Change takes place when one person recommends to another a company’s service, not because of the high style of the company’s advertisement but because a service rep went out of his way to be helpful. A consumer responding to good service is nothing new, of course. What is new in the Recommendation Age is that one recommendation from one person can result in thousands or even millions of impressions. This is not theory. It’s happening right now and it is changing society and, very quickly, the way companies do business.

The Recommendation Age phenomenon is expanding mostly through hundreds of online social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Buzz, YouTube, LinkedIn, and thousands of smart phone apps that allow anyone to log in and comment or enter a rating about anything. For instance, there is a smart phone app called My Net Diary through which you can find specific nutrient, calorie, and additive information about, not just food types, but many of even the most obscure name brand products from actual consumers who have inputted that information along with a scan of the bar code. Fellow users can then scan the bar code of a product they are considering or the name of a specific variety of raw produce and instantly see more information about the product posted by other users. My Net Diary users are just everyday consumers who are only interested in tapping into resources they feel they can trust more than advertisers and to which they themselves can contribute. That last aspect is the important part that pulls people in. I will discuss examples in Part Three of companies tapping into the consumer urge to be interactive participants in commercial dialog. But you can begin to understand the power of this aspect of social media by understanding one principle: People will be more devoted to that which they help to build.

(Excerpt from my new book, The Recommendation Age)

For a long time there has been a deserved suspicion about the dulling affect that over-consumption of entertainment media can have on mental skills. Television addicts can become mind numbed couch potatoes, etc. and never again have an original thought. Similar concern arose from teachers and parents of children who seemed addicted to hand-held gaming devices.  So in turn one might judge too quickly that the tsunamic spread of social media across the face of social culture will quickly dull overall social awareness and weaken social skills to the admittedly shallow levels one typical reads in social media posts.  It is more likely that social media participants are merely enjoying greater opportunity to sharpen the social awareness and skills they have. Granted the content of a majority of social media postings are brief and often meaningless to all but a few intended readers.  Most of the connections made are shallower than the more romantic days of hand written letters. Tweets are never likely to compare in richness with Sonnets From the Portuguese. And perhaps the high and still growing dependence on communications technology makes familiarity with finer verse less likely. But rather than dulling users, social media is actually making users more socially sensitive. A different kind of social sophistication is emerging, which we must understand is the true source of social media’s power to influence buyers and sellers. What is becoming sharper is grassroots attentiveness to the minds and lives of others. Under the shear culture changing pressure of growing social media proficiency and the long nurtured hunger to connect we are beginning to relearn to let others into areas of our lives we closed off before. This most intimate aspect is happening more slowly. But I can say that now I know more about the daily lives, struggles, likes and dislikes, hopes, and health of people I haven’t seen in many years than I used to know about my immediate family. I frequently hear this same general sentiment expressed by others. This is happening because people are eager to share their lives. This impulse to share is the core energy of the Recommendation Age. Everything is personal now and people are loving it.

But this is a great takeaway lesson for marketers and business owners. KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE WELL.

While Pia was an amazing singer, arguably the best on the stage this year, she obviously didn’t connect with the voting demographic. I am going to take a guess here and say her amazing ballad renditions were more appreciated by non-voters than voters.  And who are the voters? Well, let’s look at who is still standing- An alternative /singer song writer with a very original voice, a stereotypical rock star with an amazing voice that goes high on command, a young version of Luther Vandross who is hard NOT to like,  two very young country influenced singers with their own style, a clean cut young man that looks like he’s straight out of a boy band with the voice to match, A very original and gifted bearded singer and musician who we all can relate to as the “uncool” out of the mold guy, and  a young girl with an amazing blues influenced voice that she has made into her own original signature.

So what do we learn from all of this about the voters?

1. They want someone who is original with their own style and puts their own signature on the music.

2. The younger teens and tweens are obviously driving a ton of the voting

3. People are looking for a personal connection that they can connect to off the stage as well as on the stage.

5. Don’t rely JUST on  your singing ability. It’s your personality on stage and crowd interaction that makes a difference.

6. And as Mr. Tyler said, it’s some time the imperfect vocal ability that makes it just perfect for the voters.

The lesson and exercise above can be applied to any business or marketing initiative. If you want to connect with your fans or customers who will ultimately vote with their wallets, or their recommendation of your product or service, you have got to know who they are.

Here are a few tips that may have saved Pia, and will hopefully help you-

- Go where your audience goes, read what they read, eat where they eat, etc.

- Be authentic and transparent with your communcation

- Look at your competition and see what their fans or customers are responding to the most

- Focus on the audience of ONE. Don’t try to appeal to everyone, but imagine you are talking to that one person who is your focus demographic

- Be yourself, and at the same time focus on what makes you unique and different. Don’t be a carbon copy of anyone else.

