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October 3, 2007

Innovation Wednesday: Wal-Mart Surpasses Goal to Sell 100 Million Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs Three Months Early; CEO H. Lee Scott Celebrates with Some Hamburger Helper.

Wal-Mart, take your victory lap.

Wal-Mart announced yesterday that the company has blown past an ambitious goal of selling 100 million compact fluorescent light bulbs by the end of 2007 -- three months early. This is no small deal for the Arkansas based retailer, or the environment. Over the lifetime of the CFLs, Wal-Mart estimates that these energy-saving bulbs will have the effect of taking 700,000 cars off the road or conserving the energy needed to power 450,000 single-family homes. And although the swirly bulbs are pricier (at least for now) than their incandescent cousins, Wal-Mart customers can save up to $350 a year on average by making the switch, the company says.

Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott clearly deserves a lot of credit for this. To understand the impact of his decision to make CFLs a priority for Wal-Mart, I’d recommend re-reading my pal Charles Fishman’s award winning analysis, How Many Light Bulbs Does It Take To Change The World? Not only does Fish do the detailed math of what the bulb means for the consumer and the environment, he tells a nail-biter of a story of how Lee Scott convinced GE's Jeffrey Immelt to radically disrupt GE's own light bulb business. Fish writes: “Once Wal-Mart decides to make swirls an important product, the appeal for GE also becomes clear. It's the power of the big dog: GE can either help Wal-Mart sell swirls, or some other lightbulb company will. In either case, GE's regular-bulb business shrivels.” Tough call. We now know who won. Everybody.

Continue reading "Innovation Wednesday: Wal-Mart Surpasses Goal to Sell 100 Million Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs Three Months Early; CEO H. Lee Scott Celebrates with Some Hamburger Helper."

Posted by Ellen McGirt at 1:00 AM | 14 Comments

February 27, 2007

C Is For Cookie

You said it, Cookie Monster. Cookies are a great way to teach kids about literacy. But did you know they are also a great way for the future businesswomen of America to learn about financial and economic literacy?

By buying more than 200 million boxes of Tagalongs, Thin Mints and Do-Si-Dos from enterprising Girl Scouts, Americans help girls build important leadership skills and support the "nation's premier business and economic literacy program," says Girl Scouts CEO Kathy Cloninger.

"Through cookie activities, girls learn how to plan, build teams, speak up, make decisions, solve problems and manage resources. These skills add up, so that ultimately, girls learn to be leaders--in their own lives--and in our communities," she says.

I'd be interested to know if there are any former Girl Scouts reading this blog who attribute their success in the business world to the skills they learned selling cookies.

Continue reading "C Is For Cookie"

Posted by Alex Pasquariello at 12:58 PM | 6 Comments

February 8, 2007

Ad Nausea

Few people at Masterfoods are snickering behind their hands this week, as the company, a division of Mars, has come under fire for the Snickers ad that aired during the Super Bowl. After complaints from organizations such as the Human Rights Campaign and the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, marketers have pulled the ad.

At the same time, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention has publicly denounced a GM ad that also aired during the game. While it's debatable whether either ad was bad -- in terms of creativity or political correctness and cultural sensitivity -- the hue and cry raises some interesting questions.

As was seen in the recent Aqua Teen Boston Farce, controversial marketing campaigns can increase the reach a campaign might have otherwise had. But that street goes two ways. Controversial ads also give political and cultural advocacy groups the opportunity to protest publicly -- attracting media attention the groups might not have gotten otherwise, and attracting attention to the groups' causes and issues.

So it's arguable that controversial ad campaigns benefit the very organizations that react negatively in response to the campaigns -- by providing them a mass-market platform for their messages.

Posted by Heath Row at 10:22 AM | Add Comment

January 26, 2007

What Kind of Loyal Are You?

The current issue of Ipsos Ideas (PDF) features a brief piece that raises some interesting concepts. Timothy Keiningham, SVP and head of consulting for Ipsos Loyalty -- as well as the author of Loyalty Myths -- takes a look at the difference between brand loyalty and customer loyalty -- and how the two can work well together.

Keiningham suggests that instead of considering a customer's share of spending as separate from other customer metrics (satisfaction and so on), brand and customer metrics should be considered as symbiotic. "No experience will compensate for a weak brand; likewise, no brand can repair a poor customer experience," he writes.

