I’m sitting at my desk with a stack of industry pubs intimidating my lineup of project folders. I have a perennial backlog of marketing advice and business tip emails clogging my inbox. There seems to be an endless sea of blogs devoted to marketing and branding, some better than others (ahem). I have over five hours of TV recorded and waiting for me at home. The weekend newspaper is half-read. I have three unfinished books to read and am starting a fourth. My eyeballs are in high demand these days, and I’d wager they’re not alone in such popularity.
Today’s society is bombarded with information. It’s everywhere, much of it is free, and more of it is likely being read less and less. According to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, circulation among 814 of America’s largest newspapers dropped by nearly 2% during the 6 months between October 2004 and March 2005. That was before the issues with Newsweek’s koran-flushing story. Couple that with the high cost to print (compared to publishing online) and it is obvious that traditional newspapers are in trouble. They’re capturing fewer and fewer eyeballs.
When I was in high school, I had a crush on a certain girl of popularity. One day I worked up enough courage to ask her out on a date. I fidgited around and stuttered through my proposal, which was a very plain “Would you like to go out?” She responded that she was dating someone else at the time. Of course she was dating someone else, she was popular! She dated several guys. Was that the reason she rejected my offer? Probably not. I did very little to earn time with her. I didn’t even tell her what we would do on the date. Go to dinner at a nice restaurant? Go to see an incredible movie? Also, I showed no creativity by asking the same question that she probably had heard from many other guys. “Wanna go out?” (Of course it may have helped if I were more popular in high school as well, but we can’t all be homecoming kings)
What are you doing to capture eyeballs? Do you assume that by just putting out any information about you, your company, your services, or your product that you will warrant the attention of those two extremely popular orbs floating in someone’s head? What are you doing to invest in eyeballs? Does your website express enough value to garner time with my busy baby blues? Does your marketing campaign give enticing information that romances eyeballs or are you just asking “Wanna go out?” Sure, you may not be the star quarterback or the homecoming king, but with a little creativity and the right substance maybe you might just get that date.