J. Timothy King’s Blog

Bad RCN! Or, It’s All in How You Say It

I haven’t blogged in a long time, because I’ve been editing my upcoming novel. (And I’m keeping notes, so that I can blog about the experience. First lesson: Editing your first full novel will take 5 times as long as you think it will.)

But this week I got a direct mail piece from my cable provider, RCN, who in the Boston area is eliminating its analog channels and switching completely to digital. The 5.5-by-8.5-inch, full-color oversized postcard did get my attention. So the headlines were… uh… effective. But the message behind the piece was so haughty, so nasty, so badly conceived, I just had to take a moment out of my blogging sabbatical to skewer RCN for this egregious marketing faux pas.

Yeah, it caught my attention. And it made me angry, so incensed that I actually considered switching to Comcast. (The Comcast guys are always begging me to switch. But I never do, because I don’t usually expect to be treated any differently by them.) But after I did a little research–for the information RCN should have shoved in my face–I found out that this change is actually good for me, the customer. (Hmm… RCN has been losing customers of late. I wonder how many RCN customers will go through the same effort I did to get at the truth of the situation.) (Read more…)

2 Virtual Holiday Gifts Bloggers Love to Get

These are some of the best holiday gifts you can give a blogger. And the best thing about them is they’re absolutely free!

Clayton Makepeace put me onto this idea, and it struck a chord, even though he doesn’t even have a blog. He has an e-zine. Actually, this is also the best gift you can give to someone who publishes his own e-zine or writes for any kind of opt-in email list.

If you’ve never heard of Clayton Makepeace, he’s a world-class, old-school copywriter. His story is like that of many self-made people. At the end of his rope, broke, surviving on Ramen noodles (or however it goes), he learned how to write killer copy, and he got rich. Of course, somewhere in there were many, many hours of work. That’s the part of the story the get-rich-quick schemers never tell you, the many, many hours of work. But Clayton always levels with you regarding that part of the story, and I appreciate it. (Read more…)

Reason #217 Why Google AdWords Makes Me Laugh

A quick one: Ran into this recently on a client’s AdWords campaign. At first, it really confused me. The ads weren’t showing? Why not?! Because they aren’t allowed? Why not? On the “details and recommendations” page, Google provided a link to explain why not…

I clicked on the link and discovered it was just their terms of service. Huh? I re-reviewed the terms of service for the zillionth time and… there’s nothing wrong with the campaign, and there’s nothing wrong with the keywords, and there’s nothing wrong with the ads. And it wasn’t even a human being who “disallowed” these ads, because I had just then added them.

I was just about to dig out the contact info for Google AdWords support, when I discovered that the ads were in fact running. But the UI still said they were disallowed. Maybe, I thought, it’s because I just now added this ad group, and it’s going to take a little while for the correct information to percolate through Google’s system.

Well, here’s a screenshot from a little while later, after all the latest status has clearly bubbled to the UI.

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How Google Can Prove Anything With Statistics

First of all, I don’t know that Google is really trying to pull one over on its users. This could just be the work of some clueless PR guy.

On the Official Google Blog today, Brad Taylor, a “Spam Czar” at Google, talked about how Gmail filters more spam now than ever. He links to a Spam explained page at Gmail, and includes the graph shown there. As you can see, the graph has two lines on it. The top, orange, ascending line represents the growing amount of spam in circulation. The bottom, blue, descending line represents the declining amount of spam in Gmail users’ inboxes. The caption reinforces this perception, saying, “As the amount of spam has increased, Gmail users have received less of it in their inboxes, reporting a rate less than 1%.”

The thing is, if you look closely, you’ll see that this is not what the numbers say! (Read more…)

Secrets of Business from Rainforest Cafe

It’s summertime. Lazy days. Vacations. Time off. The kids are out of school. And only 17 16 15 days before they go back! (But that’s a different story.) I’ve been working part-time while they’re home with me over the summer.

Last Friday, my parents took us all out to lunch at the Rainforest Cafe, and then we all saw The Simpsons Movie. (Worth seeing, BTW, especially if you’re a Simpsons fan.) The Rainforest Cafe is a theme restaurant, owned by Landry’s Restaurants. And there are a number of things they do there that serve as positive object lessons to all small businesses, in every niche. (Read more…)

Actually, It’s the Word “ZOiZ”

Seth Godin posted his opinion on the new logo for the 2012 Olympic games.

