Finding Your Home: A tête-à-tête with Amy Bohutinsky

This article was originally posted at www.marketmix.org.

Zillow used word of mouth, earned media and content marketing to tell stories and connect directly with consumers to build a strong brand and large traffic base over a short period of time—all with ZERO advertising budget! I had the opportunity to speak with the brain behind the bold and unconventional marketing approaches: Amy Bohutinsky, CMO at Zillow. Follow her on Twitter @AmyBo.

When Amy started at Zillow, there was an idea, but no name or product! Heh, just a team of founders with a big ambition to build a household name in residential real estate—but a reality now no less! This small team including Rich Barton (Expedia) and Spencer Rascoff, whom Amy had worked with at Hotwire, had built successful startups before and had either taken the companies public or had very successful acquisitions. So if there were one thing that had attracted Amy to join Zillow, it was the team.

“90% home shoppers now start their search online!”

Clearly the idea was to empower the consumer, but how has that customer changed in the last 5 years, I inquired. Amy’s response was right on the money that Zillow has massively changed how people research home options. With hundreds of data points for consumers to understand what’s happening in a neighborhood, Zillow has conditioned consumers to have enormous amount of data on their fingertips during home-shopping. Before Zillow the consumer did not have a usable starting point to know what the house worth should be. Would Amy agree that more people are now open to the idea of using the data than before? Take a step back—this type of online data wasn’t even available before Zillow, which aggregated these humungous datasets ground up!

“2/3rds of usage is on a mobile device and the mobile usage on weekends is over 70%.”

OK so data is king, but what’s on the horizon for the real estate industry? According to Amy, Mobile has been a huge catalyst for Zillow to advance its strategy in the last two years. Zillow was launched in 2006 in the pre-smartphone era, but nobody in the leadership had imagined that mobile would influence the direction of the product or the marketing, at least not by such magnitude.

Her brand positioning tips for web startups does not exclude the importance of a mobile strategy either.  But Amy’s first piece of advice to a web startup is to focus on the SEO, which is one of the most important things you can and should do right from the start. Don’t take shortcuts! #2. Every brand should have a mobile strategy, and it shouldn’t come as an afterthought. Build for mobile and web simultaneously, or better yet—build for mobile first. #3. Talk to your target audience, all the time. Know their loves, their hates and their needs. But sometimes, don’t be afraid to just go with your gut!

“Don’t be afraid to hire people who know more than you, are faster or more creative.”

Switching gears a little bit, I asked Amy to share a leadership lesson she’d learned. Taking a page out of the Spencer Rascoff playbook (CEO of Zillow), Amy advocates that “Hire better than you” is a mantra that applies to any profession but even more so in marketing, where there are so many deep disciplines. Hire people who can go deeper, have faster execution and are more creative than you, because you are only as good as the team you build, advocates Amy.

Talking about Marketing as a function, what good aspect of basic marketing have marketers neglected in recent years? Many companies lose out on the storytelling, especially when there are so many channels, says Amy, adding that while it’s incredibly important to use data to tell the story, you also need to use good storytelling as a pivot for your marketing efforts. Amy feels that some of the greatest marketing comes when a company’s brand promise is completely aligned in everything it does: the products, the messaging, the investor persona, the CEO. Single mission, single message. The best marketers know how to make this happen. LinkedIn is a terrific example of this, according to Amy.

For someone with such deep insights, I would say Amy is more of a left brainer (analytical) than a right brainer (creative). Considering that she had no advertising budget until 2012, in Zillow’s seventh year, how else would she manage to play along? “I straddled the line between both—not to say that I’m terrific at both but average at both”, said Amy humbly. But the argument I am certainly more convinced with is that she’s got a knack for spotting and recruiting top talent on either side to complement the knowledge and capabilities that she or her team does not already have. And how? Hire better!

“My kids think I eat M&M’s and play ping pong all day!”

My having personality misconceptions is another matter, but what is the biggest misconception people generally have about Amy’s job? It depends on who you ask, says Amy, adding that her kids think she eats M&M’s and plays ping pong all day! Humor is a great strength-add to any job, won’t you agree? Amy knows her marketing strengths well, and ranks her sense of storytelling on the top of that list. Starting her career in broadcast journalism, she realized rather early the importance of making a strong emotional connection with the audience, which she has carried through. Her broadcasting job also required her to file stories and be live every day at 5pm, 6pm and 11pm, developing in her a perpetual sense of urgency. She admits that she gets impatient when things don’t move quickly but underscores that it’s a good trait to have especially when you are building a category leader this quickly.

