Lost Sales Opportunities - The Siloing of Marketing

Several years ago I sat in on a presentation made by the CEO of  a publishing company. After he spoke for a few minutes,  it became clear that he had recently spent time on a long plane ride and was exposed to a Forbes specialty magazine. The buzz word at the time in the business world was “silo” and the goal was to get everyone out of their “business silos” so they could all “work together.”

It was a great talk and I actually felt hopeful for that company’s future for about five minutes. However it was apparent that to this CEO, breaking down silos meant taking resources out of the consumer silo side of his business and “investing” it in the business to business silo.  We could have saved a lot of time and skipped the whole speech.

The phrase "silo" brings to mind several images: The first is the symbol of plenty we see out here in flyover country. A grain silo. A vision of flat fields of corn and wheat and bountiful plenty. If you had a “business silo” and imagined a grain silo, you could think of a business resource that you draw on in times of good or ill, and it would nurture your business.

The second image is a missile silo. Here we’re talking about concrete bunkers and uniformed, brush cut military personnel waiting for the signal from another bunker to fire death and destruction on the “enemy”. Even in a business setting you can “harden” your silo and keep others from taking your resources.

In magazine media marketing, we unfortunately do a lot of the latter. Single copy newsstand marketing is kept far, far away from subscription marketing. Advertising marketing exists on an entirely different plane. Cross promote video and print? Why on earth would we attempt that? Promotional marketing of your own product? Huh?

And the new kid, that scruffy internet punk with all those social marketing thingies. Well, she’s so out there who the heck knows what she’s up to. And she's kept on another floor. And why the hell is the home office is giving her so much time and resources?

Of course, this is stupid. We all know that.  But this is how it’s done.

Consider this publishers:

If your customer buys a single print copy every month at $4.99 per issue, it will cost her $59.88 per year. I have a client who has a $4.99 monthly magazine and they charge $2.00 per issue to subscribe. That’s $24.00 per year. It costs $1.35 per copy to print the magazine. You do the math.

If you buy the Zinio version of the magazine so you can read it on your computer or iPad, or smart phone, it will cost you $3.99. Why $3.99? Of course, an iPad could cost you anywhere from $500 to $800.  If you buy the $800 version there’s the monthly 3G fee. If you store your stuff in a cloud and you want more than 5 gigs, there is that fee.

About this all being cheaper and greener...

"So Pete, about that conference call tomorrow..."

It does make you wonder who's in charge and where are we going.

Honestly, I don’t know. But I do know, that at least in the single copy side of the world,  we’ve been on a roller coaster since January 2009 when Anderson News melted down. Since the announcement of the iPad and the rollout of new 3G Nooks, Kindles, and whatnot, we print folk are supposed to see a renaissance of the business as we embrace the digital world. Which many of us already had. But still, we’re all dinosaurs. Or we’re all dead men walking.

Whatever. It seems to depend on who’s talking.

Consider this:

If you work at a company, you could work in a silo. Raw grain is inedible. You'll starve if that's all you've got. Do you work out of a bunkered missile silo? You do know that you'll run out of food eventually.

So, really, if you work at a company, imagine that you’re all working at the dining room table. And you all need to eat. And you all want a nice meal.

So pass the food, talk across the table, not just to your neighbor, and learn some manners.