In a world of brand-smearing, free shipping, and “lifetime-value economies,” why not do something small, and remarkable?

It would cost about 40c or so, wholesale per box to make the experience of opening and using this $70 item much more pleasant. But instead, I received the gizmo from Brookstone for my birthday and it came with four little bitty things that required TINY screwdrivers to install button batteries into. Rather than having their customer happily experiencing their device, I was busy sorting through my junk drawer, cursing to myself wondering where I put my precision screwdriver set.

My guess is that less than 20% of the households in the USA have those-sized screwdrivers. People probably started whipping out pocketknives, toothpicks, and god knows what else. The whole time, the Brookstone brand passes up a huge branding opportunity.

Furniture manufacturers already give away tools for assembly. It is appreciated. Many are inscribed with their brand, phone, and web address.

Just a little idea on a Friday for a retailer that wants to be remarkable.

Managed rights photo shops, such as Getty Images are bound to protect the rights of photographers, illustrators, and videographers in order to preserve the value of their work. Especially in light of an ever increasing level of choice and quality from the very low cost stock photography sites such as istockphoto.com, they are seeking to offer the professional media producer a reliable way to make sure they’re paid each time their work is used in print, online, and elsewhere.

These folks employ a variety of tools, including picscout, to crawl the net looking for unauthorized uses of their work in websites and blogs. Through image recognition and invisible watermark technologies, the crawler seeks out and reports on locations where their photography exists, and then compares the locations to the licenses on file. If a disparity is found, it is reviewed and then action is taken on the website or blog owner. Expensive action sometimes, without a trace of a C&D. I’m certain that at this human-point of the activity there is discretion applied about how to handle it.

For those of us managing dozens or even hundreds of sites, it is very, very easy for an unauthorized image or illustration to make its way into a website. While most have absolutely no intention of defrauding the artist or the stock photography shop, some may find a bill in the mail for hundreds or even thousands of dollars showing spider-finds of photographs on websites. For the hundreds of thousands of sites built upon web templates or the packs of 250,000 images for $99.95 on ebay, you could be tagged at any moment.

As also pointed out on the Signed Media blog, it’s the era of the era of user-created-content.� I have a client using a CMS system to provide websites to over 250 individual users. Other clients edit their sites regularly and post images. These newbie users, despite our best attempts, do not think twice about grabbing an image from another website or from Google Images. Too often, these are images from a managed rights photography shop. We remove the image as soon as we can, scold the site owner, but it’s a formidable task. We have taken “reasonable steps’ as requested by the DMCA procedures to inform users of the policy. I try to tell them it is the site OWNER who will receive the letter/fees, but that doesn’t always help. They see a kitten, they post the kitten, kitten photographer be damned. (more…)

Many web merchants rightfully worry� customers won’t see the value of their products due to an inability to touch and feel the quality.� It’s impossible to bring that experience to today’s web surfing experience in the traditional way, but using well-captured experiences one can get close.

But here is an example � that bridges the gap, giving the viewer a near-tactile experience.� I don’t have access to the performance numbers of this ad (would love to see them) but have a hunch this is the wave of the future.� The ad was not easy to make, and they are out on a limb with it.� But can you think of a better way to demonstrate the virtues of the product visually, with humor, to a mess mass audience?� I mean, it’s a freaking floor mat - what’s duller than that?

(Ps: you need to get through 30 seconds before the ad gets cool. I would definitely have changed that if I were designing it.� Move some of the ‘facts’ and ‘intro’ script into the interactive stuff so you lose fewer people while she’s talking it up at the start.� But that’s just my opinion.� And she definitely should have liked one of the messes - maybe the ice cream.)

And not just on the desktop-web this type of thing has legs (rimshot!).� Think about an LCD� touchscreen� on the shelf next to the products, activated by customers.� A small linux-driven LCD photo frame type display with a motion detector would do the trick.� How about a proximity bluetooth ad which displays on a mobile device?

You probably have some ideas too, even though you may not be able to put your finger on them right now.

My wife and I decided to take an hour from our work day to get some ceiling fans for our house in a real store… Kentucky Lighting in Lexington. We are trying to buy locally a little more when it comes to house-items, especially heavier items like this. So we’ll give them a shot. We fully intended to buy while we were there. They have a terrific place. Easy to find, good location. It’s nicely laid out. Lots of parking, a big parts counter, huge selection, and seems well organized. Someone has put a lot of work into the place and it shows.

This is a profoundly rare event. The planets have to line up just right for it to happen, and it did. There we were, in a bricks and mortar store instead of a web browser or catalog, , during the day, without kids, and we weren’t in a mad rush. We have two dying ceiling fans at home, and a room that needs one. We are the most perfect customers imaginable.

It unfolded…

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I think, starting today, the “Worlds Biggest Web Host” , 1&1, now offers built-in Google Site Map Tools in their Package-level domain lists, making it extremely easy to create a sitemap for any domain hosted with their services. Too Damn Easy. They’ve had such tools in their “marketing tools” before but now it’s much more “in your face” while you view your domain names in the hosting. The “standard” webmaster tool settings creates a very basic Google sitemap 0.84 schema, uploads it, and says “thank you” . Bam, it’s that easy.

You do not have to drink the Kool-Aid folks (more…)

You know, sometimes business secrets don’t require much effort to find. The fruits of dozens of locations, millions of dollars in training development, and years of experience can focus on a single experience that’s presented right in front of you. And you are permitted to take notes.

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