“The best decision you can ever make is to work for people you deeply admire.”

As a C-level executive at a respected company, Amy is a definitely an inspiration to many women wanting to break through the glass ceiling. Amy’s corporate career progressed through startup environments, when there were no female mentors or role models and few female employees even. But it also made Amy very aware of the impact she could have by being a female leader to other women when she started growing her own team at Zillow. Amy is a strong proponent of work-life balance, trying hard to create one, and also being very encouraging of her women co-workers to be available to the family while also having a really meaningful career. Amy’s take on “leaning in” for budding women professionals wanting to have successful careers and reach C-level suites is that the best decision you can ever make is to work for people you deeply admire, who inspire you, and who make you a little nervous because you want so badly to impress them, always. Under that, Amy believes, you’ll create your best work and the rest starts to fall into place!

Someone with this type of clarity and balance evidently had some great strategies and tactics to elevate brand Zillow, fueling audience growth of, hold your breath, 75% year-over-year in the peak home shopping season of 2013! Hear how unconventional brand building approaches accelerated Zillow from startup to IPO and successes beyond, at MarketMix 2014, where Amy Bohutinsky will take center stage as the morning keynote.

What Would Chris Donaldson Do?

This article was originally published at www.marketmix2013.com.

If you are thinking that the genesis of the name Hand Crank Films has got something to do with hand-cranking of 8mm or 16mm films through the camera in the olden days, then you are right! True to its name, the company wishes to stay as close to story as possible without letting the technology interfere as much, opines Chris Donaldson (@Chris_Donaldson), Executive Producer at Hand Crank Films, and member of esteemed MarketMix 2013 speaker lineup. Video has enamoured me since time immemorial, so how could I let go of an opportunity to gather insights from a veteran of the commercial video production business?! So here we go!

“If the heart says no, the brain is not even going to have a chance to say yes or no.”

I could be biased towards video over other media, but what makes others viewers sit through an entire video – ads, movies, etc? – I curiously asked Chris. His answer was simple. He said people sit through a video it if they are engaged, and feel they are communicated to. The fact that Chris does not see video marketing as itself justifies his philosophy that good video is about good storytelling first. The common thread running through all forms of good storytelling – books, radio, movies, painting and music, according to Chris, is the ability to make a connection with an audience.

His observation of general buyer behavior is that people buy with their hearts and not with their brains. This decision is strongly based on an initial impulse – whether you like it or not, does it make you feel confident – and only then comes the analytical part. For all this to happen an emotional hook is needed and this is true not just of video marketing; any marketing effort can fail if it does not connect, said Chris.

So how are these “hooks” designed, and are there any broad parameters to consider, one may ponder. Chris thinks that effective storytelling is mainly about reaching people quickly and engaging them in a way that will keep them (esp. in the digital world). He added that the hooks must address relevant emotions, so there are no silver bullets really. For instance, a hospital-related video must highlight compassion and care, whereas a GoDaddy video must strike on shop value and/or humor. The key inputs to get the feel right, is to understand who your audience is, and to then analyze how the product or service must talk to the audience in a way that will engage this audience.

“Receive inputs on how the video will be incorporated into the client’s overall marketing strategy.”

Chris is of the opinion that the business owner/representative understands the product/business better than any outside party; hence his idea of right video marketing approach is to go top-down. At Hand Crank Films, the process is split into 3 phases – Discovery, Development and Delivery. The Discovery phase is most important as the primary goal here is to understand client’s needs. From an ROI standpoint, it is important to mutually agree what role the video will play in the company’s marketing mix, said Chris.

Video can engage people on an emotional level, which is more difficult to achieve with brochures or written word. But the marketing video must help get the viewer interested in taking the next step – to read the white paper or brochure, or to talk to your salesperson. Video serves the purpose of warming your lead and helping push through the sales funnel; therefore it need not cover details such as product specs. The actual video production has to be preceded by lot of brainstorming with the client, followed by storyboarding, conceptualizing and scripting. The goal for all participants – clients, agency, producer and shooting crew – is to agree on vision before day 1 of shoot.

