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If You're Gonna Do It, Do It Right
Posted on November 28, 2005 by Sarah Eaton.
Really, you want your email campaign to explode, but you want it to explode in a good way, right?
From ClickZ: Seven E-Mail Landmines. It's all sensible information that we need to remind ourselves of every now and again.
tags: ClickZ | email campaigns |
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November 28, 2005 in audio publication, award winning design, award winning newsletter, blog publish, Blogs, Brand enhancement, build credibility, Building B2B Relationships, Building Customer Community, Building Customer Intuition, Business editorial, business magazine, Business publications, company blog, company newsletter, Company newsletters, Company publication, Corporate Blogging, corporate magazine, Corporate newsletter, create a newsletter | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Try Looking At It Another Way: Freakonomics And You
Posted on November 21, 2005 by Sarah Eaton.
Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
By Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
A BeTuitive Book Review
The cover of Freakonomics shows a green apple that’s sliced open to reveal the flesh of an orange within. That more or less sums up the entire book.
I’m not saying that in any negative way. Precisely what I like about this book is the offbeat manner in which the world is approached and explained—and the way that conventional wisdom is debunked.
It’s a book written for a general audience, one where the difference between causality and correlation needs to be explained. The result is accessibility.
Levitt also doesn’t shy away from controversy in Freakonomics. He asks questions that some might consider odd, and he asks questions that some might consider better left unasked.
Among these questions:
- Is legalized abortion correlated with the significant drop in crime rate since the mid-‘90s?
- Do executives contribute less money than administrative assistants in an honor system situation? Why is that?
- How can data help to catch teachers who cheat in order to make their students appear to do better on standardized tests?
- How is a crack-dealing empire’s org chart similar to that of McDonald’s?
- Do real-estate agents purposely encourage you to take a lower offer when selling your home? Why?
- Do parents even matter, when it comes to a child’s achievement?
- Does someone named Jack or someone named DeShawn have a better chance at landing an interview after he’s sent in a resume?
Levitt and Dubner detail the answers to these questions in the book (they are yes, yes, read it, read it, read it, yes, read it, less than you’d think and Jack), but that’s not even the most appealing thing about it. What causes it to be interesting is that these questions were asked in the first place.
It makes me think of the way companies gather data, and how that data is utilized. We live in a world where everything can be, and usually is, measured.
Levitt aligns numbers to reveal unexpected relationships between what may seem to be wholly disparate sets of data, and the effect is often unsettling. So, what would happen if you applied this idea to the way your company utilizes its data?
I imagine you’d come up with some expected results—but also some surprising insights.
And, those insights could reveal some weak points in your strategy, which, in turn could save (or make) you time (or money). Chances are that you’ve already amassed the necessary data to do so.
Freakonomics won’t tell you explicitly how it’s done; what it will do is convince you of the merit in looking at things another way. And, along the way, it will impart some intriguing ideas, theories and truths.
tags: Freakonomics | Steven D. Levitt | Stephen J. Dubner | book review
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November 21, 2005 in award winning magazine, award winning newsletter, Blog Outsourcing, blog publish, build credibility, Business editorial, Business newsletter, Business relationships, Corporate newsletter, Corporate publications | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Clever Wordplay Makes Me Giggle
Posted on November 18, 2005 by Sarah Eaton.
From the scope of this site, it would seem like it's something that everyone knows about but me. But, I'm blogging it anyway, because it made me giggle.
It's a buzzword dictionary! Sometimes the entries are clever, sometimes silly, sometimes insightful, and sometimes they're groaners, too.
And, because it's Friday, you totally have my permission to waste the next ten minutes of your life expanding your buzzword vocabulary with words like:
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
and
centergistic: Focusing on one main goal or purpose. "We need to keep this meeting centergistic if we're going to make our deadline."
tags: buzzwords | Friday fun |
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November 18, 2005 in award winning magazine, award winning newsletter, Award winning publications, Blogs, Building B2B Relationships, Building Customer Intuition, Business publications, company magazine, company newsletter sample, Company newsletters, Corporate Blogging, Corporate publications, create a newsletter | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
The Future Is Now, And 2006 Is Just Around The Corner
Posted on November 16, 2005 by Sarah Eaton.
Things that I love about November:
1. The abrupt change in weather
2. 2006 I-Can-See-The-Future lists
3. Thanksgiving
Okay, so the first in that list is a lie, and the third is obvious, but the second is true true true. Because lists, in and of themselves, are fun, but when they're lists about the Future? Even better. (I also like Best-Of-This-Year lists, and also Worst-Of-This-Year lists, but that's a story for December.)
So, without further ado, here's a list of predictions from Drew Neisser. What's to happen in 2006? Why, this:
Newest Job Title: Blog Monitor
Podcasting: Overhyped Again
And much more, so read on.
tags: Drew Neisser | Marketing in 2006 | prediction list
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November 16, 2005 in audio publication, award winning blog, award winning magazine, Award winning publications, Blogging Tools, Brand enhancement, Building B2B Relationships, Building Customer Community, Building Customer Intuition, business credibility, Business Marketing, Business publications, CMO, company blog, company magazine, company newsletter, company newsletter sample, Company publication, corporate magazine, Corporate publications, create a newsletter | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Show, Don't Sell: Using Email To Tell Stories
Posted on November 10, 2005 by Sarah Eaton.
You know by now that I'm a glutton for e-newsletters. I sign up for them willy-nilly and helter-skelter. I want to see what's out there, see how other people are doing things, see how we can improve ourselves, see if we can pat ourselves on the back.
Anyway, my article in this month's newsletter (sign up here) tells the tale of one newsletter that did something unintentionally hilarious. You'll have to click through here to find out what.
tags: company newsletter | story-telling
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November 10, 2005 in audio publication, award winning blog, award winning magazine, award winning newsletter, Blog Outsourcing, blog publish, build credibility, Building Customer Intuition, bulk email marketing, business magazine, company blog, company magazine, company newsletter sample, Company publication, Corporate newsletter, Corporate publications, create a newsletter | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Our Chief in Chief Marketer
Posted on November 03, 2005 by Sarah Eaton.
E-zine publishing is an art, my friends. And...it is a science. How do you combine the two to make the perfect product--form and function?
Todd Smart sat down with Eda Galeno of Chief Marketer recently and answered her questions on the subject. A snippet to whet your hunger for knowledge: When asked what the ingredients to a successful newsletter are, he replied that content with tangible value was the most important.
E-Zine IQ: But how do you gauge relevance for a third party?
Smart: You must understand what prospects and customers think is valuable. A lot of companies look inward instead of outward, and the newsletter becomes all about them. When we’re working for a customer that hires us to develop their newsletter, we ask what kind of information will make their customers’ and prospects’ lives better. We want to know what difficulties they experience, so we can alleviate them. Ultimately, we’re looking for the answer to this question: What kind of information is so valuable to your subscribers that they would pay for it? Now, I’m not asking that they do pay for it. But the discovery process of formulating a newsletter and putting together relevant content depends on where the reader places importance.
You can read the whole thing here.
tags: Todd Smart | Eda Galeno | Chief Marketer | marketing interview
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November 3, 2005 in award winning newsletter, Award winning publications, blog publish, Blogs, Building B2B Relationships, Building Customer Community, Building Customer Intuition, Business editorial, business magazine, Business Marketing, Business relationships, company magazine, Company newsletters, Company publication, Corporate publications, create a newsletter | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack