FlackLife

Aviva scores a home run with community competition

2009-11-04T09:29:00.002-05:00

I was driving between meetings yesterday and turned on CBC Radio's "All in a Day." Host Alan Neal was speaking with a young woman named Alyse Schachter, who is part of a VERY cool competition.

Alyse came up with an idea called "Snacks in Packs" -- a way to ensure that children who get food and support during the week from school breakfast and lunch programs, etc., get to take a backpack full of nutritious snacks home with them over the weekend.

The idea's a great one, and she is a great evangelist for it.

But the competition is what has impressed the heck out of me.

The Aviva Community Fund, which is part of Aviva Canada, a division of an international insurance company, is running a competition to allocate $500,000 to support projects that will make a positive change in their community.

They've taken corporate giving and found a way to crowdsource it. In a way not too far off Dell's Ideastorm or My Starbucks Idea, they have encouraged people to:

Submit their ideas for making positive change
Encourage others to support their ideas
If you're a browser, look for ideas you can support and vote them up.

They've received more than 1000 ideas from across the country, and now there are 25 semifinalists, based on vote popularity, including Alyse Schacter's idea. Those semifinalists are going to be judged by a VERY diverse panel, including Ben Mulroney, Mike "Pinball" Clemons, and MAC Cosmetics entrepreneur Julie Toskan-Casale.

And they've built a full-on social media platform for this, using Facebook, Vimeo, Twitter, and Youtube to support the project as well as their own site. Credit is due to folks at Fleishman-Hillard and at Idea Couture for the strategy and execution.

It's a great job of making what could be a stuffy, closed-door philanthropic process an open, exciting, and buzzworthy one.

Ciao,
Bob.

Pitch FAIL. But thanks for your interest.

2009-10-28T10:44:00.003-04:00

I got the following pitch today. I'm redacting it to remove identifying information, but man, does the last line of that covering note grate on my nerves. To the best of my knowledge, I've never expressed interest in this company.

Here goes:

Greetings! COMPANY X, LLC just posted -- COMPANY X empowers passionate online publishers with addition to its PROGRAM Y. Please contact us if you need any additional information. Thank you for your interest in COMPANY X, LLC.

Best Regards,
PR Department
PHONE

press@COMPANYX.com

Original Collateral Text:

COMPANY X empowers passionate online publishers with addition to its PROGRAM Y Program

CITY--STATE/ October 27, 2009 -- COMPANY X, LLC announced the launch of the new entry level tier of its PROGRAM Y: PROGRAM Y: Standard. The 'Standard' package is for small content owners and web media companies. The new program rounds out COMPANY(TM) revolutionary program.

MISTER X, GRAND POOHBAH, commented: "Online publishers who want to do more than, well, one thing at a time, are frustrated. I know, I've been in their shoes. They've posted blogs, videos, photos and audios on sharing sites and tried to tie it all together along with social networking and other widgets. The tools are all different, they don't talk to each other and every time a version changes -- things break. They have no way to really grow audience and their users cannot contribute "any media" rich content. They’ve tried ad programs and ad networks and they only seem to "cheapen" content. Worse still - they seem to spend more time wrestling with the technology than on their content. I only wish that COMPANY(TM) had been available for my previous companies! "

I've asked the company when I had expressed interest in them, but haven't heard back from them.

I know that we've all moaned about bad pitches, but this one just got under my skin.

Hope this doesn't get under yours in the same way.

Ciao,
Bob.

Change can be frightening. And good.

2009-10-21T10:39:00.005-04:00

Wanted to let you know that I am leaving Algonquin College after a year or so here to embark on a new / not-new adventure.

From 1994-2000, I worked as an independent PR consultant, and I'm going to return to that career. That's the not-quite-new part of this adventure. I'm looking forward to being able to do work for clients in a direct way, with a bit more freedom from some of the organizational hoops that need to be jumped through, and also to the slightly intimidating and also freeing sensation of being responsible for myself in a way that's not possible when working on staff for an organization.

What can I do for an organization?

Help create communications plans for an initiative or for the organization as a whole
Consult on social media strategies and tactics
Support internal communications
Carry out media relations for an event
Manage projects or events
Manage the work of talented colleagues in allied fields like Web design, graphic design, etc.

This is stuff that I've done for a number of people in the past, with what I think is a pretty reasonable record of success.

I'm also moving into a slightly new area for me, with hopes that it will be provide some economic fulfilment while it feeds my soul. Most of you know that Cathy and I have been doing house concerts over the past three years. Spending time with Canada's and the world's best roots musicians has taught me that while there is no shortage of talent in Canada, there are shortages of services to support that talent.

So I'm hoping to branch out into working with some folks in the music business -- the parts of it that I love, at least -- to create some opportunities for roots musicians to play and to help roots musicians get their music and their 'brand' in front of people. There's already some stuff happening that's exciting. Whether it's enough to starve on is another question, but it sure is fun.

I'll be operating under the name Translucid Communications. That word goes back as far as Ralph Waldo Emerson, who used it to describe how a poet can use his imagination to reveal the true nature of things to others.

