Marketing Tom - Internet Marketing

Innocent Drinks and Tea!

There are some bloggers who really get it, and the guys over at Innocent Drinks really do. If you don't know much about Innocent Drinks, here's what they believe in:

it all sounds a bit Miss World, but we want to leave things a little bit better than we find them. Our strategy for doing so is simple - firstly, only ever make 100% natural products that are 100% good for people. Secondly, procure our ingredients ethically. Thirdly, use ecologically sound packaging materials. Fourthly, reduce and offset our carbon emissions across our entire business system. Fifthly, lead by example at Fruit Towers by doing good things. And finally, give 10% of our profits each year to charities in the countries where our fruit comes from. If you're interested, you can find out a bit more about each below.

I was looking at their site yesterday and came upon the story of how they had been supplied with a goodie bag from Yorkshire Tea purely because they (Yorkshire Tea) had read an article which mentioned that their kitchen was temporarily out of order. I sincerely believe, apart from the obvious marketing kickback for Yorkshire Tea, that people who read the Innocent Drinks' blog feel some sort of affinity to this company and enjoy reading about the staff, their experiences and their products. They are a truly transparent, online company. From the picure in the article it looks like the local bobbies also empathise with them.

State of the Internet: Mary Meeker

For the past couple of weeks I have been downloading Web 2.0 podcasts onto my iRiver MP3 player. Most of them came from the Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco, where there were some great 'conversations': Eric Schmidt (of Google), Jeff Bezos (Amazon) and Bob Parsons (GoDaddy), to name but a few but the podcast which I remember most is the Mary Meeker: State of the Internet, Part 3 one. The main reason is that she delivered 37 PowerPoint slides in around 10 minutes - I have used a number of them on the eMarketing courses that I deliver.

Here are the downloads:
PowerPoint Presentation Slides
Download Audio
Download Video

New Look Marketing Tom

I have spent the past day or so redesigning the new-look site and am almost there! I just need to add some content into the navigation buttons, clean up the category sections and modify the sidebar. If you would like to let me know what you think about the site, or would like me to add anything new, just get in touch: alun @ gmail dot com.

Skype Allows You To Make Direct Calls

Over the past week I have noticed that the telephone numbers on the websites have been visiting have turned into 'active' Skype buttons. So, if you have Skype connected, you can click the button and make direct phone contact (ususally through Skype Out). I saw it first on some Spanish travel sites and cost/time barriers seemed to suddenly seem very small.

I came
I saw
I Skyped

This is a brilliant stroke by Skype and must surely have telecoms companies quaking in their boots (again!).

Does Google Have Problems With YouTube?

An interesting article on Red Herring asks whether YouTube is turning into too much of a distraction for Google.

But so far, YouTube has been nothing but a source of headaches for Google executives. Their efforts to negotiate content deals with mainstream media groups have resulted in a rash of negative publicity, forcing CEO Eric Schmidt to spend an inordinate amount of time defending a subsidiary that accounts for a sliver of Google's revenues.