Similarly, it seems to me that by focusing on customer metrics and brand metrics, leaders would be able to take a more holistic view of their customers -- especially in larger companies with a diverse brand portfolio.

(Other articles in the issue are also worth reading, particularly "Tell It Like It Is," which warns against the dangers of over-promising and under-delivering.)

Posted by Heath Row at 1:17 PM | 1 Comment

January 11, 2007

Commissioning a Symphony

This news is a bit old at this point, but I just learned about it, and it might still merit mention. While companies such as Symantec are experimenting with the idea of adverbands, another company -- Nike -- is foregoing promoting fake bands in order to commission original music from already active musicians.

Last fall, Nike commissioned a 45-minute workout mix from LCD Soundsystem. Earlier in the year, Nike had commissioned a mix from the Crystal Method.

Both commissions were less advertisements as such but marketing tools to encourage people to use Nike's Nike+ system, which helps people track workouts using their iPods.

This effort also differs from the formerly popular practice of commissioning company theme songs or using pop songs in TV adverts. But does the resulting music stack up? Reviews seem to indicate so.

Were you to commission music for your customers, what would you aim to accomplish?

Posted by Heath Row at 11:07 AM | 2 Comments

November 27, 2006

Black Friday Bolsters Retail Sales

It was a great Thanksgiving weekend for U.S. retailers, with fewer shoppers spending more. According to The National Retail Federation, an estimated 140 million people hit the stores and shopped online over the past four days, down about 5 million from last year. And Black Friday, which starts the holiday season for retailers, drew about 58.9 million people, down more than 1 million.

A similar pattern was observed on the Web. While Nielsen/NetRatings reports that 19.2 million Americans visited more than 120 online retail stores on Black Friday, up from 17.2 million in 2005, but that's significantly below a 29 percent growth in overall traffic to online retail stores from 2004 to 2005.

But with all of this spending, retailers are still concerned about consumer confidence. Considering that November sales were down by 0.1 per cent on the same month last year for Wal-Mart, the world's biggest retailer, gives some pause. It was only the second time in 27 years that Wal-Mart reported a fall in sales, and it was also the retailer's worst performance in more than 10 years.

Is Wal-Mart truly the bellwether for the entire retail industry? Should retailers have concern about Christmas spending and year-end sales given Wal-Mart's performance?

Posted by Lynne d Johnson at 12:07 PM | 1 Comment

October 10, 2006

Jump-Starting Brands

Karen Post, Fast Company Resource Columnist shares:

"For over twenty something years I've been a hired gun to help companies create and build brands, which is great fun. And yes, while I've been on the executive team in many cases, I rarely shared the risk and liability of the owners' circle."

Now that she's in the owners' circle, Post has begun a series of columns, in which she shares the play-by-play experiences of a start-up brand. In "Jump-Starting Brands," walk with her through the first five steps of launching your business and creating buzz.

And while you're at it, take the Fast Company poll, Should branding be important for a start-up?

Posted by Lynne d Johnson at 7:58 PM | Add Comment

September 6, 2006

Spare No Expense

While many marketers obsess abouts costs and ROI, writes Tim Manners, some brands have succeeded by spending money where the bean counters would rather they didn't.

He says:

"So, the next time a bean-counter tells you that spending extra money won't result in any extra sales, consider telling them that it's not just about sales -- it's about growth."

Click here to read the rest of Manners' column in the Sales & Marketing Resource Center and take the Fast Company poll to weigh in on "Which path works best for you?"

Posted by Lynne d Johnson at 1:43 PM | 2 Comments

July 21, 2006

Boys Just Want to Have Fun

In the world of boy's play, Hot Wheels and Matchbox just don't cut it anymore. And neither does Batman, nor Superman action figures. So what's a toy maker to do? Mattel has presumably figured out a solution. If boys are playing video games and collectible card games, then why not make a toy (or is it a game?) that's a cross-section of the two?

This fall Mattel will release a hybrid video gaming system utilizing CD-ROM and RFID technology that is targeted at tweens. HyperScan, as the system will be called, combines video gaming and card collecting in one device. Players scan cards over the gaming system and their favorite characters appear on the TV screen. During play, the gamer can pause and scan cards over the console to upgrade, modify and enhance their battle abilities. It will ship with a game based on Marvel's X-men, and additional games will be based on Marvel Heroes, Cartoon Network's Ben 10, Mattel's Interstellar Wrestling League and Nickelodeon's Avatar.

