Don Akchin

Advertising on social media sites is an opportunity that has not gotten much attention. Thanks to the large amounts of personal information that Facebook users cheerfully let fly into the atmosphere, Facebook advertising has astounding capabilities for pinpoint targeting of your audience.  Now there are some guides for novices.  Hubspot offers a free e-book on the ins and outs. You may also enjoy an interview Beth Kanter conducted with leaders of a dance company that has developed a strategy for Facebook ads.

Well-known copywriter and author Tom Ahern delightfully distills the essence of neuroscience, as it applies to motivating people to act (and give). Much of the action takes place in the “reptile brain,” a vestige from the early days of evolution, which constantly notes what’s new in the environment and sizes it up with two questions – Will it kill me? Can I eat it? Ahern’s bottom line is that the latest brain science confirms what direct mail marketers have known for years: people respond to emotional triggers, not reason.

It’s not easy to keep up with the new digital media, much less understand it. But this provocative article in Ad Age, by Doug Levy and Bob Garfield, offers a look at the big picture. In their eyes, we’re living at the dawn of the Relationship Era, and as a result, everything we used to know about marketing is now wrong. On a similar theme, see for yourself what all the buzz is about regarding the “10 fresh realities of the Digital Age,”  a slide presentation by Lee Rainie, Director of the Pew Internet Project. In fact, have a look at the slide presentation itself.

QR (Quick Response) Codes are all the rage with marketers. In case you missed all the excitement, QR codes are like barcodes, only they’re bigger and square-shaped, and scanning them with a smartphone or a mobile phone with a camera will take you directly to a webpage. Blogger Allyson Kapin at Frogloop shares examples of ways the National Aquarium and four other nonprofits are using QR codes creatively.

Ever wonder whether advertisements on search engines work? This brief case study from the National Women’s Law Center explains what they did, how they did it, and how well it fared.

President Barack Obama’s fanatic attachment to his BlackBerry was priceless free publicity for the wireless device. Blogger Jeff Brooks reveals how ad execs would have mangled the moment with less-than-credible cleverness. (Photo credit: Andrew Zhang)