Opportunity Knocks

It's usually the case that the busier I am, the less time I have to write about the work. I'm taking a breather this weekend to add OK Radio to the show roster on this blog, as I've been working with Host/Producers Joe Folan and Lynne Norton for several months to put the pieces together for this new series.

I can't describe it better than they do, so I'm just going to steal the description directly from their website:

Welcome to OK Radio, podcasts designed to provide real world insight and context from leaders and experts in the nonprofit community.

Opportunity Knock’s mission is to bring nonprofit professionals and organizations together. Through OK Radio’s interviews we not only provide valuable information on everything from career matters to sector trends, but also learn some fun facts about the thought leaders that are featured.

Pretty cool, no?

I've worked with Joe in the past and really appreciate the work he and Lynne were willing to do even prior to the first interview to get the right strategy and voice together for this podcast. It's a good listen no matter what line of work you're in, so enjoy the show!

Bart Cleveland: How Small Agencies can Think Big

Bart Cleveland is Partner and Creative Director at Albuquerque’s McKee Wallwork Cleveland. Over the last two decades, Bart has specialized in working with brands that are dedicated to their own unique voice. His work includes branding campaigns for Coca-Cola, CNN, The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, Cartoon Network, and Dow and has appeared in markets across the globe. Bart strikes a chord with his work by appealing to human commonalities.

Bart’s unique approach to creative solutions has made him a sought-after speaker and creative show judge across the country. His work has received hundreds of awards for creativity both nationally and internationally including The One Show, CA, D&AD, and Clios.

Bart is frequently published in the advertising industry’s most highly regarded publications, including Communication Arts, Creativity, and One, a magazine. His industry perspective is often cited in business publications such as Fortune and Advertising Age. He is a writer for Advertising Age’s Small Agency Diary blog. Bart is a frequent guest lecturer at many of the country’s leading advertising creative schools and sits on the advisory board for the Creative Circus Advertising School in Atlanta. He is a frequent guest speaker at advertising clubs across the country.

Bart is a “Southern” guy with a gritty wit and edgy perspective. He is a popular interviewee because he says what he thinks (for better or worse) and loves to play devil’s advocate.

Listen to the Interview
(Length: 32:13, Size: 14.7 MB)

You wish you worked for this guy

Bobbin has a fascinating discussion with Dr. Robert Sutton, author of the New York Times bestseller "The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn't". Bobbin and Robert discuss the genesis of the book, how to deal with, erm, difficult people and clients, why audacious book titles need to also be accompanied with great content, the most asshole-ish thing he's ever done—and more.

Fortunately, all of my clients are fabulous.

No A**holes here.

Experienced (have you ever been?)

It's a must-hear. Here.

I've seen Jim's presentation, and it's fantastic. There's something for everyone in this show.

Scott Donaton: AdAge Stripped Naked

Follow the amazing career and insight of industry reporter-turned-editor-turned-publisher Scott Donaton of Advertising Age, Creativity, and AdCritic.com - all part of The Ad Age Group, the world’s leading source of news, information and data on advertising, marketing and media. In this phenomenal interview Scott and Sally discuss everything from the inner workings and strategy of the group's publications to what it takes to get your story in Ad Age, along with interesting reflections from the intersection of Madison and Vine.

Topics include how AdAge faces the same obstacles as the companies it reports on, the insider scoop on how to pitch stories, and what it takes to become the next Crispin Porter + Bogusky. (Scott even submits to a pop quiz on agency mission statements.) Working on this show was a blast, and guaranteed, you'll learn a lot about the business of publishing AND advertising from the listen.

Listen Here.

Naked and Sticky

(via RTZ) What is the common ground between the Kentucky Fried Rat urban legend and JFK’s Man on the Moon speech? They both stuck.

Some ideas — a great book, a worthy public health initiative, a history lesson — sometimes have a hard time succeeding in the world. Meanwhile, some shoddy ideas — urban legends, product slogans, rumors — often succeed with no trouble at all. Why? Why do some ideas work while others don’t?

In this interview, Sally explores stickiness with Dan Heath, author of MADE TO STICK: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die. Dan shares why some ideas stick, and how you can make your own ideas stick, too.

Listen here.

You’ve read his books. You’ve read his blog. Now hear it straight from the Purple Cow’s mouth. In this exclusive interview, Seth has strong words and big ideas for how advertising needs to change, pronto.

Seth is a bestselling author, entrepreneur and agent of change.

Godin is author of seven books that have been bestsellers around the world and changed the way people think about marketing, change and work. Permission Marketing was an Amazon.com Top 100 bestseller for a year and a Fortune Best Business Book, and it spent 4 months on the BusinessWeek bestseller list. It also appeared on the New York Times business book bestseller list.

Check it out here. Great insider perspective from Sally here as well.

Case Study published on FeedBurner

The FeedBurner Case Study is up! My thanks to Jessica at FeedBurner who put in a lot of effort to make this happen.

A little dryer than I would tend to make a podcast, I think this one gives some good info on how a podcast can help an organization reach the market in a win-win kind of way. Ken White of the Darden School also gives a great interview on some simple things you can do to push through a new marketing initiative like blogging, podcasting, etc.

Again, big ups to FeedBurner. If you're not using them, check out their site to see what they can do for your feed. it's pretty amazing stuff.

Maybe we should do more of these?

Listen Here.

and for all of our friends and family in Chicago - Go Bears!

Talkin' 'bout Boston

Just finished editing a great show from Danny G at Talent Zoo on the beantown fiasco (and much more). Jeff Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy, has some wonderful insights into where it all goes wrong and how things are changing for marketers. Listen Here.

Case Study: Darden BusinessCast

Another Draft for the upcoming Feedburner case study - what was interesting to me about this is how the creative team of a large institution can put "boutique" services like Feedburner (although Feedburner certainly offers enterprise-class services as well) to help them work around the red tape so often present in a large organization. I also just wrapped a great interview that will be included in this podcast - we'll let you know when it's posted. Here's the script so far:

So what if you work in a large institution, you've got the go-ahead on a podcasting initiative, and your IT department is handling the considerable effort of maintaing the back-end support services? I also spoke to some of the folks who produce the Darden School's Business Cast, and found some not-too surprising challenges.

Given the show's success as a key part of the school's communications strategy it's not surprising to find that the program receives input and support from resources throughout the school, not the least of which comes from the IT department who acts as the web host for the audio files. However if you've ever worked with an IT department in a large institution you surely know and likely understand that access to webserver details and statistics are heavily guarded by permissions and security settings, and for good reasons. On of the initial problems the creative team at the Darden school ran into was getting meaningful statistics on the show.


While they were working with the web team to figure out a way to get the on-demand statistical feedback they were also investigating Feedburner as an option to solve the problem of browser-unfriendly RSS files. After burning their feed to solve this problem they pleasantly discovered that their feedburner account was supplying them the stats they had been seeking, and they could get full accounts of show activity without having to trouble the IT Staff. The Darden creative team also enabled email-subscription to their feed and are able to see who amongst their various constituencies is subscribing to the show.