Reality TV and E-Commerce: A Recipe for Success

Last July NI introduced you to one of our favorite sites in “Flypaper: Producer’s Tips for Sticky Sweeps.” The Bluefly sweeps are second to none, and now they have taken it even farther - integrating with every diva’s Wednesday indulgence: Project Runway.

This new promotion goes beyond a great sweepstakes (they are giving away a trip to the finale), and does what every online TV site or promotion must do to cultivate a loyal audience - extend the storyline.

What? A story-based extension that connects a Reality show AND a commerce site?? Not possible, you say? WRONG.

Each week, Bluefly.com and PR take the show to the next level by inviting fans to “Get the Winning Look.” You can get it by shopping for items that epitomize the winning design. Throw in polls, the Bluefly Accessory Wall from the show, the previously mentioned sweeps, and clips from the previous night’s episode on Fly TV (First you watch it, then you Shop It) and fans can immediately dive right in to embrace or improve upon the designer's vision. It's a recipe for success - an extension that delivers an audience who joyfully comes back again and again throughout the season.

Everyone is trying to do online extensions, but the only other TV show that has done it this well is Heroes (with the most popular Comic Book of all time) - and NBC has never even come CLOSE to cracking the nut on elegant commerce.

Hats (and Hermes and my Prada slingbacks) Off to Bluefly and Project Runway - you've got my vote!

Who Else Wants and Additional $40k A Year?

Today Yahoo.com posted an amazing "American Dream" story that you'll love, "Rolling in Cash," courtesy of Kevin Sites via Yahoo's People of the Web.

The story is about Linda Katz, a part-time entrepreneur who started her online business, the Prairie Tumbleweed Farm, as a joke. It was 1994 and she wanted to teach herself how to design a website. Since she lived on the prairie in southwest Kansas, where rolling tumbleweeds are sometimes the only dynamic feature of an endless flat horizon, she invented a farm that sold tumbleweeds, listing prices at $15 for a small one, $20 for a medium and $25 for large.

Though she’s coy about her annual income from tumbleweed wrangling, she says it is over $40,000 a year. Not bad for a bunch of dead, dried-up weeds. Read the full article here - and then come up with your own unique, simple and original idea!

Packing the house: Six takes on positioning a classic

I love movie trailers – absolutely LOVE ‘em – I think of trailers as little pieces of art. The beauty is that any story can be told any number of ways, so this is what I hope will be the first of many explorative pieces about what we can learn from movie marketing.

The first lesson is that any story can be told from a variety of viewpoints – even a classic like “Star Wars: A New Hope”. Check out the log lines below for a look at everyone’s favorite from six different points of view:

POV: Epic

Audience: General
Log line: In the continuing saga of the Empire, follow the adventures of a simple farm boy - Luke Skywalker – and a collection of unlikely allies (Chewbacca, C-3PO, R2-D2, Ben Kenobi and Han Solo) as they attempt to rescue a beautiful princess from the evil Lord Vader. The ultimate battle between good and evil is about to be joined by new generation of heroes.

POV: Romance

Audience: Women
Log line: Han Solo was a rogue on the run. Princess Leia was a rebel leader trying to save her people from destruction. They had nothing in common and everything to lose. But together they would discover a love greater than all the powers of the galaxy.

POV: Darth Vader

Audience: General
Log line: Anakin Skywalker abandoned his greatest love for the powers of the dark side and set out to conquer the galaxy in the name of the Empire. But now, after his twisted dreams of dominion and hate have been fulfilled, he will find that the remnants of that love may spell his doom in the form of a naïve farm boy and his rag-tag band of allies.

POV: Underdog

Audience: General
Log line: After encountering a droid with a hidden message, young Luke Skywalker heads off to rescue the beautiful Princess Leia from certain death at the hands of the Empire and the evil Darth Vader. But first, he’ll have to leave the only home he’s ever known and learn to master the underlying force that controls us all.

POV: Buddy Movie

Audience: General
Log line: Luke Skywalker and Han Solo, a pair of unlikely traveling companions, find themselves at odds when they both fall for the beautiful Princess Leia. But before either of them can get the girl, they must travel the galaxy, battle Storm Troopers, attack the fearsome Death Star, and defeat the evil Lord Vader. The ultimate battle between good and evil has never been so much fun!

POV: Continuing Story

Audience: General
Log line: George Lucas' spellbinding "Star Wars" sequel, the battle to save the galaxy from the evil Empire rages on. Join Luke Skywalker - the owner of a droid with a secret message who discovers the ancient secrets of the Jedi . . . secrets Luke will need when he encounters the Dark Side of the Force in the ultimate battle between good and evil.

Photo Credit: Original movie poster for Star Wars (renamed Episode IV: A New Hope) Courtesy 20th Century Fox

Welcome to Naked Insight!

So I’ve been struggling for a while around blogging and how to focus my thoughts. I’ve been thinking through those things that I care about the most – what really sparks my passion. I’ve been going back and forth between new media, movies, tv, animation, branding… those things that get me excited from both a personal and professional perspective. See, I’m both a professional working in the entertainment & new media industries, AND a total media junkie who wants to talk about popular culture and the stuff that I love (and hate).

What has become clear to me is that the naked core of what I care about is the audience.

When I was in college (about a billion years ago), I took a graduate class in media statistics. We learned to use massive computers to perform statistical analysis around consumer engagement with movie and tv marketing. I LOVED it. Cause and effect. We do this, you do that. Brilliant! Then, I got interested in the 'why'. WHY did you do that? And that was when I learned about focus testing doing research with college students to find out what made them respond or not respond to advertising messages in the college paper (I was a Sales Account Exec at the time). And I thought - WOW - if you ask people what they think, they will actually tell you! Amazing!

That was the beginning of the fall for me – really thinking about behavior. The difference between what people think they will do, what they say they will do, and what they ACTUALLY do. Some people might think it an odd combination that I am both a member of the Producer’s Guild and also the Web Analytics Association, but to me it just makes sense. I’ve just gotta KNOW what makes consumers have to have the next big thing, why audiences laugh or cry, how marketers succeed or fail at reaching them, and how Producers create the experiences that keep ‘em coming back for more.

So welcome to Naked Insight. It’s naked cuz I’m stripping to the core of what audiences love and hate, and what companies are doing to reach them. I hope you like it and keep coming back for more. J