Madison Avenue advertising firms do it. Mainstream marketers do it. Political campaigns do it. They all piggy-back on the emotional anchoring created by famous singers, actors, and sports figures. It’s a marketing strategy with a proven track-record. People bond emotionally with people, with personal brands, and with your Primal Key™.

But what about online you when you’re marketing with New Media? How can you harness the momentum created by emotional anchoring and piggy-back off of words, quotes, images, or sounds that people are already familiar with?

It starts by understanding the simple truth of why emotional anchoring works in marketing. That is…

People buy what they like, and they like what they know

Familiarity breeds comfort. When you’re familiar with something or someone, you know what to expect. That makes things comfortable. More importantly (for marketing and sales purposes) familiarity and it’s offspring comfort both act to turn off the natural defense mechanism (skepticism) we all employ to protect ourselves.

Leveraging emotional anchors works so well in marketing because it accelerates familiarity and comfort. Its’ impact is instant, subconscious, and undeniable when it comes to boosting conversions.

Now, you may not be able to afford to pay Beyonce or Tiger Woods to appear in commercials for you. But you CAN leverage existing visual and auditory anchors, and using New Media Marketing — tie them to you, your product or your service. And you can do it in much easier, and much more cost effective way!

Here’s an example to get those Tribal Seduction mindset wheels spinning in your head.

A few good marketing ideas…

If I say "You can’t handle the truth!"… what movie do you immediatley think of?

"A Few Good Men." Right! It’s one of the most often quoted movie lines.

On the outside chance you haven’t actually seen the movie, you probably know what movie it came from and the context in which it was said. It’s familiar and it’s comfortable because it’s known.

The line was used in the climax of the movie. In what also was the most emotionally charged scene of the movie.

So where does New Media come in on this?And how does this help you with your marketing?

Well, lets take a look at a couple examples of how this famous movie quote was used in online videos. A few notes on what was done right. What could be done better. And what creative ideas you can come up with after looking at this mini-case study.

First the original clip

Let’s put things in context with the actual unedited clip from the movie.

OK, pretty powerful scene right? One of the most memorable in recent movie history.

So what can be done with this in New Media?

Follow along with me for a few minutes and find out.

Now, two examples: the good, the bad, and the "could be better"…

First; here’s funny adaptation that you’ll get a kick out of… especially if you’ve ever been attacked for being a good creative marketer.

Video Example #1:

The Good:

• Excellent voice over impersonating Jack Nicholson for Anchor Bridging
• Professional editing
• Emotional bonding with target audience through humor that anyone in marketing or advertising will "get".
• Using the "language" of the Tribe (in this case marketing and advertising pros)

The Bad:

• Questionable use of copyrighted material
• No Tribal Call-to-action

The "could be better"

The lack of a Tribal Call-to-action could easily be overcome by adding a "Holy Grail Trail" for the target audience to follow.

For example: Get viewers involved by running a contest that is promoted with a non-intrusive footer and/or closing credits screen. The contest could be as simple as an invitation i.e.: "Got a inter-departmental power struggle story? Share your story at www.CreativeMarketersUnite.com/contest/ and get a shot at winning a new Apple iPhone!"

Even a simple "More creative humor brought to you by…" as closing credits would have been better than the lack of any Call-to-action as this video had.

FACT: unless the lack of an obvious call-to-action is strategic (a good thing, especially with a Holy Grail Trail) — the number of views on a video doesn’t mean diddly to you as a New Media Marketer. It’s your Tribe taking action that puts dollars in the bank.

Video Example #2:

Next; another funny variation… this one completely original

The Good:

• No issues with copyrights
• Anchor Bridging and humor with the obvious baldness of the CEO of Tyco
• Emotional bonding with target audience… in this case Traders and Investors, best described by their tag line "Stock culture meets pop culture."
• Using "experiences" the Tribe can relate to. A totally different take on why a stock is trading at all time highs or lows.
• Channel congruity when viewers visit the WallStrip.com site. (Video leads to video.)
• Seducing the audience into discovering what Wallstrip’s main site has for them. By strategically creating a "hidden" trail for your audience to discover on their own, you can trigger a stronger commitment since the visitor feels that they are taking action on their own.

The Bad:

• No clear Tribal Call-to-action. A simple tagline in addition to the WallStrip branding would clraify that this is for investors, brokers and traders. People are pressed for time. Unless you create a direct bridge from the video content to a relative benefit waiting for viewers from your ideal audience, they’re not likely to go on the Holy Grail mission I just mentioned above.
• On some WallStrip videos on YouTube they had non-congruent, interruption-style advertisement overlaid on the video player. This is a distraction from the WallStrip brand, and more importantly — a weakening of the emotional anchors they are trying to leverage.

The "could be better"

• This is better than the first video, even though it still has no clear Tribal Call-to-action. WallStrip is looking to attract their Tribe of investment-types with their humorous parodies of corporate life. And based on their dozens of other custom content videos, it seems their lack of a clear call-to-action is strategic. Again; something as simple as a tagline added to the WallStrip logo would have a stronger pull on their Tribe.
• I came across some other Wallstrip videos that had a lack of congruity between the "tone" of the videos and the advertisements slapped on to the end. Their videos are fun, loose, and humorous and then they have some corporate looking person closing it out with an advertisement. That causes a break in rapport.

