Coronavirus, Cruises & Creative: Our #SMMW20 Wrap-Up

Ken is back from speaking at #SMMW20 (that’s Social Media Marketing World 2020) and I've got questions for him. Our accidentally pun-filled chat was punctuated with plenty of side commentary about Ken's new cold-pressed juice (it has Cayenne pepper!). Listen in for the full conversation or read on for the Cliffs Notes.

Panic Breeds Panic

Coronavirus is a hot topic in the news right now, especially since Ken is about to jump on a cruise ship with his family (please don't get quarantined!) Grocery stores and Costcos around the country are sporting bare shelves. When does the stockpiling panic of a few turn into consequences for the rest of us? Well, when you can't get soup for dinner, that seems like a good indicator.

On Cruising During Coronavirus

As a passenger, Ken isn't so worried about catching the flu. He's more worried about getting quarantined...as in stuck on a ship for an extra week or more, or worse: confined to their rooms. With one son on the autism spectrum, confinement would be more than an inconvenience. Oh, and he and his wife both have lingering coughs (which are NOT coronavirus) and the cruise line is doing thorough health checks prior to boarding. So he called the cruise line. Can they defer their trip? NOPE. What if they get denied boarding for something that's not contagious...do they get a refund or get rebooked? NOPE. So, the company is saying they want to keep passengers healthy, but they're incentivizing people to mask symptoms and/or show up sick? Yikes.

Social Media Marketing World 2020

Ken came back exhausted but energized. I stayed back at the ranch to keep the ship running (that's one of the few accidental puns that we'll keep for the blog post!) Here are Ken's biggest takeaways from #SMMW20.

Test Thumbnail Images

Test a LOT of them. We've already been doing this with our new Hero Ad. While at SMMW, Daniel Harmon of Harmon Brothers (you know the Squatty Potty & PooPourri ad agency) confirmed in a chat with Ken that this has been VERY powerful for their company. You go to so much effort and incur all of this expense to shoot a video, but what makes people watch it (or scroll past it) is the thumbnail. So you HAVE to see which thumbnail image people respond to. And it might not always be what you think!

The Value of Running Engaging Videos

Engaging videos are great for brand awareness, but behind the scenes, they give you something even better: remarketing audiences! Remarketing to audiences who watched 50%, 75%, 90% or 100% of your video is a VERY powerful way to laser-focus a portion of your ad spend.

The Power of Engagement Posts

Ken ran a little experiment while he was in San Diego, getting ready for his session. His session at 2 pm on Tuesday could hold approximately 500 people and it was competing with 5 (or so) other sessions for attendees. On Sunday night, only 138 people had registered for his session. So he posted in the app AND got all of the conference attendees invited to the thread...one by one. He told a story about a dilemma: what jacket should he wear? (This also got posted on the usual social media outlets, too.) People reacted, responded, and (most importantly) REGISTERED for his session. By Tuesday at 2 pm, he had a full room. And the first thing he taught them was that they responded to an engagement ad.

Did he stop at posting in the app? Nope, he posted on LinkedIn, IG, FB & Twitter, too.

Shoutout to Troy!

During the session, Ken showed our new hero ad (mentioned above) and 4 minutes later the crowd gave a warm round of applause. Luckily, our videographer Troy was in the room, so Ken could direct the applause his way for a helluva job on editing what was, essentially, a short film. Also, he managed three cameras and lots of guerilla documentary filming like a total boss.

Give Yourself Permission to Write Sh*t.

I got to watch the replay of Ken's session on Wednesday, and the biggest gift he gave the audience (in my opinion) was the permission to just try things. To let go of being precious about your copy, to stop worrying about perfection and just let the audience decide what works. Too many of us get caught up trying to get it 100% right. But the truth is, that if it's accurate and it fairly represents your company...there is no 100% right. Creative is a VOLUME game. So you've got to give yourself permission to write stuff you aren't in love with. And, to let go of creative you love if the audience doesn't love it the way you do.

That's it for our post-SMMW sit-down. Until next time, stay hydrated and give yourself permission to try some new creative!