If your company is like many others out there, the economic downturn resulted in you having to slash your training budgets, including most of the training efforts for your marketing organization.

The question is- can you afford not to invest in training your marketers?

These are the people that are developing your strategic marketing plans, writing messaging that meets your target market needs, choosing the initiatives that will have the best ROI while meeting your brand goals, and so much more.  It is more than a little unnerving to know that while they handle such critical tasks, 2/3rds of them actually don’t have a marketing background, as shown in a survey of 65,000 marketers by the Marketing Excellence Survey. Read More »

Marketing and media news

• Ratings remained flat for last weekend’s Emmy awards [WSJ]
• Why location-based services are still a hard sell for consumers [NYT]
• Consumers are not buying corporate efforts to look green [Adweek]
• Samsung is joining the race to bring apps to your TV [WSJ]
• Has poor customer service contributed to the climate of frustration in America? [New Yorker]
• Why ‘innovation machines’ are key for large enterprises [Economist]
• AdAge explains why the incessant focus on ‘viral’ videos is bad for marketing and advertising [AdAge]
• MTV is partnering with Foursquare for a promotion around its Video Music Awards [Mashable]
• One-third of online adults search ‘often’ for health-related information on the web [Adweek]
• How do links spread through Twitter? [Hubspot]
• Taking a look at how the iPad is changing the newspaper business [ReadWriteWeb]
• Indie rock band Arcade Fire has teamed up with Google for a music video showcasing the capabilities of HTML5 [Google]
• Success almost always leads to backlash, and Facebook is no different – examining the ‘anti-Facebooks’ [ReadWriteWeb]
• Mashable looks at how CEOs might some day use social media [Mashable]

Business and economic news

• Global stocks fell Tuesday amidst fears of a ‘double-dip’ recession in the United States [Reuters]

Marketing is about creativity, punchy language, and ad campaigns, right?  Not in social media. This post summarizes 5 outdated marketing beliefs and offers quick tips for adapting to the new world of ‘unmarketing.’ Read More »

Marketing and media news

• Google is in negotiations with movie studios to allow pay-per-view films via YouTube, putting it in direct competition with Apple, Hulu, and Netflix [ZDNet]
• Consumers continue to focus shopping on or around payday – retaining a frugal habit left over from recession [WSJ]
• Singles have come to dominate music charts as consumers opt for online purchases, YouTube streams rather than physical albums [NYT]
• An interview with Ford marketing chief Jim Farley [AdAge]
• Honda experiments with ad buy in social gaming [Mashable]
• Are consumers becoming desensitized to product recalls? [AdAge]
• The Oxford English Dictionary may skip print for its next edition; go entirely digital [Fast Company]
• USA Today announced a large reorganization Friday to focus on its digital business [NYT]
• Taking a look at the future of mobile ad networks: could device-centric platforms win out? [TechCrunch]
• Consumers becoming unnerved by increasing “retargeting” – ads that follow them around from site to site [NYT]
• In case you haven’t noticed, cable television is under assault by tech companies – are you ready for a sea change in consumer behavior? [TechCrunch]
• Pew study finds that social media use has nearly doubled for internet users 55 and up [Mashable]
• Taking a look at the pros and cons of iPad magazines [ReadWriteWeb]

Marketing and media news

• Apple could announce its long-awaited cloud-based streaming service, which would allow users to listen to their personal music collections from anywhere in the world, in September [Adweek]
• More and more bookstores are finding a market for custom-printed books [WSJ]
• Ford going all-out to promote its product placement in CW’s “Vampire Diaries” [AdAge]
• Local review service Yelp is rolling out a coupon program to compete with Groupon [Yelp]
• The FCC is putting marketers on notice: don’t submit reviews to sites like Yelp without disclosing conflicts [NYT]
• J. Crew will put outlet sales online in September, in what may be a first among retailers [WSJ, subscription required]
• Diaspora, the open-source Facebook alternative that generated serious buzz in the spring, will launch September 15 [Mashable]
• Germany may pass a law barring a candidate’s Facebook profile from being considered in the hiring process [ReadWriteWeb]
• An in-depth analysis of the spread of Twitter in the first few years of the service’s life [Hubspot]
• Throwing cold water on the smartphone hype [Mashable]

(Note: This is Part 4 of our 6-part series on marketing planning. Part 1, “Making the Case for Higher Spend“,  can be found here. Part 2, “Selecting Metrics“, can be found here. Part 3, “Marketers Squeezing Productivity“, can be found here. Check back here every Wednesday in August and September for a new installment!)

As you’re preparing for another year of marketing planning, ask yourself these three questions:

• Do our marketing plans reflect our company’s overall strategic objectives?
• Are our marketing plans based primarily on incremental changes to last year’s activities?
• Even if we know that marketing is making progress, can we tie our activities to business objectives?

