Tag: Advertising

Web everywhere

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Recently I was chatting with a Director at a global advertising agency about changes in the media landscape. The impact that the internet was having. She mentioned that the internet only affected a certain portion of the population – not all target audiences. The younger generation, the web savvy, the technophiles…

I retorted with the following:

Once upon the web was a thing you had to visit. First it was in military installations, then Universities. Eventually it was present in only very large corporates on selected computers. Later, on every desk in every company. Afterwhich  every computer in every home had it. And now it’s on our latops, in our cafes, in our pockets, it’s the GPS that directs our cars and powers the touch screen shopping mall directory. Next year all TV’s sold will be web enabled – 5 billion channels. It’s on every digital display in our lives.

It came to us, it removed the original demographic bias. The web is everywhere and permeates our entire existence. It has changed advertising forever.

The web is no longer and thing or a place. It is omnipresent.

Launch choices

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Seems there are two choices in launching a startup or brand:

1. Buy an audience. [quick but expensive]

2. Earn a following. [slow and cheap]

The problem with the first option is that we don’t get many chances to refine our stuff, and getting it wrong can end it all. The benefit with the second option is that it allows and encourages experimentation. And if we experiment enough, we might just be able dome some of the first option too.

Convention busting – retail

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Long held wisdom in the retail industry is that items must be displayed on shelves by category. Idea being that we know what thing we are looking when we shop. But what if we’re just browsing? What if we don’t want anything in particular? Bring on Smiggle – stationary retailer who display their range by color.

Eyeball worthy…. I better go check out what they have in purple.

They aren’t the only ones moving towards it, as  on line retailer etsy also display their range on line by color, with an amazing interface – check it out. It just works.

What other conventions need to be busted in your startup category?

How to run a corporate Twitter account

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

I was writing a guide for a social startup Abbostford Biscuits on how to approach twitter. Here’s a little snippet I thought was worth sharing for anyone wanting to embrace twitter in their company.

The twitter account should be open to all in the Abbotsford Biscuits organisation. Anyone should be allowed to tweet on behalf of the company. This is important because the aim is to share the company culture and values, so that you can build a following. The reality of any culture is that it is the amalgam of all viewpoints. If the brand twitter account is just maned by one person, then the personality will be too singular to truly display the organisations values. It also adds variety to the output and creates more interest with followers.

The team should be given a set of guidelines and then allowed to tweet as they please. This will also help with frequency of output, without impacting the general responsibility of staff and workers. They can do it on their breaks, or any time in or out of the office. The chaos of this proposed situation must be embraced or it simply wont work. For a true social media engagement control must be relinquished. The voice must be human, overtly honest and omnidirectional.

Your thoughts?

Brand Trust

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

Apple Inc sold an amazing 700,000 ipads on launch day. That’s around $350 million in revenue in one day. Most of the eager purchasers didn’t have full knowledge of what the gadget was even capable of. Which makes me ask these simple questions:

(A) Is Apple the most trusted brand in the world with loyalists? (B) And if so what creates such zealotry?

Startup Blog Answers:

(A) Yes, I think so.

(B) Abridged answer: Over delivering to expectations on multiple occasions.

The only other brands I can even think of people buying into without knowing what they are actually getting is the ever lasting life that comes with most religions!

Startup blog says: Over deliver, be patient and get compound returns.

Originality is for artists

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

There are no prizes for originality in business. There is no shame in copying others, sorry – idea borrowing. So many aspiring entrepreneurs say they are just waiting for a great idea. The original idea for them to launch a startup under. I was once this person too. And I was so very wrong. I learned the hard way by losing half a million in venture funding that originality is over rated. I’m convinced highly original ideas increase our probability of financial failure.

The startup blog view is this: originality is for artists.


Let me explain. People want change they can cope with, and so the business world (consumers) are most likely to reward incremental improvements. Ideas which people can cope with. Ideas that are easy to spread because the audience has a reference point. Something to switch to, a substitute. Yes, radical products and services can be a success, but they are so rare (especially with low and self funded businesses) that it is tactically foolish to chase them. We ought leave that to large corporations, and heavily VC backed startups.

It comes back to our objective – do we want to run a business, or be original? It’s rare to achieve both, so make the choice early and know whether you are an artist or an entrepreneur.

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Expertise is hands on

Posted on by Steve Sammartino

The word expert gets thrown around lot. Everyone’s an expert these days, especially in the technology and media arena. My view on expertise:

Without implementation expertise is just an idea, and ideas are omnipresent.

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