05/31/2011 08:38am
Grazie!Thank you to all of our subscribers who read the daily blogs about content, marketing and public relations this month. The Blogathon is officially over. I will, however, be blogging from time to time so I hope you will enjoy those posts.
Grazie, grazie and ciao ....
Posted By: Michele
05/30/2011 07:43pm
Tribute to My FatherSemper Fi.
In celebration of Memorial Day, today's blog entry is dedicated to my father, Frank Anthony LoDestro.
My Father ...
A brave soldier who served in the First Marine Division, A hero to me, my family, the people of the United States,
A father who said all we had in life was love
A child of our Lord, a champion of our Faith
A friend to the people at the drugstore, the garbage collector, the teller at the bank, the mechanic
A defender of this country
A man who spoke his mind without fear or regret
The patriarch of our family
Someone you would want on your side
Because he always stood tall for justice and goodness
Father .... Thank you for serving our country and thank you for being a great father who continues to teach me how to be strong and good even though you are in heaven.
Happy Memorial Day!
Posted By: Michele
05/29/2011 07:34pm
When Was the Last Time You Wrote a PoemGrammar school assignment? High school sweetheart? Your child's lunch note?
If you a marketing professional, the best thing you can do for yourself is ... create. Write a poem, pen a song, write a short story, work out a plot, keep a journal, write a letter (for no reason at all), craft a word cloud (for fun) ...
Add in an art gallery, a concert or a nature center. Read a great book, listen to music in the garden, take in Shakespeare in the park or get stoked over a museum.
Then return to your regime of bringing great companies to the forefront. I promise you this: your approach will be more sensorial, more brilliant and more enjoyable.
Posted By: Michele
05/28/2011 07:17pm
Learning From the Belgiums+OthersBelgium chocolate. Venetian lace. French pastries. Spanish wine. Swiss clocks .... every country has its bounty of crown jewels inherent in their cultures. Switching gears to marketing communications, it's interesting to learn how other countries are using and responding to social media. It's easy for us to be U.S.-centric, but that's simply not smart business.
Check out www.socialmediatoday.com. Author J-P DeClerck wrote an article called "The Perception of Social Media Marketing: It's a Free Lunch." The article, based on a Belgium-based survey by Leads United, reflects how that country's regard for social media is much less animated than here in the U.S., reminding us that one size definitely does not fit all.
Here are a few facts from that survey:
•Only 27% of the questioned companies have a social media policy.
•Only 16% of the interviewed “communication professionals” use social media for crisis communication.
•Only 46% of the interviewed parties actually use social media monitoring, despite the enormous opportunities that it offers and the fact that the least a business must do is listen and monitor the ecosystem within which it operates.
Posted By: Michele