Nifty, huh? Perhaps, but it really depends on the game's price point in comparison with what's already "hot" out on the market from the competition, doesn't it? Mattel announced that the console would be sold for $69.99 and "Game Packs" will include one CD game and six collectible game cards for $19.99. Booster packs of game cards will cost $9.99. Right now, two of the most popular portable game systems the Nintendo Game Boy and the Nintendo DS Lite cost around $80 and $130 respectively, and the DS features Wi-Fi. Game cartridges can run anywhere from $10 - $40. The dynamic Nintendo duo might not be able to plug into your television set, but there are TV tuner plug-ins available for both enabling users to turn their handhelds into mini televisions.

So how does that add up?

Posted by Lynne d Johnson at 5:52 PM | 2 Comments

January 4, 2006

Home Is Where the Focus Group Is

It's nothing new to come up with aggregate fictional personas and characters to represent the different kinds of customers and clients a company might work with. Knowing more about who you're trying to do business with can only help you -- and them. What's interesting is when companies take that a step further. Working with the marketing agency Organic, Chrysler has done just that.

Organic and Chrysler have developed a series of persona rooms -- physical living spaces "inhabited" by the company's target customers. (Online subscription required.) Gathering demographic and psychographic data, a profile of the potential customer is created. That's common practice. What's uncommon is that they then outfit an apartment of sorts with the furniture, personal effects, and accoutrements of those characters.

Think of them as furnished apartments for people who don't exist -- except in the aggregate. Where do your customers, clients, and partners live? What would you find on their coffee tables and kitchen counters?

Posted by Heath Row at 1:35 PM | 5 Comments

November 29, 2005

The "Cyber Monday" Marketing Blitz

Aha! So, in fact, Cyber Monday not really a key online shopping day after all (Nov. 22 would be a better day to celebrate online shopping, or Dec. 5 or Dec. 15). I suspected as much in my last post, but BusinessWeek.com got to the bottom of it. Turns out, it was an idea dreamed up by Shop.org, which coined the term. (Lots of people fell for it. BusinessWeek.com notes 779,000 references online, and even Wikipedia quickly added 'Cyber Monday' to its Black Friday listing.)

At first blush, sounds cheesy for Shop.org to do such a thing -- declare a name for a day. But then, what else is Father's Day, for example? Or Mother's Day?

But Cyber Monday is different. Haven't been able to find out who "coined" the term "Black Friday," but at least it evolved from an actual event -- generating black ink for retailers.

Posted by Laura Rich at 12:32 PM | 4 Comments

November 22, 2005

Coming Soon from TiVo

Amid the mad dash for TV-to-computer-to-PDA, TiVo's move this week allowing users to transfer recorded television shows to iPods or Sony PlayStations may prove something of a false start.

The new feature won't be open to some 2.3 million subscribers from DirecTV, which plans on marketing its own video recorder soon. Of the 1.3 million stand-alone subscribers left, it's possible only a few hundred thousand have Series2 recorders able to send programs to their home computers and on to PDAs. Pretty thin numbers -- in the online universe, anyway (the company itself hasn't released any figures).

Worse still, TiVo has yet to unveil the software needed to make any of this possible -- for Series2 users or anyone else.

So why the fanfare now? Possibly because TiVo is facing heated competition from generic DVRs. A recent study that scoured online forums, discussion boards and chat rooms found the brand-name novelty of TiVo wearing off. At the same time, awareness of generics offering dual-tuner boxes and HD playback is growing, the study found. TiVo, which offers neither, has promised these and other features in the near future, too.

Posted by Angus Loten at 5:45 PM | Add Comment

November 21, 2005

Pitching Place

Every so often, an active business community or region will try to rebrand or reposition itself. And sometimes, outsiders will apply a brand to a community or group of communities. Case in point: Fast Company's recent Fast Cities package.

Late last week, the New York Times ran a piece on Atlanta's recent efforts to come up with a tagline. FC's tagline used to be "How Smart People Work." Does your company have a tagline or one-line organizational pitch? Does where you live and work?

Atlanta's efforts to date swing from laughable to laudable, and what they settled on doesn't quite sing to me. How do you think communities could best approach this exercise?

