THINKing

Guerrilla Time

Tougher economic times often generate great guerrilla marketing ideas. Jay Conrad Levinson coined the term guerrilla marketing, which I define as low-cost, creative and typically self-implemented public relations techniques.

Here are a few thoughts that might spawn some ideas for your own business.

Hidden Gems

I was checking out the statistics for my blog recently and found a number of excellent posts had had very little traffic. So, here is our first edition of Hidden Gems that will resurrect these overlooked posts:

Brand Euthanasia

Fighting For The Middle Ground

Client Media Relations Misconceptions

What’s The Frequency?

The more things change, some say, the more things stay the same. When it comes to marketing, I tend to agree. Consider the following list of how advertising frequency equates to advertising effectiveness. Thomas Smith, a 19th Century London businessman, wrote this in 1885:

Twittering Journalists Update

Hey, I’ve had a lot of interest lately from journalists wanting to be added to the My Creative Team Twittering Journalist Wiki. A lot of new ones have been added and I’ve made the wiki a little more portable. Now, there is a downloadable Word file containing all the journalists and media outlets in the wiki. I typically update this file monthly, so check back often.

Use The Neglected Weapons In Your Marketing Arsenal

Business marketers have a lot of weapons in their arsenals but they often overlook some very important ones. So, let’s do a quick inventory.

Of course, you already have a company name, a positioning statement, logo, stationery, business cards and a website.
Right?

Why Coupons?

We talked recently about using online coupons to spur consumer action. Now, let’s take a look at a company which is using coupons strategically and successfully.

I talked with Jim Deitzel (@rubbermaid) and Lauren Spahr (@rubbermaidtwo) about how Rubbermaid’s organizational products line is using coupons.

Coupon, Get Your Coupon

Marketers have long known the power of a coupon, and they are rapidly discovering how much more powerful an online coupon can be than a paper one. Emarketer reports that US retailers are moving rapidly toward the online coupon to help out during the recession because they have discovered that they perform better than paper in terms of redemption,

Social Nets vs. Email

A new Nielsen study shows that social networks have overtaken email as the most popular online activity. Says a story in Adweek,

Active reach in what Nielsen defines as “member communities” now exceeds e-mail participation by 67 percent to 65 percent. What’s more, the reach of social networking and blogging venues is growing at twice the rate of other large drivers of Internet use such as portals, e-mail and search.

Pithy Pitches

Your painstakingly crafted email pitch is completely customized and ready to send to the in box of that carefully targeted reporter. There it goes! Did you hear that? That was your email pitch being deleted.

Twitter: Time Waster Or Cool Tool?

Liberal newspaper columnist, Leonard Pitts, today says he won’t Twitter. Ever. Works for me. The only thing Pitts and I agree on in this particular case is in his column’s last line:

I will never Twitter you. In the first place, you have better things to do. In the second, I am not that interesting.