“If we treated our friends the way advertisers treated us, they’d punch us in the face.”

How can you build a virtual communication strategy that is relevant, engaging and is easy to share (be viral!) but doesn’t piss people off?

By AVOIDING 3 Popular Strategies.

1. The Rain Main Strategy
Posting multiple times in one day to the same link to your blog, landing page or product. The person you are talking to is the same person whether it’s offline or online.  The only difference is the medium!

2. The Sally Fields Strategy
Retweeting when someone RT’s you and gives you props. “You like me, you really like me”. Need I say more?

Don’t act surprised and shout to the world when someone finds you interesting. Test your headlines in your blogs and tweets and if you get mention?  Rinse and repeat. Read more »

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Having spent the last 17 years using direct mail as a renewal and acquisition strategy, with acquisition rates as high as 7% at one point and renewal rates well over 30%, I hope I have learned a thing or two about relevancy.  My brand experience has been with clients such as Nestle, Coca Cola, GMAC and Procter & Gamble, so I like to tell myself I’ve have  a teensy bit of brand perspective, one might say.

So why are these well “funded” national brands struggling to be relevant? One might argue that these brands are doing better than most.  I would agree.  But I would also offer that they do can do much better. Read more »

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According to emarketer’s recent October 2009 report titled Social Commerce on Faceboook, Twitter and Retail sites, 92% of consumers consider “recommendations from people I know” as a trusted media source.  Right now it seems to be a number the brands are trying to hang their hats onto, but is it for the right reasons?

First of all, with any statistic you must understand the context.  So what does 92% really mean? If you look at it a little closer, you’ll notice that 92% of people trust recommendations from other consumers they know and even trust opinions posted by unknown consumers MORE than ads on TV, on the radio, in magazines and newspapers. Read more »

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