Jackie Huba and Ben McConnell are the co-authors of Citizen Marketers: When People Are the Message. Their first book was called Creating Customer Evangelists: How Loyal Customers Become a Volunteer Sales Force. As business advisors and speakers, McConnell and Huba have worked with Starbucks, Microsoft, Whirlpool, Discovery Education, PBS, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. [...]
A new organization for technology evangelists has just been formed in Silicon Valley. (Secular evangelism has arrived!) The organization’s first conference is coming up on December 4th. Here is the agenda. Network Meeting Center 5201 Great America Parkway Santa Clara, CA 95054 408-562-6111 12/4/2006, 11:30 am - 6:00 pm I hope to see you there!
Check out this study by Prof. Kathleen Vohs of the University of Minnesota (Go Gophers!). She tested the hypothesis that thinking about money can create social barriers. Here is a description of what she did: “To examine this idea in a more controlled setting, Vohs, now at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, and colleagues [...]
Here’s a video of my interview with Mike Arrington of TechCrunch. The salient question that Mike answers is, ”How do I get my company in TechCrunch?“ The short story is: The “standard answer” is to send an email to [email protected] and take your chances. Thirty pitches come in per day this way. The most effective [...]
I found a great blog entry that explains technology marketing. Here are the first three elements of this top-ten list: Marketing is not a department. Marketing is a combination of elements that creates the environment in which it is possible to meet a customer need (starting right back at product development). Promotion and sales are [...]
This is a video of a Churchill Club panel (9/20/06) that I moderated called Next Generation Insights. It featured six Silicon Valley young adults whose ages ranged from fifteen to twenty four. These are some factoids that I found interesting: They send as many as 4,000 text messages per month from their phones. They watch [...]
One of the important insights that the Startups 2006 panel hammered home was the importance of distribution for consumer-facing startups. (By the way, an astounding 13,000 people watched this video during the first week.) Many people use the word “distribution” as if it were a tactic when in fact it is a goal. Any bozo [...]
As a follow up to Online Reviews and Small Businesses, check out this posting about the J curve of ratings. The most salient paragraph is: Across many clients in diverse industries this “U” curve turns out to be more like a “J” curve…almost a reverse “L”. The average rating across all clients is 4.3 out [...]
One of fortunate outcomes of the “democratization of information” is that anyone can now be a critic. You don’t even have to be work for a publication anymore because of sites like Local.Yahoo and Judy's Book. Even amateurs can rate businesses: Power to the people! Ilana DeBare of the the San Francisco Chronicle wrote a [...]
This is turning into Marketing Week where is a “week” is defined as whatever time period I am obsessed with a topic. I came across this great video from the Stanford Publishing Courses for Professionals program. It features Ina Saltz. Ina Saltz is the principal of Saltz Design and professor of electronic design at The [...]
Toyota is a great company. When I was in high school in the 1970s, our family had a Corona. it was a pile of junk—I thought it was made of recycled beer cans. Fast forward to the present: Toyota is kicking butt. The company stands for innovative engineering, high-quality manufacturing, and effective marketing. Compare, for [...]
My buddy Andy Sernovitz, the CEO of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, is coming out with a new book called, duh, Word of Mouth Marketing. I highly recommend this book because it was so practical, tactical, and hysterical. Here are the ten ideas, stories, and recommendations from the book that I liked the most: [...]
Marten Mickos joined MySQL AB as CEO in 2001. Under his leadership, the company has grown from a startup to the second largest open source company and the fastest-growing database vendor in the world. Prior to MySQL, Mickos held multi-national CEO and senior executive positions in his native Finland. He holds a masters of science [...]
Seth Godin is author of six books that have been bestsellers around the world and changed the way people think about marketing, entrepreneurship, and work. He is also a renowned speaker and a helluva nice guy. I cornered him and got him to answer ten (really eleven) questions about his latest book, Small is the [...]
I read the best explanation of what makes an idea spread in Seth Godin’s new book: Small is the New Big. For an idea to be spread, it needs to be sent and received. No one sends an idea unless: They understand it. They want it to spread. They believe that spreading it will enhance [...]
My buddy Stephen Nipper wrote this very useful piece about trademarks for Think Vitamin. “Trademark Tips for Your Web App” Choosing a good name for your web app is one of the most important things to get right. But without an understanding of the way that trademark regulations work, you could fall at the first [...]
I came across a very interesting study about word of mouth advertising while reading the NYU PR graduate school blog. Here’s a paragraph to give you a flavor of the article: Surprisingly, the study found that less than 40% of consumers use e-mail to make recommendations to others, including via personal e-mail (37%), by e-mail [...]
Here are three interesting essays about how social networks work. Highly relevant reading for anyone in a social networking company—or investing in one. 5 reasons why social networks fail 5 reasons why social networks can succeed Situational Relevance in Social Networking Websites
This is an interview with Dr. Sandor Gardos, CEO and staff sexologist of MyPleasure. Sandor is a licensed clinical psychologist and sex therapist as well as a board-certified sexologist. We met recently at a San Francisco Entrepreneurs Organization dinner where I was the keynote speaker. By the way, I predict that most people will say, [...]