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When I meet people outside of PlattForm, and I explain I work in the Media department, I often have to go a step further to explain to them exactly who we are. “You know the commercials you see during the daytime for schools in your areas? Chances are the PlattForm Media department was involved.” Sometimes I’ll get a flash of recognition and sometimes I’ll get more questions probing into what exactly the career college sector is.

In some cases those who might not be completely informed about what a career college really is, can sometimes have a skewed view of the sector. I wish every time that happened I could take that individual to an actual career college and show them what really goes on there. It’s incredible and even humbling to see the dedication the educators and students both share in.

Recently, I had the chance to visit one of our client’s campuses and get a tour of the facility while classes were in session. The halls were filled with messages of motivation encouraging students to keep pushing into that next phase of their lives that a career education can offer. Various billboards throughout the building honored students who had achieved the president’s list for excellence in grades.

All that was pretty impressive – I know we didn’t have anything that motivational where I went to college – but for me, I was more moved by actually meeting one of the students. She had already earned one diploma and was hard at work on a second. Whenever I’ve had the chance to meet actual students for the schools we serve, the level of motivation and dedication never fails to astound me. These are people who are getting a chance, sometimes a second one, to improve their lives or their family’s lives by furthering and completing their education to get a better career. And from my perspective, they work twice as hard to fulfill that dream than some traditional college I’ve seen (probably mostly in the mirror). It puts a lot of perspective onto what we do in Media. It changes the way I look at CPL or even a lead for that matter. It adds so much value to what I do as a Media professional and gives me conviction to do it better every day.

Recently I was watching a program on the Discovery Science Channel about what life will be like 50 years from now. It looks like there will be invisible suits for our troops and magic elevators to space stations. Also: we will be wearing those futuristic jumpsuits that seem to be in every bad sci-fi movie. (Which I don’t believe with happen. In the past 50 years, the only major breakthrough in what we wear just may be the hoodie.)

It got me wondering… what will the Media landscape look like 50 years from now? So with my apologies to Conan O’Brien, I now present my glimpse of the future of Media. A glimpse all the way to the year 2058:

• Daytime television programming will consist of shows about schools and lawyers, while commercials will be brief court rulings, thirty seconds of catfights on Jerry Springer, and Barbara Walters and whoever the new panel consists of on “The View.”
• In an effort to become a “greener” industry, paper companies will start using 98% post-consumer waste when printing inserts. However, a detective starts digging in too deep and discovers that the inserts are made…of people!
• After the XM-Sirius Satellite radio merger, terrestrial radio couldn’t compete and eventually became a thing of the past. Instead of live deejays for remotes at open houses, lifeless robots now handle announcing duties. Or Spencer Pratt from “The Hills,” if you can’t afford the robots.
• Because most news is obtained on the Internet, local papers are only printed for wrapping things to be packed for moving and used in hamster cages. As a result advertising for moving science schools and hamster care schools skyrocket.

My point? There’s a lot of change predicted for how traditional media will operate in the future. To predict too far out would be almost an exercise in futility, because so many things can change. Who would have expected the Internet to become such a prevalent way to search for qualified leads? What I do know is that there will always be an audience for those who need to learn and develop their careers. Whether we get their attention though the Internet, High-Def TV, or writing on the moon, we’re ready to face what the future holds.

In the world of advertising, generating excitement for a product is crucial. (In my last blog, I talked about testimonials as a way of building buzz.) However, it’s one thing to have the buzz, and another thing entirely to live up to the hype. Being a pop culture junkie, I’ve got two great examples of buzz-worthy properties. One failed to meet the expectations – trust me, they were low – and the other knocked it out of the park.

The online buzz leading up to the release of “Snakes on a Plane” reached a near deafening roar prior to its August 2006 release. Is there anyone plugged in to the pop culture zeitgeist who wasn’t aware of Sam Jackson’s specific words of frustration regarding the titular reptiles? What a disappointment then, that the film failed to deliver on what would easily be described as meager expectations. No one would expect a movie called “Snakes on a Plane” to be a blockbuster initially, but based on the hype, it should have been a hit. Too bad for the filmmakers, when the proof is in the pudding, you gotta have the right ingredients. “SoaP” did not.

Now that we have even a small amount of hindsight, I don’t have any qualms saying that “Cloverfield” was a buzz-built blockbuster. In its first week of release thriller/character study pulled in $41 million, easily recouping just the production budget of $25 million alone. (And for the record, I thought it was an inspired twist on the genre it inhabits.) The producers cleverly released near-frustrating tidbits of information on the film – we didn’t even know that “Cloverfield” was indeed the actual title until shortly before its release. Watercoolers, both real life and virtual, were surrounded by people willing to speculate on what exactly this movie was. Was it even real, or just hype for something else? In the end, the overall critical reception has been positive, and it looks like “Cloverfield” is going to surpass the buzz-worthy expectations placed upon it to become 2008’s first bona fide hit movie.

