Every few weeks I find myself making the trek to different corners of the city: north for K&M Sewing, east for the Centre Mall SportChek, and south for Salon Twist. I’ll even tolerate downtown parking for The Cupcake Conspiracy.

Why? Because of the amazing experiences the experts at these businesses consistently deliver. I trust these experts because of what they do, what they know and how they understand that customer service is more than just fulfilling a need. They get what it means to be totally frickin’ amazing.

• Kim at K&M Sewing measures both leg lengths each time and delivers perfect euro jean hems – always with a huge grin on her face.
• Kris at SportChek patiently spends 2+ hours discussing running shoe arch, size and even colour, all to ensure my satisfaction each time I wear the chosen pair.
• Melissa, owner of Salon Twist, uses her UK training and sunny persona to craft precision cuts and ensure a pampered, relaxing escape.
• Christin, co-owner of The Cupcake Conspiracy , sells delectable treats within a lush décor. Her cheerfulness and mouth-watering cupcake goodness create an amazing indulgence that keeps me coming back for more.

Driven by a love for what they do, Kim, Kris, Christin and Melissa combine their expertise, consistent service delivery, and unique selves to craft an intangible magic that makes each interaction amazing.

At zu, we strive to not only deliver this same level of service to our clients but to also extend that experience to an interactive presence. We help businesses create amazing online experiences for their customers and that deliverable begins with our own customer interaction.

We want to give our clients the entire ‘zu’ difference, and to wow them each and every time with our expertise, consistency and passion for the interactive world. This helps build trust in what we do and in what we deliver. It’s all part of the magic that happens at 303 Pacific – we strive to achieve Job One so we can help you be totally frickin’ amazing.

If you Google “twitter hacked” you will see that banks, politicians, large corporations and individuals experienced the same issues as zu did. You will also read that many of them did not know what to do and they started sending out panic tweets, which probably did more harm than the original phishing attack. It should be noted that in all cases, no follower data was accessed.

Here is what we did a few minutes after the attack. We quickly changed our password so that the phishing attacks would stop. Then we disabled the ability for third-party software, such as TweetDeck and TwitterBerry, to access our account. Finally, and this is the most important thing, we sent out a tweet acknowledging what happened, apologizing and saying we fixed it.

This let everyone know we were aware of the problem and we fixed it. What happened afterwards was a bunch of people thanking zu and supporting @zutweets.

Phishing attacks will happen to everyone at some point. It is part of being on the Internet. These are not a big deal if handled properly, so prepare yourself ahead of time.

So that’s why I find the new Domino’s Pizza campaign so good. It was genuine enough to pass through my B.S. filter, yet the message was bold enough to make me curious about what they were selling. In short, they said “you hated our old pizza – our bad. We took it personally, now try this”. I agree wholeheartedly. Having gone through four years of being a starving student, like many others I detested yet still depended on Domino’s Pizza for their cheap and stale pies.

Their new Pizza Turnaround campaign is backed with a simple but effective web strategy, complete with the extended commercial and refreshingly unfiltered tweets. Another thing I like about this campaign is that it’s not funny, proving that you don’t always have to use humour to make your point in advertising.

What’s the risk of admitting your old pizza was comparable to chewing on a used Band-Aid? Not as much as there is to gain. People love when companies admit their mistakes and will only look forward to better pizza in the future. It’s quite a bit different than Ford pseudo-admitting they made bad cars – there are still millions of people who own those ‘mistakes’. I’m curious to see how this campaign is received, but more importantly I’m interested to see if we can get the new recipe in Canada. I’ll keep you posted.

You’d be hard pressed to see me walking into a bookstore and not walking out with a new book in tow. But about a year ago I decided to try switching to ebooks to see if they could take the place of my book buying compulsion, if only for a short while.

I’m continuing to work at it but I’ve yet to make the full switch. There are many reasons including price, DRM and device and format compatibility, but the real issue came from one specific niche of the book industry—comic books.

Case study
When I first opened my freshly delivered copy of The Absolute Sandman—Vol 1, my senses were overwhelmed. The look, feel and smell when I first opened it were an overload to my system and I had to sit back for a minute to compose myself. And when I finally set my eyes on the first page of panels, I nearly started crying. I’ve yet to have that experience replicated by an ebook and device combo when reading a comic book. Or any book for that matter. And until an ebook reader comes out that can show a comic as utterly resplendent—yes, it’s so good that I had to pull out the thesaurus—as The Absolute Sandman print version, I won’t make the full switch.

Opportunity knocks
While I was catching myself up on a long-running comic series I’d neglected for the last couple years, I had a dream. And in that dream it would be possible to subscribe to my favourite comics and have them delivered directly to my ebook reader as soon as they’re published.

I only follow a few series but keeping up with releases is a pain and when you want to try and follow crossover arcs, it’s an exercise in futility for all but the most devoted fans. Why not make it easier for people to buy that content?

If a Batman story ties in with a Green Arrow story, I’d be much more inclined to buy the tie-in if it was presented to me just as I finished the Batman story and I could buy it at that exact moment. Take advantage of book lovers at their weakest—when they’re fully engrossed in a plot—and keep them reading! Ebooks present an amazing opportunity for comic book publishers to develop a platform to deliver their content right to their readers and help make sense of the tie-ins. They’ve even got a chance to develop their own niche-market reading device.

Marvel is getting close but they still haven’t nailed it. With things picking up in the digital world for comic books, this is a step that publishers can’t miss.

Related Links
Stan Lee and Walt Disney Partner on Digital Motion Comic Series
Digital Comic Books Now Available for iPhone and iPod Touch
Readers Say Paying for Digital Comics is the Future

twitpitch: The future is #ebooks. @thebatlab explores opportunities for #comic book publishers to deliver content.

The complete article is available in the online July/August 2009 issue of SaskBusiness magazine.

What’s all the buzz about SMPR?
You could say that the SMPR began as a mere glimmer in the eye of content sharing and voting websites, social media networks, podcasts, and blogs. In layman’s terms, SMPRs are designed to drive news stories to online conversation forums and get the conversation going; they provide readers with the ability to disseminate information and multimedia along with bookmark and sharing tools. They are multimedia press releases that function more like a webpage than a static text document. SMPRs often contain images, video, links, and have distribution through online networks outside the traditional press wire.

Making a case for SMPR
Until recently, our marketing department channeled PR efforts through the traditional media streams of newspapers, magazines and radio—and like most organizations, we’ve garnered positive attention to our business developments by posting news releases on our website. From the outside looking in, there really wasn’t anything lacking in our existing marketing strategy that would give cause to jump on the SMPR bandwagon—except that my marketing DNA would win the battle and have me try anything bright, shiny and trendy.

Baiting the hook
I decided to bait the hook with the recent success and recognition of zuLabs TimmyMe and BucksMe iPhone apps. My involvement with production of the actual Marketwire SMPR was minimal; I crafted a text-based, traditional news release and sent it off to Jay, our Account Executive at Marketwire. I had to package up a few other details in order to build the SMPR, including creation of the following:
• keyword cloud
• video clip
• images
• Technorati tags
After a few emails back and forth, I proofed the document and it was distributed through Marketwire’s traditional and online networks. Access to the online networks is really the strongest benefit the Marketwire SMPR service provides.

Just the numbers
I set up Google Alerts and watched our SMPR take effect: we generated two interviews [including CBC Radio] and 18 online news stories in only a few days. We also observed a 60% increase in TimmyMe downloads during the two weeks following distribution of the SMPR. Collaborating with our resident SEO experts, I initiated some statistical research surrounding the traffic that was generated to our website via the online SMPR during a specific time frame: one month after distribution our unique visitor traffic stats increased 75% compared to our monthly average.

At the finish line
I would have to say that the SMPR is the BMW of news release distribution—it looks sexy and it performs. If you’re anything like me I fuss constantly over brand presentation and lead generation results, and the Marketwire 2.0 SMPR gave me both, loaded with options like: text, audio, video, bookmarking and tagging tools, content voting and sharing portals, keyword-optimized text and images. With one click, the reader can submit the SMPR to Digg, Deli.cio.us, Technorati and other social media content portals. The list of social media aggregation features in the Marketwire SMPR is long and impressive, including a social media newsroom that receives visitor feedback directly from a comment box in your press release.

There are cheaper entry point SMPRs on the market like PRWeb and PitchEngine that package up nicely with all the social media bells and whistles [I will leave the cost analysis discussion for another time], but from a marketer’s perspective, I believe the SMPR has more reach, is more functional and makes it easier for media people, analysts, bloggers and consumers to compile information for the articles they research or want to write. The SMPR facilitates this functionality by breaking down the content into logical sections in a way it can be easily scanned and used.

In my mind, the SMPR is not going to replace or kill the traditional press release any time soon. The SMPR is a tool, not a trend. And it simply improves upon the traditional press release layout, evolving and adapting to the 2.0 revolution. More people are accessing their news and information through web channels, so it only makes sense to meet them there.

Granted, the larger and more multi-purposed the website, the greater the need for IT to control the rate of change of the site. And the greater the controls and project management needed to ensure website changes don’t endanger the integrity of the greater site. We understand their need to move cautiously, resist change and experimentation, and slow the path of new technologies. (Such as corporate adoption of browsers newer then IE6, access to social media sites, etc.)

We’ve found IROs who actually need our help in dealing with/working with their own IT department to make substantive changes to their sites, such as improving information architecture and the addition of usability enhancements. We are happy to do this – to be guides and project managers for the IROs with their own information services group. And after gaining the trust of the technology folks, we are actually appreciated in helping them deliver a project on time. It is reasonable to expect that a temporary boost in web programming capability is what a project needs to actually be accomplished, as corporate IT departments are typically overbooked with projects at any point in time.

Of course, the best strategy is that the IR website be removed from the enterprise solution (while maintaining the online brand) so that Investor Relations can have much closer and immediate control of their website. Just because the website is “programming-oriented” does not mean it should be controlled by IT. The IR website is a communication project, like the annual report. Imagine if IT controlled the means of producing that.

In most cases, and especially where the website has many purposes beyond the Investor Relations function, IR websites would be far better if IT was out of the loop.

Most feel having information available on the site in a PDF form is good enough. IROs point to the screen and say, “See it’s right there”. If you were to think of your website as a lobby, and these files are in the filing cabinets behind the desk, there is a very high chance nobody is going to find them, nor do they want to waste their time looking.

Companies can create a great experience online, they just need to have a better understanding of what investors are looking for. Implementing best practices into a web-friendly experience can go a long way.

Here’s a few simple yet highly overlooked practices that you can implement at a low cost and will create a clear vision for your website users.

• Look at all your company materials, select important content, then develop it into web content. The best information is often buried and it’s your job to ensure it filters onto your website. Visitors are impatient so give them a hand.
• Ensure all your PDFs have the appropriate file names, so when downloaded they are easy to identify. Start with the company name then the file name, which should be descriptive. I have seen file names like this: 34293-3892774oiAR09.pdf. A good file name example is ABCComapany_AnnualReport09.pdf.
• The website should provide data and positioning material to address both prospective and current shareholders. Cameco is a good example of this.
• All links that prompt you to download an item should be clearly marked. Nothing is more frustrating then when you click on a link and bam… a PDF starts downloading.

It is rather tiresome to hear that there is “too much risk” in actually providing the text of what was said to investors. Text that is quite frankly necessary to make sense of the slides. How about the risk of annoying all of your investors who could not attend the event? Or, if the speech is only provided in audio, what about those with hearing disabilities?

If companies are afraid to provide the words that a key executive spoke in public, it makes me think that perhaps the person was drunk. Why else would the remarks be so unreliable that Legal believes they’re going to get in trouble for letting us read what was said? This is poor disclosure. Or laziness.

The owners deserve to hear what their executives said in public to other owners.

He says the key mistake to avoid now is failing to keep interest rates and taxes low to maintain a good money supply. He says falling commodity prices are good and will be part of the return to good times, as they give everyone more purchasing power. This will reverse consumer sentiments about holding onto money rather than spending it, and so bring about normalcy and growth. “Everything is a good deal right now”, he stated. Other positive indicators: lack of labour power means wages can come down more easily, housing is likely at the bottom, and “inflation adjusted buying power” is up.

His main idea for where the government is failing is in lack of spending on education. The US does well in sports at the Olympics but in the math Olympics, he likens the US to the Jamaican bobsled team.

As a species, we will need to think our way out of all the crisis’s facing us.

But as Dilbert was highlighting lately, wasn’t it all the big MBA brains that got us into this?

The Economic Crisis certainly seems to be on folks’ minds with tales of downsizing, especially in the financial sector, and most focused in North America–New York namely. Talking to bankers from Denmark and vendors from the UK, the pain is felt all over.

Being from Saskatchewan in Canada, which hit the crisis period at a high point in economic activity, at zu it feels more like a hair cut then an amputation—albeit we are feeling some effects as we do sell into markets around North America. Perhaps I will have greater understanding of what’s coming after the Todd Buchholz Monday Keynote. He’s a “leading expert” on financial markets, as his bio says.

