Google Instant attempts to improve the user experience even more:  by saving time, providing smarter predictions and serving instant results.  Google estimates that Instant will save 11 hours of search time for every second spent searching.  With the combination of time savings, and more accurate search results, Google is certainly staking their claim as the most forward-thinking company in search.

Google’s announcement this morning began with some amazing statistics: over 1 Billion searches occur on Google each week.  In these 1 Billion searches, it takes more than 9 seconds to enter a search term, with many searches taking 30 to 90 seconds.  Google Instant promises to save 2-5 seconds per search, as well as decrease the time it takes a user to click on a search result as well.

How does it work?  As you type in your search query, the search results will adjust based on what you Google Instant searches for you as you type, predicting the most likely keywords that you will search.  Once you see results that match what you are looking for, simply stop typing.  Your results are already there.

Here, we began a search for ‘woodpecker’ to show the results that we got along the way:

How Will Google Instant Impact Paid Search?

One of the largest concerns about Google Instant for B2B Advertisers is how this new tool will impact paid search.  Specifically, the impact on ad impressions.  As users type in a query, the search results rapidly change, displaying different ads with every keystroke.    As shown in our search for ‘woodpecker’ we returned paid advertisements for MapQuest, the Pacific Science Center, the Woodland Park Zoo and more, before we finally got to information about woodpeckers.

According to Google, an ad impression is counted if a user takes an action to choose a query (for example, presses the Enter key or clicks the Search button), clicks a link on the results page, or stops typing for three or more seconds.

Ad Position

Google Instant will also change the layout of the Google search results pages.  Because the search suggestions box remains open, the organic results, as well as any top position ads, are pushed down the page.   In some cases, the organic results are pushed completely below the fold, and users will only see the search suggestions box, as well as paid advertisements.

Though this will initially increase impressions and clicks on paid search campaigns, the quality of the clicks received is not likely to improve.  With organic results beginning far below the fold, many users will confuse paid and organic searches- resulting in low quality clicks on top performing ads. Paid ads in position 1 and 2 will likely show above the organic search results, but below the search suggestions box. Ads in lower positions (particularly positions 3, 4 and 5) appear to have a higher rank because the paid search results on the right side begin at the top of the page.

Quality Score

With increased impressions due to the ever changing search results pages, paid search marketers can expect to see a decline in their click through rate (CTR)- simply due to this increase in impressions.  Because CTR is one of the main components of quality score, B2B Advertisers may see a change in the overall competitive landscape of paid search.  Will quality scores begin to decline because of Google Instant?  At this point, we can just wait and see.

Rather than engage in a war of words, Dodge remained invisible on the issue. That is, they digitally removed any trace of Suzie the chimpanzee leaving only a walking daredevil outfit, now referring to the non-chimp as an invisible monkey.

This brilliant solution accomplished two things. It appeased PETA. And generated a great deal of free publicity for the carmaker. Among other respected sources of news, The London Daily Mail online and the Los Angeles Times—not to mention the Hodgson/Meyers blog—have reported on the event.

Kudos to the car company and its advertising agency, Wieden + Kennedy, for taking the complaint seriously and for using it to increase awareness for both PETA and the sale of Dodge cars and trucks.

With blue chip clients from Siemens, Shell and Suzuki to GE, Gucci and Goodrich, UC4 is a global leader in business automation software. For B2B Top 100 Agency Hodgson/Meyers the task was to develop a Web video that not only explained what UC4 did, but do so in an accessible and entertaining fashion.

As with similar success stories, this was most certainly a team effort. UC4 Chief Marketing Officer Fred Kahout and Director of eMarketing Paul Rosien provided company insight. H/M Director of Account Planning Jason Frummet and Project Manager Lea Loya gave strategic guidance, while partners Tim Hodgson and Gary Meyers offered brand direction. All that was left to do for graphic designer Charlie Worcester, Web master Craig Labenz and writer Gary Graf was translate those marketing thoughts into creative genius.

Key to the concept was the combination of rhythmic—dare we say, poetic—copy and imaginative—nay, truly inspired—design and flash animation that brought to life the difficult-to-convey concept of business automation.

(From top left, moving clockwise: The word “communicate” connects two animated servers; Servers rotate and mesh as if gears in operation; Camera pulls back from a line of servers to reveal a conductor’s baton as enterprises orchestrate; Black and white server squares make up a city skyline and cloud, showing that UC4 works on site, in the cloud and everywhere in between.)

Agency and client collaborated on the project through a sequence of storyboards, test footage and refinement. UC4’s graphic standards (developed by Charlie) provided the color palette for the animation. Mr. Rosien’s background as a drummer influenced the techno-percussive beat. And UC4 voice Kevin Crawford provided the narration.

