I can count.  I can hurry all I want to and switch channels, but guess what?  Over the last five years, Russell has slowly re-invested his profit into buying the same ad on all the other networks.  Apparently I can run, but I can’t hide.  I’ve come to hate the Russell Shaw ads.

So the other day I was talking with a friend who’s thinking of moving to Phoenix.  At one point during the conversation she said, “What I really need is a good realtor.”

My response?  “Well, there’s Russell Shaw…”

Points to remember:

1.  Buy smart advertising that will get you the most Frequency.  Even if all you can afford is a monthly postcard, make the message smart and keep sending the regular postcard out to the same group of people.  Embed your message into their brain then wait for their moment of need.

2.  Re-invest your growing revenue into an expansion of advertising.  If you’ve achieved maximum impact with your current mode of advertising, don’t abandon it – add on to it.  Russell Shaw is the perfect example of giving a small ad budget the power of a jackhammer.

3.  If people think your ads are annoying, that’s not a bad thing.  If you get calls and emails saying that your ad is annoying (ads in poor taste are another matter altogether), it means you’re making an impact.  And that ain’t bad.  Would you rather have an ad that leaves people remembering who you are and what you do, or a middle-of-the-road ad that the brain ignores altogether?  I’ll take annoying any day.

When you have advertising constraints, go for Frequency – done right, it hits the mark every time.