Check out this fantastic video from “the most ripped copywriter on the ‘net,” John Carlton. It’s 51-minute clip of his presentation at Frank Kern’s Mass Control seminar.
John is making this available for free for a limited time as part of his Simple Writing System Express promo, so PLEASE do yourself a favor and watch it. You may want to take notes.
Be advised that there is some coarse language.
P.S. I had to refresh the page a few times to get the video to load. It’s worth the trouble.
Pelan namun pasti, twitter sudah diakui pengaruhnya di jagad maya Indonesia. Sudah jutaan orang Indonesia yang menggunakannya. Mulai dari artis, penyanyi, pemasar, politikus, olah ragawan, orang IT, wartawan, orang iklan, rohaniwan, sampai orang umum pun nge-tweet.
Ada yang bisa memanfaatkannya dengan baik, seperti Pandji Pragiwaksono (artis, presenter, rapper) nge-tweet untuk membentuk citranya sebagai artis yang peduli dengan ke-Indonesiaan, namun ada pula yang gagal memasuki lingkungan twitter seperti Mario Teguh (motivator) karena tweet-nya yang kontroversial.
Beberapa produk (brand) pun sudah memasuki twitter. Bahkan, perusahaan-perusahaan yang masuk dalam jajaran 100 perusahaan TOP dunia kebanyakan telah menggunakan twitter sebagai salah satu alat pemasarannya.
Bagaimana dengan Anda? Sudah punya account di twitter? Apakah Anda juga menggunakan twitter untuk memasarkan diri dan atau brand Anda?
Berikut ini beberapa tips yang semoga bisa membantu Anda ketika memanfaatkan twitter sebagai alat pemasaran.
Pertama, nge-tweetlah sesuatu yang bernas. Ingat, twitter merupakan microblogging, dibatasi 140 karakter untuk sekali posting. Jadi, cobalah untuk nge-tweet sesuatu yang berkualitas seputar topik yang kita tekuni atau di mana kita terlibat. Jika memang tweet Anda bermutu, pasti akan banyak yang me-retweet. Apa untungnya ketika Anda diretweet? Tentu saja, Anda akan lebih banyak dikenal, sehingga akan difollow, dan pendapat anda dijadikan referensi.
Kedua, follow orang-orang yang sekiranya penting bagi Anda. Follow orang / tokoh yang selingkungan dengan ceruk pasar Anda. Follow juga website-website penyedia referensi penting tentang dunia Anda.
Ketiga, pantau tweet dari lingkungan ceruk pasar Anda. Kemudian, berinteraksilah dengan mereka. Ciptakan dialog dengan mereka. Bila perlu, tambahkan sesuatu yang bernilai ketika berinteraksi.
Keempat, ikutilah apa yang sedang menjadi trending topik. Paling tidak, yang sedang tren di timelines Anda dan di ceruk pasar Anda. Twitter adalah social media yang real time. Jadi, ikutilah. Tapi tetap ingat, saringlah informasi-informasi yang penting.
Kelima, integrasikan blog / website Anda dengan twitter. Jika perlu, gunakan robot twitter. Tentang pembuatan robot twitter telah dibahas dalam website ini.
Keenam, ketika Anda / brand Anda sedang mengadakan program-program atau acara, baik offline maupun online, jangan segan untuk “melaporkan”nya secara real time melalui twitter.
Ketujuh, ciptakan karakter Anda. Mungkin ini yang butuh proses agak lama. Yang terpenting adalah, konsistensi. Konsisten dengan topik yang Anda tweet, konsisten dengan bahasa Anda, dan konsisten dengan kontinyuitas tweet Anda.
Semoga tips tersebut bermanfaat. Jika Anda punya tips lain, saya sangat senang jika Anda mau berbagi juga di sini.
Artikel ini saya tulis untuk rumahdot.com
Well, I survived the intellectual and physical journey that is SXSW Interactive. I came away very impressed and full of new knowledge, ideas, contacts and swag… my social media batteries recharged. My big take-aways from the event were not so much the headlines – like the buzz surrounding the “location-aware” apps like Foursquare and Gowalla or the launch of various new products and services – but valuable lessons about why the event works, and what organizations eager to leverage social media and/or foster real innovation can learn from it.
Is word of mouth really the best form of advertising?
Word of mouth is the best form of advertising. If you haven’t heard that a billion times you must be only 5 years old. It’s one of those things that “everyone knows”. Well if “everyone knows” this gem of knowledge, then why are so few companies actually DOING the things that create great word of mouth for their company?
Attracting new customers is always important. A healthy flow of new customers to a business keeps the business alive. Our current economic condition magnifies this need. So, recognizing that there IS an overall awareness of the constant need for new customers it could simply be that the apparent lack of effort in customer service is due to a lack of understanding, by both management and staff, as to what is considered great customer service and how, exactly, to provide it.
If a business is providing adequate, normal, regular run-of-the-mill service they will get SOME word of mouth referrals. The way this works is that if, for instance, someone asks you where to go for dry cleaning or computer repair you will most likely want to give some recommendation. People generally want to be helpful and we all like to give advice, so we will give some answer, we will often refer someone to a place where we received simply mediocre service. The point is that if you are providing what is considered to be good, or acceptable service you can only expect a few referrals.
On the other hand great word of mouth comes from a remarkable or memorable experience. Lets say that you have been in to your local veterinary hospital, or Thai restaurant and the experience was memorable you very possibly will not wait until some asks you for a good vet clinic or Thai place before you tell people about it. Your word of mouth becomes unsolicited. Have you ever done this or seen it done? I have seen people talking up their hair stylist or espresso stand to people who are bald or don’t even like coffee!
Let there be no mistake, unsolicited word of mouth is what will really drive in more new customers. This is (or should be) the goal of any company.
Unsolicited word of mouth DEFINITELY applies for bad service! Customers who are irate with a business will sometimes tell as many as 20, 30, maybe up to 50 people about their bad experience, with out ever being asked directly about the business.
Be sure to read the three related entries in the “Word Of Mouth” series for more!
Say that four times and stay unaffected. Go on, I dare you!
I have finally reached the point where I can follow the story line of CSI in French. I can’t understand every word, mind you, but most of them. The fact that it’s an American series always helps, because they speak at about a tenth of the speed of the locals, so the dubbing is slow enough for non-smurfs to follow.
Naturally, getting to this advanced level of Television proficiency has required intensive french lessons. Three hours a week, apart from this week, when my teacher got a mysterious infection of a bodypart that I could not identify and had to cancel our second lesson. In hindsight, I wonder if it was a coincidence that she got sick just after I spent the entire lesson laughing at her language.
We finally got onto commony used phrases last week. I’ve heard them around the office, but never paid enough attention to realise how funny they sound! Qu’est-ce que c’est, cela? Is used about ten times a meeting by the general population. It’s meant to sound as if you’re drunk and slurring, in case you were wondering, and it means “what is it?” Seriously. Now, in marketing, where I work, people are allowed to be more arty, and I have proof, because they use the word “truc” more often than they use the word “oui”. Truc means trick or thing. Seriously. Oh, and “piste” is another favourite. It actually means ski slope, but they’ve adopted it to mean course of action. So in the average marketing meeting, four people sit around saying “j’ai fait un truc, qu’est-ce que c’est cu truc, d’accord, nous avons deux pistes” and so on. In other words “mumble, stutter, truc; drunken slur, truc; hack up a hairball (their word for OK); mumble, mumble, duh pissed.”
