But attracted by Pandora’s ZIP-code targeting, he spent $10,000 to advertise on the service in January.  IPhone traffic to his Web site — which he attributes to the ads — more than quadrupled, Mr. Feinstein said, and so he increased his spending to $15,000, then $20,000.
“A light bulb went off,” he said at Pandora’s party, holding a glass of wine. “We don’t need to buy five radio stations. We can buy one.” This has been a common complaint from media buyers for decades; buying radio – all about how deep, reach/frequency etc. high CPM etc.

Then there’s the Chevy Sonic that launched without any traditional media at all.  The “let’s do this” digital campaign  that dynamically used music, apps, games, entertainment, video and events  resulted in one of Chevy’s (GM’s) most successful launches ever.  

So you may ask “why?”  In part, the shift in budget is due to a more effective, efficient buy:  ”At the end of the day, the client budget isn’t growing; in some cases it’s shrinking,” said Dave Marsey, a senior vice president at Digitas, part of the Publicis Groupe. “You’re seeing dollars move from out of terrestrial and into more accountable, targetable channels.”

In a hotly competitive automotive business that is eliminating traditional media at every turn; a business that is selling more and more vehicles to consumers who have not test driven or stepped foot inside a dealership prior to purchase;  whose consumers visit multiple websites and research their vehicle digitally – other advertisers will do well to take note to this media buying trend!    For a “chuckle” – read the NYTimes article’s last line on how a  traditional media “seller” responds.    Guess “traditional media” did not hear that fat lady sing…on Pandora.

Enjoy my favs!

Starbucks 17th Annual Hot Java Cool Jazz  show to once again delight Seattle-area jazz fans, as the region’s top young musicians come together for a special show at the Paramount Theatre. Proceeds from the night’s performances benefit the music programs of the participating schools. Since 1995, Starbucks Hot Java Cool Jazz has raised more than $250,000 for participating schools’ music programs.   And Irish Week - by non-profit Irish Club of Seattle entirely with volunteers – actually it’s about a month long featuring, to mention a few events:  Irish Soda Bread Contest held at TS McHughs Irish Pub & Restaurant, Irish Week Proclamation lunch at FX McRory’s kicking off the activities with past notables such as Guinness heir (he was super popular), the Mayors of Seattle’s sister city Galway, ever present Mayor, Seattle’s Finest SPD Asst. Chief Paul McDonagh and the Irish community!  There’s  Irish music at almost every event by locals such as Uilleann Piper Tom Quinn, Irish Dancers Baile Glas  and the Irish Film Festival (this year extending with a  Sept 2012 Festival date!).  Sports with the St. Patrick’s Day Dash and the  Seattle Gaels Kick-Off with their very own March Mayhem.  Fundraiser upon fundraiser.

So what’s a brand to do?  Matching funds, donate volunteer workforce, ticket sales, co-brand, the usual sponsor, fuel through social media, through email marketing.   You know, you do it best; be creative! 

So we’re wrapping up First Quarter 2012, economy is looking brighter, summer’s coming – let’s put the pedal to the metal and fuel those local events this year.  There’s always time – they always need our help!

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!  Cheers!

Pinterest board

Pinterest Board

Pinterest  makes the connection – the “silver bullet” that Broadcast advertising has been trying to obtain – connecting broadcast with interactive since the web was born.  Product Placement > Buy it instantly.   Check out these numbers from Josh:

Pinterest is now driving more traffic to the Real Simple web site than Facebook . (Link)

Warbly Parker, the hip but inexpensive eye glass retailer, reports that 11% of their social traffic is coming from Pinterest. 18% from Twitter. (Link)

What’s more – it will be a goldmine in terms of marketing trove:    Qualitative, quantitative bonanza.  Audience segmentation and corresponding research.   Conversions not just “clicks.”    Beyond the affiliate cash flow  that Josh speaks of:  it will be a meteoric rise with “legs” for ad business.   Request an invitation from Pinterest.

Social Media leaders Twitter, Facebook, Linked-In and Google+ all offer audience segmentation to a finite degree.

Landing pages are not just for websites!   Create a social media landing page in Tiwtter and Facebook:

http://developers.facebook.com and http://business.twitter.com

Then use vendors such as Exact Target for email and social that offer an integrated “HUB” that can allow highly targeted deployments in Social and Email Marketing.

  .  To further audience segmentation, you may find it useful for multiple social accounts for different brands and targets to keep the relevancy.  The email drives traffic, however you need a robust tool to schedule and manage the multiple social accounts with multiple administrators.  Try CoTweet.

This is a New Year’s resolution that will be easy to keep – when you see your ROI sky rocket, customer retention improve and brand loyalty increase.  Cheers and all the best to you in 2012!