Without being particularly computer savvy or, for that matter, over the age of 10, we can today:

• Tell Pizza Hut how quickly our order got to the door – and how it tasted once it got there
• Tweet about that convertible we just rented, before the top is even down
• Review a movie, during the movie
• Tweet a picture of an actual fast food burger side-by-side with how the same meal looks in the ad
• Share hilarious photos of folks we just saw shopping at Wal-mart
• Become “friends” with our favorite author, TV or movie star, musician or sparkly vampire on Facebook

What started as a few simple comment, feedback or review forms on the Web’s most popular website soon grew into an online obsession. This culture of feedback has spawned the Recommendation Age, and it’s here to stay.

The information age and the Internet have overwhelmed people to the point that we are now more interested in connecting and making real interactions with peers, family, friends, and people with similar tastes and interests than we are in being “told” what’s hot, what’s not – and why. Where we used to search the Internet, now we listen to it; constantly seeking the advice, support and unvarnished – often unedited – views of others to help counsel our most basic decision-making processes.

This shift has also heavily influenced how people shop, research and find information about various topics. For the first time ever, Facebook now refers more traffic than Google. We are now most interested in what others are saying about the product, service, or place than we are what the source of those products are saying.

In other words, we don’t trust big corporations or, for that matter, their advertisements, product placement or paid testimonials to sway us one way or another. We’ll decide for ourselves if Domino’s crust is actually any better now than it was 10 years ago, thanks very much. We’ll go see your movie based on the recommendations of friends or our favorite bloggers, regardless of how many five-star reviews the movie poster features. And if we decide your latest bestseller isn’t up to snuff, it probably won’t remain a bestseller for very much longer.

We can read an excerpt of a book online – posted by a rabid fan – and download it instantly, without waiting for shipping or going to the store. We can pick and choose our own album tracks, downloading our favorite songs based on personal preference or the recommendation of a “dream playlist” from our favorite blog, versus the 10 that are prepackaged in album form.

In short, the days of the media’s power over unwary, unsuspecting and unsophisticated consumers are drawing to a close. Traditional media is fading fast, witnessed by the “death” of many print magazines and the decimation of hundreds of print newspaper positions, and the new “social” media is making “recommenders” of us all.

Why have individuals all over the world so universally and so abundantly invested themselves in this recommendation age phenomenon? Because it is an awakening. We have rediscovered something about who we are. Social networks, interactive bloggers, interactive commerce sites and apps and who knows what else is coming are all helping us to believe again that society isn’t a machine after all. We are a tribe. And we didn’t even know how hungry we were for tribal identity. And I believe we were created for this human interaction. Social scientists have long recognized the growing hunger for connection and an opportunity to, not just be nostalgic for the simpler days, but have a genuine, honest and relational way of depending on each other as neighbors while preserving our feelings of independence.

The Five Laws of Success in the Recommendation Age

The Law of Quality Control- Having a quality product is still the most important factor.
The Law of Transparency-Recommendations live online forever.
The Law of Authenticity-You must connect on a deeper personal level.
The Law of Responsiveness- There is no substitute for quick response.
The Law of R & R (Reviews & Ratings)-The best customer support can come from response to reviews.

Communication can’t be a one-way street; there must be a dialogue between both parties if either one is to benefit. So part of measuring the distance between you and your audience is learning to speak their language.

Hear me now: this DOES not mean grabbing a few buzzwords or soon-to-be-outdated slang and sprinkling them through your ad or Web copy. Nothing screams desperate like using words, phrases, or terms you don’t understand – or that aren’t authentic to your company’s message. Here’s a hint: If you’re using a term on your site that you wouldn’t use in conversation without feeling phony, delete it. You’re dealing with a very savvy online community that can see through a phony faster than you can say “my bad.”

The key is to speak on the same level with your audience, not too high or too low. Put your copy on a diet: cut out the fat phrases, starve the bloated sentences, and serve up fewer five-dollar words.

To make sure you’re speaking the audience’s language, read your copy out loud. Do you stumble? Falter? What words stop you up? Eliminate them. Don’t talk down to your audience, but speak to them in language they are comfortable using themselves.

To help you communicate more effectively with your audience, follow these five helpful hints:

1.    Read what they read: Every demographic has a canon of literature unto itself. Sports lovers have their bibles, knitters read what appeals to them, aspiring actresses follow all the Hollywood trade papers, and skater boys devour their skateboard mags faster than their wheels eat up the concrete. When you’ve isolated your audience, go one step further and identify their reading material of choice; then read it.

