PardonMyFrench

Vote Chris Christie in NJ - Your Only Hope To Get Rid of Corzine

Yes you should vote for Chris Christie on Tuesday.  It is our only hope to rid the state of the economy killing, private job shrinking, and government expanding Governor Jon Corzine.   Look I get that Christie hasn't explained how he is going to cut property taxes, restore rebates, and slow down the growth of government.  I get that I really do.  I also get that if you are a conservative he has pissed you off going back to the primary against Lonegan.  However....

1. The polls are tightening and Corzine can still win this
2. Chris Daggett is finished.   He is not surging in the polls.  Perhaps if he started earlier and used online effectively instead of listening to their traditional media agency (see the quote* below from Ali of the Daggett Campaign on why they didn't have any online strategy) he'd have a chance, but he listened to the wrong advisors.
3. Google Trends right now is pointing to a toss up but Corzine isn't far behind; Daggett is finished
4. Obama is extending his influence in the race even though he knows that Corzine has done a terrible job with this state in creating jobs and spurring the economy.

4 more years of Corzine is a horrible thought.  And for each of you saying to yourselves, well if we have Corzine again at least next time we can run a conservative candidate.  That's the wrong kind of thinking that led some of you conservatives to not vote for Senator McCain - and look how that has turned out.

If you are on the fence, vote Christie.  If you are a conservative, hold your nose and vote Christie.  If you want to make a protest vote for Daggett, now is the wrong election for a protest vote; the only thing that matters right now is to ditch Corzine and Christie is the only vote that can do it.  

Sorry true believers.  The way I look at this vote is to get rid of Corzine first and the only way to do that is to vote Chris Christie.

(Disclosure:  I have had ABSOLUTELY NO INVOLVEMENT with the Christie Campaign.  In fact, my 9 year old son still asks me why would I vote for him if he didn't hire me.  Answer: CHRISTIE IS THE ONLY CHANCE TO GET RID OF JON CORZINE)

*Here's the bizarre, campaign strategy killing decision by the Daggett campaign to NOT use online to network, advertise, and generate grass roots support as posted by Ali from the Daggett Campaign (BOLD is done by me). 

"From our research, we have discovered that NJ voters are primarily reachable via TV and other media -- not internet -- and that is why we have focused our efforts where we have. I can imagine you have strong opinions as to how we should be using our money, but actually the media company who has led every successful independent in this country is spearheading our efforts, so we are deferring to the experts."

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Why Was Chris Christie on Fox News Today - A Week Before Election

I watched Chris Christie on Fox News this morning and thought that it was very odd.  Sure it is great to get free media, but why make the extra stop a week out on a national news show to take softball questions from Gretchen?  The questions she asked him were very easy and almost looks like he knew they were coming in advance.  As everyone knows by now the polls show it virtually a dead heat but the biggest difference between Christie and Corzine is that Corzine has some support in the high 30s to about 40% while I have no idea what the support level is for Christie.  Plus with Daggett lurking and taking votes away from Christie or from the people who don't really care about either of the major candidates, it is dangerous. (Side note: A parent I was speaking to today was surprised that Christie Whitman would lose to Corzine)

So that gets me back to the post, why was Chris Christie on Fox?  Is it an appeal to NJ Republicans at the last minute to give him one final look?  If yes, than why the softball questions?  We learned nothing new about him other than his TV denial about driving down the wrong way of a one way street.  Is it to try to get undecideds?  Perhaps.  How about Independents?  Not sure they are watching Fox News in the morning. Finally, the typical NJ 9-5 worker is not sitting at home after 8AM waiting to watch Christie - they are on the road stuck in traffic somewhere.

To me it just looks like a last second act of desperation by Christie's campaign.  The Christie apologists would say - hey it's free media and that's true.  Too bad they didn't try to get harder questions so that he could explain what some of his plans are to cut property taxes, increase rebates, and reduce spending all while improving the business environment and schools.  I just don't get it.

One thing I do get is that other than Corzine, the online marketing for Christie  as well as Daggett continues to lag.  I also get that the vast majority of Christie signs I see around were put up by the local Republican groups and that Chester NJ which is the next town over from Christie's hometown of Mendham has precious few signs around.  Finally, another thing I get is search and the Google Trends right now points towards the hated and undeserving Governor Corzine winning this race. I hope Google is wrong but hope is all we have in NJ right now.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Senator Menendez's Health Poll - It Doesn't Matter At All

I just stumbled across Senator Menendez's health insurance poll on his Senate website and it made me almost laugh out loud.  As this screen shot show's Menendez's poll is 80% against health insurance reform, but one has to wonder why the consistent liberal Senator would even care about what the voters of NJ think.  I track his votes online on Open Congress and from what I've observed he votes consistently with other Democrats.  So either.... 

1. Menendez is so far down the liberal base that he actually believes NJ is a solid liberal state that will vote along with whatever President Obama wants without question.
2. Menendez is up for reelection in 2012 and wants to see how this issue resonates
3. He actually might listen to NJ?
4. This is just another useless poll that nobody pays attention to including Senator Menendez

The only logical answer is #1 but #4 is probably a close second.  My guess is that Menendez and staff are so really disconnected from the state that they have no idea how NJ would react.  One thing I know about this state is that on average we have a mind of our own and while there is a solid Democratic base here, the rest of the 60% or so of the state is very independently minded; that includes Conservatives.  You'd think he'd know that too, but then again what do you expect from a Senator that rarely changes his vote from other Democrats.  

