Capulet Communications

We've just published our first book here at Capulet Communications! Getting to First Base: A Social Media Marketing Playbook is a 100-page ebook filled with tricks, tips and case studies that show you how to:

• Bring more visitors to your website
• Increase your company’s visibility online
• Approach bloggers and other online influencers
• Create compelling viral campaigns
• Get your website social media ready
• Craft a potent social media pitch
• Market effectively inside Facebook
• Avoid campaign killers and online faux pas

Buy the ebook today for $29.

If you're a blogger and would like to review the book, let us know and we'll send you a copy.

Want to try before you buy? Read some sample chapters or view our 70 second introductory video. You might also consider becoming a fan of the book on Facebook.

Another thing... we’re giving $1 from the sale of every book to our favourite charity, the David Suzuki Foundation.

James Mirtle points to this story in the Washington Times about the Washington Capitals' aggressive blogger relations program. The team has struggled on the ice, and that's been reflected in poor attendance over the past few years. In the face of diminishing coverage from the mainstream media, they've been inviting bloggers into the press box:

"I was watching the traditional coverage, both broadcast and print, and was remarkably underwhelmed," Keeley said of his decision to begin blogging last year. "The first thing I wrote was a general sense of being frustrated — well, really more than frustrated. Really angry. I started from this premise that Washington is not a sports town, but there's nothing innate that says it can't be. But the old media don't do anything to change that perception. In fact, they perpetuate, in my opinion. So we started this blog, the idea that if you're interested in hockey and want more coverage, come here."

Capitals owner and AOL magnate Ted Leonsis is really drinking the Koolaid. He's got his own blog, and posted a thoughtful response to the article yesterday:

Also, I do question some of the mainstream media and its programming choices and how it creates self-fulfilling prophecies in how it allocates its dwindling resources on some matters and ignores others. I also wonder - if you are programming one traditional way and you are shrinking, then why don't you try something different? What do you have to lose as an enterprise if what you are doing today isn't working? Embrace change. The NHL has and so have the Washington Capitals. Change is good.

Few CEOs blog, and fewer still would include an emoticon in their post. I'll forgive him that idiosyncrasy, but I can't forgive him for not accurately citing the Great One's most famous quote (or, possibly, the Great One's dad).

Our pals over at Common Craft have delivered another excellent video, this time for PRWeb. The strength of Common Craft's videos is in the simple, creative way they deliver information. If you haven't seen them already, check out the RSS and Social Bookmarking videos. Brilliant work!

While I fully buy-in to Common Craft's 'River of News' metaphor, I'm not convinced PRWeb can deliver on the promises it makes in the video. I've used PRWeb many times before. Sadly, it's made little impact. In truth, there's no simple way to get the attention of media and online influencers. The best way for small players to make some noise is to research media and bloggers carefully and send thoughtful story pitches directly to the right folks. I'm afraid no newswire service out there can beat the personal touch.

I recently read three cutting critiques of marketing and advertising in Second Life. The first is by Rebecca Lieb (found via Adam):

Inhabitants of virtual worlds don't have real-world needs. To get very far in Second Life, you do need money (in the form of Linden dollars) to buy goods, services, and property. No small quantity of the virtual currency is spent on goods and services related to virtual sex. Way-far-out-there virtual sex, and no small number of sex businesses (one of which recently changed hands for $50,000) often seem like the primary purpose of Second Life. As ClickZ columnist Ian Schafer told the "Los Angeles Times," "One of the most frequently purchased items in Second Life is genitalia."

Ms. Lieb refers to an LA Times article, discussing some of the abandoned marketing projects littering the virtual world:

But the sites of many of the companies remaining in Second Life are empty. During a recent in-world visit, Best Buy Co.'s Geek Squad Island was devoid of visitors and the virtual staff that was supposed to be online.

The schedule of events on Sun Microsystems Inc.'s site was blank, and the green landscape of Dell Island was deserted. Signs posted on the window of the empty American Apparel store said it had closed up shop.

A while back, Darren posted a helpful article by James over at Work Industries about how to analyze and understand web statistics. On a similar topic, I recently came across this webcast on Beth's Blog that answers pretty much any question you've ever had about Google Analytics.

We encourage our clients--and anyone else with a website--to get intimate with their web stats. After all, if you don't know where visitors are coming from, what pages they're hitting and how long they're sticking around, how can you know what actions to take to improve your visitors' experience?