Goodbye and Good Riddance to 2011, Hello 2012

Well, the Consumer Electronics Show started this week and a quick review of their highlighted products doesn't excite me too much. Not a lot of super-cool, super innovative stuff out there. Yes, there are enhanced television and gaming stuff, as well as tablets, but what makes a backpack super-cool ... just because it has batteries or can protect your laptops or tablets? I think not.

2011 was a year where too many good people passed away ... good friends, close family and great visionaries. The visionary that I was relating to was not Steve Jobs (although he is pretty awesome), but it is Dorothy Durkin (http://dorothydurkin.com/). Dorothy was a good friend, one of three people I would call my marketing mentor. The other two are Dick Hezel (www.hezel.com) and Bill Minor at Embry-Riddle. Like Bill, Dorothy got it when it came to strategic marketing and positioning. She didn't fall for the fluff of great creative only. Like Dick, she saw the importance of market segmentation, data-driven decision-making and market research. Dorothy was also one of the first in UPCEA to push for "customer relationship management" (CRM) in the 2000's, just as she did with "integrated marketing communication" or IMC in the 1990's.

At a personal level, I remember meeting her in the late 90's at a UCEA Marketing Seminar in Arizona. She, of course, was one of the founders of the marketing seminar, as she recognized the need for continuing educational professionals to be focused on truly understanding the value of marketing. I found her so welcoming and ready to answer any question I had of her. She was always so friendly and never arrogant or egotistical in her knowledge. Dorothy also got it when it came to communicating marketing issues and opportunities to university non-marketers ... the administrators, dean or others. Dorothy created the bridge for marketers and administrators to walk on and meet in the middle. We still walk on that bridge. She was a great person we, in the education community, lost in 2011.

I'd rather forget 2011 for the most part. The things that happened at Penn State and Syracuse, the people we/I lost and other so-called top events of the year. One media outlet states the death of Osama Bin Laden as the top event, while the other being the Penn State scandal ... two things not necessarily to be proud of, war and abuse. In fact, today, as I write this entry, is the anniversary of Gabrielle Giffords being shot. While I am happy that she has recovered, what a sad day it was for the others that were less fortunate.

While tragedies and electronics don't necessarily go together, my marketing insight for 2012 will be:

• Continued development in social media as marketing and message tool. Educational institutions are still behind here and will continue playing catch up here.
• Data-driven decision making and data mining will become more of a hot button. With continuing educations becoming more versed in customer relationship management, the next step will be mining and analyzing customer/prospect patterns and behaviors.
• Big and small screens. Yes, there's a tablet craze and greater predictions for online learning as a result. However, most continuing educators will not be in a position to use the technology for marketing. Consumers are not just bound to their tablets, they're also buying larger televisions with 3D and greater hi-def and recording capabilities. They're not just home theatres, they're going to be home learning centers as well.
• More apps for education! With the growth of smartphones, most developers focused on revenue generating or information applications. Outside of a small number of apps that were primarily aimed at traditional students, few were developed with continuing and distance education in mind. That should change in the next few years.
• Given the scandals at Penn State and Syracuse, might more emphasis be placed on public relations, crisis management and reputation management?
• The impact of the state authorization of distance education regulations may expose continuing education's customer relationship and prospect management systems and processes.
• Our economy is not expected to improve immensely over the next few years. Therefore, continuing education marketers will still be in "doing more with less" mode, as well as be under the microscope to measure marketing return on investment.

While 2011 was a good year for wine and civic protests, I'm ready to move on! Positive outlook for 2012! Cheers!

The Power of the Brand

It's been a while since my last post and the whole Penn State thing has my head spinning. I was going to stay focused in on work and put off blogging for yet another month, but the nudge for me was the whole Papa John's lady chinky eyes dilemma. It is incredible how one person or in the case of Penn State, how a few people can bring down a brand a couple million notches. While the two cases are very different in terms of social impact (the lives of young people versus one person being humiliated) and neither should be tolerated, the ability of one person having the potential to do millions of dollars of damage is pretty incredible. Penn State was one of the purest brands in the marketplace. It was the Ivory Soap or Campbell's Soup of the education marketplace. The potential that one person has, coupled with the power of social media, became even more evident with Papa John's (see the story at http://www.businessinsider.com/papa-johns-racial-slur-lady-chinky-eyes-2012-1) where one employee, rather than get a person's name correct, put her name as "lady chinky eyes" on the order record.

As the event became viral, I was informed by my cousin Vincent about this ... the outrage we felt was incredible, as I am sure that others, Asian and non-Asians, were certainly feeling. Upon arriving the official Papa John's Facebook site ready to vent my anger to the papa himself, I saw that they had dealt with it swiftly. I still posted my concern and ultimate thanks and Papa John, as a result, did not lose me as a customer (we order Papa John's at least once a month). They handled it well from a PR and social media perspective and dodged a multi-million dollar bullet. Kudos to Papa Johns. Too early to tell what the ultimate impact is for Penn State, but hopefully the healing for community, victims, alumni and the university's employees has begun.