Video is now available for purchase from the third and most evolved edition of BIA/Kelsey NATIONAL, which took place March 25-27 in Dallas. At the show, we saw that industry leaders were in general agreement that major progress has been made among all the stakeholders in “national marketing, local targeting.” Many speed bumps, however, are still being felt along the way. Key stakeholders, including agencies, media companies, franchises and local franchisees are, by necessity, transforming their identifies as they adjust to the new digital (and mobile) marketplace.

During our Chairman’s Session that closed the show on Day 3, Houston Chronicle, Yahoo and Fox Interactive Media vet Warren Kay, Speakeasy CEO Mike Orren, SuperPages vet Robyn Rose and 3rd Act Marketing CEO Gregg Stewart provided their summary insights into four key topics in “national marketing, local targeting.” Among them:

1. The time is finally ripe for National Local. Research by the CMO Council — cited by BizHive’s Dave Walker — noted that 57% of CMOs say that local programs are important, but only 7% of CMOs have a successful program in place. Success, however, will soon become more apparent.

National local programs are “at the beginning of becoming the next big thing,” said Orren. “If there was a graph that showed where innovation and cost effectiveness begin to make sense for local, the line has now begun to be crossed.”

“Scar tissue” remains from the “embarrassment and disappointment” of early local marketing efforts, added Warren Kay. But now “informed decision makers really understand national local, and how they might apply the type of budget they have. That will drive the local marketing space in the future.”

2. Media and directory companies are transitioning to the new environment. Local newspapers and directories still play a real role in targeting locally — and regionally. But they are also being forced to re-evaluate their core strengths.

It is a simple admission to note that many advertisers really aren’t getting ROI from the traditional products, notes Robyn Rose. But they can reposition themselves by providing consultative services with their advertisers. “You really have to understand your partners. If you are targeting local or franchise locations, for instance, you need vertical and regional experts,” she says.

Mike Orren notes that media companies are well positioned to guide and sell local businesses and even national business in their market. But they can’t get “hung up” over moving their own inventory. Their core assets are not their product, but their “brand, reputation and feet on the street,” he says.

Gregg Stewart says that the key thing is that media companies are now being judged entirely on their effectiveness. “At the end of the day, the advertiser doesn’t care if (the media is) local or not. They want to sell something. They will look at whatever they can buy that is fastest and cheapest,” he says.

3. Some things are automated, and some things are not. Relying solely on automation and “air coverage” doesn’t work at every level, especially in local.

“There is a paradox in local,” says Gregg Stewart. Marketers build their attack the CMO level. Programmatic sales and other automation are highly effective for doing that, he says. But you need to also execute work with door to door sales.

“Companies need to understand the partnership with sales and marketing,” adds Warren Kay. They must ultimately collaborate to leverage customer insights and customize aspects of the marketing campaign. Companies such as Simpli.fi, for instance, do very well in developing content marketing programs to complement their programmatic sales.

4. Platforms can bring local franchisees in line, and also liberate them. Brands are “schizophrenic” from top to bottom, with the national brand representing one thing, and each local outlet representing something else. The question is to what degree is it healthy to have “local franchisee stars act like franchise choir boys” — as Yext’s Christian Ward put it.

“The trend with national organizations is to get more control,” says Gregg Stewart. “The stakes are too high. I see that as a trend for a while, until we get these things figured out.”

But franchises should do everything they can to encourage local innovation. “You need local stars,” says Rose. “You need to figure out how to embrace them, not bring them into everything. You need to get everyone else to emulate their success.”

The post The Chairman’s Session at BIA/Kelsey NATIONAL: The Top Four Things to Know appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Video is now available for purchase from the third and most evolved edition of BIA/Kelsey NATIONAL, which took place March 25-27 in Dallas. At the show, we saw that industry leaders were in general agreement that major progress has been made among all the stakeholders in “national marketing, local targeting.” Many speed bumps, however, are still being felt along the way. Key stakeholders, including agencies, media companies, franchises and local franchisees are, by necessity, transforming their identifies as they adjust to the new digital (and mobile) marketplace.

During our Chairman’s Session that closed the show on Day 3, Houston Chronicle, Yahoo and Fox Interactive Media vet Warren Kay, Speakeasy CEO Mike Orren, SuperPages vet Robyn Rose and 3rd Act Marketing CEO Gregg Stewart provided their summary insights into four key topics in “national marketing, local targeting.” Among them:

1. The time is finally ripe for National Local. Research by the CMO Council — cited by BizHive’s Dave Walker — noted that 57% of CMOs say that local programs are important, but only 7% of CMOs have a successful program in place. Success, however, will soon become more apparent.

