Olympic-size tactical thinking

Photo Credit: Reuters/ Lewis Whyld/Pool

I recently facilitated a tactical ideation workshop in which we applied “Olympic” thinking to the client’s media planning.

Digital media spending by London 2012 Olympics sponsors amounted to as much as 20% of budgets.

Digital outlets attracted funds that might have gone to television in prior years.

And while ad agency and brand representatives don’t provide budgets or spending estimates for their Olympic campaigns, it’s believed that a comprehensive multimedia Olympic campaign cost between $30 million to $50 million.

The pricetag was worth it, most brand executives said, because they believe they were able to weave tighter connections between their brands and target customers during the Olympics compared to other events.

Here are some of the media ideas inspired by our Olympic-size thinking:

 

Storytelling: Is it the secret weapon of the 2012 presidential race?

Here's a topical view on storytelling from Arianna Huffington.

If we can all take a break from the breathless back-and-forth about Bain-gate for a moment -- and if you can't, maybe later you can retroactively take a break -- there was a more meaningful exchange that came out of President Obama's interview with Charlie Rose that aired on CBS last Sunday and Monday morning.

The president used many of his oft-repeated lines, saying that "this campaign is still about hope... it's still about change," and that he "underestimated the degree to which in this town politics trumps problem-solving." But it got really interesting when the conversation turned to what the president considers the biggest mistake of his first term. It was, he said, "thinking that this job was just about getting the policy right."

So what else is needed? 

"The nature of this office," he said, "is also to tell a story to the American people that gives them a sense of unity and purpose and optimism, especially during tough times."

That's a spot-on description of one of the key elements missing from the last three-and-a-half years: storytelling. 

But while Obama has accurately diagnosed the ailment, he hasn't delivered on his own prescription. Where is the narrative that will give us that sense of unity and purpose and optimism? His campaign has given us all a crash course on the ills of Bain Capital and the sorts of business practices that shouldn't be happening, but he hasn't given us an alternative narrative of the kind of capitalism that should define the nation as we emerge from the financial crisis -- if, in fact, we ever do.

But of course, neither has the Romney campaign. Indeed, its ineptitude on the subject was underlined when it responded to the Rose interview by saying, "Being president is not about telling stories. Being president is about leading."

So Obama hasn't delivered, but Romney remains clueless about the fact that the office he's running for isn't CEO of the country. It's much bigger than that. And telling stories, casting a narrative, is an essential element in communicating ideas and values, and an integral part of leading -- especially leading from the Oval Office.

"Stories are the creative conversion of life itself to a more powerful, clearer, more meaningful experience," says screenwriting guru Robert McKee. They are "the currency of human contact." Or, as film producer Peter Guber, author of Tell to Win: Connect, Persuade, and Triumph with the Hidden Power of Story, puts it: "Telling purposeful stories is certainly the most efficient means of persuasion in everyday life, the most effective way of translating ideas into action."

And translating ideas into action is, of course, the essence of the president's job. So that's exactly what campaign season should be about -- each candidate telling us the story of where he thinks we are as a country and, more importantly, where he wants to take us. The best way -- the only way -- to do that is with narrative. "The stories our leaders tell us matter," wrote Drew Westen, "probably almost as much as the stories our parents tell us as children, because they orient us to what is, what could be, and what should be; to the worldviews they hold and to the values they hold sacred."

Stories and narrative, as the currency of human contact, are how we all communicate with each other. 

We don't sit down with our friends and loved ones and throw out statistics and PowerPoint slides. We swap stories. In fact, we can't help it. "Stories, it turns out, are not optional," writes Peter Guber. "They are essential. Our need for them reflects the very nature of perceptual experience, and storytelling is embedded in the brain itself." Recent neuroscience research bears him out and shows we are hardwired to use narrative to make sense of the world. Neuroscientist Michael S. Gazzaniga, who studies the functions of the two hemispheres of the brain, has uncovered how the left side, which he calls "the interpreter," takes the jumble of data and sensory information we encounter and spins it into a narrative. "Gazzaniga suspects that narrative coherence helps us to navigate the world -- to know where we're coming from and where we're headed," writes Big Think's Jason Gots. "It tells us where to place our trust and why."

So if the part of our brain that is telling us where to place our trust is all about narrative, doesn't it make sense that any candidate asking us for that trust should appeal to our need for what Romney dismissively calls "telling stories"? This is especially true in times of crisis and transition. Over the last decade our country has been through extraordinary crises, not least the failure of practically every institution in which Americans had placed their trust. How did that happen? How did we get to this point? It couldn't have just been a few bad apples. If we don't know why it happened, how can we fix it? And if a candidate doesn't have a compelling narrative for what happened, how can we trust him to get us out of it?

"Instead of indicting the people whose recklessness wrecked the economy, [President Obama] put them in charge of it," writes Westen. "He never explained that decision to the public -- a failure in storytelling as extraordinary as the failure in judgment behind it."

Unlike Romney, at least Obama sees the need for that narrative. The fundamental tension between Wall Street and Main Street is still unresolved and still not framed in a narrative that gives people the confidence that it will be resolved any time soon. And making the entire campaign about Bain Capital isn't going to do it.

"Every presidential election is a renewal," says biographer and historian David McCullough. "Like spring, it brings up all the juices. The people are so tired of contrivance and fabrication and hokum. They really want to be stirred in their spirit. That's when we are at our best."

Copyright © 2012 TheHuffingtonPost.com, Inc.

