I love Thanksgiving. And I hate it too. The chill in the air, the family, the pies. Awesome. The cooking, the cleaning, the quickness of the meal. The cleaning. Did I mention that already? Oh yeah, anyway, the thing is that I think this year there’s a lot to be grateful for. Really. I know the economy is in the tank and our 401ks look like crap, but if you’re reading this then you probably a) have a roof over your head, b) have a computer so you can connect to the world and c) will have a decent meal tomorrow. I’ll bet you could make a pretty good list of what you have to be grateful for, if you think about. I’ve been thinking about it and I am DAMN grateful.

Meanwhile, in Twitterville, some pretty terrific people (who I don’t know) are trying to raise $10,000 in 48 hours to build a classroom in Tanzania. The project is called Tweetsgiving and you can get involved here. When you set out to do good, the Internet makes it a whole lot easier. Tweet what you’re thankful for, give a little money and you might not only change the life of a child in Tanzania but make someone’s day a little brighter (of course they have to be reading Twitter, but isn’t almost everyone? Yet?). That’s pretty easy. And awfully nice.

So, back here at BG, here’s a quick list of things I am grateful for – all agency/work related:

All the new additions to our staff – your thinking, creativity and excitement are fantastic. And our pre-2008 staff ain’t chopped liver either. You all rock.

Our clients – who pay us to do great work on their behalf. Thank you is insufficient. How about a pie? A cocktail?

All the new colleagues we’ve met – especially the ones who are leading the way on social media and digital marketing. Your knowledge sharing is inspiring.

Our consultants – Nancy, Jason, Bob, David and Simon – who have helped us be smarter and better at what we do.

The new opportunities that keep coming our way. The universe has heard us and is responding in a big way.

So, if you’re feeling grumbly about the world, remember this: ‘The Pilgrims made seven times more graves than huts. No Americans have been more impoverished than these who, nevertheless, set aside a day of thanksgiving.’ Now, get out there and have a great(ful) and delicious Thanksgiving!

Being the Administrative Assistant here at BG, I go through the mail everyday. I am amazed at the amount of junk mail this office receives. Catalog after catalog, mailer after mailer. It is quite overwhelming and makes me a little sick because all I do with all that stuff is throw it into the recycle bin.  As mentioned before in Jon’s blog, we conducted a one week experiment to see how much junk mail our office received. After just ONE week of everyone saving their direct mail, we had over 14 lbs of JUNK. Here is a little reminder picture of what all that junk looked like.

As part of our effort to become a more eco-friendly company, I did some research to find out how to stop this overload of direct mail. I found some pretty great tips on the Privacy Rights Clearing House website. I wanted to share a few with you. These tips were taken directly from their website:

Pre-Approved Offers of Credit:

1. To have your name removed from this particular mailing list, you must contact the credit reporting agencies directly by mail or phone.  You can find the addresses and numbers for these agencies here.

US Postal Service Change of Address:

1. To notify senders of a change of address, it is better to contact your credit card companies, family, friends, utilities,  and magazines directly to avoid the junk mail following you to your new address.
2. If you fill out a change of address form at the post office they in turn will send out a change of address card to mailers who have your old address. This will include any current junk mail you are receiving.

To remove yourself from as many national mailings as possible:

1. Contact the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) sign up for their Mail Preference Service (MPS). Once you register your name will be put into a “do not mail” file that is updated monthly. You MUST re-register after three years. There is a $1 charge to register by mail. Their address is: Mail Preference Service , Attention Dept: 27478505, Direct Marketing Association, PO Box 282 Carmel, NY 10512.
2. Or Register with the DMA online here: DMA Choice Website

These are just a few tips from their website. It was pretty helpful to me and I hope it will be as helpful to you. (I did find a few errors on their page regarding the DMA and I have made the changes here on this blog.)  Let’s all send a message to companies who use direct mail marketing by taking our names off the list. If enough of us do it who knows we might start  something. Maybe they will try using Social Media instead.

Zagat released the results of their 2009 Hotels, Resorts & Spas Survey last week, and in these times of economic uncertainties, it is more important than ever for the hospitality industry to pay attention to these results. According to Zagat, “the 2009 guide covers 1,001 hotels, resorts and spas nationwide based on input from 14,049 frequent travelers and travel professionals, such as meeting planners and travel agents.”

According to the survey, travelers’ main complaint about the hotel industry is poor service, followed by poor room conditions.  In a time where hotels need to work harder to gain and maintain customer loyalty, the hospitality industry needs to address travelers’ issues and offer them the services and amenities they are demanding, and incorporate them into their brand.   I thought about my priorities when picking a hotel, and came up with this list of things I look for most in a hotel.  I plan to share my list, and the Zagat survey, with all my hotel clients.

Service:  When I book a hotel, I expect more than just a room.  I want an entire experience, and this includes a high level of service.  I want a friendly, fast and attentive staff.  I am much more willing to overlook mistakes if they are met with an apology and a fast correction (an added upgrade, gift or discount doesn’t hurt either).  For me, the “make or break” aspect of a hotel is often the reception, concierge, room service, and/or other staff members.

