Category Archives: Business & Marketing

Adding interesting ads to mediocre products

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Couple of bullets from a podcast with Seth Godin, during which he talks about ad agencies;

“What ad agencies ought to do, in my opinion, is not focus on selling ads anymore. And instead, focus on getting in deeper within the clients, and help the clients make products that people want to talk about.”

“The problem is that ad agencies have defined themselves as the people who take the mediocre products and add interesting ads to them, and washed their hands and say, we can’t do anything about what the factory brings us. And my answer is, of course you can, and the clients actually want you to, you’re just not working hard enough to get that piece of business.”

[via Learfield InterAction]

Okay, how about some bonus spots?

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Betsy Lazar –Executive Director of Advertising and Media Operations at GM– gave a keynote at the rcent Radio Advertising Bureau conference in Dallas. According to INSIDE RADIO, she was pretty specific in her advice to broadcasters;

“…doing business the old way won’t cut it. Pitching schedules of :30s won’t do it. What GM wants is ideas that show involvement by the station. Things that come from mining the listener database and exploiting the station website in fresh ways.”

Ad Age reports that GM “slashed ad spending by more than $600 million last year, a drop so stunning it should convince even the staunchest doubters that the age of mass-media marketing is going the way of the horse and buggy.”

In that same issue of INSIDE RADIO: Bank of America analyst Jonathan Jacoby admits his survey of 34 industry pros last week in Dallas is not statistically significant. But he says 43% of them (14-15 people) said they’ve “used or plan to use Google/dMarcto sell airtime.”

dMarc founders leave Google

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Looks like Google’s plans to reinvent the way radio ads are bought has hit a rough spot. Online Media Daily reports Chad and Ryan Steelberg, the founders of dMark, an automated radio ad placement company purchased by Google in January 2006, have left the company.

The brothers resigned amid reports of growing tension between dMarc, the company they founded, and Google over differing approaches to radio ad sales. There was also said to be tension over the limited remuneration dMarc could expect under the performance-based terms of its original deal with Google.

I’m sorry. So sorry.

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Seth Godin points us to this list of how to (and how not to) make an apology. During my years doing affiliate relations, I had to apologize many times. Didn’t matter who screwed up, I was the network as far as the affiliate was concerned. I quickly learned that weasel words and mealy-mouthed language (“We’re sorry you feel that way.”) didn’t cut it. And a sincere, heart-felt “I’m sorry” was really all most of them wanted.

I’m sorry for the way things are in China — John Denver

Pork Board sees light (feels heat?) of citizen media

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A few days ago I posted about Jennifer Laycock getting hassled by the National Pork Board because she was selling T-shirts they felt infringed on their trademark and campaign “The other white meat.” Laycock was surprised by the Boards threats, and wrote an impassioned blog post about the situation.

It looks like the Pork Board realized that hassling an activist blogger over a T-shirt that parodied their branding in the name of a good cause (breast feeding) would probably hurt their brand more than it would ever protect it. Laycock reports that “I have received an apology from Steve Murphy, the CEO of the National Pork Board and we are currently working toward a resolution.” [via Podcasting News]

Sheryl’s gonna tell us how it’s gonna be

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Ann Morren (our only Belgian reader) reminds us to watch for Sheryl Crow’s Revlon ad in the Super Bowl (sometime in the 3rd quarter)… and then head over to iTunes and purchase Ms. Crow’s cover of Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away.” Proceeds going to aid breast cancer research.

Update: Purchased/listened to the song. Okay. Liked Rolling Stones & Buddy Holly versions better. Would love to know what Revlon is paying to have SC as spokesperson.

While pinging back and forth with Ann Morren, I learned she is a photographer and persuaded her to let me share a few here. I’ve noticed that a disproportionate number of smays.com readers (Henry, Bass) take great photographs.

 

Big Pork puts squeeze on breastfeading blogger

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Jennifer Laycock runs a blog called The Lactivist and writes about breastfeeding and human milk banking. It’s mostly a gathering place for breastfeeding moms to come and share their thoughts and experiences. Yesterday she received a cease and desist letter from a law firm representing The National Pork Board. The gist of the letter was her use of the phrase “the other white milk” violates their trademark on the phrase “the other white meat.”

I’m certainly not qualified to argue who is right or wrong in this case, but I’ll bet the folks at the National Pork Board didn’t expect their letter would get any publicity.

$1.6 million for Branson.com

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So says pal Morris James. “The most money ever paid for a dot-com address for a city was for Branson.com. Commercial real estate broker Larry Milton and his wife plunked down $1.6 million for the address last year.”

For that kind of money you’d expect to be at the top of the Google ranking and Branson.com is (the top of the non-paid results). The link reads: “Branson.com: The Official Website.”

Like Morris, I wonder what makes the site “official?” Would the local Chamber of Commerce have a better claim on that distinction?

Stories like this always remind me how fortunate we were to register (waaaay back when) our company names (Missourinet.com, RadioIowa.com, Learfield.com). But one of my favorites is Legislature.com.

Demystifying blogging

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My buddy Chuck posted the following to his blog (AgWired) today:

“Hi there AgWired fans. This morning I’m doing a new media presentation with the folks at John Deere and their agency, BCS Communications. This is an example post for the presentation.”

So what? For many (most? all?) of the people in the room, updating a web page is a Dark Art. Magic. At the very least, a pain in the ass. Some person or persons (or a committee) has to approve the copy and then send it to the web people and –eventually– the web page gets updated.

Chuck just logged in to his Word Press account. Bangs in the copy above…hits the submit button…and publishes for the world to see. It took less time than it is taking me to tell you about it.

I’ve used this analogy before but it’s a good one. When a room full of execs see a demo like this (I wasn’t there but I’ve done a few of these)… it’s like the scene in every Tarzan movie with the Great White Hunters “make fire come from stick,” or when they crank up the movie projector (where did they plug it in?) for the pygmies.