Listen to that four times and stay unaffected. I dare you!
I am pleased to announce our 25th March 2010 seminar is a “sell out”.
For those of you who thought about going but didn’t email us in time, I have scheduled another seminar for 20th May 2010.
The Details:
Your Invitation to a Free Seminar – Financial Controls For Your Business
Do you want to take more control of your business finances?
Are you busy invoicing but have no cash?
Not sure how much money you are really making?
Avegna are presenting a free seminar for business owners and managers on practical financial control tools that really work!
Who should attend? Business owners or managers who want to know more about the basic financial control tools big businesses use and how to apply these to your business.
What: We will walk you through how to use the practical tools in your business such as :
•Sales Pipeline Report
•Accounts Receivable Reporting and Collections action tools and processes
•Accounts Payable management tools
•Cashflow Forecasting model
•KPI’s and Dashboards
•Budgets and Forecasting
All attendees will receive a copy of the presentation slides, a free cashflow forecast spreadsheet model to use in your own business and the other financial control tools and templates as discussed during the seminar.
Where: The boardroom at Corporate House, 155 Varsity Parade, Varsity Lakes, QLD 4226
When: Thursday 20th May 2010 from 9.00am – 10.30am (AEST)
How to book your place: Places are limited at this seminar. Please email us on info@avegna.com.au to reserve your place as soon as possible and we will confirm your attendance details by reply email. No walk up attendances will be possible due to the limited seats.
About the presenter: Scott Lyall is a KPMG trained Chartered Accountant who for over 15 years worked at a senior level in some of the largest multinational organisations in the world including Cadbury, Mobil, AXA, Shell, British Telecom and Dell Computer Corporation. After working in London for over five years Scott returned to Australia and has worked as a senior finance executive for several company groups both public and privately owned. Scott established Avegna to assist small to medium sized (SME) businesses run their finances without the need to hire full time employees.
If you know of other people who may want to attend please forward this invitation to them.
We look forward to seeing you there!
Scott Lyall
CEO of Avegna
Okaaaay, so there was some on-going media buzz about the magic drama being similar (or not) to us real life illusionists… see J C’s blog Backstage Business for all about The Illusionist. Uh, the recently ended Channel U television series, not the Hollywood flick starring Edward Norton.
J C’s written his thoughts about it and I haven’t blogged much about the subject simply because I’m quite impartial about it… I mean… TV is TV, life imitates art but art also imitates life. I think people are smart enough to form their own conclusions about things, and anyway, it’s after all, just entertainment. J C’s never made any accusations, but merely pointed out his own opinions, and it’s his blog anyway. He’s got every right.
My $0.02 is that I think it’s cool that Mediacorp TV’s interested in doing a Mandarin magic drama, and hired a local production company to put it all together. Their research writers must have had a field day 
IMHO, though I haven’t caught an episode because of my hectic work schedule, I think it really rocks to have a strong female character like Ann Kok’s “Babe Yong” character who also does escapes and illusions
Personally, J C & I had a lot of fun working with Thomas Ong (“James Lee”) & Mei Xin (“Ming”) during The Illusionist magic segment for the annual Mediacorp Festival last year, when we were hired by Mediacorp to produce the stage performance bits for them. You saw the videos and pics!
Anyways, I hope the local production company’s got the ratings and response they want for the TV series, who knows… maybe there will be a Part 2! 
The sequel could feature some loser-ish “competitors” of James Lee who try to pull him down, ALA crab mentality/ tall poppy syndrome “Tio flame!”
One could be a two-faced magician who pretends to be cordial and gentlemanly but actually backstabs James and tries hard to bring him down, trying to give James a foul reputation by fueling untrue rumors about the guy just to feel better about himself because of professional jealousy as he’s extremely unhappy that he doesn’t get the recognition James has.
Another can be a bitter, ungrateful, angry, disgraced ex-disciple or 师兄 of James Lee who lies to the world (or just doesn’t give the whole truth) about the reasons why he was actually told by James Lee to leave years ago, because of unethical decisions the guy himself actually made.
And most importantly, there must be a fat evil clown who pretends to be nice and funny, but is actually very vengeful and black-hearted. He pretends to be James Lee and impersonates him online just to bring down his reputation – but gets found out after awhile because (surprise, surprise) karma always has a way of getting around!
Green with envy, the guys hate James Lee to death because of the illusionist’s stellar track record, fame and success… but they still strangely keep a very close watch on everything he does. And instead of improving themselves to be better, the funny clique (like they always say – birds of a feather, flock together) try their best to smear James Lee’s reputation instead. But! Karma has a way of getting around, and irate people with bad intentions never ever win, because James Lee has people who look out for him and anyways, good always triumphs over evil – not just in real life but in TV serials too lah!
I know, I know… such crazy outlandish ideas huh? I’m no television scriptwriter, so I’ll leave these creative ideas for the real pros *grin* It was fun to think up of such low-life nemesis for the fictional character of James Lee anyways!
So yeah. I didn’t get to watch the finale episode of The Illusion on Channel U last night because I was actually at the Mediacorp Radio Awards *grin* I was there to support the BFF & my other DJ friends who were also nominated… Pamela Ho, Stanley Leong, Melanie Oliverio of 938LIVE; Jean Danker, Glenn Ong, Mark aka Flying Dutchman of Class 95; Ivy Tan & Dennis Chew of YES 933; Justin Ang & Vernon A aka The Muttons on 987
Jean, Justin & Pam were SMSing me during the show and I must say that Justin (who was also with me at the Hall of Fame Awards at our Alma Mata earlier this year) can really multi-task, because he would reply me swiftly backstage and he was emcee-ing with Vernon! LOL…
As usual, the Muttons were stellar, and the pair was brilliant as the hosts for the evening. It’s always great to be on their show, they seriously are a fab duo. There’s just no one else like them
Here are some pictures from the evening… which by the way, are taken using my iPhone, so they aren’t very impressive as the hp camera has no zoom function plus I couldn’t wander around to play shutterbug. I spent the whole evening with my bum parked on the seat of my reserved seat arranged for me, and it was a tad weird and took some getting used to because the BFF & I traded places for once – she on stage and yours truly, ‘Magic Babe’ Ning, in the audience. LOL!
From my vantage point, I spy… the pretty BFF in her designer dress & her colls from 938LIVE make their appearance on stage on cue, and go to their assigned seats.
The hosts for the evening were the Muttons and they were wickedly hilarious with zany antics the whole night… ranging from snide digs at Fann Wong & Christopher Lee; Tiger Woods & Jack Neo; Ris Low and her condom ambassador-ship; the works!Everyone was howling with laughter…
Here’s the BFF, #1 on the 938LIVE voting screen… Her partner Stanley Leong, co-host of their “Livingroom” talkshow, received the award His brother also received the same award, of Most Popular DJ, for Lush 99.5
My darling friend Jean Danker won her first award after years in showbiz, having gotten the most number of votes for most popular DJ in Class 95 Irene Ang, who’s always been an inspiration, gave away the award for the English stations and as always, her antics and wisecracks made everyone laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh…
It was a happy night for the couple as Jean’s other half, Glenn, bagged the Media Personality of the Year award The Muttons bagged the same award for their station, 987 …and as expected, YES933’s Dennis Chew aka Aunty Lucy also won a special award. For more information, see Channel News Asia.
