As a small business owner, sometimes you feel like you’re being tossed by the waves. I had every intention of heading down to sunny Austin this year for the Rockin’ SXSWi festival. All my favorite Peeps and Tweeps in my Twibes are going to be there. But sometimes life bites you.
After losing two major deals in my pipeline I had to make the excruciating decision to ditch SXSW this year. The fact is, I just couldn’t justify playing and spending the cash when I should be working. Even when you own a company, you don’t get rewarded when things go south. Instead you throw off everything that may get in your way, pull your boots on and get busy…working.
I recently received an email solicitation from a sponsor of an online conference that I attended. Now I understand that sponsors need to be able to reach out to attendees and try to get a return on their investment. I’m sure that somewhere in the fine print of my registration I agreed to be contacted by these guys. No problem.
The email solicitation was actually very well done. They had an image from a video “commercial” on their email with a big WATCH NOW button. Good calls to action, guys. All this was done RIGHT.
The email was so good that I actually clicked on their video commercial to see what it was all about. I was taken to their website where I prepared to watch the commercial…but the video didn’t play. Instead a Sign-up form popped up and demanded that I fork over all my information. They REQUIRED me to give:
My Name
My Email
My Company
My Title
My Phone
My State
My Zip code
My Industry
MY REVENUE!
What is so insane about this is they are requiring me to give them all my information so I can Watch THEIR commercial!
OK folks - this is how the “GIVE / GET” game works… I GIVE YOU my information when I receive something of VALUE. You then GET my contact information and a warm Lead.
Things of value include Gift Certificates, Entrance into a Raffle, a Statistical Study, White paper or other Proprietary information not available in the public sphere…etc. The example above completely violates the Give / Get principle. These guys are trying to use a GET / GET principle. They GET all my information and then the GET me to watch their commercial.
Did they get my information? NOPE. Did I watch the commercial? NOPE.
So instead of Win/Win we wind up with Lose/Lose. What a waste of a great email marketing execution.
One of the things I am involved with in Columbus is the American Marketing Association Special Interest Group on Social Media or AMA SIG - Social Media for short. Instead of doing our usual speaker / Q&A format we mixed it up a bit with Round Tables! Watch the video for how it went. You [...]
The 2009 TechColumbus Innovation Awards Event was a huge success. If “Innovation” was the Theme for the award candidates I have to say that “Interaction” was the Theme for the Event. Check out the video for some of the unique interactive things at the event this year!
TechColumbus Innovation Awards Recap from THOMAS H WILLIAMS on [...]
As a marketer, you dream of data. With data you can deliver more relevant information. You can deliver more timely information! You can Micro-Market directly to those who are most likely to buy!
Which brings us to the issue of privacy. You see, privacy and social media are inherently at odds with one another. Marking [...]
Over the weekend, I attended a great conference at my alma mater, Kellogg. The conference was packed with great key note speakers and some of the best panels I have seen. This quick blog post will give you the highlights from my point of view.
Competition: Study your competitors and find out what they [...]
A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to co-present at the American Marketing Association Special Interest Group on Social Media (AMA SIG for short). I worked with Steve Bell, Founder and Principle at Strategic Marketing Innovations Consulting. It was so much fun working with Steve, who is one of the smartest guys I’ve ever [...]
Hey gang!
I was honored to be recently spotlighted by the eduWEB Conference. The eduWEB conference is an “annual, internationally recognized event for the higher education community, attracting those who are involved in online strategy, marketing and technology”
I had the privilege of speaking at the conference this past summer in Chicago. It was at this innovative [...]
As a small business owner, sometimes you feel like you’re being tossed by the waves. I had every intention of heading down to sunny Austin this year for the Rockin’ SXSWi festival. All my favorite Peeps and Tweeps in my Twibes are going to be there. But sometimes life bites you.
The email solicitation was actually very well done. They had an image from a video “commercial” on their email with a big WATCH NOW button. Good calls to action, guys. All this was done RIGHT.
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