Wizard of Ads Clay Campbell

Powerful Ads are Like a Rhinoceros

"Move out of your comfort zone. You can only grow if you are willing to feel awkward and uncomfortable when you try something new."

-- Brian Tracy

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This week I would like to introduce you to a relatively new Wizard of Ads Partner. Tom Waneck. I have watched him do his presentations and read his blog posts and he is excellent in his niche. Please read over his column and watch the video - it is very enlightening and also very funny.

-- Clay

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Powerful Ads are Like a Rhinoceros
By Tom Wanek

Gair Maxwell recently shared this outrageous video (below) that parodies the pitfalls of group decision-making when designing a 'Stop' sign. Watch the video. It's hilarious.

Gair also observes that designers and consultants should have the courage to stand up to the bastardization of their work. And clients should realize when to back-off and allow the design process to unfold.

Both excellent points.

But there's another lesson to be learned from watching this video: Messages are more persuasive when they make a single powerful point.

My partner Roy H. Williams says, "It is foolish to believe a single ad can ever tell the entire story. The most effective, persuasive and memorable ads are those most like a rhinoceros. They will each make a single point very powerfully. An advertiser with seventeen different things to say should commit to a campaign of at least seventeen different ads, with each ad being given sufficient repetition to accomplish retention in the mind of the prospect."

Are you blunting your message by cramming too many points into your ads?

If so, your message is like a porcupine.

And as I pointed out in an earlier post, the conscious brain can juggle only seven pieces of data at any one moment. Throwing too much information at your customer will cause a seventeen car pileup on the persuasion super-highway.

So stop and remember this: Advertise like a rhinocerous. Make a single powerful point. Period.

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Perhaps now would be a good time to have a complimentary meeting with a Wizard of Ads Partner. Links to their websites and blogs are listed down the right side of The Wizard Times. Hundreds of their articles with free insightful advice can been seen at www.americansmallbusiness.com 2009 would be a great year to attend a class at the Wizard Academy 21st Century Business School in Austin Texas. What is the Wizard Academy?

Is Your Store Smiling?

"Perseverance is a great element of success. If you only knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody."

-- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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Dave Young teaches a class at the Wizard Academy in Austin Texas on blogging and websites. He is a reserved, quiet, brilliant, kind of guy. He's a friend, and a fellow Wizard of Ads Partner. This article interested me enough to look more closely at my Kentucky Opry Theatre front and start making some changes.

Sometimes all a business needs to do is to come up with an idea. Sometimes one idea can change things for you. Sometimes one idea can make you a small fortune. And... I love the idea of a smile.

Be sure and Watch the American Express YouTube video. I love the master touch of Yo Yo Ma playing the Prelude from Bach's Suite # 1. I will give that a big SMILE.

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Is Your Store Smiling?
By Dave Young

As a postscript to Monday's post on Sniffing for Market Share, it occurred to me that one more thing you could do when you evaluate the look (sight) of your business is to watch for smiles.

That's right...smiles.

Rolex has always required dealers to display their watches with the hands showing 10:10 because it looks like a smiling face.

The current TV ad for American Express drives it home as well. The first half of the ad is a bunch of everyday shots that we interpret as unhappy faces. The second half is full of smiles.

Can you make your storefront smile? Are any of you competitors smiling brighter than you?

Want to see more? Check out the Faces in Places Facebook page, this search on Flickr, or just do your own search.

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Perhaps now would be a good time to have a complimentary meeting with a Wizard of Ads Partner. Links to their websites and blogs are listed down the right side of The Wizard Times. Hundreds of their articles with free insightful advice can been seen at www.americansmallbusiness.com 2009 would be a great year to attend a class at the Wizard Academy 21st Century Business School in Austin Texas. What is the Wizard Academy?

Don't Stick It In Their Mouth - How to Re Tweet

One of the people that I think always has good posts on their blog is Scott Stratten at http://www.Un-Marketing.com.
In my email box this week, came this short note from Scott. I was curious because of all the hoopla about Facebook and Twitter tweets. Just this week, a group of Wizard Partners, on a conference call, debated the merits of business owners tweeting and doing Facebook. If you do use the social media or you are curious. Scott has some do's and don'ts.

Howdy Clay,
People don't realize the harm they can do by commenting on a tweet, check out my new blog post for you about the issue:

Don't Stick It In Their Mouth - How to ReTweet
By Scott Stratten

ReTweeting (or a RT as you see on Twitter) is repeating what someone else tweeted on Twitter. It's a great way to spread the word about someone and shows you liked what they tweeted.

But what about if you want to add your own few characters to the original tweet?

I'm about to show you why comments before the RT is the only way to go, but before you do, don't get your Snuggie in a bunch. Spare me about how Twitter has "NO RULES" or "Who the hell are you to say what I should do??". I'm Scott, nice to meet you. I'm not saying you have to do it this way, it's just my opinion, and since this is my blog there is a rule, and that is: I rule here.

I'm not telling you what to do, I've learned over 30,000+ tweets that some things work and some don't. I've learned that best intentions can get mis-interpreted, and people can start sticking words in your mouth and you don't want to know where their mouse has been.

So if you want to RT and add your comment, this is the way I suggest. Let's say @UnMarketing (he rules) states something he has seen in a study about beef saying "Studies show that men like steak". He has given no opinion, just passed along a statement he read somewhere and you, being @UnTesting, want to retweet it and add your opinion that you find that study to be "crap". I use a harsh word like that to illustrate the point. Imagine if I used a real swear word!

Here's what the tweet would look like with the comment before the RT:

There is no debate here. UnMarketing's tweet and content are all after the "RT" and @untesting added his thoughts to the start, yes?

Now, the worst thing to do is just add your comment directly to the end of the original, like so:

Now @untesting has added his comment to the end of the original tweet, making it look like the original tweeter (@unmarketing) says the study finding is crap. That's huge. Imagine if one of his followers is a client that is in the beef industry (ask Oprah about how sensitive they are). Words were now put in his mouth, and everyone who retweets this RT now put words in his mouth.

So one solution is to put lines after the original tweet to "show" that it's you commenting on the original tweet, like this:

That certainly isn't clearly @untesting's comment. It can be perceived as a comment from the original tweeter. At the very least, it's subjective and that's not a good thing when a strong opinion is stated.

Same goes for brackets:

And some people go the length of adding "me:" in the bracket:

Again, it's up for debate who "me" is, especially if it gets retweeted by a third person. If one of the rules of Twitter is to keep things under 140 characters, why are you adding unnecessary ones, be it even brackets or an arrow (<-)

I've also heard a few times that people don't want to read "backwards" meaning having the huge slaving task of reading after the RT and THEN HAVING TO GO BACK to read before the RT. It's not War & Peace people, it's 140 characters. You can do it, I believe in you.

Remember, do whatever you want on Twitter, or anywhere else for that matter. But if you start sticking things in tweeters mouths that they don't want, they may bite ya.

On another note: if you want something to be ReTweeted, make it under 120 characters, not 140. The RT plus your @ name take up space and the comment, written before the RT of course

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Perhaps now would be a good time to have a complimentary meeting with a Wizard of Ads Partner. Links to their websites and blogs are listed down the right side of The Wizard Times. Hundreds of their articles with free insightful advice can been seen at www.americansmallbusiness.com 2009 would be a great year to attend a class at the Wizard Academy 21st Century Business School in Austin Texas. What is the Wizard Academy?