Congrats y’all!
Awards galore aside, the evening had various singing acts entertain us – folks from overseas who were having gigs here. Jason Castro from American Idol ended the evening with his lovely voice It was nice to be entertained, for a change…
In all, the entire event wrapped up only past 10PM, and the famished BFF grabbed hold of me & we went off for supper. That’s us doing a quick 自拍 on her camera just before heading into the elevator, down to the car park!
It was the BFF’s special night and I’m really proud of Pam… she may not have bagged an award from the evening, but she’d always be a radiant star in my eyes, with all the differences this amazing woman has made! You rock, BFF!
Are you a coach interested in social media marketing? Have you been using social networking web sites, such as Facebook and Twitter for a while, but you haven’t gotten any coaching clients from them? The good news is that you can get coaching clients with social marketing, and it is not hard to do. Read this article for my four tips on getting coaching clients using web sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
Here are the top four tips for promoting your coaching business using social media marketing:
1. Define Your Social Media Marketing Goals.
Too many coaches jump into social marketing without a plan, without setting goals for the results they want to get from those web sites, and without creating systems in their business to support their marketing efforts.
Start by setting goals for your social marketing efforts – one of them should be building your list. Once you know what your goals are, it is going to be easier to see whether your social networking efforts are bringing in results.
2. Create Systems In Your Business To Support Your Social Media Efforts.
Even if you spend all of your time on social networking web sites, you are not going to get results unless you have systems in your business to support your social networking efforts and help you convert people you meet on social networking web sites into coaching clients.
Some of the systems you need include a way to invite people you meet on websites such as Facebook and Twitter to get a free gift from you and get on your list, a way to keep in touch with them and a way to convert them into coaching clients once they are on your list.
3. Network On A Regular Basis.
In order to get regular, consistent results from social media(such as more coaching clients), you must network on a regular basis. Share useful tips and ideas, share your blog posts, answer questions asked by your contacts.
Help others, and you will see that more and more people will be interested in what you have to say, and will join your list as a result.
4. Evaluate Your Social Media Efforts.
You will not know how well social media marketing is working for you unless you track your results. Evaluate your networking results on a regular basis to see what kind of results you are getting.
The Ecobuild trade show at London’s Earl’s Court proved to be the most successful yet, and was a great place to launch the new tCn online network (see post).
I also learned that we had to be flexible and responsive to changing circumstances during the three days. For example, we had hoped that Jason Leonard would be on our stand on the final day to do a video interview, but he unfortunately was unable to attend. Instead, we called on some of our early tCn associate members (like ESI’s Benedikte Ranum and MLM’s Geoff Wilkinson) and asked what they thought about the tCn concept….
Congratulations to the winners of our prize draw (Redland, SHEBA Marketing, Corus Colors, and NHBC) and many thanks to our sponsors (Supertravel Golf and Fairmont St Andrews) for donating the fantastic prizes.
I’m positively schizophrenic when it comes to the idea of marketing my book.
There are times when I’m totally resentful of the way I’m supposed to march cheerfully into the book-selling jungle, like a Girl Scout, and machete away all the indifference that stands between my book and best-sellerdom. I admire the rectitude of a J.D. Salinger. I’d like to reclaim the dignity of being a person of letters, instead of tap-dancing into a room like some goddamn soap salesman.
And then there are the other times, when I go on VistaPrint.com and start mocking up “Cars from a Marriage” keychains. (Too expensive.)
In the beginning of February, I started a Facebook fan page for myself, which has been joined by a bunch of people being nice to me. I’m trying to whip up a frenzy of anticipation for my book by dropping little conversational hints (how ’bout them Toyota accelerators?) but there’s dead silence. My friend Pam Satran does a brilliant job of this over at her fan page for “How Not to Act Old.” Am I just stupid at this, or is it subject matter?
Last night, I got the brilliant idea to buy a Facebook ad to promote my Facebook page. It’s pretty low-risk. I set a budget of $1.50 a day, agreeing to pay Facebook a few pennies for every thousand times the ad was seen. I even memorized the number of members of my fan page before I bought the ad: 166. Today, 10,118 impressions later and $1.50 poorer, my Facebook page is up to a whopping … 166 members.
Oh my.
Maybe when some reviews start coming in (there’s a nice one coming out in Booklist on April 1) I’ll have something meaningful to say to my “fans.”
Or maybe I should just start marketing the book for its practical attributes:
I was last Monday at a cocktail reception organized by Croissance Québec Techno where I attended a great presentation from Bill K. Aulet, the Managing Director of the MIT Entrepreneurship Center.
Bill’s talk was about entrepreneurial marketing (you can download his slideshow here). I’ve particularly liked it. His main advice to the entrepreneurs in the room was to focus on customers: “Every day,we should talk to new clients, get their feedbacks and understand their needs”. In this global world, Bill suggests to use social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc… (“The entrepreneur best friends“)
This is obviously also true in technology transfer. There are thousands of great and unknown technologies in universities and one of our main challenges, as technology transfer officers, is to reach our audience. This can very complicated since, in some cases, we’re working on (very) early technologies or even sometimes on “solutions looking for problems” (I’ve some examples of those, if you’re interested…). We then have to find visionary individuals who believe in the projects and who see what people usual don’t.
I’ve already been working in technology transfer for Univalor for 5 years now. During this time, I had the chance to talk to people from almost all the continents from Canada to South Africa, Australia, almost of the countries of Europe, China or Japan. Our audience is then everywhere and in all kinds of companies. Using the social networking sites in technology transfer is then a must!
Therefore, if you’re either seeking to extend the competitiveness of your company or looking for your next venture, here is the list of my best friends:
You can also search in my portfolio or read our quaterly newsletter on Univalor’s wesbite:
Or discover, Univalor’s technologies on Flintbox:
Fedora view from a window.
Started reading a new book on the airplane en route to Raleigh for the Marketing FAD — Purple Cow, by Seth Godin. There was a quote at the beginning of the book which I thought was particularly poignant:
“Create remarkable products that the right people seek out.” – Seth Godin, “Purple Cow”
Day 1 of Marketing-FAD-Goodness involved a number of things in terms of deliverables – but one of the most important things, at least in my humble opinion, that we’re working on is developing a solid marketing plan that we can use moving forward. We did a lot of talking – and writing, and typing, and hashing out, as well – today about… who are the Right People? What are the things that Marketing is doing – or perhaps, should be doing – to reach those people, and what are the qualities of Fedora that make it remarkable that we should be talking about, promoting, and so forth? We came up with a solid of strategies to reach the Right People – and to go along with it, a tactical list of executable things to do.
Another thing we’ve been talking about a lot — which, actually, isn’t restricted to Marketing, btw — is the process of getting rid of the fear of doing things, and instead, just doing SOMETHING. We started the afternoon today with a Marketing Plan that was a plan in the most traditional sense; i.e., something that one would actually look at and learn how to produce in a college-level marketing course. Unfortunately, those marketing plans have been, for years and years, geared towards traditional companies, who do traditional things; Fedora is none of these. So we are, in a sense, sort of re-writing how to do a Marketing plan, for an open source project, in an open fashion. None of this comes easy. And for a long time, it hasn’t come at all. So I think it’s great that today, we took the first steps towards actually solidifying a Marketing plan that is actually actionable for the Fedora project as a whole; we are going Somewhere, which, frankly, is better than Nowhere. Even if we start walking and we run into a wall, or some sort of blocker, at least we know that that route is bad. And we can try, try again in a different direction. It’s sort of like Wombat. 
