Take Permission

The Right Tools & Mindset For Success

By

Five tips to be remarkable in your marketing

Image by Michael Wesely - http://www.wesely.org

Audio version of this post:[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/andytraub/5tipstoberemarkable.mp3]
This picture took 34 months to make.  It’s not a serious of pictures though.  It’s one picture.  You’re actually seeing the destruction and construction of a building as taken by Michael Wesely in 2001.  A snapshot is forgettable.  An image taken over three years is memorable and remarkable.  So here’s the question, “Is your marketing plan forgettable or remarkable?”

Old Spice had a marketing campaign a few weeks ago and the critics are already saying that it wasn’t a success because Old Spice hasn’t seen an immediate jump in sales.  Were they really expecting people to run to the drug store and buy Old Spice?  I think they’re trying to build something remarkable and they’re off to a great start (see the videos here).  Instead of looking at your social media plan or your web traffic as a 3 month or one year campaign why not look at it from a different perspective.  Will is be perceived as remarkable?

Remarkable is hard work and most people actually think social media marketing is less work than traditional marketing.  In fact social media marketing is more difficult because it requires transparency in a way that traditional ads do not.  No one ever expected the Ronald McDonald to create personal videos for kids and post them on the internet.  It’s easier to just create a packaged message and let it run.  Old Spice created something remarkable b/c they took part in conversations with real people. [Read more…]

By

Your business could miss the whole conversation

According to a New York Times article it seems that Neilsen figured out that we spend 22% of our internet time on social networking activities.  I think that number is going to grow substantially.

In just one year the amount of social time has almost doubled from 3.5 hours to almost six hours a month.  

The momentum of social sites is unparalleled.  How can businesses take advantage of this growth?
How can your business position itself to be part of the future of the web (which has everything to do with “social” sites)?  Here are four fundamentals to move your business forward so they can be a part of the future of the web.

1. Stake your name or someone else will

BP learned this when they didn’t take the name of BPGlobalPR on Twitter.  This is what you find now when you search for “BP Twitter” in Google. The top four links are about the fake BP Twitter account.

Stake your claim to domains too. Get the .com, .net, .org and any other identity that could help or hurt your brand.  Get the YouTube channel name, the Facebook fan page name…you get the idea.  To see if they’re available use this tool [Read more…]

By

If your business uses Twitter you probably don't suck

I was in Indianapolis in a very nice hotel and my kids had just gone to bed when I sent the above Tweet.  I was shopping for a hotel room in Des Moine, Iowa on Orbitz, Travelocity, Kayak and Priceline.  I got frustrated because for as many “deals” as I found I still felt like I was relying on computer algorithms and paid for placements than real people who had slept in the places I was sorting through.  I sent out the message and other than a link to a similar travel search site’s results the only other reply I got was…


(Click here or the Tweet to see their link)

Twitter isn’t for everyone and in fact a lot of research shows that Twitter (for all the hype it gets) is mostly made up of nerdy, techy, younger crowds of people.  That being said, I still love Twitter and I think it’s going to be a medium of communication for a long, long time.  If you’re a brand and you’re not on Twitter then you might suck. Your target market might not be on Twitter and that’s valid. Sitting on the sidelines because you don’t like the game isn’t going to make Twitter go away though.  When I got the above Tweet from Country Inns and Suites in Clive, Iowa I thanked them for their response and visited their web site.  Then I screwed up.

[Read more…]