So if your company provides employees the “perk” of a volunteer outing, or looking for a partner in cause marketing in 2012  – or you just want to “give back” on a personal level – Charity Navigator is described by Kiplinger as “ rates more than 5,000 charities, making it the first and best stop for would-be donors”.  Visit Charity Navigator.

Twitter Let's Fly Update

First, it’s all about adding video, photos and integrating this.  It’s about navigation, aggregation and really “on the fly“.   The is a reason why Twitter is fastest moving Social Media  Network (see my previous post).   Twitter is happening now.  The search capabilities on subjects, conversation and what’s happening is lightening fast current.  

You can look at how Marketing Vox describes the Twitter Let’s Fly or this is how Twitter describes it:

Home:  this icon is where all the “tweets” reside – those who the user follows reside in this area.

Connect: to start a conversation.It’s the place to see who has followed or mentioned you, retweeted or favorited one of your Tweets.

Discover (aka hashtag): Discover lets you tap into a stream of useful and entertaining information, customized just for you.  Basically to find out what’s happening use that hashtag!

Me Tab (aka profile):  The new profile section puts you and your interests front and center. Others can Tweet directly to you and view your lists, favorites, followers, photos and more. The Me tab is also where you can stay current on your direct message conversations.

Speak Up Button (yup that’s where you tweet): Click on the new Tweet button and instantly send your message out to the world.

So what’s really cool is for Android and i-Phone these changes are continued into the Twitter app.   It’s all about integrating photos, video and other content that makes the world go ’round.     

In my opinion, this is the killer app for 2012.

Marketing Vox: Twitter with highest overall growth among social media networks

First, let’s review Twitter for biz (different than a social media “expert” for your company that’s tweeting personal style) Goals: Drive traffic to: e-commerce, email sign-up, website, events etc. (special landing pages always “rock” as opposed to the home page so boring).    What is your business tweeting about? What’s the balance? General Industry “relevant” info, company info and Sale/Marketing info.    Company info: case studies, product tips, awards, tech support, answers to common questions, pr releases etc. – all with a link to the content.  

When to be personal? Sprinkle it with a few personal messages such as a request for help, call to action for a survey etc. Maybe weekly etc.

What’s the value of a retweet? Viral marketing!

Who to follow?  Think about your company following colleagues, vendors, customers/clients, vendors, journalists, influencers and competitors?

Next up:   Changes in Twitter that will help your business!

Adobe Flash does not work on any Apple mobile devices. In a video demonstration of the iPad, Apple left a large hole in place of the Flash Player. Via Apple and NYTimes

 As noted by many media outlets, known to insiders, and confirmed in Adobe blog today, “Danny Winokur, Adobe’s vice president and general manager of interactive development, said, “We will no longer continue to develop Flash Player in the browser to work with new mobile device configurations.”

So there we have it!   HTML5 is a spectacular language, innovation and a result of collaboration of the industry, w3.org.   Winkor was also quoted in the NYTimes blog: “HTML5 is now universally supported on major mobile devices, in some cases exclusively.  This makes HTML5 the best solution for creating and deploying content in the browser across mobile platforms.”  Learn more at w3.org and read more on the announcement at NYTimes  Ole!

Tech Crunch reports "Fire" selling at 2000 per hour sold

 As reported by i-Media: ”

• About 63 million Americans own smartphones.
• Yahoo estimates that 36 percent of PC sales will be tablets by next year.

And on new phone purchases – check out these stats from Nielsen:

Play to your diverse audience

 Here are design hints from the report:    Responsive web design
that takes advantage of HTML5, new mark-up that will work cross-platform.  i-media used the Boston Globe as an example of scalable designs that display when the OS/handset etc. is “sniffed” out:

From Adam Kleinberg's report on the BostonGlobe

Yes, it’s an investment, work – but a necessity to stay relevant.  Designing for stickiness has a new definition…ciao!

Are you an email marketer without delivery tools, not a certified emailer? Yikes!   There are (5) new tools released by Hotmail to combat spam that could decimate your email delivery. 

As reported by Fox Tech News website, Marketing Vox and just about every outlet – Microsoft is taking aim at “Gray Market Email”.

Just in -into your inbox...

Fox News reports: 

“75 percent of email identified as spam by our customers actually turns out to be unwanted graymail that they receive as a result of having signed up on a legitimate website,” explained Dick Craddock, program manager for the Hotmail service, in a Microsoft blog unveiling the new features.

OK, what’s a email marketing manager to do?   For sure think before you “append” for lists.  Get certified.  Clean those lists and maintain data hygiene at the highest level.  

Check out more from FOX.com Tech News: