Much has been made of Barack Obama's incredible fundraising, and rightfully so. Like no other politician in history, Obama understood the power of the Internet and used it to his advantage masterfully. Because of this, Obama finds himself in a unique position over the last few days of the campaign. With a considerably higher bankroll than opponent John McCain, Barack Obama can literally spend more in one month than John McCain can over his entire campaign.
But how do you even go about spending that much money? Well, the Obama campaign figured out a way.
Last night, in an unprecedented show of campaign muscle, Barack Obama made his case directly to the American people in a 30-minute infomercial. Spanning seven television channels, including networks CBS, Fox, and ABC, the piece allowed the Obama campaign to paint a very compelling picture of the hardships America is facing and the way that a President Obama could fix them.
Seen by an estimated 35 million people, the spot seems to have been a big hit across the country. If you didn't get a chance to see the ads, check them out below and leave a comment. I'd love to hear what ad students and professionals thought of the spot.
Barack Obama's Mega Ad
McCain Ratchets Up Attack Ads
By the way Paul, congrats on casting your ballot. I know you've been itching to do it for a while.
Pepsi's New Logo
Here's a little addendum to last Sunday's post about Pepsi's Mega Shake-Up. As part of the brand makeover, Pepsi redesigned their logo. The expert voices at AdAge have weighed in on the new design in this article, but I want to know what you think?
Good?
Bad?
Ugly?
Boring?
Pepsi Shakes Things Up
I'm a Coke man. Always have been. As a matter of fact, I recently made the switch to Coke Cherry Zero and I couldn't be happier. I'm not entirely sure it had anything to do with Coke's advertising as much as its taste, but it's hard to accurately measure the kind of impact the Coke brand has had on my life. I suppose it's possible that the chubby Coke Santa Claus and those adorable Coke Polar Bears had something to do with my preference. I do know one thing for sure. Coke's main rival - Pepsi-Cola - just never did it for me.
Maybe that'll change now though. According to an Ad-Age Report, Pepsi-Cola is in the midst of making a big change to their brand. To the tune of $1.2 billion, Pepsi is rebranding all of its products to try and jumpstart positive growth for the company in a decidedly unfriendly market. To help achieve this change, Pepsi is reportedly turning some its resources from its traditional agency, BBDO, to Arnell, which is affiliated with industry giant Omnicom Group. It'll be interesting to see if this mega shake-up recharges the brand. If not, I suppose they could try Pepsi Cucumber again.
Zack and Miri Make a (CENSORED)
I'm a Kevin Smith fan. Sure, Jersey Girl was awful, but other than that his repertoire has been solid. Since his next movie, Zack and Miri Make a Porno, features another one of my favorite Hollywood personalities, Seth Rogen, I'm inclined to think that his quality track record will be preserved. Before the movie premieres however, people need to hear about it. Needless to say, when you've got a movie with such a provocative title, that's easier said than done.
I Miss Football
Given the current state of our economy, I would never complain about having a job. In fact, I love working. I like my coworkers, I'm pretty good at my job and I have a good time doing it. On the other hand, it has taken up a lot of time which I used to spend sitting around doing nothing.
For instance, I've only been able to catch a couple football games this season since I've been so busy with working and moving into my new place. If I don't get locked in to the season soon, I won't have a clue what's going on. Luckily, I caught this new Nike commercial directed by Michael Mann which has totally reinvigorated my love for the game.
P.S. This isn't the first pairing Michael Mann has had with Nike, as I detailed in a previous blog post.
Rob Learns About Sales: Part 2
So in my last post, I left off by posing a question to the LinkedIn community - "In one sentence, what is the difference between sales and marketing?" In no time at all, the answers came pouring in from all over the Internet. And, though they weren't always one sentence, they were all good. So, without further delay I present to you the difference between marketing and sales.
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In my opinion, marketing is generating interest in your product, while sales is converting the interest into purchases.
-Brian L.
Marketing creates awareness, interest, and inspires people to act. Sales continues to increase interest and close the deal.
-Susan P.
Marketing is the prayer; sales is the promise.
-M. Joyce M.
Marketing is everything that you do to reach and persuade prospects and the sales process is everything that you do to close the sale and get a signed agreement or contract. Both are necessities to the success of a business.
-G. Sandhu
In the real world: nothing.
-Jeff R.
Marketing is not an end in itself, it is a means to an end (sales)....
-Ramachandra R.
Sales is one of the 4 strategic efforts that in combination form the activity known as 'Marketing':
1. Product management and/or manufacturing;
2. Pricing;
3. Marketing communications, including public relations and advertising; and
4. Channel management (otherwise known as 'Sales').
-Peter R.
Sales is a function of marketing.
-Bryan E.
Marketing is a coordinated mix of strategies that communicate product information to a prospective customer, on a one-to-one basis, through a variety of media, including a sales force, to facilitate their decision on whether they wish to buy the product and to conclude the transaction.
-Frank F.
Without marketing there is no sales!
-Joe B.
In general, marketing is lead generation and sales is direct customer interaction to close a business deal. The difference between sales and marketing is vague depending on the sales model. This vagueness is especially true in businesses that use the internet as their sales interface and lack a direct sales force.
