Marketing Brilliance….What Inspires You?
When it comes to direct marketing, what stands out? What companies do the best marketing? Tonight’s chat was inspired by the following article from mediapost.com, entitled “Dove Asks Women: ‘Who Inspires You?’” As many of you already know, Dove has built a reputation for helping women build confidence through their “Campaign For Real Beauty.” So, they wanted to know, who inspires women? Who are their idols? I would like to ask you all the same thing tonight. Who inspires you in the marketing and social media worlds? I’ll give a short forum tonight, and the new can all share who inspires us and why!
A recent Forbes article, “Steve Jobs’ Legacy for Marketers,” pays tribute to the brilliant contribution Steve Jobs made to technology and marketing. The article is broken down into three specific points that Jobs did better than individual or company to date:
1. Make things easy for customers to use:
“Apple has been legendary for its focus on “ease of use,” and the company has pioneered many great products with this mission in mind. But making products and services easy for customers to have a great experience should not be limited to technology firms. Banks, hospitals, insurance companies, auto makers and airlines could learn this lesson from Steve.”
2. Develop “Whole Products”:
“For years Apple was criticized for the “closed” system approach it used for its Macintosh computers. By controlling the hardware, operating system and many of the peripherals, Apple made the Mac easy to use, but also much more expensive. This ultimately limited the market share for the Mac. However, this whole product philosophy was critical to the success of the iPod.”
3. Create a beloved brand:
“Few brands have as many passionate fans as Apple. This brand fanaticism has been a result of not only lessons #1 and #2 but also the consistency with which the company communicates. Every touch-point in a consumer’s experience has been executed with the same visual identity and simplicity. From product packaging and advertising to the website and retail stores, the Apple brand has been clearly and consistently delivered. Steve would have it no other way.”
During the BMGChat on Wednesday, October 26th at 7:30pm EST, participants such as @janettekotichas @karlitoslife @wekgroup @LukeHenrySEO said that what inspires them in social media and marketing are components such as innovation or education, through thought provoking material, humor, or a call to action for a good cause. Above all, the social media or direct marketing campaign must stay true to the brand authenticity.
4 Essential Tips for Conquering the App Development Process
Apps are becoming a huge part of our daily lives. We check the weather, track our weight loss, do business, and stay in contact with friends and family thanks to the millions of apps right at our fingertips. Applications are relatively new on the direct marketing scene and, undeniably, they’ve had tremendous success. There is money making potential, whether it be designing or marketing these applications.
In light of all of this, when reading over a few articles on Mashable this past week, “4 Essential Tips for Conquering the App Development Process” stood out to me. Here are their tips…and a few of our own at Break Media Group.
1. Communicate Clearly:
Sometimes communicating an idea specifically to a developer can be the most difficult part of the process for “managers and ‘idea people’ who are not well-versed in technical areas.” If you’re an “idea person” responsible for communicating it a developer, think it through and practice actually articulating it to a few people before taking it to the design and development team. This way, you can bounce ideas off of them, answer basic questions, and fine-tune the idea a little bit better. “The important piece of detail that they should be conveying, though, is what the idea is and what they want the developer to create in order to solve the business problem.” In other words, the app can be wildly creative, but it has to add value; it must solve a business problem.
2. Aim for Simplicity:
“When communicating an app idea and its desired features, project managers should start with the big picture first.” Again–what is this app going to accomplish? What problem is it solving? Tedious details such as fonts, color schemes, and layout, can be super time consuming and take the forefront of the project development. I think the article said it best: “Details without clear context will create unnecessary complexity… and unnecessary details also multiply complexity.” So, the lesson in all of this? Keep it as simple and clear cut as possible.
3. Consider Complexity:
This is the other side of “Aiming for Simplicity.” When putting an idea into action (creating the application itself), complexity is something you are going to have to grapple with. Discuss it! Talk about the unpredictable, the unknown, the things that could go wrong. Then, put it into perspective. “Process needs to solve the problem of complexity. More importantly, though, process needs to help us cope with complexity, because it exists in everything we do, whether it’s whittling a piece of wood or developing a large enterprise application.”
4. Know Your Constraints:
I used to think constraints were a bad thing. But when developing an application, they are your guidelines and they keep your project focused. “If an idea is changed after development has begun, the idea is unconstrained.’ Having an unconstrained idea makes development more difficult, taking up more time and money to finish the initial iteration. As a result, ‘An unconstrained idea necessitates an equally unconstrained timeline and budget.”
