The iPhone leapt to popularity in part due to the user-generated applications that made owning an iPhone a fun and interactive opportunity.

Those who might not otherwise have been persuaded, leapt on the bandwagon when they found out about a particular application that they really wanted to have – and with over 65,000 apps generated, there was bound to be something for everyone.

Now TV networks are taking the same strategy and trying to apply it to their offerings in hopes of keeping TV in the loop as media changes rapidly. TV has been a famously non-interactive experience, and many would tell you that’s part of its appeal.

Companies are experimenting with the idea that TV watching should be as interactive and social an activity as using a social media channel or Tweeting the latest on Twitter.

TV has been offering their viewers the chance to get news articles and other interactive media tailored to their needs for some time, and they’re also toying with the idea of allowing viewers to interact with one another as their favorite shows are playing; all the people watching House M.D., for example, could open an application that allows them to chat about what just happened on the show.

By opening up the field to user applications, TV networks hope to discover, just as Apple did, a few services they weren’t even aware their viewers wanted in a service – and then use those new applications for ad revenue, and to keep their own relevance high.

Microsoft and Yahoo have joined forces in hopes of battling against the biggest of the big giants in search-engine history: Google.

Even with the merger, Microsoft and Yahoo combined only make up 28% of the search market, which, pitted against Google’s 65%, does not look like good odds. They’re not looking at the market they have, though – they’re looking at the market they could get.

One of the reasons for Microsoft and Yahoo having difficulty gaining traction in the market was the lack of advertising. Since a disproportionate number of searchers used Google compared to Microsoft (8.4%) or Yahoo (19.6%), advertisers seeking bang for their buck naturally gravitated toward the search engine provider who could give them the biggest audience.

With a much larger portion of the search market in the combined “Microhoo,” the merger has a shot at being a valuable secondary market for advertisers.

The merger also means more data sharing, which in turn allows both companies to improve the way they perform searches on Yahoo.com and the newly launched Bing.com.

Data sharing could be the key; Microsoft was able to snag an impressive portion of the market in fairly short order by using their own search engine technology to rival Google’s ability to come up with the best matches. Better technology equals better searches, which may tip more of the market to Microhoo’s side.

Google doesn’t seem threatened. Their experience, they say, is that competition brings great things for users. Maybe they’re really not evil, after all.

In order to survive a recession and come out the other side moving swiftly forward, two things need to happen: Your competitors still need to be stuck far behind, and you need to have used the time to create brand-new strategies that resonate with consumers just when they’re ready to spend again.

Companies have been flagging left and right, cutting their marketing budgets significantly and focusing largely on hitting short-term goals rather than looking to the future. Much of this short-sightedness is out of necessity, since companies have frequently been hit so hard they’re unable to set aside the resources to plan for future growth.

There are a few notable exceptions to this rule, however, and we’re beginning to see the results of their planning:

>    Wal-Mart has distinguished itself by revamping its entire marketing campaign to build loyalty in the customers it gained during the recession. Instead of rejoicing in the current uptick in customers, Wal-Mart knows that in order to keep those new consumers when the recession turns, they’re going to need a loyalty strategy – and that’s exactly where they’re putting their efforts.

>    Other companies are also making sure they catch the wave as the tide turns. Unilever and P&G are other notable companies that are starting to increase their spending and look to new innovation, ready to hit consumers with new and exciting products and practices when the pursestrings loosen again.

Another trend in recession-style business has been the elimination of monthly sales reporting, a strategy that simply removes the focus from the short-term. This means of “big picture” reporting and planning may not be contributing directly to how companies are currently marketing themselves, but it sure does reflect an overall intention to focus less on details and away from a one-month limited snapshot.

Yes, everyone’s twittering.

People who enjoy living in the world of 140 characters use it a lot and they talk about everything under the sun – but may never ask themselves what Twitter gets out of the deal.

From a marketing perspective, Twitter’s seeming ambivalence about making any money out of its extraordinarily popular social media tool echoes the sentiment many of an older generation are still expressing about tweeting: “What’s the point?”

The point, as it turns out, is that Twitter has a viable commercial use.
Companies are using Twitter to communicate with their customers, to find out what they like and don’t like, to offer customer service and answer questions, and simply to create a personal relationship that will be effective in maintaining loyalty to the brand.

Twitter is now talking about the possibility of creating commercial accounts that those companies would use for a fee. They may finally have gotten companies to the point where Twitter is a tool they’d pay not to do without.

And that is a pretty big point. In fact, it’s probably a bottom line.

As tracking software and abilities become more sophisticated, figuring out which of your markets is responding to which ads is becoming simpler.

Even better, it lets you know which demographics are responding at which times of day, which can mean that an ad campaign could have as many different layers as it has potential consumers.

What does this mean for the future of marketing? Instead of a huge blast approach, where companies would try for one big ad that would hit everyone who saw it hard, marketers are now trying to figure out how to track down each individual demographic and hit them with a series of smaller ads directly targeted to them.

Call it Sniper Marketing.
Whatever you call it, it’s working. The data component of marketing has come to the forefront, and figuring out which customers are responding is a big part of whether a campaign will stay or go.

