Hey, quick, what are you doing on May 20th? No plans. Cool. If you're in Green Bay, WI, how about dropping by to support a benefit that we're putting on for my wife's mother, Pat Massart.

Pat Massart was diagnosed in mid-February with stage IV pancreatic cancer, for which she is currently undergoing treatment We are raising money to help lessen this huge financial burden on her family and allow Pat to enjoy the rest of her life. The money raised will be used for medical expenses incurred and living expenses during this difficult time.

I've attached the formal flier and benefit solicitation letter below. If you're interested in contributing, just drop me a line!

Oh, and if you're keen to supporting with an online donation, the fabulous folks at Community Benefit Tree will help out - make an on online donation here. (Seriously, they are just amazing at helping put together benefits...give them a shout if you're doing one)

Some shameless self promotion on two items, both of which were phone/email interviews that I responsed to. The first is a piece that was nicely done by the AMA, building up the Mplanet in a couple of weeks, where I'll be presenting.

The other is a piece I contributed to for a Wells Fargo newsletter based on some previous writing I had done on my feelings toward small business and PR.

Publication: AMA - Marketing Matters Newsletter
Date: November 16, 2006
Title: Q&A with Dana VanDen Heuvel (leading up to Mplanet presentation

From a marketing perspective, companies have a lot more stuff to experiment with now, but we still need to heed the basics of marketing. It's easy to get caught up in all the whiz-bang new media. But to be effective, we still need to ask the same basic questions. "Who is the customer?" "What segment are they in?"

Whether you're putting out a billboard or putting a billboard up in Second Life, the fundamentals remain the same. You still need to have the marketing basics to make decisions in new media.

Publication: Wells Fargo - Business Banking Roundup
Date: November, 2006
Title: "Getting the Word Out", Interview with Dana VanDen Heuvel

If you don't tell your story, someone else will--and they'll tell it wrong. If you're looking for a way to get your message out your way, you might want to consider the benefits of working with a PR partner.

"A good PR firm can help you review the 'marketing assets' that you have available and leverage them appropriately," says Dana VanDen Heuvel, Director at RSS marketing firm Pheedo, Inc. "By assets, I mean everything from the products you make or services you provide, to the philosophy with which you conduct business or the organizations that you associate with. Every part of you and your business can be an asset that can be leveraged for publicity and market outreach."

More on other previous media coverage is always located here.

Hello everyone!

On July 22nd and 23rd I will be taking part in the Scenic Shore 150, a 150 mile bike ride from Milwaukee to Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin to support the greatest of causes, the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. However, I need your help!

I need your help in raising money to support the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of Wisconsin. All of the money stays in the state (sorry for your out-of-staters) and goes toward Leukemia & Lymphoma research.

Please give what you can. We all know someone who has been touched in some way by Leukemia or Lymphoma.

Think of it this way....

...Donate your weekend trips to the coffee shop--$10
...Donate a dollar for every 10 miles--$15
...Donate a dollar for every mile you're glad you don't have to ride...$30
...Ride your bike too and donate your gas money for the weekend--$40
...Donate your dinner out for the weekend--$50
...Donate a dollar per mile that I'm riding for Leukemia & Lymphoma--$150

I'm shooting for $1000 in donations this year.

Want to help? Visit my donation page here.
http://www.active.com/donate/2006SS150/danavan
Or, donate to Timothea here: http://www.active.com/donate/2006SS150/TVanDen3

However, we have a bone to pick. Why is it always coffee that's supposed to take the hit? Why not drink tap water instead of Aquafina for a couple of days? Why not order the well vodka instead of the Grey Goose? Nope, it's always "give up the latte and contribute the savings to us." We have a better suggestion - give up the $4.00 latte and buy a $3.00 press pot of a quality varietal bean and actually taste the coffee instead of the milk. Don't do this for a weekend, do it for a whole week. Give Dana the savings. The L&L Society wins, Dana wins, and you win because you're actually drinking something great. Or buy the well vodka.