Other cool App ideas/sites: www.ifttt.com and www.bestapps.com
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Spooky B-Movie Viral Hit Yield Ideas For User-Inclusive Marketing Fun
Eric is the CEO of Break Media Group
If all those great sorority-slasher horror movies of yesteryear were remade today, they would surely involve smart phones and the villain stalking coeds Facebook status updates announcing “So excited to be alone at the lake with Billy.”
Laughable B-movie schlock? Not so much. Facebook privacy and security is such a hot topic right now that a a customized horror movie starring “a lovely Facebook stalker” is the runaway viral video hit of the week.
The spooky just-in-time for Halloween video starts when you visit www.takethislollipop.com. At the site you are asked to do what every single young child in North America is warned not to do, you guessed it…take a lollipop from a stranger. After you’ve done the unthinkable, the application mines your Facebook account, pictures, updates, news feeds and uses them all to create a cyber-stalking horror movie with you (us!) as the hunted. The stalker, a twitchy computer letch, gets increasingly agitated as he reviews our information and then finally pulls up Google Maps and finds directions to where we are from geographic data contained in our profile. He tapes a profile picture to the dashboard and off he goes – after his next victim…you or me!
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What is PR?
PR is all about communicating messages. These messages can be anything from new products, to changes in websites, to building hype for a new or growing company. The difference between PR and marketing/advertising is that PR is…FREE! I oversee the PR here at BMG, and here’s the “Best Practices” I like to stick to!
Here’s a few tips I found to be super helpful from an article posted on Mashable. Some of them overlap to the BMG Best Practices, but we’ll discuss them at little more in depth! I’ll site it at the end for everyone to read over. Here we go…
1. Know What’s Newsworthy
Before you begin pitching your startup, stop to think about what is truly newsworthy, especially to the publications you’re targeting. Newsworthy = Something unique or offering added value beyond the existing competition.
Once you figure out what qualifies as newsworthy, begin crafting your message by first understanding all of the details about what you’re pitching.
2. Have a Concise, Value Driven Message
Before sending out any pitches, take time to craft your company’s message. Be able to explain your startup in one sentence so that anyone — techie or not — can understand its purpose. For example, “Skillshare is a community marketplace to learn anything from anyone.” Cut down on industry jargon so that any average Joe can understand your pitch with one read.
3. Customize Your Pitches
People generally don’t like to be part of blast emails. When you want a particular person to cover your story, customize your pitch to be relevant to his coverage area and audience. Take the extra time to craft custom emails for a small list of journalists that you really want to cover your story. They will most likely notice that you’ve taken the time to write a thoughtful email and be more likely to respond.
4. Have Useful Assets Available
As you get down to pitching time, make sure you have all assets ready that an actual journalist (someone trained to ask questions and dig deeper!) might request, such as a company or product description, photos relevant to the story, and screenshots of the product.
5. Offer Up Unique Data
When pitching, include data and numbers that support your ideas when possible. In fact, an interesting study, infographic or other data sometimes warrants its own pitch. If your company has gathered proprietary information that tells a compelling story, pitch it.
6. Follow Reporters On Twitter
Make it your goal to build relationships with the group of journalists (or bloggers, or other marketers) that cover your industry. A great way to stay in touch is to follow your key contacts on Twitter. Writers often tweet when they’re looking for sources, and they share articles and other news that they’re interested in. Use these pieces of information to learn more about each contact and tailor your communications accordingly.
So as previously mentioned, Tips #1-6 were taken from the article titled “10 Essential PR Tips for Startups” posted on Mashable. Even though it was a little too focused on journalists, I thought it was a great article with so much real-life application! Here’s the link if you want to read the other 4 tips!
Do you think PR is as effective as paid advertising and/or marketing? What’s the most creative and effective use of PR you’ve seen?
Follow and join #BMGChat Wednesdays at 7:30pm EST
7 Tips on Web Development Projects
When digging in to a new client project, it can be so exciting that you get caught up in all the fun! However, if you don’t take the time to plan on the front end, your exciting new business venture could become the biggest headache you’ve ever had!
So, here are some tips to help you stay organized and productive (on a team or solo) when working on a Web Development project. Some pre-planning can go a long way. Take a look at these tips on how to better map out your next project:
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