Fireworks are synonymous with July 4th and celebrating the day. While watching the festivities this year with my family, I wondered why do we keep coming back year after year? Why do we feel we haven’t properly observed Independence Day until the last spark dissipates from the sky?

How can we market better by learning from the attraction principles of fireworks and how it has been anchored to July 4th? What if anything can we apply to our businesses.

...continue to read "Can You Bring Fireworks to Your Business?"

Last year, Geert Desager produced a short film called “The Breakup” for Microsoft that made all of the marketing circles, was presented at conferences of very smart people and applauded widely. My question is, did you remember that it was a promotional/viral piece for Microsoft Digital Advertising? I didn’t.

A friend recently sent me a link to “The Breakup” on Geert’s blog, where I discovered that they released the sequel just a couple of days ago. Check it out for yourself: “Inspiration,…

...continue to read "It’s Not YouTube, It’s Me…"

Here’s a great opportunity: The oceans are dying.

Seriously, the oceans are in horrible shape, and it’s your fault. You did it, Supply, Demand, Pollution and Overfishing. And if we don’t take ownership now, our brands, our children, and our collective appetite for seafood may never forgive us.

I’m not trying to bum you out, but the next time you feel the need to impress clients or co-workers with your sushi-ordering skills, you should at least know whether you’re eating sustainable fish.…

...continue to read "“Green Marketing”? Save Some for the Fishes…"

More than any other brand, Dunkin’ Donuts has popularized iced coffee in the United States. So when a friend reminded me of their “free iced coffee” promotion happening today (Thursday, May 15, 2008), I was a bit surprised that I hadn’t seen or heard any ads for it. No radio commercials. No TV spots. Not even a subway ad or billboard.

Were they doing this purely by word-of-mouth, as a “thank you” to loyal customers who would then tell their friends…

...continue to read "Yes, Googlers, Dunkin Donuts Has Free Iced Coffee"

This may not come as a shock, but new research suggests that, yes, our friends are more influential than so-called “influencers” like bloggers.

According to MediaPost,

…a new study from Canadian research firm Pollara, self-described social media users put far more trust in friends and family online than in popular bloggers, or strangers with 10,000 MySpace “friends.”

Of more than 1,100 adults polled in December, nearly 80% said they were very or somewhat more likely to consider buying products recommended by real-world friends and…

...continue to read "Are Friends More Influential Than “Influencers”?"

A few months ago, I showed how Dell had bought a PPC ad for “bestbuy Sony DSC-W80,” and although they were smart to buy this highly-targeted search term, there was no follow-through on the landing page.

Bryan Eisenberg bought the camera last year and was so happy with its performance that he’s been spreading the word around the office ever since. After doing a routine Google search, we noticed — unsurprisingly — that there are a lot of bidders for the term…

...continue to read "The Good, The Bad & The Pay-Per-Click Ugly"

One might think having the year’s biggest viral marketing hit would be any business’s dream come true. Unfortunately, though, not all Web traffic is equal, and popularity contests don’t pay the bills.

According to Advertising Age, 26.4 million people spent a total of 2,600 years at ElfYourself.com, turning themselves and unsuspecting family members and coworkers into virtual dancing elves. But chances are that unless you’re a marketer, blogger, or anyone else who might have bothered to notice in the first place,…

...continue to read "How to Elf Yourself Out of Millions"

I’ve never been a huge fan of Gladwell’s book, The Tipping Point, because it oversimplifies how ideas spread. I intuitively knew that idea spreading was more complicated than that. In the February 2008 issue of Fast Company there’s an interesting article that I think provides additional context for understanding viral marketing: “Is the Tipping Point Toast? — Marketers spend a billion dollars a year targeting influentials. Duncan Watts says they’re wasting their money.”

Here’s just a small excerpt:

In the past few years,…

...continue to read "Wasting Money Targeting Influentials? Another Tip…"

In February 2003, Amazon.com canceled all their advertising and put that money towards free shipping as a word of mouth strategy. Many thought Jeff Bezos was crazy and that Amazon.com would never turn a profit. In 2007 they were solidly profitable with over $15 billion in revenues. Bezos knew that marketers used to get paid to make promises the business had no intention of keeping.

He understood that, in an increasingly transparent environment, being truly customer focused would matter more than telling…

...continue to read "Should You Cancel All Your Advertising?"

...continue to read "Why Your Conversion Rate Matters More Tomorrow"