January 2009 ~ Advertising For Success

Blog Your Blessing : 7 Deadly Sins

10:04 PM

The 7 Deadly Sins
(government as usual)

Wealth without Work

Pleasure without Conscience

Knowledge without Character

Business without Morality

Science without Humanity

Worship without Sacrifice

Politics without Principle

Gandhi

If you look at the list of sins, you may easily see where the last administration in the USA went wrong. Despite proclaiming with his mouth that he was a religious man, GWB failed to walk the path of a righteous person.

We must be watchful for transgressions in every level of government and business. Raise the bar on elected officials and on the people with whom we do business. Demand fairness, honesty and accountability.

The Blue Panther Experience is host for Blog Your Blessings Sunday. Visit the blog, grab the blogroll code, add it to your blog, and leave a comment on Blue Panther Experience. Next Sunday, post your blessing. We are of all faiths, creeds and races, so everyone is welcome. Join us on any Sunday as we blog our blessings

Winning Against the Odds : MarketingProfs

10:46 PM

Digital Marketing World
Free Virtual Conference
Winning Against the Odds
April 1, 2009

Tracks: One for business to business marketing and one for business to consumer marketing.

Keynote Speaker: David Plouffe, Campaign Manager for Barack Obama.

Details: The event is FREE and virtual, but you must register in advance.

LeapFish - Just Type It!

6:10 PM

There is an exciting new way to search called LeapFish. LeapFish boasts of being the first click free search engine. LeapFish is easy to use. Simply start to type your query in the search box. Before you are finished typing the first word, you will have results from blog, image, shopping and news sites, just to name a few.

LeapFish will surprise you with relevant information that you will not find using other search engines. LeapFish uses hyper-threading technology to communicate with all major online portals to deliver the search results from across the web to users in a single search query.

The current search engine strategy limits relevant information to the first page of search engine results, leaving a great deal of information that could be relevant to the search query, lost in space.

If you advertise using key words, you may want to try LeapFish. LeapFish is giving a free car to advertisers that have purchased keywords through their advertising model. The last day to receive an entry for each $1000 spent on keywords is February 2, 2009. Check out the LeapFish blog for more information.

Also from the blog:

Behnam Behrouzi, CEO of DotNext, Inc., a leading developer and incubator of innovative Internet-based companies, says that the rapidly accelerating birth of unique and highly desired content is outpacing the capacity of traditional Internet gateways to capture and deliver this data to users.

This is great news for all people who search for consumer-generated content and the people who are tired of the current algorithm being used by search engines to rank pages.

Post?slot_id=31380&url=http%3a%2f%2fsocialspark

Blog Your Blessing : Words of Wisdom

5:56 PM

The six most important words: "I admit I made a mistake."

The five most important words: "You did a great job."

The four most important words: "What is your opinion?”

The three most important words: "If you please."

The two most important words: "Thank You."

The one most important word: "We."

The least important word: "I."

Note: I am sorry I do not have a source for this quotation. If anyone knows who wrote it, please let me know.

Tags: bybs, blog your blessing, sunday post

Perception Management 101

12:21 PM

Purveyors of perception management (PM) create the "truth" and then sell it to the world. Perception management has been used quite effectively by several administrations, most notably in my life during the presidency of Ronald Reagan.

Evidently, the average US citizen did not like a "boots on the ground" approach to war after Viet Nam, so we needed to be re-educated. Instead of contra guerrillas and death squads, Americans were presented with "freedom fighters."

Read more in Media : Mourning in America (excerpt below).

President Reagan was in the habit of telling whoppers. His tales ranged far and wide: to deny environmental degradation, or blithely pretend that widespread human rights violations by U.S.-backed regimes didn’t exist, or denigrate low-income people in the United States.

If any administration has used PM more than Reagan, it was our last president. Using 9/11 as a battle cry, he invaded and decimated two sovereign nations, began a war that has yet to end, sold the the US economy to Chinese investors, trampled the rights of American citizens, put the interests of big industry before the environment, and ensured his cronies in oil & gas made mega-money. Meanwhile, he ignored genocide in many other (non-oil-rich) countries and all the weather-related disasters, including the one taking place in this country, Hurricane Rita.

From an article in Consortium News:

On a personal level, Bush appears to have found in his electoral victory a validation of his public-relations strategy of casting his foreign policy as a black-and-white war between good and evil. In this tough-talking approach, Bush has been helped immeasurably by the powerful conservative news media, ranging from AM talk radio to Fox News, from right-wing newspaper columnists to Internet bloggers.

