I’ve viewed American Express’s OPEN Forum blog as a legitimate small business publication for a long time, but, hey, I’m biased. Amex partners with FM and top SMB authors and experts (Anita Campbell, Scott Belsky, Guy Kawasaki, John Jantsch, Mike Masnick, Knowledge@Wharton, the Techdirt Insight Community, et al) to create the editorial content published on … Read moreAmex OPEN Forum Blog: It’s an SMB Publication Now
Dell taps Techdirt’s Insight Community on a project that’s somewhere between a virtual focus group and a sponsored forum. As Techdirt’s Mike Masnick puts it: “we’ve put together a site, sponsored by Dell, on The Future of Storage, which is powered by the Techdirt Insight Community. We’re building an ongoing conversation around the future direction … Read moreDell’s The Future of Storage, Assisted by Techdirt, Ars Technica
BMW’s Graffiti contest that invites Facebook users to color in outlines of 1-Series cars has done a few things very well. One, ad units on Graffiti app pages within Facebook as well as websites outside of Facebook (eg, Boing Boing) are performing better because the campaign invites participation. Two, it enlists a core group of … Read moreBMW Graffiti Contest Gives Bloggers, Twitterers Something to Talk About
As reported by Springwise, Domino’s now: “lets consumers create the pizza of their dreams—specifying the type of crust, the amount of sauce and cheese, and unlimited toppings—for a flat rate of USD 10.99. A 10-day contest last month even promised USD 500 in gift certificates for the most creative design. What’s really interesting, though, is … Read moreDomino’s Pizza Does Conversational Marketing
Earlier this month Dell brought its eco ReGeneration campaign to Facebook with a drawing contest among the Graffiti Wall community. (Based on installs of Graffiti’s app, that’s 8,600,000 Facebook members.) Through banners targeted at Graffiti users and on digital culture sites such as Boing Boing, Ars Technica, 43Folders and Make, Dell’s contest inspired 7300 entries. … Read moreDell Goes Green; 1,000,000 Votes For Dell
Storage-maker Iomega’s current banners feature flames and copy that reads “Burn, Baby. Burn!” The algorithms of some contextual ad network served the banner alongside the news of a child dying in a house fire. (From AdRants.)
As part of their “What Do You Have To Say?” brand campaign, HP is sponsoring Facebook’s Graffiti Wall. In addition to banner units, HP helped Graffiti add comments and the ability to print Graffitis. Within 3 hours of the launch of comments functionality, Graffiti users had posted 1000 comments. (Artist on the below: Crystal Hughes.)
Mindshare is out with a survey that says the Writers’ Guild strike, which is putting more re-runs on TV, may drive viewers back to books, magazines and newspapers One finding, according to Ad Age: “Respondents between the ages of 18 and 34 — a prized demographic among advertisers — said they were most likely to … Read moreReruns On TV, Kids Turning To Books
Last month’s “Welcome to the Human Network” campaign by Cisco continues to illustrate the impact of “author-driven” or “conversational marketing” beyond the surface metrics of impressions and click-through rates. Sure, by letting authors lend their names and personal definitions to Cisco ads on their own sites, Cisco’s ads experienced better-than-average click-through rates. But more than … Read moreCisco’s Human Network Campaign: #2 Result on Google
A year ago in a letter to the editor at the NY Times (link, reg req), I argued that agencies would never support a TV ad model that required them to create hundreds of discrete creative units — one for each micro-target — for every campaign: “Sure, the concept of targeting ads to tiny clusters … Read moreEveryone’s a Copywriter with Modem’s “Rant” Banner