My Spinning class is a metaphor for how to market in today’s world
I’m a new Spinning enthusiast — I’ve been taking Step Aerobics for years, but I couldn’t find enough classes to go to. And that’s where this story starts. I love step aerobics — it’s very challenging, it’s a derivative of dancing, which I love, and it’s high energy. But step is dying. Gym members don’t [...]
Tiger Should Go With His “New Hugh” Persona
Now that the stories about Tiger Woods have descended from “marital woes” to “all out sex/party maniac,” I think Tiger needs a new strategy: Tiger should go full-steam ahead and plant his flag as “the new Hugh Hefner,” or in my shorthand (trademark pending), “The New Hugh.” I’m serious here. Hugh Hefner has made a [...]
What the heck is U-verse? AT&T doesn’t make it easy to find out.
I’ve been planning an upgrade of the TV set-up in my house, and have started to research the options. It is almost a full-time job. On the hardware side, the options are pretty straight forward — HD or not, 720 or 1080, LCD (cheaper) or LED (much more expensive). But on the content side — [...]
Cartoon Network, Gays in the Military and Other Things 18-Year-Olds Think
As promised, here’s a link to the Beloit College Mindset List for the Class of 2013, i.e., 18-year-old freshmen born in 1991 who are now entering college. According to this super-helpful list: There has always been a Cartoon Network. The status of gays in the military has always been a topic of political debate. The [...]
Obama is Blowing the Health Care PR Battle
I’m stunned by the amateur approach of Obama and his White House team to the PR aspects of health care insurance reform. While the opponents of the plan have done a masterful job of ginning up opposition to change, the White House has been caught napping and clueless. I kept waiting to see if the [...]
Really helpful guide to the mindset of 18-year-olds
I’m 50. So as hard as I might try, I have no clue what people under 40 think about the world. I remember when Johnson was president. I watched the moon landing. I lived through Vietnam and Watergate. A heck of a lot of people didn’t do any of those things, because they weren’t alive [...]
Does Obama Need a Hail-Mary PR Pass on Health Care Reform?
Back from Vegas, where the famously in-touch Vegas taxi drivers were 100% against Obama’s health care plan. Why? Who the hell knows. Probably because the right wingnuts on talk radio are tearing it down. But there’s a serious grain of reality in these man-on-the-street insights. Eight months ago, Obama’s PR machine had created a feel-good [...]
Having Some Fun With Your Web Site
It doesn’t all have to be serious — you can have some fun with your business-oriented web site. For instance, I’ve decided to add my Springsteen writing to this web site. But that’s nothing compared to the awesome job these guys have done with their VC firm web site, Foundry Group. I’m also a big [...]
Ticketmaster Tries to Solve a Big Problem With a Little PR Push
One of the most important lessons of crisis communications is that most crises are not communications problems, they’re operational problems. Communications can help in many ways to diffuse a crisis and calm people down, but if the operational issue at the heart of the problem isn’t addressed, no amount of PR spin is going to [...]