The Web for Your Company: Magic Bullet or Poison Pill?

There are basically two types of companies. The first see the Internet as a poison pill, the rest see it a magic bullet. The poison pill companies fear the Web. They see the rush of companies onto the Internet, and they feel that they must join the stampede. They are bitter, they feel slow, and they are angry that the Web has changed the game. The magic bullet companies see the Web as a new frontier, they embrace change, and they capitalize on the Internet hysteria. Rather than simply throwing a Web site out there, they are making the Internet part of their business. They are building the Internet into their strategic plans, and they are taking it for a ride.

Rhodes, John S. WebWord (1999). Articles>Web Design>Marketing

Web Personalization for One-to-One Web Marketing

Web personalization allows you to have a Web site that tailors Web content to a Web user's preferences and other profile information. In addition, a personalization system logs every Web page displayed to every user so you can develop a "clickstream" view of what they saw, when they saw it, and for how long. Just imagine what you could learn about your audience with a complete understanding of their Web usage.

Allen, Cliff. Allen.com (2003). Design>Web Design>Personalization>Marketing

Welcoming "Joe Canadian" into our Living Rooms: the Spaces of Canadian Advertising  

The question of space has been a preoccupation of writers in critical theory for some decades. From the reconsideration of architectural practice which focuses on the user, to a broader interest in the physical locations of the production and consumption of culture, writers are paying increasing attention to the effects of the spatial on our engagements with cultural forms as a means of expanding our understanding of the meanings of those forms themselves.

Whitelaw, Anne. University of Alberta (2003). Articles>Communication>Marketing>Canada

What About Writing?  

Like many businesses, many academic programs in professional and technical communication attempt to promote themselves as unique and as fulfilling a particular niche. Such specific orientations can serve a marketing function. For instance, some professional and technical programs use their advertising literature to promote classes that train students in the uses of cutting edge technologies. And as this conference's call for proposals suggests, some programs may begin to focus primarily on a particular type of technical communication such as computer documentation, medical writing, or multimedia.

Praetorius, Pete. CPTSC Proceedings (2000). Academic>Education>WPA>Marketing

What I Learned From Television

Despite the increasing number of website ads, consumers aren’t necessarily getting their feathers ruffled more, they’re getting smarter.

Danzico, Liz. Boxes and Arrows (2005). Articles>Web Design>Marketing>E Commerce

What's Your Position in the Client's Mind?

Marketing, copywriting and design are a triangle. They influence each other. Marketing however, is the key element as your copywriting and design should be based on previous marketing research.Even if you do not deal with marketing and you are only designing, you should know some basics of marketing because your designs are still influenced by the message and the image your company or client is trying to communicate.

Bruno, Elisabetta. Elisabetta Bruno (2005). Design>Information Design>Marketing

When Customers Want You to Close the Sale

The voice of commerce grates terribly online when it is misplaced. When I'm reading someone's weblog, I do not want to be offered the opportunity to buy a t-shirt or baseball cap.

Usborne, Nick. ClickZ (2002). Design>Web Design>Usability>Marketing

When Metaphors Fail to Keep Their Distance

Was I being too literal when I made the following change? I don't think so. A name-brand financial columnist wrote the following paragraph in a piece about Web-based credit cards: Most issuers mail you a plastic card, usually a MasterCard or Visa, which you also can use in stores. At Citibank, however, plastic has become uncool. Instead, it's offering ClickCredit, a virtual card (www.clickcredit.com). It acts like a credit card, but exists only in Citi's computer. You use it solely for making purchases on the Web. The problem is, I have one of these Citibank cards, and while it's true that it's not an ordinary credit card that you carry around in your wallet and use at stores, it's also true that the ClickCredit people do mail you a card, and it's made of plastic.

Walsh, Bill. Slot, The (2001). Articles>Style Guides>Marketing>Tropes

Whither Your Business? In Pursuit of Policy and Procedure Assignments  

If work coming in the door is not bringing in enough income or is just not satisfying, it may be time to cultivate new clients. However, moving into an unfamiliar field presents a new set of challenges. How do you navigate your way into that field? How do you demonstrate your credentials? A step-by-step method does exist. It requires research to identify the right niche and more research to focus on the right customers. Only after sufficient information has been gathered is action appropriate.

Smith, Gem. STC Proceedings (1998). Careers>Freelance>Marketing

Who and What are You, and Why Should Anyone Care? Shaping, Telling and Retelling Your Organizational Story

In the waning weeks of 2004, discussion of integrated communication is, to paraphrase my teenage daughter, “so yesterday.” Like cascading communication, any talk today about integrating organizational communication is on par with contemplating one’s navel. Integrated communication should be a given for any organization. What is integrated communication and why is it so passé? To have a chance at being heard in today’s cluttered environment, all facets of the organization’s story need to be coordinated and consistent. No matter where you touch that organization, the story must be the same.

Grates, Gary F. Communication World Bulletin (2004). Articles>Business Communication>Public Relations>Marketing

“Whose Brochure is This, Anyhow?”—An In-House Writer’s Guide to Working with an Ad Agency  

Even if you’re part of a strong “in-house” marketing communications group, sooner or later your company is likely to hire an advertising agency. Whether they’re brought on board for a specific project or to provide ongoing services, the idea of working with these flashy, high-dollar outsiders can make you feel threatened, frustrated, or jealous. It doesn’t have to be that way. With a little time, understanding, and effort, you can come to see the ad agency’s team as allies in getting your work done—and advancing your own career.

Sutherland, Sam. STC Proceedings (1995). Presentations>Collaboration>Marketing

Will Plain-Text Ads Continue to Rule?

