The Upside-Down Revolution
16 Sep
What would happen if big companies acted like small ones? 
There are big brands out there trying desperately to appeal to influencers. To gain traction in geek circles. To be human. Some of these companies spend obscene amounts of money in the pursuit of this coveted attention. The problem. Their budget is a crutch and not an asset.
Let’s take conference presence, for example. In fact, let’s take a look at SXSW 2010.
Case Study: Buying Lunch for the Cool Kids
Microsoft vs Freshbooks
Microsoft is a big company. And they did what big companies do. They sponsored stuff. In fact, they sponsored the Bloggers Lounge. It was cool, I guess. Free WIFI, outlets and free bagels or whatever. I liked the Blogger’s Lounge. It was fine. It even added some value to my conference experience. Do I like Microsoft more because of it? No. Did I have to think really hard to even remember they sponsored the Blogger’s Lounge? Yes.
Freshbooks is an online invoicing software for small business. Freshbooks is small. Freshbooks didn’t sponsor anything. But you know what they did? They set up a table on a corner half a block from the convention center. They fried bacon. They handed it out. Bacon. They handed out bacon with a sign that said “Freshbooks helps you bring home the Bacon.” Now, did Freshbooks add value to my conference experience? No. Did they provide me with a unique, irreplaceable experience? Yes.
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This is the great irony of the new economy.
Money can buy you eyeballs, but it can’t buy you loyalty. And in a race towards the middle, in an age dominated by the precept of hyper-scalability, we appreciate, more than ever, when someone has the balls to give us something unique, something irreplaceable, even if it doesn’t scale. Especially if it doesn’t scale. In the same way that we appreciate a hand crafted Christmas card over a thought-less fruit basket.
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Tony Hseih gets this. It’s the reason he’s doing his book tour like this. It’s the reason, he encouraged Zappos employees to have personal twitter accounts. It’s the reason he decided to drive a renovated school bus with a dancer pole throughout Austin during SXSW when he could’ve easily sponsored anything he wanted.
Foursquare gets this. It’s the reason that they kicked Gowalla’s ass all over the school yard at SXSW. Instead of blowing money sponsoring the event like the Austin-based Gowalla, they broke out a bouncy ball, and played old school foursquare with their users across the street from the convention center.
You call it guerrilla marketing. I call it poetry. Unscalable. Irreplaceable. But it’s what makes us love them. It’s what turns fans into fanatics. And when brands figure this out, they will finally incite the Upside Down Revolution they desperately want.
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But they need to go back to a time before IPO. Before conference rooms. Before expense accounts. To a place where scalability bowed at the feet of customer experience. If I worked at a big brand, I would paste the following verities on the inside of every office door in the marketing department.
Slapping your name on a big sign doesn’t make people care.
Instead of spending $50,000 to sponsor an event, why not run a unique competition and offer to sponsor 50 bloggers to road trip to attend that event from different parts of the country, and throw them a VIP party when they get there.
Adding value is great, but sometimes giving an irreplaceable experience is better.
Hand me a bagel in the blogger’s lounge and I’ll remember you for an hour. Hand me a slice of bacon on the street and weave that experience into your product and I will remember you forever.
Scalability builds technology, not relationships.
I know its counter intuitive. But don’t do the same thing everywhere simply because it scales. Yes, its much easier to serve Vanilla ice cream at every party because no one hates vanilla. But you’ll never delight anyone. You’ll never surprise anyone. And you will never convert fans into fanatics.
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The reality is this, sometimes wealth gets in the way of creativity. Your first thought in approaching any marketing possibilities in the geek/influencer space should be “how would I do this if I was a start up?”. Make that your starting place, and your big budget will become an asset and not a crutch.
What say you? What would you add to this list?