So where am I going with this?

PlattForm’s always had a lot of hype built up around it as a sector leader. But once you get past the idea of great buzz, you gotta deliver results. And that’s what we strive to do on a weekly, daily, even hourly basis.

Existing clients, new clients, prospective clients, employees, vendors, other sector rivals -
Here’s my message to you: In 2008, PlattForm will continue to generate the buzz it’s always had. When 2009 starts, you’ll know it wasn’t just hype.

I’m pretty sure word-of-mouth was the first form of advertising ever. Think about it… two cavemen are sitting around a raw piece of meat, and lamenting the fact they have to dine tartar. Caveman number three strolls up and in two words, informs them of a fantastic new invention that can solve their culinary woes: “Fire good.” Thus the medium-well steak was born.

Advertisers place a lot of stock in word-of-mouth, especially the positive kind. An advertiser can believe with all their heart they have THE product to change the world. There are many factors that go into the success of a product or service launch, but an important element that can make or break the campaign includes “the buzz.” Remember “Crystal Pepsi”? Did you actually drink it to know it was bad, or did you trust the word on the street and avoided that sludge like it was a new Steven Segal movie? Or what about your first iPod? Did you buy it because of the mellow branding campaign with dancing silhouettes, or because someone you knew told you how great their new portable MP3 player was?

Point is, word-of-mouth advertising is free and effective. Why would someone whose career rests on the fact he places paid direct-response advertising want to discuss anything related to free advertising? I’m getting to that. Let me add some caveats regarding free advertising before I get to my point:

• Effective as it is, word-of-mouth take a great deal of grassroots effort, and the scope of such a singular campaign still can’t match the reach and effectiveness of a traditional media or interactive campaign.
• One can only have so much control over the buzz. It’s an important element, but if it goes in the opposite direction you planned (“Worst. Medical Assistant. Program. Ever”), you’d better have your contingency plan ready.

So to my point, how can you build a word-of-mouth style direct-response campaign but have more control, using your established and proven methods?

Testimonials.

For my money (which is actually my clients’ money) it’s hard to find more bang for your buck than testimonials. It’s the next best thing to true word-of-mouth. Building television spots with actual graduates discussing where they were in life and how their school made a difference is just what potential students will respond to. If the viewer can identify with any element of the on-air testimonial, then there’s something of a feeling that a friend or confidant is expressing the sentiment of the spot personally. That goes from print ads too. Demonstrating someone overcoming the odds and building a better future through their career college can speak volumes and bring in stronger results.

Even better? YOU control the buzz. Find true evangelists of your school, not lukewarm dabblers. The lives changed in the career college sector are those who WANT to change their lives. They are your models of excellence and the ones who can best spread the word to affect change in the lives of those who haven’t yet made that commitment.

Have you added testimonial advertising to your current creative mix? I’m tellin’ ya, I believe in it. It’s turned markets around for me.

It’s only October 2007, and the political season is already looming large for the media department. With 2008 predicted to be the largest political year in history in terms of advertising spending, us Media types are working hard to ensure we’re prepared.

Here’s how it breaks down for us. Political advertising runs in highly-viewed areas, such as prime and the fringe areas. Regular local advertisers are no longer able to run in those areas, due to being bumped by the candidates, referendums: “Say No to Proposition 107”; “Say Yes to Proposition 107”; “What is Proposition 107?”; “Are You Sure It’s Not Proposition 108? (I’m Just Saying, This Whole Voting Process Can Have Its Occasional Hiccups)”, and so on.

So where do the regular local advertisers have to go when they can’t run in their standard dayparts? Right smack in the middle of daytime, which is the lead generation bread ‘n butter for Direct-Response advertisers in the career college sector. While the candidates are duking it out for who will be the better local sheriff, we in Media are preparing to duke it out with advertisers encroaching upon our prime advertising space.

How are we preparing, you may ask? Planning ahead. This year, we’re already working on negotiating our annual agreements with stations to lock in rates as early as possible in anticipation of the upcoming political season. It’s a win-win for both our clients and our vendors to have our schedules laid in well in advance for the coming year. Clients can rest assured we’re already ahead of the curve and we should see fewer preempts due to political advertising than other advertisers who are less prepared for the rough and tumble year that 2008 is projected to be. Vendors are also set up for a good 2008, as they already know in October 2008 what our clients’ general advertising plans are for the coming year. With annual buys already locked in place, the sales people we work with on a continual basis can breathe a sigh of relief in the assurance they’ve got at least one of their clients prepared for 2008.

And that kind of assurance for both the client and vendor lets us in Media know we’re not leaving anyone hanging like a chad.