tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-76230142012-01-30T03:34:46.257-06:00A marketing blog from the publisher of Marketing Today, Fortune 500 marketer, Peter DeLegge. Addresses business-to-business (b2b) and business-to-consumer (b2c) marketing issues and trends giving special attention to internet and integrated marketing issues.Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.comBlogger351100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-14365128953609263102011-02-10T05:03:00.018-06:002011-02-11T02:41:30.837-06:00

 Groupon's Super Bowl Commercial "Our ads highlight the often trivial nature of stuff on Groupon when juxtaposed against bigger world issues, making fun of Groupon. The last thing we wanted was to offend our customers - it's bad business and it's not where our hearts are."- Statement from Groupon's CEO in response to the outcry over Groupon's Super Bowl commercial trivializing suffering in

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-92043375256442206972011-02-06T14:34:00.026-06:002011-02-07T03:15:43.137-06:00

My dearest Amazon.com, All this time, I really thought you knew me better. In our more than ten year relationship, I've always been impressed with your abilities. How you pay attention to me and what I do. You're always offering up some kind of related advice, some attempts at helpful suggestions that relate to our past experience. I was beginning to think you understood me and my needs, at

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-79961035790549625262011-01-28T18:22:00.006-06:002011-01-28T19:31:26.392-06:00

Taco Bell has very quickly, and smartly, responded to a recently filed class action lawsuit against them that has gained a good deal of media attention due to its claims that the meat Taco Bell uses in their food items contain less than 35% beef and does not meet the USDA requirements to be called "beef." Taco Bell's campaign includes a counter-suit PR effort, Taco Bell's website, print ads in

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-69366349738257844462011-01-26T15:40:00.004-06:002011-01-26T16:50:53.774-06:00

A recent study of Fortune 1000 company CMOs done by by Blog2Print, a company that turns blogs into books, attempts to shed some light into the reasons some companies have not embraced corporate blogging. The firm's press release might be entitled, "Survey of Fortune 1000 CMOs Reveals Interesting Insights Into the Minds of the Corporate Blogger," however, I found the insights into the minds -- or,

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-53369760318129534612010-10-27T23:45:00.039-05:002010-11-02T14:34:31.173-05:00

What do you do when a good deal of your dissatisfied customers share their poor experiences with your brand with others online? Well, one thing you shouldn't do is turn your social media efforts into a customer service triage unit. I recently came across one company using its social media efforts to deal with their customer satisfaction issues in a manner that I find such an excellent example of

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-32841283655662139932009-10-09T13:55:00.005-05:002009-10-09T19:08:18.983-05:00

The recently published Federal Trade Commissions "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising (16 CFR Part 255)" addressing blogging and social media has received a good deal of attention lately. These rules largely codify marketing best practices of ethical marketers, PR professionals and bloggers. That said, there are a good deal of companies, even at the Fortune

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-85587425050402080752009-06-19T13:08:00.010-05:002009-06-19T17:09:39.181-05:00

A newly published study by X+1 found that more than half (57%) of corporate marketers surveyed were dissatisfied with their search engine marketing (SEM) results. Surprising? Not really. From managing online marketing, including search engine marketing (SEM) and search engine optimization (SEO), for nearly 15 years and running best practice global SEM programs at the Fortune 500 that have

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-65930767664964348172009-04-06T18:47:00.011-05:002009-04-06T19:06:32.684-05:00

I'm presenting on Managing Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) at a best practice level tomorrow, Tuesday at 10 AM CST. It's a free webinar via BrightTalk: http://www.brighttalk.com/dcemail_redirect/webcast/1777. The presentation will be relevant for companies of all sizes, from Fortune 500s with large budgets to small business. Sorry to all for the short notice.

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-2641806013354257332009-03-26T16:54:00.008-05:002009-06-02T02:06:59.550-05:00

I just got back from judging this year's CADM (Chicago Association of Direct Marketing) entries for their 2009 Tempo Awards. I have to say, after looking through a good deal of entries, I really appreciate strong creative, but in the end, it's all about results, no matter how pretty the pictures are, how clever the copy is or how many seconds the very creative, Flash-centric design takes to

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-27396987784195158452009-03-20T10:27:00.005-05:002009-03-20T10:42:13.961-05:00

Have a habit of doing things like accidentally including the boss in that last group email about what a doufis the boss is? Gmail has a solution for you.Kind of a low tech solution. But since this is Google, maybe they'll serve up a relevant ad from a writing service right after you press undo? Or perhaps, if the email was really late at night on a weekend, an ad from a company that sells a tonic

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-23676152491852587062008-07-31T09:21:00.012-05:002008-07-31T16:01:22.703-05:00

Great buzz can result in a great deal of product trial. Brands like Google were built on word-of-mouth. Users loved the product and the brand itself and enthusiastically told others who tried the product and also liked what they found. But what happens if all of the buzz leads to trial of a product that doesn't deliver?It would have been difficult to have read general news, marketing and business