#4 is a real possibility because the question is so vague that nobody knows what they are really voting for.  The bills in the Senate and House are so complicated that they couldn't be simplified down to a single question.   Most people that I've spoken to are supportive of many reforms but where people separate is when it comes to deficit spending and how the public options is included or not; that nuance is not included in Menendez's poll

Anyway this poll no matter what it says is an insult to New Jersey voters everywhere...

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Chris Daggett's Online Marketing Won't Allow Him to Be Viable

(Disclosure: I received several emails after my last post.  I am not involved with Christie's campaign.  I've never spoken with them.  I do want Corzine to lose and I AM NOT advocating that Daggett should drop out).

Chris Daggett's campaign isn't viable unless he can get into the mid-30s as I wrote last week.   Yes I get that The Star Ledger just endorsed him for Governor and Google Trends' finally has a pulse.  

It doesn't matter.  He has no online marketing. The website isn't ready for prime time, it looks he had a cousin build it for him on a WordPress template.  There are no Google ads trying to direct people looking for information on him.  I've seen no display ads, his Facebook fans are about 10% of his competitors and his YouTube page has little subscribers, little views, and really looks like it is a page dedicated for Halloween.  There are no Facebook widgets to grab.

This isn't an insurgent campaign.  There is little evidence to suggest that.  If this campaign had a chance they would have been employing modern internet marketing techniques, however, I can't find a single piece of evidence that the Daggett campaign even noticed what happened in the 2008 election.  Yes Daggett is receiving matching funds and this allows him to be in the debates which he has dominated so far. However, did anyone stop to ask besides paying his staff and buying political signs what he plans to do with the rest of the money?

Clearly it isn't to invest in modern marketing techniques.  I've heard there was a live TV commercial floating around, but I haven't seen it live.  One has to ask why on earth would they run TV ads in this market?  How many GRPs could they actually buy?  Could it even make a dent in your viewing habits if it could even cut through the Corzine buy?  Does anyone want to bet me there will be a horrible waste of direct mail coming your way to a mailbox near you or annoying robo calls to your home phone?

If this was really an insurgent campaign someone there would have used online to network properly and market his plan.  Maybe if Daggett had started ANYTHING online months ago they would have actually been viable.  Unfortunately for them they didn't and they will end up being nothing more than the General Election's version of the Steve Lonegan campaign which also failed any semblance of a modern marketing plan.

At this point from my cheap seats in Long Valley, NJ Daggett isn't viable.  I get that some people are disappointed with the Christie campaign and hate Jon Corzine.  However, NJ needs to get rid of Corzine first and Daggett can't do it.  I get the idea of a protest vote.  I really do.  This isn't the year for a protest vote.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

P.S. Here's an interesting and short article from the Nation Review called Chris Daggett, Jon Corzine's Bodyguard.  

P.P.S Please read the comments for a response from the Daggett campaign. 

Bruce Springsteen Still Rocks and Crowd Surfs

My family and friends attended Saturday night's Springsteen concert and it was a great time.   My wife and daughter had seats in the lower level while my son Jacob and I had an awesome time in the pit.  The setlist was great - 28 songs, 3 hours, and cover to cover Born in the USA.  It wasn't the best concert I'd ever seen (that's either closing night of the reunion tour in MSG or Atlantic City on the Rising Tour), but I'd give it a solid B.  Bruce was awesome as usual as well as Nils, Roy, and the Mighty Max.  A couple of quick observations:

1. Even Bruce must agree with my post that Working on A Dream is one of the worst if not the worst Springsteen album of all-time.  Why else does Bruce only have two songs in the setlist at this point?  Compare it with the end of the Magic Tour where about 4-6 songs still remained in the tour.
2. Watch the youthful 60 Bruce Springsteen crowd surf.
3. The pit procedure was quite reasonable - especially because Jacob and I got a bracelet and were about 15 deep in front of the stage.
4. Jacob wants to see him again in the pit - how about Buffalo?

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

NJ Race is Really Between Christie and Daggett

(This is a post for my good friend and college roommate Jim W)

After watching and reading the reports about last week's NJ Governor Debate it is pretty clear this race is really between the two Chris' - Christie and Daggett.  Corzine's fate really rests with Daggett and Christie.  I haven't received and didn't want to dig around for more detailed polling information, but it seems pretty clear to me that around 40% of the voters will vote for the hated, job killing, economic disaster Corzine.   In stock buying terms, that's Corzine's support level.

Christie on the other hand, I have no idea what his support level is.  That's not to be shrill, but I don't have inside polling data to know who are his definite or "1" voters.  Also, for that matter, I don't know Corzine's but he consistently polls around 40%.

Daggett is interesting because he has qualified for state funds and I've seen him poll around 10%.  However, like Lonegan from the primaries his website is horrible, I've seen little social networking, I've seen little search marketing, pretty much not much invested online.  However, in the debates and in the press he is attracting attention and even garnering attention from some of my conservative friends.

The problem for Christie is Daggett.  Usually in NJ you'd get the protest vote,  but this time the protest looks reasonable to a large number of voters.  If Daggett starts polling higher those numbers will come out of Christie.  Check out this recent Google Trends chart to see how Daggett is starting to pick up interest. So that means:

1. Corzine wins with around 40% of the vote (WORST CASE) because Daggett surges into the 20s
2. Christie beats up Daggett and keeps him around 10% of the vote
3. Daggett in a miracle finish beats up Christie enough that he gets more than 40% of the vote

To me, this is the wrong year for a protest vote.  We can't afford 4 more years of Corzine.  Sorry Daggett fans, but unless he starts polling around 30% he isn't viable.  He needs more of a surge and while that is possible and he has some time, I don't think Daggett has the marketing or grassroots support to really make up the distance; too bad he didn't start sooner.   BTW - if you really are a Chris Daggett fan - more power to you, but to the NJ voters into a protest vote against Christie and Corzine, now is NOT the year.