Check out some of the pics from the Opening Reception. Follow us @zutweets on Twitter for live updates at NIRI09.

Case Study: Selling the Stampeders Online

Can a great website fill a football stadium? Our numbers show it helped. This case study will show how we combined a unique audience expansion strategy with the smart use of social media and rich media elements to increase fan support for the Calgary Stampeders football team online. The example highlights how having a client daring enough to explore new ideas (even the players got on board) helps open the door to a major win online. As the old saying goes, “Offense sells tickets, but good websites win championships!”

I attended some excellent e-marketing seminars during the two-day event; here are some of the highlights I captured:

Design principles for non-designers – presented by Jeff White
Web is limited to five fonts: Verdana, Georgia, Helvetica, Trebuchet MS, Arial

• Georgia looks best when it is scaled big (headlines)
• Verdana looks best when it is scaled for small copy (body text)
• Helvetica is the preference of designers
• Trebuchet MS is the typeface of Web 2.0; it’s a modern font but does not bold well

Build your brand through online public relations – presented by Savior Young
Best practices for engagement:

• Be honest
• Be authentic
• Be mindful of tone
• Be timely and responsive
• Be providing relevant information
• Be willing to engage in meaningful conversation

Secrets of search engine optimization – presented by Rob Swick

• Do not try to trick the search engines; play by the rules and develop for standards
• Be consistent with page titles, content and meta data
• Concentrate on Google, Yahoo and MSN (Google is the hardest to please due to monthly updates to their formula)

FAIL! – Embracing an iterative design process – presented by Daniel Burke (Digg!)
Don’t be afraid of failure; take chances and don’t be afraid of things going wrong. Don’t try to make it perfect; release it and gather feedback. Repeat and listen to your users. User feedback and experience is important in order to improve and modify to meet their needs; however, don’t get overly concerned with the vocal minority.

• Step 1: Get it out there
• Step 2: Add sophistication
• Step 3: Gather feedback
• Step 4: Start revising (based on goals and priority) and measure success

For the past three years, we have heard that the newspaper industry is in trouble. In 2008, 40% of North Americans got their news from the Internet, compared to 27% in 2007. For people under 30, those numbers are higher: 59% now get their news from the web, compared to 34% in 2007.

What many people fail to look at is: why are printed newspapers declining? Studies show that the average person gets their national and international news from the web and get their local news from local newspapers and local radio. As newspaper revenues have declined the past few years, the newspaper industry has responded by cutting local reporters and replacing those stories with national features. So, in an effort to cut costs, printed newspapers have accelerated their demise by reducing what people are most interested in: local news stories.

As these newspapers slowly go bankrupt, there will be a huge opportunity for someone to start an online local news outlet. There are now thousands of qualified journalists looking for work. Setting up a local, online news site is inexpensive. It is just a matter of time before a few journalists figure out that they can make a good living doing what they love to do by reporting local stories.

For communicators, the declining role of traditional newspapers coupled with the increased number of people accessing news online should be a wake-up call. It’s time to alter those communications plans and go where your audience is, online.

Initially, Ryan and I wanted to put up large signs that display “Future Home of IKEA,” to which our lawyer promptly advised against. So in the end we decided to give everyone the freedom to do whatever the hell they wanted. The only guidelines were to use the new zu colours (yet to be revealed). Anyway, here’s a few clips from the day and the awesome/not-so-awesome results.

Here’s a brief overview of the key points discussed:

• HTML online annual reports are the best approach as they take full advantage of the power of the Internet.

• The goals of best practices are to be investor friendly, meet the needs of investors, enhance communication, promote comprehension and transparency and make key areas prominent, understandable and pleasant for the stakeholder.

According to IR Web Report, these are the bare minimum standards of online annual reports:

· The entire report, including all pages, reports and data tables must be in HTML — not images — for rapid viewing and reference;
· A detailed, clearly labeled navigation menu;
· All HTML pages in printer-friendly versions;
· An easy to use downloads area;
· A link to an order form for the print version;
· Full and segmented PDF files for printing and offline use.

We may hold a webinar every quarterly with more examples and a panel of experts. We also promise to talk slower next time!

Contact us if you missed the webinar and are interested in learning more about online annual report best practices.

Thanks again to everyone in attendance!