As a communicator, I see the word more as a combination of two other words -- translucent and lucid. As a communicator, I'm strongly against organizations being opaque and not communicating with their publics; but that doesn't mean that you throw open all the doors, open the books, and tell EVERYone EVERYthing. The balance between being totally opaque or closed and totally transparent or open is where I want ot help organizations live. And to communicate effectively with audiences or publics, an organization needs to be lucid -- to be clear, understable, coherent. Hence, Translucid.

I think I have some skills to share with organizations and individuals. If you know of someone who might require my services, please recommend them to me or vice versa. I'll have a web site up very soon at Translucid.ca; in the meantime, you can check out the temp site at Translucid.

Oh -- and while I think Flacklife will get rolled into the new web site and may at some point even lose its name, BobCat is eternal, and will continue to offer great musicians the chance to play in front of great people, with all the money going to the artist. Wish me luck! As the post title says, "Change can be frightening. And good." So yay (shudder).

Ciao,
Bob.

How to understand these new technologies?

2009-10-06T07:04:00.002-04:00

While the buzz is deafening about Twitter, Yammer, and other hotsy-totsy social media tools, Seth Godin points out that lots of businesses can't even manage to get e-mail right. By the way, the SMTP protocol has been widely used for about 25 years.

Sigh.

Photo by Adam Tinworth.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/adders/ / CC BY-ND 2.0

UPDATED: Thoughts on Blogola

2009-09-30T08:42:00.004-04:00

Spent a pleasant few minutes (so few, but they go so fast) talking with Kathleen Petty and Andrea Tomkins on CBC Radio this morning talking about giveaways and bloggers. UPDATE: Here's the audio, in the hated RealAudio format. Sorry.

As I drove home, I thought about the frustration of having what, to radio, seems like a fairly significant discussion about a subject, but in reality, missing out on the thousands of posts, let alone thousands of words, written about blogger relations and ethics around giveaways to bloggers.

A couple of thoughts that I wasn't able to get into the discussion:

According to Technorati's last State of the Blogosphere, the median income for bloggers is $200 (US). There are a few who make scads of money from their blogs -- Dooce, for example, is rumoured to take in $40,000 per month. But the vast majority of bloggers make little to no money. So does this make us MORE or LESS susceptible to blogola? On one side, you could see it as a slight reward for a lot of effort. On the other, you could see it as being proportionately greater in terms of impact on the blogger -- if someone sent me a $1000 camera, that would be a huge equivalent of income for my blog (given that I don't think I've ever made ANY money from it).
The attention given to blogger giveaways and the HUGE criticism of some bloggers and corporations (Chris Brogan, come on down; Microsoft, here's your prize) for perceived ethical failings ignores the fact that bloggers rely on the credibility that their audiences vest in them. If I lose the respect of my readers I lose whatever rationale there was to send me stuff in the first place.

Anyone else out there with thoughts? Would love to hear them.

Ciao,
Bob.

I am Zero Means Zero

2009-08-28T19:47:00.002-04:00

How can they be Mr. ZMZ when it was me? Iiiiii amm ZMZ.

Ciao,
Bob.

A truly sad day for all politicians.

2009-07-15T12:16:00.002-04:00

I know this may be difficult to read without shedding a tear, but ... Barack Obama's teleprompter dies; trusted speech aid was barely 2.

It is survived by these:

Ciao,
Bob.

Politics: Wafers, G8 moments, and the likely fallout

2009-07-10T14:02:00.004-04:00

Canadian politics watchers have been getting lots to talk about this week. First, there was what some people are calling "Wafergate" -- the controversy over whether Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper (a) should have accepted a communion wafer at the state funeral of former Governor-General Roméo Leblanc, and (b) whether, having accepted it, really ate it or just put it in his pocket or otherwise disposed of it.

And this afternoon, there's a growing firestorm around a gaffe at the G-8 summit in Italy. During a news conference, Harper said the following:

"If you don't mind giving me a moment to address the comments of Mr. Ignatieff. The leader of the opposition suggested very recently in the last day or two, I gather, that it's possible -- I’m not sure if he's saying it's desirable or should happen or could happen -- that there will be a group come to the fore, a group of major countries that will exclude Canada. I don't know where he's getting this idea. Nobody but Mr. Ignatieff in the world has suggested excluding Canada from a meeting of major countries. Nobody. It's the first anybody has heard of it. I think it's an irresponsible suggestion, Mr. Ignatieff is supposed to be a Canadian. I don't think you go out and float ideas like this that are so obviously contrary to the country's interests when no one else is advocating them. So I would suggest that he look carefully at his comments and withdraw those. Frankly they would be irresponsible coming from anybody but particularly irresponsible coming from a kean [sic] Canadian Parliamentarian."

Within minutes of this pronouncement, the PM's press secretary Dimitri Soudas, and then the PM, apologized, saying that in fact it was not the Liberal leader but an academic who had made the remarks which prompted Harper's rejoinder.