Want to read more, read this post from FiveThirtyEight.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Artie Lange for Mayor of Hoboken - Now That's Funny

I love the fact that Bob Abouey started an Artie Lange for Mayor of Hoboken campaign (http://twitter.com/MayorArtie and http://www.mayorartie.com/ ).  Since I went to high school with Artie and they might need someone with political experience, I'll be happy to help.  I guess the biggest problem if I worked for Artie is this post I made on him a while back.

Al Franken Wins MN Senate Seat - Who's Next Artie Lange?

Yes my wife will tell me that I've run out of Artie jokes here, but then again she bought me Too Fat To Fish.  Anyway, the Associated Press has reported that comedian Al Franken has been certified the winner of the Minnesota Senate Race. Norm Coleman will of course fight this in court, but thanks to the people of Minnesota and a little Barack Obama coattails we in this country have to deal with this clown in the Senate.  I did a little work in this race and I can tell you that of all the races that I've worked on that lost, this is the craziest one. 

Al Franken has no business being a US Senator.  He has no real policies, but he made it in by bashing President Bush.  His company failed to pay taxes or carry workers compensation.  The guy is a clown and broke the law, but the people of Minnesota overlooked that and elected him anyway.  When Minnesota elected Jesse Ventura a lot of people snickered, but not me.  That's their state and they can do what they want but the US Senate effects all of us.

Seriously, that's awful.  That's like New Jersey electing Artie Lange to the US Senate.  Heck, I think Artie would make a better Senator than Al Franken and here's why....

TEN REASONS WHY ARTIE LANGE WOULD BE A BETTER SENATOR THAN AL FRANKEN

1. Like a lot of members of Congress Artie has already been arrrested
2. Sure Artie has a drug problem, but at least you know that going in and won't find that later on.
3. Writing of drug problems, who better to help fight drug abuse then someone like Artie?
4. Artie is a true rags to riches to on the rag and back to riches person.  He never attended a classy place like Harvard to get his education
5. Artie is a true working class person - driving a cab, working as a long shore man in Newark NJ.  He understands the working man.
6. Unlike other Senators, you're pretty sure Artie won't get caught soliciting a male police officer in the men's room of an airport.
7. According to Artie he already has a long history of dealing with prostitutes but unlike Spitzer he won't need to transport them across state lines or overpay for sex.
8. You already know he will work with labor Unions and is very liberal.  That makes him attractive to NJ's most influential voting group the CWA which if it isn't already, will be representing the largest pool of workers - the NJ Government payroll.
9. No need to worry about ties to organize crime; although Artie can help represent the gambling and casino groups since he can explain what a vig is...
10. Finally, Artie has a huge following especially in the youth voting segment making it easier for Artie to get elected in NJ.  You won't have to worry about long recounts because the youth vote will go in mass for him, plus the Unions, gamblers, drug addicts, pro-legalization of pot people, prostitution, Italians, the arts and entertainment, casino and horse racing industry, cab drivers.  Heck he'd probably carry NJ by a much larger spread than Obama.

So since I'm pretty sure that Artie could win a US Senate Seat if he can survive until 2012 or until Frank Lautenberg goes on life support, I've bought the URL http://www.artielangeforsenate.com.  You can email me now if you want to help.

PardonMyFrench and my joke,

Eric

Not Only Does Jon Corzine Suck, He Knows How To Lie With Statistics

This will be a quick post. NJ's unemployment rate inched up to 9.3% and remains at a 32 year high.  Sure the rate has slowed.  However, for Governor I know How To Lie With Statistics Jon Corzine to send out an email promoting 13K new private sector jobs in NJ is a low point in politics.  Oh and to back up his crap he talked about how our unemployment is lower than the national average.

Look Corzine, this is a lie and you know it.  You can try and spin these numbers to suit your political purposes but to the workers in NJ we see and feel the unemployment.  I know every email you try and tie Christie to President Bush and Karl Rove but they wouldn't stoop to this level of lies with statistics.

Jon Corzine you suck (really you do, but I put that in there for SEO reasons).  You didn't do what you promised the last time you ran.  You need to be dumped.  I only hope the Christie campaign is average enough to take you out.  BTW - here's a link to the response from Jennifer Beck that points out your obvious flaws in your announcement.  Your crappy email is copied below.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Dear eric,

By now, you've probably seen the Gun Lobby-sponsored Republican advertising against me. You know, the ones that say, "watch what he does, not what he says."

Well, the new numbers on job creation in New Jersey came out today, so, for a change of pace, let's listen to the Republicans and take a close look at what my administration has done about creating jobs in New Jersey:

• 13,000 private sector jobs were added last month because of our business-friendly policies.
• At the same time, our continued focus on increasing efficiency in government led to a reduction in 7,000 public sector jobs.
• Our state-wide unemployment rate continues to remain below the national average.

These are inescapable, indisputable facts that our first-in-the-nation economic recovery package is working, and that not only are businesses staying in New Jersey, but they're actually growing. Small businesses are taking advantage of the programs we're offering in the state, and job creation numbers are going up as a result.

Not even Karl Rove can spin that success away.

Since the earliest days of this national crisis, I've made New Jersey's economy my first, second, and third priority. I was determined to ensure that our state is well-positioned to take advantage when this global economic recession turns around, and we are beginning to see the effects.

