Category: Phil Bernstein

Phil Bernstein Live! at the Portland Business Alliance

Once a month, the Portland Business Alliance puts on an educational forum for small and medium-sized businesses called Cornerstones for Success. The topics change each month, but each one is chosen for its relevance to the challenges faced by local merchants.

On Thursday, August 7, the subject is “Advertising Avenues”. I’ll be on the panel along with Craig Brown of KGW-TV and Brian Johnson of The Oregonian. We’ll be talking about how a business with a finite budget — like yours — can effectively deliver a persuasive message to the people who could become your customers.

It takes place from 4-6pm at the Portland Business Alliance, 200 SW Market Street. You can find out more, and register online, here.

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

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

Got a question? Call me at 503-323-6553.

Confidential to Oregon Auto Dealers

Who’s writing your copy? If it’s someone at a radio or TV station, you probably assume that you’re working with a professional who’s up to date on auto advertising laws.

You may very well be wrong.

A few months ago, the Oregon Department of Justice, having just issued a new set of rules, held a half-day seminar on how to keep auto ads legal. The only Portland broadcast rep who attended the seminar also writes this blog.

Yesterday, I heard a commercial that committed five separate violations in 60 seconds. I didn’t think that was possible, but in fact, all of the violations took place in a 25-second span. The commercial violated the Federal Truth in Lending Act, along with several Oregon administrative rules.

If the commercial had actually aired, the dealer could have faced thousands of dollars in fines. It didn’t air because I heard it in advance, called the other radio station and told them how to fix it.

I guess I’m just a giving sort of fellow.

Want to know if your commercial’s legal? Give me a call before you put it on the air.

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

Advertising Lesson from Professor O’Day

If you write copy for a living — or otherwise depend on ad results to put food on the table — you should check in on Dan O’Day’s blog. Monday is my favorite day of the week, because it’s “Commercial Smackdown” day.

Once a week, Dan deconstructs an actual radio commercial. And he’s not shy about letting you know exactly how he feels.

This week it’s a Lasik commercial. Enjoy, and learn.

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

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

Got a question? Call me at 503-323-6553.

How a Committee Can Screw Up a Simple Message

UPDATE 7/31/08  Apparently Youtube took the video down. Here’s another link:

 

I suspect everyone who’s ever worked in advertising has dealt with at least one client like this:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kU9YeOQm3Y0]

Thanks to Seth Godin for the alert.

 

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

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

Got a question? Call me at 503-323-6553.

How to Convert Contest Entrants into Customers

As reported in an earlier post, my company will soon be launching the “Green Home” contest — an online lead-generation promotion for Portland-area environmentally-conscious home improvement companies.

We’re going to be delivering thousands of leads to the contest sponsors, and I was looking for “out of the box” ideas on how to turn those entrants into customers. So I posted the question on LinkedIn (see it here if you are a LinkedIn member).

Among the answers was this insight from Mike Seidle, who runs the internet marketing firm Indy Associates. Here’s what he has to say about follow-up techniques:

Doesn’t matter what the method of contacting the consumer is, the conversion rate is always a function of the offer you make after you generate the lead. We just did a contest that generated 78,000 leads. Soft offers worked (get a free catalog, try ___ for 30 days at no cost, free fertilizer application, etc…) , hard offers didn’t (SAVE 10%, $100 OFF, GET A FREE TRIP!). Funny thing is sellers don’t like soft offers because they see a risk of higher cost. Reality is that you get lower ROI on hard offers because they don’t convert as well.

It seems counter-intuitive at first — once you’ve got a whole bunch of qualified leads, why can’t you just sell ’em something. But I’m guessing that although these people, by definition, are interested, they’re not yet ready to buy. The contest is a promising first date, but it’s not time to get married yet.

Check out Mike’s blog here.

 

___________________________________________________________________________________

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

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

Got a question? Call me at 503-323-6553.