Chip McComb

I’m sure a lot of people heard about this the other day.  I was driving home from work and heard on NPR that New York is dealing with a pest it hasn’t heard from in awhile.  Bedbugs!

Now these critters are nasty, so the New York city public health department is waging a public war against this health threat.  To do this, they have a multi-pronged public education plan.  What I thought was interesting was how they decided to build their own website to educate people about this.  My first thought was that this move makes sense, but after thinking about it for the rest of the drive home, I quickly became convinced that the New York public health department missed a HUGE opportunity to reach New Yorkers with their critical message.

First off, the idea for a web site comes from an April 2010 report from the New York City Bed Bug Advisory Board Report to the Mayor and City Council which states in recommendation 1.3:

“Launch and Maintain an online Bed Bug Portal devoted to bed bug facts and resources.  A NYC Bed Bug Portal would provide an accurate, consistent and accessible source of information to the public”…”a Bed Bug Portal would serve as an outreach tool where residents could download fact sheets and educations resources, view instructional videos or slide presentations and find other documents.”

So what’s the rub (besides the use of the word “Portal” to describe a website?) Building a new web site wasn’t the answer.  It’s a tactical response to a strategic problem.

Practically, they failed to launch with a traffic generation strategy.

1. A quick search for terms relating to New York and bed bugs reveals not only that this new web site is nowhere to be found on the first, second, third or fourth pages of Google, but it reveals there are a lot of other beg bug related websites out there.  Many were created by average New Yorkers for New Yorkers.
2. All of the press releases that I’ve seen relating to this announcement don’t include a URL at all.  They’re not telling people the name of the web site.   See what I mean right here.  NPR: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128828526
3. Why will someone visit their site over another site?  There’s a lot of competition for the term “bed bug new york” in search.

So here’s my recommendation.  Wikipedia wins search all the time.  Why not just fill the Wikipedia article with all of the reputable, quality and trustworthy bed bug information?  Why try and win search from scratch when you can use the site that wins search to communicate your time sensitive, critical and trustworthy information.  Spread the word, building a website isn’t the answer.

I’m learning something.  A good blog post generally starts or ends with a good cup of coffee.

One year ago I didn’t drink coffee.  It was almost a matter of principle, I was even prideful in my coffee aversion.  Then something changed.  My wife and I had our first child and I came face to face for the first time with true exhaustion.  Now, nearly one year after our child’s birth, I can’t get enough of it.  Its bold hot goodness gets me up in the morning and gets the wheels turning.

I’m only 12 months into my relationship with the dark drug, but I’m starting to realize that there’s a lot of detail to enjoying everything there is to enjoy with each cup.  (Bear with me, here comes an analogy to web strategy.)

If you’ve ever brewed coffee using a french press, you know there’s some very specific steps one needs to follow to make sure an optimal cup is brewed.  So just like with coffee, there are some basics that need to be addressed when you’re putting together any type of strategic web initiative.

• Preparation – For a french press this means choosing a good coarse grind for your beans and good quality water.  For a web strategist this means selecting the right “parts” for your new media brew.  What web sites will you be using, and how will you be driving traffic to them?  Answering this question is an all important one.  Don’t think that simply because you have a web site that people will visit it.  Find your the audience you want to target and then setup your outposts where your target will find it.
• Brewing – After you’ve boiled your water and poured it over your grounds in the french press you need to let it brew for about 4 minutes.  In the world of web strategy I see this as setting the site on your trap.  Do you have a clear conversion on your site so that when people land on your online postage stamp that they have enough to do engage with that they can get all the info they need and still remain close to the conversion.
• Press – Everyone knows… don’t rush the press.  Slowly push the stopper down on your french press to push the coffee grinds down to the bottom of the carafe.  Likewise don’t rush your conversion on your site.  I may come to your site 3-5 times before I’m ready to convert, don’t try to force me to convert each time I visit.  Force me and I may bounce from your site, just like coffee can eject from the top of the spout of your french press if you slam the plunger down too fast.
• Pour and Taste – And lastly the entire brewing process would be a waste of time if we didn’t then drink the coffee.  Likewise, be sure to measure your results from your web initiative.  Installing Google Analytics is a great start to measuring and analyzing your efforts, but be sure to look beyond the dashboard data.   How many people converted?  When did they convert?  If they abandoned, when did they leave and why?  Play the detective and have fun.

