The GottaQuirk eMarketing blog The GottaQuirk blog is a great resource for information about internet marketing. It’s an up-to-date resource on the happenings in the fast-moving eMarketing industry. Statistics Unique Visitors: Total Unique Visitors: Outgoing: Total Outgoing: 0 0 38 4901

Articles from The GottaQuirk eMarketing blog

Blog Action Day 2007-10-14 23:52:17 So apart from being Monday and the day after a fantastic display on the rugby field courtesy of the Springboks it is also Blog Action Day. Blog Action Day is essentially the first annual event where bloggers from around the world come together to focus on a single topic – the environment. We all know that awareness and education are the first steps to facilitate change and that’s why we at GottaQuirk were so keen to get involved (that and the fact that there’s quite a few of the tree hugger variety around here). So… eMarketing is out for the day and the environment is in. The QuirkStars will be posting on environmental topics throughout the day so keep an eye out for some excellent tips on what you can do to save the environment and while you're at it send us your thoughts on what we can all do to make the world a better place – I don’t know about you but I’m not really keen for a fiery or icy death any time soon so let’s see wha ...

Fight for Kisses 2007-10-14 01:36:59 The Wilkinson Fight for Kisses viral has done exceptionally well over the last month. With countless views on YouTube and plenty hits on the micro site it's pretty easy to see why the ad's been so successful. Ask any new dad - there's an element of jealousy when the little 'bundle of joy' gets more love and attention than you do and Wilkinson have tapped into this. While I thought the ad was awesome and exceptionally well made I was quite surprised, after I'd done a bit of digging, to find out that it's actually promoting  a PC game they've developed. You can download the game to your PC here (no Mac of Linux - sorry) - it looks like fun. Comment on "Fight for Kisses" ...

Don't let this be the end 2007-10-13 01:45:36 Can’t really say too much about this one from the WWF. It’s a message that needs to get out there, and people will pass it on as long as they believe in the content. Viral Marketing at its simplest: Comment on "Don't let this be the end" ...

Radiohead relax after success of online campaign 2007-10-11 07:06:55 Phew, what a week Radiohead must have had. People have been talking about the new album where ever I turn; from the countless mentions across the Internet to the general excitement of my housemates in the lounge of our happy home. Thom Yorke and the Oxford boys gave the music industry a bit of a kicking this month with the experimental release of In Rainbows, their seventh studio album (sans EMI), online with a “pay as you please” payment system. Not the band’s first venture into eMarketing; the five piece ensemble also had a website devoted to their live performance/documentary/video art mash ups called Radiohead TV. Thom told NME earlier today that he spent the day yesterday relaxing in his local pub while the world went Radiohead crazy. The band have refused to release information of yesterday’s download stats or sales figures, but the experiment had fans crashing the Radiohead.com website while clambering to get their hands on the much anticipated albu ...

First Tuesday Recap 2007-10-11 05:08:00 “The end of the world is a scenario” Clem Sunter I attended a First Tuesday event on… Tuesday ;-). The keynote speaker was Clem Sunter, a renowned strategist and author who spoke of a  visit he made to China last April. China currently occupies the number four spot in terms of world currency and they aim to get to number 1. Below is a series of questions that Sunter asked the Chinese and how they responded (well the short version of the answers). What is the context / playing field? China is making deals with countries that have raw materials, as they little in terms of raw materials (excluding coal). They are masters at making fake products that look exactly the same as the real thing. The next step for them would probably be for them to make their own products and not fakes, like Japan did in the 70s. Who are the players? The West, export markets Developing countries – raw materials Communities – run them like a multin ...

Chasing the Good Chase 2007-10-10 09:20:28 Having spent the last week flying around like a vampire bat on E, I somehow find myself with some blood still left in my caffeine stream. Considering I probably more closely resemble an H. R. Giger imagining than a human being I was actually very glad to find myself not having to deal with anyone throughout the morning. Instead I sat down to write this blog post and try to gradually draw the poison that is coffee from my veins. What happened? Well, I stared blankly at my monitor for about 5 minutes and realised that any further effort expended on coming up with a topic could better be put forward to finding a way of achieving world peace. No worries. After all I’ve been out of it for what constitutes a considerable while in online time, and I still have the various news sites and forums that I regularly visit, along with my ultimate fail-safe: my feed-reader. Well, I went to the news sites and found nothing that really grabbed me. At the forums I came across various conversatio ...

Radiohead have been thinking about you 2007-10-09 13:36:15 Radiohead, one of the world’s most successful rock bands, have been making headlines recently as their release date for the newest album, In Rainbows, draws near. The band’s seventh studio album has sparked much interest within music industry circles as the band announced at the beginning of October on the official Radiohead blog that they will be giving fans the opportunity to download it from their website – legally and for free. On the In Rainbows website, users can pre-order the entire album, and will be provided with a unique link which will be activated tomorrow – the official release date. The artists ask only for voluntary donations, or £40 for the massive box set. Although they aren’t the first band to freely release their music (most major artists just release a catchy single or two), the sheer magnitude of the outfit has music fans hoping that Radiohead will set yet another online musical trend. Comment on "Radiohead have been th ...

Stream - The Highlights Package 2007-10-08 09:03:40 So much for my regular postings from Greece… The rest of the conference was so jam packed that I didn’t get a chance to do much else other than participate, let alone write a decent blog post. Anyway so many of you have asked me how the rest of Stream went so here's a wrap-up of the highlights. Friday morning started with a bang. After breakfast I went straight into a discussion called “Its 10pm: do you know where your data is?” held by Esther Dyson. The conversation revolved around consumer privacy issues and how companies like Google and WPP are using and storing data. The general vibe was that WPP in particular wants to ensure that they are ethical in their treatment of consumer’s data and this is particularly relevant with their recent purchase of 24/7 RealMedia which has the potential to raise concerns about privacy. Thankfully for them, at the moment Google and DoubleClick are taking the majority of the mindshare on that issue. The next discussio ...

