Major League Dreidel

On the second night of Hannukah, we attended Major League Dreidel at the Knitting Factory in Williamsberg. Bryan and Leslie signed up to compete. Among about 200 participants divided into groups of six, they spun driedels in the 'spinagogues' for the best time, trying to avoid 'spinterference.'

Competitors had names such as "7 Deadly Spins" (also champ in 2007), Challah At Me, Gelt Digga and Jimmy Gimel.

Short Takes: Paris stops

Good book to read if you're interested in Shakespeare & Company: Time Was Soft There, by Jeremy Mercer. Documents the experience of living and working at the famous bookstore in Paris.

You've Been Selected for Inclusion into The Who's Who of Executives and Professionals

i think this is really good direct marketing. you've been selected!

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Strathmore <info@mktgsystems.com>
Date: Mon, Oct 26, 2009 at 5:28 PM
Subject: You've Been Selected for Inclusion into The Who's Who of Executives and Professionals
To: XXXXXXX

Dear Executive,

You were recently chosen as a potential candidate to represent your professional community in the 2009-10 Edition of Who's Who among Executives and Professionals.

We are please to inform you that your candidacy was formally approved October 12th, 2009. Congratulations.

The Publishing Committee selected you as a potential candidate based not only upon your current standing, but focusing as well on criteria from executive and professional directories, associations, and trade journals. Given your background, the Director believes your profile makes a fitting addition to our publication.

There is no fee nor obligation to be listed. As we are working off of secondary sources, we must receive verification from you that your profile is accurate. After receiving verification, we will validate your registry listing within seven business days.

Once finalized, your listing will share prominent registry space with thousands of fellow accomplished individuals across the globe, each representing accomplishment within their own geographical area.

To verify your profile and accept the candidacy, please  visit here. Our registration deadline for this year's candidates is December 31, 2009. To ensure you are included, we must receive your verification on or before this date. On behalf of our Committee I salute your achievement and welcome you to our association.

Sincerely Yours,

J. Edward Simmons
Vice President, Research Division

Strathmore's Who’s Who
26 Bond St.
Westbury NY 11590

Confidentiality Notice: This e-mail communication and any attachments may contain confidential and privileged information for the use of the designated recipients named above. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that you have received this communication in error and that any review, disclosure, dissemination, distribution or copying of it or its contents is prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please delete the communication and unsubscribe from the mailing using the options available in this email.

This message was sent to XXX by info@mktgsystems.com

Email Marketing by

23-35A Steinway St, Astoria, NY, 11105

Posted via email from matzucker's posterous

re:direct launches

At the DMA Conference in San Diego last week, OgilvyOne launched re:direct, a movement to reinvigorate creativity in the direct marketing industry.

Above is the video we played at our cocktail reception. It was part of a print->mobile ad experience as well as PR (guest column in AdAge, press release) and social media. The re:direct blog is here and you can follow us on twitter @re_direct.

Rory Sutherland at TED

Very funny+smart perf by Rory Sutherland, Ogilvy UK Vice Chairman, including highlights of Diamond Shreddies towards the end (14:00ish).

Short Takes - Torrey Pines

Ezra Pound in Print

The West Side Spirit and Our Town published a piece of mine about dog parenthood, featuring Ezra. You can find it in this week's street boxes on the Upper West Side and Upper East Side of Manhattan, or over here.

Early firsts : Ecommerce and Dayparting

I think I’m getting sentimental or just paranoid of my memory going. I’m thinking back to early digital experiences and realizing how early on I emigrated from advertising to the web.

In 1995, America On-Line was very precious and didn’t allow anything commercial (this would be amusing years later when it became a shopping mall), but CompuServe had an online store where you could, get this, buy directly. I was a copywriter at FCB and for our client Rayovac Batteries, and with Sean Connolly and Adam Gargani, we set up a mini-store in what would be one of the first ecommerce plays for a packaged good. I wrote sell copy in formats I had never done before, and within a few weeks, we had sold thirty (30!) sets of rechargeable batteries. I remember being excited, feeling the rush of actually selling something directly to people.

Just a few months later, Nabisco wanted to be among the first corporate web sites, so my art director Miguel and I concepted a Nabisco “town,” where Town Hall would have corporate and HR information, the park would have Oreos, a cafe would have Cream of Wheat, and so on. We created the design comps but to program it, we went over to then-True North partner Robert Greenberg & Associates on West 39th Street, who seemed to be the only ones in town who knew how to actually program it. (I would return ten years later to work there as a creative director when it was hot interactive shop R/GA). Realizing that people could come to nabisco.com at any hour of the day, we suggested it go dark at night and those crazy programmers were able to do it. Yup, this is one of the earliest examples of day-parting on the web. Later, there were tons more virtual towns for brands but this was before all that.

