The Big Fat Marketing Blog

Nashville – I’m at the 2010 National Catalog Forum, presented here April 13-15 by the American Catalog Mailers Association. It’s being held at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel. Equipped with 2,881 rooms and 600,000 sq. ft. of meeting space, the Gaylord Opryland Hotel must have its own weather pattern. more

So Twitter has finally committed to advertising. Big deal or not?

Here’s what PC World has to say.

Personally, I will just avoid the ads, just like I do on Google, Facebook and LinkedIn.

Research suggests that one motive for brands getting involved in social media is fear—worry about what people are saying about them in communities and social networks.

As it turns out, brands should also be worried about how people are interacting with scam artists impersonating those brands in social networks.

Swedish retailer IKEA had its trademark and identity phished last Friday by someone who built a fake Facebook page for the brand and then broadcast offers of a free $1,000 gift card. more

The DaffysBang cross-channel campaign has the potential to be great. But in its current form, it highlights the retailer’s disjointed approach to channel integration more than its great bargains.

Daffy’s is a bricks-and-mortar apparel discounter with multiple locations in the New York metro area. In a full-page ad on the back of one of those freebie newspapers catering to commuters, it described its DaffysBang Twitter campaign: If you post a tweet along the lines of “My #DaffysBang is a [name of purchase] for [$XX],” you could win a $50 gift card.

It seemed like a catchy way to spread the word about Daffy’s unique selling proposition—more fashionable bang for the buck—to Twitter users who don’t already subscribe to Daffy’s feed. Promoting it via print also extends the reach to bargain lovers who aren’t yet on Twitter.

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When it comes to mobile-marketing and permissions, it doesn’t pay to take anything for granted—including the meanings of the words “call” and “consent”.

A federal judge ruled last week against dismissing a lawsuit against Twentieth-Century Fox for violating the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, thereby allowing a suit to proceed against the studio for sending a consumer a text message he didn’t opt into.

The decisions is the latest in a string of recent cases exploring the gray area of whether a law set up to ban robo-calls can be used by the Federal Communications Commission to police the explosion of text messaging campaigns. more

Thanks to Susan Davis of Paradysz Matera for telling me about the message at SmithAndHawhen.com that it’s going to become some sort of social media site. Target Corp., which acquired Smith & Hawken and ownership of SmithAndHawhen.com the from The Scotts Company (according to Network Solutions) on Dec. 30, says it isn’t so.

I received an e-mail from Michaela Gleason in the Target communications office explaining that “The message was mistakenly posted before we acquired the Smith & Hawken brand. We are currently working to remove the information.” more