There’s Nothing Quite Like a Real Book: The Secret Life of Bookstores
Last Inspired Marketing Friday, I challenged you to document the creation of your products in a unique way. This week, I bring you a bookseller that uses merchandise to provide a kinetic feast for the eyes, while combating online competition.
As of this post, the video has been seen nearly 1,300,000 times — and I suspect it has increased foot traffic and sales. Heck, if I lived in Toronto, I’d definitely visit Type Books and make a purchase or two.
For another boost of inspiration, visit the store’s website to see how it integrated the video into its homepage design. It’s an immersive experience that will surely create lots of fans.
What’s been inspiring YOU this week? It doesn’t have to be a video — it could be an awesome sales letter, a clever squeeze page or even a blog post. Let me know in the comments section below.
Encourage New Generations of Women Entrepreneurs: Become a Role Model
Becky Canary-King is an account manager and press contact at Direct Incorporation, a company focused on providing a more economical and efficient alternative to using a law firm for common legal/entrepreneurial issues.
A recent study in the Journal of Economic Psychology posits that women have a lower preference for becoming self-employed.
Is it just that women are under-motivated? I don’t think so. Could it be a lack of role models for young female entrepreneurs? After all, women make up only 3% of CEOS on the Forbes list of 500 biggest companies.
Whatever the reason, you can help change this, by inspiring future generations of women to embrace the benefits of small business ownership. Here are four suggestions to get you started.
1. Share your story. During my Girls Scouts days, our troop was visited by a female sales manager, architect and local politician. Seeing women in a wider range of career than usually depicted on TV really broaden my ideas on who I could be when I grow up. Continue reading
You Say Brandwashed Like It’s a Bad Thing: A Skeptic’s Look at Martin Lindstrom’s Latest Book
This Christmas, my mother-in-law gave me a copy of Martin Lindstrom’s book, Brandwashed, 
“I want to read it when you’re done.”
My family rarely shares my love of marketing books. And I loved Martin Lindstrom’s last book, Buyology: Truth and Lies About Why We Buy
And I did, at first. Lindstrom starts by describing a year-long challenge he undertook to avoid branded products. No McDonalds. No Gillette shaving cream. Even branded fruits like Adirondack tomatoes were out of the question. He called it “brand rehab.”
Not surprisingly, brand rehab failed. Brandwashed documents why.
The Skinny on Brandwashed
Like Buyology, Brandwashed is chock full of research on our relationship with brands, from social experiments to surveys to fMRI brain scans. But unlike Buyology, Brandwashed borders on sensationalist. Continue reading
How to Create Killer Marketing Leaflets
This guest blog post was supplied by Nick Green, managing director of Printed.com, suppliers of digital leaflet printing.
Business leaflets – simple, two-sided sheets of A5 or A4 folded into three sections – are ubiquitous nowadays. Chances are you’ve seen thousands of the things in the last year, papering the walls of the local library, carpeting your porch, cascading out of magazines.
Some of these leaflets are excellent, providing targeted and useful information that prompts readers to become customers. The majority of leaflets, unfortunately, are less successful.
The problem is that business leaflets are so easy to produce that it’s tempting to do so with comparatively little thought – which would be a mistake, because a well-designed leaflet can have an outstanding impact on your marketing. Continue reading