National local programs are “at the beginning of becoming the next big thing,” said Orren. “If there was a graph that showed where innovation and cost effectiveness begin to make sense for local, the line has now begun to be crossed.”

“Scar tissue” remains from the “embarrassment and disappointment” of early local marketing efforts, added Warren Kay. But now “informed decision makers really understand national local, and how they might apply the type of budget they have. That will drive the local marketing space in the future.”

2. Media and directory companies are transitioning to the new environment. Local newspapers and directories still play a real role in targeting locally — and regionally. But they are also being forced to re-evaluate their core strengths.

It is a simple admission to note that many advertisers really aren’t getting ROI from the traditional products, notes Robyn Rose. But they can reposition themselves by providing consultative services with their advertisers. “You really have to understand your partners. If you are targeting local or franchise locations, for instance, you need vertical and regional experts,” she says.

Mike Orren notes that media companies are well positioned to guide and sell local businesses and even national business in their market. But they can’t get “hung up” over moving their own inventory. Their core assets are not their product, but their “brand, reputation and feet on the street,” he says.

Gregg Stewart says that the key thing is that media companies are now being judged entirely on their effectiveness. “At the end of the day, the advertiser doesn’t care if (the media is) local or not. They want to sell something. They will look at whatever they can buy that is fastest and cheapest,” he says.

3. Some things are automated, and some things are not. Relying solely on automation and “air coverage” doesn’t work at every level, especially in local.

“There is a paradox in local,” says Gregg Stewart. Marketers build their attack the CMO level. Programmatic sales and other automation are highly effective for doing that, he says. But you need to also execute work with door to door sales.

“Companies need to understand the partnership with sales and marketing,” adds Warren Kay. They must ultimately collaborate to leverage customer insights and customize aspects of the marketing campaign. Companies such as Simpli.fi, for instance, do very well in developing content marketing programs to complement their programmatic sales.

4. Platforms can bring local franchisees in line, and also liberate them. Brands are “schizophrenic” from top to bottom, with the national brand representing one thing, and each local outlet representing something else. The question is to what degree is it healthy to have “local franchisee stars act like franchise choir boys” — as Yext’s Christian Ward put it.

“The trend with national organizations is to get more control,” says Gregg Stewart. “The stakes are too high. I see that as a trend for a while, until we get these things figured out.”

But franchises should do everything they can to encourage local innovation. “You need local stars,” says Rose. “You need to figure out how to embrace them, not bring them into everything. You need to get everyone else to emulate their success.”

The post The Chairman's Session at BIA/Kelsey NATIONAL: The Top Four Things to Know appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

“The industry is changing right around us,” Peter Kravilovsky. We’ll be unveiling several new mergers and acquisitions in local media during the week.

At the intersection of national and local marketing, we face an accelerated speed of change, lack of experience talent in interactive, structural changes in the market that challenge traditional marketing practices. The move from push to pull communication is changing who is in control of the messaging. Gregg Stewart, CEO of 3rd Act Marketing began by framing the week’s discussion. The agency, formerly the commander of local marketing, is now just another partner at the table.

The pace of change has disrupted media planning, Stewart said. We need to be “agile,” even if that is an over-used term these days. Now planning must take place in mini-bursts throughout the year rather than all at once at the beginning of the year. We need to do more testing of channels and techniques, throwing out what doesn’t work fast.

Stewart says the talent vacuum is our biggest challenge as an industry. Organizations must understand opportunities to bring talent together for specific projects: Buy experience with a group of star digital talent, but the salaries often are often outsized compared to actual experience. It takes about 18 months to get a return from these investments in human resources, and that’s the current average length of tenure in the industry. Do more training and develop people from scratch, but there the agency has to defend the talent from poachers. Continuous development of talent is essential.

A hybrid model for human resources also can be an asset, as your people spread through the industry. Identify networks of relationships and build on those relationships. This points to the question of whether we are organized correctly as an industry. (We’ll be covering this question at BIA/Kelsey NOW in June). Early efforts to blend digital and traditional made the different media types enemies. Now we need to integrate and train across traditional and digital, especially as we go to mobile.

Even though 93 percent of sales take place offline right now, mobile and online are of increasing influence in that decision-making. We need to start to think about all these different channels as an integration problem. Retail is leading this, because it is where the transactions still happen.

