This Company has a Marketing Budget

Posted by Andy Boyer in Entrepreneurism, Marketing

Because the blog entries here revolve around marketing, with a little start-up stuff thrown in, I’m pleased to find what could be the stupidest product of all time.  But these guys not only have a marketing budget – enough to advertise in Google Mail – but a Google Page Rank of 4, making their dumb product’s web site 100 times more important than this blog.

Here’s the tagline:

"The Safe Banana Guard will fit most bananas & give protection during your journey."

Yes, apparently there is a market for a product that’s specific job is to protect a banana.  And, the company is funded.

Not only does this product exist, it comes in 9 colors.  Because this is a family blog, you will notice that I am refraining from any jokes that could easily float their way to the surface from viewing the order page.  It’s not for a lack of material or imagination, I promise.  Just sometimes the fruit is so low hanging, you want to let someone else pick the tree.

I think possibly my favorite part is that they have a section called, "Testimonials."   Come on… Seriously?  Testimonials?  Doesn’t something called ‘SafeBanana" speak for itself at this point?  Do you really need to read a quote like, "Dude, this thing like totally protected my banana.  I know it’s called SafeBanana, but I didn’t see how it could be possible.  Now, I’m a believer."

Anyway, as a public service to all you people who have suffered and survived banana trauma, I bring you SafeBanana.  Please use responsibly.

Only 44,445 to go….

Posted by Andy Boyer in Personal

Not that I pay attention to thtis stuff…but I noticed my Alexa ranking today is 1,044,445.  I only need to catch 44,445 sites to make the top Million.  I don’t know why exactly that seems interesting.

Quick Rant – Frisbee Ballet

Posted by Andy Boyer in Personal

<rant>

I’m trying to enjoy a beautiful sunny work day by transferring the home office down to Peet’s on Green Lake.  I have my laptop, iPod, a table, an iced mocha and a great view of the fields and the lake.  Life is grand.

Then these 4 characters get in my sightline and start performing frisbee ballet tricks.  While there are some activities that are ignorable, this is just flat out weird.  Dude is doing piroutettes before catching the disc.   Is there music playing that I’m not hearing?  I don’t get it. 

Now to be clear, I’m not knocking Ultimate – I’ve seen people play that and it looks like real athletic work.  I think I played once and nealry passed out from exhaustion from doing nothing but running 60 yard dashes and throwing passes that travel at about a 270 degree angle.  But this frisbee ballet thing is just – bizarre.  I hope I don’t offend any of my friends with this post….

</rant>

 

The Danger Side of Decentralizing Your Campaign Supporters

Posted by Andy Boyer in Marketing, Politics

Politics 2.0 is great!  Supporters spreading the word – for free!  Blogging all over the internet- for free!  Emailing their friends – for free!  Generating online campaign donations! Planning campaign fundraisers for both you and the opponent of someone in your own party….WHOA.  Hold on….

Turns out the Obama campaign is the first one to face the inevitable issues that are going to come from letting all the genies out of the bottle at once.  Originally published on Roll Call, but also found on Georigia Politics 101:

Alarm bells were sounded briefly within the Congressional Black Caucus this week when word spread of a fundraiser benefiting both the presidential campaign of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and the Republican opponent of Rep. David Scott (D-Ga.).

What? Why would Obama be raising money with a Republican, and one who is seeking to knock off one of his fellow CBC colleagues to boot?

Turns out that the event, a 5K run/walk with a registration fee ranging from $30 to $35, was not sanctioned by the Obama campaign — which sought to put the kibosh on it as soon as the Senator’s advisers learned about it.  It was organized by a grass-roots supporter in Georgia, who also is a backer of Deborah Honeycutt (R), Scott’s challenger. The plan was that 85 percent of the proceeds from the event would go to Obama and 15 percent to Honeycutt, who garnered 31 percent of the vote against Scott in 2006 and is running again in 2008. The event was linked through my.barackobama.com, the campaign’s grass-roots networking Web site that allows supporters to share planned events…

"They’ve already asked them to cease and desist," Davis said. The campaign never received funds tied to the event, which was scheduled for a TBA date and location. "It’s not anything the Obama campaign had to do with," Davis added.

A relatively small deal, but when so much power is transferred from a central campaign headquarters to the blogosphere, well, look for a whole lot of interesting anomalies and headaches for the campaign team.  Just like anything, all the positives are going to come with a cost…

Succumbing to the Grocery Store Promo

Posted by Andy Boyer in Marketing, Media, Personal

X-13D.jpgIt’s easy to reach me at the grocery store.  Just have the best discount.  I admit it – I’m cheap about commodity items like frozen dinners, toothpaste, shampoo, soup, pasta sauce, etc….if you drop your price for a special, I’ll buy it.

And so I was surprised at myself when I ran across the latest Doritos promo, and how I immediately put a bag in my cart.

First off, I don’t buy chips.  I’m big enough – no reason to make it easy for the fat cells to win this battle.

If you look around the grocery store, you see thousands of packages that have been meticulously designed, researched, surveyed, evaluated, tested, focus grouped and rewritten so that every word, even the small print, succinctly and accurately explains the attributes of the products in the clearest way possible.  Marketing folks around the country – folks not unlike me – make a living figuring out EXACTLY what should be on that package.  They want the consumer to know what they are buying and why they want it so badly.

