Marketing Blogs
|
by Online Editor | Scotlandon Jul 30 |
NAB spamming: maybe it's time to take dance lessons
And while Jim Stewart pursued an interview with NAB, for Julian Cole, the solution wasn't to boycott the bank's financial services or talk to the bank. He took Duncan Riley's advice, and decided to see how NAB felt about being on the receiving end of a similarly unsolicited commercial message.
"So, NAB thinks it's cool spamming bloggers. Well, we'll go see whether it's cool spamming their banks."
Have a quick watch of Julian Coles' 'Nab Spamming' video below. It shows how ridiculous the situation would be if we approached our offline interactions in the same way as NAB approached their online spamming interactions.
If you're waiting in line for the bank teller, you don't expect to be accosted by somebody selling you a product or a service, however nicely they address you :-) Simply mimicking the language of real conversation - "Hi guys" - doesn't substitute for understanding the communicative needs and wants of your target audience.
Sure, a bank is a public environment. But when we visit the bank, we assume that they will make sure that that environment is free from other commercial messages from third parties. In effect, the bank are responsible for moderating their own environment, much as many bloggers are ultimately responsible for moderating their own environment.
But imagine if every time you went to the bank, NAB employees were having to deal with entrepreneurial salespeople hawking their own products in the branch? Imagine the time and money the bank would have to expend keeping the branches free from this outside spam, and then consider the potential impact of this on the bank's ability to deliver the services and products to their customers.
- Article links
additional info, around the time of this incident I interviewed the head of the PR agency responsible and he was very responsive around blogosphere interest in this story:
http://prdisasters.com/bank-pr-agency-will-learn-from-spam-pr-criticism/
For me, the episode shouldve ended then.
Yet having looked at the story from several angles and spoken to a few players, I think the spamming by Cox was poor (they accept that), the NAB PR was unwitting while being outed by Jim S (too trusting by Felicity maybe?) and finally, that Julians branch spam stunt adds nothing to the debate but may work as a profile-booster for Colesy as a maverick blog personality.
Gerry
Gerry, thanks for the awesome tag line of ‘A Maverick Blog Personality’, and thanks for the profile boosting post that you gave me on your personal blog.
http://prdisasters.com/blogger-spams-bank-attempts-to-exhume-nab-pr-disaster/
However suggesting that I add nothing is a little dubious, social media is a hard beast to explain to someone who does not come in contact with it very often. Giving an everyday analogy I think is an important contribution in helping more people to understand the problem with what NAB did.
And maybe I meant the vid execution was a little lame-o; you could have written the analogy out briefly - think most people would prob have got it without the filmed skit. Seriously, too, it is an example of blogger 'self promo' even if you didnt expressly intend it to be so.
Cheers Gerry
I guess with the video I was trying something new. I have never tried to communicate an idea through video.
I think from now on I will just stick to the blog writing stuff….Actually I always make spelling mistakes which makes me look like a LAME-O blogger too, so I think I will just stop writing and keep my ideas to myself.
Gerry, I put the challenge to you, create some entertaining and humourous video content for your next post for Marketing Magazine and then I think your comments of being ‘lame-o’ and not being ‘humorous or entertaining’ will hold much more weight.
Julian Cole: No offence, but I would have preferred free tickets to the footy than your business card.
For example, if NAB were to have posted a helpful advice post under their brand name, would that constitute a commercial message? At the end of the day such a post may convince a reader that NAB is a helpful organisation and that they may in future decide to place business their way.
So whilst I think its good to give these guys a little slap on the wrist, i think it should be followed with some constructive feedback as to how they could better engage with the blogosphere.
http://www.privacy.gov.au/faq/individuals/q1