Thought Leadership: Compelling Mail Campaigns
There was a great article this morning on Xerox’s In the Balance Blog entitled “Customer Experience Lost in the Mail.” The author discusses the lack of positive customer experience conjured by mail and...
View ArticleUniversity Four51: Recap of yesterday’s class (3.22)
Kathy Emerson, our University Four51 guest professor, will be contributing a weekly post to Insights Four51. University Four 51’s Spring Session, Marketing to Marketers, got off to a great start...
View ArticleUniversity Four51: Recap of yesterday’s class (3.29)
Kathy Emerson, our University Four51 guest professor, will be contributing a weekly post to Insights Four51. Greetings to all of you who participated in the second lesson of the spring course Marketing...
View ArticleClient Growth Corner: University Four51 Session 2, making yourself known!
The Client Growth Corner is an ongoing column from our Client Growth Coordinator. Hi all, We had another great session of University Four51 on Thursday. For those of you who weren’t able to attend, the...
View ArticleClient Growth Corner: Insight from University Four51
The Client Growth Corner is an ongoing column from our Client Growth Coordinator. Hi All, Today was another great session of University Four51′s Marketing to Marketers. My favorite part was the...
View ArticleUniversity Four51: Recap of our last class (4.12)
Kathy Emerson, our University Four51 guest professor, will be contributing a weekly post to Insights Four51. This week in University Four51 we talked about identifying leads, qualifying leads and...
View ArticleFour51 News: At the On Demand show
On site coverage from Liz Bogut! Four51 is at the On Demand show in Boston this week, providing support in the Kodak booth for the Kodak MarketMover Network, powered by Four51. A steady stream of...
View ArticleThought Leadership: Why a site must change
The B2Blog’s March 28 post had some great thoughts as to why a website must be updated that echo Mark’s comments below. Dave, a marketing manager who writes the B2Blog had a great thought as to why a...
View ArticleUniversity Four51: Wrapping up a great semester
Kathy Emerson, our University Four51 guest professor, will be contributing a weekly post to Insights Four51. The last session of University Four51′s Marketing to Marketers semester was held yesterday....
View ArticleClient Growth Corner: Helpful tips from University Four51
The Client Growth Corner is an ongoing column from our Client Growth Coordinator. Hi all, Thank you to everyone who attended our Spring Semester of University Four51, Marketing to Marketers. Special...
View ArticleThought Leadership: Out with the old and in with the new
Ad Age posted an article this morning about Chrysler’s newest messaging campaign: “Engineered Beautifully.” This campaign replaces “Inspiration Comes Standard,” and is being launched with a bevy of...
View ArticleThought Leadership: Four51 and the KMN at the New Marketing Summit
The New Marketing Summit starts today in Boston and the Kodak MarketMover Network, powered by Four51 will be attending! WhatTheyThink.com and QuickPrinting.com both featured an interview with Nicholas...
View ArticleIndustry News: More on the power of Direct Mail
Patrick Henry had an interesting post on the PrintCEOblog earlier this week about the real power of personalized direct mail. To say that direct mail is “powerful” is obviously nothing novel but Mr....
View ArticleClient Growth Corner: USADATA and list acquisition
The Client Growth Corner is an ongoing column from our Client Growth Coordinator Hi All, Last week I participated in an in depth demonstration from Ed Greissle at USADATA, with whom we have partnered...
View ArticleClient Growth Corner: Marketing on the web
The Client Growth Corner is an ongoing column from our Client Growth Coordinator Hi All, Is it really already nearing the end of July? 2007 is halfway over! However, that doesn’t mean that it’s too...
View ArticleMarketing: Credibility is Integral to Marketing Strategy
I came across an interesting article on Advertising Age this morning entitled “Integrity in Marketing is Not Optional,” discussing the necessity of credibility in any marketing strategy. Reading the...
View ArticleIndustry News: Bringing Customers More Experience
The 1:1 Blog had a post this morning about the next generation of customer experience. In this example, it’s a shopping store mirror that suggests outfit enhancements to the things you’re trying on in...
View ArticleMarketing: A responsible marketing campaign
Here’s a phrase you don’t hear every day: “a responsible marketing campaign.” And I don’t mean responsible like, “Way to stay in budget, Chip!” I mean responsible like, “Hey Chip, way to create an...
View ArticleMarketing: Thoughts from the Minnesota AMA Conference
Yesterday, Liz and I attended the Minnesota chapter of the American Marketing Association’s annual conference (this year’s theme: design) in downtown St. Paul. The conference was just one day, but the...
View ArticleSustainability & Marketing: Getting it right
I wrote about greenwashing a little over a month ago, and seeing this article today reminded me of the importance of being very careful in any and all “green marketing.” As the article points out, it’s...
View ArticleMarketing: A Refresher in Authenticity
In my daily email from Ad Age there was an article that got my attention, “Stop dishing out the phoniness, marketers.” Of course, a marketer’s instinctual response is “But I’m not phony!” True or not,...
View ArticleSustainability: FTC Examines Greenwashing
I know there have been a lot of sustainability posts lately, but there’s a lot going on recently! This post in particular covers an important development for everyone in the sustainability game–and...
View ArticleMarketing: Getting Personalization Right
Marketing Profs blog contributor Elaine Fogel had a great, succinct post yesterday about personalized messages from vendors. In her experience, she received a personalized email from an airline to...
View ArticleMarketing: Recession as the mother of invention?
We’ve all heard that necessity is the mother of invention, but a post on Ad Age made me think that maybe recession is the mother of invention (at least for now). This article seems exactly in line with...
View ArticleMarketing: It’s all about the follow-through
I really love marketing blogs. I don’t love them [just] because they’re written by fellow marketers–I love them because frequently the posts are based on personal, everyday experiences that could...
