My Mental Vacation

Murphy-Goode Winery Dream Job / Campaign

I have really enjoyed watching Murphy-Goode's campaign to hire a social networking expert for their winery. (See A Really Goode Job.) $10,000 a month for six months, PLUS you get a house to live in, up in the California wine country. Qualifications: Blogger. Good tweeter. Video. Wine lover... Wow! Talk about a fun job... Their wine is pretty good, too.

I admit it. At first I was fooled and thought it was a "real" job, which, of course, it is. But I was totally surprised by the originality of this as a marketing campaign, and the depth of thought and planning that went into it.

There's a promo site. There's a "contest," where applicants submit a 60-second video of their qualifications, and where viewers watch the videos online and vote for their favorites. Want to be notified when more of these really creative videos are submitted? No problem... just provide your contact info, sign up for the mailing list, and they'll keep you posted. (They will no doubt ask you to join the wine club, too.)

To get to the top 50 candidates, popularity carries a lot of weight. Kind of like the American Idol of job hunting. Only the top 10 will get interviews, and we will be the first to know because we'll get the announcements, and we'll see it tweeted on #winewednesday, #areallygoodejob, and #murphygoode. And, we'll watch their videos to make sure we didn't miss anything goode.

I can't wait to see how this plays out between now and September when the hire takes place. I know we'll read, see, and hear about it... the top 10 will be going to Healdsburg for a week, where, "...in addition to the interview, you must participate in various activities during the interview process. Activities may include tasting wines, commenting on wines in writing, on camera screen tests, attending media dinners, and other similar events. " Yup. Media dinners. I guess that means we'll read about the candidates in the wine section of the Thursday Chron.

If you don't know Murphy-Goode's culture, poker plays a huge part. Wine names include Snake Eyes, Liars Dice, and All In.

My favorites so far:

Best at telling the story:
Alyssa  (AND gets the poker connection!)

Best food/wine cred:
John (Wine Spectator award winner, and plays Liars Dice)

Most talented (tie):
Carolyn (who can hula hoop and drink wine at the same time, without spilling a drop!)
Vince (two heads are better than one.)

Best closing:
Diedre ("...and I have great wine country outfits.")

Most dubious qualification:
Julie (from Marietta, GA, "Home of the Big Chicken.")

Intrinsically qualified:
Sophie VINOgrad (the name says it all.)

We Ship to Lake Tahoe

I was driving in Palo Alto / Menlo Park today, and spotted a funny sign in the window of a Mattress Discounters store. It was large, plain-text sign that said "We ship to Lake Tahoe" - at a very busy intersection on El Camino. Hmm... What does that say about the neighborhood market demographics? "We have tons of customers with second homes in Lake Tahoe who are shopping for beds. Advertising especially to them is the best way to increase our sales."

Or maybe the point is something else... if they ship to Lake Tahoe, they'll probably ship anywhere between Palo Alto and Lake Tahoe, or anywhere just as far as Lake Tahoe. Or maybe they ONLY ship to Lake Tahoe, so don't even bother asking if they ship anywhere else!

Enquiring minds want to know, so I went to this website to find out... Not helpful... apparently, they don't have a store in Palo Alto... or Menlo Park... or even CALIFORNIA! The directory came up empty. Or else the database is broken. Thinking there might be more than one chain of the same name, I Googled it. This led me to Yelp, and a review from jc c that said: "DO NOT SHOP HERE, unless you are feeling especially masochistic. You will 1. Deal with slimy salesfolks 2. Pay too much 3. Have poor service.  If I could give 20 negative stars, I would."

I wonder if the sign caught anyone's attention besides mine. Probably not... but it only takes one, and then you have a blog post, and it is probably going to automatically get posted on my Facebook page, and I'll bet somebody there tweets about it. If it wasn't for the intriguiging, oddball sign, I would have never looked them up, and would have never seen the Yelp review.

This demonstrates why companies need to monitor their online reputation diligently. Somebody please tell Mattress Discounters that they really need some marketing/web help. I'd be happy to provide a consultation.

More on Kauai Chickens and Tourism

I wrote something a while back about the chickens running loose all over the island of Kauai in Hawaii. I actually enjoyed them... they added some local color to the vacation, which I always enjoy. I thought they added to the charm of the island. Apparently, they are having a negative effect on the tourism industry. I actually liked waking up to the morning crowing. I guess I'm in the minority.

Today's Wall Street Journal has a story about the chicken problem on the island, which goes into much more depth than I did as a tourist. The article says, "Kauai, the oldest of the Hawaiian islands, is called the garden isle for its lush vegetation. Now people are calling it the chicken isle because it is overrun by roosters, hens and little chicks. Most of the birds are believed to be descendants of former fighting cocks unleashed during a devastating hurricane more than a decade ago. The birds now forage at outdoor food courts and ruin sugar cane and corn crops. They wake islanders -- and tourists -- with predawn crowing."