The result? A lively, engaging animated story that visually reflects the power of UC4’s ability to integrate and orchestrate business processes, all to help automate and accelerate companies’ growth.

All in a day’s (well, several days’) work for the team at Hodgson/Meyers

UC4 Flash Video Script

We’re UC4.

We help servers communicate

systems operate

applications integrate

enterprises orchestrate

processes automate

and companies accelerate.

With UC4,

computers know what to do

and when to do it.

Every time.

Automatically.

We’re on the job 24/7:

on site,

in the cloud and

everywhere in between.

We’re UC4.

It’s time to Rethink Automation.

Take a look for yourself. See how UC4 Rethinks Automation.

Fluke Corporation is the world leader in the manufacture, distribution and service of electronic test tools and software. Since its founding in 1948, Fluke has achieved the number one or number two position in every market in which it competes.

A wholly owned subsidiary of Danaher Corporation, Fluke is a multi-national corporation headquartered in Everett, Washington, USA. Manufacturing centers are located in the USA, the UK, Asia and The Netherlands. Sales and service subsidiaries are located in Europe, North America, South America, Asia and Australia. Fluke Corporation has authorized distributor and manufacturer representative channels in more than 100 countries and employs approximately 2,400.

With so many letters and catalogs destined for the recycling bin, woe to the direct mail that does not immediately capture the reader’s attention. At Hodgson/Meyers, we’ve found that sometimes the best way to put the wow in your DM is to put the meow in your DM.

Enter the Fat Cat.

Illustrating the problem: Here kitty kitty

With service in 16 states in the southeast, Windstream Communications provides phone and Internet packages to business and residential markets. On the consumer side, Windstream often found itself up against more established, yet more expensive cable providers. To help portray those companies as being more costly, we represented them collectively as, you guessed it, the Fat Cat.

A casting call was put out for filled-out felines to…actually PhotoShop magic was responsible for creating the centerpiece character. Gold eyes gleaming and pleasantly plump, the animal quickly caught the fancy of H/M employees, earning such endearments as Phat C, Heavy C and Puff Catty. Not only did Fat Cat stand out as illustrated, he perfectly illustrated how cable companies profit from charging their customers higher prices.

Windstream vs. Cable TV: A tail of five kitties
Originally scheduled to star in a single direct mailing, the Fat Cat so resonated with Windstream—and its customers—that the client requested a series of five pieces to showcase the savings Windstream offered over its competition.

With Fat Cat soaking in a tub of money, one mailer featured the headline: Are you getting soaked by those Fat Cats at your cable company? Another featured the Cat sporting a diamond-encrusted gold dollar sign collar (think of it as feline bling) in front of a private jet with the headline, Is your cable company getting fat off you?

Fat results
Windstream notes that the first Fat Cat mailing pulled 55% more responses than their average pieces. Which shows that Puff Catty was the purr-fect DM solution.

Click To Enlarge

Click To Enlarge

Click To Enlarge

Click To Enlarge

So, if you’re an advertiser, how do you stand out? In the case of Hodgson/Meyers client CSG Systems. Inc. – a customer interaction management solution company – the answer was to come out fighting. Or at least to wear boxing gloves.

How to stand out in the direct mail crowd

In touching more than half of all U.S. households, CSG helps companies such as Comcast, DISH and Time Warner with billing and customer interaction solutions. When the time came to introduce a new product offering, CSG wanted to reach approximately 100 key decision makers in the cable and satellite TV industry.

With such a narrow, targeted audience, a direct mail approach seemed the most appropriate vehicle. However, these influential executives are also the same targets of most every other technology company as well. Thus, the challenge became to create marketing materials that would not immediately be placed in the round file, under W for wastebasket.

As the marketing agency for CSG, we needed to think big and think outside the box. In this case, thinking big meant size. And thinking outside the box had to do with thinking about what went inside the box.

Which brings us back to boxing gloves.

Adapt the mail strategy to the marketing strategy

Cable and satellite marketing managers face the never-ending problem of customer churn, people who leave one provider for another. CSG has a way to help providers eliminate churn with a better customer management solution. We recommended sending life-size professional boxing gloves along with product information to the target audience, allowing CSG to figuratively and literally give marketing executives the tools to effectively fight churn.

The sheer size of the direct mail piece (7.5” x 10.5” x 12.5”) received immediate attention. Inside a handsome box, copy and layout framed a personalized message as if announcing a heavyweight championship bout.

Box copy and Everlast boxing gloves were customized with each individual recipient’s name. These decision makers were encouraged to “K.O. churn with CSG customer intelligence solutions.” In so doing, they’d be able to build strong customer relationships, retain subscribers more effectively and enhance the value of each customer interaction.

Big package. Big Idea. In short, a real knockout!

(Customized boxes for the CSG mailer were provided by MasterCraft.)