Posted by Heath Row at 4:51 PM | 2 Comments

October 17, 2005

Renting Up

Almost two years ago, Linda Tischler wrote up about the trading up phenom: people putting a premium on new luxuries. Now there's a new wrinkle on aspirational consumerism: renting up.

Wall Street Journal writer Nick Wingfield takes a center-column look at what I'd like to dub speculative renting. (Subscription required.) Increasingly, people are making short-term purchases to satisfy lifestyle desires -- often divesting the purchase at a profit.

One example features a fellow who rented a handheld video game for the weekend, uploading photos of it for a Ebay auction even before he began his trip. At the end of the auction, he sold the device, making money on the deal.

In the past, we've considered products as services and reducing manufacturing waste. What new opportunities might be afforded by a "buy to flip" approach?

Posted by Heath Row at 9:19 AM | Add Comment

September 22, 2005

Giving Credit

It's been awhile since an FC Now entry has taken a look at innovation in the credit card industry. Long-standing, silver-haired American Express is beginning to target a younger, "cooler" crowd.

While the company's Blue program seemed promising at launch, I'm curious whether this new approach bodes ill for its success. Blue was cool: a high-design smart card that... turned out not to be so smart once I got mine in the mail.

Now Amex hopes that its In:NYC program -- as well as its counterparts In:Chicago and In:LA -- will help buoy a shrinking market as young people increasingly turn to debit cards. Somewhat similar to the Marquis Jet card -- look for the October issue of Fast Company -- the card promises access to elite products and services.

Is this on brand for Amex? Off brand? Should credit cards be designed for specific urban areas?

(A subscription is required to access Wall Street Journal articles online.)

Posted by Heath Row at 10:54 AM | 2 Comments

September 7, 2005

Variety: Too Spicy?

Harvard Business School has just given a name to a marketing trend that has made shopping particularly annoying lately. It's called "overchoice" -- giving consumers too much product variety. The expert on this, John Gourville, says too many choices can confuse. I agree. I'm sure we've all sat in restaurants, unable to choose from a menu with an abundance of mouth-watering selections.

Continue reading "Variety: Too Spicy?"

Posted by Kevin Ohannessian at 11:39 AM | 8 Comments

August 29, 2005

The Geek Shall Inherit the Earth

Last night I laughed when I saw a Heineken TV commercial that featured superheroes -- an obvious attempt, if you ask me, to appeal to comic book readers and sci-fi fans. There's also an Earthlink spot in which their customer service workers proclaim themselves geeks who get the job done. And Best Buy keeps announcing on the tube that they're now using the "Geek Squad" to fix your computer problems. All these advertisements have something in common, the declaration that geek is cool.

Companies have marketed to the geek demographic because they often have more disposable income, which they're willing to spend on expensive toys. As a subculture is pushed to the forefront, companies may jump on the bandwagon to appeal to this niche market. Businesses should be cautious though: The original demographic may feel they're being pandered to, and that this marketing has adopted a degree of artificiality.

It's smart to aim for specific groups -- the Long Tail model can be successful -- but companies must be careful not to upset the niche they're pursuing.

Posted by Kevin Ohannessian at 11:10 AM | 4 Comments

August 18, 2005

For in That Sleep of Death What (Marketing) Dreams May Come...

The body hasn't even cooled on my last post about marketing in church (and at funerals) and I just saw this today! Please, when I shuffle off this mortal coil, just burn my corpse and throw the ashes to the wind.

(And no sponsorships.)

Posted by Lucas Conley at 1:46 PM | 2 Comments

August 16, 2005

Marketing to the Grave

This one just came over the transom -- sure, it's really a plug for a conference on buzzmarketing, but what a question for debate: Will marketing ever reach the altar? Apparantly, it already has. Next stop: funerals and wakes?

Posted by Lucas Conley at 2:17 PM | 6 Comments

August 9, 2005

How Innovative Leadership Impacts Customer Experience: Part 2

This may sound like the beginning of a bad joke: What do you get when you combine:

• A nuclear engineer
• A rap artist
• An FBI agent
• An AOL / Time Warner executive
• A professional stand-up comedian

How about a church leadership team? As an experience architect, I've been exploring ways that innovative leadership is imprinted on customer experience. New Life Christian Church is a great case study. It's one of those unique places where the customer experience definitely reflects the drive and innovation of its leaders... and there's something to be learned for all.