Read the whole thing here.

Calgon, Take Me Away!

That is probably one of the most memorable taglines of all time. I'm sure many people are like me.... you get stuck at your desk or your job working too hard, or your stress level is high for whatever reason. Then you just start yearning to escape from it all and take a vacation... off to some tropical locale... sunshine, umbrella drinks, and a summer lust novel.

"Calgon, take me away" has all of the qualities of a good tagline. People directly relate to the message, they remember it, and it becomes adopted as part of the vernacular. There is an entire generation of people now who don't even know that Calgon is a water softener. But check it out on Wikipedia... the phrase was translated in many languages, and was mentioned in books, songs, and films.

Even if I don't say it out loud, I often hear that phrase in my head whenever I'm ready for a vacation.

And speaking of umbrella drinks, one of my clients makes The Perfect Puree to give fresh fruit flavor to artisan cocktails and beverages. Check 'em out!

Will Austerity Marketing Reach Celebrity Chefs?

Our recent trip to Las Vegas shined a light on marketing in the food and restaurant industry. Our hotel and its sister property had restaurants created by Emeril Lagasse, Mario Batali, Charlie Trotter, Wolfgang Puck, Thomas Keller, and many more celebrity chefs. These are all high-concept places, and they all featured stylish decor and menus that match the theme. And great food, of course. For prices that seem almost obsene, given October's Wall Street meltdown. (But yes, we did partake, and we really enjoyed it.)

Today's "name" chef has a chain of restaurants, a series of cookbooks, his/her own television show, web properties, their own wine labels, cooking equipment, just to touch the tip of the iceberg. In a place like Las Vegas, it seems like every hotel boasts their own celebrity chef's as part of their own marketing.

All the way up the food chain (sorry), companies are going to the bank with profits resulting from the talents of their chefs. I'm not quite sure how this trend became so firmly established, but I wonder what will happy to Las Vegas with such a high concentration of top restaurants in a tourist-supported city. With tourism, and dining out in general, dropping off because of the economy, will our celebrity chefs and restaurants lower prices or close their doors, or will they adopt creative "austerity" marketing programs to bring in customers and get them through the coming months?

I'll bet we see some of both results.

The pros are better at being quiet.

I read something today on Seth Godin's awesome blog today. The post was entitled "Silence is a Virtue."

Godin said, "Nothing at all is actually the biggest difference between professional and amateur marketers. The pros are better at being quiet."

There you have it. Rather than posting something inane, I have been pretty quiet lately. Happy to say that I can now blame that on being a pro! I'll come up with something soon.

Work Comes First, Sometimes

I haven't written in a while, but I've got a darn good excuse. I've been working a lot. Business is good. Busy! 

As consultants, we take the business when we can get it. To me, that is one of the most challenging aspects of being self employed: managing the workload without a) burning out, b) falling behind, or c) interrupting the sales process to deliver work, and then winding up with nothing on the horizon when a big project is completed.

I've been taking active steps to change this. The first thing I did was to incorporate. Yep. I'm now an LLC. I've got two clients on retainer now, and I'm working on establishing other quality partnerships. The goal is to better manage the ups and downs. All that should give me more time to travel, and more time to think about it.

My niece is coming from Texas with her family. I always like it when she visits. Her kids have never seen tall trees and mountains, so I've suggested we meet up in Tahoe and rent a house for a few days. I'm happy! I get to plan real travel, and will hopefully get to a place that I really love. North shore is my favorite. The pace is slower, and there are fewer tourists. I'll let you know what I figure out.

Did you notice that this post was a shameless plug for my marketing consulting business? Yep. I got that web ad into my blog, inserted a link, and there it is! Your turn. Go click on it!

Road Warriors Reunion

Claudia was here from Montreal for a week, and we are going to do some business together! Sounds boring, but you have to know Claudia. She's fun.

I was her client back when we were both pioneers on the web trail. Her company developed some machine translation software, and my company needed a cheap way of translating content for its global employees. We worked together for a few years developing this application, and did a lot of traveling in the process. Funny how traveling together creates bonds between people... indelible memories that always remain associated with a sense of place.

So, this week, we revisited our old adventures, and had a grand time of it. We went to a conference, worked the show, and had many meetings. Tapas at B44, cocktails at the Marriott bat cave, a side trip to Sonoma, and a final stop at Baker Beach to see the Golden Gate Bridge.

Most of our talk was around travel, and the numerous places we had met before. Montreal, Chicago, Orlando, San Francisco... we both love working in the international space. We love the cultural differences, enjoy being either the guest or the host...  Work and travel fit together perfectly in my mind. Hope we can continue this, and work together again.