I'll try to update this with screengrabs but my images are all on FLOPPY disks ;-)

The Puma Index: Direct Sexponse

The latest and greatest in lead capture -- The Puma Index. To showcase Puma Bodywear, your choice of female or male model will take off their shirt if the market goes down. So if you lose your shirt, so do they.

While attention-grabbing digital pieces like this have existed before, this requires your email address before getting in. This helps make it less hit-and-run advertising-like and more substantial acquisition leading. Will be paying attention to what they do with my address and see if it was worth it.

Notes from the OMMA Panel on Social Media Creative

The panel I was on at the OMMA Global Conference as part of Advertising Week was interesting, though it felt like we didn't really tackle the topic: "Best 2009 Creative Social Media Campaigns." Wonder if we disappointed the audience.

Hosted by Greg Christian from SamnLori recruiterswe covered a little bit of work and each chimed in about challenges facing creative development in social media and what agencies and clients need to do in the space to succeed this year.

Cathy Taylor from MediaPost was in the audience, and afterwards, she wrote an article about things she heard throughout the day, including what I spoke about for creating nimble creative teams for social media.

Advertising Week 2009

This week is Advertising Week; if anyone had any sense, they'd rebrand it Marketing Week. But advertising is more glamorous so we'll let it own the week (just as it's hijacked brand ;-)).

Tuesday, I'm on an OMMA panel at the Marriott Marquis called "Best 2009 Creative Campaigns in Social Media" if you're attending. Come and cheer or jeer. Probably will mention Skittles.com, as most would expect.

3 Years: Remembering mach

of course we remember.

the wisdom. the laughter. the warmth. the trouble-making.

it's absolutely crucial we do.

for ourselves, for those we'll teach and guide.

the impression he made in so many of us was deep and indelible. (even if it was in lowercase ;-0

mach, we miss you.

<from his school. from his company.>

Minding the Snore in the NY Press

Last year's sleep test experience just got published in The New York Press's 8 Million Stories column, "Minding the Snore."

Please go read, rate and comment it.

Email Jacking Lessons from Mom

My mother taught me how to "email jack" — using a form letter created by an organization one does not agree with and changing the pre-purposed content to something more amenable to your views and then sending it on. This one was a form letter from an AFA Action Alert to complain to the AAA that they had recognized gay couples as, get this, real married couples in their coverage. I simply edited the pre-filled in text to thank the AAA for recognizing gay couples as real married couples in their coverage.

Now I'm on the listserv for AFA Action Alerts which are amusing and creepy. The next one I saw was anti-health care.

Digital pays Direct back

New piece just published in AdAge's CMO Strategy column, "How Digital Marketing Can Help Reinvent Direct Marketing." It talks about digital as good apprentice who has grown up, while direct is a bit stuck in one-to-one of a perfected past. Provides some lessons which we're going to apply at OgilvyOne to direct marketing and unstuck it for the modern era.

I had submitted it with a more provocative title from Bryan: Digital has learned so much from direct. It's time to pay it back.

Instant Gratification Was Fast Enough

I just finished my five-week writing class, "Instant Gratification Isn't Fast Enough."

Let by Susan Shapiro, it was a terrific hands-on, uber-practical, no-nonsense dive into the world of creating and selling your work to publications. She does a great job of demystifying publishing and also fostering a workshop-like environment and giving tough critique to work we bring in based on her curriculum. Excited, too, to have so quickly built up a bit of a better nonfiction portfolio and know better how to creatework that sells and even have started to send out some of the essays, op-eds, and service pieces.

Sue Shapiro, a journalism professor at The New School and NYU, also has a new book Speed Shrinking coming out August 4. Pre-order it here. Sure to be hilarious.

Where is my bus?

I was so excited to see how Chicago bus systems let you track your bus from your phone, so you know how long you have to wait for the next bus. Especially helpful if you're in the cold or in a rush and debating between bus, walking or cab. Apparently, Portland and a few other cities are also already doing smart stuff like this.

New York's MTA was planning on rolling out something like it and started with a test starting in 2006, but in February, the MTA pulled the plug on the pilot for GPS for NYC Buses. So disappointed about this, especially now that I'm commuting mostly by bus to work on 11th Avenue.