Continue reading "How Innovative Leadership Impacts Customer Experience: Part 2"

Posted by Leigh from LivePath.net at 7:39 PM | Add Comment

Differentiation That Works?

Mark Northern asked in his previous post about differentiators that work. Here's .02 cents from someone in the trenches with folks engineering new products and messages every day.

The differentiators that work are the differentiators that matter most. The differentiators that matter most depend on the individual. Individuals in today's marketplace don't always know what they want, and are conditioned to be more fickle, discontent and less patient.

Delivering differentiation messaging effectively is unquestionably more complex today than it ever has been. This isn't just because our customers are now more educated than ever. We're also dealing with online and offline channel proliferation, a lack of data standards, systems integration, and a shortage of seasoned quantitative analytics staff who can make sense out of mounting customer information...

But that's a topic for another day... Here's the good news: In this era of tight competition and commoditization, the differentiator that matters most may have less to do with your product than you think.

Continue reading "Differentiation That Works?"

Posted by Leigh from LivePath.net at 2:46 PM | Add Comment

Heart, Meet Sleeve

There is a great article about advertising in soccer jerseys in the August 2005 issue of FourFourTwo magazine. There is hardly a soccer club, at any level, that wouldn't sport its sponsor's logo on the chest of the jersey. And no wonder. According to FourFourTwo, Samsung pays London-based Chelsea 50 million pounds (90 million dollars) to have the reigning Premiership champions wear their logo the next four years. Deutsche Telekom coughs up 24 million dollars a year to Bayern Munchen, the German champion.

In the NHL, the teams don't have any advertising on their sweaters and it wasn't until 1980 that the rink boards got covered with advertising. The ice got its share in the 1990s and soon, it will move to the sweaters, it's inevitable. But what about the NBA, the NFL and MLB? Fellow blogger, Mark Cuban, is already advocating that development.

Continue reading "Heart, Meet Sleeve"

Posted by Risto Pakarinen at 10:55 AM | 1 Comment

August 8, 2005

How Innovative Leadership Impacts Customer Experience - Part 1

We've talked a lot about innovative leadership. As an experience architect, I'm also interested in how innovative leadership is reflected in customer experience. Let me hear from you on this one.

I'll start us off by contributing some information about a company called Honest Tea, which relates to Peter Rees' post on Social Impact and Profit.

Honest Tea's Co-Founder Seth Goldman's passion for quality, community, culture and socially responsible trade is reflected in the products he makes. As an innovative tea aficionado, Seth introduced high quality, less sweet teas, bottled with social conscience to the market in 1998. His teas and newly launched lemonades are now sold at national retailers and health food stores around the country.

Continue reading "How Innovative Leadership Impacts Customer Experience - Part 1"

Posted by Leigh from LivePath.net at 10:57 PM | 2 Comments

Innovative Leadership - A Definition and Roll Call

Thanks for inviting me to BlogJam, heath. As I geared up for the main topic: innovative leadership, I began to think about the nature of leadership and innovation. I thought thought it'd be interesting to start a collaborative roll call of innovative leaders. We've all got our own definitions, so to start on a level field, I started my exploration by looking up two definitions on Dictionary.com (shortened and reformatted for display purposes):

Innovate (Word Net definition: n 1: to create (a new device or process) resulting from study and experimentation [syn: invention] 2: to create something in the mind [syn: invention, excogitation, conception, design] 3: the act of starting something for the first time; introducing something new...

Lead: 1: To show the way to by going in advance; 2: To guide or direct in a course [syn: guide]; 3: a) To serve as a route for; b) To be a channel or conduit for; 4: To guide the behavior or opinion of; to induce; 5: a) To direct the performance or activities of; b) To inspire the conduct of; 6: To play a principal or guiding role in; 7: a) To go or be at the head of...

By definition Innovation is a creative act that has implicit leadership characteristics. Leadership itself does not necessarily require innovation.

Continue reading "Innovative Leadership - A Definition and Roll Call"

Posted by Leigh from LivePath.net at 4:19 PM | 4 Comments

Simplicity in Marketing and Sales

Leigh Duncan in getting smart about managing marketing burnout talks about marketers needing superhuman skills, having to be available any time/any channel and to be able to leap tall silos in a single bound.

Success, says Leigh, hinges on good, smart leadership. I agree, smart leaders need to sift through ideas and choose which to execute; they need to create structures that help individuals and teams succeed in going to market faster; and build capacity within their organizations so they run efficiently to capitalize on that new idea fast.