Text-only advertisements work far better than banners, but is this only due to their novelty? Search engine text ads will retain their superiority over time, but text ads on other sites will work only if they focus on directly meeting users' needs.

Nielsen, Jakob. Alertbox (2003). Design>Web Design>Marketing>Usability

With the Latest Software, Track How Your Readers are Interacting With Your E-Newsletter

While webmasters have long been able to study how site visitors interact with a web site, e-mail has been more elusive. No more. With the latest generation of smart e-mail software, marketers can now essentially look over the shoulders of their readers, seeing first-hand what works, what needs improvement and what is simply falling on deaf ears.

Dysart, Joe. Communication World Bulletin (2005). Articles>Business Communication>Marketing>Email

Writing Effective Brochures: What Goes Where? Part 1

If a brochure is ineffective, it's rarely the fault of an awkward phrase or unexciting adjective. Most paper-based brochures that fail, fail right in the planning stages. This article presents one method of organizing information for a three-panel (2-fold) 8  by 11 brochure.

Bennaco (2004). Articles>Writing>Marketing

The Writing of Marketing Materials as Technical Communication  

Writers of marketing materials seem to be stepchildren at best in the family of technical communication. Yet one cannot engage in writing effective marketing materials about technical products or services without being a technical communicator. And the more "typical" technical writer--such as an author of documentation--will perform better when she understand-s the marketing component of her work. We will serve the marketing communicator and his technical writer counterpart well by breaking down the barrier that seems to exist between the disciplines.

Baker, Dina. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Business Communication>Marketing>Writing

You Can Create Effective Marketing Materials: A Technique for the Technical Writer  

Technical writers can create effective marketing materials by following a six-step process. First, interview your customer to define the audience, usage venue, goal (desired audience action), benefits of the product, any obstacles or competition it faces, and the strategy and means to attain the goal. Next, work with the designer to determine the major elements of the piece. Then write a text that reflects a buyer’s typical mental process. The writer then supports the designer in creating a model or “comp” of the intended finished product. Writer and designer pitch the comp to the customer to obtain changes and final approval. The last step is to let go!

Bradley, Gerald A. STC Proceedings (1995). Articles>Writing>Marketing

You Get What You Pay For: What's Your Business Image Worth?

Unfortunately it seems that more and more companies are choosing the lowest price in deciding which white paper writer to engage. Why would a business that would never bat an eyelash paying for a high-quality website, choose the low price provider for a white paper?

Kantor, Jonathan. WhitePaperSource (2006). Articles>Writing>Marketing>White Papers

"You're a Guaranteed Winner": Composing "You" in a Consumer Culture    

This article explores the functional elegance of direct mail as it constructs its target audience. More specifically, it examines direct mailings included in a nationally publicized court case involving Publishers' Clearing House and articulates how the use of particular genre-based, rhetorical and linguistic strategies in these mailings construct reader identity. It argues that the documents use you-attitude to construct the identity of the reader as winner, implied reader devices to reinforce the reader's identity as winner and to establish the reader's identity as the writer's friend, and linguistic politeness strategies to build feelings of solidarity of the reader toward the writer. It concludes with the observation that the direct mail in our study, rather than being "junk," is really a skillfully written set of documents, successfully interweaving various discourse strategies and raising both ethical and professional issues in the process.

Ewald, Helen Rothschild and Roberta Vann. JBC (2003). Articles>Business Communication>Marketing>Rhetoric

Your Customer is a Search Engine

While consumer confidence in advertising is at an all-time low their confidence in search engines is growing. Why? Search engines offer consumers what advertising does not: relevance.

Janisch, Troy. Icon Interactive (2004). Articles>Internet>Marketing>Search

Your Own Best Ad: Promoting Yourself as a Contractor

Most contractors can't afford the time or money to advertise. If they can, there probably aren't many places where an ad would reach potential clients anyway. By default, then, your reputation as a contractor rests on your behavior at each job. Leave a happy client behind at the end of each job, and you'll soon start a word-of-mouth campaign that will keep you employed the rest of your working life.

Byfield, Bruce. TECHWR-L (2008). Careers>Consulting>Freelance>Marketing

Your Website: An Extended Infomercial?

Your website serves as an opportunity to give your new contacts a deeper understanding of what your business can do for them.

Bennaco (2004). Design>Web Design>Marketing

The Zen of Craigslist  

During a recent move, the author not only acquired and sold many items via Craigslist (www.craigslist.com), but gained insights about herself as well as running her business.

Frick, Elizabeth G. 'Bette'. Intercom (2006). Articles>Business Communication>Marketing>Online

Ethos as Market Maker: The Creative Role of Technical Marketing Communication in an Aviation Start-Up    

This study examines how a very light jet start-up, Eclipse Aviation, changed its ethos appeals in order to survive the loss of its principally declared innovation, a jet aircraft engine. Eclipse Aviation’s corporate transformation from a spin-off company to a convergence-of-innovation company hinged on modifying an early marketing strategy. To overcome the loss of the jet engine, employees had to radically modify earlier expert representations and adopt rhetorical appeals that more closely parallel what Miller described as "cyborg discourse." To understand how Eclipse Aviation survived the typically fatal loss of a stated primary innovation and to explore the implications that this particular start-up’s rupture has for technology transfer and technical marketing, this study centers its analysis on a Web site that marketers used to "ventilate" the company and prevent financial collapse. The transformation in the company’s marketing strategy illustrates how cyborg ethos appeals aggregate and discipline distributed stakeholder roles.

Mara, Andrew. Journal of Business and Technical Communication (2008). Articles>TC>Marketing>Case Studies