“The distribution strategy has to be robust in order to make the overall marketing strategy work.”

So you have the video now, but it remains that delivery is a unique challenge. YouTube seems to be the de facto consumer video distribution platform, but you have to explore sites frequented by your potential (niche) audiences said Chris. For example, the Mackie speaker ad can maximize its potential if it were put up on websites frequented by DJs and rock & roll bands, besides YouTube. You must have a strategy for timing your social media engagement as well; Facebook – post once a day, Twitter – 5/6 times a day, Blog – once or twice a week, all fed by a content library with varied content that is each say 3m, 5m or 15s long. At Hand Crank Films for example, the content is developed after mapping out the client’s editorial calendar, which spans the entire marketing mix over a year and which covers dates and frequency of events, blogs, social media engagement, product launches and other types of customer-facing marketing deliverables.

While technology brings content to audience, endorsement from a friend or a colleague and a good review is akin to word of mouth, which expands the content’s reach, observed Chris. In the B2B space, he realizes that the viewer base is a much smaller niche and is potentially limited to endorsements from customers and/or clientele, etc. but it does lead to people attending your event, contributing to your charity, and increased sales. Word of mouth is the least expensive and the most valuable way to generate marketing, so lap up all those comments, likes and RTs!

“DIY has its own set of challenges, not the least of which is story development and editing but it can be done pretty easily with just a little forethought.”

Clients may not be able to roll out professionally produced content every two weeks, but you can perfectly fill the void using DIY content on blogs, demos, reviews, etc. advocates Chris. Chris thinks DIY certainly has its place in the marketing mix esp. considering consumers seem to be increasingly forgiving of low quality content produced via mobile devices as long as the video is useful/ appealing. DIY tips from Chris: (1) Start with a simple ‘Talking Head’ video every other week and post it to the company blog and Facebook. Talk about industry challenges, company culture, etc. Keep it to a minute or so – slam a logo at the end and boom! – you’ve created content! (2) Concentrate on content that has VALUE to your consumers/audience. Don’t talk about your company (use the 80/20 rule). Talk about the market – provide solutions – answer customer questions – all that stuff. By becoming a resource for your customers, you’ll soon be seen as an expert – which will bring business in the long-run.

“People sitting on Desktops watch videos for 2m and this stat more than doubles for people watching content on mobile device.”

This, Chris says, is because viewers are more engaged, and less distracted, adding that mobile is not just about smartphones and tablets – it is about content being available everywhere and anywhere. Clarifying that QR codes are very much alive, Chris says we will soon be walking by triggers that initiate content such as video, blogs and in diverse forms of augmented reality (smell?). How will you create relevant and engaging content to grab people’s attention in these spaces? How will you design triggers for these new platforms? These are huge opportunities, exclaims Chris. My question to you, reader: How would you answer #ifihadglass?

Finally, I asked Chris about his most successful video campaign and if he had insights on why it had worked. “9/11 Happened To Us All”, he said is dearest to him. It was shot as a 4 part series on account of 10th year anniversary of the cataclysmic 9/11 incident. Being part of a project which channeled honest emotions, which was released on an emotional day and which combined the serendipity of being picked up by media (CNN, NBC, Yahoo) and of having clocked a million hits in 3-4 days’ time, was very humbling, said Chris. Even if Chris hadn’t told me, I would have known that this interview of a Muslim firefighter from 9/11, being able to capture the essence of humanity in a minute, is the reason why the campaign worked. You will agree when you watch the video.

Tech innovations such as portable cams enabling shooting in 5K format and crazy efficient distribution models are already here, but at the end of the day customer engagement is sparked by good storytelling. So go tear that lid off your brand with a video! If you don’t already know how, learn from the man himself on Mar 20, 2013 at MarketMix!

What India Inc. needs: Customer Service

Needs to offer, that is. Cakewalk, considering the gazillion call centers operated out of India, right? Wrong. It is a culture question, not infra.

Take another type of B2C interaction – Advertising. The following came after I expressed to Sainath Saraban what I thought of his review of an Airtel 3G TV commercial. I felt the ad was futile simply because it did not focus on the product’s USP. But Saraban told me the ad was part of a campaign so it ‘works’. Told him I disagreed, and he said:

Not sure if his last statement meant to acknowledge my thought or to simply shut me up. Anyway.