View ArticleMarketing: Taking a risk
Advertising Age had an interesting article this morning about a recent Welch’s grape juice marketing campaign, conducted in People magazine, which included “taste strips.” Consumers were told to lick...
View ArticleMarketing: The Protected Pitch
The marketing of a book often includes the dreaded book tour. Endless appearances at bookstores, on radio and on TV. In between authors who can’t be helped by marketing and authors whose books fly off...
View ArticleMarketing: Is honesty the best policy?
I’m sure you’ve seen or heard about the videos on You Tube showing four cell phones popping popcorn when pointed at one another with a few kernels in between them (if you haven’t seen it, ask your...
View ArticleSales & Marketing: Know Your Shelf Space
We finally have two major presidential candidates to consider this November. Call me shallow, but I’m not thinking about meaty issues when I think about these two candidates. I’m wondering which one...
View ArticleMarketing: Reaching Outside your Target Market
I am a self-professed tomboy. I like beer. I consider buffalo wings their own food group. I can kill a spider. It may come as no surprise then that my favorite TV show is Sportscenter. Every morning, I...
View ArticleMarketing: Search-in-search to the rescue
I think that most of us are of the mindset that Google is king of the internet. So when we think about Google making it even easier and faster to find the information we need, we get pretty excited...
View ArticleMarketing: Don’t put yourself on an island
I’ve had the chance over the last couple months to moderate two different sessions of Four51 Sales Training here at our headquarters in Minnesota. Attending these sessions were participants from all...
View ArticleMarketing: Ad Agencies–Friend or Foe?
I worked at one of the largest full-service ad agencies in the world for four years and, since jumping to the client side, I’ve hired and fired my share of agencies. So I have some knowledge of how...
View ArticleMarketing: Excuses are just missed opportunities
Seth Godin had a great post on his blog the other day about small businesses and their tendency to be, well, whiny. He shared an anecdote about ordering from a small company via Amazon. When he was...
View ArticleMarketing: Turning pain at the pump into potential profit
It’s inescapable. Everywhere you look, people are talking about gas prices. From CNN’s daily recap of barrel prices to the Minnesota Twins reducing ticket prices to help save fans money at the pumps,...
View ArticleMarketing: Data is our friend, or so they tell me
To me, the word data evokes images of horror and pain, as if I’m being suffocated by endless rows and columns of ubiquitous Excel spreadsheets. Wow, scary…deep breath. To other masochistic souls, data...
View ArticleMarketing: Is the latest always the greatest?
When looking for the most up-to-date and fresh marketing techniques, I like to think we all have a go-to source for information. I usually consult my RSS reader which keeps the list I have built...
View ArticleMarketing: No Country for Ad Men
Come on a journey with me to a place called Ad-Land. Ad-Land is near Never-Never-Land, not far from Oz and Planet Claire. No real humans live there, but advertising execs visit frequently. Some develop...
View ArticleLazy Marketing in this Economy?!
You gotta be kidding me. Lazy marketing is never OK, but you’re absolutely doomed if your current marketing strategy is kickin’ back, spamming the world with jargon and asking the prospect to do the...
View ArticleOn-Brand Behavior
I really enjoy Jim Morrison and the Doors. And I really enjoy Italian food. Last night I learned I don’t enjoy them together. But that’s what my wife and I experienced when we were out for an evening...
View ArticleWells Fargo Sheetrock
This is a post about two aspects of marketing that I find fascinating: 1. Brand and product line extensions 2. Slamming the competition Wells Fargo is well known in the financial services industry. Not...
View ArticleHumans Listening to Humans
You could probably name dozens of products that broke too fast or were impossible to use or tasted lousy. Here’s one that is delightful because the people who created it were tuned to the voice of...
View ArticleTag You’re It!
I stumbled across some new research on taglines and slogans on Brandchannel. Tagline Guru, an agency dedicated to taglines and slogans, has released its analysis of more than 150 corporate taglines...
View ArticleDo your clients like You?
I saw this posted on LinkedIn not long ago. “ Do your clients like You? Do you know as an organization the answer to this question? Most do not….we are building a Call Center in WI that can help you …...
View ArticleGood Blogging Hygiene
Good blogging is more than good content. Presentation matters. The food might taste good, but if I can’t cut it, lift it, chew it, swallow it, and digest it…that’s a problem. Seth Godin blogs a lot....
View ArticleTurn ‘Likes’ Into ‘Loyalty’
I’m sure you’ve heard the buzz, Fan Acquisition, in the race for those ‘Likes’ on a brand’s Facebook Page. Well, just getting ‘Likes’ doesn’t mean you’ve hit your target. As Debra Aho Williamson in...
View ArticlePut Those Precious Email Addresses to Work!
For years we’ve told clients to cultivate an opt-in email list. And so they did, and then along comes social media. Where does that leave email marketing? On the outside looking in, wearing a scarlet...
View ArticleSocial Media Marketing, Getting Started on Facebook
Many people have been on Facebook for a long time, or have had a business page on Facebook. The difference of being on Facebook and utilizing Facebook is where people get caught up. Social Media...
View ArticleFacebook Marketing for Beginners- It’s never too late to start!
“Facebook Marketing” could be one of the most used ‘buzz’ phrases of all time. But, there is a good reason as to why we are still hearing it, and why it probably won’t go away! It’s where the people...
View ArticleSocial Media IS Word-of-Mouth…right?
Let me give you four numbers from an Small to Mid Sized Business (SMB) survey I read recently: 35% of SMBs plan to invest in Marketing in 2012 (the top area for investment). 25% of SMBs believe Word of...
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