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News, opinions and advice on marketing and the rapidly evolving media landscape.

The 10 best strategic business slides of all time: #8 — The Sales Funnel

Anyone in sales will tell you it’s a process -- and they are dead right. But what is that process? Enter the Sales Funnel, another of my favourite slides.

An email exchange with Harry Hellraiser

Not so long ago, I received an email sporting the colourful headline, "I am pissed off Mr 'ethical businessman'." Receiving the odd spray is all...

Seth Godin’s Linchpin in one 30 second summary [DOWNLOAD]

Seth Godin’s earlier book Purple Cow suggests that an average product for an average person is no longer effective. Instead, you needed a Purple Cow – a product remarkable enough to get people talking naturally about it. Now, it’s your turn. In Linchpin, Seth says YOU need to be remarkable or indispensable to be successful in your career. It’s time for Purple You!

How to give good headlines, and create emails that get opened [CHEAT SHEET]

If you have a beautifully crafted email with a thoughtless headline, no one will open it. It’s as simple as that. There are three main...

What’s more awesome? Volvo Trucks or Jean Claude Van Damme? It’s a tough choice...

Volvo Trucks is doing some remarkable things with its marketing. The company is not one to shy about from the opportunities to be interesting, memorable...

ABC Shop grabs top honor at first Online Retail Industry Awards

ABC Shop, Aunty's web storefront, was the overall winner in Australia's inaugural Online Retail Industry Awards. Another big winner was Shoes of Prey, which walked away with three awards -- Best New Online Retailer, Most Innovative Online Retailer and Best Online Marketing Initiative.

Mass trouser drop at Melbourne train station a stunt for underwear by mail

Train commuters in Melbourne no doubt started scouring the environs for hidden cameras earlier this month as an epidemic of trouser-dropping broke out around them. Up and down the platform, even in the trains themselves, men and women peeled off their pants, proudly exposing their underwear and, generally, pale legs. Was it a flashing flash mob? Mass hypnosis? An initiation stunt for a gender-neutral school fraternity? No, no and no. This boxer rebellion was carefully staged publicity for The Pantless Postman.

5 ways to help keep your customers informed about changes to your business

Regardless of the size, location and industry of your business, your customers are probably coming to you right now with a flood of questions

How much sleep does an entrepreneur need? [VIDEO]

It's a good question, right? It's Friday morning and maybe you're tired right now? We hear of great leaders, Churchill among them, who only have...

Think Mums and Dads are jiggy with it? Toyota does. [Video]

Collectively, the money spent on car advertising in a year must be enough to end third world debt. And what for? So we can watch another well-crafted, beautifully shot and stylish depiction of a beautiful, well-crafted and stylish car that we'll probably never get the chance to own. Promoting the latest and greatest to run off the production line has become amazing and predictable. Which is why this recent ad from Toyota comes as a refreshing change.

What you see when Google Wave crashes (screenshot)

I only have one other Wave contact, so I haven't exactly been Hanging Ten so far. Nevertheless, I just checked in and discovered this attentive message from my new guardian angel, The Doc. Perhaps Google's Chrome browser crashed Wave, but it's good to know The Doc is in my corner.

Why your press releases are treated like spam [Five ways to alienate a journalist]

Having run free PR and media leads service SourceBottle for just over a 18 months, I’ve gathered some rare insights into the minds of journalists and what will lead to a figurative black mark against your name. The average journalist will receive from 20 to 200 PR news releases per day. And, as a result, most are treated like spam. Are your media releases the PR equivalent to penis enlargement emails and Nigerian scams?

Are you a modern day information broker? If so, that could make you a...

Profits have always been made by those organisations that owned the most attention. What's changing now is that it's much, much easier to acquire some of that ownership. Called ‘Streams of Content’, the presentation likens the flow of information in modern society to a stream.

Hyundai scores slam dunk with 'Worst Parking Job Ever' altruism

In this age where there is a camera on almost every corner and in every pocket, video clips of car accidents and mishaps are a dime a dozen. But this CCTV footage from Canada of the 'worst parking job ever' has an extraordinary quality that has seen it become a YouTube sensation.

How to avoid being pigeonholed

Often customers remember your business’ initial offering, but have difficulty imagining you producing new services. You’re not alone: being pigeonholed is a common business problem.

What creates word of mouth? A case study in coffee talk.

What makes for a good strategy to get people chatting and raving about your brand and passing the word on to others? We posed this question to Soup, a marketing agency that works with influential people to spread the word about products and brands. Tracey Coleman, Soup's conversations director, shared this story of a successful cafe in Sydney and what it revealed about word-of-mouth marketing.

Visual Domain shares 5 tips on how SMEs can win business from the big...

With Visual Domain, we found that we didn’t need a savvy sales or a marketing budget, we set out with a goal to make things easier for businesses and this ultimately meant breaking the video rulebook.

Rudd vs. Abbott. Playing on a social media near you.

As the political battle heats up ahead of the national elections this year, a Canadian software-maker has come up with real-time analytics on how it’s playing out on the all-important social media.

Fan generated advertising. It’s the new force in marketing (pun intended) [VIDEO]

Pringles has joined forces with the new owners of Star Wars, Disney, to add a whole lot of Jedi to the crisp market. Only a...

Did Anthill’s “sponsored message from the future” outrage or delight you? [Case Study: pURLs]

Last week, Anthill emailed a 'sponsored satirical message from the future' to 9,000 members of its 14,000-strong eNewsletter database. The message informed recipients of their success winning a fictional award from the year 2012. Responses were mixed, ranging from "This is hilarious and very clever!" to "I WOULD PREFER NOT TO RECEIVE THIS CRAP!" So, is Anthill likely to run a campaign like this again?
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New Zealand’s Xero eyes US IPO, further disruption as subscribers increase...

Xero recently held its annual meeting in Wellington, during which the company revealed some interesting details about its future. As has been widely suspected, the...

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