Category: Phil Bernstein

Jott Blogging

The previous post was a test of a service called Jott. The service (no charge during beta — like crack on the playground, the first taste is free) converts voice into text, and then delivers that text. The “voice” part comes from your cell phone. The text can be delivered to an individual via email or text message. It can also send it to your blog, as the example below shows, or to Twitter. And since both Twitter and my blog go to my Facebook page, my profound wisdom will wind up there as well.

I called Jott on my cell phone, and an automated voices asked “Who do you want to Jott?” I said “WordPress” (I’d filled out an online form with my URL and password). I spoke a few words, the voice said “Got it!”, and minutes later I had a blog post. Except for the Phil-fill issue, they got it right.

Of course, they make sure a link back to Jott appears on the post, so in addition to using me as a guinea pig, Jott gets free advertising out of the deal.

As a free service, this is a no-brainer, but eventually they’re going to have to figure out a way to make money. Will subscribers pay enough to make the company profitable? Will they be able to sell advertising? This will be interesting to watch.

 

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Twitter for Business — What’s Appropriate?

As a brand-new Twit, I read Ron Shevlin’s post on Twittiquette with interest. If this thing’s going to work for me, it’s going to work as a business tool — if I want to communicate with my vast network of friends, I can call him on the phone.

So for the business users among you, a query — how much is too much? What do your customers, prospects and business associates want to hear from you. What’s so important that they would subscribe to a feed that gives me regular access to them?

What constitutes appropriate business Twitter behavior, and what constitutes an annoying repeated intrusion?

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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.

Phil Bernstein is a Twittering Fool!

You can subscribe to my blog. You can connect with me on LinkedIn. You can “Friend” me on Facebook. And now, I’m on Twitter, too.

Frankly, I’m not sure why, exactly. But supposedly, this blog is now synced up with Twitter, so my “followers” (assuming I have any) will get a “tweet” when I publish this post.

Do you use Twitter for business? If so, leave a comment, and tell me why, and how you use it. And if it helps you at all.

Enquiring minds want to know.

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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.

Using Radio To Get Customers to Your Web Site — 7 Proven Techniques

Many of my long-time customers are now, finally, using their web sites as selling tools. They often ask how they can most effectively drive prospects to their sites, and convert them to customers. Here are seven techniques, based on education and trial-and-error in the field:

1. Have one call to action in the ad — a command to visit your web site. Having both a phone number and a URL will hurt your results. If the listeners have to make a choice of actions, it gives them a reason to hesitate, and a significant percentage will do nothing at all. Copywriting guru Dan O’Day taught me this at a seminar, and my experience has confirmed it.

2. The success of your URL will depend to a large extent on how simple, and how memorable, the address is. You’ve got a better chance if it matches the company name exactly, or if it’s a natural expression of the value proposition. If there are hard-to-spell words, or people have to think about it at all, you’re in trouble.

3. Insist on “dot com”. “Dot net” or “dot biz”, or other suffixes, will lower your response because people remember Dot Com no matter what they actually heard.

4. If your URL is hard to remember or spell, consider using the radio station site as a “short cut”. Most stations promote their web sites heavily these days, so listeners are trained to go there already for news, entertainment, and contests. You can put a banner on the site, and then the call to action is to go to the station site and click on the banner. For example, “Go to K103 dot com and click on the VanderVeer Center logo.” CAUTION: banners are often sold in rotation. To get the results you need, you must make sure that the banner is up on the site 100% of the time.

5. Many stations have a search box on their web site. An alternative to the banner is to buy a keyword, and use that as your call to action. “Go to K103 dot com and type in the keyword ‘Botox’. That’s K103 dot com, keyword ‘Botox’.”

6. Make sure your site is set up to capture customer information for later follow-up. If people come to your site, read a few things, and leave, you may never get them back. Offer some value in return for their email address — a free report, coupon, or other premium that would convince them to tell you who they are.

7. Once you have the information, follow up quickly. Your prospect will find other things to think about if you let time go by. An email autoresponder can help you automate the process.

If you’re a Portland area business owner or manager, I can help you set all this up. After all, it’s what I do.

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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.


The Gardenburger Mess — How Not to Handle a Crisis

It started last weekend, when small signs at Burgerville outlets notified customers that the chain was temporarily taking Gardenburgers off the menu. The story picked up steam when Burgerville placed a huge order with a small local meatless-patty manufacturer. Now, it’s exploded into public view as grocery giant Fred Meyer announces that it has pulled the product off its shelves.

From the outside, it appears that Kellogg, owner of Gardenburger, has done its best to keep the whole thing quiet. By attempting to sweep the issue under the rug, Kellogg has guaranteed an extra level of public attention — and done enormous unnecessary damage to Gardenburger’s reputation.

The story is still developing, but here’s how it looks right now:

1. More than a week ago, Burgerville workers unpacking the product noticed something they didn’t like. Burgerville officials contaced Kellogg, weren’t sastisfied with whatever they were told, and pulled the product. To its credit, Burgerville announced the change to its customers with signage at the stores.

2. A few days later, Burgerville announced that they would carry a different meatless burger — the first public indication that this problem might be a big one.

3. Later in the week, Kellogg announced a “voluntary withdrawal” of Gardenburgers, but refused to say why, beyond a vague statement that food safety was not an issue.

4. Kellogg apparently didn’t bother to mention any of this to the FDA. Charles Breen, the agency’s regional director, found out by reading about it in the Oregonian.

5. As of the time I write this, concerned customers who visit Gardenburger’s web site will find no information at all about the problem.

It is often the case (see Nixon, Richard) that when there’s bad news, a cover-up will make things much, much worse. Kellogg has lost their opportunity to have some control of the information flow.

This is in sharp contrast to Johnson & Johnson’s prompt and aggressive outreach following the Tylenol deaths of the early 80’s. Gardenburger should follow J & J’s playbook — tell the public exactly what the problem is and what they intend to do about it. The unnecessary damage they’re doing by remaining silent will haunt them for years.

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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.