"During my press conference, I attacked Mr. Ignatieff for some things he had allegedly said about Canada and the G8," Harper said.

"I learned shortly after the press conference this was not a quotation of Mr. Ignatieff. I regret the error and I apologize to Mr. Ignatieff for this error."

Soudas, who also apologized, said the remark attributed to Ignatieff was actually made by an academic.

According to blogger BigCityLib, it was Gordon Smith of the University of Victoria's Centre for Global Studies who actually made the remarks, which you can hear here:

So. Two gaffes, and what do we learn?

The first gaffe I chalked up to silly season and the media desperate for something to work on. This was, to me, not an issue. Not being religious myself, I'm more than willing to accept the possibility that Harper shouldn't have taken the wafer at all. After all, it has a theological meaning that likely doesn't gibe with his beliefs. But it seemed like a tempest in a teapot to me.

But the G8 gaffe is of a different order entirely.

To take time during a global summit to attack your political opponent doesn't seem cricket to me. And to do it based on erroneous information seems to me to be an offence that will pretty much guarantee that Mr. Soudas will be leaving his job, either with a handshake or a kick helping him along.

I've never worked in political communications, although spending time in Ottawa working for universities and colleges has left me with many experiences of watching politicians at work. I can't see how the Harper PMO can get past this second gaffe without sending someone off the plank.

Hat-tip to the indefatigable David Akin.

Ciao,
Bob.

Don't cry for me, Ma-ark Sanford

2009-06-24T16:08:00.002-04:00

I've been a flack since the 1990s, a lover of politics for longer, and I have to say that this news conference as captured by Gawker is about the strangest thing I've ever seen.

Apparently, South Carolina's governor disappeared on Thursday, saying he was going to hike the Appalachian Trail. Turns out he went to Argentina to visit his mistress.

Talk about watching someone's political (and personal, probably) life unravel on live TV.

Sure, you have to wonder what he was thinking to have an affair. But could nobody have kept him from doing the news conference this way?

This makes Eliot Spitzer look like a media master:

Ciao,
Bob.

CBC lets Ira Basen down. Again. (UPDATED)

2009-06-21T11:46:00.005-04:00

Ira Basen is a long-time CBC journalist who explored the public relations industry in his 2007 documentary series "Spin Cycles".

Now, he's doing a two-part series called "News 2.0" exploring the role of news in the social media era.

Shame that CBC appears to have done no promotion, either old-style or viral, for this worthwhile project.

Advance copies for social media or journalism bloggers? Nah.
On-air promos? Pass.
Blogger outreach? Too much trouble.
News release?! Feh.

I heard about it by e-mail and Twitter from Judy Gombita, who is always on the lookout for interesting stuff and blogged about the series on Friday at PR Conversations. The Sunday Edition's electronic newsletter appears on Fridays, so that wasn't much heads-up.

CBC could have looked at the fact that someone like me was interested enough in Basen's last documentary to blog about it, and to interview him for the Inside PR podcast, and then decided to reach out to me.

Or they could have gone out to Joe Thornley, who had an interesting exchange with Basen some time ago.

And I'm sure there's dozens of other ideas. But it appears that they didn't bother to do any of that. Pity.

I wish I could say it was a one-time lapse. But if you look back at "Spin Cycles", they didn't do a great job of promoting that either, according to me and others.

Ciao,
Bob.

UPDATED: Added a link to "Spin Cycles" and links to Judy Gombita's blog post and Twitter feed, all of which shoulda been there in the first place.

How Loblaws ticked me off

2009-06-15T07:07:00.005-04:00

My partner and I have done a lot of gardening in the last couple of years, since we landscaped our back yard. We will likely never be cottage owners, so we decided to make the yard our refuge.

Thanks to a great designer, Lynda Milina of Kavamilina, and a great installer, Denis Willaert and Apprize, we have a back yard we can hardly tear ourselves away from on weekends or in the evening.

One side effect: MANY plastic pots that once held plants for the trip from the nursery to the yard, and then sat empty.

So when I saw a brief story in the weekend Ottawa Citizen saying that Loblaws stores would accept pots and flats for recycling -- and give you a $5 coupon if you brought in 25 -- I was sold. We immediately started in counting our flats & pots, and came up with 150 that we were happy to get rid of.

So off we go with six bags full of pots. While Cathy trundles through the garden centre, I line up to return the goods and add to what Loblaws says is 600,000 pounds of plastic it will recycle. When I get there, the woman grunts at me and points to where they should go. Then she asks if I have more than 25.

"150, actually."

"Would you like a coupon?" I'm a little bit surprised. I figured I'd get 6 coupons. "No, you get the coupon if you bring in more than 25."

Then she gives me the coupon -- $5, sure enough. If I spend more than $50, one coupon per purchase. Instant disillusionment.

When I shared this with my partner, we wandered around for a little while, looking at fairly nice pots and fairly sick-looking plants, and left, having decided to spend our money elsewhere.

