The River

With action in Canada around Bisphenol A, the last few days have been hopping with online activity among parents — parents worried about the safety of plastics their kids are using; parents looking for information and products that will help them avoid this threat to their children’s health. From what I’ve been observing, most of the discussions are taking place on sites like Z Recommends — a “mom and pop”-type blog, not affiliated with any major media company — where the information in the comments are as valuable as the posts themselves.

This is the phenomenon documented in a BabyCenter/Keller Fay study released today, which finds that pregnant women and new moms engage in 1/3 more word-of-mouth conversations than other women, and 2/3 of those conversations involve product recommendations. Though the study found that most of the conversations happened in person, the Internet was the #1 driver of word-of-mouth among media.

Stuff like this is one reason I’m so jazzed to work with the highly-influential authors in our BabyCenter Parenting Federation (which FM runs in partnership with BabyCenter). Well, there’s that and the fact that I’m both pregnant and a new mom myself, so I personally love immersing myself in this world. Luckily for me (and marketers), the folks in this world are making tons of buying decisions (and having lively conversations about these decisions) every day.

I loved Kent Nichols’ (of Ask a Ninja) explanation of what we at FM — specifically our salespeople — do. Paraphrasing here, but the moderator asked how AAN has been successful courting brand advertisers. The secret, Kent said, is “sweaty people who drink” — aka hard work building real-life relationships with agencies and advertisers, sometimes with the lubricating influence of alcohol. It’s the non-engineerable aspect of advertising, he said, and it requires the sweat of people who do “voodoo bullshit” and “close deals.”

This panel has completely rocked — best of the SXSW interactive conference so far — and Kent Nichols is a great instigator. He totally gets it, and he expresses it in a laugh-out-loud hilarous way.

After all these years, I’m finally getting the chance to re-visit one of my favorite towns — where I did my undergraduate degree — and I’m thrilled to be attending SXSW Interactive for the first time. Yippee! So, if you’ll be there, too, let me know.

Interesting approach. I like the idea, though the video itself seems a little slow. They’re distributing it on their own site, and promoting it in a media buy that includes BabyCenter (FM partner and J&J subsidiary).

Via the WSJ

I would be extremely remiss — and I’m already pretty darned late to the game — if I didn’t link to John Battelle’s latest musings on conversational media/marketing. It’s thinking like this, with which I heartily agree, that lured me to work at FM in the first place. But these ideas are influencing much more than my piddling career prospects. They’re really observations about a sea change in the worlds of marketing and media. (And there’s going to be a book!)

We’re growing, and adding two more positions to support our 100+ authors. These folks would work on my team in the Author Services department. We just have one job description, but are hiring two people that will do similar stuff. If you’re interested, drop me a line.

Now, without further ado, the description:

The Author Services Account Executive (ASAE) at Federated Media works with the whole Author Services team, and the rest of the company, to take care of authors. This person will institute and follow a plan to make regular contact with FM authors, checking in with them on how we are proceeding, together, toward meeting their goals. An ASAE must have excellent communications skills, as a primary responsiblity will be to communicate instructions and requests to authors, and also serve as the author’s advocate within FM. Besides proactively contacting authors, the ASAE will also respond to requests from authors — for information, technical help, advice, etc.

This person will also help search for new authors for this growing company, and respond to queries from prospective authors.

The ideal candidate needs to be organized and have an eye for talent. He or she should be able to cope with a rapidly changing amount of data from various sources. A passion for the world of blogs — in particular for the world of search, media, and technology — is required. The ability to work comfortably with a wide variety of personalities is a must. Editorial experience is critical. An understanding of the publishing and advertising worlds and a knowledge of general business operations are both important. Meticulous accuracy and attention to detail is essential, as is the ability to work on numerous projects simultaneously and under tight deadlines.

When my husband first moved to the U.S. and we got married, one of our first family inside jokes involved poking fun at direct response TV. When one of these spots aired, we’d each take a guess on the final cost (”just $19.99″ or “the low low price of $29.95″) and predict the moment when the full product line had actually been laid out — when there were no “but wait, there’s more…” lines left to say. These DR techniques are an integral part of American popular culture.

The WSJ today has an obituary for Arthur Schiff (reg req), the DR genius who came up with the “but wait, there’s more…” technique and marketed the legendary Ginzu knife set. (”In Japan, the hand can be used like a knife. But this method doesn’t work with a tomato.”)

Schiff died a couple of weeks ago from lung cancer in Florida. (The SF Chronicle obit.)

It’s fascinating to see what Big Tobacco does to market itself nowadays (to adult smokers only, natch), given all the restrictions these companies face. And now they’re joining the user-generated-media craze. The image here was from an e-mail I received after signing up for a mailing list (and verifying my age, and saying I smoke). If you’re under 18 or a non-smoker, navigate away now, before you accidentally become swayed by the marketing message.

Yes, it’s true (as if you doubted it). I’m joining FM Publishing as author services manager, to work with John Battelle and his team on developing this next-generation publishing company.

Why? One of my earliest experiences in the Internet ad world was as intern/writer/ad sales person at @NY. I got the ad sales part of the job (and all the rest) courtesy of Tom Watson, who I’d met while finishing up my masters in journalism at Columbia. One of the more important things I learned (besides that I was not cut out for selling) was how difficult it was for agencies to buy ads across niche Web sites. No matter how engaged and influential their audiences, it was just plain logistically difficult to buy across all those sites. And that was 1998, before the explosion in blogs, and their accompanying engaged, influential (but niche) audiences. That’s one of the issues FM is looking to address.

Why else? I’ve spent the years since that experience thinking and writing about interactive advertising, watching the boom, the flameout and the subsequent rise. Joining FM is an opportunity for me to apply everything I’ve learned over the years about advertising and about managing writers. It’s also a great chance to work with brilliant, dedicated people who have a strong vision of the future of publishing. Needless to say I’m especially looking forward to getting to know the authors, many of whom I feel I know already through reading their compelling writing. I’m really eager to start helping them realize their dreams for their sites.

One of the things I had to really look at when considering this opportunity was whether I’d miss writing. I’ve helped with writing news and authored a bi-weekly column since 2001. I looked back recently over the archives of what I’ve written for ClickZ, and the sheer volume is amazing. Thankfully, FM, as you might expect, is supportive of my blogging, so I’ll have The River as an outlet for my musings. Not sure exactly how often I’ll be posting or what shape it’ll take, but give me time to get my feet wet and together we’ll see what emerges. (Feedback is always welcome, of course.)

I’m still at ClickZ for the next week. Then I’ll take a whole day (!) off to do yoga and nap (or something equally relaxing), and I start at FM on August 1. To all you FM authors out there, I look forward to working with you!

Wendy’s is reportedly abandoning the “Biggie” name for its large soft drinks. A spokesman explained: “We felt like the Biggie designation is not what most customers were used to. Most people were used to small, medium and large.” Amen.

UPDATE: Friends have mentioned that this is actually a ploy by Wendy’s to get people to buy bigger sodas. I knew that. Just wanted to take the opportunity to stick up for “small,” “medium” and “large” as perfectly adequate words to describe drink sizes.