However, to be fair, perception management began with the US military. On the US Military section of About.com, you will find the following definition of PM from the Department of Defense:

Actions to convey and/or deny selected information and indicators to foreign audiences to influence their emotions, motives, and objective reasoning; and to intelligence systems and leaders at all levels to influence official estimates, ultimately resulting in foreign behaviors and official actions favorable to the originator's objectives. In various ways, perception management combines truth projection, operations security, cover and deception, and psychological operations.

Exploring further, I conducted a search on the Department of Defense website for "perception management" (including all military websites) and found 45 references to PM, including several statements of work (SOW) for contractors.

Probably the most disturbing document is the Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on The Creation and Dissemination of All Forms of Information in Support of Psychological Operations (PSYOP) in Time of Military Conflict (May 2000), presented to the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense For Acquisition, Technology and Logistics.

From the report:

In the Information Age, there is an increasing reliance on sophisticated, near-real time media dissemination. Information, and its denial, is power. The state or entity most able to effectively control or manage information, especially managing the perceptions of particular target audiences, will be the most influential (p. 12).

Of particular interest to me was Chapter 3: Reaching the Target Audience, with subsections of

3.1 Packaging the Product,
3.2 Developing the Message,
3.3 Brand Identity,
3.4 Measures of Effectiveness.

Marketing war and public policy like a soft drink has never been easier. I guess The Who were wrong: we did get fooled again (and again). Pray God we have learned from it. This time . . .

Blog Your Blessing : Activism

2:07 PM

Never doubt that a handful of committed people
can change the world.
Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
~ Margaret Mead ~

Tags: bybs, blog your blessing, sunday post

Mapping Our Online Conversations

1:12 PM

I love graphic renditions of relationships and below is a conversation prism or conversation map.

According to Brian Solis, the creator of the Conversation Prism . . .

. . . the conversation map is a living, breathing representation of Social Media and will evolve as services and conversation channels emerge, fuse, and dissipate.

A conversation prism provides an in-depth analysis of the social media of a country, which includes all social networking categories and at least 20 country-specific services, including music, video, location/events/user generated products, online gaming, rss, e-commerce, bbs, micro-blogging, etc.

China IWOM Blog has Chinese, French and Japanese versions.

Windows Worm Hits 3 Million Computers

4:22 PM

As reported back in December, Internet Explorer has a major security flaw. Evidently, not everyone heard the news or, for some reason, did not update their security. If you use Internet Explorer, make sure you update your anti-virus software and install Microsoft's MS08-067 patch.

BBC NEWS | Technology | Three million hit by Windows worm

The malicious program has infected computers in many different parts of the world, with machines in China, Brazil, Russia, and India having the highest number of victims.

Either switch browsers or update Internet Explorer.
This is one nasty bug--and it is evolving.

Blog Your Blessing : Success

8:19 PM

To laugh often and much;

to win the respect of intelligent people

and the affection of children;

to earn the appreciation of honest critics

and endure the betrayal of false friends;

to appreciate beauty,

to find the best in others;

to leave the world a little better;

whether by a healthy child,

a garden patch

or a redeemed social condition;

to know even one life has breathed easier

because you have lived.

This is the meaning of success.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson-

Tags: bybs, blog your blessing, sunday post,

Market Not Slowing Microsoft Momentum

10:01 PM

Steve Ballmer, Chief Executive of Microsoft Corp., delivered the keynote address to the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas yesterday. Ballmer discussed Windows 7, the latest version of Windows operating system, which is due for general release late 2009 or early 2010. Some lucky beta testers will be taking delivery of Windows 7 this January.

Microsoft(MarketWatch) CEO touts new Windows, mobile search deal

Ballmer also spoke about a partnership involving Microsoft serving search results to customers of Verizon Wireless. This is a coup for Microsoft, because Google and Yahoo were hoping to provide mobile search for customers of the largest cellphone carrier in the US.

Blog Your Blessing : Women's Christmas

11:35 PM

A Blessing for Nollaig na mBan
Women's Christmas - January 6

May you always seek your spiritual star
Away from home, whether near or far.
May you delight in wonders unforeseen,
And in new adventures only just begun.
A blessing on your Epiphany tea,
May all go well with that,
and may all go well with you and yours
in the year that lies ahead.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Adapted and edited from a blessing by
Fr. Andrew M. Greeley

Advertising For Success