So whose fault is this? Was I being greedy to expect $30 worth of coupons? Should I have gamed the system by dropping off the pots in batches? If I got 6 coupons, I would have to have bought $300 worth of stuff to use them.

My feeling: There's a bad case of conditionitis here. I went there feeling like I was doing a good thing and getting a reward. But afterward, I would have preferred just to have dropped off the pots and flats and gotten nothing than a "this but not that and only under this condition."

Contrast this with Floral Design Landscaping, a nursery in Kemptville that we found while looking for another one. They have a sign up saying they'll give you credit for plants you bring in. We asked about it. They had a specific set of plants they were looking for - peonies, hostas, and the like -- and the guy told me that while it wouldn't be much money, it would be a store credit we could use.

If we go out with a carload of split plants, it won't matter whether it's $5 or $15. We'll feel like we get something for nothing. Not "if you buy $50" - whatever.

At the risk of sounding like Seth Godin (I WISH!), conditionitis is a bad thing. If you want to give something away, then GIVE IT AWAY and make people feel like YOU JUST GAVE THEM SOMETHING.

Ciao,
Bob.

Gladwell was very cool.

2009-06-11T18:41:00.005-04:00

Malcolm Gladwell put on a great show and made lots of people think. Here's the livetweet feed of what he was talking about.

And I got to meet Vicky. Vicky was my guest at the talk, thanks to United Way Ottawa, and when they got to the audience Q&A, her question was the first asked!

Yay her, and yay United Way.

Ciao,
Bob.

We have two winnahhhhs. Gladwell awaits you.

2009-06-11T07:37:00.003-04:00

Hi all:

So I didn't realize how hard it would be for me to pick the winner. I was gonna just go random, but then I actually read the posts.

But I'm going to say that Vicky and Karen are my picks. If you folks are on Twitter, please DM me after the speech - I'd love to meet you both.

I wish I had tickets for all of you. And thanks to United Way Ottawa for putting on the event and for helping me put the contest together.

Ciao,
Bob.

Who wants to go see Malcolm Gladwell thanks to me and the United Way?

2009-06-08T17:37:00.004-04:00

Okay. This is exciting. I have two tickets to go to a VERY cool United Way event and hear Malcolm Gladwell in conversation with Mark Sutcliffe at the National Arts Centre this Thursday, June 11, at 4:00.

Gladwell, of course, is the author of The Tipping Point, Blink, Outliers, etc. etc. Mark Sutcliffe will undoubtedly do a great job of interviewing him -- he's a talented broadcaster and entrepreneur.

If you want to see Gladwell more than anything (and you can't afford $75 to do so, even though you would be supporting the United Way you cheap b****d) and think you deserve to, leave me a comment with your best argument why you should get the ticket rather than anybody else.

UPDATED: Remember -- leave me a way to get in touch with you, and leave your comment before midnight my time Wednesday.

My two favorite answers will get a ticket each. I can't pay any travel, etc., so you have to get to Ottawa and the NAC on your own.

Thanks to the great folks at United Way Ottawa for giving me the chance to do this.

Ciao,
Bob.

A Twitter trifecta: in the courtroom, on the job hunt, philosophy

2009-06-08T11:29:00.006-04:00

Three great things to read today about Twitter I'd like to point you to. In no particular order, here we go:

Kudos to Lawyers Weekly for this solid article (and super illustration by Jeremy Bruneel) about "Twitter in the courtroom."

While keeping a light touch, author Luigi Benetton investigates the use of Twitter at the trials of Mayor Larry O'Brien here in Ottawa (by Ottawa Citizen reporter Glen McGregor) and of some Bandidos motorcycle gang members in London, Ontario (by London Free Press reporter Kate Dubinski).

To quickly summarize comments by litigator Daryl Cruz , law library guruette, social media know-much and cool gal Connie Crosby, and Internet law guru Michael Geist:

Daryl Cruz: “Six months ago, we probably wouldn’t have had this conversation because it wouldn’t have crossed anybody’s mind... Using new technologies to provide information about a public event can be helpful, but you can’t forget about the countervailing issues...Evidence in a courtroom takes time to assume a real shape,” he says. “Real-time sound bites are likely to bear no relation to the sum of the evidence of the witness after a lengthy time on the stand...Reporters who sit in the courtroom and do not live blog take notes and listen to the whole sequence of events. They get to understand the sum total of the evidence before they prepare reports."
Geist: no big deal. “Nobody would question the right of the public to attend the trial; nobody would question a reporter taking notes at a meeting. Twitter is nothing more than taking notes, with faster dissemination...If your local newspaper made mistakes every day, it wouldn’t be your local newspaper for long. If somebody Twittering a trial regularly makes errors, people simply will not follow that person...Any steps taken to increase the level of transparency are typically good things. I think we’ll see more Twittering take place in government hearings, events that are nominally open but which few people attend, events that don’t take place behind closed doors but which typically don’t get much attention.”
Crosby: trained journalists are less likely to OMIK (open mouth, insert keyboard). “[Twitter] doesn’t give a lot of room for clarifying context and giving facts...Journalists will often fact-check with lawyers during breaks ...I’m pro-citizen journalism, but there’s a lot to be said for the training a journalist has.