2.    Hear what they hear: What radio stations appeal to your core audience? Is it talk radio for your target CEOs? Is it punk rock for your surfer dudes? Is it adult contemporary for your stay-at-home moms or maybe golden oldies for the Boomer set? If you don’t know, you can’t hear; if you can’t hear, you can’t speak effectively.

3.    Watch what they watch: Get to know the viewing habits of your bull’s eye audience. Know when they are tuning in – and to what programs. Are they watching ESPN or HGTV? Are they fans of MTV or more inclined toward CNN? Who are the celebrities that appeal to them? For instance, if you don’t know the heavy hitters of the knitters, like Lily Chin and Debbie Bliss, how can you understand why they are so appealing to fiber fanatics?

4.    Know what they know: Every set, subset and sub-subset of the American public has a core set of knowledge they subscribe to. Fishermen live by the tide charts and seasonal ebb and flow of Mother Nature. Nurses get plenty of rest in advance of a full moon or holiday weekend because injuries are more frequent during these periods, piling up the patient count. As you read, watch, and hear the materials your audience devours, isolate those truisms that are repeated over and over and know them by heart. When you know what they know, you can finally speak authoritatively.

5.    Go where they go: What does your audience do? Where do they do it? What is it about this place or these places that appeals to them? Can you go there? Or at least learn about these destinations? The more time you can spend in the natural environment of your audience, the more comfortable you become there – and with them.

When you follow these five simple tips, you will better communicate with your audience in ways that sound realistic – and not regurgitated. If effective communication is key to reaching your audience, then knowing your audience is the key to effective communication.

It’s difficult to conjure up personal, unique, relevant, authentic images of your demographic, baseline, affiliate, or end-user. So don’t. Pick one person from that targeted group and focus all your energy on him or her. Maybe it’s a picture of your grandmother, or the harried businesswoman you sit next to at church every weekend, or the kid who mows your lawn, or your spouse, or her brother, or just the guy you stood behind in line at the coffee shop this morning.

Whoever you’re aiming at, make this person the sole focus of your targeting efforts. Don’t just envy those profilers you watch on TV every night, become one; compile a living profile of your audience of one. What are their habits? What are their hobbies? Where do they shop? What makes them feel comfortable, happy, safe and loved?

This is truly an audience of one, and while you may think that this is too simplistic a formula to work for you, try this little quiz and you’ll soon see it’s anything but. Below, I list some brand names of people, places, and things. As you read the following list, close your eyes and picture their unique audience of one.

•    Tony Hawk
•    Tony Bennett
•    Disney World
•    The Dallas Cowboys
•    JetBlue
•    The Black Eyed Peas
•    iPod

How’d you do? Could you picture who might buy Tony Hawk’s latest video game? What might a Dallas Cowboys fan look like? Slide a Tony Bennett CD into any sound system and who might respond favorably? What does the typical Black Eyed Peas listener wear to go out dancing at the clubs? Who is choosing to travel on JetBlue?

Maybe the world is not quite as familiar with your brand as they are the above super-brands, but at least one person should be: YOU. If you can’t define your audience of one, how will your audience ever know they’re the one? Don’t worry; The Bull’s Eye Effect will help you define the audience of one.
But first you have to Find Your Target.
Fortunately, that’s our very first step…

TRY THIS…

Flip through a magazine or watch television commercials. Make a note of the product and the message for five different ads. Then write down a description of the intended “audience of one” based on this information.

Case in point: Have you ever noticed that you’ll only see trailers for comedies before a comedy? Or previews for scary movies in front of a scary movie? That’s because like breeds like; an audience for the latest zombie offering is more likely to remember – and look forward to seeing – another zombie movie than, say, a light romantic comedy.
I’ve found that this is a great way to think about how YOU target your customers. If your product or service is the payoff after all those previews, the movie itself, then what kind of preview would be playing in front of it? Comedy? Buddy picture? Family film? Action? Adventure? Thriller?
Horror?!?

I want you to take this seriously. We often think in terms of “mission statement,” “purpose” or “elevator pitches,” but those are more company-oriented. Thinking in terms of movie trailers to describe your product or service – and, in turn, your audience – is much more customer-oriented. Your sales pitch shouldn’t be general. You need to zoom in to the core of that audience of one. Figure out the appeal of your product or service to this specific individual. In other words, “tailor your trailer.”
Movies come in genres – comedy, romance, thriller; companies come in niches – just as businesses do; for example, retail, B2B, automotive. Seeing your target audience in simpler terms is better for both of you. Be direct. Be clear. Be exciting. Learn from the movie previews. They entice the audience with clips that will appeal to their individual movie preferences.
Many movie trailers are so specific they don’t just cater to one broad genre, such as horror, sci-fi or chick-flick, they cater to one specific sub-set of one particular genre. One such example is the latest trend of adapting bestselling video games into blockbuster movies, aka Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Mortal Kombat, Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Doom, House of the Dead and the latest entry, Hit Man.

