advertising

PR/Advertising Lessons for Entrepreneurs from P.T. Barnum

Here is wisdom from circus showman P.T. Barnum I have often shared with early stage #entrepreneurs to reinforce the last point- end game here is to create short and long term sales-  the rest is ‘showmanship’ and important not to confuse this point. Also note the need to emphasize benefits to build on adv/promotion and actually close the sale (i.e.,”explain how much fun they’ll have spending money at the booths, answer their questions…”). Good counsel and insights here for early stage entrepreneurs.

“ If the circus is coming to town and you paint a sign saying “Circus Coming to the Fairground Saturday,” that’s advertising. If you put the sign on the back of an elephant and walk it into town, that’s promotion. If the elephant walks thru the mayor’s flower bed, that’s publicity. And if you can get the mayor to laugh about it, that’s public relations. If the town’s citizens go to the circus, you show them the many entertainment booths, explain how much fun they’ll have spending money at the booths, answer their questions and ultimately they spend a lot at the circus, that’s sales.

                                                                                                                                                                                P.T.Barnum

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HOW BOOK MARKETING/PROMOTION DRIVES CLIENT BUSINESS AND SELLS PRINT BOOKS

BOOK SIGNING AND MEET THE AUTHOR AND  EVENT AT  EXPO EAST CONFERENCE  ATLANTIC CITY : HOW BOOK  MARKETING/PROMOTION DRIVES CLIENT BUSINESS AND SELLS PRINT BOOKS

I was invited to do a book signing and “Meet the Author” event June 5th at the Expo East promotions expo in Atlantic City, NJ. for my first book in the   “Worm on a Chopstick” series,   Understanding Today’s Entrepreneurial Age: Directions, Strategies, Management Perspectives, and discuss my second book planned for release in late 2012.

One of the largest promotions/marketing conferences, the trade-only event attracts major corporate buyers, sales reps, promotion/marketing companies, ad agencies, and others.  Today we see explosive growth of  e-books which is driving market demand, and also see the demise of traditional ‘brick and mortar’ bookstores.

However, before we writeoff the traditional print book market, it is clear to me based on discussions at this event and elsewhere, that print books are supporting many creative marketing and promotion initiatives to create new markets, promote major lines of business, and sell books in large quantities. While we may typically think about print books sold in bookstores, airport kiosks, via Amazon or other mail order channels, the following are some of the marketing and promotion channels I have discussed now being used to support business and sell books:

  • Major bank develops a “Small Business Corporate Library’ to offer selected clients to strengthen their relationship with small business customers and reinforce their brand
  • Pharmaceutical firms integrate nutritional health and wellness programs with one or more selected books
  • Insurance companies use selected ‘branded’ planning/lifestyle texts to create new educational programs for their clients
  • Emergency services (local police and fire) ‘private label’ educational publications for children to provide safety education
  • State governors add ‘tip-in’ pages in a customized version of a business/entrepreneurship or other book to support economic development and attract businesses to the region (“tip-in” pages are custom pages inserted upfront into print books)

All of the above are driven by a basic need – companies want to attract, educate and strengthen relationships with customers. Traditionally, you may have received an imprinted calendar, pen or notepad from your favorite bank, and probably still will, but the above are some of the many new creative and exciting marketing/promotion activities we see emerging now. Given today’s intense global competition, I expect these initiatives to accelerate and others to emerge also linking social media, print books, and e books- we are seeing major new, exciting market opportunities developing here.

Paul B. Silverman writes about entrepreneurship, healthcare, analytics, and strategy management and serves as Advisor, Speaker, Educator, and Managing Partner of the Gemini Business Group, LLC, a new venture development firm, and author of “8 Building Blocks To Launch, Manage, And Grow A Successful Business.” He also serves as Adjunct Professor in the School of Business at George Mason University. See more at Paul B. Silverman Blog and sign up for Entrepreneurship Today! email updates to track latest new venture developments.

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Next Gen Ad Analytics:’Finding the Significant Few Among the Trivial Many’

The online advertising market is estimated at more than $30 billion in 2011  growing at 22 percent annually based on Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) statistics. What we are seeing is explosive growth of predictive-analytics based tools and applications to drive the creation of new targeted ad services.