It takes a team to do great things.

Over the past 45 days I’ve been working long hours as part of a team to put together some major events and I’ve been amazed by what our group has done.  Even though at Kiwanis, one of our core competencies as an organization is putting together meetings and events, I’m seeing more and more how important it is to put the right people in the right positions.   When you have the right people doing the right things, the most complicated detail driven projects can go smoothly.  It’s truly amazing, especially as it relates to community building.

Whether your community lives online or offline, without a strong, effective team supporting the functions that allow the community to thrive, the community will fail.  These aren’t really any new thoughts, just fresh thoughts.

It all started at 11:41pm EDT October 28th on Jimmy John’s Facebook page.

This was followed up by another comment on their wall last the 28th at 7:01pm.

“Jimmy John’s Gourmet Sandwiches Indy-Metro $1 SUBS Thursday, Oct. 29th 11:00 am – 3:00 pm Buck subs at 16 locations in Brownsburg, Carmel, Indy, Kokomo, Muncie, Nora, & Plainfield Your mom wants you to eat at JJ’s tomorrow!
Yesterday at 7:01pm”

Now, less than 24 hours later, it’s turn Indianapolis upside down.  Large crowds have been spotted across nearly all of Jimmy John’s Indianapolis locations.  I first heard about the offer from my wife at noon today, and through an unofficial survey of my peers I’ve found that most others found out about this via facebook, or via word of mouth from one of their friends.  Surprised by the viral spread of this social media marketing promotion I though I’d dig into things and see what nuggets of wisdom I could find and share.

1. Facebook Usage

- Jimmy Johns has obviously learned that the best way to tell customers about their product isn’t to post it to their web site, or even publish a press release.  They go where their customers are.  At the time of this writing Jimmy Johns has more than 250,000 fans on facebook.  Albeit not all fans reside in the Indianapolis area, however sharing this great promotion across a medium where they already have the the attention (and permission) of their most loyal fans was a great first move.

Navigating over to their web site, you won’t find anything about this promo.  If you ask me, they saved a lot of time not worrying about updating their web site to highlight this offer.  Which brings me to my next point.

2. Great Offer!

- Where else can you go and get lunch for $1.00?! The nature of the offer was so great you had to tell someone about it.  Before I went to lunch I heard about the offer from no less than 3 people.  On my way to lunch I heard about it from another person.  And on my way back into the office i heard about it from another 2 people (who had just visited the nearest Jimmy Johns!).  If your message is good enough, you don’t have to tell everyone about it yourself.  The quality of this promo led others to take the message to other mediums.  JJ’s didn’t release the message to twitter, Youtube, or MySpace at the same time… but the message of the $1 subs made it there.

3. Simple Offer

- By making the offer simple, it was easy for people to redeem.  The only friction JJ’s had to worry about was keeping people patient while waiting in the long lines for their $1 subs.  There weren’t any coupons for the cashiers to worry about, there was no discount code customers needed to remember, and there were no complex terms of use that customers and cashiers had to worry about.  People just needed to show up.  Congratulations, are you human?  Perfect, you’re eligible.

What made this possible?  The brevity of the offer, (it’s only good for 4 hours) and the simplicity of the redemption.

4. Customer Appreciation

- Lastly, by connecting the offer to customer appreciation, Jimmy John’s alienated no one.  They reminded their loyal fan base why they eat at JJ”s, and at the same time gave the 1.2 Million people who live in the Indianapolis metro area a reason to consider eating a JJ’s sub the next time they crave a sandwich.  It was simple, and I have a feeling, we’ll hear about the success in the days to come.

I was amazed to learn this, so I thought I’d pass this along.

One of my colleagues coaches a the cheerleading team at a local school. Evidently cheerleaders, just like football players, runners and other athletes need performance shoes for their sport. Here’s the cool part. Apparently cheerleading shoes are made for stacking humans! These shoes have spots for fingers to grab on to them.

Who knew?