Marketing Bombogenesis

Review of Raymond Loewy Exhibition in Boston Globe

I love history. I'm somewhat of a news hound too. I guess that's why my labor-of-love client is the National Heritage Museum. In addition to presenting the expected history exhibitions, the museum presents the more unique/interesting/unusual stories of our country. Quirky looks at popular culture like the history of the diner, the evolution of cocktail shakers (very cool), and even the impact of jeans and leather jackets are just of the topics they've covered. It's a great place.

Today, Greg Cook of The Boston Globe, did a terrific review of the current exhibition, Raymond Loewy: Designs for a Consumer Culture. Loewy is not a household name like some other famous designers, but one look at his stuff and you'll know who he is. He designed the Nabisco and Air Force One logos, the Lucky Strike cigarette pack, and the Avanti Studebaker, to name a few. He's the father of streamlined design. Loewy designed modern classics that look as if they could have been created today.

The on-line review does not include photos of Loewy's work, but The Globe also put up an on-line gallery of his beautiful designs. From the looks of his portrait, he was quite the dasher himself.

Two Smart Guys With Smart Things to Say About the Presidential Campaign

Gene Carr, President of Patron Technologies and David Meerman Scott (The New Rules of Marketing and PR) are two "smart guys" I rely on. In recent weeks, both of these smart guys riffed on marketing aspects of the presidential race. Both touched on, as Gene says, "the chasm that lies between the traditional media (i.e., television) world and the new media (i.e., Internet) world in which we are all now living."

In a recent blog post, Gene provides a vivid analysis of how the recent debate in Nevada shows how our "television networks still believe that they are living in a world in which they rule." He makes a great case for how the public’s thirst for authentic information will force much more direct contact with the candidates. Obama Nightly Webcast, anyone? Gene has a "Presidential Web Watch" happening on his blog.

In his blog, David M. Scott points out that as TV continues to bombard us with details about the candidates TV ad buys, they completely missed the most significant marketing news of the campaign to date. Not one TV outlet reported the news that when John Kerry endorsed Barack Obama, he passed on millions of email addresses to the Obama campaign. This email bonanza is an assest potentially worth a hundred million dollars in donations (or more). Here's the link to David's post on this marketing news that only he has pointed out.

The Walking Realtor.com Just Walked By My Window

Okaaay...not five minutes ago, an amazing bit of personal marketing walked by my office window. A guy in a bright yellow T-shirt emblazoned with "The Walking Realtor. com" strolled, hood up against the cold, down the sidewalk. First one way, then the other. The shirt wasn't even silk-screened. Seems "the walking realtor" prefers, um, the pizzazz of shiny, black vinyl press-on letters.

So I looked him up--www.thewalkingrealtor.com. And sure enough, his name is Ed Shapiro. It seems Ed is on his second tour of walking every street in town. I must have missed him the first time round. He says, "There are 519 streets in town, and I have walked almost all of them. It has taken me about a year, starting January 2006. These days, I am on my second round. I do it because real estate is changing daily. I do it because it is important for my clients to know about those changes....In the process, I talk to my clients, learn about neighborhoods and locate those that best match my clients' interest." Ed left out he's probably in the best shape of any realtor in town.

If it works, hats off to you Ed. In any case, any guy who's out there drumming up business walking through the streets when it's 20-degrees out with wind chill deserves a blog nod at the very least.

Bill Gates--Watch Out?!?!?

I just had a conversation with a client that went like this....

Me: "I sent you the project outline in a Google doc. That way we can both work on it together and save the changes in one fell swoop."

Client: "Google doc? Great. They are so cool. Much better than going back and forth on this the old fashioned way via email."

Email--"the old fashioned way..." Wow.

For sure, Google has sent a shot across the bow at Microsoft's $12-billion annual revenue stream. That's old news, but the notion that email is "old fashioned" is new to me.

David Meerman Scott Rocks My World--Again

Feel like being empowered today?  Then do yourself a favor and download David Meerman Scott's new FREE ebook The New Rules of Viral Marketing: How Word of Mouse Spreads Your Ideas for Free. By page five, this online thought leadership guru will have you planning hundreds of ideas to put the strategies to work for your clients--or yourself.

David rocks my work world on a regular basis. The New Rules of Marketing and PR and Cashing in with Content are a few of his works that realigned my definition of what it means to work in marketing and PR today. I credit him with saving me from what I see as the eventual fate of other PR professionals who fail to jump on the new marketing train--a blank client list or unemployment. Read and learn, people. While you're at it, subscribe to his blog.

After you read the book, you might be left wondering why David would give something that valuable away for FREE. As part of "A Brand You World" global telesummit, David presented a riveting personal case study revealing how giving away the free ebook The New Rules of Marketing and PR launched a viral firestorm. Here's the MP3 to David's presentation "Promoting Brand You with Viral Marketing on the Web."

What the Bleep is Bombogenesis?

My husband is a serious weather junkie. He follows things like "forecast discussions"--deep analyses of weather patterns that, if you ask me, are written in some kind of secret code. Be that as it may, a few weeks ago he warned that a snow storm coming our way had the potential to go “bombogenesis.”  To translate weather-geek speak, "bombogenesis" means the storm is going to be a whopper, and it's happening fast. This rapidly intensifying storm is huge and getting stronger by the minute.

It struck me that the bombogenesis phenomenon is not unlike what's happening in the world of Web 2.0 marketing. The flow of trends, the intensification of opportunities, the convergence of new technologies, and rapid changes are colliding to create a "Marketing Bombogenesis." Join me as we follow the winds of the new marketing perfect storm.