There are so many intricacies surrounding 15 minutes of fame, even though it sounds like it should be simple. Here’s a list of people I’ve compiled (via memory and a little Twitter help). I think most of these people, who got famous for a variety of reasons, got a bum rap.

Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher – Joe the Plumber
James Frey – A Million Little Pieces book controversy
Ken Jennings – long-running Jeopardy winner
Larry Platt – Pants on the Ground
Spencer and Heidi Pratt – The Hills
Susan Boyle – sang “I Dreamed a Dream” on Britain’s Got Talent
William Hung – sang “She Bangs” on American Idol tryout

Individuals are seldom ready for an onslaught of attention, but most organizations prepare for the good and the bad sides of media for years in advance. And this preparedness shows when businesses or people handle their 15 minutes well. The tricky part is making the time count, with the right balance of storytelling and personality. And my big thought and question is: does that right balance really exist?

Now for the interactive portion (which I think has the potential for some really great debate!):

1. Can you think of a person or organization that had 15 minutes of fame and benefited from it without any backlash?
2. Is your company or organization ready for 15 minutes of fame if it happens?
3. Personally, how would you handle all the fame?

Erica Gordon is currently interning at Clear Verve and works part-time at a Milwaukee area nonprofit. She recently received her Communication MA from Marquette University.  Follow Erica on Twitter @erica_g.

Restaurants: A recent Nations Restaurant News article featured restaurants that have started offering  corkage-free promos. They encourage people to bring their own wine to restaurants and do not charge a corkage fee.  It’s a great idea.  It allows wine connoisseurs to bring the wines they love to meals.  Plus, it allows budget-conscious diners to save some money. 

Retail locations: OfficeMax & Menards – both offer special percentage off days where you receive a specific discount if you bring in the paper bag they provide.  An even better and greener alternative – most grocery stores provide you with a discount when you use a reusable tote bag for shopping.

Movie Theaters:  Concessions definitely are a money maker for movie theaters, but something many budget conscious people cut back on.  To keep people coming in, Fandango offers “bring your own popcorn” times.

How can you incorporate a BYO concept into your marketing/promotions?  Here are a few ideas to get you started:

• Is there an area of your business where you can forgo a product/service but still retain your profit?
• Get to the bottom of what pains your customers.  If you have a good understanding of this, you can help ease a burden for them – even if it is something small.
• Are there any social good organizations you can partner with to help them and offer some sort of BYO concept?

Please share ways you’d suggest adding a BYO concept into your business or organization or great examples you have seen.

In my experience, people like and need to have their worlds divided into multiple categories: work, family and social life. Within each of these divisions, there are more separations: book clubs, sports teams, children’s play dates, longtime friends, new friends, guy friends, girl friends, online acquaintances, mentors etc. The list is endless. But the point of the list is that it shows people are inherently dividing up parts of life. Google Wave was trying to bring everything together and, in my opinion, that might have made people uncomfortable.

As convenient as it might be to have multiple ways of communicating in one place, we already have that idea with computers or handheld smart phones. While it is a great idea for Google to recycle parts of Google Wave as they figure out how to redevelop their ideas, it was time for the official Google Wave to go. People have already personalized ways to pull their different worlds together without meshing them together. And, in most cases I’m guessing it’s without the use or creation of a high tech program. It might just consist of having a system or order of communication amongst the different groups.

Overall, I completely understand what Google Wave was trying to do and I am impressed by what it looked like. I just think that what they developed can work better in separate communities as an intranet of sorts for the time being. Pulling everyone’s online communities together might be a little too much too soon.  Your thoughts?

More on the end of Google Wave:
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/update-on-google-wave.html

Erica Gordon is currently interning at Clear Verve and works part-time at a Milwaukee area nonprofit. She recently received her Communication MA from Marquette University.  Follow Erica on Twitter @erica_g.

We were curious how this is all being done so quickly. Read Write Web shares how the commercials are being made.