Taking a cue from something that was mentioned over at 43 folders, I've gotten into the habit of turning a few of my email folders "upside down" (oldest on top) every friday afternoon and reaching out to a few of the folks that turn up at the top with whom I've not had any recent contact. It's helped rekindle a few conversations and is a non-scientific by somewhat effective way of keeping in touch with loose ties.

Technorati Tags: GTD, Productivity

Seth posts about the problematic nature of making decisions under the 'guidance' of your marketing heroes. Point taken. You see this every day. I guess I think it's more an issue with sales than it is with Marketing. If you follow Mintzberg or Kotler or Guy Kawasaki or Jagdish Sheth, I don't know that it matters too much.

However, when it comes to sales strategy, many a disagreement can arise, especially at startups who are just defining their sales & marketing strategies, when you follow one sales type, such as Zig Ziglar, or a similarly slick figure vs. someone like Neil Rackham, who advocates a question/consultative strategic approach to selling.

Personally, my marketing heroes are:

1. Raj Devasagayam, my college marketing professor who told me that everything I needed to know about marketing I really learned in marketing 101. I prove him right every week.
2. Neil Rackham. SPIN selling & Major Account Selling Strategies changed the way I sell
3. Everyone who's featured in: "Marketing Classics: A Selection of Influential Articles" (Ben M. Enis, Keith K. Cox, Michael P. Mokwa)

Who are YOUR sales/marketing heroes?

The newest addition to our family:

Lucy is an 8 week old Golden Retriever. She's probably the most low-key and mellow dog I've ever met. That's a good thing around here :)

[UPDATE] The Purina podcasts just became very, very relevant. I've subscribed to all 3.

Today our family lost a very dear friend of 15 years. Holly, the dog that we got for Christmas when I was only 14 left us this morning. She brought us almost 15 years (she would have turned 15 on Christmas Eve) of great memories.

When you really think about pets, and looking back over the last 15 years with Holly, you realize that there is no such thing as bad memories. For the most part, most pets do nothing but bring us pure joy for the little slice of our lives that we get to spend with them. Holly did just that and more.

When you consider that the average life span of a Golden Retriever is only 10-13 years, we're very fortunate indeed.

We'll miss you, Holly.

No sooner did I click submit on the post bitching about the idiots over at GreenBay Net than I read Curt's post on 'doing a 5 To 1' over at Worthwhile.

So, Curt, I'll take your advice, as I almost always do. Here's my 5to1 on how to get a positive spin on this issue.

(some of these are from the perspective of GB Net, some from my perspective)

1. Write a small applet that allows you to track users or to 'lock them in' when they're in hotspots that you support. That way, you'll be able to allow access to only 'known users'
2. Offer a premium service for x$/mo that allows full access, the rest just browse the web
3. For me, know that my work here is all during downtime and would otherwise be unconnected (kind of like working from coffee shops in 2001) Could be great for writing articles & such - no Internet disctractions
4. Commit to putting influence on the ISP from the consumer perspective. Bitching @ the coffeehouse is pointless.
5. Bring books instead of the laptop.

There, I did it. 5 positives. Not bad. Looks like a good habit to get into!

Jason over @ 37 Signals has an interesting thought today.

Throw everything on your desk in a box. E V E R Y T H I N G! Only remove things as you need. Wait...and get rid of all the other crap.

I can say from experience (I'm in the process of moving, and have recently switched jobs, so I've had something like 3 diff. office spaces in 2 mos...) that when you do this, you'll be amazed, (unless you're a GTD guru like Marc) at how much shit just isn't required for you to be productive. It's just such a cleansing feeling.

Try it.

I have been searching the Internet for months trying to find a distance marketing PhD. So far University of Phoenix (online) is
the only available option, but I have not heard a great deal of positives about their courses at that level, and was wondering if anyone knew of any other 'distance' PhD programs in marketing?

