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When I was seven, my favorite TV show was a western called Have Gun. Will Travel.
Each Saturday night, a lonely gentleman gunfighter-for-hire with the single name of "Paladin" roamed the dusty streets of the little towns getting justice for his clients. Besides a custom-made Colt revolver, Paladin carried a knowledge of history, Classic and Romantic literature, law and foreign languages.
He was James Bond in cowboy boots.
Last month, Junta42 and MarketingProfs released an intriguing study, B2B Content Marketing: 2010 Benchmarks, Budgets and Trends, based on a survey of 1,100 business-to-business marketers.
The study shows 90 percent of B-to-B practitioners market with content.
It also shows that the average practitioner spends 26% of her budget on content marketing and uses eight tactics, including (in order by popularity) social media, articles, in-person events and e-newsletters.
The three top challenges B-to-B marketing practioners face, according to the study, are:
- Producing engaging content;
- Producing a sufficent volume of content; and
- Finding the money to produce that content.
If you're a B-to-B marketer struggling with these challenges, why not make life easier?
There's a bunch of freelance copywriters roaming the West (and the East). We want to help you out.
Have pen. Will travel.
A blog post of mine earlier this week set off a teapot-size tempest inside Washington, DC's video production community.
I took to task marketing guru David Meerman Scott for extolling "business casual video."
Local video professionals were riled by Scott's low opinion of the value they add to a production and re-posted my piece on a number of sites.
Well, with apologies to cute little Carol Anne in in Poltergeist, "He's back."
Besides asserting that video production professionals are unnecessary, Scott now suggests that traditional video release forms are superfluous as well.
"
Many people obsess over getting legal release forms signed prior to posting a video interview online," Scott writes. "However in my experience, the mere act of thrusting a legal document in front of someone and demanding they sign causes many people to re-think permission."
Scott skips the formality of getting a signed release in favor of asking for a verbal okay.
"I simply ask the person I am about to interview if it's okay to post the video. Then in the edit process, I save the video permissions and post the interview. It works great. I've interviewed and posted video with rock stars and Fortune 500 CEOs and top government officials using this method."
Looks like another "sacred cow" of the professional video world has been butchered.
Not to worry. Any moment, the lawyers will be having another.
"Authenticity" is the new black.
The trend poses a huge problem for many marketers. Why? Because authenticity requires credibility. And credibility isn't the strong suit of a lot of organizations.
Think about it.
How many times have you been victimized by providers of poor service and manufacturers of shoddy goods?
Probably thousands.
I'll bet not one of those organizations used an advertising slogan like, "Stinko. And proud of it." or "Terrible. Every time."
No, their ads probably claimed instead that they're "Connecting and Perfecting" or "Reaching Beyond Excellence."
Even if your branding appears healthy on the outside, it won't save your organization's reputation if there's cancer within.
"But I'm just the marketing manager," you insist. "I can't fix customer-service problems. I can't eliminate product-bugs."
True enough. You probably can't cure the disease. But you can help your organization by finding its place of authenticity.
The journey starts when you discover the "truth" in the eyes of your customers.
Authentic branding isn't that hard. In fact, it's really pretty basic. Like black.
You can learn more about it by reading my free report, Path of Persuasion.
How do you look in black?
Associated Press reports that a congressional candidate from Ohio has been criticized by a leader of his party for donning a Nazi uniform during historical reenactments.
Baby Boomers may remember Sergeant Schultz, a character in the inane 1960s television comedy Hogan's Heroes.
To dodge conflict of any sort, Schultz would constantly grimace and exclaim, "I know nothing!"
When asked by AP's reporter whether it might be a tad offensive to go around wearing a Nazi uniform in the middle of Ohio, our hapless congressional candidate replied, "I don't see anything wrong about educating the public about events that happened."
By remaining clueless and unapologetic, the candidate is guilty of what I'll call "doing a Schultz."
PR 101 teaches that the crucial first step in "handling" a public relations crisis is the swift public apology. (And not only must that apology come forth immediately; it must be offered with a reasonable facsimile of remorse as well.)
To understand the power of the swift public apology, recall the recent cases of David Letterman and Tiger Woods.
Letterman apologized for his sexual indiscretions on his show before they were publicized. A month later, no one cared. A few media critics actually praised Letterman for his honesty.
In contrast, Woods shunned public attention after news of his sexual escapades broke. When his apology finally came three months later, it was too late. The damage to Woods' reputation was severe.
You can find more good advice about responding to a PR crisis in Chapter 9 of Michael Maslansky's The Language of Trust.
Maslansky emphasizes the importance of establishing context before offering apologies or explanations. Without context, audiences will always interpret your statements negatively.
Today John Lennon would have been 70.
Fans can only imagine what he'd have to say about life, love and the state of our world today. Or how marvelous his musical output might have been during the three decades that have passed since his murder.
This week, serendipitously, I rediscovered a 40 year-old solo album Paul McCartney made entitled, simply enough, McCartney. It contains Sir Paul's all-time favorite composition, "Maybe I'm Amazed," plus a dozen other songs he penned, all quite wonderful.
Listening to the album and remembering just some of the nearly 200 songs McCartney wrote and performed with Lennon, as well as all the fabulous music each Beatle produced after the band's 1969 breakup, leaves me in awe of their talent.
If only I had a shred of it, I'd be a happy camper.
