Communications Need to Stand Out – Ford Escort Seller Shows How

March 22, 2012 Leave a comment

If you need a lesson on how to make your communications stand out, the person who wrote the classified ad for this Ford Escort–“the most ballingest car ever”–shows the rest of us how.

Here are some gems:

This well-maintained and fully restored beauty is a salvage title. It was bought out of an insurance pool after getting into a tiny fender bender (i.e. vicious car cock fight. . . which it won. . . with metal and brawn).

This one-of-a-kind ZX2 coupe is to the limit. And it takes no prisoners.

And the best:

The right front fender was dented, but then replaced by a cadre of men who were born in garages and bottle-fed Penzoil.

Read the whole ad at hooniverse.

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Fisher® Nuts “Freshness You Can Win” Campaign Welcomes Cubs and White Sox Rookie Managers

March 17, 2012 Leave a comment

Fisher® Nuts “Freshness You Can Win” Campaign
Welcomes Cubs and White Sox Rookie Managers

 

Robin Ventura, from left, Brendan Honan, Director of Brand Marketing, John B. Sanfilippo & Son, Inc., and Cubs skipper Dale Sveum

Robin Ventura, manager of the White Sox, Brendan Honan, Director of Brand Marketing, John B. Sanfilippo & Son, Inc., and Cubs skipper Dale Sveum introduce the Fisher Nuts Freshness You Can Win Program. pau1ke11y

Fisher Nuts Donates $500 to Charity Each Time Both Teams Win on the Same Day;
Fans to Score Great Prizes All Season Long

 

CHICAGO – Chicago-based Fisher Nuts will team up with JEWEL-OSCO to welcome rookie managers Dale Sveum of the Cubs and Robin Ventura of the White Sox to Chicago with the “Freshness You Can Win” campaign.  Each time both ball clubs win on the same day, Fisher Nuts will donate $500 to the teams’ charities. In addition, a season-long sweepstakes will reward Cubs fans and White Sox fans with hundreds of prizes, including a Cubs or White Sox VIP Game Experience.

“We’re celebrating the fact that for the first time in Chicago baseball history, the Cubs and the White Sox are getting a fresh start by having two rookie skippers lead their clubs on Opening Day in the same season,” says Howard Brandeisky, Vice President Global Marketing.  “In partnership with our friends at  JEWEL-OSCO, we’re excited to support two great nonprofit organizations serving deserving families throughout the Chicago area: Chicago Cubs Charities and Chicago White Sox Charities.”

Not only do the teams’ charities collect when both teams win on the same day, but fans have an opportunity to win as well, thanks to Fisher Nuts. The grand slam of prizes: Two grand prize winners get a party for 20 and game tickets; one at Wrigley Field for the Cubs and a Diamond Suite at U.S. Cellular Field for the Sox.  A special meet and greet with the teams’ respective managers is also included as part of the grand prize package.

Fisher Nuts is awarding even more prizes all season long:

  • First Prize: Two Cubs fans and two White Sox fans and two fans will win four game tickets for their respective club, including the opportunity to watch batting practice on the field before the contest.
  • Second Prize: Four fans will win two Cubs game tickets on Fisher Nuts Day at Wrigley Field, and their names will appear on the scoreboard during game. Four fans will win two White Sox game tickets, and their names will appear on the scoreboard during game.
  • Third Prize:  Twenty Five winners will receive $50 JEWEL-OSCO Gift Cards.
  • Fourth Prize: Fifty winners will get free Fisher Snack Nuts and T-shirts.

In addition to the giveaways, Fisher Nuts will award 50 coupons for free Fisher products at their local JEWEL-OSCO any time the Cubs or White Sox win during the season. Participation is easy; with the purchase of Fisher Nuts on your JEWEL-OSCO Preferred Customer Card®, you are automatically entered to win. That’s thousands of coupons for free Fisher Nuts for Cubs and White Sox wins this season.

Throughout the season, Fisher Nuts will be tracking the progress of the number of times that both teams win on the same day for its Cubs and White Sox charity fundraising efforts. The big winners, of course, will be the city of Chicago and its great fans.

For more information on Fisher Nuts, please visit www.fishernuts.com.

About John B. Sanfilippo & Son, Inc.

John B. Sanfilippo & Son, Inc., (NASDAQ: JBSS), founded in 1922, is a leading processor, marketer and distributor of baking nuts, snack nuts and nut-based products that are sold in multiple distribution channels.  Our products can be found under the Fisher, Orchard Valley Harvest and Sunshine Country brand names and a variety of private labels.

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Analytics, Marketing, Habits, Targeting All in One Place

February 16, 2012 Leave a comment

How Companies Learn Your Secrets from the New York Times Magazineis a must-read for anyone who is interested in analytics, marketing, how to lose weight, how to save money, Big Brother, and more. It’s all here.

Target Your Audience

Target Your Audience

For those interested in losing weight, the author imparts a great lesson in habit. It basically is cue, routine, then reward. Cue … some stimulus or call to action. Routine … going something the same way over and over again that becomes habit. Reward … some happy thing that happens at the end. To understand the habit loop, as author Charles Duhigg called it, is deeply ingrained in our brain, because it is a way for our brain to conserve energy from having to think through everything.

So, take a look at your bad habits. Try to figure them out, and you can fix them. … Yup.

But the crux of the article deals with habits, how we all fall into them, analytics of the data trail we all leave, and how we are targeted. We need to learn how to communicate effectively with our constituents, using analytics.

But here’s the deal. We need to be honest about analytics and targeting. Constituents may not like it, but they will like it less when we use analytics and targeting as effectively as we can.

 

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Social Media: Lessons on How Socia Media Drives Communication

February 9, 2012 Leave a comment

Delivering Key Message - Social Media

Delivering Key Message - Social Media

In my experience in communications, Social Media has enabled customers or constituents to get what they need in terms of content and use it to deliver value.

Of course, the important element in all this is to deliver your key message or messages in online media in various ways, with various content, again and again. You need to manage the content so that it supports products or services, channels or promotions.

The customer, the constituent, is now involved in the communication. Is this dangerous? Well, not really, if you believe in your message. And if you manage your message correctly. And if you understand that the risk in not being in the conversation–the Social Media space–is far greater than engaging in the conversation and getting your message across.

So you need to get buy-in. I’ve gotten buy-in from a few organizations for social media efforts. I didn’t do as an effective job as I should have, so I am researching how to do that better. Here’s a couple of things that I’ve found.

Gini Dietrich writes:

… I found Leading Change: Why Transformation Efforts Fail. [Note: this was a dead link] In the article, they cover eight steps for getting buy-in and managing change.

  1. Creating a sense of urgency
  2. Identifying a powerful guiding coalition
  3. Creating a vision
  4. Communication the vision
  5. Empowering others to act on the vision
  6. Planning for and creating short-term wins
  7. Consolidating improvements and producing still more change
  8. Institutionalizing new approaches

Another approach was from Caffelli, a Portland, Oregon, creative agency:

So stop thinking about a Twitter campaign, or a flash-in-the-pan interaction. Start thinking about a holistic communications [note: they said “marketing” but I think you can substitute “communications” easily] program that seamlessly integrates social media—that is truly what get their attention.

So … start the conversation. Get the buy in. Strategically deliver your key message. Over. And over. And over again.

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