New York should be on the forefront of innovation. Will research the excuses.

NPR's Place + Memory Project

I love this Place & Memory Project, just launched by NPR. 

The site says it is "recreating those places from our past that made their mark on us–but no longer exist."

There a phone line you can call into, a map you put a pin in and other ways of sharing or marking your place and story. 

Working on what I submit which might/ might not include:

• Terry Lou Zou
  
• "Toilet Bowl Hill" at Baltusrol Golf Course
• Springfield Nurseries fields (tricky since the Nursery still exists further down the road)
  
• Cul-de-sac on Ashwood Road
• Brewbar NYC

Most people post businesses so I might think of a few of those too.

Community CRM

Neighborhood shops along Ninth Avenue by my house bond together for opt-in list for customers. 

Not sure how each of the stores or all of them are going to back-end the data so they can share it and use it, but glad they're doing it. It's always a shame to me when everyone reinvents the wheel themselves when together, they could be stronger with little overlap and more combined power. 

Incentive to fill out: Win a $250 shopping spree at the shops. I happily did it and I'm sure others did too. Will try to find out the results.

Thanks to you, I got to write my a** off

Today was the 4th annual New York Writer’s Coalition Write-A-Thon. Called “Write Your A** Off,” it’s the second year I participated, independently raising just over $500 for free writing programs in New York for disadvantaged youth, seniors, veterans and others who can’t afford workshops. 

About fifty writers attended. Hard to tell but seems mostly amateur writers like me who simply want to get in the habit of doing more and need support from each other. Two I recognize from last year.

10-30-5.30PM

The writer-friendly, loosely-structured day was hosted at the charming Library for the General Society of Mechanics and Tradesman. Beautiful room of books and wood. They provided tables for writing with power supply, free workshops upstairs led by instructors, endless coffee and lunch plus a guest speaker -- published author Jennifer Belle — to talk about the craft. She was hilarious, and I’ll have to look into her work, such as Little Stalker and High Maintenance. She warned us against outlining things, holding back, forcing oneself to get up at 6a.m. to write because we heard we should, and most of all, from getting an MFA. She also talked about how publishing has changed recently, how contracts and deadlines really matter and plenty of writers have had books pilled for missing key milestones. Her deadline for her fourth novel is in about eight days. She cited exercises she gives to get people going when they’re stuck: Write about a friend you hate, or your favorite alcoholic. She also suggested agentquery.com to find a literary agent which I didn’t know about.

Got a fair amount of writing done -- deeper into a story I started a few weeks ago, some ruthless editing of an essay I want to resubmit some places, and some rough prose from the workshop exercises, each of which could become something. 

The race for the top spot

My fifth place finish in fundraising gave me a choice of many unusual and tempting prizes. I chose an astrology reading with a woman in Oregon. By phone.

The executive director, Aaron Zimmerman, had gotten a google alert about my posting on Friday on AdAge’s Digital Next column, so I explained to him my experiment in fundraising. He's also been trying different things as well.

Next year: Join me

Definitely doing this again next year and if you want to do some writing and be a part of it, I encourage you to do it. Thanks to all those who donated money -- not only do you a good tax deduction but you did a lot for me and for the writers across NYC who will benefit from your generosity.

Return to the Red Carpet

Today, I start as ECD of OgilvyOne, New York. 

My brief is to reinvigorate creative in response and reinterpret it for the modern, digital age using online and offline channels. It's a fantastic job, and there's no place I'd rather do it than Ogilvy.

David Ogilvy said direct marketing was his first love and his secret weapon. As many people know, I was at OgilvyOne for nearly six years starting in 1999. I straddled both OgilvyInteractive and OgilvyOne with one of the first hybrid digital-traditional groups covering a range of brands from Cisco to Enfamil. For me, Ogilvy has what great modern creative needs: the understanding of brand, the rigor of direct, the experience of digital.

After four years at two very different digital shops, I'm also returning for an integrated job. The past two years at Agency.com and the previous two at R/GA, have been rich with challenges, people and work — always busy, often innovative, occasionally breakthrough. I hope to bring some of the entrepreneurial spirit and behaviors back to Ogilvy. I am grateful to the people and clients at both shops who were so supportive of what I wanted to achieve with them and who gave me very long leashes to try things, to trust me with their brands, their briefs and the responsibility of helping run a very large piece of business — or even an entire office.

