Bad Marketing

The Perfect Example of Good Reputation Management

The "Good"  - proactively managing your reputation with sincerity, clarity and transparency

Thanks to the good folks over at Outspoken Media for their post relating the NBC-Conan-Leno debacle to online reputation management.  Read the full post here, but to summarize, Conan won the reputation battle by taking his clear, honest message straight to the audience while Leno kept quiet so no one had any idea about his role/motivations and therefore everyone assumed the worst which was that he was screwing Conan over to get his old time slot back.  Outspoken summarizes the 5 key steps that Conan took to protect or even build his reputation:

1. Control the message by explaining, in simple and honest terms, exactly what happened/ is happening.
2. Don’t get emotional or look for sympathy. Just state the facts.
3. Admit any wrongdoing, if applicable.
4. Show grace and humor.
5. Offer a resolution or plan of attack for the future to calm fears.

These are terrific lessons for any business handling their own reputation, be it a crisis situation or just responding to negative reviews online.

Now that Conan has some time on his hands maybe he should be Tiger Wood's personal Reputation Management advisor ;)

Ignore Everybody and Crush It!

The "Good" - knowing that there is no such thing as overnight success

Over the holidays I read two good books :  Crush It! by Gary Vaynerchuk of winelibrarytv.com fame, and Ignore Everybody and 39 Other Keys to Creativity by Hugh McLeod of gapingvoid.com fame. 

I’m not going to do a full reviews here, since honestly I’ve hated book reports ever since 5^th grade.  That said, I recommend both books as they are quick reads with wisdom on how to turn your unique talent/passion into a business that provides happiness and hopefully some income.   While chock full of lessons on how build your personal brand via social media, the key message I took away is an old fashioned one that is lost on most people today….work hard! 

McLeod’s third chapter is titled “Put the hours in” and Vaynerchuk devotes a section to “Hustle.” 

Per McLeod:  “Doing anything worthwhile takes forever.  Ninety percent of what separates successful people and failed people is time, effort and stamina.”

Per Vaynerchuk:  “Too many people don’t want to swallow the pill of working hard every day….if you’re making money through social media, you don’t get to work for three hours and then play Nintendo….That’s lip service to hard work.  No one makes a million dollars with minimal effort unless they win the lottery.”

I know this isn’t exactly a new/original concept, but as a marketer I see a lot of business/creative people who think they can come up with a great idea and that is will take off virally via social media.  Overnight success is a myth and I like that these authors don’t go there just to sell more books (see all the authors of day-trading and real-estate investing books for that). 

Check out the books for loads of useful marketing strategies/tactics for harnessing the power of the social web to build your brand.   While it doesn’t fit into the theme of this post, I absolutely loved Vaynerchuk’s ninth chapter entitled “the best marketing strategy ever.”  It’s one word long:  CARE!  It’s so damn simple but so powerful.  I need to give it more thought and bake it into my 2010 marketing plan for my company, then I’ll write another post.

Paying for Search Ads on Your Name - Part 2

The "Bad" - not running paid search ads on your business name

I saw this great article in Search Engine Land yesterday which dovetails perfectly with my prior post.  While my colleague Nathan Hanks put forth the logical business reasons to "own" your name by bidding on your brand keywords, David Roth gives a semi-scientific way to prove the value.  He recommends that you run a test site visits both with and without the PPC ad for your brand name and then determine the cannibalization/lift that is caused by using the text ad.  Here's his definition:

“Lift” is the net amount of traffic that is added to the mix by virtue of the PPC ad. Cannibalization is the portion of PPC ad traffic that comes at the expense of the organic link. If you can quantify cannibalization and lift in any situation, you can then begin to think intelligently about what to do.

It sounds like the research proves the value since David says he was ecstatic with the results of his test.

Paying for Search Ads on Your Name

The "Bad" - not running paid search ads on your business name

Check out this blog post by my colleague Nathan Hanks over at Local Online Marketing Gumbo who answers the question many businesses ask "Should I bid on my own business name?"

A quick excerpt below...

When it comes to search engine marketing, bidding on business category keywords (ex: “Dallas spa”) is a must if you want your business to show up in a paid ad when someone is looking for your kind of products or services. But it’s just as important to bid on your business name keywords (ex: “Sally’s Swanky Spa”).  Here are some reasons why:

It’s your business name – so why pay for it? Because your competitors are! According to Performics, leading brands only receive 87% of traffic from their business name keyword searches. The remaining 13% are “poached” by competitors!* That’s because they know that when your customers search for your business, they have an opportunity to snatch the sale straight out of your hands with a well-worded sponsored ad.  Don’t give them the chance.

Check out Nate's blog for the other important reasons why you should bid on your name.