We're seeing these results because we put New Jersey's share of the federal stimulus right to work into transportation and infrastructure projects, passed programs like the Invest New Jersey initiative which offers a $3000 grant to small-business for every new job created, and signed a second economic stimulus package two weeks ago to ensure that we keep New Jersey's recovery going strong.

Make no mistake, we still have a long way to go and there is much work still to be done, but my administration's recovery initiatives are fostering job creation, while President Obama's recovery program is helping to restore economic confidence.

Together, we're making real progress for New Jersey.

Governor Jon Corzine

Chris Christie is from Mendham, Right?

I'm getting worried about the NJ Governor race and it's because Chris Christie lives in Mendham NJ.  Huh?

Well the last few weeks I've had to take my wife to Morristown for health reasons.   The route we take is through old route 24 from Long Valley, through Chester and Mendham and then up through to Morristown. Here's a Google map of how we drive that route. Now some of you don't know the area but driving along old 24 is a mix of homes and small business until you hit the green in Morristown.  I know this way very well because besides being two towns away from where I live, I used to drive this way to AT&T by cutting down through Medham to Bernardsville-Basking Ridge NJ.

Chris Christie lives in Mendham NJ

Here's a Mendham street view by one of the big curves.  As I said very small town USA looking.  You know what I've noticed while driving to Morristown?  Not one single Chris Christie for Governor sign.  NOT ONE. Now, I don't expect to see them in the usual no man's land where political signs pop up (see this YouTube link for Long Valley's favorite area), but to not see a single sign in Christie's hometown is worrisome.

Chris Christie lives in Mendham

Perhaps you are thinking, well that's a main road, did you pull off and check out the side streets? The answer is yes.  We spend a lot of time in Chester NJ.  Chester and Mendham share a high school and are in the same high school district with Long Valley. We cut around the main traffic in Chester and take a lot of side streets.  One of our favorite cut downs is past Bernie's.  That bypasses old 24 and is just homes and farms.  There are no signs on people's lawns.  In fact, I haven't seen a Christie sign in Chester or Long Valley or Mendham and

Chris Christie lives in Mendham.

What this tells me is that there is very little grassroots support and that has me worried.  Sure they have 5900 friends on Facebook but for a state the size of NJ that's not good.  I'd expect to see some signs on people's lawns a few months before the election in the very Republican areas but to see nothing is very worrisome.

Chris Christie lives in Mendham

My assumption is that the Christie campaign is using the old big donor/TV playbook which coincidentally is the only playbook that the Corzine campaign will have.  Corzine is well hated in NJ so any drumming up of grassroots support (Corzine has 9500 fans on his official Governor Facebook page and a truly horrific 3300 fans on his election page) will be futile so the only thing Corzine will have to do is tap into his big donor group, especially the Goldman millionaires, wait for Obama to help him, and blast with negative TV spots. 

Basically this fight will be Christie TV ads versus Corzine TV ads with Obama pumping him up for good measure.  The polls could be tightening and without critical grassroots support for Christie, this has me worried.  Too bad they didn't start their digital grass roots campaigning earlier and

Chris Christie lives in Mendham.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Grading Paid Search Marketing in NJ Governor's Race - A C-, Inc, and a B+

Taking a look at online advertising between NJ Governor Jon Corzine and Republican challenger Chris Christie illustrates who kind of has been told what to do and one that could care less at least in July.  First, Jon Corzine.

Corzine in my opinion gets a C-

Granted I'm as guilty as a lot of folks who were trying to track exactly what I was doing for McCain's advertising in 2008, but like everyone else then, I don't care too much.  Corzine grades out to a C- and it would have been lower except his challenger Chris Christie gets an incomplete.  As I've pointed out in earlier posts, clearly the Cozine campaign has either been briefed or given an internet marketing playbook, but they are slowly finding out that they will be the text book case of what happens when you try to market like Obama but lack his charisma and loyal following. 

The Corzine campaign is running paid search ads but they seem to hit their max budget quite early in the day.  They seem to only have a few variations running on a few obvious set of keywords and every click goes to their home page.  The keywords don't seem to expand into NJ issues like property taxes, economy, unemployment, environment, schools, etc.  This is very basic search marketing advertising and they look like they have a summer intern running their campaign right now. 

They do seem to be running some truly tasteless banner ads through Google's content network which of course take some liberties in how they promote how much good Corzine has done for this state. 

Here are some sample text ads promoting Obama's visit to Rutgers; not only did this give the summer intern a chance to vary the ads, it once again highlights the only way Corzine can win which is the over promote ties to Obama.

Chris Christie gets an Incomplete

I've yet to see any advertising or search advertising online.  Perhaps after labor day they will explode on the scene, but I have low hopes.  The campaign knows how well McCain's online advertising did (don't forget we won the Primary after being left for dead and faced with a much more well funded campaign) so to ignore it seems terribly Political Advertising 1.0.   I would have given the campaign a F but perhaps they are relying on other groups to pick up the slack for them like....

RGA and Other Independent Groups Get a B+

I've been really surprised with the work of the Republican Governor's Association and other independent groups who have been constantly advertising in the state.  They buy paid search ads on a variety of subjects and also run a lot of display ads that set the record straight on Corzine's failed tax and spend policies in NJ.  One of my favorite's has this line - Jon Cozine Watch What He Does not What he Says.  These groups get a B+ for the efforts in the state.

That's it in the middle of July.  A C-, and incomplete, and a B+.  Not a stellar showing for a post-2008 race and a state where it is very expensive to run TV.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

The Corzine Dangers Lurking Online for Chris Christie Campaign

I've written a series of post regarding the year's NJ Gubernatorial race and up until recently the lack of online advertising that I've seen has been disappointing.  That is until the Jon Corzine campaign started to put the Obama online advertising playbook into action.  The Chris Christie campaign however, remains in the internet advertising fog of war with the occasional email message or Facebook post.  This of course has me very concerned because this state needs to make Corzine a one term and done Governor.  Here's what I'm seeing:.

