Author: "Doctor" Phil Bernstein

Auto Repair Advertising Case Study

Barbara Bell owns Bell’s Velvet Hammer, an auto collision repair business in Vancouver, Washington. For years, Bell’s Velvet Hammer has delivered high-quality repair and restoration work to Portland/Vancouver area drivers. The shop has also been an integral part of the local community.

When Barbara Bell wanted to use the power of an endorsement to tell the Bell’s Velvet Hammer story, she chose Paul Linnman of 1190 KEX Radio.

In the video below, she discusses how she chose Paul, the relationship they’ve built, and the results the campaign has delivered.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gC-_pPw9Tvk]

If your car’s been in an accident in the Portland/Vancouver area and you need it fixed right the first time, Bell’s Velvet Hammer is the place to go. My thanks to Barbara Bell for allowing me to tell her story.

 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Check out Phil Bernstein’s Facebook Fan Page — and become a Fan – here

Click here to learn the shocking truth about Phil Bernstein

Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising and Marketing Blog.

Request your free copy of Phil Bernstein’s white paper, The Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes and How to Fix Them here.

Got a question? Call Phil Bernstein, Portland’s Advertising Expert, at 503-323-6553.

Pitfalls of Social Media Marketing

During my presentation/interview at the Northwest Business Virtual Summer Conference, Tom Cochrane asked me what the big difference is between marketing with social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc) and using the traditional sources such as TV, radio, and print.

I replied that there has always been something of a “contract” between the audience and old media — radio listeners get their content at no charge, and in return accept the fact that advertising is part of the landscape. Same for newspapers and television: the information arrives either at no charge or heavily subsidized.  Although there is more interaction than there used to be, the content is still “consumed”, and must be paid for somehow.

The fundamental difference with social media, I told Cochrane, is that people use it to communicate with each other, and do not expect to be pitched to. Even though Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace are essentially free services at this point, the users, rightly, or wrongly, have a different set of expectations.

Since making those remarks, I’ve encountered a couple of good posts that expand on the topic:

At Marketing in Progress, Brett Duncan takes on the Twitter spammers:

It saddens me to see so many people constantly posting tweets and Facebook updates that go something like this:

  • Brand X is helping me lose 10 pounds a week. It can help you, too. CLick here . . . .
  • If you want to make $1,000 this week on the Internet, I have what you need.
  • Want to earn what you’re worth? Sign up with Brand X. Ask me how.
  • I get 300 followers a day. Go here to find out more.

Nobody gets on Twitter looking for crap like this. There’s nothing “social” about using social media as your own advertising medium.

And The Digital Marketer offers counsel on how to avoid damaging your social media reputation.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Check out Phil Bernstein’s Facebook Fan Page — and become a Fan – here

Click here to learn the shocking truth about Phil Bernstein

Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising and Marketing Blog.

Request your free copy of Phil Bernstein’s white paper, The Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes and How to Fix Them here.

Got a question? Call Phil Bernstein, Portland’s Advertising Expert, at 503-323-6553.

Never Anger a Customer Who Can Sing

I once heard Marketing Consultant Paul Weyland remark at a seminar that if you have an unhappy customer, “You need to either make him happy, or kill him and bury him in the backyard.”

United Airlines did neither with this passenger.

I don’t have any way to evaluate the particulars of this story. But apparently Dave Carroll of the band Sons of Maxwell flew United  a while back, and something bad happened to his $3,500 guitar.

Carroll responded by making the video below. He posted it on July 6; in less than three days, it’s been viewed more than 255,000 times, and has generated nearly 3,000 comments — very few of which are sympathetic to the airline.

Two more videos are in the works. Enjoy this one, and ponder: how much will United Airlines’ inability or unwillingness to make one passenger happy cost them in damaged reputation and lost business?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo]

 

UPDATE 7/28/09: According to Business Week, the video has now been viewed more than 3.5 million times. United Airlines has made a $3,000 donation to charity at Carroll’s request, and says it will “do a better job” deciding when to bend rules on passenger compensation for damage.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Check out Phil Bernstein’s Facebook Fan Page — and become a Fan – here

Click here to learn the shocking truth about Phil Bernstein

Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising and Marketing Blog.

Request your free copy of Phil Bernstein’s white paper, The Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes and How to Fix Them here.

Got a question? Call Phil Bernstein, Portland’s Advertising Expert, at 503-323-6553.

Current Event Advertising: Nice Try, But…

From the Oregonian Friday, July 3, 2009:

 

stimulus

I applaud The Adult Shop for attempting to use the story of 2009 in their marketing. And the term “Stimulus Package” is a nice touch.

But…

1. The discount is only ten percent.

2. Anonymity is likely to be important to a porn store customer

3. A significant number of jobless potential customers may be embarrassed about the fact.

So expecting unemployed people to walk into an adult store and “present [their] current unemployment check stub for sales associate to verify” — for a lousy ten percent — seems like a recipe for failure.

Of course, I’m neither unemployed nor an adult store regular. Am I wrong? What do you think?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Check out Phil Bernstein’s Facebook Fan Page — and become a Fan – here

Click here to learn the shocking truth about Phil Bernstein

Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising and Marketing Blog.

Request your free copy of Phil Bernstein’s white paper, The Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes and How to Fix Them here.

Got a question? Call Phil Bernstein, Portland’s Advertising Expert, at 503-323-6553.

Business Northwest Virtual Summer Conference

I’ll be one of the presenters at the Business Northwest Virtual Summer Conference, happening over three days (July 9-11) later this week.

 The theme of the conference is “Getting Your Business Message Out in Today’s Economy With Today’s Technology.”

 There’s a live event at the Marriott on July 9th at 9:30am featuring a panel with Kent Lewis and Hallie Janssen of Anvil Media, Matt Kish,  Managing Editor of the Business Journal, and Tom Cochrane of TKC Solutions. The rest of the presentations, including mine, will be on the web.

 My presentation, titled “Brand New Technologies, Same Old Errors: The Seven Deadly Online Advertising Mistakes and How to Fix Them”, is tentatively scheduled to run at 9:30am on Friday, July 10.

 Attendees will be able to see all the presentations, ask questions of more than 20 speakers in special forums, and download written materials. You can have access to the whole thing — you can see it live or watch the archived presentations at your convenience for 30 days — for just $8.50.

 Find out more, and register, at www.businessnorthwest.org/conference.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Check out Phil Bernstein’s Facebook Fan Page — and become a Fan – here

Click here to learn the shocking truth about Phil Bernstein

Click this link to subscribe to Portland’s Finest Advertising and Marketing Blog.

Request your free copy of Phil Bernstein’s white paper, The Seven Deadly Advertising Mistakes and How to Fix Them here.

Got a question? Call Phil Bernstein, Portland’s Advertising Expert, at 503-323-6553.