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-44165051474372975202007-09-07T12:19:00.000-05:002007-09-07T14:10:27.813-05:00

Yesterday, I received an email from a friend and fellow marketer indicating that I needed to do another post on Apple. He was right. When Steve Jobs made his latest announcement on Wednesday, September 5, that Apple lowering the price of the 8GB iPhone by $200 less than two months after its release and eliminating the 4GB model, it made a fair amount of iPhone owners feeling disappointment. As

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1116335560250851582007-09-04T15:26:00.000-05:002007-09-04T16:43:57.060-05:00

While I left Motorola earlier this year and am currently am on contract to a leading B2B/B2C brand not in the cell phone industry, I continue to be fascinated by the competitive activity in the cell phone space. Like many others, I am particularly fascinated by Apple. But for me, my fascination isn't merely because of a cool new music cell phone. My interest is due to Apple's marketing and brand

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-86526104579177831032007-01-22T17:32:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:46:27.721-05:00

The Creative Group recently polled 250 marketing and advertising executives to create their latest list of the most overused buzzwords. Of course, they probably should have polled other departments to find out what they thought were the most overused buzzwords from marketing and advertising departments (we do generate a good deal of these terms). I’ve edited down their list to create the absolute

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-63732333751634842282007-01-14T08:25:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:48:15.334-05:00

The phrase Web 2.0 has become popular lately. If you’re not familiar with the term (and like a lot of internet-related terms, its definition is not completely agreed upon), it describes the web’s second generation, which has more community applications, such as social networking sites, wikis, message boards, blogs, etc.Web 2.0 means that users have a voice and increased expectations for

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-79911094164730893052006-11-09T20:37:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:50:04.911-05:00

There has been a good deal of talk about corporate blogs in the last few years – first hype, then a media backlash – but still, there are relatively few Fortune 500s with blogs. As I was spending last weekend finishing up a chapter on blogging for my forthcoming book on B2B internet marketing, I thought I’d share a draft of a list I've created of "rules" or lessons learned for developing and

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1160797763917959522006-11-01T07:07:00.001-06:002008-05-22T07:34:22.057-05:00

I often present at marketing events. But I was taking a breathier at a recent event and came as an attendee. After listening to a panel of B2B online marketers from Fortune 500s present, I was a bit surprised that there wasn't a single reference to social media -- blogs, message boards, etc. -- as it's been a hot topic of late and frankly, it's important to anyone handling online marketing. And

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1161091598175806432006-10-17T08:08:00.000-05:002006-11-04T11:47:58.832-06:00

GM and Frito-Lay and their agencies have recently figured out a great way of getting consumers more engaged with their brands, leveraging the new found power of the consumer. It's a great lesson in integrated marketing communications and engagement for all marketers.Both brands are running contests for consumers to create homemade commercials (also referred to as consumer generated content) for

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1160777126563985892006-10-13T16:45:00.005-05:002010-07-26T09:19:13.697-05:00

I am amazed at how often we marketers debate over whether marketing is art or science. I was recently at a marketing association fund raising event where a speaker proclaimed that marketers are true artists, as if being artists validates our work. I thought, hmmm...Maybe that's part of the reason why CEOs and other departments think of marketers as lacking process and accountability, because we

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1157904314789943192006-09-10T10:41:00.000-05:002007-09-06T12:51:34.418-05:00

Seth Godin recently wrote a post on marketing ethics at his blog that has marketers talking. I applaud Seth's passion and his clever way of addressing marketing ethics in his book "All Marketers are Liars." It's a topic our profession needs to dialogue on and care about. I realize that business ethics books don't sell very well, so I'll keep this short and hope you'll look at Seth's post. Seth's

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1157897978150873802006-09-10T09:14:00.000-05:002007-09-06T12:49:02.787-05:00

It's common blogosphere wisdom that to keep a blog alive, you need to keep to a rigorous publishing schedule. Well, if you've kept up with my blog, or even if you haven't and you notice the dates of previous posts, we're about to put that assumption to a test, as I make my re-entry into the blogosphere.But first, a little disclosure. For those cynics out there, you may see this (perhaps, rightly)

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1128277824768030462005-10-02T13:07:00.000-05:002006-11-04T11:47:58.161-06:00

Forgive the self-promotion, but I'll be speaking and participating in a roundtable at Crain's BtoB's NetMarketing Breakfast in Chicago this Thursday, October 6th. I've been strugling between two presentations, one regarding a significant study that breaks apart and measures each vehicle of marketing campaigns -- television, print, Internet, search engine marketing, radio spots, etc.; the other

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1126714792741990432005-09-14T07:14:00.000-05:002006-11-04T11:47:58.090-06:00

It was only a matter of time. Google has been promising blog search for a couple of years. Finally, this morning they rolled out a blog search engine capability. Not surprisingly, it’s labeled “beta.”According to a Google, “The goal of Blog Search is to include every blog that publishes a site feed (either RSS or Atom).” It looks for sites that update pinging services and crawls in real-time. It

