A lot of people go through life fearing risk. It’s not hard to see why either, risk is a big thing. You can lose a lot and you can gain a lot, but either way you learn something. Now, I’m not talking about the risk that goes into gambling, I’m talking about the risk that goes in to betting on yourself. You know, a while ago I was very much interested in the stock market, I actually came quite close to being a broker a Morgan Stanley, but then one day, I saw the branch manager come into the office and let several of the employees go, one of which hired me. This made me think and then I realized, why do I need to invest in somebody else?

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Marketing is no longer a position that you fill at a company.  Marketing is not a television commercial or a radio advertisement.  Marketing is not a piece of collateral you send off to reporters, bloggers, or journalists.  Marketing is everything you do and every interaction you are involved in.

Every time you have a business meeting with employees, investors, etc. that is marketing.  Every time you talk to someone at a bar about your company or service, that is marketing.  Every presentation you give and every online and offline conversation you participate in is marketing.  I used to work at a marketing agency a while ago that presented monthly reports to clients.  At the end of the report the last page would say “thank you.”  What kind of marketing is that?  Why not let the company know about any news, announcements, updates, or new products/service that you have?

This is crucial to remember, especially for a startup.  Everyone at a startup company is marketing, everyone!  Startups build their brand and their image based upon the initial interactions that take place between users (press, etc.) and the employees (although they are usually the founders).  Most people identify with a company because of the founders/creators.  You are the marketing and PR department!

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First off, my apologies for not posting in the last few days, I was quite ill with the flu. I am still not 100% but am feeling good enough to write, which is all the matters.

I am a fan of utilizing linkedin to ask questions to my network as I have found the I receive great feedback and thought provoking answers. The latest question I asked was as follows:

“Should Social Networks Charge? Would you Pay to Use Twitter/Linkedin/Facebook? How Much Would You Pay?”

I received several great responses from folks in various industries. Before you scroll onto the next page ask yourself the same question, should social networks charge? and would you pay if they did charge? Really think about this for a moment. Here are a few of the responses that I received…

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I find it fascinating that marketing folks still spam pitch me (and other bloggers). I mean we’re talking about people with fancy titles like “VP of Marketing” or “Director of Marketing” who go online, copy and paste their pitch and then hit send. Now, how exactly did you get to be in charge of your marketing department when you still don’t understand that spam does not equal marketing. I’m usually quiet about this sort of thing because there are plenty of other bloggers out there who ream pr and marketing professionals for spamming them, but it seems to me, that the only way to teach these guys is to call them out. So here it goes…

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Recently I flew on Virgin America airlines from San Francisco to Los Angeles. I haven’t flown on Virgin American in a long time and I was pleasantly surprised and impressed. There are a lot of airlines out there that we can all choose to fly on and in fact I usually just fly on Southwest Airlines. This time I decided to try something different (mainly because the Southwest option just didn’t fit what I needed). Now out of all the airlines that you have heard about or have flown on do you identify with any of them? Have any of the airline branding or marketing messages really reached you? Do you even remember how a particular airline branded itself?

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