Marketing Talk on Tumblr

If you keep up with my digital marketing work, you may have noticed that the URL for my old consulting practice now links to a new Tumblr blog.  I am excited to use this forum for my own writings and the best articles on integrated marketing, social media and mobile commerce I encounter on the Web.

More interested in my views on Atlanta best tacos?  Keep an eye on View from Inman Park and look for the annual Best of newsletter later this month.  Click the subscribe button on the widget bar to be sure you are among the first to get my take on the year that was.

Thanks for reading!

A New Taste of the Sandwich Generation

Check out the great new series in the New York Times focusing on the Sandwich Generation - the 20 million plus population of Americans simultaneously caring for aging parents and their own children.  Ron Lieber, author of the Paper's Your Money column, highlights a variety of fiscal challenges faced by this growing segment:

Aging parents run short on money just at the time that they need specialized care. Adult children fail to launch and move back home with their parents. And people in their 40s, 50s and 60s are stuck in the middle, supporting the older and younger generations amid their own uncertainty about continued employment.

For the big picture on this Sandwich Generation phenomenon,  read  Baby Boomers and Their Parents by Georgia Sate's own George Moschis.

Systemax Gives New Life to Failed Brands - WSJ.com

Systemax Gives New Life to Failed Brands - WSJ.com

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Social Media Week Tweak

While perhaps overshadowed by Groundhog Day, the first week of February is also Social Media Week. As I get more active in the Social Media community it is easy to forget that many folks are not knee deep in Tweetups and Poken exchanges.

Here are a few suggestions for those on the sidelines.

Grab a Seat – Even if you are not an active Twitter user, grab your ID now. As James Fallows reminded us this week, with the example of Justice Scalia, its not always fun having a surrogate on the Web.

Listen – Think it is arrogant to Google yourself? Take it to the next level anyway and setup a Google Alerts email report for every mention on the Internet of your company, your favorite restaurant or your loud neighbor.

I Don’t Know from Blogs – Just for kicks, poke around the web and find a well written, cool looking blog about a subject you enjoy. Leave a comment and you are instantly a social networker. Start at Blissful Glutton or Ropeadope in a pinch.

Get Your Jam On – Have a flashback by finding footage of your old favorites on YouTube or go all in and download the Barton Hall ’77 show from the massive Internet Archive site.

Back It Up – Once you are tweeting, networking on LinkedIn and swapping pics of the kids on Facebook, register with Backupify (free through Feb. 15) to have a permanent online back up of all of your social media exchanges.

Have another idea for the social media upstart? Leave a comment!

Coke's New Bottle Is Part Plant

Green is getting to be the new norm! Great article at WSJ.com

Fresh Juice From Social Media

This week's SocialFresh gathering in Nashville was poor in organization but rich in information. With an agenda focusing on the marketing side of social networking, the event offered a number of insights on the coming year in social marketing.

The star of the show was pundit/guru Jason Falls. While Chris Brogan of Trust Agents fame preaches a purist version of the gospel of Social Media, Jason is the no B.S. prophet of value and revenue via social marketing tools. His gruff-but-lovable, Dukes of Hazard tinted delivery makes him a star.

The crowd, I am guessing over 250 folks, included many luminaries and players. I enjoyed lunch with author Dan Zarrella, who's Social Media Marketing Book was published in November. Dan delivered the deepest presentation of the day, delving into the psychological models and conditioning that underpin our behavior online. Check out some of these amazing insights in Dan's white paper on Retweeting.

Here are my key takeaways:

Social Acceleration - 2010 is the year of social media integration. More organizations will view social media applications and customer networking as a core part of their marketing mix. By extension, email and social will begin to morph together, with mobile advertising joining the gumbo too.

Don't play in Social Media if You Don't Care About Your Customers - Social Media is at its core an extension of a company's culture. You have to be willing to open a real dialogue with your customers to be serious about social networking.

Protect Your Turf - Home Depot has an eighteen month track record on Twitter, but their presence was driven by a squatter claiming the Home Depot ID. All organizations (and individuals) must have at least a basic presence in the core social media channels to ensure, at the very least, that their interest are properly represented.

Small Businesses Must Have a Storefront - The imperative of basic Social Media planning for small business was stressed by several speakers. Home-based businesses in particular can leverage the trinity of email campaigns, meaningful blog content and effective use of social media tools to construct a virtual storefront.