March 31, 2008Intel learns to listen
Filed Under: Join the Conversation
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Intel has just launched ITopia (huh? OK, I get it "IT" + Utopia = ITopia) and in so doing, joins the conversation:
Intel is making its engineers available for one-on-one conversations as part of a move to embrace a "listening" marketing model.
What's really great here is the "no end date" associated with the program. As a wise old man once said, "Marketing is not a campaign; it's a committment".
Following the lead set by Dell and most recently Starbucks, what we're seeing now (as I wrote about in the book) is a strong backbone of customer service being interwoven into ongoing marketing and branding initiatives. It's a pretty sublime partnership of proactive and reactive backwards and forwards which aims to maintain a continuous and fluid dialog between brand and consumer.
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Comments
Great idea! We like the name and that they took hold of this good concept... it's a great investment of time and will benefit both parties for sure we can imagine!
Posted by: Social Marketing Journal
While I applaud the idea, I have to say the execution and experience of this site is downright bad.
Posted by: Mac Randall
Sounds interesting, and we will have to watch this one as it unfolds. IT professionals always like to speak directly to engineers when they can (based on my years with HP...), so this should strike a chord with them. I like that they've joined the conversation, just not sure it is all that different from other "support forums" that are already prevalent out there.
But I'm cheering for them.
Posted by: Becky Carroll
Have to agree with Mac. I showed this to my class tonight based solely on Stuart Elliott's customary lazy write-up in the Times. I hadn't even checked it out prior.
What an embarrassment. I had to apologize to the class. I'll be blogging about it Friday.
Posted by: Kevin Horne
Kevin,
This is troubling for many reasons.
As in life, there are two parts to everything:
- IDEA
- EXECUTION
I never checked out the section as the Adweek article mentioned that the initiative had not yet launched, but I'm fairly sure I would have come to the same conclusion as you and Mac
Sad
Posted by: Joseph Jaffe
Right! And part of that is: who is driving the idea/execution bus. In order to keep my nose clean as a freelancer who relies on the agency channel for projects, I won't name names,,,but let's just say there might be a lesson here as to where companies should go to get this kind of help (hint: "big" and "integrated" might not be the top criteria ;)
Posted by: Kevin Horne
While Intel's intent seems progressive, let's remember that "listening" marketing is limited to active users.
Another important part of a marketer's job is getting new users. It's not easy creating brand awareness through conversation.
When I look around my home at all the brands I have, I can think of a traditional marketing campaign for most of these products that raised my awareness, but I have a tough time imagining how or why I would want to have a conversation with the vast majority of them.
I bet the people at Canon, Amazon, Budweiser, or Peace Cereal are really nice, but I don't have time nor do I care to talk to them. Show me a 20 sec ad, try to make me laugh, then move on so I have time to talk to my friends. That's how I like to hear about new brands.
Posted by: Craig