Read the Ogilvy press release here.

Stick, then Carrot: Scare to Response

"It's not safe to fill your prescriptions at multiple pharmacies," the bottom of my Rite Aid receipt read today after buying some new super-strength Febreze.

Then: 

"Transfer all your prescriptions to Rite Aid so we can monitor for dangerous interactions. Talk to a pharmacist today. Plus, ask for your $20 appreciation savings coupons."

Not sure how I feel about the execution of this strategy. Raising the issue of drug interactions and mistake is timely and good support for digitizing records (of which I am a big advocate). But scaring people with that clunky headline doesn't appeal and seems off-brand for service and neatness-challenged Rite-Aid, though admittedly I don't really know what the brand does believe in (though I do for CVS, which I adore).  Unlike CVS or many Duane Reads, Rite Aids in the city are usually kind of sloppy and disorganized which doesn't reassure they're so perfect behind crucial counters like the pharmacy, though I'm sure they're fine as anyone. 

The $20 coupons might get some response though but they seem oddly connected to the scare point above. If Rite Aid believes so much in the headline, then they should offer Safety Coupons or Clarity Coupons or something else that ties in.

This is the same space for the dial-in sweepstakes of which I was so fond and have yet to win. Though they could call any day. 

 

Sponsor My A** Off

May 16 is the next annual Write Your A** Off, a day dedicated to writing to raise money for the NYC Writers Coalition. 

They're an amazing group who bring writing classes and workshops to the underserved, including homeless, disadvantaged kids, elderly and more. 

We spend an entire Saturday writing and talking about writing. Here's my experience from last May if you want a taste of it. We raised $37,000 in one day.

This year, I am trying to raise at least $400 as my part, which is modest but these are tough times for people. At the event, unless I'm deep into a storyline, I plan on twittering as well or perhaps doing a closed status update to the people who sponsor me.  

It's easy to put in $5, $15, $25, $50 or more. Please, please sponsor me here.

Timely Bulls and Bears

This is a painting I've always heard about but finally saw last month with my friend Suzanne. "The Bulls and the Bears" is an allegorical painting from 1879 about the turbulent market by William Beard. Setting is Broad Street, where the current NYSE is on the left. See it for yourself at the New York Historical Society on the upper west side. It doesn't have the wall space and drama it deserves but it's really exciting. 

Customer service and flow: A good experience in NYC

A friend from Paris was visiting this week, and since we both were on vacation and had long lists of clothes shopping to do, we had plenty of time to discuss shopping patterns and customer service, a favorite topic of mine.

Bloomingdale's flagship Men's Store on 59th Street used to quite unpleasant to visit -- dark, creepy, crowded and disorganized labyrinth in the basement. The utterly revamped and redesigned Men's Store, however, is much better, starting right at the subway door and moving up three levels from jeans to designer collections, suits and beyond. Lighting is improved, there is more space between collections, better grouping of collections, better signage and a more comfortable flow to move one self through. On the weekday morning of our visit, it was also semi-empty which was depressing for them but convenient for us. 

Our first sales guy in jeans proactively told my friend about a perk neither of us knew about and from which he could benefit: Bloomingdale's 11% discount for out of country visitors. 

This is really terrific and Macy's might have it as well.

Meanwhile, I was using my tax return money to get a new suit with a 30% discount as part of a pre-sale the following week (I can get the discount now but won't be charged or can't pick it up until then).  The sales are confusing but at least the staff tried to help me figure out which one was best for me to use. 

Over lunch — after visits to Calvin Klein and the required pilgrimage to Barney's — we discussed service experiences between the US and France; my friend noted that in Paris, one would never have "pre-sales" event like that; it's an American invention.  In Paris, the sales person would simply tell you to come back next week.  Pre-sales, though, seem great for businesses getting you to buy stuff ahead of time and perhaps more of it.

Calvin Klein's flagship store on Madison Avenue, in comparison, was clean and sparse but the tomb-like design and sterile feel was uncomfortable and life-less. Staff were friendly enough, but followed you around like you were going to steal something. Clothes were displayed on hooks hanging from the ceiling. Men's underwear were the only thing on sale and were displayed coldly in recessed shelves, leaving little reason to buy them here when you can get them on sale nearly everywhere else from Bloomingdale's to Century 21 (suggestion to CK: hire models for the flagship store. Now there's a reason).  Leaving, unimpressed and hungry for the real world of emotion, we took the elevator too far down and found women in the Home department who seemed like they were in prison. We didn't spring them free, though; we simply left and with our many bags, went downtown to SoHo for more stores and a lovely lunch. 