• Facebook - Both candidates have low involvement. Corzine 09 page has 1665 supporters while his Governor page has 9588.  Christie has 4681 fans.  Christie's numbers are a nice jump since the last time I looked but Corzine has lost some (no surprise, but more on that later).  I do get messages from Christie, but few and far between.
• Email Marketing - The Corzine campaign is good for about 3 per week while the Christie campaign maybe sends one out once per week and that's very sad.
• YouTube - Check out the pages of both candidates.  Not much going on here for either of them.
• Paid Search - Corzine has launched a newbie style paid search campaign with only minimum changes to the text ads and clicks driven to the homepage (very search marketing 101).  However, Christie is doing ZERO marketing here which is scary.  The only support he is getting is from John McCain's Country First PAC (hmm I wonder who is directing that) and some enterprising 529 groups.  BTW - this image shows that Corzine is advertising on Christie's name.
• Display Advertising - Corzine is already running them and while they are decently constructed showing some planning for the ads, they once again show a lack of creative optimization and click through to the homepage.  Christie - ZILCH but support from similar folks from the paid search area.
• Website - Corzine's Quantcast profile shows a heavy slant towards wealthy women while Christie shows no real demo patters.  The site traffic screen shot shows that Corzine's campaign's web traffic growth has exploded (I wonder what online advertising does for you?).
• Polling Data shows that Christie is still ahead but Corzine has reversed his downward spiral and his poll growth increase surprising looks like his website growth.  Plus, most Jersey folks aren't paying attention now and are thinking about the shore which makes the numbers unreliable.

What does all mean?  Well Corzine will be the text book example of what happens if a candidate without Obama's charisma, grass roots support, imagery, and likability does by using Obama's marketing playbook.   Hopefully the Christie campaign has more modern marketing tools in their tool belt come Labor Day but it will be an uphill battle given Corzine early foray into online marketing.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Corzine - Using Obama's Marketing Plan without Obama's Personality

Well the NJ General Election for Governor has started and Corzine's campaign has wasted no time in borrowing Obama's Marketing playbook.  I've already received about 3 long emails from them plus links to videos on their YouTube video channel (I can't bring myself to link to anything to do with that campaign, so sorry). 

Their latest state of the campaign video is actually a compete joke when they talked about how brave Corzine was after his accident which was self inflicted when he refused to wear a seat belt while his driver was speeding on a highway on his way to an Imus interview.  As a reminder, here's Corzine's accident story so I find it appalling that his campaign would in any way shape or form describe him as being brave. 

Anyway, Corzine the Governor has 9200 Facebook friends while Corzine the Candidate has about 1900 friends.  So this got me thinking....

• Corzine's campaign studied Obama's campaign playbook and will try hard to duplicate it
• However, Corzine is well hated and is already trailing Christie in the early polls.  Corzine's approval rating is at 35% and his unfavorable rate is holding steady in the mid 50s.  I don't remember ever seeing Obama with those kind of ratings.
• Corzine can't give a speech and can't even pass himself off as a man of the people
• and finally, it is extremely hard to run a grass roots networking campaign when you don't have the charisma of Obama and can't generate passion among the voters when you are well hated by the electorate.

However, what Corzine does have going for him is a crap load of money and President Obama.  If you watch any of their boring, poorly shot videos or read any of their novel sized emails you'll see that

1. They will not run on his crappy job, economy, and spending record
2. They will push the linkage with Obama and Biden
3. They will pump up Obama's spending, stimulus plan and feature Corzine as a friend to the administration
4. Tie into anything to do with Obama - my guess is Corzine will only frequent the same restaurants as Obama and start smoking the same cigarettes. 
5. Paint Christie as a friend to the "vast right wing conservative conspiracy"  even so much as linking him to Sarah Palin even though there is little to no evidence of this

Corzine will do anything and spend anything to win.  He will have President Obama with him, so I do hope the Christie campaign starts quickly on their internet strategy, otherwise we are just handing over that territory to someone who does not deserve reelection.

BTW - Hat tip to my friend Mark.  The knuckleheads at camp Corzine prove my points with their "ineptitudeness" on natural search results.  Clearly they know how important natural search is from Obama's marketing playbook, they just don't have the experience to the plan into correct action.  Here's a screen shot of the natural search results for the keyword "jon corzine".  Clearly the Corzine campaign will be the case study of marketing like President Obama without Obama's skills as a campaigner or without the experts who ran his eMarketing campaign.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric.

Why Lonegan Lost, Christie Has Work to Do, and Corzine Isn't Dead Yet

By now you know that Steve Lonegan lost to Chris Christie in the Republican Primary to take on well hated current Governor Jon Corzine for NJ's top job in November 2009.  As I was driving to my Union NJ office building yesterday I had on NJ 101.5 and listened to all the Lonegan supporters whine about how stupid the other NJ voters are for voting for Chris Christie.  I heard people moaning about how Christie bought the election and how Christie fooled them.  This got me really fired up.