I understand that there may be times where you need to live/study at the actual university, but moving away 'full-time' to a specific school is not an option right now.

Thanks for any help you can offer. Email me at dana[at]danavan.net, or leave a comment. Thanks!

I'm the worst for this, but there's strong evidence to 'quit'.

Dining out for lunch everyday is a quick way to chew a hole in your wallet, especially if you work in an area where the cost of living is high. By brown-bagging lunch, you could save thousands over just a few years. Think I’m kidding? This lunch-savings calculator shows how swapping your $8 take-out for a $3 bagged lunch could save you $3,943 over three years. To make sure you actually save that extra $25 a week, boost the contribution level on your 401(k) so the money is automatically deposited into your savings.

[via WSJ and Terri Cullen]

The holiday of Cinco De Mayo, The Fifth Of May, commemorates the victory of the Mexicans over the French army at The Battle Of Puebla in 1862. It is primarily a regional holiday celebrated in the Mexican state capital city of Puebla and throughout the state of Puebla, but is also celebrated in other parts of the country and in U.S.cities with a significant Mexican population. It is not, as many people think, Mexico's Independence Day, which is actually September 16.

Thanks to the Sasser Worm, Internet radio is all but shut down today. I've not been able to access Radio Paradise, Virgin UK, or most others for that matter. KCRW is still online though...

For those of you not listening to Internet radio, now is a good time to plug the idea. I personally use iTunes here and have access to hundreds of Internet radio channels through the iTunes interface. Great tool, great service, great music! Try it :)

Danielle LaFleur shows how you can learn alot about a client by kissing them. Hmmm...never thought of it, but it sounds interesting.

We have a guy in the office who's worked extensively with Aritificial Intelligence. Maybe he can design a robot with some AI that does this sort of test for us... That would be cool. We could say that it's something like a funny thing that our company does as a joke, but really it's a test, and then we take secret videos of our clients kissing our Pucker Test 2000 robot and them into our new corporate demo reel. Yeah, that would be cool for 2 days while we're still in business... :)

This review is enough to keep me away from seeing BBT's new movie, The Alamo.

Once within the domain of only those companies that had advanced website analytics programs or 3rd party tools like GoToast, Google has announced it's FREE version of PPC conversion tracking via the adwords program. Google's conversion tracking feature is completely free. All you need to get started with conversion tracking is a Google AdWords account with running ads and keywords, and a basic knowledge of your website code.

It works the same way that javascript web analytics tools like HitBox (HBX) work. This is a tremendous value add for those advertisers who've invested signifcant stock in AdWords as a PPC/Advertising medium.

[via Kolabora]

It's rare that I have any fewer than 5 books going at one time - good reading begets better reading!

Here are a few that are on the coffee table as I write, all in various stages of completion:

Profitable Growth Is Everyone's Business : 10 Tools You Can Use Monday Morning by Ram Charan - I've only gotten though the first 30 pages, but I love this book already. I truly value Ram's original thinking, and am quite sure that this book will live up to its promises.

Becoming a Writer by Dorothea Brande

The Commanding Heights : The Battle for the World Economy by Daniel Yergin

Defensive Design for the Web : How to improve error messages, help, forms, and other crisis points by 37Signals

The Inmates Are Running the Asylum : Why High Tech Products Drive Us Crazy and How to Restore the Sanity (2nd Edition) by Alan Cooper

Call of the Mall : The Author of Why We Buy on the Geography of Shopping by Paco Underhill

Re-imagine! by Tom Peters

Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable by Seth Godin

Free Prize Inside: The Next Big Marketing Idea by Seth Godin - This is part of the next round of the BBBT - Catch it here on May 6th

I think that the current financial state of our country parallels, to some degree, the state of respect for copyrights in our county. This is why grade schools are taking students in grades as early as 3rd grade, and teaching them the basics of finance so that they don't become debt ridden burdens like their parents. Perhaps the same thing should be done with the treatment of copyrighted goods. However, is it the parents responsibility or the school's? I would argue that it falls on the parents. Funny thing, the parents think so to!