Your ideas…

• So what do you think? Which style video did you like better? Why?

• Did this mini case study give you a couple ideas to use in your New Media Marketing?

• What established emotional anchors could you piggy-back off to grow your Tribe?

Share your thoughts and ideas in a comment below. We’d love to hear what you’re thinking.

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Until now, when you posted a video to YouTube, tracking info was limited to how many times your video was viewed or commented on. Now Google has decided to boost YouTube’s tracking power allowing New Media Marketers to analyze video performance more effectively.

The new tools help put the performance of a video into context over time. You can see where your Tribe is coming from and how well your message is connecting to your audience. And… a big plus — you’re now better able to get ideas on how to improve your videos and track how your improvements translate into attention.

What YouTube now tracks for you

To access your new stats, log into to your account then “My account > Videos, Favorites, Playlists > About This Video.” Here’s what you’ll see when you do.

Obviously the wimpish stats that you had before are still available. (above)

The left side of your screen when in the “Views” tab will give you: (above)

• How many countries your video was viewed in any given time period
• An adjustable slider bar to select any time range you want since the video was posted

The right side of your screen when in the “Views” tab will give you: (above)

• A visual color coded map showing the countries your video was viewed in

Click on the “Popularity” tab and you’ll see: (above)

• The relevant popularity (to other videos) in a given territory
• Color coded map showing popularity instead of views

Unlike the total viewership counts, all the detailed information will be available only to the user who uploaded the video. Some data will still be limited to paid advertisers and partners, including information on how many viewers make it through 25 percent, 50 percent or all of a video.

Some ideas for New Media Marketers

Sometimes when people hear the word analytics or tracking, they start to doze off. But that’s mostly because they’re not sure how to use the data at their fingertips. And that’s a shame because tracking your efforts and making improvements based on data (instead of feelings) is the key to making things more fun and profitable in any area of business.

Here are a few starter ideas on how to use YouTube’s new analytics to help with your New Media Marketing.

• If your niche is in extreme sports (or any sports for that matter,) you may find that your viewership peaks on Thursdays in the US. So you could release new clips then.
• You may see that your viewership on your videos starts to dip or flatten out after three weeks. That would let you know that you should release a new video at least every three weeks. And you can test a shorter frequency to see what that will do to increase viewership and hold those higher numbers for a longer time period.
• If you’re an expert on investing and see that your videos are popular in Mexico and South America, you could test releasing your videos in both English and Spanish.

Not an exhaustive list, but it’s a start.

Your ideas?

Do you have ideas on how you’ll use YouTube’s enhanced tracking to help boost you New Media Marketing? Share them in a comment.

A little thought goes a long way. With this new information, you can concentrate on creating compelling new content that appeals to your Tribe and post your videos on days you know these viewers are active on YouTube.

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You see it everywhere…. You Tube, Bright Cove, and MySpace. In-stream and overlay ads that marketers and advertising agencies count as New Media Marketing. Don’t give me that crap! That’s not New Media — especially when those overlays auto-open in the middle of a video. That’s the same old marketplace molestation on a new channel.

Christine Beardsell in a recent article The next Step in Online Video Marketing raises an interesting point, (and even more cutting question.)

“YouTube, Hulu, Joost, Brightcove, and endless other content providers are seeking fast, scalable advertising models. Now, with announcements from companies like FreeWheel, such interruptive models (in-stream video and overlay ads) will soon prevail.

The question: where do real conversations fit into these models? Sure, we can now market a car racing show within (or on top of) a video about cars, but what about the interactivity and conversations we keep hearing about?”

Now you guys and gals already know my thoughts on conversations. I feel like pulling a Bill Clinton circa 1992 whenever I here that word related to New Media and saying “It’s the CONNECTIONS stupid!” Conversations without connection are useless if your goal is to build a Tribe.

But that fine point aside, Christine hits the mark here in identifying the next freight train of pain to hit advertisers, marketers, and PR pros trying to use New Media Marketing.

Old school marketplace molester tactics will not do!

Online marketers better get the new rule book for the game. Or they should plan to get booted out of the game altogether, (at least the profitable end,) very soon.

Winning at the game of New Media Marketing has a new set of requirements. Whether you’re a mega marketing firm, PR agency pumping out promos for your clients, or an eager online entrepreneur fighting to build your business, expect to give extra:

- Attention to strategy
- Creativity in production
- Attention to emotional connection

These are the basic requirements. These are what will create, as Christine says so well, “experiences people want to seek out, rather than click away from.”

You do as your Tribe does

If you want to attract a Tribe, instead of trick the “herd” — then start to think about what YOU do online. Think about your natural actions and activities when it comes to developing your New Media Marketing strategy… instead of what “experts” write about in magazines or “gurus” tell you in emails that end up in your Spam filter.

Side note: In the last month or two we’ve been so busy with traveling, software and course development that I’ve admittedly (and quite obviously) neglected sharing insights and thoughts here at Tribal Seduction. But when I cam across Christine’s article and shared my thoughts with several clients I heard the same thing — “why don’t you share that type of stuff at Tribal Seduction?”

I will be doing my best to heed the advice of those wise men and women and open up my 3lbs. of gray matter in a more “free flow” format here from now on. It’s a long road to recovery, but I’m on my way.

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