The Big Fat Marketing Blog

Thanks for sending me a fully-inflated vinyl chair to promote your new Saturday Evening game shows. Oh, and the matching 32 oz. cup with witty ingredients showing how fun your shows will be. Oh, and the DVD and the press release.

And I’m sure the confused FedEx guy is happy with you, too. Wait till he finds out you sent this to one reporter (me) who doesn’t cover television or entertainment (or work for a publication called “Multichannel News,” or spell his last name with an “e,” but hey, you got the street address right). Or for that matter, that you sent a second one to someone who is no longer with the company! more

Does this shirt make me look fat, or just plain dorky? Yeah, not a lot of people are in the market for a t-shirt with three wolves howling at the moon silk screened on it. But they’re selling like crazy at Amazon.com, thanks to some creative customer comments.

According to the BBC, sales of this shirt are up a ridiculous 2,300% because the comments went viral. So is it hip to be square? Maybe not, but maybe it really, “Fits my girthy frame, has wolves on it, attracts women,” as one comment says.

Amazon’s not completely thrilled with the comments, but is happy for the seller.

My wife and I have been at Wyndham-Kingsgate in Williamsburg, VA since Saturday, pretty much just trying to get away from everyday life and not be bothered by anybody. We own a timeshare in Myrtle Beach, but decided as an owner and an RCI member, we’d take advantage of a bargain vacation deal.

But RCI should have had a disclaimer on their Web site: “Warning - by agreeing to a bargain vacation, you are subjecting yourself to a daily ‘oh, no, this is not a sales call’ marketing push, because if you’re dumb enough to buy a timeshare in the first place, you’re dumb enough to buy another one.” more

Hemisphere Marketing president Gina Valentino was on MCM Radio earlier this week to talk about what she learned (and taught) at ACCM.

Valentino had a busy week at ACCM, with the Medical Center and the Catalog Critiques and speaking in sessions and all sort of good stuff like that. And the vibe she got from the show: Merchants are eager to get back on track. Industry gloom and doom was hardly on the mind of attendees. more

But again, Compendium Blogware founder Chris Baggott hitting the cutting room floor is again a good thing. Why? Because he’s got a story to tell you about Twitter.

And the timing of this is great. While social media gurus are screaming about the value of tweeting, Baggott puts it in perspective. It’s a growing piece of the social media puzzle, but it’s not quite the Holy Grail.

Twitter may not drive leads (qualified or random), but can be a pretty darn customer service tool. Here’s a story Baggott shared with MULTICHANNEL MERCHANT: more

Let my loss be your gain, readers!

Once in a while we close an issue of MULTICHANNEL MERCHANT, some content hits the cutting room floor. Really, it happens, it’s just just what some guy at a bar told you about being in a deleted scene in Star Trek (that’s just a pick-up line!).

One piece that hit the floor came from Steve Spangler of Steve Spangler Science. And it came from an ACCM session about social media. And if there was ever a reason why merchants should blog, it’s this figure right here: more