If teenagers and young adults aren't convinced that improper online downloading is a big deal, should the entertainment industry target an even younger generation? According to a BSA-sponsored Ipsos survey, 78% of US adults think it is the parents' responsibility, and not the teachers', to teach children respect for copyrighted works.
[via eMarketer - Teaching Copyright and Wrong]

I'm not usually one for weighing in on personal or family issues, but my general dislike for television collides with news like this and I can't help but passing something like this on. I like what a friend of mine has done with her family. As a general rule, if they see it on TV, they can't have it. But alas, that's just one mother's way of handling the onslaught of ads geared toward children. Another friend of mine grew up virtually sans television. Their TV is relegated to a corner of the basement and last I heard, they still rented the VCR from the local video store when they want to watch a movie. Granted, these are measures that are not for all, and TV is unfortunately the path of least resistance for many when trying to keep kids occupied.

"For all children, a time limit makes a big difference," she said. "Parents need to provide other options so TV isn't the first resort or becomes a constant background in a child's life."

Chicago Tribune: Task force reports commercials have big effect on kids

Research shows about 65 percent of America's school children have televisions in their bedrooms. Even one of four toddlers has personalized TV access.

If you ask Joanne Cantor, this is not good. Part of her reasoning is based on a new, comprehensive report by an American Psychological Association task force calling for tighter government regulation of television advertising aimed at children.

"Sponsors spend a lot of money for a 30-second commercial to make the product seem so incredibly fun and enticing," said Cantor, professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin and member of the APA task force. "Then Mom -- or Dad -- is left with only words to provide a counterpoint of view."

Cantor and her APA colleagues spent two years poring over all available studies about kids and TV. Among other findings: The typical American child will see 40,000 commercials this year. That's more than 100 per day.

What's more, the task force confirmed what some behavioral scientists have been contending for nearly three decades. Kids who are 8 or younger can't discern what is a sales pitch and what isn't.

UPDATE: Chris O'Donnell bit into this one with a full set of teeth. I knew I'd like his point of view on this subject!

Herman Miller's Juggelzine newsletter recently featured an article by Sally Abrahms on fitting a regular excercise routine into the way-too-busy schedules that most of us keep.

A Tight Fit: Squeezing exercise into even the busiest schedule, gives some unconventional ideas for keeping fit between travel, kids, elevator rides, and long hours at the office. Some of the basic guidelines are as follows:

I found this article today in the Hattiesburg American on guy who started his career life cutting lawn, and fixing bicycles. James Moore is now the owner of a couple of bicycle shops.

This is exactly how Dyckesville Cycle (my former business) got going back in the 80's! Actually, there were several of us from our small town that "started" it initially, but I ended up the sole proprietor of the shop at age 13, and ran it until I was about 20 in 96.

The Center for Media Research sends out daily emails w/ little tidbits about media and society. This one immediately caught my eye, as I am not a huge fan of cooking and realize, sadly, that WAY TOO MUCH of my budget goes to "eating out."

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Consumer Expenditure Survey, released in summary by NewStrategist, Americans spend 67 percent as much eating out as they do buying groceries.

This is wild! There is a whole market segment sprouting up around the overweight American. Who knew. We're moving away from healthy eating, dieting, and exercise message to the accommodation tactic.

More than two-thirds of U.S. adults meet the government's definition of being overweight, and one in five is obese. They've thrown manufacturers into a redesigning frenzy in recent years because traditional size standards no longer apply.

Check out:
http://www.amplestuff.com/

Well, it's off to Seybold San Francisco! Back Thursday.
Stay tuned for blogging from Seybold. I can only imagine that given the level of technorati that will be at this conference, there will be a lot of blogging going on from the conference!

http://www.seybold365.com/sf2003/conference/

Well, here's a slight departure from the normal crap, in fact, maybe I'll have to start a seperate blog for this topic!