Second: This morning's Globe and Mail explores the relationship between "Sweet tweets, sweet job leads." for older workers who aren't 'digital natives.' Some interesting case studies. My pick for the 'money quote:'

"I think one of the key attributes that somebody of that age can use to differentiate themselves is to demonstrate a comfort zone for using those tools and actually using them. Any prospective employer nowadays, I think they pretty much are looking for those signals of knowledge and awareness."

-- Michelle Corsano, President of Burst Technology Marketing

And finally, a great blog post from Brian Solis (and there's an equally good one above it) on Twitter. Solis brings together a TON of data on Twitter to come to this conclusion:

Right now, Twitter and its potential for progress is limited only by the information, direction, and education provided by Twitter itself in order to demonstrate and teach existing and new users how to truly use and take advantage of this new and dynamic information ecosystem. While Twitter's API is empowering third-party developers to create Twitterverse of exciting, useful, and entertaining applications that enhance the Twitter experience, it can not outsource nor rely upon the community to teach the world how to use Twitter. Providing recommendations on people to follow doesn't really help at all.

In the meantime, Twitter will continue to flourish as a rapid-fire broadcast network until people learn how to communicate, understand how to participate and what to contribute, and eventually ease into a collaborative, two-way meaningful dialogue that represents Twitter's greatest promise.

I'm not sure I agree with him. But the data alone is worth going through.

Read and enjoy...

Ciao,
Bob.

UPDATED: Would it kill the Fraser Institute to give a guy some credit?

2009-06-05T14:30:00.005-04:00

The Fraser Institute is a think tank here in Canada that believes in "a free and prosperous world where individuals benefit from greater choice, competitive markets, and personal responsibility."

I would call them a right-wing think tank. But they're pretty darn media savvy. One of their standards each year is the proclamation of "Tax Freedom Day" -- the day on which Canadians theoretically have earned enough money to pay all of their tax burden for the year and begin "working for themselves."

They claim the day fell on June 6 this year. They say the latest one was June 24 in 2000, while in 1961, it was two months earlier, meaning we were less burdened then.

As part of their blitz on Tax Freedom Day this year, they have a Video and MP3 available of a song somebody wrote about taxes.

It's not a bad song. Kinda cute, kinda funny. But I've got two pet peeves.

The Fraser Institute should have been smart enough to put embed codes in or to post it publicly to YouTube so I could put it here. They didn't, so I can't. The Share button is fine, but come on, make it easy!
They never mention who the guy is who sings it (and presumably wrote it.) Would it have killed them to give him some credit?

Admittedly, this is no Conference Board of Canada-level scandal. But Fraserites -- could you make it easier for us out here in the blogosphere?

UPDATE: The video is on Youtube. They just don't SAY it is.

Ciao,
Bob.

Drew Olanoff is my kind of guy. Why? Blame his cancer.

2009-06-04T12:53:00.002-04:00

First saw this via Joe Boughner, and by now it's taken over the world.

Social media guy Drew Olanoff(right), who's someone I'd never heard of, got diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma on May 20.

And what's he doing? Blaming it. For everything. Lost his keys? Cancer. Twitter down? Damn cancer. I love that. When I got diagnosed, I tried to be something like him. Most of the time I succeeded. But I didn't do it this way, and I admire him for setting up Blame Drew's Cancer and for encouraging people to blame THEIR troubles on his cancer. And for deciding to find companies to sponsor the site by donating per "blame".

I plan on doing it a whole lot. Even Lance is doing it.

My favorite quote from his site: "I have cancer, but cancer doesn’t have me."

Sadly enough, the Bloggers With Cancer club is large and growing every day. There's me, Dooce, Derek, Katie, Drew, Zoom... it goes on and on. And you know what? I blame Drew's cancer.

And if you're some huge corporate dude reading this post -- please work a deal with Drew. It's would be a very cool thing for you to do.

Ciao,
Bob.

Annals of bad timing, Conference Board edition

2009-06-04T09:41:00.004-04:00

Given what's transpired with the Conference Board of Canada in the last couple of weeks, I might have recommended they not send the following e-mail to their list (please note: it was NOT spam - I'm on their mailing list):

Forward this notice to an interested colleague:

I thought you would be interested in this information from the Conference Board of Canada.

Dear :

In the face of tough economic times, you need to spend smarter, not cut your marketing budget. The Conference Board of Canada can help you get more bang for your marketing buck with relevant research and presentations that address your key marketing challenges – marketing ROI, making better marketing decisions, customer segmentation …. We cover all the issues affecting marketers today.

Marketing Essentials Kit

1 report,1 e-Presentation and 1 Executive Action Report for $495

a value of $1,210 – a savings of $715).

Call 1-866-711-2262 and quote campaign code MARKET to recieve this offer.

Here’s what you get in the Marketing Essentials Kit…..