The Steve Lonegan campaign failed to get their message out.  It wasn't that Christie's marketing was so slick.  It wasn't.  It wasn't that Christie spent boatloads of money in the primary; he didn't.  The failure of Lonegan's campaign rests clearly with their campaign for failing to use any modern marketing techniques as was demonstrated by the 2008 Presidential campaign.  You can read these past posts to see how I was tracking Lonegan's lack of modern marketing.  Lonegan's campaign relied on:

• NJ 101.5 to pump out his message.  This is preaching to the converted
• Paul Mulshine which again is preaching to the converted
• Direct Mail which is a complete waste of time and money
• The occasional well hated robo call

Basically the Lonegan campaign used an old school playback for political marketing which didn't allow his message to spread virally,   What did he miss?

1. Paid search ads to interrupt the masses with messages while they are looking for information
2. Email communications targeted to Republican voters in NJ for pennies on the dollar
3. Display ads on popular NJ sites
4. Facebook for voter activism and grass roots organizing; don't get fooled by the 2K Facebook supporters.  They didn't employ any networking techniques and barely used it to push out messages.
5. YouTube views were pathetic
6. Where was the ability to get supporters to talk to their friends and pass out messages via Facebook or some other online organizing?

I'm catching up on some old reading and found a print out of an Esquire article regarding Obama's campaign manage David Plouffe.  Inside it has this line which wasn't quoted but makes a lot of sense that he could have thought it or even said it. "We have to beat Clinton. She has the establishment support, she has this huge system of money-raisers, so we must create an alternative network."

Substitute Christie for Clinton in the Primary with Lonegan and now Corzine for Clinton in the general election and you see why I'm concerned about beating Corzine in the fall and why Lonegan lost.  In NJ or any other state for that matter, you can not just rely on old school political marketing playbooks.  You must use modern marketing techniques especially when taking on the hated Corzine and here's why:

1. He is rich and can spend boatloads of money
2. He doesn't have to rely on the small donor and can tap into his Goldman millionaires
3. Do you really think President Obama is going to sit on the sidelines of this election?
4. Corzine and Obama will focus on those high populated areas which ALSO COINCIDENTALLY ARE THE CITIES WHICH RECEIVED THE MOST OBAMA STIMULUS MONEY.   
5. If you don't think #4 is a problem, you aren't paying attention
6. If Corzine needs help with his Digital strategy, he can, umm, tap into Blue State Digital for help (Obama's guys and gals).
7. I read somewhere today (NJ.com or Daily Record) that Chris Christie will be accepting matching funds which limits him to $10 million or so.  That virtually eliminates a large TV buy in this state until the end.
8. In order to win, Christie has got to get his message out to voters across the state and shouldn't ignore #4.  In order to be smart about #4 he needs an alternative marketing plan - which would be search marketing, email and display, plus online organizing - basically Obama's playbook.
9. Search marketing is the great equalizer where the biggest spender isn't always the biggest winner.

Lonegan didn't lose because NJ voters are stupid.  Lonegan lost because he didn't get his message out and didn't have his supporters network and organize online.  Chris Christie should beat the hated, useless, NJ economy killing Corzine but he can't rely on going toe to toe with a foe that can and will outspend on old school marketing techniques and a foe who will rely on a popular President to rally his stimulus receiving supporters. 

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Chris Christie versus Steve Lonegan before June 2 2009 Primary Vote

The last couple of weeks I've been traveling all over the state.  I've been in NYC which means a drive down Route 78 to Jersey City to take a PATH to a meeting.  I've visited my in-laws who live 30 minutes west of Milford PA so I had to travel through North West NJ.  I've also been in my Union NJ office and traveled through parts of Morris County.  This past weekend I visited my former college roommate Sam down in Cherry Hill NJ which was a drive down Route 31 to Route 295 over to Route 70 and then local roads to Sam's house.

You know what I've observed?  Few Chris Christie road signs and a ton of Steve Lonegan signs.  If road signs are a measure of grass roots support, Lonegan has a huge following!  In fact, I think my home has received more robo calls from the Christie Campaign than all of his signs I've seen in place. 

Throw in some TV ads I've seen and wasted direct mail pieces and it is clear that the campaigns are employing old-school styled politics.  I'm pretty much confirmed that strategy through the lack of online marketing employed by either campaign.

As usual this campaign will hinge around voter turnout.  The NY Times has a good article on how both candidates are trying to drum up last minute GOTV activity.  Based on the marketing techniques employed and ignored to date, it is clear that a low voter turn out favors Lonegan and an average  one or better (12% of primary voters) favors Christie.  I think Lonegan's conservative message coupled with anti-Obama furor gives him an advantage in turning out the few right wing conservatives that live in NJ.  Pollster.com has this chart which shows Lonegan closing fast versus Christie, so I don't think it is over.

However, as I wrote a while back I think either candidate will have a tough time with Corzine.  Yes Corzine is vulnerable, but neither Republican candidate is actively embracing the internet for marketing or grass roots organizing.  Online networking will be key to market in traditional Democrat strongholds that also coincidentally have large populated areas.  The internet is the great money equalizer and even with a well hated Governor like Corzine, he has too much money, he can generate too much money from all those Goldman millionaires, and President Obama is lurking in the shadows to help turn out his voters to rescue Corzine.

Lonegan or Christie?  Just make sure you go out and vote on June 2.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Dear Christie and Lonegan Campaigns - I Don't Think Corzine is Dead Yet

Watching the NJ Republican Debate the other night and tracking what is happening online for the three main candidates Lonegan, Christie, and Corzine I can't help but wonder about the missed opportunities to communicate and organize locally in NJ.  Right now Corzine is in a lot better shape than most NJ folks think and as both major Republican candidates duke it out, they should be gearing up for a GOTV machine coming their way in the fall.  Here's what the view looks like from my cheap seats in Long Valley, NJ.

