Apple's Amazing Marketing Skillz
Of course we all know that Apple has mad marketing skills. But this one blew it out of the water. I took a screen capture of the nytimes.com site because im not sure how long this campaign will be on the homepage. Sorry about the quality, but now we can watch it will last forever.
18 Sep 2008


Kinkos Gets Tossed In The Dumpster
Now here is something that makes no sense to me. FedEx purchased Kinkos in 2004 while it was still a thriving business. Today, four years later, they announce they will write off $891 million dollars worth of good will and assets associated with the Kinkos brand and drop the name all together. From what it looks like, that does not even include the cost of replacing their FedEx Kinkos logo everywhere it shows up.

ups logo changeWhen I think of changing logos and brand replacement two companies come to mind. In 2003 UPS announced that they would change their logo to a new more modern design. The estimated cost was $20 million and included changing their logo on thousands of vehicles, more than 250 aircraft, 1,700 facilities, 70,000 drop-off and retail boxes, and more than 1 million uniforms. FedEx has far less places to change the FedEx Kinkos logo but is spending over 40X more money to do so.

FedEx obviously did not plan for this. Why would they let the Kinkos brand thrive sync with the FedEx brand if they just planned on breaking it off and throwing it in the dumpster? The best example of a company succeeding in buying a huge company and then scrapping their brand just happened recently with AT&T and Cingular. One week AT&T bought Cingular, and the very next Monday AT&T had commercials and advertisements all over the United States saying "Cingular has joined AT&T". Just one month after that, AT&T incorporated the "Cingular Orange" into its logos and dropped the name completely. Even though BellSouth and Cingular spent a reported $4 billion dollars promoting the Cingular brand, AT&T crushed it in about two months but not before stealing various elements of the logo.

Kinkos is a big healthy brand. People still think of Kinkos first when they need copies or print jobs. I think the FedEx brand has actually benefitted from being associated with the Kinkos brand. Brandtags.net shows this best. The website displays a logo and then asks you to type in the first word that comes to mind. After entering your tag, it displays the results of everyone's responses in the form of a tag cloud. The larger the word, the more relevant it is to the brand. Maybe FedEx should think twice about dumping Kinkos all together. I'm sure a chain of print shops somewhere would pay good money to buy the Kinkos name. One things for sure, FedEx Office just dosn't have the same ring to it. Kinkos, R.I.P.
03 Jun 2008


Handheld Hero
I understand that they are trying to leverage the brand and milk guitar hero for all its worth, but is it worth destroying the experience? The reason Guitar Hero took off was because it leveraged the idea of playing an instrument. People who have never played the guitar felt like rockstars and guitar enthusiasts loved it because they were so damn good at the game. This is what happens when the market size and money clouds your vision and becomes more important than the brand. This is a perfect place for an analogy but I can't think of one... can you?
29 May 2008


If It's Not Creative, Don't Bother
I have always been a sucker for a good marketing campaign. In this day in age, if you are going to use traditional marketing distribution channels, you better be creative. Here are a couple of great campaigns that I stumbled upon at techEblog.com
29 May 2008


Fighting For Furminators
furminatorJust when I thought people are abandoning eBaY for other online shopping sites I was proved wrong. My mom called me this morning and left this voicemail:

"Greg, I need to get this special dog hair brush for Kelsey. It is called THE FURMINATOR and my friend said the best place to get it is on ebay. You are much better at that stuff than I am so can you do it for me?"

So I hop onto ebay, search "furminator" and I was shocked. There were over 650 items (which is what I expected because eBaY is so over crowded) but almost ALL of them had bids. People were fighting for Furminators!

It comes in 3 different sizes: small($23.99), medium($28.99) and large($33.99). Of course my mom said she needs the large one. Every single one is selling and some of them have over 15 bids before the auction is over. Inventing this product is one thing, but whoever is behind the viral marketing campaign is a genius.
20 May 2008


Track Advertising Success With Barcodes
Looks like barcodes are finally going to become a consumer product thanks to ScanLife. I've heard for years that they are huge in Japan. There are a TON of ways this can be used to enhance and track marketing campaigns. What I didn't expect is that it would take the iPhone to finally bring them to us.
20 May 2008


Do they honestly think Diggers will click that!?




I think they need to work a little harder on their target demographics models.
01 May 2008


When Google Owns Everything
Casi and I were chatting and I brought up that Google was going to start selling tv advertising. She was like WTF! are they trying to do everything?? Yeah they are, soon everthing is going to be googalized! This lead to about a half hour of us coming up with awesome google words:

Googlishious - Googtacular - Googorama - Googley - Goognormous - Googalization - Googtastic - Googness - Googantuant - Goognation

I told her that beer shes drinking might some day be a Googweiser or a Goog Light. That led into another half hour of Googalized people, products, companies & places:

Googneyland - gBeach - Drive a Googyota - Barack GooBama - Shop at Googstroms - Produce from Googbertsons - Gas from Argo - Snacks from sevenGleven - Sippn Goognotiq - Knots Googley Farm - Googlifornia

When it was over I couldnt resist throwing together some Googalized logoz. Enjoy!