Managing and Measuring Return on Marketing Investment ($700)
This 28-page report documents the research findings of The Conference Board's Working Group on Managing and Measuring Return on Marketing Investment (MROI). Its detailed statistical analysis supports the argument that an organization must not only create the right environment and have the appropriate skill sets available in order to make good progress with MROI. It also makes a strong case that long-term effort and commitment to these metrics are crucial for success, and that endurance wins out. Two case studies as well as numerous quotes from working group participants complete the report.

Using Customer Segmentation to Drive Improved Marketing Performance ($350)
Under the right conditions, customer segmentation can enable the more efficient and effective use of marketing and sales resources. Companies, however, rarely implement customer segmentation strategies. Getting segmentation right is challenging and requires superior strategy and planning, senior management buy-in, flawless market research, and focused implementation. This webcast presents rich case studies of best and worst practices from market leaders in a variety of industries. It will also give senior marketers the insights they need to 'operationalize' segmentation.

Precision Marketing: Five Ways to Make Better Marketing Investment Decisions ($160)
Faced with an onslaught of advertisements through not just traditional media but new media as well, customers have developed mechanisms that enable them to be highly selective of the messages they receive. Companies, accordingly, need to sharpen their efforts and work that much harder to reach their audiences. This 7-page Executive Action report presents five principles that can help companies make better marketing decisions by refocusing their concentration and perception of customer behavior — and in some ways redirecting their delivery investments.

Rethink, refresh and retool with Conference Board research at a special price - $495
To order the Marketing Essentials Kit at the special price of $495 (a savings of $715) or individual copies at the prices listed, please call 1-866-711-2262 or email publications@conferenceboard.ca and quote campaign code MARKET.

Sincerely,

Christina Marshall

P.S. Order before May 29 and receive a free copy of Customers and the Web: Web-Based Solutions That Improve Customer Acquisition, Loyalty, and Retention. This 64-page report (value of $875) describes five web-based marketing strategies that enable organizations to reach customers inexpensively using targeted messages. It also presents 10 best practice profiles of companies using them successfully

For more information, visit our website at www.conferenceboard.ca.

If you do not wish to receive any further notifications from
The Conference Board of Canada, please unsubscribe.
The Conference Board of Canada
255 Smyth Rd. K1H 8M7

Ciao.

Top Toronto Tweets - who makes the Ottawa edition?

2009-06-03T13:50:00.001-04:00

Globe and Mail editors have listed the Top Toronto Tweets and opened it up for discussions. I'm glad to see among them folks I know like Rayanne Langdon (@rlangdon), Michael O'Connor Clarke (@michaelocc), and Amrita Chandra (@tinkugallery).

But what about here in Ottawa? Who are our twitter leaders?

I'll start with a few people I like, respect, find amusing, or am challenged by, in random order:

Ian Capstick, ex-NDP dude, now PR consultant @IanCapstick
Donna Casey, Sun reporter @dmcasey
Kate Heartfield, Citizen columnist @kateheartfield
Joe Boughner, association flack, @joeboughner (and his wife @amy_sparkplug)
Xander Stobbs, cool dude, great singer, @maplelime
Emily Chen, designer and music lover, @mchenwears
Ask Around Ottawa, a cool idea, @askaroundottawa
Kady O'Malley, Maclean's blogger extraordinaire, @kady
Joe Thornley, social media ubermensch, @thornley

Who are your favorites? How do we create the hot list? And then what do we do? :-)

Ciao,
Bob.

More on e-cigarettes

2009-06-03T12:30:00.003-04:00

Slate magazine's William Saletan has taken a look at the e-cigarette market with today's article The irrational war on electronic cigarettes.

And the Wall Street Journal and New York Times are on the e-cigarette story too. The Toronto Star wrote -- and conveniently posted a video about it back in March, before it was banned:

Back in March, the American Lung Association made its position clear:

Makers and retailers of these products have been making unproven health claims about their products, claiming that they are safer than normal cigarettes and asserting that they can help people to quit smoking. Absent scientific evidence, these claims are in blatant violation of FDA rules.

In fact, no studies have been done on e-cigarettes to date regarding their health effects or their effectiveness as cessation aids. Like the “light” and “low tar” cigarettes that tobacco companies claimed were healthier for consumers, there is no evidence to back up the claims made by e-cigarette makers. In September of 2008, the World Health Organization stated that they have “no evidence to confirm the product’s safety or efficacy.”

The American Cancer society:

The e-cigarette has no published clinical trials that suggest it might work as a way to help smokers quit. No clinical trials have been submitted to the FDA. As of early 2009, the FDA has not ruled as to whether e-cigarettes are medical devices but it is investigating. There may also be questions about how safe it is to inhale some of the flavorings and other substances in the nicotine mists into the lungs. Even substances that are safe to eat can harm delicate tissues inside the lungs.

Like other forms of nicotine, the e-cigarettes and nicotine cartridges can be toxic to children or pets. They can also pose a choking hazard.

