Buzz Builder

Red Bull Gets Wings & Buzz with Flugtag Publicity Stunt Since 1991

Kudos to Red Bull for creating Flugtag, an annual publicity stunt that has taken place in numerous locations around the world since 1991. Each year, it generates tremendous buzz for the company  reinforcing its advertising slogan: "Red Bull gives you wings." Flugtag is a tongue-in-cheek flying event judged on three criteria: distance, creativity and showmanship. What constitutes a craft is purely up to the imagination of the participating teams.

The first Red Bull Flugtag took place in Vienna, Austria, in 1991. Since then, more than 35 Flugtags have been held around the world -- from Ireland to San Francisco -- attracting up to 300,000 spectators. The record for the farthest flight-to-date currently stands at 195 feet set in 2000 at Flugtag Austria. The U.S. record stands at 155 feet set in Nashville, TN in 2007 (see video below from Red Bull which documents this flight).

I was impressed to see Red Bull's Flugtag event featured on the front page of The Oregonian, my daily newspaper, this past Saturday with a photo of a contestant getting ready to jump off a ramp. Clearly, a great photo was the clincher to secure such prime coverage since the article didn't cover the contest rather it merely noted the deadline to apply for the event in August is less than two weeks away.

Yes, Red Bull and other companies have discovered that publicity stunts can still break through the commercial clutter and generate tremendous media and public attention provided they meet some basic as I explained in this post.

Simple is Good Marketing Lessons from Twitter, Common Craft, and the Portland Baroque Orchestra

"Perfection is not when there is no more to add, but no more to take away."
Antione de Saint Exupery, author of The Little Prince and a pioneer in aviation

In a world in which the typical urbanite is exposed to 5,000 marketing messages daily, simple is good. Too many companies get lost in the commercial clutter communicating in a confused way. Today I noticed a public bus with a a sign on the back for the Portland Baroque Orchestra. There was a picture of a violinist, the orchestra's name, and three words: fresh, intimate, and alive.

It seems that more companies are entranced with stating their core values using three words. There is nothing inherently wrong about this. In fact, if you could tell folks what makes your organization, service or product different and interesting in three words, I'm all for it. However, if there is cognitive dissonance between the words you choose and what you offer, you're not helping your brand. Rather, you're merely confusing your possible customers. I can't imagine that there are many people in the world who are drawn to seeing an orchestra that is fresh, intimate and alive. Those words just don't evoke a quality orchestra rather they sound more appropriate for one of those newfangled automatic air fresheners.

But, simple words can be used very effectively. I recently stumbled across a small company in Seattle called Common Craft that does clever videos utilizing paper cutouts to illustrate complex products and services. Make sure to check out the below video that they did for Twitter since it provides an excellent explanation of rapidly growing social media and shows how much can be communicated using simple words and graphics.

Travel Oregon Website Builds State's Buzz Creatively

I'm proud to be an Oregonian and I get a lump in my throat every time I return from a trip outside the state. Recently, my wife and I enjoyed a fantastic trip to Oaxaca, Mexico where we loved the people, delicious food (I still dream about the amazing mole sauces), amazing ruins (don't miss Monte Alban just outside Oaxaca), and beautiful arts & crafts (check out our visit to one of the most famous local rug merchants). Yet, when our Mexicana flight dipped below the cloud cover and we saw the tree-lined streets and parks of Portland, we felt incredibly lucky to live in such a green and friendly place.

Our neighbor, a Wieden+Kennedy employee, has been working on an an elaborate web project for the Oregon Tourism Commission. The Travel Oregon website is nearly complete and it has a lot of cool free features such as the ability to create a personal journal to plan and save trips as well as as a signup for a free electronic newsletter and interesting Travel Oregon Magazine which comes out twice a year. Of course, I'm incredibly biased but the most interesting feature of all is the 365 Days in Oregon calendar which features our dog Bella the Boxer. Just click on April 16 to see Bella and her boyfriend, the chocolate lab Norm from across the street, in action on the beach. Even before appearing on the calendar, Bella's blog generated more traffic than this one. Now, she will pull into an even larger lead that will be hard to overcome.

If you want to see why Oregon has been generating such great media buzz, check out the Travel Oregon website and I bet you'll be making plans to visit our state soon.

Toro Bravo in Portland - Great Tapas But Waiting Policy Needs a Buzz Makeover

Usually, my wife and I avoid trendy restaurants on Friday and Saturday nights since waiting and crowds are just not our thing. However, last Saturday night, we wanted to treat some friends to a special dinner so we proposed uber-popular Toro Bravo in Portland. Unfortunately, the restaurant has a no reservations policy and we knew that we would be in for a wait. Much to our chagrin, when we arrived at 6 PM, the hostess told us that the wait would be about 1-1/2 hours. Lesson #1, never try to "out-early" Portlanders - I'm convinced this town could give retirement communities in Florida a run for the money when it comes to people who dine early. Usually, we don't wait anywhere for more than an hour but our friends were excited about trying Toro Bravo and they had trekked over from the food wasteland of Vancouver, Washington.

We put our name on the reservation list and the hostess told us to check back in 30 minutes to see "where things stood." I asked whether they had a pager that they could give us to let us know when our table would be ready since Toro Bravo has no bar and the waiting area is miniscule for weekend crowds. While there are a couple of nice bars nearby, it's hard to enjoy them when you feel that you might miss being called for a table. When I asked if they could call my cell, the hostess sniffed and said, "We don't usually do that. But, if your wait lasts more than an hour we might take your number." Gee, thank you very much.

After more than an hour, the hostess didn't take my number and we kept having to send somebody in our party rushing out the bar up the street from Toro Bravo to inquire about our reservation status. Ultimately, after nearly two hours, we were seated. We proceeded to have a fantastic meal. You really can't go wrong with any of the creative tapas at Toro Bravo. Even a Spanish friend says that it has some of the best tapas he has had in the U.S.

Yet, leaving Toro Bravo, I wondered whether it or any restaurant with an extremely inconvenient waiting system will sustain its devout following. With technology prices dropping, it would be fairly inexpensive to implement a buzzer system. Surely, Toro Bravo could make up the cost for such a system with the increased goodwill and repeat visits that it would generate. Or, for no expensive, Toro Bravo could train its hostesses to always offer to call patrons on their cell phones when tables become available.

It's alway worth making the lives of your customers easier to keep your buzz growing.

How Professional Service Providers Benefit from Blogging

My friend Hermes Aleman, a business banker at Affinity Bank in San Mateo, California started a blog in February 2008 that provides interesting information to business owners and to people thinking about becoming entrepreneurs. I especially enjoyed his excellent post on why PR is much more powerful than advertising at a fraction of the cost. He also included a plug for my free buzz marketing seminar in Berkeley, California on April 10.

I've met a lot of business bankers and Hermes is the first one I know who is blogging regularly. Hermes' blog makes business sense for many reasons but here are the top three:

1. It show his existing clients and prospects that he offers a lot of added value.
2. It will keep him on the cutting edge of knowledge as he generates content for his blog.
3. Over time, his posts will make him appear in top search engine listings since blogs are much more "Googlelicious" than websites. This will surely drive new business his way.

If Hermes gets so busy that he can only blog once a week, he will still enjoy the three aforementioned advantages. That said, why aren't there more business bankers and other professional blogging when it costs nothing to set up a blog?