We all know what the answers here should be, but how many of us actually get it right? Read More »

Marketing and media news

• Ford will expand its presence in the India market in a big way, will launch 8 new vehicles in the next 5 years [FT]
• Amazon’s new Kindle enjoying record sales, shortages (I’m still waiting for mine!) [TechCrunch]
• A rundown of digital shopper marketing innovations, including those from JC Penny, Dunkin Donuts, and The Limited [WSJ]
• Intuit will launch new credit card platform for iPhone [Mashable]
• ..while Consumer Reports pushes for more fraud protection on mobile payments platforms [ReadWriteWeb]
• Analyzing public perception of the advertising/PR biz [Adweek]
• An infographic timeline of Facebook’s privacy woes [Mashable]
• Online technology and fast prototyping is leading to resurgence in custom goods [WSJ]
• Popeye’s Chicken will embrace its Louisiana roots and taste-test wins in a new campaign targeting KFC [NYT]
• Adweek has a few complaints about BlogHer 2010 [Adweek]
• Google Voice booths, modeled off of English telephone booths, will begin appearing in public places like airports and universities [TechCrunch]
• Clothing chain Zara will open up its first online store [WSJ, subscription required]
• EMarketer estimates that 28% of the American public will access the web from smartphones in 2010, up from 17% in 2008 [Adweek]
• French grocery chain Carrefour will spruce up its hypermarkets in an attempt to draw customers back [WSJ, subscription required]
• Conan O’Brien upcoming late-night TV show for TBS is approaching Letterman/Leno ad pricing [AdAge]
• Some dissent over Apple’s plan to offer 99-cent TV shows [LA Times]
• How Entertainment Weekly is embracing digital media: mobile, video, augmented reality [ReadWriteWeb]

Business and economic news

• Be prepared for a rocky month of September in the US economy [Reuters]

On Monday, Fortune came out with a long, in-depth piece on the success of Trader Joe’s – the wildly popular small gourmet grocery store. The chain, owned by German grocery conglomerate Aldi, has experienced dynamite growth in the last 15 years, expanding from its base in Southern California to over 200 stores nationwide. Their sales numbers ($8 billion in 2009) are similar to those of semi-competitor Whole Foods, and their sales per square foot are an estimated $1,750, more than double those of Whole Foods.

Fortune spends a lot of ink (or pixels, I suppose) analyzing aspects of Trader Joe’s success. It’s a good article, but what has made TJ’s such a cultural phenomenon isn’t too difficult to discern. I’d separate it into a few key buckets: Read More »

What are the limits of the Nature vs Nurture debate?  Was I really a St. Louis Cardinals fan at birth?  (of course).  One friend of mine seems predisposed towards the Jersey Shore.  Is it in her nature?  (well, she is from New Jersey).

I’ve even heard echoes of the debate when members refer to their employers:

“It’s our nature to follow very specific processes”

“Our culture hasn’t changed in 85 years”

“Our leadership believes that our go-to-market strategy from 2002 is still relevant”

“Our brand personality mirrors one thing: our company’s history”

In other words, some members claim that Nature trumps Nurture.  That the innate qualities of a firm’s culture, leadership, brand personality and politics (Nature) eclipse the impact of externalities and experiences (Nurture). Read More »

Marketing and media news

• Online advertising will jump 14% in 2011, led by strong growth in mobile and video ads [MediaBuyerPlanner]
• Apple is close to a deal with major content producers to introduce 99-cent TV show rentals via the iTunes store [Bloomberg]
• Look at me. Now at my Emmy. Now back at me. Now back at my Emmy. [Adweek]
• Facebook’s informal valuation is now as high as $33.7 billion [FT]
• The Wall Street Journal takes a look at the reading habits of e-reader owners [WSJ]
• …while the future darkens at Barnes and Noble [NYT]
• Who talks and texts the most on the United States’ mobile network? African-Americans, women, and southerners [Nielsen]
• “CBS Evening News with Katie Couric” tied an all-time ratings low last week [TVNewser]
• Nissan will shift brand messaging in a campaign to begin this weekend; will focus on the company’s drive to innovate [NYT]
• Sign of the times: Costco will begin taking over department store space in malls [WSJ, subscription required]‘
• AdAge asks – why not make back-to-school a subscription? [AdAge]
• Social coupon sites like GroupOn and LivingSocial are pursuing more personalization in response to merchant complaints [WSJ]
• Some cool ways that big brands are using Foursquare [Mashable]
• Love iPad/iPhone game ‘Angry Birds’? You can soon buy a line of toys from the game, and a movie may be in the works [TechCrunch]

Economic news

• Month-to-month real estate sales dropped 27% from June to July, sending markets reeling [Reuters]

Congratulations!

• Steve Easterbrook named global brand chief, McDonalds [Adweek]
• Monica Ray named head of consumer marketing, Conde Nast [NYT]