Here in Canada, Health Canada followed suit three days after the FDA banned e-cigarettes with this media advisory, saying:

Health Canada is advising Canadians not to purchase or use electronic smoking products, as these products may pose health risks and have not been fully evaluated for safety, quality and efficacy by Health Canada.

These products come as electronic cigarettes, cigars, cigarillos and pipes, as well as cartridges of nicotine solutions and related products. These products fall within the scope of the Food and Drugs Act, and under the Act, require market authorization before they can be imported, advertised or sold. The sale of these health products is currently not compliant with the Food and Drugs Act since no electronic smoking products have been granted a market authorization in Canada.

So when I originally wrote about this, I focused on it looking dorky. Andy Nulman, who originally pointed this out to me and a bazillion other people, responded that "They are dorky, Bob! But so was the Prius when it first came out ;)"

Now I'm starting to wonder if the industry is just going about the market introduction all wrong. If the product is as innocuous as they suggest it is, why not go through the hoops of getting licenced? I don't doubt it would be costly, but if the business case is there, then why not do it?

Because it appears that they (the cig-makers, that is) have sorta blundered into the markets with the assumption that they would be welcomed. Which kinda surprises me, given that they have anti-smoking activist David Sweanor on the board of their US association. Sweanor made this point in an Ottawa Citizen piece he wrote after "snus" were banned in Canada:

"Canada currently is the victim of a "nicotine maintenance monopoly." More than five million of our fellow citizens are only allowed to satisfy their long-term nicotine demand by use of a product that will kill half of them, reduce the quality of life for most of the rest, pollutes the air for all of us and causes users to be unwilling role models for kids...Rather than attacking Imperial Tobacco for introducing a much less toxic alternative to cigarettes maybe we should welcome the opportunity to discuss a rational, health-based regulatory approach for the full range of nicotine delivery products. If in the end there is a better recognition of the limitations of a "just say no" approach to tobacco and nicotine, so much the better."

So I'm feeling kind of weird. We know cigarettes are dangerous. And we let those be sold. We don't know about these, and for some reason it appears nobody's doing the research, but they can't be sold. If the companies did the research, would it be accepted by the anti-tobacco folks? If the companies won't, who will?

And I still think they're dorky. What are your thoughts about this?

Ciao,
Bob.

Improv Everywhere: you had me at hello

2009-06-02T19:07:00.004-04:00

Sure, I'm a hard-hearted, cynical PR guy.

But gosh darn it, when the folks at Improv Everywhere throw a wedding reception for a random couple getting married at New York City Hall, who am I to kvetch.

Look at Raff and Frank, how happy they are. Look at how much fun the Agents are having making them feel special. And for what reason? NONE AT ALL! I LOVE THAT.

This is right up there on the level of Where The Hell is Matt or Free Hugs for feelgooding.

Will Frank and Raff love each other this much forever? Will they grow old together? Who knows. But their happiness, thanks to the tools of social media, is captured now, and will make other people happy for -- well, not forever, but for a long time.

I gotta get the Improve Everywhere book.

Ciao,
Bob.

Warmer, Fuzzier - The Refreshed Logo - NYTimes.com

2009-06-01T16:50:00.006-04:00

Interesting analysis of some refreshed logos in the New York Times, with the hat-tip, as I've done so many times before, to Jason Kottke.

The article looks at companies including Walmart, Kraft, Cheer detergent, Stop & Shop, Super Fresh, QuickChek, Australia's Woolworths, food distributor Sysco(whose name always makes me feel funny since my dad spent 44 years working for another Sysco entirely) and the company formerly known as Blackwater and is now called Xe (pronounced Zee), which have all unveiled new logos or wordmarks recently.

Other than generic interest, I found this interesting because we're at the beginnings of a discussion at my day job about whether it's time to change logos, tinker with our brand, or do a full rebranding exercise.

According to the article, we should "Behold the new breed of corporate logo [as] non- threatening, reassuring, playful, even child-like. Not emblems of distant behemoths, but faces of friends."

Fair enough. I can see why companies want to take on those characteristics. But the question for me is whether their actions and activities reflect that.

For me, the question that comes to mind is what are companies doing -- OTHER than the logo -- to shift their image. And the point that comes to mind is that analyzing these logos separately from their brands -- and we all should know that the brand is more than a logo -- is a mug's game.

And one big problem I just discovered -- if you Google "Xe blackwater" you get to ... someone else's site. In fact, there appears not to be a global Xe site, and Xe.com is a foreign-exchange site. Blackwater.com takes you to http://www.yeah.com/

Why have a name/logo change if you're not going to have anything to back it up?

Anyone have great / terrible examples of relogoing that has backfired on the company in question? I call dibs on the Tropicana disaster (old one left; new one right), which must be destined to go down in history as one of the biggest pullbacks EVER.

Ciao,
Bob.

Electric car or Edsel of the smoking world?

2009-05-26T15:22:00.003-04:00

Andy Nulman posts about the NJOY electronic cigarette, which he wonders about. Are they The Electric Car of The Smoking World, he asks?