Except, you know, with ponies. And the Right People. And a remarkable product.
Oh, how ’bout them Phoenix Coyotes?
Manager Marketing
Min.8to 10 yrs experience of HAVC
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Emal:ecoducts@gmail.com
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I’ve had the great privilege to work at Mozilla for about 2.5 years now, and time after time there are some things which always stand out:
People will tell you with no surprise, this is the kind of backbone and success of open and decentralized organizations. But I will tell you, unless you’ve experienced the possibilities in action, and worked with such a team to truly create, its hard to appreciate what this kind of dedication and commitment is all about.
A current example is Mozilla’s Open to Choice campaign, whereby scores of people are coming together from across Europe intent on informing and educating people about the importance of the Web browser, and why that informed choice matters. The campaign sets out to help tens of millions of Europeans who are currently experiencing the Microsoft Browser Choice screen, an initiative from Microsoft which gives Internet Explorer users the opportunity to choose their own Web browser. So far together Mozilla has -
Our campaign is on going, but at this stage I would like to call out some heartfelt thanks to the Mozilla teams, and our ever present wider community including: Members of the Mozilla Marketing community who have already done so much to share and spread browser choice in Europe. Our design community who helped create web site and campaign assets. And a special thanks goes to *all* the l10n teams who worked tirelessly, burning much midnight oil to get the campaign site live in 15 locales. Plus, to many friends and partners of Mozilla who are also making this campaign possible, a heartfelt thanks to you.
Patrick Finch also has a blog post thanking everyone who worked on the Browser Choice screen for Mozilla.
I’ve said this at least 50 times in the last few weeks, but I’ll say it again here – working on a project such Open to Choice, which has so much importance, to so many people, created by so many committed individuals — is a true inspiration. There’s no doubt in my mind that informing millions of people about the importance of browser, and Web choice is exactly the right thing to do. And that’s what we’ll keep doing!
Internet Marketing is also known as I-Marketing, Web Marketing, Online Marketing, and E-Marketing. It involves connecting to the target market through the Internet or the World Wide Web. It is somewhat similar to traditional marketing in terms of goals; but it has a completely diverse set of strategies as the channel being used is definitely different.
To add, the techniques that must be used in internet marketing must cater to the virtual audience or the Internet users. It must be appealing to the online target market. It has its own components. Its significance has been known around the world, and learning how this industry works is truly an advantage.
Just like any other marketing strategy, Marketing Online has its basics that are surely easy to understand. Start with these and get ready to take the next steps in this lucrative industry.
“We’d like you to order up some new company T-shirts for us.” You need to get up to speed on buying this type of thing… fast!
Here is some important real world knowledge about the promotional product buying process…
Prices and Products are Not the Same as at Target - Newer and less experienced buyers are usually sticker-shocked at how much an item will cost when purchased for promotional purposes. “But I can get a Hanes T-shirt at Target for $3″ they muse when their distributor quotes a price of $6 for what they feel is the same shirt with just some printing on it. In some cases it might be the same shirt or something very similar.
Here’s the situation. Large retailers are buying product by the truckloads. Notice that it is truckloads with a “s.” They have huge centralized buying forces that negotiate based on volume and many other factors such as shipping. Your 144 piece order is a short, special order run even for the distributor and his suppliers. Plus, you are buying occasionally and they usually don’t know when your next order might come in. Thus the higher pricing to cover their costs to hand hold you through your order without guarantees for future business. Additionally, your distributor or decorator incurs costs to set up presses and process your order. These are also built into your price.
You Need “Good” Art – If you email a JPEG file of your logo to your promotional product distributor, first he’ll just shake his head and say, “Not another one.” In this situation, your distributor may ask you to provide electronic artwork in a “vector” format such as Encapsulated Postscript (.eps) or Adobe Illustrator (.ai). These formats provide clean-edged art that is required for imprinting and can usually be provided by your company’s graphic designer. Alternatively, they may charge you an art clean-up fee to make it print-ready.
Your Distributor is Not Printing Your Product in His Office or Basement – Promotional products are typically imprinted at large facilities that can handle orders of hundreds or thousands pieces each. Your distributor is not printing them for you at his or her company. So suggesting that you can pick up your order at your distributor’s office to save some time or shipping costs will not be met with a positive response.
Shipping and Handling Costs and Issues Can be Huge – After the product price sticker shock, shipping and handling fees are often the aftershock. There are multiple issues.
First, a single tote bag, T-shirt, or mug may seem like a small item. Now multiply that by 1,000 or more. The sheer physical volume of a large quantity of promotional products can overwhelm your office or dock. Also, thousands of boxed up pieces could be of significant weight, maybe even into the hundreds or thousands of pounds. Ask your distributor for information on the shipment size and weight and how it will be delivered to you so you can plan accordingly. While you’re at it, ask them for an estimated shipping cost, too.
Second, expedited shipping is very, very, very expensive! In many cases, your product will not be shipping from the person or company from which are buying. It may be shipping across the country to your door. Many distributors do their best to look for the closest suppliers to shorten shipping time and cost. So allow for sufficient time to get the product produced plus the time to ship to you.
Now that you know more about the promotional products industry and the buying process, you won’t be sending out a newbie alert when you contact your distributor.
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The bastard child of capitalism and mediocrity...
So McDonalds sells really great coffee! And awesome pecan nut tarts! And they’ve been doing it for a while.
Of course, you’d be forgiven for not knowing this, since the advertising/marketing behind this new-ish (it’s been around for a while overseas) offering has been pretty dire.
Actually, it’s been non-existent.
For some reason, it’s been decided that it’s just not worth the effort to get us excited about the Mc-Coffee vibe, unlike this little effort that could easily have been replicated or (GOD FORBID!) even improved upon, down here.
It’s nothing new. The same thing happened with District 9’s marketing. We missed the entire campaign by about 2 months. Our own local media only caught a whiff of it by the time it was winding down overseas.
And clearly adidas just doesn’t see the benefits in extending its global marketing programme to this country. The Star Wars range of sneaks (which marketing campaign I’ve written about somewhat) arrived in the stores about a week or so ago without so much as a rogue storm trooper.
Why do we put up with this box-checking, mediocre approach?
Probably because we don’t know any better. Probably because we’re so used to mediocrity being churned out at us, we think it’s the norm.
Maybe one day, we’ll catch on that brands need to prove they deserve our support. Maybe we’ll force them to all behave like Nandos who work really hard to show us something new. Maybe one day we’ll make it so that they understand that they need us more than we need them.
Or we’ll just carry on playing Farmville…
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I had made new friends, a diverse group comprised of Local Caribbean people, French, English, Australian, Canadian and Americans living in the Grand Case area. They were Musicians, Artists, Chefs, Waiters, Landowners and Landlords, and Business Owners, etc. One of my new friends was Mair Pattersun, a long time resident in Grand Case from England, who had been painting acrylics on Orient and the rest of the island for many years already. We tossed about ideas for finding an outlet or a place to sell our art in Grand Case, especially in the evenings when the tourists were about before and after dinner.
