“Ah, a sea bass repast.”

A Tasty Tweet

This spring I broadcast a Tweet expressing my unmitigated joy over a delectable dish of fish - sea bass to be exact. Moved to the point of illustration, I added a hieroglyph depicting my meal - a fish graphic fashioned from alphanumeric characters:

Turns out Paul Ocepek (@paulocepek), founder of ShirtPizza.com (@shirtpizza), was fishing in my Twitter stream just then.

An Unexpected Treat

Paul Tweeted a hint that he might add the typographic fish to the ShirtPizza product line. When he did so, he sent me a sample tee. The above video clip captures the Brainstorm “unboxing” of the unexpected gift.

A Takeaway

One-to-one relational marketing concepts are still a wise play for today’s brand marketers, but fortify them with WOM (word of mouth), Search, feeds, and a voice in the online community to bring one-to-many reach to what was once a private exchange.

In developing and launching a community-inspired product, ShirtPizza broadened not only their product line and their reach, but their customer base as well. We’ve been fishing around the ShirtPizza site, now maybe you will, too.

His mom sends oranges
(and off brand fig bars) Yum!

Our latest list of inane musings from the Brainstorm office white board:

Top 20 Reasons Why Hiroki Should Be Employee Of The Month

1. He is not data, he is action
2. His heart is not that of a procrastinator but rather a concatenator
3. He’s a real gem, a hep cat and a mod perl
4. I’m the most humble (Just a month?)
5. Because Linda declined the honor
6. It’s logical
7. He always washes his hands after using the office washrooms
8. Because he represents all nationalities
9. He’s the server savant
10. He could use the $1,000,000 bonus check
11. He’s AWESOME
12. He’s my HERO (Hiro)
13. He always fixes my computer
14. He is only 50% complete (as a person)
15. Two mints in one: He’s a programmer AND a web developer
16. He has great hair
17. He doesn’t grocery shop during working hours
18. It would make his mother proud
19. His mom sends oranges (and off brand fig bars) Yum!
20. He is “ki” to our organization

See the entire board
Image: kfisto

“No great marketing decisions
have ever been made on quantitative data.”

John Scully
Former PepsiCo president, former Apple CEO

The Tree of Knowledge

Marketers commonly use decision trees to assess features and benefits to determine what is most important to consumers. Quantitative results can be obtained by asking respondents a sequence of very specific questions that branch out using if/then methodology.

Unreasoned Response

In a focus group years ago, an outspoken man was asserting himself by speaking out of turn, disparaging the process, and scoffing at the premise that brand had any bearing on his buying decision, ultimately proclaiming, “I’m just here for the money.”

“Control” Group

Experienced focus group moderators realize if unaddressed, dominant individuals can establish control, affect the group and ultimately hinder true and useful input. The deft moderator began to ask a series of if/then comparative questions that challenged the man to reconsider his inherent assumptions. In essence, the moderator drove him through a decision-making process to help him formulate reasoned positions.

Once back on topic the naysayer became the moderator’s most vigilant and attentive advocate - offering considered and definitive feedback. The rest of the group followed suit.

“The only relevant test of the
validity of a hypothesis is comparison
of prediction with experience.”

Milton Friedman
Nobel Prize-winning economist

Overrated Ratings

Similar principles apply to common online qualitative tools such as the five-star, numerical value, or Likert scales used to value or measure a respondent’s level of agreement with a given statement. Although quick and simple for respondents to complete, unlike decision trees, these methods ask subjects to value an attribute or preference without any measure of comparison, which lacks objectivity and is prone to positive or negative bias when respondents rank nearly everything of high (or low) importance.

Minimize Error

In What Do Customers Really Want on the Harvard Business Review site, Eric Almquist and Jason Lee explore Maximum Difference scaling. An extension of the Method of Paired Comparisons where subjects select a preference from two choices, MaxDiff asks respondents to identify their highest and lowest preference from a subset of attributes or statements. Multiple subsets are tested as part of a series. Almquist, a partner at Bain & Company, talks through one MaxDiff study on the relative importance of restaurant attributes in this presentation.

Asking respondents to rate selections is helpful and informative, but requiring them to decide between selections forces them to weigh answers. It inspires considered input, and generates more defined, useful and valuable feedback while eliminating undecided responses and mitigating positive and negative bias.

Maximize Outcome

Qualitative research adds relevance and validity to quantitative findings. In brand marketing research, consider your premise and process carefully from the outset to limit risk and maximize return. Remember, research often drives strategy, strategy drives spending, and spending drives outcomes – both good and bad.

Let well-considered decision trees help you branch out in the right direction.

image: pkeyn

Wash our socks
in his oatmeal bowl

Our latest list of inane musings from the Brainstorm office white board:

Top 20 Favorite Things To Do While Bob is Gone on Break

1. Lunch, on Brainstorm!
2. Come up with 20 favorite things to do while Bob is gone on break
3. Give his XM Radio some much-deserved downtime
4. Play Baggo in the back hallway
5. Disorient him, organize his desk
6. Eat out of his oatmeal bowl
7. Sit in his chair, sleep in his bed until you find the one that’s just right
8. Enjoy coffee in liquid form, not solid
9. Bob was gone?
10. Everyone pick a red PMS chip (or hexadecimal equivalent) - whoever’s is closest to Bob’s skin tone when he returns wins
11. Call his mom
12. Movie Marathon Monday
13. Click his pen.
14. Wash our socks in his oatmeal bowl
15. Sleep in
16. Call Dartmouth, see if they still need him for that goalie position
17. Replace his MAC with a Dell
18. Unscrew the bolts on his chair
19. Guess how many pens are buried on his desk
20. Miss his smiling face and upbeat attitude
21. Whistle

See the entire board
Image: Melissa Hennessy

Unbox (tr.v.)
To remove from a box.

Unboxing my Unsleeving

Top Canadian digital marketer and social media maven Kate Trgovac introduced me to “Unboxing,” the practice of recording and sharing online the opening of a package arriving via post.

In addition to her roles as President of LintBucket Media, Publisher of Canada’s One Degree and the ever-popular My Name is Kate blogs, Kate maintains a top-ranked Squidoo lense that reviews laptop bags, sleeves and backpacks.

Inadvertent Angling

So, in the spirit of unboxed reciprocation, I’m posting this picture of the BBP Bags laptop sleeve I just received from Kate. She sent me the sleeve after reading a comment about my daughter’s penchant for the color pink and bags in general that I left on the Flickr picture associated with her Squidoo review.

For the record, I wasn’t angling for the laptop sleeve, but her generous offer will net me a number of dad points with my daughter. Here’s to that, and to Kate.

Get Friendly

Your brand marketing takeaway? Get involved. Stay alert. Reach out. Act. Friendlies can be very friendly and help propagate insights about who you are, your brand and your message.

Heck, they might even write about you.