Everything is Connected: Email to Blog to Book

I can't remember what movie recently featured the tagline 'everything is connected' but I'm co-opting it here to make my point about how you can spread your ideas incrementally across media. Take these three commonly used marketing pieces:

• Email newsletter
• Blog
• Book

Alone, each of these items is a finite vehicle for you and/or your company's ideas. However, if you undertake the simple task of connecting them you can create a lean, mean marketing manifesto and quickly ensure the spread of your ideas.

How? I'm guessing, like so many out there, you collect customer email addresses and someone has said "we need to send out an email newsletter." So every quarter/month you are scrambling around for relevant content for your e-newsletter so that you can dredge up something to say to your customers.

Fast forward a couple of years when blogs crop up and, again, someone at the marketing round table said "we need to get us one of those." So now you're blogging. You now have two content driven pieces struggling for relevant content.

But what if you take a step back and tie these two pieces together. Janine Popick, CEO of VerticalResponse, my favorite email ASP, does just that. Every month she sends a newsletter that has a teaser to one of her recent blog posts that links to the blog site. And, as we all know, once you click through and read her blog how likely are you stay on her site ...?

Brilliant, right? So then you follow this thing through to it's next logical conclusion and you take your best blog posts and assemble a book like Seth Godin is doing with his upcoming book Small Is the New Big. Really, previewing potential book content on a blog gives you great insight into what your audience wants to hear from you. If I'm not mistaken "Small Is the New Big" was Godin's most popular blog post and is thus the central idea of his latest manifesto.

The Point? Connect your messaging dots. We spend so long searching for content for emails, blogs, books. Why not use one as a spring board to another and another. If you can get your message firing on all pistons, your ideas can build like a mighty snowball! I'd better get out of here before the metaphor police arrest me.

P.S. If you were really paying attention, I'm sure you noticed the key ingredient that I glazed over: the simple fact that you must have something relevant to say to your audience. This whole rant is null and void if you don't have a message. So ... uh, get one. Easier said than done. More on that later.

P.P.S. "Everything Is Connected" was Syriana's tagline but since I can't really connect this marketing riff to oil I'll bow out gracefully.

Personal MBA

Josh Kaufman proposes a new type of business education that I think is worth looking at. Maybe, I'm partial to his theory since I consider myself a graduate of his new school.

The Point? Josh sums it up best in the quote from Good Will Hunting below (P.S. I'd be cheating if I didn't give Seth Godin props for pointing me to Josh's site on his blog.):

“You wasted $150,000 on an education you coulda got for a buck fifty in late charges at the public library.”
- Will Hunting (played by Matt Damon), Good Will Hunting

Don't Forget Your MAP

When I develop a marketing plan, I call it a MAP -- a Marketing Action Plan. It's a pretty simple acronym and metaphor. You use your MAP to get where you're going and you can refer to it when you get lost. It should state some background (how you got here), your objective (what you want), and, of course, how you're going to go about getting it (your strategy and tactics).

It's the last part that, the strategy and tactics, that adds the ingredient of action and makes this thing a living, breathing document that guides you throughout your campaign or project.

Is it a locked, concrete document? No. What makes it breathable is that if something changes as you begin you can go in and modify your map (OK, so the changeable part breaks the map metaphor a bit -- bear with me). You have to be a cartographer during your journey (there!).

The Point? Just a name? No, it's more important than that. It's a label. And labels are important because they get your head in the right place. By the right place, I mean a place where you can take action. And action is where it's at. A map is your tool to get somewhere!

Hot Tip: The Lowdown on Email Subject Lines

As an email marketer, I've been known to spend a substantial amount of time crafting the perfect subject line. It's a big deal. It effects open rates. It's a split second you have to capture your recipient. It's like having a good teaser on the outside of your direct mail package.

No surprise yet, right ... Well, recently I conducted an experiment on carrying this practice over to my internal emails to clients and co-workers. Rather than typing 'Question' or 'Project Update' or 'Re: The Twelve Previous Emails We've Exchanged' in the subject line, I starting taking a couple of seconds to craft a zinger. 'Cause who doesn't feel like they send their emails out into cyberspace and into a co-worker's overflowing mailbox. In theory, if you want attention from a client or colleague shouldn't you employ the same tactics as the rest of the noise?

The results? No surprise here either. My own internal email response rate went through the roof when I go with a quirky subject line from left field like 'Fuel for Your Fire' or 'Caution: Low Ceiling' or 'You Can Thank Me Later.'

The Point? Am I crazy. Well, hell yes but I'm a crazy person who people respond to.

In Praise of The Geek Squad

I almost ran into a lamppost last week when I saw Best Buy's Geek Squad VW bug with its custom paint job in my neighborhood on a house call. Holy cow is that a remarkable concept.

Take a sec and consider all of the theatrical elements that they've managed to pull into the relatively straightlaced world of retail technical support.

• Costumes -- short-sleeved white dress shirts, black slacks, and a thin retro tie (also black). The uber geeks can also further trick themselves out with the dashing addition of spiked hair, think black glasses, and maybe even a chain wallet.
• Logo -- this division of Best Buy has it's own logo and look and feel that is independent and rebellious to the rest of the store's brand.
• The aforementioned wheels.

Can you name the any other electronics' superstore's dedicated commando unit of a support team? Probably not. And who will you think of the next time you need computer help? Gonna sit on hold forever and then have a boring tech explain something that is easier shown than told or are you gonna consider callin' that wacky bug?

The Point? What can you Geek-up about your product or service? Ever thought of trying a costume for what you do? Not tights but a certain type of look? Crazy or remarkable?