Pierre Bruyer, an Frenchman who was an acrylic on canvas artist, lived on the Boulevard, just down the alley from me with his wife and brood of children. He had invited me the prior year to set up on his porch a few nights and sell. Good laughs, good times. By this time I had also met Gloria and Marty Lynn, big name American artists who lived in the back of their little gallery house next to Bistro Caribes for about 30 years. They too, let me set up on their porch at the gallery entrance. Good conversations, knowledgeable people. I wanted my own art location on the Boulevard and I was looking.
Meanwhile, I spent my days selling on Orient. I dressed for the day in one of my pretty beach sundress, jewelry, makeup, a distinctive hat, and aviator sunglasses, flat-soled leather strap sandals. My backpack contained approximately 30 rolled plastic-wrapped signed and numbered prints with towel, lunch, and a 32 oz. frozen bottle of water. I closed and locked all the windows, and with my display folio of my latest artwork and keys, stepped outside the sliding glass door to the balcony entrance. Closed the door, and put the long bar in place, with a key padlock, reaching from the bottom of the outer door, up in a diagonal, to fit into the lock bolt holes on the opposite side, and click the lock into place. I always parked somewhere in the middle of the Orient Beach back road, in case of rain or need of more prints kept in the car. At first I parked at Kontiki, but later realized that Kakao Restaurant was a closer place to park, right behind their Soka Bar entrance.
Early in December and after the beach, I showered and dressed again, and walked around the corner to the Lolos to get some ribs, plantains, slaw and mac n’ cheese to bring back home for dinner. Between the Lolos and closer to IL Nettuno Restaurant there was a small retail shop in a white wooden shack, with a side window and shelf open to the Lolos, and an open door front. A woman named Corrine was inside, she sold ladies clothing and accessories for the tourists, pareos and polished cotton one size fits all colorful beachy island vacation clothes. We got to talking through the window, I was looking at the bare white wooden wall on the outside of the shack and neighboring one, recessed from the street, and closer to the Lolos, wondering if she could sublet the wall space and the shelf ledge, and run a cord for lights? She did. $50 per week. I shared my find with Mair, and we split the rent.
We sold prints, and got commissions to paint originals. About 10 days later, Corrine surprised me by asking if I would like to sublet the entire shop? She offered to remove everything inside, reasoning that business wasn’t good enough for her. I was surprised, because I had been doing well enough those past few evenings outside her window. I had now purchased a used Shrink Wrap Machine, from Simpson Bay Art Gallery, and was able to display my prints under plastic mounted on cardboard on the walls. Corrine wanted $500 per month to sublet the shack. It seemed that local people on St. Martin traded a good deal in rounded US currency dollars. $20, $50, $100, $500. The dollar was strong then. It was coveted. When I asked her how much she rented it for she was honest that she paid $250 each month, with a year and a half left on her lease with a Marigot realtor. I was ecstatic, Mair not. I decided to give it a go anyway, and worked out a small deal with Mair for her to rent the outside wall and shelf. I agreed to give it to her for $25 per month. I took the shack, and soon found other reasons that Corrine and her husband Gerald did not want it. There was a leaky roof above, and during any rain, as the clouds rushed by, water came in. Corrine informed me that it was up to me to fix it if I wanted it done. A new roof would be necessary according to my workman, Changa. I gave the go ahead.
In the evenings Mair was outside the shop, I was inside dodging the leaks and New Year’s Eve was coming. I planned to be closed, and made party plans to go celebrate. My friend Kevin was going to come get me in his car and planned to go out to see friends around the island, to dine out, and then dance and party all night at Bikini or somewhere on Orient.
At 9:00 pm on New Year’s Eve 2000/2001, the power went out. Phoom. It was gone. All of the restaurants on the Boulevard and elsewhere in French Saint Martin lost power. As tourists and locals were being seated. As entrees were being served. As chefs in the kitchens all over the French Side were working, they went into the dark. What happened? Those establishments who had generators kept their guests. There was great disappointment for the all of the others, people and establishments. A very interesting evening driving around in the dark on the French Side, the Dutch Side however was unaffected and we stayed much to that area until later that evening when we went down to Orient where a few places had generators and music, before a ride home.
The first morning in 2001, I found out through the street grapevine that the 12 workers at the Margot Power Station went on strike in support of their brothers in Guadeloupe who were already on strike for some time. The strike continued for over 3 weeks! Right in the middle of season. As it continued from the first day to the next, any planned visitor tourist who found out from the news or Internet cancelled their reservations through April! Grand Case was dead. The Boulevard was empty, with a few tourists on Orient, and most of the tourists on the Dutch Side. My main concerns were that I was not in my little gallery at night earning money for Corrine.
Maintaining fresh food in my kitchen was a big challenge. I placed everything in the freezer to keep with what was previously frozen. Then I went to my corner grocerette and purchased ice that they had delivered each day. They had a generator for their small selection of produce items so I was able to get some broccoli, onions, 7-day-old mushrooms, what ever they had I used for my meals. I had a gas stove/small oven in the apartment that I had planned to only use in these types of emergencies, preferring otherwise to cook with electricity on a two-burner unit that I had purchased the prior year. I spent a great deal of time on the Dutch Side that month, coming home before dark, and playing guitar on my outside stairs in the evening before sleep. Every few days, in the middle of the night the power would strangely come on again for an hour or so. I learned to have a laundry wash ready to fill in the machine the moment I was awakened by a light coming on. Angry restaurant owners who’s food had spoiled, went to the power station and threw their wasted food garbage over the fence in protest.
During this uncertain month, I flew to Saba from the Dutch Side to spend a few nights at Scouts up in Windwardside. My friend Mair was staying with her friends Scott and Kendall at the Carpenter House below Mt. Scenery just inside of Windwardside, on right side the main road before the Church, coming up from the airstrip. We ate at a wonderful restaurant called Y2K and I thought that was a clever name. The scenery is breathtaking, the higher you go up the volcano, the greener it is. We climbed the 1000 stairs to the top, saw the miniature pre-historic palm trees there and looked down to the sea, and out to Sint Maarten Saint Martin and Saint Barts. I painted my first Saba watercolors that trip, the first of a few longer excursions.
The strike was settled, the power came back, but as many of you know, it was suspect to go off and on as a regular thing anyway. It was the same thing almost with the water system. That was particularly annoying when it happened that you got up in the morning and there was no water, or little pressure. It happened more than once in the years I lived there.
Back to the Boulevard at night, selling prints, getting commissions to paint. Having lots of fun. Dogs roamed the boulevard freely, and ate rib bones from the trash bins and garbage across from the Lolos. Visitors gave them encouragement with tidbits, me being a dog lover, no exception to the rest. One night, three dogs came to my gallery and I called them Brownie, Whitey and Blackie. The Brown one seemed more timid, and took a real liking to me. He was a bit dirty as beach dogs are, with a ratty torn collar and no tags what so ever. He would find me on the Boulevard some mornings when I got breakfast, or a loaf of bread and bar of butter from the French Bakery next to Il Nettuno, and follow me back to my apartment. I’d leave him at the bottom of my stairs with a laugh that he was a good dog, and friend. After a few weeks of this routine of his following, I told him that if he followed me that day, I was going to open the car door and see if he wanted to go for a car ride. He did, and I drove the dog to the Cole Bay Animal Hospital for a bath and dip to rid the many Ticks he had attached to him. He came out all shiny clean, with some white markings that I had not seen before. He was skinnier than I thought he should be and inquired about adopting him. I got a medical exam for him, and all the shots, a new dog collar and leash, dog food bowls and food and treats. I licensed him in my name back on the French Side, and officially named him Brownie.