• Neither Republican candidate right now gets organizing online.  This is a glaring hole in their strategy come September.  Both have woefully low SocNet engagement and no search marketing to drive interested parties to their website for information.
• Both candidates now are using old playbooks by running TV ads, dropping crappy direct mail, and bombarding registered Republicans with the always friendly and welcomed robo call.
• Supporters are slowly putting out road signs but last Friday I road out from my home to Denville and then back.  Then I drove out to Clark NJ via Route 78 and back through Scotch Plains.  I think I saw less then 6 Chris Christie signs which is shockingly pathetic.  Where is the grass roots support?
• I'm seeing little commentary and momentum in the blogosphere.  In fact, the only guy that seems to drum up any excitement is Paul Mulshine.  Neither side however, seems to send supporters out to popular blogs and articles like that to push their talking points.
• Video content is pathetic at best
• Email communication is non-existent unless you count the occasional Facebook message as email
• The polls found on Pollster.com show that Lonegan is behind Corzine at this stage and Christie holds a decent lead. However, these polls are meaningless in NJ right now because the average voter is not paying attention because we have bigger economic worries or you are gearing up for a well deserved and needed summer down the NJ shore.
• Barack Obama will campaign here in NJ for Corzine and will definitely focus where large areas of voters are found - Camden, Newark, Bergen County, Hudson County, and Union County.  Obama carried this state by 15% - Obama beat McCain in Essex County 240K to 74K.

Using Essex as and example, Lonegan/Christie should focus on using the internet to organize the McCain supporters in these popular areas.  TV ads will be wasted on them there and expensive if you go network; DM is useless.  Only by following Obama's playbook for grass roots organizing online can a Republican be competitive there even when the Obama GOTV machine touches down in Newark Airport.

Until I see some real online organizing activity Corzine still has a good chance to get reelected once President Obama comes to town.  I think it is sad that neither campaign sees the power online for finding and organizing folks in areas that are not normally good areas to market in.

As I've told everyone that has ever asked me, Obama didn't wake up one day with all of those Facebook friends.  That strategy was started a long time ago, so the time is now for Lonegan and Christie.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Career Planning Lessons for AT&T Employees via Brett Favre

Like most sports fans I'm sick and tired of the Brett Favre stories.  I'm not sick and tired about whether he is going to play again; I'm more sick of the teary goodbyes when he announces his retirement (see this video when he starts breaking up around the 27 second mark). 

Anyway, I also started thinking, if Brett Favre wants to come back, why shouldn't he?  After all...

• His whole life revolves around football
• He's been playing professional football for 17 years and if you add in college that totals 21 years
• He is still productive even though he has slowed down, after all he is almost 40
• Has never missed a game in his 17 years
• Companies still want him around as do his customers

That started reminding me of my former AT&T associates especially the ones that are still there.  My old advice on this was that these employees should get out of that place because it is in a death spiral especially if you are located in NJ.  Friends of mine that got out of there are doing just fine proving that there is life after AT&T.  Some folks that left and took jobs with other NJ telecommunications companies (ex - Lucent) typecast themselves even more when they didn't learn new skills or a new industry.  I often felt bad for these telecom drones in addition to the NJ employees of AT&T.   Now I've had a little change of heart.

You see the old AT&T demanded a lot of your time, commitment, and most importantly loyalty.  Nearly all of these employees gave it and in return we built friendships that lasted forever, had good jobs, and great rewards.  A lot of people married co-workers ensuring AT&T talk and thoughts 24/7.  Some people built skills by taking different jobs within the company and they used these skills when they quit or were laid off.  Some folks still cling to their former cubicals.  BTW - my wife and I still remember my telephone number from Basking Ridge (908.221.7723) even though it hasn't worked in 9 years.

Anyway back to Brett Favre and the obvious link to AT&T.  Look if you like your job, you are still good at it, your customers and co-workers still want you, why shouldn't you stay there?  As long as you can still perform and someone wants to pay you, what's wrong with staying in the ONLY JOB YOU'VE EVER KNOWN?  Nothing. Nothing wrong at all.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Lonegan versus Christie versus Corzine - Who Gets eCampaigning in NJ?

I had completely different posts in mind for tonight, but I can't hold my my tongue (really my fingers) any more.  Why?  I am completely sick of receiving 1980s styled political marketing communications from GOP gubernatorial candidate Steve Lonegan. This isn't the first time I wrote about this campaign's lack of progressive (progressive as in new and not liberal) marketing techniques.  However after weeks of receiving the same really wretched direct mail campaigns begging for dollars, tonight was the last straw for me.  Stuffed in my mailbox was a newspaper styled flier with a real cheesy bumper sticker and a return envelope to give a donation.  Not only does this insult political marketing post the 2008 election but it deprived the US Post Office from postal processing fees.

So of course I decided to take a poke around the internet to see what I can find on the candidates.  Now I'm a busy man, so I didn't research all of the like dozen candidates to beat a vulnerable and weak Jon Corzine because well if I can't find the big three advertising online I'm not that worried about the rest.  So here's what I found...