Look over today’s announcement  http://tinyurl.com/7tmmvsp that predictive analytics firm eBureau is spinning off its online advertising targeting business into a new company called TruSignal(TM) offering targeted advertising using proprietary predictive analytics and other tools.

All companies are interested in finding what we call the ‘significant few among the trivial many’ – I foresee many exciting developments and issues emerging here as we pursue this goal:

  • Expect other online advertising companies to create separate, specialized analytics driven service entities – analytics technology is driving this trend, is highly specialized, and this is moving very quickly
  • Different skills sets are needed as ad business moves to even more advanced analytics and visualization technologies- think of the implications for the online advertising sector looking for creative and ‘analytics-savvy’ candidates – new skill sets are needed now to secure and retain industry leadership
  • Expect to see more analytics spin-offs in other sectors- the same model is occurring in the health care, financial services and others

Always important to look at how major companies respond to these changes (think response of Barnes & Noble vs Borders to the e-book revolution). How does a major ad firm, well entrenched in traditional print, TV, radio media, address these new trends- most are obviously committed to the social media revolution but new predictive analytics tools are changing the rules of the game, helping ‘find the significant few among the trivial many’ in ways not possible today.

As these services accelerate, and they will, I expect to see major firms ramp up internal efforts to develop competitive analytics services organically. These powerful services are evolving very quickly and I expect to see major industry leaders seeking alliances with creative innovation leaders in the predictive analytics market.

 

Paul B. Silverman is a Lecturer in the Robert H. Smith School of Business in the University of Maryland. He also serves as CEO of Sante Corporation, an early stage personal health care management company, and Managing Partner of Gemini Business Group, a new venture development and advisory services firm. He can be reached at paul@paulbsilverman.com or via Twitter at @globalbizmentor

 

Paul B. Silverman writes about entrepreneurship, healthcare, analytics, and strategy management and serves as Advisor, Speaker, Educator, and Managing Partner of the Gemini Business Group, LLC, a new venture development firm, and author of “8 Building Blocks To Launch, Manage, And Grow A Successful Business.” He also serves as Adjunct Professor in the School of Business at George Mason University. See more at Paul B. Silverman Blog and sign up for Entrepreneurship Today! email updates to track latest new venture developments.

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Who Thought Paper Was Gone: How About Mini-Newspapers?

Newspapers are not quite gone yet. Mini-newspapers are coming.

Here is an excerpt from an interesting post by Emma Hutchings about a new mini-newspaper printer:

London-based design studio BERG has created a small device that prints out personalized, receipt-sized paper strips with news, puzzles, social network updates and information from apps. The Little Printer connects wirelessly to the web via an included Bridge unit. Using your phone as a remote control, you can configure it and set up subscriptions to different publications, and it will then gather these together into a personalized print-out for you. When you press the button it produces small black and white thermal updates

The benefits of paper in digital world? ” You can paste in it on the refrigerator, fold up in your wallet and scribble on it.” Given the explosive growth of mobile devices of every shape and kind, Little Printer take us in a new and I think interesting direction. Will be watching market reaction to this development and other products in the queue here. Check out

http://www.psfk.com/2011/11/little-printer-generates-mini-newspapers-of-curated-content.html#ixzz1fC8Yw0r2

 

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Emerging Opportunities – Internet TV, Ads, New Services

Emerging Opportunities – Check out NY Times Media Article Today–Ads and Services in Internet TV Sector

I track this area closely – note projected 50 percent of all homes will have at least one digital TV by year end. What is coming is crossover of many
exciting new business and consumer services that build on this new infrastructure (e.g., e-couponing, on-line ordering, mass-customized ‘perfect fit’ clothing, home health care services, and many others).
Advertisers have been missing link so this is positive and expect others will follow – still need to evaluate user reaction to ads but I see this being resolved. High potential area and some creative and exciting new business models are being developed here from what I have seen so far…

Here is article and link…

LG Brings Ad Capability to Internet-Connected TV
By STUART ELLIOTT
Published: November 1, 2011

A LEADING marketer of consumer electronics is adding an advertising capability to its Internet-connected televisions through an agreement with a video advertising technology company. And a charter sponsor has already been signed to join them….. more

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/02/business/media/lg-brings-ad-capability-to-web-connected-tv.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha26

I will be adding more info on this topic in next few weeks at http://paulbsilverman.com/blog/

 

 

 

 

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