And then —– here’s Doritos with a bag that says, "Um, we’re not going to tell you what it is.  Eat it and tell us what you think it tastes like."

GENIUS! I MUST HAVE A BAG NOW!

I don’t know what it is, but I am now all a twitter about the surprise I have just bought myself for $2.50.  It could taste like an old shoe, but the simple fact that I’m driving home from the grocery store wondering what I bought makes me WAY more than $2.50 worth of happy.

I think they could have charged me $10 for this, and I’d have said, "Sure.  I want, no I NEED, to try that black bag of X-13D’s."

So here I am on a Friday afternoon.  My bag of chips in front of me.  And I seriously think this may be the most exciting moment of my week.  What will they taste like?  Do you know? 

Ok, opening the bag now…. it smells less pungent than your normal bag.  Does this mean less taste?  I hope not.

The chip has a lighter color than a normal one.  I’m now worried. Is X13-D shorthand for "X-13 flavor, Defective"?  Are these the chips that didn’t get enough Doritos sauce in the first batch?  Am I about to eat a reject?

Time to taste… 

Ah ha….no this is not a reject.  It is unlike a chip I have had before.  I think it has mustard in it.  And I usually hate mustard so I never would have bought these.  But I am oddly intrigued…..It’s mustard and…..something.  I can’t place it.  But I bet I eat this whole damn bag in the next 3 or 4 days trying to figure it out.  

So, Mr or Ms Doritos Marketing person – I salute you and your mystery campaign.  You are zagging when other people zigged.  Nice work.

 

 

Team “No Runner Left Behind” Beats the Bridge

Posted by Andy Boyer in Uncategorized

btb02a.JPGWell, we lost one guy at the start, and one runner got temporarily stranded on the short side of the University Bridge, but 10 of 10 runners finished, and everyone had a blast this year at the JDRF Beat the Bridge Run.

There are some sore legs and backs in the No Runner Left Behind locker room this week, but we avoided ay major blisters, shin splints or otherwise debilitating injuries.

Mike Decklever and Dre Mason took 1st and 2nd place, though Decklever’s time is in dispute because no one actually saw him run.  Thus, judges have ruled the team award to be given to Mason, who was confirmed in the 54 minute range (though in all fairness she waited 8 minutes so that we didn’t leave any runners behind.)

The team was happy that 9 out of 10 – a 90% success rate –  made the bridge, and our 10th runner (to be left nameless) promised to get in better shape for the 2008 event.

Coaches have not yet decided whether next year the whole squad will adopt the Rob Newton Race Method of 500 100-yard sprints mixed with periods of walking and dancing.

Keep it in your calendar and join us next year – it’s a fun run for people who don’t ordinarily run. 

(L to R In photo: Team No Runner Left Behind:  Pat Conniff, Heather Coniff, Catherine Gerlach, Dre Mason, Andy Boyer, Chris Howard, Mike Decklever (sitting), Ben Shepherd, Rob Newton, Kathrin Newton)

Incidental Marketing

Posted by Andy Boyer in Marketing, Media, Politics

Hot Tipper "G$" sends across this link about Incidental or "Accidental" Marketing.

The AP article entitled "Giuliani Apologizes to Farm Family"  chronicles the media debacle caused when a Giuliani staffer mistakenly accepted a fundraising opportunity from an Iowan farming family, the VonSpreckens, and then cancelled it when they realized it was going to be a waste of time.

In the end, Giuliani turned the negative into a plus, spending 2 hours with the farm family out in eastern Iowa.  The little weekly Eastern Iowan newspaper, the Anamosa Journal-Eureka, seems appeased as well.  So it now seems everyone in Mrs. VonSprecken’s sewing circle will go vote for hizzoner.

So a couple of angles to take here: 1) Interesting that the Anamosa Journal-Eureka could contribute to a national headache for a Presidential hopeful.  2) From a marketing standpoint, every negative PR opportunity is a chance for a greater positive one.  But I’m shooting for #3) Can we finally admit that Iowa has WAY too much influence in the presidential election?

Iowa is a non-border state that does not have any oil wells, coal mines, steel refineries, automotive factories, technology leaders, entertainment hubs, travel destinations, world reknown universities, innovative medical research facilities or major population centers.  It has corn and farmers – lots of both – so there is some impact on agriculture.  And it home to the evil insurance companies and a number of banks.  But if you had to pick the most irrelevant states on an influential level, I would have to throw them in the Top 2 or 3 along with South Dakota and West Virginia. 

So the fact that the Iowa Caucuses force a Republican hopeful to cater to the damn VonSpreckens of Olin, is a complete joke.  In the several thouand hours Giuliani has left to spend with influencers, I want him meeting with tech leaders, defense specialists, cultural experts, social welfare pioneers and economic visionaries.  I want him spending as little time as possible with Grandma VonSprecken and people who will vote for him because he’s a nice, honest young man. 

Let’s let influencers influence, and let the followers watch what happens on TV. 

 

Tumri

Posted by Andy Boyer in Uncategorized

I’m playing with some widget technologies from Tumri.  Haven’t gotten it to work 100% as planned yet, but it’s interesting.  I wonder why Froogle hasn’t done anything like this yet.  My Tumri experiments are here at www.andyboyer.com/tumri

Wild prediction – Google buys Tumri for $50- $100M in < 24 months.