Personalization: Little personal touches go a long way.  I don’t want to be treated like part of a herd, I want my specific preferences to be addressed- and hopefully remembered.  Everyone is different and hotels should treat each guest like they are the most important person in the hotel.

Value:  This might be the most important thing I look for in a hotel.  At the end of the day, I want to feel that my money was well spent and I got what I paid for.  I am always willing to take a chance on a new hotel if they are offering an irresistible deal.  And, if I love my experience, they will have a loyal customer for life, and I am likely to return again and again.

What matters most to you when you are choosing a hotel?

This month, Bailey Gardiner makes its debut at the Adobe MAX conference in San Francisco. Some might wonder, what is a PR/Advertising firm doing at an all-things-geek Mecca? The answer is simple. We want to learn from the best to achieve the best as we continue the steady growth of our online presence.

The Max conference kicked off with Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen explaining the company’s focus on a Flash Platform which now includes Thermo and Flex Builder- giving a preview of the next version of Flex Builder called “Gumbo”. Following Narayen, Kevin Lynch shifted the focus to client and cloud computing, social computing, devices and desktop computing followed by the adoption of the Flash Player and improvements, such as advanced text engine, added 3D display object, new drawing API and finally, dynamic sound generation followed by the audio mixer example.

Use of thin clients and so called “cloud computing” and the effect of hosting computing on workflows and company productivity is a specially covered topic at MAX and deserves extra attention which I’ll cover in my next post, so check our blog frequently to see how companies like Bailey Gardiner can utilize CS4 capabilities to improve workflows and overall productivity.

As a first time MAX attendee I give enormous credit to the Adobe team for making the “Connect, Discover, Inspire” themed gathering a memorable experience…Looking forward to all upcoming sessions!

Recently I was at a Halloween party. It was Halloween, coincidentally, and into my buddy’s basement-turned-dance-club walks Colonel Sanders with a bucket of chicken, offering it to everyone. At the time I remember thinking, “wow this guy is seriously costume committed.” The costume was spot on. It looked as if the Colonel himself had risen from the grave. So having started my third beer, I did what anyone else would have done and grabbed me a delicious piece of extra crunchy deep-fried yum-yum.

That moment, I smelled something besides the Colonel’s secret recipe. What I smelled was marketing in disguise. Here’s what made me suspicious:

KFC is hardly doing cool enough advertising right now that somebody would roll into a Halloween party dressed as such. The Colonel is certainly an icon, but most Halloween getups are based on what’s current i.e. Sarah Palin, Joe the Plumber, Michael Phelps and what have you. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe that guy just really liked KFC and wanted to be the Colonel for Halloween. I guess I’ll never know.

What I want to believe is that KFC had this awesome guerilla idea and executed it to a tee. My buddy lives in a house with four other dudes. They sent out a massive event invite on Facebook and half of San Francisco attended this thing. How easy would it have been for KFC to go onto Facebook, find a bunch of big Halloween parties and send Colonel Sanders out to them to give away free chicken?

Later I mentioned the encounter to my buddy and asked him what he thought. Neither of us knew the guy, but we both agreed it was pretty cool that someone would come as Colonel Sanders handing out chicken.But if we had come to find out that KFC paid for the Colonel’s attendance that night, it would have been instant lame. Why? Because true guerilla marketing occurs when the target doesn’t know they’re being advertised to. It has to be sneaky. The advertiser’s cover can’t be blown.

You hear “guerilla” used all the time now to describe marketing tactics that are unconventional. And while unconventional is a big component of effective guerilla marketing, we need to remember to keep incognito because now more than ever no one wants to be caught by advertising.

When people visit our agency offices, they always comment on the visual experience we present — they love seeing the vibe we create because it represents an escape from the traditional office environment.  Sure, we showcase our creative talents in advertising, design, PR, etc. by posting our latest and greatest on the walls.  While we are very proud of the work we create for our clients, and our clients love seeing it displayed, we need creative inspiration as well.

That’s why, when we’re not showing our own creative art,  we decorate our walls with original works by local artists.   We’ve collected some pretty cool pieces over the years from some pretty well known local painters and mixed-media artists — and many were obtained from the same place.  The San Diego Art Institute:  The Museum of the Living Artist is in San Diego’s Balboa Park, and their space displays works from local artists in variety of media and genres.

And here’s what’s cool.  Twice a year they have a fundraiser called C-Note, where they sell works donated by their artist members for $100 or $200 each — and many are even framed!  What is a c-note you ask?  Well, in urban slang it means a hundie, a benjamin, a 100 spot, a Texas dollar and a bunch of other nicknames for a one hundred dollar bill.

In this case, the C-Note is a free-for-all “art grab”, where they open the floodgates and everybody runs into the museum and starts grabbing art off the walls.  For those that don’t want to spill their wine in the process, the activity calms down considerably after the first 20 minutes and you can then leisurely stroll through and choose pieces you’d like to purchase. The only rule is that once you take it off the wall, it’s yours and you must buy it.  Throughout the evening, the walls are replenished a bunch of times as people take things down and museum staff puts new things up.  Most of the pieces are valued at much higher prices than the one or two c-notes they sell for, so you end up with art that immediately appreciates in value.  Seriously, it is a major deal and so much fun.