Have you ever seen a preview for one of these movies? You can tell just who in the audience has played the game before by their almost instant, immediate response to the teaser-trailer; there is almost an electric feel to the theater as these audience members – typically young men or women in their late teens to early twenties – literally leap to their feet and cheer on their latest gaming hero.

Now, you might think that being so selective with their marketing efforts to one sub-set of the genre might alienate the rest of the audience, but the opposite is the case; the rest of us earmark the phenomenon and think to ourselves, “Well, there must be something to this if these young people are so enthusiastic about it. maybe I’ll check it out when it gets released…”
Remember: Like breeds like; find out who would like you and pitch to them. So, in other words, don’t pitch your zombie flick to an audience that’s hungry for comedy. First you have to know what you’ve got on your hands; a comedy or a scary movie.
Knowing what type of product or service you provide should seem like second nature by now, but if it really was so easy, you wouldn’t be here reading this right now because I wouldn’t have had to write it in the first place.
Let’s say you’re a shoe company. So far, so good. What kind of shoes do you sell? Dress shoes? Flip-flops? Women’s? Men’s? Sneakers? What? Athletic shoes; great. Does that tell you your audience? Hardly. I’ll grant you, nowadays pretty much everybody uses athletic shoes, but that doesn’t mean they’ll use yours.

Taking the athletic shoe analogy a little farther, ask yourself a few questions to narrow the audience:

•    Are your athletic shoes edgy enough to appeal to the teen/tween market?
•    Are they too edgy to appeal to the senior market?
•    Are they cool enough for the college crowd?
•    Are they affordable enough to cry out to urban hipsters on a budget?
•    Are they sensible enough for upscale women?
•    Are they rugged enough for working men?

Pretty confusing, isn’t it? Rejoice! There is freedom in simplicity; there is profit in specifics. For instance, let’s pick any target audience up there – seniors, career women on-the-go, weekend hikers, pick one – and you can see how focusing on that audience, and only that audience (the bull’s eye), means less time spent worrying about the other audiences (the rings around the bull’s eye).

For instance, if you pick the fairly robust target segment of weekend hikers, you can play strictly to them. With design issues, with ad copy, with graphics, with seasonal campaigns, with colors, with treads, with laces, with – well, you get the picture.
It’s all bull’s eye; all the time. Now you can finally picture the genre your product or service is in and create a “preview” that’s appropriate for fans of the genre. And remember, it’s not about recreating the blockbuster formula that works for every movie, every time.

Don’t research the top-five selling boots for weekend hikers and simply replicate their ad copy and TV spots; what works for them might not work for you, and vice versa. It’s not about copying the other guy just because it worked for them; it’s about targeting YOUR audience with YOUR message touting YOUR product.

Don’t forget our audience of one. When you can ignore all the other sub-markets for athletic shoes and visually pinpoint your genre – weekend hikers – you can now picture your audience of one; that single weekend hiker.
Now real communication can happen – and prospects can become customers. You’ve found your bull’s eye and you’re ready to take aim at it. Let the box office pour in!

TRY THIS…

Imagine your product or service is the focus of a new movie. Instead of a commercial, make a movie trailer. How will you get the audience excited enough to come back and see it?

This is understandable. As businesspeople, we work hard to capture our message; it’s valuable work that can only be done by internal employees who know our culture, our co-workers and our CEO. But the very insider nature of our mission statements and corporate copy can sound exclusive and clique-y to our customers.
They often don’t get the inside jokes, the clever language, the puns, metaphors or similes that we worked so hard on – for so long. If customers don’t get your copy, if it doesn’t speak in their language, you might as well not write it. And copy that only works for you simply doesn’t work!

The trick is to seek comfort where you’re not comfortable, which is usually in your target audience’s shoes. Let’s say you’ve never knitted a day in your life, secretly make fun of knitters behind their backs, talk down to them in their presence and generally just “don’t get this whole knitting thing,” but are suddenly put in charge of producing a new line of do-it-yourself manuals for, of all things, knitters.

Well, unless you get out of your knitter-doubting comfort zone but quick, your future customers will pick up on your thin knitter knowledge – but quick. The best way to do this is to switch off the comfort and welcome the uncomfortable. Immerse yourself in the world of knitting to the point that you are absolutely obnoxious about it. But you can’t just fake it; you have to open yourself up to it.

This is literally the biggest step one can take in measuring the distance between you and your audience. This is your straight line to the audience you’re targeting – and if you can’t feel comfortable in this niche, they’ll never feel comfortable buying it.