Internet Marketing New York, Perfect Baseball Games and Dave Matthews: What your business can learn from human error vs. technology

Posted by Salem Global on Jun 8, 2010

I grew up playing little league and was a pretty better than average baseball player until I started missing and dropping balls. In business we experience learning from our mistakes all the time. We try our hardest to please our customers and clients. Do mostly everything we can to try and get new clients. Sometimes we succeed. Sometimes we fail. But when the sun is in your eyes or you aren’t sure where the fence is or another outfielder calls it but you don’t hear it. The ball falls. But when it’s not so clear whether you caught the ball or you tagged out the guy or your foot was on the base, we enter into the human zone where team one argues with team two whether he was safe or out. But when human emotion gets in the way and clouds our decision making, we need to call upon an UNbiased third party to decide who is safe, who is out, who is right and who is wrong. And then sometimes even THEY get it wrong. Question is whether it was due to foul play <pun intended> or did they honestly not see the activity from the correct angle.

So last week on June 2, 2010, Detroit Tigers Pitcher Armando Galarraga was robbed of a Perfect Game by umpire Jim Joyce’s terrible call. Even though the year is 2010 and instant video replay exists, Major League Baseball still relies on humans to make the final decision. As of this writing, there is no dispute at all. He was 100% out. See for yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3OE8iA621s

(And of course here is the Hitler movie spoof related to the incident if you have been following the story that YouTube has been taking them down left and right http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixKidAhVtW4)

I mean – we use it in tennis and the NFL. Why not in the MLB? Maybe this will be the straw that breaks baseball’s back.

Clearly, technology rules in sports and it rules in the business world as well. Of course – that’s why I have chosen a career and vocation based upon an exact marketing science vs. the whole guessing game. When I started out in the advertising industry in the late 80′s, the Internet was not commercialized as of yet. No one had email. No businesses had websites. We had Nielsen Ratings that developed audience measurement systems for the television industry. Basically, a sample of people in America would get an electronic box attached to their TV and that would send a signal back to a big server and database that measured what people watched at what hour. But we all knew that there was a tremendous margin of error because plenty of people left the room with their TV on while they went into the kitchen to get a beer or a snack. Some people even left their TV sets on while they left the house. And then there were people who actually played with the electronics because kids and parents were all paranoid about Big Brother even back then. (Boy if they knew back then about wiretapping, the government and Facebook privacy issues, George Orwell would have a 1984 field day!)

And that’s why I got into the Internet. Most people don’t know how to block their IP address. (It’s a bit more complicated than removing a wire from a set top or cable box.) But most people also don’t care. So now that we have established that the general population is not hiding anything (even their porn usage), we have a pretty solid measurement of IP addresses and website visits, hits, impressions and clicks. That means that you can REALLY measure ROI from Internet Marketing vs. trying to measure ROI from a print ad or a :30 second television commercial. People lie and make errors. And sometimes computers make mistakes too and break down – but they are a lot more accountable than humans. Go ahead. Try your hand at a PPC, SEO or email marketing campaign. With the tools available today, you can see how much money you are actually spending per person or per thousands of people, how many people SEE your ad, click on your ad or your website and ultimately how many people call you, send you an email, fill out a form and of course, buy your products or hire you.

Had a pretty AMAZING weekend that included seeing the Dave Matthews Band (now that I am in the know I call them DMB) at SPAC (Saratoga Performing Arts Center). I went with three other good friends who knew a lot more about DMB than I thought. The venue was mostly filled with college kids, beers in hand, perhaps some illegal substances as well but hey – they could’ve been legal cigarettes – who knows?… So my friend Ezra tells me that DMB fans blog about the concerts all the time. How Dave played this song and that song. What he was wearing and how cool the venue and setting was. Then my associate Aryeh tells me that people twitter during concerts all the time about what song he is playing and people compare notes on sets and songs and versions at what concerts in what cities etc. etc. (Check out www.DMBAlmanac.com) If Dave Matthews is using technology and his audience is using it, don’t you think you should too?

On a final note, as a result of this weekend, I have added a new song to my favorites. We will see how long it stays in my head. Enjoy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kD9CrZODlNA (Here is the Grammy Awards version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6t78OW-yhM.) Last funny note, after showing my super cute and adorable six year old daughter the original version she couldn’t understand how the people appear in the video and then disappear at the end. I said it was magic but she will soon figure out its all about the technology of video editing…

If you want to know more about Internet marketing and using technology to gain more exposure, get more clients and sell more product, give me a call at 212-993-5828, email raphis@salemglobal.com or check out www.SalemGlobal.com for more information.