The Old Spice YouTube channel is #1 in the U.S. for total views and over half a million people are following the banter on Facebook alone.  This post from Junta gives a great summary of stats on this effort.  Adweek also published the following article on this campaign.

Based on the last YouTube video from last night, Mustafa and crew are taking a break from the videos for a bit and it will be interesting to see if they continue it or not. 

Procter and Gable definitely took a chance with writing marketing content in real time but we think they will definitely reap rewards from this effort.  Way to go Wieden + Kennedy for helping bring new life to Old Spice.  This marketing blitz is going to be one for the record books!

Stephanie Sherman, co-owner of Lela Boutique in Milwaukee, knows how to successfully incorporate social media to make it work for her in the fashion world. Since the boutique profits from sales, technology is not allowed on the floor due to the fact that it might turn away customers. Stephanie explained in Milwaukee BizTimes “The Last Word” article in the June 25th issue that even though these items stay in the back office so as not to deter from making sales they DO assist with marketing . But it’s in a way that jives with the goal of the business and doesn’t get in the way with people who are in the store. The payoff? The sales keep coming and Lela Boutique’s Facebook page is quite active with over 500 people who like it.

This mindset can be used in a variety of situations by almost any organization. Think about your own business or organization and consider what policies you have in place for what’s allowed in your front room and back office area when it comes to social media usage. If participating in social media is impacting how you are able to serve your customers, a change needs to be made. If someone at a nonprofit is spending too much time connecting with people on Facebook when he/she could be doing more to help clients (either by grant-writing or direct service) a change needs to be made. While Stephanie commented that she may be old-fashioned with her idea, her system keeps her customers happy and she is still able to connect with others online.

Using social media in the back room to promote your company or organization means that people are hopefully making the time they put in short but effective. It means listening to what people are saying about you and having two-way conversation online, but still listening to the customer if they’re “in your store.” If you forget about those people in the front room and the experience that they’re having, it’s almost not worth putting in the effort elsewhere.

In my experience, I’ve found that a team effort when participating in social media is the best solution, if possible. This means that the responsibility for being the voice of the organization rests on more than one person. The pair or team can work together to come up with fresh ways to connect with current or future customers. Then, while one person is out “manning” (or womanning!) the store, the other person can update Facebook or Twitter and communicate with potential or current clients who are online.

Keeping Stephanie’s success in mind, it’s not necessary to have a long and complicated social media policy guide but have some simple rules in place about when and where to use it.

Erica Gordon is currently interning at Clear Verve and works part-time at a Milwaukee area nonprofit. She recently received her Communication MA from Marquette University.  Follow Erica on Twitter @erica_g.

I recently attended the Milwaukee Business Journal Women of Influence luncheon and received information about the Alverno College Research Center for Women & Girls.  We have to commend this group on the creative brochure they used to promote their findings from a recent survey.  It was cleverly packaged in a business card sized folded piece.  Using simple design and powerful research findings, we thought it worthy of sharing bits of this resource and study with you in multiple blog posts.

The Alverno College Research Center for Women & Girls (RCWG) is one of the first centers of its kind creating positive social change through research specific to women and girls.  Alverno RCWG has recently shared its 2010 Status of Girls in Wisconsin Report, which studied the lives of 372,000 10-to-19 year old girls.

Insight 1:  Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics

Wisconsin girls in 5^th and 7^th grades are improving in math.  In 2009, 45% of 5^th grade Wisconsin girls scored at advanced levels (38% in 2007).

After seeing this insight, we were curious how this stacked up to national statistics.  In a 2009 an Reuters article regarding a National Academy of Sciences report indicated that girls can do just as well at math as boys — even at the genius level — if they are given the same opportunities and encouragement.