So if you have time, go check it out and support our local artists.  It’s a great way to add to your collection and help out a deserving non-profit in the process.  (And it’s a tax-deductible donation!)

It’s November 22 from 5-8 pm, but get there early….

Let’s face it, most people don’t have a positive opinion of traditional advertising. Many times it’s uninvited and a message they don’t want to hear.

But what if you could get people to interact with your brand, play with it?
Make them want to hear your message.

They would take away a positive impression of your product without feeling they were being advertised to.

I’d like to introduce two brands that have done just that. The first is Carlsberg beer’s ipint app for the iphone. Push a button and the screen appears to be a pint filling with beer. Every time it’s tilted—you guessed it—it disappears just like the real thing does when you drink it.

The second is not a product but a TV show—several of them. In a ground-breaking partnership, a group of designers used Showtime’s original series “Dexter”, “The L Word”, “United States of Tara”, “Californication” and “Weeds” as inspiration for the design of a beautiful Gramercy Park townhouse. Each show inspiring a different room within the house.

In the Dexter-ized dining room modern plates, glasses, chairs, a chandelier—even custom silverware—were created in the spirit of the lovable serial killer.

To showcase the promotion, pictures of the home were plastered all over the internet, including on major blogs like “if it’s hip it’s here” and featured on-air on Showtime and NBC. They even had a month long open house advertised in local papers for tours for the general public.

Expect to see more and more of these innovative marketing techniques as consumers become jaded by traditional media and advertisers continue to think of more unique ways to catch eyeballs.

When your client is Chick-fil-a (a fast-food chain based in Atlanta that serves lots and lots of chicken entrees)…you present a campaign featuring nothing but cows.

Can you imagine the look on that Marketing Director’s face? How about the awkward silence that followed the presentation? Believe it or not, the best campaigns are the ones that are so different, they make you feel uncomfortable. They make you think it could never be done. They aren’t what everyone else is doing. What makes it a great campaign is just that — they are so unconventional that they actually spur a response from the consumer you are trying to reach.

The Chick-fil-a Cows have been in circulation for over a decade. They are a team of cows that joined forces to encourage people to eat chicken rather than beef (aka a hamburger at competitors).  The campaign is genius, differentiating Chick-fil-a from its fast-food rivalries like McDonald’s and Burger King. A truly guerilla effort on the cows’ part, they hold signs that are misspelled and often have local messages. The cows have reached all types of media including TV, outdoor, events and sponsorships.

Hindsight, the campaign seems like a no-brainer. A funny, tongue-in-cheek way to get attention. However, it probably wasn’t that easy from the beginning. There was probably some squirming. Some doubt. Some push back. But lo and behold! Creativity prevailed! Hats off to you Mr. (or Ms.) Marketing Director, for going against the grain. For letting your agency give you a great creative direction that has spanned a decade!

Marketing Director Moral of the Story: Do something different. Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different response. Can we really expect consumers to respond to us if we keep feeding them the same thing over and over?

Agency Moral of the Story: It is our job to make our clients feel uncomfortable. To make them rethink the way things are done. To make them step outside the norm. It is our job to make consumers pay attention.

It’s hard not to get stuck in the day to day chaos of the economy and all the factors that go into the mix.  I find myself looking at each market change under a microscope, wondering what it means to my clients.  Which is why I’m relieved to have some retrospective, bigger picture data about the housing industry.

A little over a week ago, the National Association of Realtors released their 2008 home buyer and home seller survey results.  The results reveal broad trends that shed light on where we’re moving within the industry.  Here are some stats I found interesting:

• 87% of people who researched their home purchase online also used a real estate agent
• First-time home buyers have increased significantly due to tax credit and improvements to the FHA loan program
• Percentage of buyers who purchased a home in foreclosure increased 600%
• 41% of buyers said commuting costs were “very important”
• 90% of buyers said environmental features were important to them

Although this survey is industry-specific, it also shows marketing trends that can be applied to clients across the board.  For the quick marketing bullets and charts, check out this blogpost.

A couple of months ago while the agency went through a brand redesign and web redo, our Executive Creative Director sprang a doozy on us. “I know this may sound a little weird,” he began, “but I want to put a Love page on our site.” Huh? As he explained it, every agency on the planet lists its past client experience. What about the clients you want to work with? The clients you would LOVE to work with?

Thus the Love List was born. We selected a few of the brands we love the most. The ones we would climb mountains to work with.  He figured, maybe it won’t work. But what if it did?

And you know what? It did.

A couple of weeks ago we got an email from the interim CMO at Aptera, a very cool new car concept being born right here in San Diego, that is on our list. Someone at Aptera is plugged into the Internet, cause they found us. And they’re coming to the agency this week. Isn’t that cool?