Buzz 12-3-07

You know, Cyber Monday is not considered the biggest online holiday traffic day.   Online retailers do better the 10 days or so before Christmas which is when people are rushing.  There doesn’t seem to be an official name for it yet! 

Tops for October from Nielsen – social networking sites:  myspace, facebook, classmates online, windows life spaces, aol hometown, linkedin, aol people connection, reunion.com, club penguin, buzznet.com.  Top 10 blogs:  blogger, wordpress, six apart typepad, tmz.com, livejournal, xanga, thatsfit, gizmodo, autoblog, styledash

Article on HarperCollins Author Assistant from BookSquare.  This is an example of one of the sites.  Our own Joe Wikert’s blog is mentioned in this article!

ACCOUNTS

Office supply stores report weak quarters.

TV networks in stores like Wal-Mart and Target are targeted to generate over 300 million this year.  The latest entrant is Borders TV which will hit 250 stores by February.    This is the NY Times article on Borders TV.

ADVERTISING 

Yahoo’s new ad venue – PTA newsletters, youth sport leagues, part of a venture with Adobe.  Publishers interested in signing on to this program can go here.

WSJ Office Network (place based video network) shows extremly strong recall retention with advertising that people found relevent to them.  The WSJ Office Network currently has video installation in top 15 DMAs.

Ever considered advertising on napkins?  NapAds reaches wide swath of popular nightlife venues.

What about advertising with tatoos? 

In a deal announced this week between Clear Channel and Bluetooth content distribution provider Qwikker, thousands of out-of-home ad properties will be able to talk to your phone directly and download robust content.  Passersby will be able to activate their Bluetooth receiver on a phone and accept an invitation from the signage to interact. 

An interesting text campaign for Project Runway that did extremely well.

BLOGS

The blogger’s guide to search engine optimization.  Includes some great examples of how to increase traffic.

CATEGORIESCooking – Gourmet, specialty sales expected to soar.   Another article – Fresh, super & organic top trends for 2008.Finance – AOL revamps money & finance site.  offering more up-to-theminute news & stock market information.

Health – Physical symptoms #1 usage driver for health sites. 

Technology – Tech companies target older consumers. 

CREATIVE

Taglines losing their luster for major brands.  Pretty interesting – basic point is if you’re going to have a tagline really celebrate, don’t relegate it, or don’t bother with it at all.

Results from a 3-year study says successful ads tell stories.

 MARKET RESEARCH

Consumer Statistics You Can Use – including 40% of Americans (303 ml) are on the move during the 2 hour rush hour, average person sees 5-8 movies a year, more TVs in each household than people, 71% of households have an internet connection, average American is going online both at work and at home, visits an average of 6 domains per day, and spends over 3 hours online a day…..

Retirees Surf and Respond – lots of interesting data on who responds to email promotions and email follow-up, demographics of who’s willing to receive investment advice over the internet, etc.

Social networkers are also heavy technology users.

 MEDIA – Print, Online, Whatever

Whole Foods Market Magazine launches January 2008 in midwest, and expected to move on nationally.

AMEX folds Travel & Leisure Family into their main magazine.

Fortune Magazine gets makeover beginning with Dec 10 issue.  There will be 4 expanded editorial areas – technology, management, investing and luxury.  Fortune will also be contributing more content to CNN/Money.com.  Article also highlights other magazine info – WSJ new weekly magazine Pursuits will also be distributed in Europe and Asia. 

Basic cable ratings for Oct 2007.

Telemundo launches bilingual late-night talk show.

NY Times has a facebook page.

Salon still thriving as brand evolves.

Meredith, Comcast debut Parents TV.

The decline of the author tour.  Being usurped by virtual encounters and promotional videos.  Booktour.com is also featured in article.

SOCIAL NETWORKS

Social networks set sights on UK Market.

FaceBook – a snapshot of the FaceBook audience - a couple of tidbits – oldest age with at least one million users: 24,  age with most Facebook users:  19.

VIDEO

10 lessons for marketers using viral videos.

WIDGETS

7 rules for widget creation success.

Buzz – 11/26/07

HOT STUFF

 Lots of Kindle stuff (outside of publishing sites) including how they’re marketing kindle (author testimonials, etc.)       Clickz    Forbes     Marketing Daily     MediaWeek

More publishers join video vendor Turnhere’s network including Bantam Dell, Chronicle, Disney (Hyperion), Doubleday Broadway, Hachette Book Group, Loyola Press, MacMillan, Thomas Nelson and W.W. Norton.

