By Leo Valiquette
Business and trade press journalists regularly find themselves in the position of needing owners or executives who are willing to talk about specific issues in their industries and how their businesses have dealt with them.
For a PR practitioner it’s the classic dilemma – the goal is to drive earned coverage of a client’s story (as opposed to paying for an ad) when many of the media who are receptive may have a different agenda in mind. Hard-nosed and busy executives often brush off interview opportunities if they feel that the nature of the story will not provide a clear and obvious promotional advantage for their organization. “Why should I talk to this reporter about X when that doesn’t highlight the value proposition of my business?” they ask.
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By Alexandra Reid
I’ve been a volunteer at Big Brothers Big Sisters Ottawa for almost a year now, running the youth mentoring organization’s online accounts and helping with its blog. As a non-profit, its budget for marketing activities is tight and so it relies greatly on word-of-mouth referrals and small events to attract volunteers, donors, and partners and spread its messages.
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By Bob Bailly
In the July 13 post on Francis Moran and Associates blog’s Great Articles Roundup, this excerpt was referenced and it caught my eye: The startup pitch in the corporate context.
You can tell a lot about a company by its approach to the business pitch. This post argues that the corporate business pitch could take some pointers from the standard VC pitch, which should always identify a clear problem, provide a compelling solution and be differentiated, aspirational, inspirational, and visually communicative.
The excerpt references a longer blog piece written by Joe Lee that contains great practical advice on the corporate pitch. I’m pleased to say his ideas are also supported from a neuro-scientific point of view.
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By Alexandra Reid
As a regular feature, we provide our readers with a roundup of the best articles we have read in the past week. On the podium this week are Marketo, NextGen Journal, ReadWriteWeb, B2B Bliss, Ventureburn, and Montreal Tech Watch.
Building a B2B marketing brand advocate army
Great information on how to create a program to reward B2B brand champions, modelled after Marketo’s own champion program.
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By Jeff Campbell
I recently had a very refreshing day in terms of strategic marketing. I spent several hours with two entrepreneurs in Toronto who are building a great business. It is the way they are going about building the business that is so refreshing to me. It is a well-focused, pragmatic, and calculated strategic campaign to ultimately be the 800 lb. gorilla in a well-defined niche market. I am speaking of Shaun Ricci and Somen Mondal, co-founders of N4 Systems, and their safety and compliance service, Field ID. More about their success and future plans in a moment.
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Have the feds finally found the right way to back winners?
July 25, 2012 by Leo Valiquette
Government, particularly Canada’s federal government, isn’t known for being a bold early adopter of new technology and certainly not an entity eager to play the role of guinea pig […]
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Throttled by those five ubiquitous rings
July 24, 2012 by Alexandra Reid
The International Olympic Committee is launching a host of programs with the goal of making the 2012 London Games the “most social and tech-savvy Olympics ever,” but restrictive social media guidelines reveal the organization’s inability to move beyond its old […]
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What technology firms must get right to internationalize quickly
July 23, 2012 by Tony Bailetti
Conventional approaches call for a technology startup to gradually internationalize from local to home continent markets before entering the global market. Unfortunately, these conventional phased approaches take too long, cost too much, increase […]
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Great articles roundup: Content marketing, social forums, access journalism, liars, and startup tribes
July 20, 2012 by Alexandra Reid
As a regular feature, we provide our readers with a roundup of the best articles we have read in the past week. On the podium this week are Joe Pulizzi, Social Media Examiner, Memeburn, Peter Shankman, and Fast Company […]
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Why I like customer advisory boards
July 19, 2012 by Jesse Rodgers
Seeking out customer feedback and using it to build a great product is not a new concept. Great designers have been doing it for a long time as have great companies. The Lean Startup manual (or startup bible to many) talks about involving the customer while […]
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Where is Ottawa’s International Startup Festival?
July 18, 2012 by Leo Valiquette
On Monday, Francis shared some highlights from last week’s International Startup Festival in Montreal, which of course raises the obvious question, why do we not have these kinds of events in Ottawa? […]
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5 qualities of a great ghostwriter
July 17, 2012 by Alexandra Reid
While content marketing has been around for a long time, content marketing through digital channels is becoming increasingly important in many of today’s marketing programs as social media and blogging continue to rise as influential channels where […]
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The best time to start a business
July 16, 2012 by Francis Moran
To hear many of the speakers at last week’s International Startup Festival in Montréal tell it, there has rarely been as good a time as the present to start a new business. “Now is awesome,” said technology industry watcher Chris Shipley. “Resources for startups are […]
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By Leo Valiquette
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The Future of A&R – Walabe : [...] http://francis-moran.com/marketing-strategy/top-10-questions-every-strategic-communicator-should-ask... [...]
Traditional Marketing is Dead – Long Live Bikini Waxer Marketing | Scalexl : [...] pointed out by Alexandra Reid on the Francis Moran website content marketing is becoming more and more like journalism. So, it is not just about the content, [...]
It’s Summertime…and the Networking is Easy? | THE MERRAINE BRAIN : [...] In fact, summer is perhaps one of the times least used to network, yet at the same time has shown to be the most productive time to network. People tend to be in a brighter mood compared to during the gloomy winters-especially where I am from in England! Networking needs to be fun and not approached as another chore, like mowing the lawn. (http://francis-moran.com/marketing-strategy/social-media-strategy-why-meeting-in-the-real-world-matt...) [...]