Several marketing departments fail to understand closed sales is the key measureable for any business. Marketing benchmarks often revolve quantity issues like lead generation, number of campaigns executed, and quantity of deliverable items. Although these benchmarks are important, one must understand these tasks need to lead to closed business. I find many marketing professionals feel their job is complete if they execute a certain number of deliverable items.
-Christopher K. (FYI, Christopher suggests young marketers read The End of Marketing as We Know It)
Marketing is formulating the strategy and overall message while sales is delivering it. Out of college I expressed an interest in marketing jobs and people kept trying to put me in sales, actually saying I expressed an interest. Either me, them, or both of us, or the overall meaning, were confused.
-Kevin H.
Marketing is for lead generation what sales is for closing.
-Patrick H.
It seems common to find definitions of marketing that place it as almost a step or component of the sales process. I don't see it this way at all. There are activities that are "marketing" that are not directly related to sales as the end goal. Marketing is far broader than sales and may pertain to activities other than selling a product and service.
-Matthew W.
The meaning of the word "commission"; either they'll get a commission to do some marketing, or they'll do some sales to get a commission.
-Philip S.
Sales is a part of marketing, the end of the process that starts with research, leads to a product,a name, a way to get the word out, and finally get someone to buy it.
-Tim D.
Marketing sets the direction and provides the resources, while sales communicates to the customer and executes the marketing strategy.
-Josh C.
Marketing is what you do to gain your prospects' attention, and regain your customers' attention. Selling happens when both parties -- prospect and seller -- examine the business fit.
-Shawn G. http://www.savageandgreene.com
For business, marketing is the view from 30,000ft, sales is the handshake.
-Bart C.
In my opinion I feel that marketing is everything you see from a company: the outer layer of the company, the website design, the newsletters, the images. Sales is all about the numbers.
-Casey C.
Marketing is building the relationships and sales is cashing in on that relationship. The difference is that marketing is about caring, communicating, talking, telling a story - then if your client/customer buys into it you can actually make a sale. I believe it really is all about cultivating relationships in a sincere way.
-Jacqueline W. http://www.moxieworks.net
Remember AIDA? Well Marketing is the "AI"; not artificial intelligence but rather Attention and Interest. While sales then would be the DA or Desire and Action.
-James G.
Selling is the management of the present, while marketing is the management of the future. Sales is an important part of marketing. Put another way, sales allows you to eat today and marketing allows you to eat tomorrow.
-Gene R.
Marketing is what creates or brings a prospect to us to sell. If I am marketing, I am looking for prospects, or trying to create interest in a product or service. If I am selling, I am trying to take that prospect and make them a customer. Depending on the industry, marketing and selling can be almost the same thing, or they can be miles apart. Most of the time, however, marketing doesn't require closing or asking for the order. Once you are doing that, you are moving towards sales.
-Jim S.
Marketing is the act of generating interest in your product/service, Sales is the act of delivering product/or service for a fee.
-Chris C.
Marketing is the awareness of the product and sales is the success of that product.
-Scott P.
AND
Marketing is all the strategies and tools used to reach and persuade consumers to buy a product or service, whereas sales is the direct personal interaction between the consumer and the sales person used to close the deal/purchase.
-Jenna L. (as in Jenna Lebel our very own Experience.com Super Blogger)
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Phew, that was a lot of answers. Hopefully it helped clarify things. If it didn't, however, and you find yourself more confused than ever, I'd like to formally pass the blame on to everyone who contributed to this post. What am I supposed to be an expert or something?
Rob Learns About Sales: Part 1
Guess what you marketing blog faithful, I've got some good news! Recognizing my stupendous abilities as a talented and witty blogger (save for the occasional fart post) the bigwigs at Experience.com approached me with an exciting opportunity over the summer. For this cycle of blogging, I will be writing not only about marketing related news, but also about the sales industry.
Now, I'll be the first to admit I'm not exactly a sales guy. Sure, I'm a smooth talker, and I think I might be good at selling, but I'm not sure I have the stomach for it. Then again, maybe that's just because most of my understanding of sales stems from Glengarry Glen Ross. Cold calling, chasing leads, closing deals. How much of that is actually part of the sales professional's job? How exactly does the sales team of a company work with the marketing team? Better yet, what exactly is the difference between sales and marketing?
In my quest to find the answers to questions like this, I've done what any savvy young professional should do: I asked people. Specifically, I used LinkedIn to pose the question, "In one sentence, what is the difference between marketing and sales?" Pretty clever move, no? In just a few hours I had already gotten loads of great answers which I'm really excited to share. So, here we go...
PSYCH! Hahaha. I got you guys good. You should have seen the looks on your faces. But seriously, I did ask that question on LinkedIn and I have already gotten a bunch of great responses. However, I'm not going to share them now because I want to wait and see what happens overnight. After all, I don't want to sell you guys short, and, if my gut is right, I'll open my e-mail tomorrow morning to a whole bunch more top notch answers.
In the meanwhile, since I was talking about Glengarry Glen Ross earlier, enjoy this video I found on YouTube. For anyone who's seen the film, you'll undoubtedly remember this fantastic early scene featuring Alec Baldwin as a brass balls havin', f-bomb droppin', real estate sellin' bad ass. Unfortunately, since Experience.com is a pretty family friendly website (I'm not even sure if writing ass is okay) the actual scene is probably too intense to share. Thankfully I found a solid alternative. Enjoy.
