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Marketing your business. Effective methods and exemplary stories.

  1. Dec06

    Kanoodle cookie bounty

    Advertising network Kanoodle will now pay webmasters for planting a cookie on a visitor's computer without ever showing an advertisement. Sites placing a cookie classifying a user's browsing habits into one of 7,500 contextual ad categories. Publishers in the program will be paid 5% of the revenue earned when an advertisement served on the Kanoodle network is triggered by a cookie generated on the publisher's site.

    Kanoodle advertisements are an integrated option for TypePad Pro users. Bloggers could profit from distributing cookies on their own personal weblogs for later monetization on a TypePad Pro site with advertising or other blogs using Kanoodle's advertisements.

    I am not a fan of third party cookies and block all cookies that are not served from the site I am currently browsing. Most users won't even know the extra cookie has been added to their system and with no screen real estate lost I expect many publishers may experiment with this new cookie bounty.

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  2. Nov26

    San Francisco Auto Show marketing highlights

    Yesterday I attended the San Francisco auto show to geek out over the latest cars. A few companies stood out in their marketing efforts to connect their brands with passive customers.

    1. Chrysler had special photo zones around popular cars such as the Dodge Viper, a Chrysler 300 Dubs Edition with gull-wing doors, and the Chrysler Phaeton concept car. The company setup special floor mats as photo zones and attendees lined up to have their picture taken. Chrysler representatives handed special cards to everyone they photographed with a URL and access code to retrieve their digital photograph the next day.
    2. Subaru highlighted their Impreza WRX with a special immersive gaming experience playing Gran Turismo 3. Children got into a special pod with a motion simulator and 3 LCD displays. They raced around a virtual track in a WRX, stepped down from the ride, and jumped into a real WRX STI next to the game pod. Mom and Dad followed behind, learning about the car.
    3. Volkswagen brought Stanley, winner of the $2 million DARPA Grand Challenge autonomous robot race covering 132 miles in 6 hours and 54 minutes. Stanley was created by Stanford students based on a VW Touareg R5 with contributions from VW's electronics research lab. Kids love robots, and they were being lifted high by their parents to check out the range finders and cameras on the front of the vehicle. Showing off Stanley increased the technology cool for Bay Area geeks.

    It was interesting to listen to what the average shopper was looking for on the floor of the auto show.

    • Comfort of the back seat in a sporty car.
    • Fuel economy.
    • Center console configuration. Navigation systems should be featured on any display model to drive interest.

    Honda's line of hybrids seems to be popular among shoppers wanting a hybrid that feels like a car. If customers can think of a hybrid as a $3000 option on any model and not just a special buy the technology will really take off.

    XM Satellite Radio was highlighted at multiple booths as a factory installed option but I did not see any promotion of Sirius. XM was cleverly marketed as a dealer-installed option providing both audio content as well as data such as real-time traffic data updated every 3 minutes.

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  3. Nov20

    Napster UK advertisement

    Napster Music Ad

    Napster UK has a sexy new commercial online to promote its music subscription service (NSFW). The commercial shows a 30 second peep show that abruptly ends as the stripper is about to remove her bra. The ad ends with "Leave you wanting more?" and links to a free trial subscription. Clever.

    A link to a free download for the commercial's musical track would have been a perfect ending.

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  4. Nov15

    Example product blog: Scooba Clean

    Scooba

    I created a sample product blog to demonstrate how a corporation might engage a potential market in advance of a product launch. I chose iRobot Corporation and their latest product, Scooba the floor washing robot. I created a blog named Scooba Clean to show what a product blog might look like in the six months before the product is released.

    Corporate marketing teams are often a bit afraid to enter the world of corporate blogging. They read reports of mobs of bloggers attacking CBS or Kryptonite and fear for the lives of their brands in the wild frontier that is the blogosphere. Companies are also afraid of creating a huge mistake such as the Juicyfruit blog. I wanted to create a good example for corporate marketers to show how a company can try to connect consumers with information about the products they care about.

    I chose iRobot because they fulfill every child's dream with robots that do your chores. Machines with a mind of their own also introduce a variety of problems for consumers who might hold off buying the product due to a lack of information about how the robot well perform in a unique home environment. I think a blog can solve a lot of these problems and put a person behind a company and its products.

    I created a fictional blog based on facts from the initial announcement of the Scooba in May until it became available for pre-order earlier this month. Topics include introducing the product and its features, pointers to magazine articles with photographs and more information, product video demonstrations, and interviews with key product team members.

    Almost the entire first page of Google results for "Scooba" is full of blog content.

    I have no association with iRobot Corporation but I hope you enjoy the example blog. I sent iRobot an e-mail inviting them to check out the new blog and even take it over as they move towards launch.

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  5. Nov08

    Designing the right customer experience

    Bain & Company recently surveyed 362 firms and found that 80 percent believed they provided exceptional customer service while only 8 percent of their customers agreed with the firm's perceptions. Their findings are summarized in "Tuning In to the Voice of Your Customer" in the October issue of Harvard Management Update. Bain found "the ultimate test of any company's delivery lies in what customers tell others. The best companies find ways to tune in to customers' voices every day." I found the article very in-tune with blogging and customer engagement, promoting not only high profit customers but also high profits from the reach of company advocates.