Street Parking in NYC

We pulled our Mini from the garage two months ago to try out street parking. 

Spaces on the weekend in our neighborhood aren't difficult to find, often right in front of our house. The week, however, is much trickier both because our street is blocked off during school days and street cleaning requires alternate side parking.  Each street from south to north has a no parking window, like "No Parking Monday & Thursday 9-10.30AM." Then the next street north would have "No Parking Monday & Thursday 9.30-11AM." The opposite side of the street has "No Parking Tuesday & Friday 9-10.30AM."

Bryan has how and when and where to move the car down to an elegant effortless science, but when he goes out of town and I have to move the car, it becomes an inelegant effort — with the car ending back up in a paid lot.

Yesterday morning at 10AM, I take our car out of the paid lot where it had been for 24 hours (I gave up on Thurs), to move it. My plan was brilliant — find a spot that will be legal in 30 minutes and just sit in and wait. I put on NPR and start to circle blocks but am finding nothing. Suddenly, there's a great little spot my Mini can fit in in back of the school. After I smartly and snugly park, I get out to realize that it's available only because one cannot park there because of the school. I get back in, continue to circle, listening to NPR's analysis of the the governor's Senate pick, and circle and circle. 

This goes on for more than an hour before I give up. There's still time to make this experience worse, and I do. I drive the car with me to mid-town to work and only find no spots and a more expensive garage for the day.

Brilliance fades — I am novice.

Ethnography-wise , it is fascinating.

Walk along a street 30-60 minutes before the deadline and you see people smarter and earlier than I was, sitting in their cars, waiting and waiting. It becomes a cultural habit, and if you look closely, you can see that they're listening to the radio, doing their nails, talking on the phone, drinking coffee, reading a magazine. 

I want to knock on their windows to solicit advice, curious if I'll be warmly welcomed into this brotherhood of street parking or if the secrets are kept because the competition is so fierce.

Yoga : Just breathe

I started my beginner's course in Yoga, and it's not a stretch to say it's good for me.

Bryan's been into it for awhile, and he suggested I try it at the Joschi Body Bodega, which offers a four-week beginner's course. I did this on the one condition that no one expects me to become a vegetarian (my unspoken fear is the movement is a cult to vanquish cheeseburgers).

First breaths, first stretches

The first lesson, this past week, was really stimulating, and despite a challenging stuffy nose, I arrived on time with my own mat (mat on the mat, i know) and a class of about 8. 

The instructor is friendly, clear and helpful. She reminded us to do what feels right to us, not try to do everything right. The first class was warm-up exercises and you could feel your whole body work into it, stretching dormant muscles as you figured out to breathe in and out with the right moves. 

We introduce ourselves and she probes any injuries of which she should be aware (I ask if she means "emotional or physical?"). Several people in the group are not really beginners but luckily the guy to my right is not only a beginner, but he is incredibly inflexible, sent here by his daughter. 

Even after just one hour and half lesson, I have a favorite pose — the one where you thread your arm under the other and lie down fetally on your side. It pulls on your shoulder but if you focus a bit, you could really rest (i.e. nap). The famous downward dog is no problem, though I utterly lack grace getting into it and out of it. The plank position is brutal and it gets me very close to flashbacks to pushups from brutal varsity tennis training. I am looking forward to when I can smoothly move from pose to pose; it must be very gratifying.

While I am not particularly athletic, I like to think I am. 

For one, I can wear an 'athletic fit' Hugo Boss suit. I also played tennis a lot throughout childhood and middle and high school. What most people do not know is that I did gymanstics as a kid. In fact, the only reason I really stopped was because my favorite exercise was the mat exercise (another mat on mat joke goes there) and I was furious to learn that boys weren't supposed to do their floor routines to music the way girls did. It's utter discrimination, no? I mean, how can you have a theme song if you have no where to play it publicly?!?! (I think there's a piece of blog journalism in this alone.)

I'm trying to figure out if yoga is more of a fitness or spiritual thing. I asked this in class, and I got a "whatever you want it to be" answer. Yoga is like that. Anything goes, suggestions, but no direction. Everything's just terrific and everyone's wonderful. But do this. Try this. Touch your toes.  Even trying to figure out where you stand in the class is a big no-no.  Competition is antithetical to yoga. 

I try not to think of where I rank out of the eight... as I do the sun pose.