I am a wine freak. Which means, in short, I love wine. I drink all kinds, and love all kinds. Fun stuff, wine.

Anyway, I'm all for change, but I don't know that I'm about to change my perception about boxed wine, but here goes. This taken from Reveries Cool News of the Day.

Boxed Wine. One in five glasses of wine consumed by Americans comes from a box, reports Frank J. Prial in The New York Times. "We're third," he continues. "In Australia, boxes have half the wine market and in Norway...they claim a third." In Britain, "the market for boxed wine is growing twice as fast as that for bottled wine." Ryan Sproul, who markets a three-liter, Napa Valley 2001 Chardonnay called Black Box, says boxed wine is growing in popularity "because consumers have come to realize that the wine is more important than the packaging." The quality of the wine inside does count, of course -- Black Box actually "won a silver medal in a competition sponsored by The San Francisco Chronicle."

The truly surprising thing here, however, is that boxes make great wine vessels. That's because the "triple-layer clear-plastic...bag that holds the wine" inside the box is airtight. The bag contracts as the wine is dispensed, keeping remaining wine in "perfect condition, for a surprisingly long time." It's an innovation claimed by the Australians, which they say dates back 30 years. It is most associated in America with cheap, sweet wines, sold mostly in "supermarkets and working-class liquor stores." The typical American box of wine, marketed by vintners such as Almaden and Franzia, holds five-liters and sells for "$8 to $12 , or $1.35 to $1.75 a bottle."

Labels like Black Box, however, are selling for 25 bucks a box. Australia's BRL Hardy has a line of chardonnay, shiraz and merlot priced at $16. A "magnum-size, organic bag-in-the-box wine called Our Daily Red," actually depends on boxing -- because it contains no sulfites it "soon becomes unstable in an opened bottle." In London, "a recent tasting...featured 30 bag-in-the-box wines, all of them serious entries from France, Spain and Italy." Mr. Prial concludes: "We Americans are still pretty insecure when it comes to wine. We still place undue importance on the bottles, labels and corkscrews. But, as the figures show, we're changing."

A friend just emailed me on this thread that's going on at Slashdot on whether or not it's advisable to get a PhD in Computer Engineering. Really, this could be applied to a PhD in any number of fields, and as one who is dead set on doing this, it's a great thread to read because there are many PhDs writing in, and many hiring managers writing about hiring said people, so the conversation is pretty lively and insightful!

In my opinion, and the only valid reason for pursuing a PhD is because you really want to, and have a passion (yes, passion!) for the subject matter. Forget career - that should have little to do with your decision. Doing a PhD is hard work, and you will almost certainly go through times when you wish you'd never started and wonder if you should just cut your losses. On the other hand, it can be immensely rewarding, and will teach you a whole new way of thinking.

As for jobs afterwards, outside academia at least, it's a crapshoot. Some companies value them, others don't. So that shouldn't really affect your decision. We have a PhD on staff and he's an extremely valuable team member because we need someone with his research background and wealth of experience to lead that area of the company. I don't think, however, that we could fully utilize PhDs in many other parts of the company.

Give the Slasdot thread a read if you're at all interested in the PhD or further education generally.

Just spent an entire Saturday at Irish Fest in Milwaukee, WI! I'm not Irish, or even related to anyone Irish, but this was the best damn party I've been to in some time. It's amazing to me to see the rich culture that comes out at these ethnic festivals. Milwaukee is known for it's many ethnic festivals, but I have to say, Irish Fest is the best I've been to.

One interesting point that struck me as odd.... There was little visible security (I actually didn't see one police officer the whole day), they were not checking bags or patting people down, and they did not, at any point, check the IDs of anyone purchasing alchohol!

We should all be so trusting!