Successful Social Networking Campaigns Begin With Strategy

ADOTAS – With social media attracting consumers in droves, businesses are scrambling to get on the bandwagon and exploit a new “direct marketing” channel. While many organizations succeed, many more struggle or fail altogether. The biggest reason is a business’s approach. Too few stop to develop a strategy and a roadmap of where they want [...]

Holiday Forecasts Hold Out Some Hope

Coming so soon after last fall’s near-collapse of the global financial system, the 2008 holiday-shopping season was doomed from the start. Now, with an economic landscape that features some signs of recovery alongside plenty of lousy numbers (and plenty of consumer anxiety), how can we expect 2009′s holiday-shopping season to pan out? Some early forecasts [...]

Forget :30 Spots, Write It On The House

Speaking at the Association of National Advertisers’ Agency/Client Forum in New York on Thursday, Jeff Goodby mentioned that client Pepsi soon will launch a Twitter-centered campaign.  ”Twitter is enormously useful because people pass things along so quickly,” he said. “[Tweets] just take off. And people have not used that yet to a degree that we [...]

A Clip-and-Save Renaissance

It may be the digital age, but when it comes to pinching pennies, most consumers are opting for a method that is well over a 100 years old: the paper coupon. Thanks to the miserable economy, coupons — like board games and family dinners around the kitchen table — have made a comeback. The recession [...]

Hilton Sweepstakes Taps into “Mad Men” Glamour

The Hilton Family of hotel properties checks in as the latest brand to borrow some of the marketing buzz generated by the multiple-Emmy-Award winning show “Mad Men” with a “Live like a mad Man” sweepstakes. (read more)

One in Five Tweets is Brand-Related

One in five (20%) tweets posted on Twitter contains some type of inquiry or information about a specific product or service that is brand-related, according to study by a research team atPenn State University. (read more)

Gender, Behavior Influence Teen Buying

Marketers may want to fine-tune their advertising to target “jockettes” and “young metrosexuals.” These are the two largest teen segments, according to new behavioral segmentation created by Euro RSCG Discovery. (read more)

Saturn’s Marketing Lesson Is One To Remember

Fundamentally, there are two ways to increase sales: (1) Expand the brand, or (2) Expand the brand’s market share. Most companies focus on the first way, expanding the brand. While this might seem to work in the short term, expanding the brand will eventually weaken the brand and leave it in worse shape than before [...]

Six Reasons Companies Are Still Scared of Social Media

Whether it’s time-wasting employees or worrying that haters will damage your brand, many corporations still fear the effects of engaging in social media. (read more)

Newspapers Have Not Yet Hit Bottom

Despite some tentative optimism from Washington, Wall Street and Madison Avenue, people who monitor the newspaper business for a living say it has not yet hit bottom. But in what passes for good news these days, the free fall in newspaper advertising may be slowing, and specialists predict it will ease through 2009 and into [...]