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How Does the Aurora Tragedy Affect Your Business? Crisis Response Lessons in a Volatile World
Corporate Communications…By Dan Weedin, CIC, CRM
There are two truisms to crisis management. First, crisis will happen. No matter how hard you work to avoid it, it is inevitable. Second, history repeats itself. From that, you must learn its lessons. Not doing so is negligent. Last week’s tragedy in Aurora, Colo. leaves us with another crisis to contend with. It’s a crisis not solely to be faced by the movie theater, Aurora Police Department, and the community. It’s one that deeply affects all of us. The similarity between this violence and others like Columbine, Virginia Tech, and Fort Hood need to be analyzed by risk managers of any organization or business.
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Olympic Gold Interview: GE Grows Its Global Brand as London Olympics Sponsor
Olympics… By Brian Pittman with Peter Voss, GE
“Any company must carefully align sponsorship opportunities with its corporate values – and recognize it’s all about growth at the end of the day,” says Peter N. Foss, President, Olympic Sponsorship and Corporate Sales at GE. “If you can’t find a link to driving company profits – don’t do it!” warns Foss, who in addition to coordinating GE’s global Olympic Sponsorship also manages the company’s Sales Force Effectiveness program. “In our case, GE’s values are all about integrity and so are those of the Olympics,” he explains.
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What’s Your Brand EQ: An Engagement Quotient Questionnaire for Business
Branding… By Sam Ford and Emily Yellin, Peppercom Strategic Communications
Most businesses are built on interacting and connecting with their customers. But even the most audience-centric brands can become disconnected from the audiences they seek to engage – often because customers have been reduced to mere data points on a spread sheet. That’s bad news. It’s often the root cause behind failed marketing campaigns, communications initiatives that produce low engagement, and brands that just fall flat. Ultimately, brands with low brand engagement quotients (EQs) lose customer loyalty, and eventually, market share.
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Publishing Bad Feedback, F-bombing Rappers, Disney World and Me – A “Famous in Your Niche” Self Disclosure
Social Media Zone… By Vicki @Smartwoman Flaugher
This post is entirely and blatently a self – promotion. As you read this, I am vacationing in Disney World, celebrating the marriage of two very dear friends, and I am probably dancing with Mickey Mouse about right now. After this week’s other post about horror and pain, I figured something light was called for. I get asked pretty frequently what I’m “up to” and where people can find what I am doing. So, to share, here are some links and goodies to help you get to know the crazy, smart alec @Smartwoman, a la moi. Hot off the Presses – Interview with Benjy Portnoy, digital marketer and world-class drummer (and entrepreneur)
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eCommerce Customer Segmentation Strategies: A Marketing Principles Free Webinar
By WhatCounts for the Effective Email Marketing Channel
What is eCommerce customer segmentation? The answer to this important question is tied to a marketing fundamental: It is cheaper to convince an existing customer to buy again than to convert a prospect.
Because of its high ROI, several years ago leading marketers began looking for new ways to use email to increase profit margins. Ultimately, they returned to one of the basic principles of all marketing: it is cheaper to convince an existing customer to buy again than to convert a prospect into a new customer.
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Chick-Fil-A Battles PR Nightmare Over Same-Sex Marriage Stance
International Business Times
Chick-fil-A faces its latest public relations disaster on Wednesday, when Internet users alleged the fast food company was creating fake Facebook users to defend the company’s anti-gay-marriage stance. The fiasco started when Chick-fil-A President and Chief Operating Officer Dan Cathy told the Baptist Press that the College Park, Ga.- based company opposed same-sex marriage. He said that the company, which doesn’t operate on Sundays, was “very much supportive of the family — the biblical definition of the family unit. We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first lives.” Cathy’s comments drew the ire of long-time customers, companies and even cities. Boston Mayor Thomas Menino issued a statement that “Chick-fil-A doesn’t belong in Boston” because it “discriminates against a population.” Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, President Barack Obama’s former chief of staff, supported Menino’s statement and said that “Chick-fil-A values are not Chicago values.” …
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Mazda Appoints Eric Booth As Senior Manager of Public Relations
MarketWatch
Mazda North American Operations announced the appointment of Eric Booth to the newly created position of Senior Manager, Public Relations in the Public Relations and Brand Experience Department. Booth, a 13-year automotive industry veteran specializing in public relations and media communications, joins MNAO following seven years at Hill+Knowlton Strategies where he led the Mazda account. Prior to that, he held various public relations positions at Nissan North America, Inc. in both the Nissan and Infiniti divisions. In his new role, Booth will be responsible for managing MNAO’s public relations division, including product, corporate and internal communications. He will report directly to Jeremy Barnes, Director, Public Relations and Brand Experience, and will be based out of MNAO’s corporate headquarters in Irvine, Calif.