Everyone seems to be related if they are a local in Grand Case. Cousins abounded. Maybe two months later, walking Brownie back in the morning from the Boulevard, one of the younger nephews of my landlord’s mother Stazie, who lived in the house next to us, saw Brownie and I walking, and asked me about the dog. He thought the dog looked familiar, that it may be one of Stazie’s nephews dogs. Stachie’s dog, Sparky! Stachie had a Grand Case Lolos restaurant facing the water, the one on the left side in the back, as you enter the middle of the group of buildings. I brought Brownie to see Stachie. He said yes, that’s my dog, but he runs away all the time, and he had too many dogs to keep track of them all. Stachie lived further up the Boulevard in the area before the road to the Grand Case Beach Club turns off the main road. He then told me to keep the dog, no problem! Brownie was a pretty good dog, well behaved in the apartment, but liked to pick fights with other dogs while on the leash with me out for a walk. These dogs were all loose and would bait him and taunt him to bark or fight. One day Brownie took to pulling me down the Boulevard frantically after a Bitch in heat. He jumped her and I could not stop him. After dragging him home (I almost had to carry him) I had the dog neutered. I got a lot of flack from the local men for doing it. Dogs are treated in the Caribbean almost the same way that Cows are in India. You don’t mess with them. They are free to do as they please, and to take away his manhood was the ultimate shame to the local men. Stachie heard of it, and was angry with me.
I had a new corrugated roof installed at my Lolo shack gallery by Changa, and a woman named Stephanie from Australia designed a 4 foot round plywood roof sign, and painted it with my new logo for the gallery I had named L’Art Au Lolo.
Spring turned into summer, In July, Corrine asked me if next year when her lease ended, would I like to buy the rights to the lease? What??? Was this legal? Everyone does it, she informed me. Her price would be $10,000 in US dollars. She pressed me about it, and I put her off until my planned return in late fall as season started up again. I had enjoyed that summer, with many off days at Cupecoy, Plum Bay Beach and out to lunch meeting Kevin at Port De Plaissance where our friend Julie was now the Chef at the outdoor restaurant next to the tennis courts. Julie’s cooking is well worth the drive, no matter where she is on the island. Later she went to the Hidden Forest Restaurant at Loterie Farm where she has been now for over 8 years or so. Go there and you will get the best cuisine on the island. I guarantee it, hands down.
Late in the summer, on a dark night my little shack of a gallery was broken into with a crowbar, the wall in the backside of the shop had been pried open on the beachside in the dark. I never left anything of value inside. I carried all of my prints, display racks, and original paintings to and fro each evening. Sometimes Brownie came with me, other times he stayed home to guard there. I always changed my routine, because things do happen on the island and I did not want it to happen to me. Having found nothing inside of my gallery, the thief took what items were there, the broom, hammer, nails, tape dispenser, scissors, sitting stool, and the lights. I called Changa, and he came and fortified my shop walls, and front door with a new system. I paid Corrine for some months ahead, closed the shop for the end of summer and early fall.
By this time I had painted the following watercolor scenes (in alphabetical order): Artist At Cupecoy Self Portrait 2000, View of Anse Marcel 2001, Baie Rouge 1997, Baie de Grand Case 2000, Butterfly Farm 2001, Baie Rouge Hill (commission) 2001, Boulevard de Grand Case 2000, Cupecoy Sunset 1999, Club Orient 1998, Cupecoy Beach 1997, Creole Rock 1998, Cole Bay 2000, Club Orient 2001 (big 18×24” in my home), Colombier 2001, Cupecoy Rock 2001, Cottage Under Mt. Scenery, Saba 2001, Club Orient 2000, Coco Beach 2000, Cupecoy Cliffs 2001, Dawn Beach 1999, Frair’s Bay 2001, Le Flamboyant 2001, French Cul De Sac (commissioned big 18 x 24”) 2001, Green Key and Tintamarre 1998, Port de Gustavia, St. Barts 2000, Great Bay, Philipsburg 2000, Grand Case Beach 2000, Grand Case Sunset 2001, Happy Bay 1999, Isle Pinel 1998, Kontiki 1998, Loterie Farm 2001, L’Escargot Restaurant 2001, Michael’s Café 2000, Marigot Harbor 2001, Orient Beach (acrylic on masonite) 1997, Orient Beach 1999, Oyster Pond 2001, Pinel Island Snorkel Beach 1999, Pedros 2000, Pirate Restaurant 2001, Road to Grand Case 1998, Rendezvous Bay, Anguilla 2001, Simpson Bay Lagoon 1999, Saline D’Orient 1999, Sandy Ground, Anguilla 2001, Uncle Ernie’s at Shoal Bay 2001, Soka Bar 2000, Tintamarre with Pink Lady 2000, Tan Lines 2001, and Windwardside Garden View, Saba 2001.
I now had prints selling in other places on the island. With Zuzu at Le California Restaurant’s gift shop, at Marla’s gift shop at the Grand Case Beach Club where Mair and marla’s son Bart worked, Paradise Restaurant above Orient Beach at the lookout, Karin at the Butterfly Farm’s gift shop, and with Mike and Marilyn at Michael’s Cafe in Grand Case. It was easy to be a one person business if I kept it simple and close by. I was not ready to be driving all over the island, but I was looking for opportunites to branch out. An opportunity came with an art gallery on Anguilla above Sandy Ground, and I was looking into St. Barts and Saba. I stocked up my distributor locations and got ready to go home for a break.
I made plans to fly home on Saturday, September 15 on Continental direct to Newark, NJ. I was taking Brownie with me, in a dog crate that I had purchased to check him in to the flight. I would visit with family until late November.
On the morning of September 11, 2001, Brownie and I went early to Cole Bay for a medical exam to get an okay on traveling papers that was valid for just two weeks. As the doctor was examining the dog, his radio was on playing music from a local station. There was an interruption to the music and an announcement came on that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center and it appeared to be a severe situation there. We finished up with the dog, and I drove straight back to my apartment. When I arrived I put on the TV and got CNN on the screen. I watched in horror footage of the buildings, at the smoke, and was sitting there watching it as the second plane hit. My skin turned to ice; I was numb and sat there trying to absorb it all for the rest of the day and into the next. The airports were closed. No flights in or out. Not in the USA, not in Sint Maarten either. No fresh food came in. There was a scramble at the grocerette and the shelves were emptied. I purchased as much poultry and fish as my freezer could hold and all manner of dry goods and sundries. I simply did not know if I would be going home at all.
But on September 22, the airports had been opened again, and with renewed travel papers for Brownie, and Changa having boarded up my windows and door on my apartment again, Kevin drove me to the airport where I boarded a flight home. Almost empty the flight had seven people aboard. I was given a seat in First Class, complement of the sole stewardess. What did I go home to? Great sadness in the US, Anthrax scares and high anxiety. My mom and I got a big blue bottle of water and kept it in the garage for an emergency situation. I thought to myself, what would the next season bring in Sint Maarten Saint Martin?
Frenchy – Next Segment Part V: 2002 – Holding on for What it’s Worth
What it means to be proactive?
A lot of people to me without getting an overall view of the word proactive. What does it mean for you? Not that the hesitation? What does "always at stake?" If you select "Yes", you're right, but there are a lot more.
They are the "cause" or "effect"?