Ideas that might not have been big enough before are now a valuable part of each marketing campaign, since they’re effective toward one section of the customer base. It also means that innovation is valued far more, as companies vie not to come up with the next big ad slogan but to create more personal relationships with each customer on an individual level.

Standard online advertisements include banners and small block ads, which consumers are more and more inclined to ignore. After they’ve become de rigueur, it takes a lot for an online ad to catch the consumer’s eye at all, much less for someone to click on it to find out more.

Some companies are offering solutions. Their new ad strategy has websites inserting 15 to 30 second video ads between pages on their websites. In order to get to the next page, viewers must watch the ad.

This may solve the huge gap between ads online and ads as they used to perform on TV and in print. Those ads would interrupt the viewer’s experience, forcing them to focus their full attention on the ad before being returned to what they were doing before. The online video ads may well serve the same purpose.

Users may not like it, but they may also adjust more rapidly than advertising marketers give them credit for. If every newspaper began using such ads in their online newsrooms, they might actually break out of their ever-decreasing ad revenue stream from print publication. Remember too that users have already become accustomed to similar short ads interrupting their online TV show viewing experiences.

We’re seeing the fall of the newspaper, but we’re also seeing a rise in reporting. As more and more industries begin to publish their own news and become sources of information for their customers, are newspapers partially getting shoved aside because their customers are looking elsewhere?

Marketers are building sophisticated communities online, and they’re largely centered on the exchange of information. Blogs and other tools have helped companies build huge audiences that draw more and more people by word of mouth. That means the better a media outlet a company becomes, the less hard it has to work to earn the attention of their ideal consumer.

Consumers are also becoming media sources themselves, rating and commenting on their favorite products and customer experiences. A company that treats a customer poorly can no longer disregard it if that customer also happens to be the head of a popular blog.

Brands that become their own media companies have certain challenges ahead of them. In order to keep the eyes and ears of their customers, they have to continue to create interesting and effective new media, a task that used to be relegated to news industries. Communities without causes often dissolve, however, and unless brands put effort into putting new media in front of them, they can’t enjoy the benefits of a word of mouth audience.

In our previous post, we talked about the rise of the pitchman.

Today we’re sharing a few more tips on how to make the most out of every pitch:

Stop Them in Their Tracks
Once you’ve got a crowd, other people will stop to see what the crowd is looking at. That’s why YouTube videos go viral – everyone’s got to see what over a million people have already seen. Give them a good reason to stop with authority and energy.

Ask a Question
Some of the most famous phrases in pitching are questions, and it’s for good reason. Many pitches start with questions like, “Wouldn’t you like?” or the infamous “How much would you pay?” Ask a question that the customer couldn’t possibly answer with anything but a positive response.

Give Them a Thrill
When victims of a recent layoff are sitting on the couch with insomnia, they’re not looking to be bored. They’re hoping for a quick thrill, a shot of adrenaline that makes them feel a little better for a second. Pitchmen give them that with the promise of winning something others don’t – “Buy now and get this free extra!” It’s a small boost, but every little bit counts.

Sophisticated advertising was great when the market was doing well, but when consumers have a small budget, it may actually boil down to who can shout the loudest – and the most persuasively.

Enter the TV pitchman. Pitchmen are the reasons infomercials succeed, the ones who are able to hawk their products with such enthusiasm and persistence that consumers find themselves, at 3:00 in the morning, reaching for the phone to dial that 800 number. There are a few things that make a good pitchman into a great one.

Believe in It

Nothing kills a pitch faster than a pitchman who isn’t as amazed by the product as he’s swearing you’ll be. If you’re going to pitch, find yourself a product that you really believe people will want.

Solve a Common Problem

You can’t sell a product that only a small portion of the population needs. That’s fine for other kinds of advertising, but when it comes to being a pitchman, nothing is better than a product that fixes a problem everyone has. Spot removers still move off the shelves for a reason.

Tune in for more tips on what makes a good pitch.

In January 2009 CBS viewers noticed something new. Two minute infomercials for a DVD set, “The World at War” by Time Life began regularly showing up on the prime time Saturday line up. This is a clear indication of just how troubled the broadcast advertising market really is.

“The economy is the number one focus for everyone, and it affects the advertisers and the rates,” says Pat Boos, Senior Vice President, acquisition and marketing at Direct Holdings Americas, which licenses the Time Life brand.

Infomercials prevent dead space. “When someone pulls off the air,” Boos explains, “like a pharmaceutical or medical or sports company, the networks sometimes find themselves with last-minute dead space,” she said. “We can come in and say we’ve got a tape ready, we’ve got the product ready.”

According to Ms. Boos, Time Life is currently running double the number of spots they ran last year. Networks typically try to avoid infomercial advertisers because they pay significantly less than the cost of general advertising.

However, in exchange for such low rates, infomercial advertisers have no say over when their ads will run. Priority is given to full-priced ads, but when they don’t have enough advertisers to fill those slots, they rely on direct-response ads.

Direct-response ads are increasing all over. And it’s not just television filling empty time slots with direct response ads. Radio, print and Internet media buyers are doing it too. The trend is more noticeable in broadcast because networks cannot add or lengthen programming to fill empty spots.