4 tips for creating a consistent transmedia content strategy

At the office, at home, and on the go, consumers are digesting and interacting with content on multiple platforms in increasing numbers. As marketers and content strategists, we need to be able to anticipate and meet their needs to engage, connect, and motivate them — whenever and wherever they need information.

At the heart of our ability to reach this goal is developing a consistent transmedia content strategy, writes Denise Zimmerman, president & chief strategy officer at Netplus, a full service digital agency.

Denise Zimmerman is a 25-year marketing veteran who has spent the past 18 years of her career focusing on the emerging digital landscape and best practice applications in marketing and communications.

She is blogging in conjunction with Content Marketing World2012 which will take place on September 4 – 6, 2012 at the Columbus, Ohio Convention Center.

It’s 2 full days dedicated to keynotes, 30 breakout sessions, and multiple tracks of programming, such as How to Develop a Content Marketing Strategy and Organizing Your Marketing Department for Publishing Success.

Here’s more of what Denise has to say about content strategy:

A consistent transmedia content strategy will not only help facilitate stronger and more meaningful connections with your customers, but it can also significantly extend the value of your content and amplify its overall impact.

While the best practices for content strategy are still evolving, there are steps you can take now to implement an effective transmedia content agenda that can be updated as content marketing practices continue to take shape.

Here are a few tips to consider as you get started:

1. Establish content strategy as a practice and discipline in your organization

2. Connect your content efforts to existing brand and/or marketing goals

3. Identify, analyze, and prioritize your assets

4. Make content findable, distributable, and extendable

Make sure you build in checks and balances, set benchmarks, and be prepared to apply a number of different measurement scenarios and tests to help you gauge how well your content efforts performed. Some common measurement guidelines you can use include:

• conversion rates
• engagement rates
• new customer acquisition rates
• cost per sale calculations
• earned impressions
• changes in the number of “shares” your content generates

Read more from Denise on the different ways to develop a consistent, transmedia strategy at http://www.contentmarketinginstitute.com/2012/03/creating-a-consistent-transmedia-content-strategy/

I also write about transmedia strategy in my upcoming book, N-of-8, so if you'd like to read more, click to why-transmedia-storytelling-is-future

Why “transmedia storytelling” is future of biz -- studios creating mythologies, multimedia worlds

Now that the franchise has replaced the blockbuster as Hollywood's holy grail, a new tool has emerged to help those who want to extend film and TV properties across multiple platforms.

This according to an Peter Caranicas writing in the June 26 issue of VARIETY.

The tool -- transmedia storytelling -- is capable of performing such feats as the recent revival of the Batman franchise, which helped propel "The Dark Knight" to the second-highest box office numbers in history, after "Titanic."

"They resurrected a dusty old brand that ran into trouble in the early '90s," says Jeff Gomez, co-founder of Starlight Runner Entertainment, which specializes in applying the transmedia approach to studio tentpoles. "The filmmakers were able to go back to the essentials -- the true, deep conflict that the character faces -- and they managed to make it resonant with our current conflicts as a society."

Transmedia takes the concept of the bible (a document containing backstory information that film and TV writers rely on for building plots and characters) to an extensive new level.

The idea of developing a piece of intellectual property in a consistent manner across multiple media platforms was pioneered in its modern form by George Lucas, who turned his first "Star Wars" film into five more features, multiple TV shows, a panoply of books and an onslaught of toys and games. The feature films alone have generated a cumulative worldwide box office of more than $4 billion.

And today, as the industry struggles to maximize audiences and revenues, many producers consider transmedia a key to extending franchises across the additional platforms that have emerged in the three decades since the first "Star Wars" film.

"I grew up on 'Star Wars' and experimented with that stuff on my shows. It helped build a loyal fan base, connect with them beyond primetime and reach them in other parts of their lives," says Jesse Alexander, co-exec producer on "Lost" and "Heroes," and exec producer on NBC's 2010-debuting skein "Day One."

For "Day One," an hour long drama set in the aftermath of an unspecified event that destroys the global infrastructure, Alexander says he's working with NBC Universal to develop ancillaries like a comicbook, a prequel novel and online content to be available on or before the show's debut. "It helps to build out the franchise at launch," he says.

"People are realizing that this kind of concerted implementation is one of the most powerful ways to convey messages," says Gomez, who worked with Disney on "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "Tron," and with Fox on James Cameron's "Avatar." "For them, as for most of our clients, we make sure the universe of the film maintains its integrity as it's expanded and implemented across multiple platforms."

Starlight Runner typically got involved with projects toward the end of their development, but more recently has been jumping aboard at an earlier stage, Gomez says. And producers are building the costs of creating a transmedia plan into the production budget rather than leaving it as an afterthought paid for by the marketing division.

Starlight Runner was founded in 2000 and has built a client list that includes Acclaim Entertainment, Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Showtime and Hasbro.

Starlight Runner creates "megabibles and mythologies" contained in oversized binders full of images, chronologies, storylines, character profiles and descriptions of such details as geography, vehicles and weapons. "We teach the studio, other divisions of its parent company and its licensors how to bring these characters to life in a way that's true to the original platform."

"We always try to extend a property to other experiences," says the exec. To do that, he adds, it's important to "look at what the essence of the property is, what people are responding to, and re-create that in other ways."

Another believer in the transmedia concept, scribe Danny Bilson, who's steering production and marketing at vidgame publisher THQ, takes as his mantra the old Microsoft advertising slogan "Where do you want to go today?" "That's different from 'What do you want to watch?'" he notes.