If you have taken the idea that you are going to the effect of external forces, we are all at times, so you're not on your life or businessfrom the perspective of proposals. What to do if you are not enough customers? Do not blame the economy, interest rates, your boss, the environment in some way?
We often do not look inward and to affirm our personal power. Most of our training is for someone or something outside ourselves to blame for 'effect'. Maximizing in my 30 years of coaching people to their success, I think it is a profound turning point, when my client (s) decide to take the initiative and that"Cause". So next time you have a lack of customers, for example, ask what actions can we take? If you are unsure, you can find a book, a tape or a coach who will help you know what to do. Turn your concern into action and discover that you have the possibility of customers can be won.
Let the circumstances outside the control of your answer?
Suppose you worked Escrow or falls from a client that you decide to cancel? AsThey respond to these circumstances? It is obviously disappointed, but I wasted too many people who saw and depressed, when they know that starting from scratch. The problem is that when foreign to the point where the function can be controlled, productivity suffers. Then what are you afraid of, the money is usually not enough reality.
Here's a suggestion from the Law of Attraction: You get what you focus on him. Focusing on the lack of Escrow andWhat do you get? You're right, Escrow less. Focusing on the lack of customers, and what do you do? Right again, the customer is not enough. The solution? Jump to focus and quickly. Once you notice that the focus is on the wish to think quickly, as you want. A bank account?
Many clients? Stick that Escrow? Whatever it is take it in your conscience and the switch. Then ask yourself: "What's past actions have inspired me to do?" Inspired action will feel goodDrag a feeling from within. Frantic action is scattered and feel "out of sync."
An active means, choose your answers. Keys next time, ask yourself:
Or am I proactive or reactive?
Or am I the cause "ol '" effect "?
Oh, I'm concentrating on what I want and not what I want?
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Last Sunday I had a wonderful thing happen in my absence at church. My mother (who is one of my biggest fans ) took my book to her Sunday school class and, for lack of a better description, “marketed” it. Before the class was over there was a volunteer to write up an article for the church newsletter. Before the worship service that follows Sunday school concluded, the minister was informed of my book. He said that, if the person who volunteered to write the article hadn’t, then he would have. From there it’s supposed to make it’s appearance at the next monthly elders’ meeting. It seems that things are beginning to roll for Fear Not! Discovering God’s Promises for Our Lives.
So why does it all feel like I’ve failed?
It’s because of the POD stigma. As soon as someone says, “Congratulations on getting your book published!” I ask myself if I deserve the congratulations. Surely I do. I worked as hard putting together a book I’m proud of as a straight A university student does to stay on the Dean’s list. (I even “pulled an all-nighter” a time or two. )
Then comes the question, “Who published it?” I answer honestly that it was published by Lulu, but I don’t always add that it’s a large self-publishing company. That bothers me. Afterall, I’m a trail-blazer like all the other Indies out there.
I’ve been thinking about it all week and I have an idea why writers are stigmatized more so than any other Indie. We’re the customer who jumps into the “just opened” line at the store before anyone else realizes it’s open. The traditionalists are upset at themselves for not venturing outside the status quo. The good news is that there are traditionally published authors such as Stephen King, Douglas Rushkoff, and Douglas Clegg who are now jumping into self-publishing, according to M.J. Rose in the article Self-Publish Stigma Is Perishing.
On the flipside, Rose says there are also Indie authors being signed on to traditional publishing houses after their book breaks the 5,000 and 10,000 sales mark. That’s a very good reason to start out as a self-publisher. Of course, as Ray Robinson points out in his article Self Publishing Stigma, unless you do everything you can to market your book you’ll be lucky to end up in the 6% who break even. That’s why having a marketing strategy and doing as much research on marketing techniques is so important (and a subject for yet another post ).
There are a lot of reasons why achieving success as an Independent Author can sometimes feel like failure. Most of those boil down to letting the ubiquitous “other” make us feel unworthy of the title Author. I hope that someday we’ll all be able to through off our cloaks of undeserved shame and walk in the sun of success on The Road to Writing.
Dear Brand Team,
Please stop dumbing down my ideas on your personal whims. If you know just how to advertise your product, why hire us in the first place? You might know your product inside out, but we know advertising and the people’s psyche. Here’s the deal: you make the product, and leave the advertising part to the experts.
Sure, give us your insight, we might be able to use it. But don’t tell us where to place the logo, what sounds right or wrong, or what colors you want.
And don’t tell us that the approach is too radical. In today’s highly saturated market, your obsession with being “safe” is going to be the final nail in your brand’s coffin.
Regards,
Umair Kazi
Strategy Guy
There. Problem solved.
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![[Macaron]](http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/P1-AU031_Macaro_F_20100301190454.jpg)
Sara RossoA box of macarons at Ladurée in Paris.
Like the cupcake before it, the macaron, a French confection that resembles a pastel-colored sandwich cookie, is ready for its close-up.
It has been featured on film and television, in magazine articles and a new book called “I Love Macarons” by a Japanese pastry chef. Once the preserve of high-end French patisseries such as Ladurée and Pierre Hermé, macarons are showing up at retailers like Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s and Starbucks. Even McDonald’s is selling a scaled-down version in its McCafés in France, backed by ads showing two hands holding the tiny treat like a hamburger.
Instead of celebrating, however, fans of the meringue-like pastry have been whipped into a frenzy.
“Macarons are not meant to be mainstream,” sniffs Laetitia Brock, a native of Paris who has been blogging about French culture from Washington for the past six years. When she got wind that Starbucks was offering macarons over the holidays, she ran out and purchased a boxed set. “Very mushy,” she concluded, after a few bites.
Her negative blog post about the trend elicited a tempest over the tea cake.
The upper-crust French snack macarons are sold in high-end patisseries such as Laduree and Pierre Herme. Now chains like McDonald’s have added them to the menu. Can Parisians really tell the difference?“I saw them at the McCafé on the Champs-Élysées—just down the street from Ladurée! What is the world coming to?!?” commented Allison Lightwine, using the screen name La Mom.
“It was so weird to see these delicate, very French pastries in something that’s so American. It’s kind of like if you showed up in a tuxedo to a baseball game, it was so out of place,” Ms. Lightwine, who writes a blog about being an American mom in Paris, said in an interview.
The word macaron comes from “the Italian maccherone and the Venetian macarone (meaning fine paste), from which macaroni is also derived,” says Larousse Gastronomique, the encyclopedia of French cooking. Various sources trace the roots of the pastry to an Italian recipe from the Renaissance or a group of French monks who modeled the dessert after the shape of their own belly buttons.
More recently, the macaron has been a hallmark of Ladurée, a small, 148-year-old chain of Parisian tea salons and pastry shops that packs its macarons in small pastel-colored boxes.
Macarons are made with egg whites, ground almonds and sugar. Their hard outer shells are sandwiched together with a soft creamy center that can consist of anything from fruit purée to chocolate ganache. Macarons, pronounced mack-ah-rohn, typically come in fruit flavors, pistachio, chocolate and sometimes more exotic varieties such as violet, foie gras and white truffle. The English spelling is “macaroon,” but the French confection is not to be confused with the dense chewy treat made with sweetened coconut
“People think of them like cookies, but they are much more delicate and exciting than a cookie—so crunchy on the outside and so soft in the center, like a little pastry,” says François Payard, a third-generation pastry chef from France who owns an eponymous patisserie in a loft-like space in Manhattan.
