Think About It

June 2008, Virginia Highlands neighborhood, Atlanta

It’s regrettable when an outdoor advertisement distracts drivers. But it’s plain incomprehensible when the offending billboard is one which urges drivers to pay attention to the road.

The subject of driver complaints is a billboard sponsored by the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Department. It features a photograph of a young woman on a cell phone and a mind-boggling 16 words of text – more than double the recommended number of words for an outdoor ad – cautioning drivers about distractions. [See the billboard.]

We imagine drivers lose their focus as they try to make out the small print at the top of the sign, which reads, “Milwaukee County Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr. reminds you...” Removing this phrase from the billboard would make the sign much more readable. Of course, that would never fly politically, since sheriffs typically like to see their names in 3-foot-high letters.

We just cringe when we see design that undermines the intended message. We’re reminded of another prime example of design clashing with the communication objective. A while back, the Atlanta Press Club held a meeting to discuss avian flu. The speaker was the deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. His message was simple: “Be prepared, but don’t panic.” Yet each guest received a press kit that included a surgical mask. It was, no doubt, intended to be clever, but it struck us as inciting just the sort of overreaction the speaker wanted to discourage.

It’s so important to remember that words can only do so much. If the words are in conflict with the way a piece is physically put together, most often it’s the tangible design that leaves the more lasting impression. A nonprofit organization trying to show good stewardship of funds shouldn’t print its annual report on vellum. And a sheriff trying to encourage safe driving shouldn’t put up a billboard that runs people off the road.

When you sit down with a team from Point of Vision, you may think of us as a principal, a project manager and a designer. What you may not know is that you’re also sitting down with a magician, an adventure traveler and a punk rocker.

For a small company, Point of Vision has an impressive cast of players with diverse backgrounds.

Some of us have lived all over the world. Others are native Atlantans.

Some of us are single. Others are married. A few of us have kids.

Some of us love living in the city. Others have found our homes in suburbia – and beyond.

Our interests range from hockey ... to dancing ... to knitting.

We think differently, too. Some of us have technical minds, others think visually, and others express ourselves best through the written word.

We have big idea people with a knack for imaginative, inspiring concepts. We also have detail-oriented people whose creativity is geared more towards finding a clever way to bring a brilliant concept to reality.

All this diversity isn’t the result of random luck. We’ve made a point to hire people with varied backgrounds, experiences, working styles and lifestyles. We think it helps us do a better job.

When we put together a client team, we know we’re going to have someone whose perspective matches up well with the way the client perceives things. We also like to have someone on the team whose perspective is different. We believe that the interplay of various viewpoints yields the clearest, most thorough thinking and the best outcomes.

In some workplaces, individual differences are tolerated. At Point of Vision, they are truly cherished.

And in the end, we respect every viewpoint because we know that no matter how differently we may see the pathway, we are all working toward one goal: the advancement of your brand.

We like to think we’re on the ball. We’re always looking for new ways to communicate our clients’ brands that will enable them to grow and prosper.

Yet we’ve never asked a client, “Have you thought about a strategy for marketing in virtual worlds?”

Virtual worlds, where people interact via 3-D images on the Web, have exploded in popularity. The site Second Life alone boasts “millions of residents from around the globe.” Some companies, seeing this new opportunity for exposure, are stepping into alternate universes with storefronts, events and even one-to-one marketing.

So why aren’t we recommending virtual marketing to anyone?

It’s not that we don’t appreciate the cool factor. We love cool. But in our advice to clients, we’ve never been about cool. We’ve always been about smart. And we think the smart move here is to wait, watch and learn.
 
Today, virtual marketing has too many unknowns. What return on investment can it deliver? Do participants in virtual worlds welcome or resent companies coming into their alternate universes? How do the demographics differ among the various virtual world sites, and which “metaverse” is the best fit for a given company or organization? We just don’t have the answers.

Some niche agencies are pushing their clients into this new world, despite the unknowns, saying that now is the time to jump in and start learning ahead of others.

We disagree. We say, now is the time to watch closely and learn from what others are doing.

So we are watching. We’ve seen the American Cancer Society organize a Relay for Life on Second Life that raised more than $100,000. We know that companies are using virtual worlds as focus groups, asking people to give them feedback on new products.

As we watch, we’re thinking about how our clients could benefit from the unique aspects of virtual marketing. At the same time, we’re asking tough questions, like, “How would we know who’s really in a virtual world focus group? Would we trust the opinions of alter egos as key informants in refining a product or service?”

Until we see the right fit, we’re not going to encourage anyone to take the leap into a virtual world. The way we see it, being one of the first settlers on a new marketing frontier is an ego boost. But from a business perspective, it’s not that important to be among the first to enter a new realm.

We don’t buy the hype that trailblazers are guaranteed to be the biggest winners. Later arrivals who offer something better can be as successful – or more. Alta Vista developed the first Web index, but today Google is the undisputed champion of Web search.

Of course, there are scenarios where early experimentation might make sense. A company whose target market is online gamers would find a captive audience in a virtual world. A company whose brand is centered on being a pioneer, especially a technology pioneer, also might benefit from jumping in ahead of the mainstream. In such a case, we wouldn’t be concerned with the direct return on their investment. For that pioneering client, riding the first wave in the tide of virtual marketing would be a brand-building move, not a sales move. Any revenue they generated through their virtual presence would just be gravy.

For most companies, we think there’s more to lose in investing in a medium that’s still a mystery than there is to gain from being a pioneer. So for now, we’re keeping our clients in the real world.

What do you think? Do you spend time in a virtual world? What kind of marketing do you think could work there? And when is the right time to experiment with virtual marketing?

Outside the Blue Horse building, January 28, 2008