Hate to disagree with a man who gave me a copy of his great book AND a pair of VERY nice Parasuco jeans, but I dunno. I think they're more like the Edsel.

These gizmos deliver nicotine in a cigarette or cigar-shaped package that is battery-operated. I'm not sure how many people are making or selling these, but it appears there are a number of them.

There's even an Electronic Cigarette Association, which is pitching itself much more as a way to get away from tobacco, and has Canadian anti-tobacco activist David Sweanor associated with it. Sweanor talks at some length about the products and the controversy surrounding them in this interview.

According to the NJOY product web site:

NJOY e-cigarettes are a revolutionary new smoking alternative that looks, feels and tastes like a cigarette or cigar, and gives smokers all the pleasure and satisfaction of traditional smoking without all the health, social and economic problems.

I'm not sure I'd agree with this. Obviously, nicotine COULD pose health problems. It is an alkaloid. But as Paracelsus (I think) said. "the dose makes the poison."

The Boston Herald ran an op-ed piece suggesting that the tobacco industry is working hard to stop the e-cigs from being sold.

So will this work? Is it the Prius? Or an Edsel? I have to say that I think it's the latter. I've NEVER smoked. Not even a puff. Of anything. But I will acknowledge that smoking can make people look really cool. And that's why a lot of young people take it up. Think of Bogey:

Or Angelina, before she became an earth mother:

Or Marlene Dietrich:

I HATE cigarettes. But I gotta admit that is cool. I mean, look at Bette Davis and Paul Henreid:

Cool.

But when I see video of these e-cigs and cigars:

Dorky.

If I were so inclined, I'd rather smoke the real carcinogenic things than look like some sort of eccentric dipwad. No offense, e-cig users. But that's how I feel.

Ciao,
Bob.

The Daily NRU

2009-05-25T17:53:00.000-04:00

According to dogged David Akin, French nuclear reactor maker AREVA wants to help us.

From Akin's story:

"AREVA is ready to provide all the support that you will deem necessary to reduce the health impact of the current isotope shortage,'' AREVA Canada Inc., presidentArmand Laferrere wrote in a letter to Raitt and Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq, a copy of which was obtained by Canwest News Service. "We will, as requested by you, facilitate contacts with European isotope producers. We are also ready to assist technically in the NRU repairs.''

Of course, it would be a major embarrassment for Canada's nuclear industry to have the French competition come in to save our isotopic bacon.

But equally of course, it's embarrassing as hell that we had this crisis already in 2007, and it appears we were completely unable to prevent another possibly worse one from happening.

AECL Status updates here. Canada Nuclear Safety Commission updates here. MDS Nordion (the company which markets medical isotopes) updates here.

From MDS's May 19 letter to customers: "As the leading global provider of medical isotopes, we are taking every step possible to support the nuclear medicine community. This supply interruption, beyond our reasonable control, is taken very seriously and we will continue to provide updates as more information becomes available. MDS Nordion regrets any inconvenience this may cause."

Inconvenient as hell for cancer patients, that's for sure.

Ciao,
Bob.

Fossil's pop star arrival born of a new thirst for PR

2009-05-25T09:32:00.004-04:00

I'm not a paleontologist, although when I was a kid I wanted to be, more than just about anything. But I'm still a dinosaur geek. Not as much as some people, but still.

So when the discovery of "Ida", or a remarkably complete fossil of a creature dubbed Darwinius masillae, was announced, I was glued to the ol' TV set.

The claims of significance for this 47-million-year-old fossil were pretty huge: “The link until now was missing. Well, it is no longer missing,” said Sir David Attenborough. The researchers themselves were effusive.

But now the hype is being questioned, in articles like this one from the Sydney Morning Herald or this one from the Times of London headlined "Origin of the Specious."

The Times article portrays the man who launched the fossil into the spotlight, palaeontologist Jorn Hurum, as a bit of a rogue with more than a slight sense of bombast.

The Guardian profile of Hurum (which sounds like an Ent clearing its throat) is a bit more charitable than some media.
And the decision to publish the paper in a free-access journal PLOS One rather than Nature or Science has raised eyebrows too. Hurum's argument is that he's paid by the government for his research, so shouldn't publish the fruits of said research in a journal that restricts access.

It's interesting to me that palaeontology should become the hook for a debate around science and hype. Medical and health research is rife with this sort of stuff. Look at the faux debate around a study of "risky" reusable shopping bags fomented last week by the Canadian Plastics Industry Association, for just one example.

The argument here is, apparently, that the release of this research was driven more by the TV and book launches than it was by science, and that the importance of the discovery of Ida (named after Hurum's six-year-old daughter) was torqued to make it more relevant to human evolution than it actually is.

I'm not sure of the science. But I believe that while responsibility is important, it's equally important to communicate with complete, understandable, effective and enthusiastic messages when you're talking about scientific topics.

So does Hurum's team get an A or an F? I guess I give him a B for boffo box office and a C for contorting the truth just a leeeeetle.

Ciao,
Bob.