Occasionally you come across a little nugget like this; for all you clients who don’t know.

Friday, Myself and 10 of my colleagues headed out to Austin to attend SXSW, one of the most intense, knowledge savvy conferences that anyone in the interactive, film and music industry would want to be a part of! Why you might ask? Only some of the brightest and most knowledgeable mind on the forefront of technology were there, thats why! From Microsoft to individuals that have made it big through ingeniousness( Tim Ferriss) the representation was astounding!:) One of my absolute favorite panels that I enjoyed was on Monday, the discussing was the Marketing of No Marketing, HUH??? This panel ws comprised of the following incredible people:

•Deb Schultz-(deborahschultz.com)- She believes strongly on personalizing your brand. Live Journal, Social software background, music biz, social software tools, customer service, product development: how to get? GIVE!!!

•Chris Heuer-(the conversation group)- Making a place where you want to be! Social media as an element. How we relate amongst each other. Stop trying to sell me and start trying to help me make smarter decisions. www.theconversationgroup.com : remember the best thing you can give away is Knowledge.

•Jermeiah owyang-(web-strategist.com)- Communities and bloggers: let customers take charge, i.e .a personal embassy, amongst get feedback from clients. Ambassadors of the community. Elf replicating marketing. www.web-strategist.com

•Tara Hunt: research on social capital: value of relationships. Online community. “down in out in the magic capital” KARMA woofee: www.horsepigcow.com, The more you give the more you get- bring goodness to the world. Web 2.0 demo crazing for the world we are in. Book: blue ocean strategies. How do you become successful? Theme here is : GIVE!!!!

•Hugh McLeod: storm hook winery, blog writing, and boost! Giving away bottles, company didn’t have any $$, Impromptu geek dinners and bringing wines take pics and post, Conversations about the product and the people, Social communication among geeks is objects. Hence became social gestures, now turn into social markers. Examples of your objects: www.gapingvoid.com : Russel Davis, big brands have lots of little small ideas, ie star bucks, apple, tables, ear plugs. BIG BRAND= good little things

•David Parmet: the future of the economy is free? Giving it away! www.marketingbeginsathome.com

there was so much to take away form all of these wonderful people, but mostly the theme was unanimous in the sense that you have to give to get! Thats right, GIVE to get! We have been listening to our moms tell us this since we were kids, remember the word share? It works like GIVE, your offering something because you want to and those that receive will talk well about you for doing so. Its about edifying your friends, your friends businesses and the things that you get excited about! Its not always about the bottom line and how much money you will make. Companies forget this sometimes. A really great example of a company that follows this example was Zappos. com they were so good at listening that when it started pouting down raining ion Sunday, they had rain hoodies for EVERYONE at SXSW to wear! Now thats what I call good GIVING!

When I think of Valentines’s Day, chocolates, flowers, and those little chalk-tasting hearts with the messages come to mind. But Dr. Pepper is taking a gamble that people who associate Valentine’s Day with Vegas marriages will also associate its new Cherry Chocolate Diet Dr. Pepper drink with the holiday. That’s the idea behind a new microsite from Cadbury Schweppes in partnership with Yahoo and Vegas Tourism.

On February 14th, visitors can watch live web-stremed weddings from the three chapels at the Hard Rock Hotel, propose to someone, book their Vegas wedding with e-card invitations or crash another person’s wedding. But the fun doesn’t end after the big day, Cadbury Schweppes has bought Yahoo’s front page for February 15, according to Enid Burns at ClickZ. The article also states that a large budget has been allocated to search and display ads to promote the site and create buzz.

The site sounds catchy at first; it’s like reality wedding television on your web browser, but if you are like me you were probably left wondering, what is going to make the average person stay on this site for more than 30 seconds or for that matter, visit the site again the following day? And why would this make me want to buy and/or drink more Dr. Pepper?

My guess is having Pauly Shore as the host.

Every year, advertisers spend millions of dollars to capture the attention of football fans nationwide. This year’s price tag was a whopping $2.7 million for 30-seconds of air time. But has Super Bowl advertising lost its flare? Has the general public become immune to advertisers efforts to shock and entertain them?

I believe Super Bowl advertising is on a downhill trend. We are bombarded by hundreds of advertising messages each and every day and while many people look forward to seeing the Super Bowl ads each year, I don’t believe the advertisers messages are making a real impact. Sure, they get headline news for one day after they air, but whether people remember the product they are trying to sell is key and is something isn’t always happening.

