Guy Kawasaki's post "How To Suck Up To A Blogger" offers some good advise to PR flacks. Blogging has flipped traditional PR on its head. It used to be that ink begat buzz. Life was simple then: you sucked up to the Wall Street Journal, one of its reporters wrote about your product, and the buzz began. Nowadays buzz begets ink. Journalists no longer anticipate or create buzz--rather, they react to it. Guy lays out a …
Guatemaya
According to this article in Ad Age, branding guru, Al Ries, wants Guatemala to change its name to Guatemaya. Guatemala is a country rich in heritage. It was the cultural center of the Mayas, the most advanced civilization in all of North and South America. Even today, 43 percent of Guatemala’s population of 14 million people are of Maya descent. Many still speak dialects of the Maya language. With mountain ranges …
Charting The Storyline
From The New York Times: To promote their upcoming season of "The Sopranos," HBO, a division of Time Warner, and Deep Focus, an online marketing agency, have created an interactive map of New Jersey, using satellite maps from Google, and have highlighted important points of the most recent season's storyline. The map has about 15 icons in specific areas where scenes took place. When the user clicks on an icon, the …
Forget Marketing. Focus On Manufacturing Something Of Value.
Hugh's buddy, The Head Lemur, really let one fly today. Marketeers always deny that what they do is harmful. They create the most convoluted and 'plausable' justifications for what they do. They will tell you that marketing is good for you. They will tell you that you can't live without them and you are somehow incomplete without them. They are wrong. Not because of the creativity, but because of the format of the …
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No Syrup In This Butterworth
"Blogging is the closest literary culture has come to instant obsolescence." -Trevor Butterworth Mainstream journalist, Trevor Butterworth, delivered a thought provoking but ultimately dismissive article on blogs called "Time for the last post" for the weekend edition of Financial Times. In an ironic twist, FT set up a blog, where readers can chime in on the story. One of the more interesting aspects in the piece is …
Get The Download On Iraq
Eva Barboni on the Swarthmore lawn While Rocketboom looks to fill its tank with an estimated $2 million in ad sales--a lot of money for a video podcast--a group of students at Swarthmore College outside Philadelphia are deeply immersed in another sort of podcasting venture. War News Radio is a news program on conditions in Iraq today. We at War News Radio are trying to rediscover the voices of real people. Our show …
Gen Y Has A Mind Of Its Own
From Christian Science Monitor: Offer to buy the world a Coke and you'll probably find plenty of takers. But try to sell the iconic American drink, and you might meet with some ambivalence among youths these days, particularly abroad. That's according to a recent study that compared big global brands it considered "teen relevant," gathering feedback from thousands of youths in 13 countries - including the United …
ConAgra Gets CGC
Dawn Anfuso, senior editor for iMedia Connection spoke to Kevin Doohan, director of web marketing for Omaha-based ConAgra Foods, a Fortune 100 company. iMedia: Consumer-generated content is scary for many brands because of their inability to control it. How do you view the topic? Have you had much experience dealing with it yet? Any advice for other marketers? Doohan: I believe consumer-generated content is best when …
Grand Marnier Takes “The Conversation” Offline
[via Copyranter] …
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Gawker Poaches Another One
Ben Popken, of The Spunker has a new gig—editor of Gawker Media's The Consumerist. Joel Johnson will be moving up to Executive Editor of the site. Hit me up at ben [the darn at sign] consumerist.com with your consumer kvetching, hot ads and dishy industry dirt. You may recall Ben was recently looking at becoming a copywriter. I think he made a wise turn. I mean, why be told what to write by uncaring clients, when …