A childhood memory to boot. My grandmom until few years ago preferred purchasing fresh ground coffee powder from a vendor whose store was in the vicinity in the past. We moved homes to a different locality but she continued to purchase coffee powder from the same store. It wasn’t about the quest for perfect filter coffee taste, it wasn’t the price, It was the emotional connect that mattered to her the most.

Back to the ad, Mohan Agashe looking for an old acquaintance over Airtel’s efficient 3G network should have been the case, but seemed vis-à-vis social networking. As a reviewer I really was looking for Airtel in that facebook commercial. My takeaway from the ad is effective access of facebook, now on mobile networks. I would rather expect the enabler, the product, the brand to hog better part of that limelight. Many options to choose from – Idea, Docomo, Airtel, etc and how these compare with each other, the number game that a customer may factor in would be a discussion for another day.

Going by Saraban’s logic, Airtel would probably hold its own (and big) in the newly introduced 3G market segment by simply creating that connect. Of course, customer loyalty, quality, pricing – all remaining competitive. I must admit from my own experience that emotional connect elates a brand no less. This leads me into thinking about favoritism as a concept. How does one favorite a gupchup bandi (Pani puri stalls for the non Hyderabadis) or a Biryani joint? The taste, one may argue. Agreed. How does one favorite a grocery store? The distance, one may say. How about the Barber? Job well done. This Q&A activity can go on. In a random sample of individuals, each person would have a list of favorite vendors and this set of preferences differs from person to person. So really, it’s a many:many relationship. What I am getting at is each vendor is not an overall favourite; they just create that connect with certain few consumers who then become regulars in spite of access to other convenient options.

Advertisements are only a method of reaching a broader audience. Like any other, a commercial viewed/heard or an online banner ad clicked through does improve brand image, but it’s only the later portion of engagement that according to me seals the deal. Single purchase is seldom goal of a campaign, as much it may be about regularizing customers. Given that branding as a theory has changed from promoting universal appeal to tailoring the shout-out based on media used, target audience, product line up, geographies, yada, yada, yada, I feel it is really controlled by the consumer based on how they perceive it. So how to create a loyal customer base (that directly or indirectly generates revenue for your product/service) is directly and obviously dependent on how customers feel about the brand. They come back if they’re happy with the product and additionally the customer experience and satisfaction which help build that hunky dory relationship.

Does good customer service help always? Depends, according to me. If the goal simply is lead conversion that affects the bottom line, I guess excellence in customer service does not always ‘help’. If it is about forging a relationship so the customer will come back sooner or later to make a purchase or get one other to make that purchase , it ‘does help’, at the very least in spreading the prophecy of the brand. My previous blog spoke about the purchasing power of Indians and myriad pockets waiting to tap that money. Reuters’ recent article that Asia’s wealthy park cash in cars, homes, art and wineand not so much in investments is only good news for the retail industry.

Seen from a 10,000ft view, what an irony that a country that is called the engine of ‘good customer service and satisfaction’ to customers all over the world through its gazillion call centers, has a pretty superficial outlook towards customer service for its own citizens?! For all that you know of a conventional Indian corporation, there is significant red tape to cut through, procrastination unparalleled, lack of a structured operational mechanism, petty politics or simply no enforcement of rules. Of course a lot of it is changing with corporations now being put on the world map, but we’re not quite there yet. Good customer service is a culture that an individual must imbibe, a company must imbibe and eventually must spread to other retailers, service providers and any business that has anything to do with customer interaction. With customers taking to social media and internet forums to review their experience, companies are proactively approaching customers to have a chat. Good first step, by few.

India has begun browsing streaming videos over 3G network. It’s no surprise that India’s e-commerce market in 2011 is expected to hit Rs. 46,000 Crore. Spending power is not a permanent virtue of a country, but what may help sustain a relationship between a business and its customer is the love, or customer service in another language. The penny pinching Indian customer is going to find 5 options for anything they wish to purchase. While the product USP is one thing that appeals to them, it’s the plusses that is going to matter in the long term. Building a brand so the customers themselves can market will be an ideal goal to chase. Until next time.