Human Bait 2007-10-07 02:31:21 I've always maintained that I'm going to meet a sticky end during one of my runs. I feel that giant hellhounds, crazy taxi-drivers and grannies with a chip on their shoulders have got it in for me. Honestly I've gotten paranoid about taking a jog through my leafy suburb - the pine trees, thatch-roofed houses and old age homes are merely a facade to lure the unwary to their doom. Still, I don't think the most jaded paranoid android could have foreseen this one from Toyota: I feel that an over-the-top twist at the end of a clip always does wonders for a viral campaign - and that little touch with the tentacle straightening the board just adds a little bit of class. Comment on "Human Bait" ...

Adding Colour 2007-10-06 02:08:21 The Sony Bravia ads are always winners. I remember seeing the paint extravaganza one months before it came out on TV here in South Africa. I must have sent it to pretty much every one I knew because I’d simply never seen anything like it before, and I’m pretty sure most people who received it sent it on. Here we have another fantastic ad which is bound to do very well in a viral context. Gorgeous isn’t it? I do so love small creatures – even plasticine ones make me happy. Check out the full details of what it took to create the ad here. Comment on "Adding Colour" ...

Global Teaching 2007-10-05 05:59:57 Traditionally universities have tended to keep their lectured intellectual property very close to their chests and sharing hasn’t been one of their strong points. Recent developments seem to be changing that – which is GREAT news for everybody. Yesterday I received an email from Riaan regarding another university,Berkley, which is using its own YouTube channel to upload lecture videos and other teaching material - Awesome. While this is very novel and I applaud them for this bold step, it pales when compared to MIT’s juggernaut of online material. In 2001 MIT created OpenCourseware and literally opened its doors (or is it servers) and offered anybody the opportunity to not only download their course notes but also the lectures in video and audio formats. Over the past six years they have nurtured this encyclopedia of teaching material into over 1700 courses ranging from the relatively mainstream “English Literature – Shakespeare” through to the p ...

Streaming from Greece 2007-10-05 01:18:00 So I never managed to have that afternoon nap. Suffice to say I was a broken man by the end of the evening but thankfully the adrenaline of this event kept me going. A few highlights of the evening: Dinner – these Greeks can cook! I was a very happy gastronome. I played Guitar Hero against Josh Spear and I chose a Pearl Jam song as I thought it would give me an advantage because I know them all backwards. To cut a long story short – it didn’t and he thrashed the pants off me. Here is a pic of Josh shredding the World Champion Diabolo Juggler (no I’m not kidding). He chose a Rage Against the Machine track which was probably recorded before this kid was born so perhaps he had an unfair advantage. I met Adam Selig the Chief Exec of reputation monitoring and management company, Visible Technologies and the makers of Trucast and Truview. Adam is a really smart guy who has clearly put a lot of thought into the ins and outs of ORM. I certainly learnt a few things ...

Stream - Day 1 2007-10-04 10:07:06 In yesterday’s newsletter I made the potentially foolish promise to blog my experience at Stream 2007. Those who read this blog often will know that I am an infrequent contributor at best so this was quite a commitment. Well here I am in Athens, I’ve only been here a few hours and despite my nagging flu and droopy eyes (no one likes to get up at 3am… least of all me!) I’m already having a blast. Here is the view from my room: We arrived on the red eye from London at about 1 and after grabbing a tasty Greek lunch, I decided to meander about the hotel to meet some people and generally soak up the vibe. Within minutes I was sucked into a game of Guitar Hero. I started off with Nirvana’s Heart Shaped Box but my rocking was a little sloppy and I am pretty sure Kurt Cobain was rolling in his grave at the time. But what a lot of fun! I’m determined to master the strumming before I leave this place... I will climb that Stairway to Heaven.   I e ...

The power of Word-Of-Mouth 2007-10-04 06:55:26 Despite the many advertising platforms available, according to a global survey conducted by Nielson, it seems that consumers still place the highest level of trust in other people's opinions. This survey was conducted over 47 markets and was made up of 26,486 Internet users. Attitudes towards thirteen types of advertising, including online advertising, were surveyed. The survey found: "Filipinos and Brazilians (67%) to be the most trusting overall of all forms of advertising, while trust among Danes (28%), Italians (32%), Lithuanians (34%) and Germans (35%) were the lowest in the world." In terms of eMarketing, the Internet is catching up with traditional advertising mediums in terms of ad-revenue yet it is still lagging behind in terms of trust. Word-of-mouth or customer recommendations are considered the most credible form of advertising among 78% of respondents though significant national and regional differences were found regarding this and other mediums. North Ame ...

Blogging the Newsletter 2007-10-03 09:39:19 Today’s newsletter marked the release of the final installment of our 10 week long series on Social Media, and with that statement I breathe a huge sigh of relief it’s been a pretty tough series to write (what with there being so much to say and all). This week we looked at blogging: what it is, how to get started and how to ensure a blog’s success. If you haven’t signed up for the newsletter you can check it out here. Sarah (other Sarah) also featured some very interesting articles which included a look at how to market to media-savvy teens without driving them away and some tips on how to boost your blogger profile. In the next edition we’ll have something very special for our South African marketers and after that we’ll be launching our second “How To” series: How To Build Good Websites – keep an eye out for it or sign up to receive our newsletter. Comment on "Blogging the Newsletter" ... Blogging