As we develop online learning centers of our own, here’s an interesting article on a  a newly integrated learning and community platform from Powered.   There is also a good link to Travelex who is using this system (as well as companies like AOL).

Video – Site Uploading.  This great information was flagged for us by our UK counterparts.  This is a great site called tubemogul.  This site allows you to do your distribution and analytics all in one place.  It has a universal upload tool and technology.  Included are youtube, metacafe, myspace, yahoo, aol, daily motion, brightcove, and you can do others as well.    Link

 ACCOUNTS

Staples promotes high-ticket items for the holidays.

ADVERTISING

AOL launches ticker ads (below the frame banners)

BLOGS

 Interesting article on haiku blogging.  It’s the format that Rosie O’Donnell often uses in her blog.  Way to get out messages that are short, but to the point and spend less time on blogging.

Top 1000 blogs launched

11 Tips for getting your comments noticed on a popular blog. 

 CATEGORIES

Pets:     Pampering pet owners make retailers happy. 

CREATIVE

Interview with Michael Carabetta, creative director at Chronicle Books.

 Search engine friendly copywriting style often not friendly to humans.

Eye-tracking rules.  Where you should put in a promotion, website, etc. to maximize your impact.  Example – Ads in the top and left portions of a page will receive the most eye fixation.  This is the full article.  This is a really good point-of reference when reviewing ads, websites and many other promotions.

MEDIA 

San Jose Mercury News reinvents itself.

Time Inc. bolsters digital brands.

MOBILE

Getting your content from the web to mobile phones using Bongo -With the Bango Button, consumers visiting websites, blogs or other destinations on their PCs can click on the button, which will take them to a page with instructions on how to find Bango’s Wap.com on their cellphones. Their content shows up there, ready for download.

RESEARCH

Social sites and blogs support growth of word-of-mouth marketing.

 STATS

Newspaper unique visitors and time spent per month – there is some interesting information here that may help to answer some questions we get about how much time and unique visitors to newspaper sites are meant when we give online visitor information with our PR and advertising information.  We are working on pulling together as much detailed information as we can get here on the top newspapers.  This kind of information (time spent per month, readership by articles) is not available at all for the print.  So, in general, knowing specifically who is reading the article about your book or product (whether in print or online) is not a quantifiable science. 

TWITTER

Guide to twitter as a tool for marketing and PR.  Great way  sharie links to timely resources or things found on the web that you’d like to share/promote immediately as well as tidbits of personal/business information.  Also, has some great other links.

Twitter limits UK tweets that users can receive by SMS to 250.

Buzz 11 11 07

 

 

Brand Extensions – Frommer’s luggage line extension favorably mentioned – Link

Journalists consistent in their online use and preference – Link To get the full report – Link

ACCOUNTS

Convenience stores sign deal with Nielsen Co. – Link

Wal-Mart’s Biggest Tool – it’s website – expects 800 million visits to its website in 2008 – Link

BOOKS

Building a Book Campaign when an author won’t participate – Link

SharedBook Enters the Web 2.0 Cookbook – Link

ADVERTISING

Facebook unveils new advertising ops – using social data – users can share their engagement with brands – Link

Newspapers adopt total audience (print/online) to circulation data – Link

Martha Stewart run specialty ad network focused on home & decorating tips – Link

Google Retools AdWords – rolling out placement targeting – Link Link

MySpace launches self-service ad platform – called SelfServe gives customized tools to upload ads and select target audiences – Link

Reader’s Digest creates food advertising network that includes a self serve system- Link Link

Ad network, Buzz Logic and then create a customized ad network – Link

MARKET RESEARCH

Marketers must adjust to ther gadget generation – Link

MEDIA – PRINT/WEB/TV

House & Garden closes.

Radio on the web making gains – Link

New Magazine – Jewish Living Debuts – Link

SEARCH

Top 10 Search Terms in 10 Categories – Link

SOCIAL NETWORKS

Facebook adding shopping service to its menu – you could eye a hot title as it began to climb the bestseller list within your facebook network – when somone buys something on a commerce site they can inform folks in their Facebook network – Link

Yahoo launches social network for graduates – Link

Buzz 11 5 07

ACCOUNTS

New Wal-Mart ads – Link

Best Buy unveils paid video-sharing service – Link

Indigo unveils good 2nd quarter results. Link

In Canada – Wal-Mart to sell books, magazines at US list prices. Link