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Social Media Marketing Alert: Facebook to Roll out “Want” Button
Brafton
Unconfirmed reports suggest that Facebook is prepared to unveil a Want button in addition its already popular Like function. The feature could be especially valuable for marketers, as the button could encourage explicit endorsement of a product or service discussed on the platform. Social media marketing with Facebook has received a series of new capabilities in the months since the company’s IPO. With Facebook actively looking for new ways to generate revenue and maintain its growth, innovations that both marketers and consumers can use are important for the organization. According to rumors, the Want functionality will be available for fans of business pages to suggest items they plan to purchase. A piece of code spotted by Tom Waddington indicates it will be a boon for social commerce. Marketers might be able to choose which posts they include the Want button on, so it won’t appear when web content or other non-product, non-service posts are shared …
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Nike, Famed for Olympic Ambush Marketing, Tries New Tack
USA Today
Nike, famous for being an Olympic ambush marketer, has a new ad touting athletes in London — but not ones in London, England. Nike’s new YouTube ad instead touts athletes in other towns around the world named London. The subtext to the ad, suggests the New York Times, is “don’t get all worked up about the Olympics, people” — which Nike isn’t sponsoring. Or, maybe, also leave some consumers feeling that Nike has some kind of tie to the London Games. That’s the essence of Olympic ambush marketing: Non-sponsors, like Nike, can at least create confusion about who is an official sponsor — blunting the effectiveness of competitors’ sponsorships. With London, that’s Adidas, which paid about $60 million for its official status. Nike generally avoids official Olympic sponsorships …
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XBRL US Issues Second XBRL Challenge
Accounting Today
XBRL US launched on Wednesday its second annual XBRL Challenge, a contest to discover the top open source analytical tools that can mine XBRL-formatted corporate financial data from the SEC’s EDGAR database. Similar to the previous contest, this one will award a $20,000 Grand Prize to the top two teams, individuals or organizations that submit the most useful and user-friendly application that conducts innovative analysis of public companies. The XBRL Challenge is sponsored by the American Institute of CPAs, the CFA Institute, and Wharton Research Data Service. To date, over 8,800 public companies file Extensible Business Reporting Language-formatted financial statements down to the detailed level. Legislation is also pending that would require the use of XBRL-formatted data for reporting on all government program expenditures, which could make XBRL-enabled tools for processing, reporting and analysis even more critical for investors, analysts, regulators, businesses, watchdogs, economists and academics …
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Judge Faults SEC Oversight in Wall Street Research Accord
Reuters
U.S. securities regulators drew sharp criticism from a federal judge who said they have failed to properly oversee a $55 million investor education fund created by a nearly decade-old settlement with Wall Street banks. The fund had been created as part of a roughly $1.5 billion regulatory accord in 2003 with Citigroup Inc (C.N), Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N), JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) and other banks accused of publishing biased analyst research. U.S. District Judge William Pauley in Manhattan said the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has shown a “lack of oversight” and “indifference” toward how a nonprofit organization charged with distributing the money has been managed. He faulted the regulator for tolerating “opaque” and seemingly wasteful spending by the nonprofit, the FINRA Investor Education Foundation, as well as “inadequacies” in its auditing …
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Study: Misconduct Reporting on the Rise in US Companies
Examiner
The Ethics Resource Center released just yesterday, their findings of a National Business Ethics Survey (NBES) of employees at Fortune 500 companies (www.ethics.org). The report concluded that the highest revenue companies are showing a higher incidence of misconduct. According to the study, about 52 percent of workers in the higher revenue companies were reporting misconduct occurrences in the last 12 months over 45 percent at other U.S. companies. The survey also reported that 16 percent of the workers felt pressure to break the rules and Whistleblowers were more likely to experience retaliation at the higher revenue companies as well. Ethics Resource Center President Patricia J. Harned was optimistic about the increase in reports attributing the higher reporting rates to strong ethics programs …
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Media Watch: Newsweek Owner Says Magazine to Shift to Online-Only
Bloomberg
Newsweek will eventually transition to an online publication, owner IAC/InterActiveCorp (IACI) said yesterday, marking the beginning of the end for the money-losing magazine’s 79-year run as a print weekly. IAC Chairman Barry Diller made the announcement during a quarterly conference call, saying the New York-based company aims to curb investments in the business. Newsweek is projected to lose as much as $22 million this year, according to a person with direct knowledge of the matter. Still, Diller stopped short of saying the magazine would undergo a “total” shift online. “The transition to online from hard print will take place,” Diller said. “We’re examining all of our options.” A plan for Newsweek will be announced as early as September, Diller said …
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AOL Banks on Ad Market Rationality to Drive Revenues
ClickZ
Data-driven rationality is driving the online ad market, but AOL needs to play catch-up to harness that trend. AOL CEO Tim Armstrong said as much during the Q2 earnings call with investors during which the company reported 6 percent global ad revenue growth compared to Q2 2011, propelled by international display and third-party ad network growth. Ad revenues hit $337.8 million in the second quarter, however domestic display revenue was flat at $126.8 million. It was international display revenue – which grew by 21 percent to $13 million – that buoyed overall display to 2 percent growth, AOL reported. Meanwhile, the third-party Ad.com network brought in $111 million, a boost of 19 percent year-over-year. The company said it is focused on optimizing campaigns for advertisers in the network …
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NBC Says It Has Reached $1 Billion in Olympics Advertising
New York Times
NBC said it had reached a previously untouched number in terms of advertising sales for a single television event: as of Wednesday, the network had taken in $1 billion in advertising for the coming Olympics in London. “It is an important number and a symbolic number for us,” said Seth Winter, the executive vice president for sales of the NBC Sports Group. “It is unprecedented for any event to hit that kind of number.” NBC sold about $850 million in advertising for the Beijing Games four years ago. One key to the growth this year has been digital advertising, which is up 200 percent from four years ago. The $1 billion figure includes sales across all the networks and entities that will carry portions of NBC’s coverage, which includes NBC, MSNBC, CNBC, Bravo, Telemundo, the NBC Sports Network, NBCOlympics.com, apps for mobile and tablet devices and, for the first time, a 3-D channel …
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