20th Century Goo



24 Hour Gooness



Beyond Googtroleum



Citigoog - Corporate & Investment Banking



Disgover Card



Wells Googo Bank



GOL



Gooz-its



Goog Warner Cable



Goorriott Hotels and Resorts



Uncle Googs Rice



Googbucks Coffee



Googlebees Restaurant



Googaroni & Cheese



Gox Cable



The Ritz-Googleton



Googbuster Video



GSPN Classics



Googboy TV



The Mighty Googs



Goog of America



Fed-Ex Ginkos



Gotorola



Googstrom



GNN



Goog In The Box



Googmerican Express



Washington Googtual
16 Apr 2008


Cake Financial Knows Whats Up
Thanks to the Techcrunch 40 I was introduced to a new company today called Cake Financial. I had this idea for a while but didn't have the time or $ to get it going. They did an amazing job & I think this is going to be a huge hit for investors.

Basically it is community investing. See what community members are buying, selling, saying. You can see how the community is doing as a whole via the Cakedex and learn from the traders who are making the most money.

The most impressive feature is the ability to import your investing account directly from your broker. It was painless and smooth. Without this feature, this idea wouldn't work. People would try to manipulate the system. But since every trade is pulled directly from your account, there is no tampering with your activity.

Mad Props to the Cake guys, they did it right.

One more thing...
Check it out! I was the top performer for the last 30 days on their launch day. sweeeeet.
19 Sep 2007


Google Goes .edu
Today USC announced a partnership with Google that will give USC students access to a special USC version of Google Apps. I have 2 classes this semester where all the projects are done in groups. We are using Google Apps to write all the papers, take notes, and make outlines. I even have to do a powerpoint presentation next week. Since I just got access to the new presentation software I am going to HAVE to use it :)

I am glad to see USC is teaming with Google for this. Collaboration software is so important in business and education it just makes perfect sense. My school forced me to take a Microsoft Office Class. A Google Apps class in the curriculum is the next step.
19 Sep 2007


Its Time To Start A Web Company
Over the last few weeks I have been coming up with every idea I can for a web company. Between Ian's mad coding skillz and my design and creativity I KNOW we can make something amazing. The first website we ever made won an award for the best in its industry (www.aitginc.com). I am definitely going to create some kind of community based site but I have no idea what (you can tell how far I am from making my decision!). There are a few things that i'm keeping in mind while coming up with ideas.

1) It needs to be remarkable! This means that it must be an idea that people will make remarks about. Whether its in their blog or just talking to their friends in order for the idea to spread it needs to be remarkable.

2) I want to try to use people's egos to help spread the idea. That sounds evil but really its not. I need people to WANT to spread the word about this site. What better way than to use their egos to help? example: Check out what I did!!!

3) I want to promote productivity. I don't want a bunch of lazy ass users. People who use this site will be driven and motivated which will make the community an active environment.

4) I cant be afraid to team up with other web companies to get it done. For example, If part of the site involved adding pictures, there is no reason for me to host and manage them. We could use flickr, picasa etc.

5) It has got to be something that im interested in. I watched a panel discussion the other day and one of the GUYS was starting a community for single mothers. I doubt he is interested in that and I cant imagine it succeeding for just that very reason.

6) It needs to be able to make money. Not to be a greedy bastard (which I am), but if I am going to put a lot of time and energy into this it would be nice to come up with an idea that can be profitable. The more revenue streams the better. I can use ads, payed services, sell products or even build a site specifically to become takeover bait.

7) Some part of the company has to involve something super innovative. I could always rip off some other site and make a "Me Too", but the site has to be known as the first website that let its users _________.

If you have any ideas for a company that meets all these criteria let me know. I am recording all of our ideas at www.splitp.com. It is password protected so if you want to get involved or even just tell me why all our ideas suck, drop me an email and I will give you access to the site.
11 Jul 2007


Seth Godin Is A Marketing Genious
27 Jun 2007


Pill Cams Are as Speculative as It Gets!
Today Cramer was pitching a company called Given Imaging(GIVN) for his Speculation Friday pick. These guys are actually convincing doctors and healthcare providers that they need a pill cam. Yes, as in a camera that you swallow. I love how it has the logo imprinted on the side of it, looks like a promotional product! Check out the website too, looks like a scandalous company trading on the pinksheets. I can't imagine a doctor prescribing their patient to swallow a camera. If people are actually benefiting from this then thats great, but honestly this seems like a desperate attempt implement imaging technology.
22 Jun 2007


Jones Soda - Great Story, Great Stock, Scary Stock


Watching a stock run from under $1 to over $30 is an amazing feeling... if you own it. I have been watching Jones Soda stock since before I even started trading. I couldnt believe that a little company like this was even public and back then it was trading at about 40 cents. I knew penny stocks were risky and I stayed clear of it.

With the AMAZING run Hansens had last year because of its monster energy drink investors have been chomping at the bit to find the next great soda story. Thats exactly what Jones has. They recently signed a major distribution deal, started selling cans for the first time, switched to ALL real sugars (went green?), might be expanding into fountain drinks, just signed a deal with the SeaHawks to be the official beverage etc. Its a great story of the American dream too considering some kids started their own soda company printing their pictures on the bottles.



Now the company is worth about $400 million and is sporting a PE near 100. JSDA ran $20 or 200% in the first 4 months of the year. When it topped out at $32.60 investors absolutely destroyed it. After coming back down to $15 and bouncing off the 200 SMA I think its time for me to give it a try. What the hell right, its never too late to try.
20 Jun 2007


It Is Official - This Site Is Now Profitable
After 2 weeks of work this site is officially profitable.
15 Jun 2007


Seeing Things From a Different Point of View
I am not really sure what significance this has. All I know is that I have never seen a super market from this point of view. Its kind of creepy isn't it?

Click through to see a larger version of this image.
11 Jun 2007