Marketing

Wouldn't it be a kick-in-the-head if the most innovative and creative efforts Kickstarter inspired were its effective emulation by the world's most innovative organizations?

YouTube recently celebrated its eighth birthday, reminding us that less than a decade ago we had no access to cute cat videos, screaming goat clips and viral trends such as the Harlem Shake.

A backgrounder for understanding the storm that hit Moore, Oklahoma.

The law doesn't allow for the trademarking of a great view, but there’s nothing wrong with branding it.

Not that anyone shops at Barnes and Nobles anymore but I just saw on my create space account that they have picked up a large amount of inventory to stock at select locations around the country. This is really interesting news cause 2 months ago when we hit the 30,000  copies sold mark I was approached by a publisher who told me the only way to get into traditional book stores was to invest $40,000.00 for renting the “shelf space”.  He said that these traditional book stores take zero risk now days unless they know they can make money on a book. So lol…  Not sure if they think they can make money on it or if that was just total BS. Looking for an SEO service that won’t get you banned?

Mobile Payments company, Payvia, has acquired Mogreet, creating what is likely the largest mobile company in Los Angeles with nearly 150 total employees.

Sara Rosso is definitely what you would call a ‘superfan’ for Nutella.  So much so that in 2007, Rosso decided that the chocolate-hazlenut spread deserved its own holiday and created World Nutella Day.  Over the past 6 years, the ‘holiday’ has grown into first a community for fellow Nutella fans, and now a movement celebrating the brand.  The stated goal for creating the holiday was to “ encourage Nutella enthusiasts worldwide to enjoy and get creative with Nutella.”  The event has its own Facebook page with 40K Likes, and a Twitter account with almost 7K followers.  On the event’s website, fans have currently submitted over 700 recipes for Nutella, and the entire platform is obviously driving interest, fandom and sales for the brand. And Nutella just told Rosso to shut the whole thing down.  Last month, Rosso received a Cease and Desist letter from Ferrero, the parent company of the Nutella brand. “They asked me to take down the site because they consider it to be an unauthorized use of their intellectual property and trademarks—the Nutella logo and brand,” Rosso explains. In Think Like a Rock Star, I devote an entire chapter to helping brands understand who their fans are, and what motivates them.  No doubt, Ferrero looks at World Nutella Day, and likely sees little more than customers using its logo and likeness in an unauthorized manner.  The company feels it needs to step in and protect its brand, and to be fair it has every right to do so. But in acting this way, Ferrero is also communicating that it does not understand its own fans, and why they are driving this effort.  A fan sees itself as the owner of a brand, in many ways the parent of that brand.  As such, they want to see the brand grow and succeed.  So they act in what they perceive to be the brand’s best interests. Ferrero would likely counter that even so, the fan’s best interests for the brand might not be the same as what the brand wants for itself.  This is why Ferrero should be working with its fans.  Fans are special customers, they want a relationship with their favorite brand.  Fans want the brand to step in and give them more instruction on how they can better serve and help that brand. One of the case studies from the music industry I talk about in Think Like a Rock Star is the fan-run site TheDonnasMedia.com, which was created by fans of The Donnas.  The site contains hundreds of thousands of hours of live concert footage from the band’s performances, and even custom made liner notes and photos so fans can literally create their own CDs of The Donnas’ concerts.  The band found out about this site years ago, and instead of shutting it down, they contacted the fans running the site, and began working with them to make the site better.  They understood that the point of the site from the fans’ perspective was to create new fans for The Donnas, so instead of sending a C&D letter to the site’s owners, the band instead began promoting the site to its fans!  And for their part, the fans self-police the site, and won’t allow any material to be uploaded to the site that’s been commercially released by the band (remember what I said about fans acting in what they perceive to be the brand or in this case band’s best interests?). If Ferrero would reach out to its fans that have organized World Nutella Day, they would no doubt find that Ms Rosso and her team would bend over backwards to accommodate any request from the brand, and would be thrilled that Nutella was reaching out to them.  There is an obvious opportunity here for Nutella to work with Rosso and these fans, and create a huge platform for the brand’s fans that could create a significantly positive financial impact on the brand. But instead, the brand is attempting to shut down the entire movement, and that has, shockingly, led to Nutella now receiving criticism from its own fans on its Facebook page: &#

More than just marketing in the channels customers use, marketers should provide purchase ability, as well.

A biotech project manager explains how she keeps her workweek at roughly 40 hours, and how you can too

Can you believe WUL celebrated its fourth birthday earlier this year? I didn’t make a big deal about it as I’ve done in years past, because… well, I don’t know why. But I should have, because in a world where blogs come and go (as so much else does), I’m proud that WUL is still around. Four years may as well be four decades in our world of instant gratification! Ch-ch-ch-changes Those of you who’ve been with WUL from the beginning have seen how it’s changed. The only thing that is more or less the same is the theme I started with (and I love it too much to let it go… for now…) and which, incidentally, influenced the look and feel of my business site once that was set up. There’s just something about the little bird that I love, and that I don’t want to let go of. But it’s changed in so many other ways. We changed the tag line (bet you don’t even remember what the old one was), we welcomed guest bloggers, many of whom have become fixtures here. And though some have moved on, I’m grateful to each and every one of them for their contributions, because WUL is what it is because of all of us collectively. We went through dry spells, and extremely fertile spells (a post a day for a while… I honestly don’t know how I did that, hats off to bloggers who can make that happen). Some of us shared very personal experiences (cough, me, cough… Gini, did I get that right?) and you responded with warmth, and sincerity, and support. We’ve had active discussions, some fairly heated, some more playful, and we’ve done it all together. What do you think? We know when you like posts, by your sharing and commenting… but there are a few things I’ve always wondered about, Analytics be damned. And, four and a half years down the road, I think it’s high time I asked you directly. I want to know what you like/don’t like about WUL, what you’d change if you could, which posts compel you and which make you reach for the “delete” button… and yes, I want you to be honest… preferably civil as well, but definitely honest! Because, as you know, WUL is a labor of love for all of us. Just like all labors of love, it takes a lot of time, and especially since I’m trying to build my business back up at the same time, I need to make sure we’re not just publishing here for the sake of it. And that is why we need your feedback. I didn’t want to do anything as formal as a survey, but I would really appreciate it if you would leave your responses in the comments section, so that we can make sure WUL continues to be a forum that challenges you intellectually, stimulates you emotionally, and makes you comfortable enough to kick off your shoes and stay a while. Here are my questions: 1. Off the top of your head, can you name some of your favorite WUL posts (even one)? What made them (it) so? Are there some writers you prefer over others? 2. Do you care how often we publish posts on WUL and, if so, do you have a preference? When do you actually read the posts? Have you ever thought we publish too often? That’s it. I mean, I could ask more questions, but I figured short and sweet is better. But if you have other comments about WUL, please do let me know below. See that rocking chair above? That’s for you to sit in as you tell us what you think. Don’t worry, we’re not planning anything drastic. We just really want to know what you like about the blog, and how it provides value to you. So thank you in advance for sharing your thoughts – we really appreciate it! Waxing and Waning, Lyrical and UnLyrical is a post from: Waxing UnLyrical Author informationShonali BurkePresident & Grand Poobah at Shonali Burke Consulting, Inc.Head honcho of Waxing UnLyrical, Shonali Burke is President & CEO of Shonali Burke Consulting, Inc. Based in the Washington, D.C., area, she loves h