Brand control is becoming problematic. We need to have the right people at the table to understand the problem of local marketing within the national brand budget. The big decisions at agencies have been based on large budgets, but small spends can make a bigger difference local.

The nature of brand is changing due to social. The customer feedback — ratings, likes, retweets — have given the customer a voice at the table that brands must recognize. We have to learn how to talk with our customers. Brands were not ready for the deluge of communication that has come flowing back from the market. Learning how to handle this, within the context of different goals and programs, is the new brand marketing challenge.

Reputation management is evolving. For the first time, Stewart says, I see platforms for reputation monitoring and management coming to market with useful tools. They are shifting to consulting arrangements, to help advise companies and brands on their use of particular channels.

And we are off to the next session.

The post At BIA/Kelsey NATIONAL: Gregg Stewart on Solving the Talent Vacuum appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Advertising expert Gregg Stewart is the CEO of Third Act Marketing and co-chair of BIA/Kelsey’s National event March 25-27 in Dallas. He has specialized in localizing national brands since 1985 and has previously served in leadership capacities at Wahlstrom, TMP and 15 Miles. Some of the brands he has advised include FedEx, GE, Hilton Hotels, Enterprise Rent-a-Car, United Van Lines, Brooks Brothers, Farmers Insurance, Target, Bank of America, Aspen Dental, and ADT. We had the chance to sit down with Gregg to get his thoughts on the state of National-Local.

BIA/Kelsey: Local marketing used to be an after-thought for national brands and retailers. What’s changed?

GS: In the early days, brands relied solely on their sales channels (dealers, agents, franchisees) to do local marketing for them through co-op advertising programs. Now, brands have taken a lot of the responsibility for local marketing on themselves.

BIA/Kelsey: Why?

GS: The emergence of digital media has accelerated the need of brands to take control at the local level. Digital requires very specialized resources. It is also highly fragmented and nuanced. It isn’t just two or three things, like newspapers, radio, TV, Yellow Pages and direct mail. Now, there can be 25-30 media options per market.

BIA/Kelsey: It is definitely more complicated. But is it better?

GS: If you do it well, it is an opportunity area. Digital certainly has a direct impact on a lot of businesses and verticals. The brands and sales channels that have not embraced digital have seen their market share fade. One example of a brand that has done it right is GEICO. Many insurance brands have a huge local infrastructure, with thousands of agents. But they have not yet leveraged local. GEICO has a centralized organization. But it has embraced the opportunities that Internet and mobile present to get very hyperlocal and target their ad messages specifically to individual markets of opportunity.

BIA/Kelsey: We tend to think in simplistic terms about winning the “brand” account. There are actually several aspects to local marketing for brands.

GS: Marketing brands locally is much more complex than direct response focused brands. Many brands have multifaceted sales forces/channels including dealers, agents, franchisees or branches. Dealers tend to be multiple brand focused. Franchisees are usually single brand and are dedicated to that brand locally. Agents can be captive, or they can be independent and sell local brands for verticals such finance and insurance. And branches tend to be company owned like Starbucks and Enterprise Rent a Car. Stitching together brand advertising that is locally targeted needs to leverage these sales channel complexities.

BIA/Kelsey: As brands take more control of digital marketing, how will the traditional agency business be impacted?

GS: There is a transformation occurring. Large agencies tend to do things like they have always done. They always hawk TV first; move a lot of dollars; and get paid a small percentage of these media buys which maps up to large amounts of revenue for the agency. That’s their best margin opportunity. It is very mechanized and cost efficient for them. But a $5 million digital campaign targeted locally will involve lots of legwork, with a lot of different ad sizes and overall, a lack of standardization. While the rewards are great, there is lots more “heavy lifting”, and labor costs are much higher. It is highly nuanced. Local specialists including Where2GetIt and Location 3 are focused on these aspects.

BIA/Kelsey: You are co-chairing BIA/Kelsey’s National event. Why should brands and marketers join BIA/Kelsey’s local community at this event?

GS: The BIA/Kelsey events really stand out for their content and networking. You get to rub elbows with many of the leading innovators in the market. You don’t get that at the mass shows. I’m looking forward to contributing to BIA/Kelsey’s thought leadership on this one, and providing an opportunity for marketers to learn tactics to help them use digital to become more specialized and strategic.

The post Expert Insights: Gregg Stewart on National Brands, Local Marketing appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.