Right now reading : The New Rules of Marketing and PR

Went to Landmark book store, Spencer Plaza, yesterday and picked up The New Rules of Marketing and PR by David Meerman Scott.

With this , the total number of books in my library collection goes up to 1753. Quite an impressive number huh ? :-)

Well 3 reasons why i had to lay my hands on this book :

• I am Social Media Marketing Evangelist. I got infected with Social Media bug and quiet sure it aint gonna leave my system for a long , long time to come.

• This book comes highly recommended . The gurus of PR, Marketing and Social Media swear by it . It stands next only to Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies by by Charlene Li, Josh Bernoff ( Authors are from Forrester Research body ).
  

• I seem to have lost interest in Advertising for reasons i cant share it here . But after much reading and analysis of the trends in new age media and marketing , i believe Integrated PR and Corporate Communications coupled with social media tools helps in building brands and deals with image and crisis management in a much ethical and effective way. And no, this is not a crib out of bookish knowledge . I have seen my friends ( i will have to name them here : Anu, Shraddha, Nikhila ...from a very reputed PR firm ) work so well with brands using PR as a very effective tool. I am not belittling advertising at all. I think advertising is great but not if it just about writing greats ads which at the end of the day don't sell the product.
  

I love the concept of building brands . There is something awe-inspiring in the process of brand building that cant be explained here and it is something you have to experience it yourself. I just decided that advertising is not the way i would like to explore the concept of branding. PR with effective marketing strategies will unleash the potential brand in a much better way.

If you are into social media or believe in the concept of digital branding - social media, Integrated PR, corporate blogging,Online word of mouth marketing... etc , then here are few recommendations you may want to read :

The Anatomy of Buzz by Emanuel Rosen

Buzz Marketing by Mark Hughes

Connected Marketing by Justin Kirby

The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Purple Cow by Seth Godin

The Fall of Advertising and the rise of PR by Al Rise and Laura Rise

Corporate Blogging by Debbie Weil

Wikinomics by Don Tapscott and Anathony D Williams

(ps: this is not an all inclusive list .. i will update as and when i write more posts on social media, PR , Marketing and Branding)

You guys are most welcome to drop in with your book reading suggestions, criticism ... anything ..

Innovation is the key to social media marketing not random banner ads

The article Advertisers face Hurdles on Social Networking Sites in The New York Times is once again bringing to light on the fact that putting up banner ads and fan page in social networking sites need not be entirely successful. Being a social media evangelist myself, i echo same point here as well.

Putting up in-expensive banner ads or creating a fan page is not good enough. The users will sign up/become a member of the fan page just to show their solidarity to the brand. Fair enough. But that is not branding .

Branding is all about reinforcing the name of an existing brand and the product or luring in new customers to buy the brand. To put in simple language , that is. Bottom line .. all this is done is to increase sales. Dynamic banner ads is not the solution for that .

One thing is that social media marketing and networks are at a very nascent stage. In order to leverage social media companies should find much better ways to use social networks in branding and lead generation.

One good way is to start a blog ,connect with relevant bloggers and run a viral campaign. Implement multiple viral/buzz/online word of mouth marketing campaigns and learn from trial and error method. But make sure there is one "Big IDEA" behind every campaign which is run. For this , the marketing teams should innovate and launch highly customized products to users and propagate it without being intrusive and irritating.

Budgets are boring - How can we make it simple and efffective

Just a random thought...

Have you ever wondered why your friends never sit down to watch the budget when presented in the parliament?

Because it is too long , too boring and with lots of technical economic jagron. The budget is for the common man. And most probably the common man of India will fall in the bracket of 21 years - 35years. Unless he is married , a young college going or just-started-working guy wont bother to watch it.

Wondering why FM's have to give us long and boring budget speeches and waste time?

Here is what he can do :

• Give a ppt presentation covering the important points. He can just give the Income and Expenditure of the Year, then move on to point out what was the amount collected last year and what is to be allocated for each department in the forthcoming year. Simple one point and the amount highlighted. This should not go more than 30-45 min.

• Start a website dedicated for Indian budgets alone ( with archives) and make it web 2.0 friendly . which means, make it interactive using RSS feeds, forums , blogs etc . The site content can be moderated by a young techie guy. He should be completed briefed throughout on what to be said and what not to be said in the website. You can find numerous such talented tech/management guys via civil services exam . Make sure you pay them good.

• The minute the Budget gets over, digitize the entire contents online for everyone to read. Make sure the language is clear and simple to follow. The website can also have pop up tabs over technical words so that a 21 year old arts student can understand what the budget means to him.

• Open tabs to give info like this " what the budget means to students" , " what the budget means to the senior citizens" .. one can work out the modalities later.

• Let the government invite people from Finance Ministry, Planning Commission etc to contribute articles on what they think about the budget. This will ensure a dialogue between the common man and the ministers.

• Use twitter ( profile created by the govt) to send real time info to everyone in the web. use other micro blogging tools as well.

• Most of the "Babus" in the cabinet are not exactly net savvy. No problem. Once the Budget is done, distribute copies of the entire budget with the intricate details to the opposition parties and all other concerned parties and one copy to the press.

• Budget can be made less boring, more informative, reach more audience and entirely fun and hence more effective and accountable if we can combine knowledge and technology .

what are your thoughts ?

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