Smart things I've heard lately (1.14.10)

Photo: Ancient Rome still stands between modern Rome.

Smart things I’ve heard lately (Vol. 1)Now and again you hear things that make you pause, reflect and consider — “that was really smart.” I’m going to start a series that posts the smart things I’ve heard recently and here’s my chop at the first volume.

1. “Here’s our product. It is great. Here are customers who say it is great. Now buy some of our product.” David Meerman Scott writing on his blog about “conflict-driven business writing” and who earlier quoted a writing teacher as having said, “One writing teacher went so far as to say, “Writing without conflict is propaganda.”

2. “We still see too many Social Media zealots suggesting that the rise of self-publishing models mean, ‘Advertising is Dead’ or ‘PR is Dead’ or ‘Journalism is Dead.’ That’s utter B.S.” Todd Defren sounding off about integrated communications. I couldn’t agree more. The old debate was “Which is better: PR or advertising?” That too was wrong. Each medium has it’s own merits and smart marketers use them in harmony.

3. ” ‘Brand equity’ is the premium a company can add to the price of its goods and services, simply on the merits of its company name. We need to figure out what contributes to brand equity for each individual organization, because the answer will be different every time. And then we need to measure it.” Gail Granger quoting a “wise man” this on a LinkedIn discussion about measuring the value of PR. Indeed there is a financial term you’ll find on M&A transactions called “goodwill” that measures the value of the purchase above the book value of the company. I like to think of this as brand value and is a tangible reflection of market awareness.

4. Nathanial Perez pens a guest post on Fast Company, comments on changing times. He “transcribes” three take-a-ways from a lecture by Michael Wesch, Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University.