Dennis Pannuto, CEO Aha! Insight Technology

Keeping them not only so there’s loyalty, but now they become a marketing voice for the brand. They’re actually marketing by communicating their experience in their communities. They’re becoming a marketing vehicle within the community that you’re trying to create. And it’s their voice that matters more than the brands voice in many instances.

Not only do they create conversations about brands, they are now a critical part of directing that transaction, as well as directing the community in many instances. There’s a pride factor; they want to feel good about their contribution.

Look at some of the simple models out there: Skype, Linkedin, Facebook. You become part of these communities then all of a sudden, people start reaching out to you, you get connected with others, reviews get written. In those examples “your brand” is more controlled because you only connect with people you want to and you moderate what is said about you to a large degree. Not so easy with Fortune 1000s in cyberspace.

MM
You introduced this notion of a conversation with the consumer.

I’d like to come back and revisit that. From a brand marketer’s perspective, conversations are a great kind of meet-and-greet, but the real art of marketing to someone of Shannon’s generation is not so much a conversation as it is persuasion and argumentation.

DP
If we’re going to talk about Shannon-if she’s the example there. I don’t think Shannon thinks about all of those things consciously.

She’s going to react to the experience that she has. She’s also going to react to the experience that other people have. That’s part of building that community.

That’s where I say that in the early part of the value chain that you’re trying to create or that a marketer’s trying to create-especially if they’re trying to sell to Shannon-it’s got to immediately be something that engages them. That may be through conversation.

MM
I agree with you that the initial courtship is going to be very conversational and undirected.

DP
Right. In some cases. In many cases. A lot of her conversations are happening digitally. They’re not happening in the traditional way, in the schoolyard or at some kind of after-school activity. It’s happening over the web, and it’s global.

So I think a marketer-if we’re still using Shannon as an example-has to make you feel that way. If they’re trying to promote their product, it has to be immediately engaging. It has to be honest. And in some way, it has to get them in there right away.

They’ve got to “taste” something. They’ve got to “touch” something.

For example, let’s look at things like Webkinz. There’s an example of a traditional product-a brick-and-mortar product. A stuffed animal that now has become the hook into a whole digital world that’s engaging young children.

To get them as part of that value chain you must engage them with something that they’re attracted to. It’s not only the plush toy. It’s the idea that they can go and build their own world and interact with others.

MM
Take us through the Webkinz experience.

DP
I’ve got 3 kids and about over 20 Webkinz at my house. I think the whole Webkinz experience is brilliant. And I’m sensitive to it. When I was at Golden Books working in the children’s entertainment market, we played with this idea-this was back in the 90’s. We tried to come up with some way to get the Internet involved with some kind of interaction, and to build a market there with our products.

We had books. We had videos. We had toys and games. One example of a product we developed before its time was FindItQuick.com. FindItQuick.com was a subject specific book, like Astronomy or Dinosaurs, that you bought in a bookstore. There was a web site where you had to type in a code and become part of that community There were links inside the book that would take you to the main site and various websites to get new content, updates, engage in activities, play games and interact within the community. The timing was off. It didn’t work as we would have liked. So I get the whole Webkinz phenomenon.

When I saw Webkinz come to market, right away, I thought, “They’ve got it. They’ve got it, and it’s going to boom.” That’s exactly what happened.

What’s really unique about the Webkinz experience-and why it works, in my opinion-is not only because kids want to build their own world, but also because it addresses a very fundamental and social dynamic that’s part of every human being. That is the desire and the need to communicate with other people. And to socialize with them.

Amazingly, I’ll come home and see my daughter who’s 9 years old hogging up the house phone, on speaker, with her friends. 3-way calls, while they’re in
Webkinz. They’re going to the different rooms and chatting. They’re basically building their world.

They’re not only building their world, but they’re able to share that world with each other. They’re out there gaining virtual money for this, so they can build and buy more materials for their world.

MM
So, what does Webkinz involve?

DP
You basically buy a plush toy. The stuffed animal has a number on it, a unique identifier. You get onto Webkinz.com and register it. Then all of a sudden, you’ve got this identity. You go in and start to build your world. You gain virtual money to be able to buy things by engaging in different activities.

MM
So the idea is that there are these educational activities appropriate to a 6-year old or an 8-year old or a 10-year old. When they play the game, they get a kind of currency or points or some sort.

They use that to then buy food and other sorts of things for the digital version of their plush toy. Is that correct? If, for some reason, they don’t feed their digital Webkinz, they start to look like sad, poor starving puppies.

DP
That’s right.

MM
That elicits from them, “Oh, my Webkinz needs some food!” That, then, is the empathetic impulse to go do stuff to earn points, to buy foods, to keep the cycle of life going.

DP
That’s absolutely correct. Very similar to Tamagotchi Town. Yes.

MM
Then what happens is that if you want to have another digital Webkinz, you’ve got to go get the plush toy in the store. Is that correct?

DP
Yes.

MM
What’s interesting about this from a social dynamic perspective is that the plush toy becomes a persistent messaging object of the online-and otherwise intangible-destination. The question that marketers would abstract from this is, “What are the plush toy equivalents for the online experience that we want to give our customers?”

DP
Exactly.

And Apple is a perfect example of getting it right. You’ve got your iPod connected to our iTunes. Right? You’re connected to both worlds. You’ve created that physical symbol. That physical icon.

You’ve got that physical connection and then you’ve got your digital world. Same thing if you go to my kids’ rooms. Each one of them in their rooms have lined up all of their Webkinz. They will play with them physically if they’re not online with them. They do that. It’s kind of like playing house in the twenty-first century.

MM
The question then is, as a former CIO of one of the largest advertising agencies in the nation-who was intimately involved in marketing and branding products and services-what comes to mind as the Webkinz equivalent for an executive?