The perfect macaron takes time, but has a short shelf life, he says. After whipping, baking and stuffing the macarons, he pops them into the refrigerator for 24 hours to achieve the right consistency. He then lets them sit out for at least an hour, so the filling isn’t too cold. He tosses any that don’t sell in a few days.
“They’re sort of weightless, with an airy density. When you take a bite into a macaron, it should be like a meringue, with a soft ending,” says Susannah Chen, who writes about food trends for online magazine YumSugar.com and is a self-described macaron snob. “They’re meant to be eaten fresh, and I don’t see how that’s possible with large-scale chains or corporations where they have to go through so many channels before they hit shelves.”
Clémence Trancart, a press-relations manager in Paris, stopped by the original Ladurée on Rue Royale recently to pick up a box of rose, lemon and chocolate macarons for an afternoon snack with friends. The dessert “is very refined and elegant. That’s why I wouldn’t go to McDo for it,” she said, using the French nickname for McDonald’s. “It’s the little French treat.”
McDonald’s started selling macarons in its McCafés—the coffee and pastry bars located inside regular McDonald’s restaurants—in France in 2007. The burger chain’s macarons are shipped frozen to the restaurants from Château Blanc, a subsidiary of Groupe Holder, Ladurée’s parent company. Despite the common corporate parentage, the two versions use different recipes.
McDonald’s recently plastered the Paris metro with ads for its macarons. Some Parisians bit.
On a recent day, Olivier Cartier, a French salesman, ordered a pistachio macaron and a cappuccino at a Parisian McDonald’s. “It’s the trend,” he says, explaining that he’s tried macarons from mainstream supermarkets and bakeries and that McDonald’s version compares well.
High-end macarons leave him cold. “I’m not sure if there’s a big difference,” he says. “And then some of their flavors like foie gras are bizarre.”
McDonald’s says its macarons are selling well. At roughly $1.25 each, they are about half the price of the comparably sized upscale version and are aimed at a different audience, McDonald’s says. “Our McCafé offer is made for everyday small breaks,” says McDonald’s France spokeswoman Caroline Deleuze.
Pierre Hermé, France’s pre-eminent macaron chef, says he’s neither for nor against macarons’ newfound popularity but says he hasn’t tried the McDonald’s version. “There’s macaron, and then there’s macaron.”
![[MACARON]](http://sg.wsj.net/public/resources/images/HC-GO551A_Raspb_BV_20100301194612.gif)
In Sofia Coppola’s 2006 film “Marie Antoinette,” the young queen offered macarons to the Austrian ambassador. Macarons have since appeared in Oprah Winfrey’s “O” magazine, on cooking shows, in an episode of “Gossip Girl” and in wedding magazines. “I Love Macarons,” the new book written by Japanese pastry chef Hisako Ogita, provides detailed instructions on how to make the treat at home. Adour restaurants, located in the St. Regis hotels in New York and Washington, are offering macaron-making classes in March and recently began selling the treats.
“Macarons are gaining traction in the States because they possess all the attributes of a cupcake: They come in different colors and flavors, and they’re indulgent, but they won’t wreck your calorie count for the day,” YumSugar’s Ms. Chen says, explaining that she doesn’t want to see macarons proliferate unless they’re done right.
She sampled the boxed macarons Starbucks was selling in some stores in December and was unimpressed. They were dry, she said, and the pistachio-flavored kind tasted like Froot Loops.
“It’s hard to do something mass-produced because they’re so delicate,” Starbucks spokeswoman Lisa Passé said, adding that the company hasn’t yet decided whether to bring back the offering, which was supplied by Château Blanc.
Some macaron devotees see a silver lining to the popularization of the French delicacies. Joe Mallozzi, a Vancouver, British Columbia-based producer for a science-fiction television show, says he fell in love with macarons during a trip to Paris several years ago. His fondest hope: “Maybe people will stop calling them ‘macaroons.’ “
Write to Julie Jargon at julie.jargon@wsj.com and Christina Passariello at christina.passariello@wsj.com
What makes GREAT marketing research? It’s not necessarily the most sophisticated analysis. It’s not necessarily a brilliantly creative questionnaire. It’s answering marketing questions in a way that lets managers take ACTION to solve problems and increase profits.
And the best marketing research is done with a strong, common understanding between the marketing researchers (either in-house or external) and the clients (managers). But if you have ever cringed at the notion of getting those managers to sit down and go through the up-front thinking and discussion that leads to great research, it will help formalize and facilitate the process.
These are the essential questions that will help create your next marketing research project and get everyone involved in the project on the same page right from the start:
1. What is the budget for this project?
2. What business objective will we be addressing?
3. What is the objective of this marketing research project?
a. What problem are we trying to solve?
b. Has other research been done on this topic in the past? How well did it answer questions? Did achieve its goals?
4. What is the subject product/service?
a. What is the value proposition or brand position/differentiation of the product/service?
b. What are the key features of the product/service?
c. What are the key benefits of the product/service?
5. What action will we take with the information?
a. Who will take this action and are they involved in designing the research?
6. Who is the target audience for this research?
a. What is the size of the audience?
b. Do we have a list of these people? Do we have permission to use this list for marketing research?
c. What contact information do we have on this list?
d. What languages are needed for this marketing research? Will we do the translations in-house or externally?
e. How likely is it that the target population will respond to the survey? How busy are they? How motivated are they to provide their feedback? Do incentives need to be offered?
7. What is the best data collection methodology for the respondents?
a. Will we need to expose the respondents to graphics in the course of this interview?
8. Will the survey be conducted “blind” or will the survey sponsor be revealed?
9. How should we analyze the data?
a. How much do we want to slice the data?
b. Do we plan any multivariate analysis?
10. What is the appropriate sample size for the analysis?
11. Who is the audience for the research results?
12. How will the research results be reported?
13. Will in-person presentations be needed?
14. What taboos, if any, need to be avoided?
15. Is there anything else that needs to be conveyed about this project?
16. Do we have enough budget for this project to be done correctly?
Customize this list for your own situation, but this will provide a good starting point. And remember that Question 3 (what are our objectives and what is the problem we are solving) and Question 5 (what action will we take with the information) are the most important questions to answer. If you don’t get any further, answering those two questions will be a big step forward.
If you can’t answer these questions, or if there are too many divergent viewpoints on the answers to these questions, you probably are not ready to start the marketing research. Keep talking and challenging. Identify and fix the weaknesses, clarify the objectives and outcomes, and then start the process again with question #1.
We eventually resorted to Pillsbury and the commercials lie! It does not make my belly tickle and laugh in good way. We were forced on a cookie free diet (probably necessary) for weeks.
Salvation came the day “new batch” (as marketing by Nestle) hit the shelves. Now we buy cookie dough as if we are preparing for the Washington, DC Blizzard of 2010 (26 inches of snow and 4 days federal leave). So what does this have to do with confusing leftovers? Due to our crazy consumption we have recycled over 5 Nestle cookie dough re-sealable bowls as Tupperware. And continuous confused leftover spaghetti sauce as a hopeful cookie desert or have to take the dreaded peak under the lid in search of expired leftover mold (yuck!) However, to be fair we also have 5+ Hillshire Farm Ultra Thin Deli Slices containers serving as yesterday’s dinner leftover vesicle – at least those are clear. Overall, our obsessive brand loyalty has us confusing which of the many Nestle Cookie Dough containers in the fridge isn’t a whammy”!