While I think some commercials may have missed the target (enough with the cavemen already) one commercial in particular did the best job getting the actual product benefit across. The Tide To Go “Screaming Stain” commercial not only showed the benefit of using the product at a crucial moment, but was also entertaining. That crazy screaming stain got quite a few laughs. Tide To Go has also create a mini site around this promotion which the chance to win prizes daily or become famous by creating your own spoof of the commercial. By the way, this was Tide’s first attempt at a Super Bowl commerical.

Check out Yahoo’s top five Super Bowl commercials and tell me what you think. Who did the best job of getting their product message across?

Every now and then someone takes my sarcasm to the next level, and this is one of those times. Granted Agency Fusion came up with the concept, but I posted my little snip first only without the video work. If you’ve ever worked with difficult clients you’ll get a real kick out of Make My Logo Bigger Cream, Enjoy!

Marketers are always trying to find that power demographic; the group that holds the spending power. For so long that key demographic has been the 18-49 age range, the poeple with more descretionary income to spend. However, the age demographic is changing to the Baby Boomer generation. Consisting of individuals born between 1946-1964, this demographic is now 76 million people strong, that’s 28% of the US adult population, and it is quickly becoming attractive to marketers everywhere, according to a recent Online Media Daily article by Peter Koeppel.

Traditionally, the best way to reach this niche market was through television, since they were the first generation to grow up with a television in their home. However, Baby Boomers are more tech saavy than we give them credit, and internet marketing in now one of the best ways to reach them. Read the rest of this entry »

We all know that “click here” is perhaps the weakest of all calls-to-action, and should be banned from any good copywriter’s vocabulary.

However, coming in at a close second is “learn more”. This generic phrase screams copywriting laziness and a lack of interest in understanding why a visitor to a page would actually be interested in learning more.

The use of “learn more” seems to be particularly prevalent in home page promo banners.

I see it used so regularly that when someone actually takes the time to write a more meaningful call-to-action, it really stands out.

We all know that “click here” is perhaps the weakest of all calls-to-action, and should be banned from any good copywriter’s vocabulary.

However, coming in at a close second is “learn more”. This generic phrase screams copywriting laziness and a lack of interest in understanding why a visitor to a page would actually be interested in learning more.

The use of “learn more” seems to be particularly prevalent in home page promo banners.

I see it used so regularly that when someone actually takes the time to write a more meaningful call-to-action, it really stands out.

Guilty as charged. As I have become aware of this glaring ugliness of verbage, I have attempted to phase out the use of Click Here to…” but sometimes it takes a really poignant blog to show me the error or my ways.

Here is an example of a good and bad call to action:

Enhance your web knowledge with the rest of this article on SmileyCat.com

Facebook.com, a social networking site with 31 million active users, recently announced efforts to develop a more sophisticated ad serving system allowing marketers to precisely target ads based on the personal data users have provided about themselves.

Facebook currently offers “flyers” and banners that can be targeted by location and school, but soon it hopes to offer relevancy based ads by predicting user interests based on information listed in profiles. This may be similar to Google AdWords Content Network that reads web pages using semantic matching. The ads will appear in a prime location; subtlety mixed throughout the “friend news feed” page that appears first upon the user login.
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So what do you do when you are the largest soft drink company and have the most recognizable brand worldwide? You must come up with creative advertising and marketing tactics in order to get consumers involved with your brand. Recently, Coca-Cola has done with its new viral campaign in which the company tries to sue itself.

That’s right, Coke Zero, the new no calorie soft drink from Coke, is suing the original Coke for “taste confusion.” In the new campaign, a fake law firm Covet & Yourminy, solicits potential plaintiffs who could be victims of the taste confusion with the usual cheesy-style lawyer ads. The campaign used cheap media buys, similar to what most local law firms would purchase, such as radio, bus shelter, and truck advertisements.

Bus Shelter Ad

Truck Ad

All ads seek to drive consumers to the microsite, designed in the same fashion. Here, people can request a Covet & Yourminy taste kit that includes coupons for a Coke and a Coke Zero. How clever. There is also a toll-free hotline that has reportedly received more than 17,000 real phone calls. Clearly, this “taste confusion” campaign was a successful and interactive way to engage more consumers with the Coke brand, while putting more Cokes and Coke Zeros into the consumer’s hands through the use of coupons.

A good friend of mine from college is now working as a sales rep over at Kimberly-Clark, you know the folks who make they make Huggies, Kleenex and Scott Towels; so when I see their name mentioned along with a viral campaign I have to take notice. Ad Age had a great write up about how K-C used a viral video site to promote their Duckbill brand, but as I read the article I couldn’t help but feel as though they could have done so much more.
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