Most of the senior marketing executives cut their teeth in broadcast media systems. It was the golden age of media, when you had three stations and the entire country tuning in together as a family. The “big brand†era was born with “plop plop fizz fizz†advertising, and the only thing you needed was a catchy phrase and repetition. Advertising rates were so low on the big three a fortune could be made with this very simple formula.
Times have changed but the mentality has not. For the most part we are still applying broadcast methods to a new narrowcast audience. I can look no further then my kitchen table. My 12 and 10 year old boys were cleaning the garage with me last Saturday and they saw an old yellow book in the corner that I told them to toss out. I explained it was the yellow pages and what you did with it. The look on their face made me feel like I just pulled up in a model T! It is uncomfortable to explain when I was their age we did not have cell phones, the internet, a PC and I can still remember our first TV was black and white! I need to stop, the keyboard is aging me with every click. Anyway you would have thought we found an old world war two field manual. They actually laughed! What is more shocking is the mass market tricks most advertisers have been taught from the veterans and media departments at universities don’t apply today. Wake up call, my kids say “Old People†watch the big three. With the exception of Heroes until they screwed it up in the 2nd season. They are tough critics. They like the Disney channel and Wii. The radio is also old school. “Why would I want to listen to what everyone else listens to?†They like XM and their iPods.
Chris Anderson illustrated the difference in the book The Long Tail when he compared the budget of the Abrams Report. They get 200,000 eyeballs a day to sell ads who watch the show. It takes dozens of crew members and a big studio budget to pull it off, and then broadcast away. Rocket boom is a daily show, Jon Stewart like comedy news channel over the web. They also get 200,000 viewers, the difference; they have two people running the $2,000 cameras, lights and shoot the three and a half minute news in front of a crappy cardboard map. Yikes! Formula (Broadcasters = Revenue Junky) (Narrowcasters = Margin Junky) size matters in a perverse paradoxical, Alice in Wonderland business world we call 2007. Small has now become more powerful then big! It is the reason why big venture capital firms need to invest in hundreds of lame companies in hopes of one big winner is the same reason that big media must invest in hundreds of lame programs in hopes of a few winners. When you have a big nut, you need to make big investments on a mass scale and hope the law of averages will work in your favor. Small investment bankers can “Afford†to make a few small investments in great small companies because they need to be right, not lucky. Can small actually be more powerful then big? Can being big cloud our judgment in business because we have too much to lose if we “Change our waysâ€.
I have watched this first hand where perfectly capable executives that came from Fortune 100 backgrounds, became CEO’s of small promising startups and quickly ran them right into the sandbar. Entrepreneurs need to be keenly aware they need to choose their Advertising, Investment and Executive teams that understand narrowcasting realities if they want their Franchise to flourish.
If you do not believe we have entered into a new unchartered exciting world of opportunity where David gets to clean Goliath’s clock on a continual basis. Please ask your teenager what they think of the yellow pages.
Why most advertising and investment ideas are wrong
Times have changed but the mentality has not. For the most part we are still applying broadcast methods to a new narrowcast audience. I can look no further then my kitchen table. My 12 and 10 year old boys were cleaning the garage with me last Saturday and they saw an old yellow book in the corner that I told them to toss out. I explained it was the yellow pages and what you did with it. The look on their face made me feel like I just pulled up in a model T! It is uncomfortable to explain when I was their age we did not have cell phones, the internet, a PC and I can still remember our first TV was black and white! I need to stop, the keyboard is aging me with every click. Anyway you would have thought we found an old world war two field manual. They actually laughed! What is more shocking is the mass market tricks most advertisers have been taught from the veterans and media departments at universities don’t apply today. Wake up call, my kids say “Old People†watch the big three. With the exception of Heroes until they screwed it up in the 2nd season. They are tough critics. They like the Disney channel and Wii. The radio is also old school. “Why would I want to listen to what everyone else listens to?†They like XM and their iPods.
Chris Anderson illustrated the difference in the book The Long Tail when he compared the budget of the Abrams Report. They get 200,000 eyeballs a day to sell ads who watch the show. It takes dozens of crew members and a big studio budget to pull it off, and then broadcast away. Rocket boom is a daily show, Jon Stewart like comedy news channel over the web. They also get 200,000 viewers, the difference; they have two people running the $2,000 cameras, lights and shoot the three and a half minute news in front of a crappy cardboard map. Yikes! Formula (Broadcasters = Revenue Junky) (Narrowcasters = Margin Junky) size matters in a perverse paradoxical, Alice in Wonderland business world we call 2007. Small has now become more powerful then big! It is the reason why big venture capital firms need to invest in hundreds of lame companies in hopes of one big winner is the same reason that big media must invest in hundreds of lame programs in hopes of a few winners. When you have a big nut, you need to make big investments on a mass scale and hope the law of averages will work in your favor. Small investment bankers can “Afford†to make a few small investments in great small companies because they need to be right, not lucky. Can small actually be more powerful then big? Can being big cloud our judgment in business because we have too much to lose if we “Change our waysâ€.
I have watched this first hand where perfectly capable executives that came from Fortune 100 backgrounds, became CEO’s of small promising startups and quickly ran them right into the sandbar. Entrepreneurs need to be keenly aware they need to choose their Advertising, Investment and Executive teams that understand narrowcasting realities if they want their Franchise to flourish.
If you do not believe we have entered into a new unchartered exciting world of opportunity where David gets to clean Goliath’s clock on a continual basis. Please ask your teenager what they think of the yellow pages.