MinJungKim.com

Never trust or hire a Russian marketer for target marketing. Because clearly, they have no idea that I don’t read Russian, don’t have a penis, and don’t care about home loans, debt consolidation, or being a transfer mule for money out of Africa.

Also, in flashback to a conversation had with KC & Buzz.

Wouldn’t it be mighty convenient if the government made viagra available for free?  Just the reduction in spam alone would make it worth it and heaven knows, that’s one way to tell the terrorists that we’re lovers, not fighters.
Buzz’s comment on the matter:  “Well… that would present a hard problem.”

…

…

…

BUAHHHHHAHAHHAHHAHHAHHAHAH !

Seriously. Points V. & X. are top of mind today.

B.L. Ochman’s 12 Tenets of Social Media Marketing

Go clickforth and readeth.

The FTC’s recent staff opinion might cast the legality of paid blogging programs in the U.S. in a questionable light. Underscore Marketing’s president discusses what this opinion means for marketers.

Over the past few months, several companies have entered into the business of making it easy for marketers to incentivize bloggers to write about their products and services. The most popular of these companies is PayPerPost, but others have also entered the space, including LoudLaunch (which hasn’t yet formally launched) and ReviewMe.

Back in October, a watchdog group known as Commercial Alert filed a petition with the Federal Trade Commission, requesting an investigation of companies involved in “buzz marketing,” defining the term as “a technique by which corporations seek to influence buying decisions, often by stealth.” Earlier this month, the FTC responded with a formal staff opinion, and while it declined to issue guidelines concerning the practice at the time, it did indicate it will “determine on a case-by-case basis whether law enforcement is appropriate.” So, while there won’t likely be a sweeping investigation of numerous companies at this time, the staff opinion left the door open for individual cases to be investigated.

If you’re a marketer paying people to write favorable blog posts about your company or its products, now might be the time to start sweating bullets.

Hat tip & Full article @ Imedia Connection

Re: Sony’s marketing debacle’s of late — not the least involving fake blogs & w/o mention of that racist billboard ad.

1] Good advertising doesn’t rely on tricking, lying to or deceiving your target audience.

2] The consumer is smarter than you think, alternative marketing tactics must be genuine, authentic and in today’s world, transparent.

3] Today’s interest in brand politics means that everything you do will come under scrutiny from someone. See number 2.

4] Involve your consumer in the brand conversation, give them the tools to do so and they will repay you four-fold.

Hat tip: Adage

This piece articulates a lot of what I’ve had in my gut for a while and some of the ideas discussed at last months Web 2.2 event that Chris & Kristi put together.

Well done.

Though being within the community and *being* an influencer to a certain degree, I have some nuance differences with the “worst case scenario” marketer that is shown here.

Still at its core: Marketing, when done well, is about metrics & measurability, product, execution, messaging, and strategy.

Not a business of “well I’m cool and people listen to me so you should give me money so I can travel to France and tell other people why they should listen to me because i know what’s real and marketers don’t.”

I’m just saying.

Intel, IBM Use Chat-Enabled Banner Ads to Talk to Customers“As more consumers are going online, it makes marketing more difficult, but also more interesting, [so] as marketers we have to get smarter about how we reach them and how we interact with them,” said Sandra Lopez, Intel’s global business integrated marketing manager. “It’s a balance between giving them compelling content and [having them] not thinking it’s just a marketing ploy.”

Full article

So I just finished up my session on Real Marketing aka No Bullshit Marketing for Web 2.2 with Jason & Raj of WDFA Marketing talking about taking the bullshit out of marketing and calling it out as real marketing.

First off:

Yes: I totally said “There’s a shitload of clusterfuckery in the Web 2.0 World“.

Highlight of the points that I hope people got out of the session are as follows

Every touch point with a user is a marketing opportunity – Offline/Online – customer care, user design, email responses, shwag, conversations, your business card, etc.

Every person is a marketer: on your first date, speaking, conversing, passing on a business card, etc.

Embrace your inner capitalist – every person (marketing absofably!) should be held accountable for the value that they add to their company. Goals/Results are still v. important.

Marketing & Writing are very similar

To do it well, one has to keep in mind Who/What/Where/When/How

(not discussed but from my notes)

Who : Who really is your audience?

Are they early adopters? Your mom? What language do they understand. How do they behave? It’s a lot of anthropology here: Are they a micro audience? Are they forgiving of errors/breaks? Are they willling to change behavior?

What: What are your goals? Stay focused on it

Brand Awareness/Acquisition/Upsale/CrossSale/Loyalty/Evangelism

Where: Where is your audience? Which environments – behavior segments/demographics/psychographics/geographics/ are they?

When : When are you interacting with them? What time in the life cycle – from registration/exposure to point of purchase or even upon canceling your service – customer/user loyalty lifecycle is really key to targetting msging

How : In a growingly fragmented media distribution environment – what works best to get your message across to respond to your call to action.

And oh yeah – disagree with something? Call bullshit on it.

Thank you for everyone who attended and participated. It was fun!