Simple enough? So why is this so complicated to achieve?

Posted by Valeria Maltoni at 1:32 PM | 1 Comment

Why Integrated Marketing Makes Me Shudder

I've been spending a lot of time with disappointed executives who mistakenly assumed that integrating the marketing department would revolutionize marketing and dramatically improve customer acquisition and relationship management.

More than a few of these executives (especially the ones on the hook for the technology ROI) are now fighting to keep their jobs.

Were they wrong about their investment in CRM tools? No, but that may not help much.

These executives are now steeped in the knowledge that truly integrated marketing can only be driven out of a truly integrated organization. Creating such an organization spans beyond the marketer's area of influence and control and stands in the way of improved experience and customer-centricity. A lack of organizational integration also impedes effective collaboration and frustrates the sales and marketing process.

Continue reading "Why Integrated Marketing Makes Me Shudder"

Posted by Leigh from LivePath.net at 12:50 PM | Add Comment

Why Integrated Marketing Makes Me Shudder

I've been spending a lot of time with disappointed executives who mistakenly assumed that integrating the marketing department would revolutionize marketing and dramatically improve customer acquisition and relationship management.

More than a few of these executives (especially the ones on the hook for the technology ROI) are now fighting to keep their jobs.

Were they wrong about their investment in CRM tools? No, but that may not help much.

These executives are now steeped in the knowledge that truly integrated marketing can only be driven out of a truly integrated organization. Creating such an organization spans beyond the marketer's area of influence and control and stands in the way of improved experience and customer-centricity. A lack of organizational integration also impedes effective collaboration and frustrates the sales and marketing process.

Continue reading "Why Integrated Marketing Makes Me Shudder"

Posted by Leigh from LivePath.net at 12:50 PM | Add Comment

Get Smart about Managing Marketing Burnout

According to the UK Recruitment firm, the Hudson Group, 44% of all marketers are facing burnout. I haven't seen any US figures on this yet, but last week's article in Brand Republic reinforces one of my hypotheses that today's marketers are being stretched beyond their limits.

The UK is feeling the backlash in the form of increasing absenteeism, turnover, poor morale and declines in productivity and quality of output. Conduct an informal quick poll of the marketers around you. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that this phenomenon is present in the US, as well.

Wanted: Marketer.

Continue reading "Get Smart about Managing Marketing Burnout"

Posted by Leigh from LivePath.net at 10:40 AM | 3 Comments

Get Smart about Managing Marketing Burnout

According to the UK Recruitment firm, the Hudson Group, 44% of all marketers are facing burnout. I haven't seen any US figures on this yet, but last week's article in Brand Republic reinforces one of my hypotheses that today's marketers are being stretched beyond their limits.

The UK is feeling the backlash in the form of increasing absenteeism, turnover, poor morale and declines in productivity and quality of output. Conduct an informal quick poll of the marketers around you. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that this phenomenon is present in the US, as well.

Wanted: Marketer.

Continue reading "Get Smart about Managing Marketing Burnout"

Posted by Leigh from LivePath.net at 10:40 AM | 3 Comments

Wal-Mart vs. Costco

The differences between Wal-Mart and Costco provide one of the most interesting studies in contrast going today. For any number of reasons, it seems that Wal-Mart is regularly (and maybe justifiably) villified while Costco is routinely (and maybe unjustifiably) praised.

Two articles -- one each on Wal-Mart and Costco -- recently caught my eye. The Wal-Mart article, an op-ed piece in The New York Times by Pankaj Ghemawat and Ken A. Mark took the contrarian view that because Wal-Mart paid its employees less, it is able to deliver more value to it shoppers -- and primarily those shoppers are in rural, impoverished locales. So, in other words, Wal-Mart is the best friend a poor person could ever hope to have.

The Costco article, a "news" story in the New York Times by Steven Greenhouse, was all about how Wall Street was not happy with Costco CEO Jim Sinegal because he pays his people an average of $17 per hour, which is about 42 percent more than the average Wal-Mart employee. The article also noted that Costco's average shopper has a household income of $74,000. So, in other words, Costco is the best friend a rich person could ever hope to have.

What are we to make of this?

