7 Questions Raised by Situational Influence

Can understanding the situation improve our marketing?

Yes, but we've got work to do. 

The concept of 'Situational Influence' was recently shared by Jeff Wilson on the The Social CMO Blog. Using the analogy of solving the 'getting wet problem' caused by rain with either an umbrella, shelter or ark the article makes a good case for thinking about the decision making process based on the situation we find ourselves in.  

The basics keys on Situational Influence…

1. Situations directly affect action.
2. Situations rise in priority according to urgency.
3. Urgency drives immediacy of action
4. We are oblivious to all of it.

These raise some interesting questions for marketers that need more thinking than I'm incapable of doing today, but its a start of a new to do list.  

1. Should we be marketing to the situation and not the person?
2. Can influence be broken down into components that marketing can impact?
3. Are there dimensions of content that can be combined in various ways to help shape decisions?
4. Does the weight given one dimension of content differ across need states?
5. Are different channel, content combinations more effective at one time over another?
6. How does the fact that interactions occur unseen impact our media planning?
7. Should we think in terms of helping people choose rather than in specific responses?

What should we also be asking ourselves?

Revisiting the CRM to Social CRM Migration

Did CRM miss the point? 

CRM is (was) often described as 'delivering the right message, to right person, at the right time'.   But who decides on 'right'?   If the marketer is doing it, then it is probably wrong since we are clearly biased.   

Messages do not and can not stay on point in a world where we can all create, edit and publish our own versions. About the only type of content that is safe from being completely repurposed is promotional; incentives in terms of offers usually aren't changed by consumers (although they will try.) The aspirational or emotional content will clearly be used as a badge - positively or negatively - and forms the basis of personal expression. 

If consumers seek, stumble upon, actively receive and passively absorb messages the idea that 'we deliver' is also off the mark.  We're not the only delivery channel by a long-shot; nor do we have control once a message is out there.   The communal aspect of content suggests that sharing of recommendations etc. may be of equal or greater importance in consumer choice.   In fact, our customers are often more qualified to understand 'right person' than we are.

How do we rethink communicating in a world that is really "we don't know what is said, we don't know who got it, and we don't know when it was received?"

Digital is Obsolete

What will the digital world look like in 4 years?

An excellent piece on the growth of the digital life from Neo Labels shared by my colleague Ian Barkley. 

At some point we should probably just drop the adjective 'digital'.   We no longer talk about 'jet planes' or 'digital phones' - to us they're just planes or phones.   And when we drop the adjective we can think about bringing all content distribution vehicles together.   The fact that the smartphone makes everything interactive also helps.

I did see a magazine in that 'digital house' didn't I?