“…your favorite TV show will air every Thursday at 8:00 p.m. You know the morning paper will arrive around 6:30 a.m. every morning.”-Forbes Magazine
As a child, Tuesdays at 8 pm were sacred- a new episode of Happy Days would air, and I made sure I was sitting in front of the TV by 7:59 every Tuesday night. Starting in the late 1940’s families started the behavior of setting a date to sit in front of the TV to watch the Ed Sullivan Show every Sunday night between 8 and 9 (for you millenials and younger, Ed Sullivan was like the first Jimmy Kimmel or Steven Colbert). TV viewers routinely set aside specific days and times each week, or even every night to watch their favorite shows.
Yet, over the past decade, we have had the largest transition in behaviors since the advent of the TV. Families are not sitting and watching TV together, they are all streaming on their own schedule. The on-demand revolution arrived, and not only for watching shows, but over the past two years, we have created on-demand work. We no longer have a typical 9-5 life. We are working all different hours, and often that means more. But if you had an appointment in the middle of the day, it became easier to schedule and get to.
So, how does this on-demand world affect channel marketing? The answer is even with the immense flexibility available the human persona craves some structure and consistency. For example, how many people have something that they do routinely every morning? From getting a cup of coffee to going for a morning jog or in the evening doing something each night that helps us relax after a long day, most of us have routines without even realizing it.
“Daily routines are helpful, but you may need a weekly routine for things that you do less often, such as grocery shopping or exercise. Set one or more routines, and you can reap these benefits:
Your stress level will fall. If you have a plan, you’ll feel more in control. You will have made many decisions in advance, and you can focus on making good choices for the ones that remain” -WebMD, Psychological Benefits of Routines
So, again how does this impact channel marketing?
As stated, weekly routines are important to accomplish tasks that need to happen less often. Take, for example, ContentMX.com/PartnerOn, we offer partners a cadence that never stops. Week in and week out a partner can expect new content from their favorite vendors. Additionally, week in and week out prospects can be sure that new content will appear from these partners in their newsfeed.
It is this level of consistency and level of expectation that offers partners and customers comfort. Seeing content and remaining on top of important information related to the products and solutions partners sell becomes part of their routine and aids in their business. Furthermore, after sharing content consistently, the partner then becomes the source of information for the customers, which keeps them at the forefront of their customers’ minds.
“Publishing and distributing content on a specific schedule keeps your brand top of mind with your audience. This is likely due to a series of psychological principles, as Mark Zimmer explains on his blog. As potential customers get consistently exposed to your brand and content, your audience will begin to see your company as an authority on various industry topics.” Forbes Magazine
Our behavior around TV may never return to targeted time slots, and we may be in an on-demand world from here on out, but we do need to set some parameters in our lives in order to execute what we NEED to do.
We return you to your regularly scheduled programming with ContentMX.com/PartnerOn and the stress-free relationship that it provides.