I have to admit, I was really looking forward to Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince – due out in November 2008… That was until I heard the astounding news that the Warner Brothers Studio was pushing it back until July 2009.

I call this astounding news because the only reason that I’ve heard sited for bumping it back was so that the studio could make more money.

In other words, they made a killing on The Dark Knight and so they didn’t need a big blockbuster this fall to end out the year… so why not push it back so that they can seed their profits for next year? In addition, the kids are out of school and movies are more accessible to them, and they’ve also got the DVD/Christmas season release to consider.

HUGE mistake.

Let me tell you why I think the studio has really messed up on this one…
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My kids are on a demo team for tae kwon do, which means that they perform tae kwon do demonstrations in our local area.  Usually they demo, along with their teammates, at local area businesses, clubs, etc.  As a parent, I’ve encouraged the kids to perform demonstrations because I think it helps them with their confidence and forces them to perfect their techniques.   After all, if they can perform in front of thousands of strangers at a tae kwon do tournament (which they have), they certainly have enough confidence to do a lot of things that are outside most people’s confort zones (which they do). 

As a business owner and marketer, I totally understand why the demo team exists… to solicite new members to our dojang!

It’s a sound marketing strategy, in theory, but something happened over the weekend that really got me to thinking about the whole thing. Read the rest of this entry

Did you know that Americans get an average of 1.7 pieces of junk mail everyday (I know it seems like at least twice that at my house!)? It’s estimated that 75% of that junk mail goes straight to the trash before it’s even opened, so the real challenge for most businesses that use direct marketing is to actually get people to open their pieces.

You just can’t sell people your product if they never even see your message… that’s the first big hurtle in direct marketing.

Recently I received a piece of unsolicited mail that got my attention… In fact, it actually got me to open it even though I knew I wasn’t interested in this company. Let me set it up for you. Read the rest of this entry

I’ve been hard at work all weekend, but I finally have the June Edition of Answers eMagazine ready for you to take a look at!

This month we’re taking a look at:

    – How to make your blog more profitable

    – Finishing up the list building series

    – Talking about great places to advertise

    – Exploring how you can get testimonials for your new product… even if it’s in a brand new niche!

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I’ve always been a big fan of swipe files. It’s taken me over 10 years to develop a reasonable collection of swipe files to help me with my copywriting. For years I’ve collected direct marketing pieces, online sales letters, autoresponder messages, etc. that I thought were particularly effective. I have dozens of file folders full of hundreds of pieces… and I drag it all out and spread it all over the living room and my office when I need to get a little copywriting inspiration.

It’s a huge mess!

You see, whenever I see a direct marketing piece that has a great headline, awesome bullets, a really terrific closing, etc., I keep the entire direct marketing piece so that the part I want to swipe stays in context. I try to keep them organized, but it’s nearly impossible! The real problem is that I can rarely find what I want when I want it.

How frustrating!!! Read the rest of this entry