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1125864595497664062005-09-04T15:07:00.000-05:002006-11-04T11:47:58.020-06:00

After more than a decade experience with the commercial web, you’d think major marketers would consider the web more than an afterthought. However, evidence reveals many consumer marketers still can’t distinguish between a website, an ad or a brochure. While retailers like Wal-Mart, Lowes, Nordstrom and Circuit City get it, there are others that still seem confused. When clothing retailer Gap ran

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1122820193130722092005-07-31T09:12:00.000-05:002006-11-04T11:47:57.949-06:00

Shock value is the refuge of the talentless when it comes to advertising and viral marketing. Burger King has decided to one-up Carl Jr.'s Paris Hilton raunch, by creating a series of over-the-top raunchy commercials and a website to promote a fictitious band called Coq Roq -- filled with bad double entendres. And while Carl Jr. is a small brand that can thrive by staying in the niches, Burger

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1111686213578534242005-03-24T11:39:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:50:43.960-05:00

A quick perusal through my email inbox reveals dozens of messages from companies touting for pay articles, books, seminars and papers on every topic known to marketing all claiming to possess "secrets."I checked a few out recently and was amazed to learn that things I've considered fairly common knowledge among those experienced with online marketing are actually secrets! Things like Google

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1107822721561279712005-02-07T18:29:00.000-06:002006-11-04T11:47:57.427-06:00

One of the great lessons of the dot com era was that you can’t buy your way into a successful brand with mere dollars and awareness. After all, awareness doesn’t equal preference or sales. Those who attempted to “build their brand at breakneck speed” only ended up breaking their brand’s neck. Great brands are not built from ad dollars, although there are always marketing and advertising

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1103664638710863692005-02-04T21:21:00.000-06:002006-11-04T11:47:57.252-06:00

Indulge me for a bit. This post is a diversion. Perhaps an infusion of some color and personality into Marketing Today Blog. I am going to get personal. What have I become? I was once an extremely logical consumer. Then it happened. The event that transformed me into an illogical consumer, guilt-ridden to pay a premium and prone to emotion over logic. To a point. The event that brought the

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1104457178001079422004-12-30T19:16:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:53:45.219-05:00

First and foremost, I would like to begin this post by urging everyone who reads it to do his or her best to influence corporate giving towards Tsunami relief funds and strongly consider a personal contribution. Contributions can be sent to the Americares Foundation and American Red Cross International Response Fund. The tragedy is enormous and the help needed is immense. Please provide whatever

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1103844197085066872004-12-23T17:16:00.000-06:002006-11-04T11:47:57.310-06:00

A new study reveals the most overused, annoying buzzwords and it is pretty much spot on, in my book (hmm…those phrases didn’t make the list; last year’s list, perhaps?). Of course, the research process for this could have been much easier than contacting hundreds of companies. All they had to do was have someone pick up the phone and listen to a few management consultants for a couple of minutes

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1103084923663157752004-12-14T21:57:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:52:38.951-05:00

The number of self-professed experts on marketing ROI is astounding. Ask one of them for greater detail and the number quickly and dramatically decreases. I recently wrote an article entitled "The Bottom Line on Marketing Accountability" that suggests a real-world solution for marketing accountability. Just in case you don't feel like reading the article, I'll provide a short summary. The idea

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1102711945003782262004-12-10T14:29:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:54:45.543-05:00

The American Marketing Association and Aquent recently released the results of a salary and job satisfaction survey of marketing professionals (AMA members) across the US. In addition to the salary information, the study included psychographic and workplace dynamic related questions. Some of the findings:More than 80% of marketers surveyed regarded marketing ROI and new technology initiatives as

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1102549316521014452004-12-08T17:38:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:55:37.676-05:00

I just received a call from a recruiter asking if I could help find a Marketing Specialist for a B2B company in the Chicago suburbs. If you are interested, check this link for a full description: http://www.marketingtoday.com/careers/index.htm . Also, a Marketing Today Job Board is in the works and is expected to launch in January 2005. - Peter

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1089864202860971472004-12-08T10:10:00.000-06:002006-11-04T11:47:56.959-06:00

A recent Yahoo! Mail survey of 37,000 Internet users in 11 countries on five continents, found that people all over the world hate spam. Surprising? It shouldn't be. I'm amazed that after so many years, that anyone still needs to make arguments against spamming. If you want to know what are the biggest threats to legitimate (which means permission-based) email marketing effectiveness, they are

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7623014.post-1089749977861837752004-12-08T08:00:00.000-06:002007-09-06T12:56:58.127-05:00

Okay, it took a while to jump on the blog bandwagon, but here it is. No editing, just informal, shoot from the hip insights and opinions on marketing with an occasional typo, grammatical error and, hopefully, a sense of humor.I will be covering marketing strategies, marketing communications, emarketing, trends, technologies, products, companies, campaigns...with a special emphasis on online

Marketing Todayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12972518696586247479noreply@blogger.com4