    Customer advocacy can be summarized as a net promoter score, calculated as the percentage of customers who would recommend a company (the promoters) minus the percentage that would urge friends to stay away (the detractors).

    Some of the advice mentioned is to empower front line employees to talk to their customers and know their needs so they may develop new products and methods to increase profits from each customer as well as that customer's satisfaction and connection with their purchase.

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  6. Nov05

    Increased ad sales through free small business web hosting

    Advertising networks are becoming web hosts in an attempt to provide a fulfillment destination for click advertising. Bringing more businesses online provides a destination for online advertisements from small businesses such as plumbers and restaurants creating new destinations for local searches. Microsoft and Yahoo! already offer free hosting for businesses and other advertising dependent businesses such as Google, Amazon, or eBay are likely not far behind.

    What if every pizzeria in town had a website? Local searches suddenly become more interesting, with multiple pizzerias competing for your next purchase with a text advertisement on large search networks.

    Yahoo! offers a free website for any small business. Microsoft just announced Office Live, a service that will match Yahoo!'s offering and add extra features such as group tools and business e-mail. Yahoo! offers a premium listing upsell for $10 a month and Microsoft's upsells are still unannounced.

    eBay currently offers paid web hosting through ProStores but I would not be surprised if they offered a free version of the service to attract more merchant offerings on Shopping.com or listings on eBay auctions. I am currently unaware of any Google web hosting option.

    Cost Per Call: Bridging the Gap

    Getting small businesses online will not be an easy task but everyone still has a telephone to receive sales leads. Local advertising networks will continue to develop cost per call advertising to connect to these businesses regardless of their online presence. eBay will integrate Skype into its lead generation services, Yahoo! will integrate Dialpad, and Microsoft has already demonstrated its Windows Live Call service integration with local listings.

    That's where I think small business advertising is headed.

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  7. Oct31

    Web 2.0 wedding proposal

    Dave Garr, a Silicon Valley marketing geek, decided to create a special website to propose to his girlfriend Elizabeth last week. The site parodies eHarmony and uses Web 2.0 engagement synergy technologies such as embedded video and a guide to dating milestones using Google Maps. The couple created a TypePad blog to allow friends and family to follow their wedding and honeymoon planning.

    I like the use of Google Maps to illustrate date locations and points of personal interest. The engagement process was heavily documented for friends and family who can follow along step-by-step and see pictures and video of her reaction to each stage. Very clever.

    (via Google Maps Mania)

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  8. Oct28

    Sony superball commercial

    Bravia superball

    A few months ago Sony closed down part of San Francisco's Russian Hill neighborhood to film a commercial with over 250,000 superballs bouncing down the hill. Sony wants to emphasize the richness of color in its televisions, and director Nicolai Fuglsig's use of bright bouncy balls definitely illustrated that point.

    The high resolution version of the 60 second commercial is about 18 MB and the crispness is worth the wait. You may also watch the smaller 5 MB video below.

    I have watched the video at least 5 times already. I recommend downloading the zipped archive of the high resolution version and watching it full-screen. You can't help but smile.

    The song used in the commercial is "Heartbeats" by José Gonzales.

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  9. Apr26

    4orty2wo Entertainment event tonight

    Jordan Weisman, Sean Stewart, and Jim Stewartson 4orty2wo Entertainment are speaking tonight at the San Francisco International Game Developers Association about alternate reality games and I Love Bees, the highly successful marketing campaign created for the launch of Halo 2. The hype around Halo 2 led to over $125 million in sales on its first day in stores.

    I am really looking forward to this event. The website says free booze, so if you are in San Francisco and are interested in viral marketing and engaging users in very creative ways you should come!

  10. Apr07

    Guinness Believer event

    Guinness

    Tonight I attended a Guinness Believer event at the Merchants' Exchange in downtown San Francisco. I received a constant stream of Guinness marketing from a hired non-Irish actor in exchange for all the Guinness, Harp, and Smithwicks I could drink from the tap, bottle, or can.

    There was room for about 100 people in the room and about half of the available seats were filled. The presenter was a paid Jewish actor who does not drink. It would have been nice to have an Irish person present or at least have a marketer realize why a Black and Tan is not mixed with Smithwicks (there is some history behind the drink).

    I always enjoy seeing people from a product's country of origin at events, or at least someone with a passion for the product. Last year I was lucky enough to test drive an early production model Volvo S40 T5 after speaking with some of the Volvo staff direct from Sweden. I learned a lot about the brand, its direction, and their core values. There was a distinct national pride from the Swedes about their new Volvo.

    I would have created a more interactive event. Want to show off the features of your new bottle? Show a cross section of the inside and let people play with the nitrogen widgets. Teach people how to pour a perfect pint and let them pour one. Conduct blind taste tests of bottled Guinness and Guinness from the tap.

    I had such high expectations for the event but I was let down.

Niall Kennedy Niall Kennedy is a web technologist in San Francisco, California in the United States. I am very interested in the world of... MORE »

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