Here’s recent work from Hodgson/Meyers for WatchGuard Technologies. This campaign was designed to give WatchGuard positioning presence and marketing personality in the crowded network security industry comprised of many competitors with “me-too” propositions. WatchGuard is known for its distinctive red hardware.

We developed the campaign positioning platform expressed here.

Get red. Get secured.

Then we created the red animal ad campaign that WatchGuard is using in print, interactive, and trade show environments. The campaign is also running as backlit display ads in major airports around the world, such as the one below in the United terminal at San Francisco International Airport (thanks to Jason Frummet, our Senior Account Director for snapping this photo with his iPhone for us).

Here’s what our client, Margaret Liddiard, Director of Marketing Communications for WatchGuard Technologies, says,

“This campaign is the most memorable one I’ve worked on in many years. We were searching for a way to make WatchGuard really stand out in a noisy, crowded B2B tech market, and this campaign is helping us do that with the catchy tag phrase and arresting images. And it has been enthusiastically adopted throughout the globe by our field marketing teams and partners. WatchGuard is on the move in the market place, and our Get red. Get Secured. campaign is contributing to our growing brand awareness.”

11:15 pm. You try a different photo. Try some Photoshop filter and some technique you saw in a video podcast recently. Surely that will pull this idea back from the abyss. It doesn’t. It goes over the edge and you watch helplessly as it spirals down to its death. In slow motion. Screaming “SAVE ME PLEASE!” But there is no saving of this idea.

12:45 am. You make a strong pot of coffee and splash cold water on your face. It helps, but only for a moment. It’s then, that your eyes glaze over and you have a weak moment. It starts as just a tiny thought that you immediately dismiss. But you think about it some more, and start rationalizing it. And then common sense kicks back in, and you feel dirty. Not because the clothes you’re wearing have been on for more than 18 hours and 27 minutes. You feel dirty, and cheap, because you’re rationalizing using a — cliché. Yes, a worn out cop-out cash-it-in surrender to the circumstances cliché. And your mind continues to wrestle with the thought. You think you could dress it up so it doesn’t look like a cliché. Get a really cool photo from Getty Images (there is a little photo budget in this job, isn’t there?). Get some dramatic lighting, maybe a little grunge background with some cool shadow stuff going on. Place and kern the type tastefully and expertly so that it just sings visually. People might just might swoon after all!

1 am. But the battle rages on within you. As tired as you are, a tiny vestige of rational thought struggles to its feet and croaks to be heard. You try to block out that little voice, but you hear it anyway. It says, “No amount of window dressing will ever change the fact that this “concept” is still just a photo of two guys shaking hands.”

___________________________

A little dramatic, perhaps, but consider the landscape. Take a look at some of the ads floating around, specifically in the B2B space. One would think it obvious to not be this trite, but alas, that’s not the case.

Many years back we made a list and posted it in our conference room. It’s a list of all the VERBOTEN things for ad and marketing imagery. We will NOT, under any circumstances, use ANY of these things in our ads or marketing material for our clients (unless of course they insist and their budget is . . . just kidding). Are there exceptions? Sure, but they’re rare.

So, don’t be tempted to use these whether you have an in-house marketing department or work with an agency. There are actually many more than these, but these are some of the biggest offenders.

The 7 deadly things that should never be in an ad.

1. Shaking hands

2. Globe

3. Gambling things (specifically dice, playing cards, roulette wheel, slot machine)

4. Mountain climbing

5. Dart boards

6. Crystal balls

7. You pick. What do YOU think should be number 7? Let us know in the comments.

We get asked all the time, “What’s with your logo?”

Our logo mascot is the Pileated woodpecker, the largest woodpecker in North America.

These are visually striking creatures, with zebra-striped head and neck, long bill, and distinctive red crest.

They’re noisy; their call is a wild laugh, and their hammering and drumming are audible at long distances.

Woodpeckers are powerful; the holes they make can cause dead trees to split in two.

All characteristics of good marketing, don’t you think? By the way, our woodpecker is named Spike, and he’s federally protected, so you can’t shoot him.

His take on agency trends based on interviews and interactions with senior client-side marketing professionals.

Clients want true marketing integration, but often feel that agencies are too territorial to work with other agencies when additional expertise or skill sets are required. Clients also feel that internal agency specialists and teams are too siloed. EG: the Web folks don’t talk to the media folks. You agree? Or not?

Clients want branded content that can be expressed and re-expressed through a variety of channels––online, PR, advertising, promotions. Content is king right now.

Clients want measurable ROI. No shocker there.

And mostly, clients want “renaissance” marketing advisors, those who are Internet-savvy and multi-channel disciplined.

What do you think clients want most from agencies? Whether you represent agency-side or client side, we’d love to hear your candid assessment.