The 2012 Olympic Games Logo

Here’s how organising committee chairman Seb Coe described the new logo:

This is the vision at the very heart of our brand.

It will define the venues we build and the Games we hold and act as a reminder of our promise to use the Olympic spirit to inspire everyone and reach out to young people around the world.

It is an invitation to take part and be involved.

Seth noted that no, that’s not right. It’s just a jaggy picture. He’s wrong. It’s actually the word “ZOiZ.” But Seth was right about this:

If you are paying money to someone who talks like this, may I suggest you stop? And if you work for someone who talks like this, time to look for a new gig.

To paraphrase Jamie Hyneman of the Mythbusters, can we not do any more of these oogie-boogie marketing myths?

Rolling on the floor, laughing,
-TimK

Here’s Why It’s Good For a Consultant to Tell the Employees How Much He Makes

I swear I had decided to write this before reading Pam Slim’s latest post about earning more by working less. But her thoughts dovetail so perfectly with mine.

Recently, the hiring manager at a client company reluctantly agreed to my rate. But he asked me please not to say anything to the other people on the team, because there are some working for a third that. It’s a great feeling, by the way, if it’s never happened to you. (A third? You couldn’t get me to sneeze for that much.) I had no objection to keeping my rate secret, since it is standard procedure. But that got me to thinking.

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What Chocolate Says About Entrepreneurship

“Once upon a time, there was a quiet, little village in the French countryside whose people believed in tranquilite. If you lived in this village, you understood what was expected of you. You knew your place in the scheme of things. And if you happened to forget, someone would help remind you. In this village, if you saw something you weren’t supposed to see, you learned to look the other way. If by chance your hopes had been disappointed, you learned never to ask for more. So, through good times and bad, famine and feast, the villagers held fast to their traditions. Until one winter day, a sly wind blew in from the north…”

This past week I rented one of the best films of the last decade. It’s not a film I usually would have watched. Despite its awards and nominations, the movie got a mediocre rating on IMDB. And there was nothing I read to make me think I would find it any different. But I remembered some old friends talking about it years ago, about how in the movie they put ground chili pepper in hot chocolate. (Tastes good, by the way.) And then I learned that this was how the Mayans used to make it. And I love chocolate, and I love chilies, and history intrigues me. And I figured, “What the hey?” But I was unaware of what I was getting myself into. This is one of those films you have to watch over and over again, each time gaining some new insight. Most surprising, and most painful, and most inspiring, as I watched the film, I found myself identifying more and more with Vianne, the main character, in a way I never expected.

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Selling to Big Companies Podcast Interview

It’s Jill Konrath, author of Selling To Big Companies, which I recently wrote about, in the context of narrowing your niche and target market. Jill Konrath gave an interview on The Innovative Marketer podcast.

As in the book, in the interview she talks about more. Much more. It’s impressive how much there is to take away in this short interview. As Jill wrote on her blog:

[Steve Gershik] got me talking about things I’m pretty passionate about:

• The biggest mistakes salespeople make.
• What marketing/sales need to know from each other.
• Creating strong value propositions.
• Leveraging triggering events to crack into accounts.
• Launching new products into the market.

Listen to the Innovative Marketer Podcast - it’s a power-packed 20 minutes. I’m listening to it right now and I can’t believe how much I covered in this short time.

I’ll echo that sentiment. I’m listening to it now, and I’m really impressed. And I’ve already read the book! Listen to Jill Konrath’s interview, episode 8 of The Innovative Marketer podcast.

-TimK

Does Google Think It’s Bigger Than the Market?

John Carlton wrote recently about Google’s latest change in AdWords. This change has upset a lot of people, because now suddenly their AdWords ads don’t make money. It’s also pleased a lot of people, because they believe the change will thin their competitors. Regardless, no one should be relying completely on AdWords (or on any single service) for your business, and if you are, you deserve to be put out of business. Because we have to expect Google will upset its customers in perverse ways. It’s only a matter of time. And maybe the time is now.

We saw it with IBM, a once innovative company. Yes, IBM was actually once innovative. This was before my time, but I can read it in the history books. Peter Drucker even uses them as a shining example in his classic Innovation and Entrepreneurship (which you can buy individually or as part of The Executive in Action):

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