Comments on: SEO childs play – or not? http://www.betterlanguages.com/seo-childs-play-or-not/ Timely Translations Mon, 14 Nov 2011 16:19:37 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v= By: mike http://www.betterlanguages.com/seo-childs-play-or-not/comment-page-1/#comment-64 mike Wed, 03 Feb 2010 18:12:32 +0000 http://www.betterlanguages.com/?p=1101#comment-64 Hi Francine Your experience sounds even worse than mine. In general I don't like direct mail at the best of times. Not sure what the success rate is, but I seem to remember that it has one of the worst marketing hit rates. Received another annoying one today. A brochure from an estate agent marketing space in an award winning low carbon building I attended a meeting in recently. What was annoying was that they've worsened the carbon footprint by direct mailing companies about an eco-friendly building! A more creative and environmentally friendly approach would have been much more appropriate. Regards Mike Hi Francine
Your experience sounds even worse than mine. In general I don’t like direct mail at the best of times. Not sure what the success rate is, but I seem to remember that it has one of the worst marketing hit rates. Received another annoying one today. A brochure from an estate agent marketing space in an award winning low carbon building I attended a meeting in recently. What was annoying was that they’ve worsened the carbon footprint by direct mailing companies about an eco-friendly building! A more creative and environmentally friendly approach would have been much more appropriate.
Regards
Mike

]]> By: Francine Pickering http://www.betterlanguages.com/seo-childs-play-or-not/comment-page-1/#comment-63 Francine Pickering Tue, 02 Feb 2010 19:11:04 +0000 http://www.betterlanguages.com/?p=1101#comment-63 What a disspiriting tale but, sadly, it's not uncommon. I wonder if it's down to people being so keen to take a "creative" approach to marketing in an understandable desire to stand out from the crowd (as they say) which ends up with them being "creative" for "creative"'s sake. Some wacky stunt can easily undermine a business' credibility and this is a particulr danger in the business-to-business arena where humour can be useful but needs to be handled with care. It's no wonder you felt insulted by this prank. Not so long ago I received a similarly "creative" piece of direct mail - a fake newspaper cutting extolling the virtues of a business advice provider. The envelope was postmarked from the West Midlands and the cutting had a hand-written post-it note attached recommending the provider and signed by "J". Worth a try, I guess, but given that I don't know anyone who would sign themselves "J" let alone someone in the West Midlands who would do that, this was quickly rumbled as being downright deceitful and an insult to my intelligence. I'd add to your tips: think about the knock-on effects to your reputation BEFORE to get enthralled by the idea of a crazy creative promotional trick - is it really worth coming across as patronising, manipulative or even worse? What a disspiriting tale but, sadly, it’s not uncommon. I wonder if it’s down to people being so keen to take a “creative” approach to marketing in an understandable desire to stand out from the crowd (as they say) which ends up with them being “creative” for “creative”‘s sake. Some wacky stunt can easily undermine a business’ credibility and this is a particulr danger in the business-to-business arena where humour can be useful but needs to be handled with care. It’s no wonder you felt insulted by this prank.

Not so long ago I received a similarly “creative” piece of direct mail – a fake newspaper cutting extolling the virtues of a business advice provider. The envelope was postmarked from the West Midlands and the cutting had a hand-written post-it note attached recommending the provider and signed by “J”. Worth a try, I guess, but given that I don’t know anyone who would sign themselves “J” let alone someone in the West Midlands who would do that, this was quickly rumbled as being downright deceitful and an insult to my intelligence.

I’d add to your tips: think about the knock-on effects to your reputation BEFORE to get enthralled by the idea of a crazy creative promotional trick – is it really worth coming across as patronising, manipulative or even worse?

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