So what does this study have to do with marketing?  Well, many things.  It provides insight for women, parents, grandparents and those that support our educational system and women and girls in Wisconsin.  Plus, it may beg more questions of people reviewing the information and they may do just what we did and explore more information about this via the Internet.  If you sell a product/service focused on women and girls, what a great opportunity to support a great new research center focused on women in Wisconsin (hint, hint, nudge, nudge ).

Discounting can be tempting for businesses and organizations to consider.  Especially with our current times. As with any marketing strategy, the need for discounting really depends on the situation and the type of business and organization.  If you offer a product and need to push inventory out the door or sales are down, discounting may be necessary.  If sales are going well for your company or organization then there is no need to discount.

To determine how best to provide a special offer, you have to understand what is going on in your organization and be on top of sales. Here are some questions to consider.

1).  If your sales are down, make sure you have a good understanding of the internal and external environments for your business instead of jumping right into discounting.  Here are a few things to consider:  Do you have more competitors offering your product/service?  Is something in your organization not going smoothly?  Do people not have a need for your product/service as it currently exists?

 2).  Review and fine-tune your messaging.  It is good to be consistent with messaging but if your offering is not well-explained in the first place, your prospective customers may not understand why they should buy. If customers don’t understand why they should buy, they may buy only because of the discount and not value the purchase. Especially in a service environment, this can lead to vendor shopping.  

 3). Consider the long-term effects of discounting over time.  If you are always discounting, what is the perceived value you provide to your customers/donors? Will they ever be willing to pay full price?  You may have devalued yourself to the point where customers don’t appreciate your offering and only buy because they need to and you are the cheapest.

 4).  Understand your customer and measure how they respond to offers.  If you are looking for customers to purchase more of your product or services, test offers and consider a customer loyalty offering versus a discount each time they purchase.   Customer loyalty offerings can allow you to provide special perks to those customers that purchase from you most frequently.

 5).  Make it easy for your customers/donors to work with you.  Nothing can turn off a person more than bad service and the negative word of mouth that goes with it. 

 6).  Test marketing channels for special offers based on where your customers are likely to see your messages.  Know the demographics of these channels to make sure you are reaching the right audiences.

 7).  Instead of a discount, consider offering a gift with purchase or free initial consultation. 

We hold on to some of our favorite articles and found these valuable on the topic of discounting.

Golden Practices Blog:  Tired of Competing on Price

The Right Way to Offer Retail Discounts

Can your Brand Afford to Discount? from Marketing Profs

Do you have any other tips to share when it comes to discounting?   Please share.

I recently learned about some amazing new businesses ideas and plans at the recent BizStarts Milwaukee/Mason Wells BizStarts Collegiate Business Plan Competition.  Many students at colleges and universities in the Milwaukee 7 region participated in this competition.

It was exciting to hear more about the plans and descriptions each of the five award winners provided.  Not to mention impressive to hear the two minute pitches each gave regarding their businesses.  I truly hope each of them is able to get their businesses up and running!  In a room full of people that wish to support entrepreneurs in the Milwaukee 7 region, I wish more could have been there to hear first hand about BizStarts, its resources, and ideas that come from this group so I thought I’d share this in this blog post.   Check out this site when you have a chance and you will see classes, resources for business planning, lending, legal advice, etc.

This was my second time attending the event and this time around I got a little more than I bargained for – a nasty novovirus that affected about a hundred people at the event.  Its amazing how fast these flu viruses spread – within a little over 24 hours.

I have to commend the Country Springs Hotel on how they handled this situation.  It is not the type of PR a banquet facility likes to have.  They had their crisis plan in place and gave statements to the media right away when a bunch of reports came in that people who attended the event were sick.  They addressed the situation and reacted to what they were going to do to prevent future illnesses including sending home staff and thorough cleaning of the kitchen area.  Now comes the recovery part. This location is one of the best places for large events in the area.  There are still people that are a little skittish about the illness, but the Waukesha County public health department did a good job getting information out via the news media.  The one criticism I would make is that they also should have called back those that reported they were ill and attended the event – this may be something in the works though.