Posted by Tim Manners at 8:36 AM | 33 Comments

July 28, 2005

Get Used to It

The New York Times article on used books is interesting. As a buyer of books, both used and new, from Amazon or mom and pops stores, I can tell you that I usually buy a used book when it is something I am only mildly interested in and wouldn't have bought new.

Continue reading "Get Used to It"

Posted by Kevin Ohannessian at 1:04 PM | 3 Comments

July 13, 2005

How Do You Kick the Digital Tires?

That's what I'm wondering since Ford plans to sell its second hybrid, the 2006 Mercury Mariner Hybrid, primarily online. I understand the reluctance of devoting valuable dealership space to slow-moving inventory. And I'm all for American automakers getting out of their rut and trying something new. But this seems like an idea that's ahead of its time.

We're still in the early years of hybrids, and although sales nearly doubled last year, they represented less than one percent of the 17 million new vehicles sold. Most Americans haven't been behind the wheel of one. No wonder there are so many misconceptions, starting with the notion that all hybrids need to be plugged in (false). What are the chances that consumers will order a $30,000 Mariner Hybrid off the Internet without so much as a test drive? Just a hunch, but I'd say they're not good. I fear that Ford is undermining its R&D efforts and will scale back its hybrid program, citing disappointing sales. I just hope I'm wrong.

Posted by Chuck Salter at 3:59 PM | 6 Comments

July 11, 2005

White Paper Chase

Ever wonder about the development of the "white paper"? Ever want to learn how to write one -- one that works well? Kevin Barefoot manages a blog entitled Barefoot White Papers that offers "notes on a unique document type."

Recent entries feature tips and tactics on copywriting, white paper names, and other related topics. Of special interest is the May 3 entry, which provides a pointer to Gordon and Gordon's State of the White Paper 2004 research report.

Posted by Heath Row at 12:36 PM | 2 Comments

July 5, 2005

Acting Up

On Saturday, I went and saw War of the Worlds. Worlds was a good adaptation of a good novel. But, despite the marketing machine behind it, two of my friends didn't come because of Tom Cruise's recent antics. Some have said that the film's success proves that the public can separate an actor's private life from his work. Yet, everyone was talking about the Lauer-Cruise interview. Maybe the percentage was small, but there are those who didn't go because of it.

Can a person's actions be a liability to a company? One could point to Steve Jobs or Michael Eisner, but their criticism hasn't been of a personal nature. The big business personalities don't get the same scrutiny that celebrities do. But, when those celebrities are tied to business, like an actor in a film or a spokesman in a commercial, the backlash to a company can be huge. Remember Madonna's incident with Pepsi?

In the last few decades the fields of business and entertainment have been inextricably tied together. With endorsements, sponsorships, and alliances, companies have become bound to the fickle nature of celebrity and public opinion. Is the gamble worth it? When is using a celebrity the wrong way to market?

Posted by Kevin Ohannessian at 10:58 AM | 8 Comments

June 30, 2005

Irony of the Day

One of the leading telemarketing firms in the UK is called the Listening Company.

A special calibre of call handler is required for this market with strong objection handling skills to get across the key sales messages and deal with complex business issues. ... We employ a very high calibre of caller in our B2B units who are capable of getting through to, engaging and handling objections from senior managers and directors.

I guess it depends on what you mean by "listening."

[Thanks, John!]

Posted by Heath Row at 12:48 PM | 1 Comment

June 29, 2005

Intern BlogOff: Marketing to the Military (Con)

Congress finally did something this week about the predatory lending practices that have been taking advantage of military personnel for years.

Why do they need protection? Because they are essentially a captive audience.

Corporations know this -- and are in a perfect position to exploit those who don't really have a choice. Faced with deployment and military pay that may be below available civilian jobs, young service men and women turn to "payday" loans to pay their bills.

Continue reading "Intern BlogOff: Marketing to the Military (Con)"

Posted by Kerry-Ann Austin at 4:28 PM | Add Comment

Intern BlogOff: Marketing to the Military (Pro)

The House bill to limit marketing to the military is a good safeguard from unfair products or services, but the notion of marketing to a captive audience shouldn't be discounted. Some may argue that such direct marketing -- soldiers and officers are a captive audience in some ways -- is unfair. Why? It's a good practice to speak directly to your target group or demographic. That's a basic precept of advertising, sales, and marketing.

Continue reading "Intern BlogOff: Marketing to the Military (Pro)"