1. Paid Search Marketing - Nothing.  Not a thing.  None of the three are advertising online for people that are looking for information.  This is like shooting fish in a barrel in NJ.  There are tax issues, spending issues, economy, environment, etc that a well thought out campaign could be running to get in front of voters.  Seriously, this is a piece of cake.  It will raise donations, get people to join the campaign, and help voters understand where these candidates stand on issues.  Remember, we won AAPC's best use of new technology award for search makreting so I kind of know what I'm talking about.
2. Social Networking - I joined Christie's as well as Lonegan's Facebook pages.  Corzine I did not join but a quick browse of that page shows almost 9.900 supporters and a lot of information; it has also been updated on a regular basis.  Lonegan has 974 supporters but since joining I've yet to receive any emails/messages via this group.   It also seems that Lonegan is using a ghost writer /ghost Twitterer to make posts.  Chris Christie has almost 3,400 fans and it appears his brother makes semi-authentic messages and posts (I wrote semi because I don't know if he really writes them, but it sure looks like that).  
3. YouTube - Christie loaded up a recent video 2 days ago and has 34 subscribers and his most viewed video has about 1,244.  I couldn't find an official Lonegan YouTube page and gave up looking for it (there were no links from his website).  BTW - same thing for Corzine.
4. Twitter - The Lonegan campaign uses Twitter and has 720 followers but the Tweets I saw look nothing more than press clippings. Christie has 734 followers and Tweets in the same fashion as Lonegan.  Corzine has an account with 140 followers but no Tweets.  Clearly somebody just grabbed the Twitter account just in case they figure out the internet before the fall.
5. Website - Corzine websites is barely above brochureware with no links to any social networking options.  He does have one thing going for him which is a picture with Obama.  Lonegan's site is an improvement over Corzine's but other than the top masthead it is in need of a face lift.  The homepage scrolls forever with repetitive links all over the page and their use of colors in inconsistent.  Sure the site has a lot of information but it is poorly organized.  Quite frankly it needs a MASSIVE overhaul.  Christie's website is beautifully designed and looks like a modern political website.

Based on what I can see, none of these three warrant a rating of A for their eCampaigning prowess.  The best of the bunch is the Christie campaign even though they haven't employed paid search marketing and can do more in the YouTube and online grass roots organizing areas.  Lonegan's campaign with its wasteful use of direct marketing really doesn't seem to get using the internet.  Seriously instead of dropping bad direct mail, improve the website and use search marketing as well as YouTube. 

Christie needs to make some small improvements (search and online organizing), but Lonegan needs a massive overhaul to even get in the game.  Why?  While Corzine is weak and well hated in NJ, he will have the greatest campaigner alive working the phones and campaigning for him in the fall; more importantly President Obama will be campaigning for Corzine in the more populated areas of Camden County, Essex County, and Hudson County.  That means Corzine has a BIG DAWG in this fight.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

I'm Down to My Last (Paper) Newspaper

Any day now my wife will call into The Star Ledger and cancel my daily subscription.  That will end my subscriptions to paper editions of daily publications leaving only my once per week local newspaper The Observer Tribune.  Yes - no more daily Ledgers, Wall Street Journals or Daily Records (unless of course I'm interviewed in them). 

Will I miss the paper versions?  I don't think so and here's why:

Twitter + iPhone + RSS Feeds = Faster and More Interesting News

Yes the iPhone-Twitter combination killed any chance I had as a continuing paper subscriber.  Why?  Simple I used to love to read the newspaper on the couch or in the men's room or just waiting around.  Now, I have my iPhone and sure it gets flagged, but now I have all my news, books (via Kindle 2), email, and etc at my palm and it easily replaced my Star Ledger.  So where am I getting my news without the newspaper?

• WSJ Twitter feeds for national and business news
• ESPN Radio via XM and ESPN Tweets for national sports news and commentary
• Daily Record for New Jersey and local NJ news (ht to one of my favorite Twitters @meghanvandyk)
• I get Yankees news from @MLBYankees and of course ESPN
• The Star Ledger Twitter feeds gives me breaking news, NY Giants news, and NJ breaking news
• I subscribe to Paul Mulshine's RSS feed because Paul doesn't have a Twitter feed yet
• The iPhone besides providing me with Google Reader and Twitter, I've also downloaded Apps for The New York Times (yes I wrote that - see below) and AP News.  BTW - Star Ledger gets a LOT of their stories via AP so why pay for the paper edition
• Heck, the iPhone has Suduko Apps so that paper addiction is no longer necessary
• Fox News first thing in the morning and CNBC in the afternoon for business/stock information

With all of this electronic news, why would I subject myself to wrapping up newspapers every weekend?  No more.  The iPhone with Twitter has helped me to kick the paper newspaper habit.  Unfortunately, I'm not the only person as paper newspapers are slowly going out of business. 

Join the electronic revolution and ditch your paper newspapers.  I did.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

NY Times Note - Yes I still think the NY Times is biased towards the liberal left.  However, I do enjoy it when they take the Democrats to task when that occurs on the rare occasion.  Plus, I did miss their Business, Science, NY Food, and Sports stories but now I'm back thanks to my free iPhone App.

For Cajun Food in New Jersey, Try Butler's Louisiana Kitchen in Long Valley

    ***UPDATE ON 4-23-09********** We stopped by last night and there was a note on the door that Butler's is temporarily closed due to the economic conditions.  You should call before you just show up.  I really hope it is temporary because the food in Long Valley is just pizza, burgers, and beer.***********************

We love Butler's Louisiana Kitchen in the center of Long Valley, NJ.  Our entire family has eaten there about a half dozen times and ALL of us love the food.  Those that you know me, know that I love finding great restaurants and I'm happy to report that there's a great place just 10 minutes from my house.  We've tasted the following menu items and have loved them all:

• Smoked Hog Wings
• Creole Hot Salad
• Seafood Gumbo
• Smoked Brisket and Smoked Ribs - both have been ordered multiple times per visit!
• Jambalaya
• Etoufee
• Beans, Greens, and Mac-Cheese

The only complaint that I have is that the food isn't spicy enough for me, but that's me being a little picky.  Seriously the food is awesome, priced right, and you can bring your own booze.  So since this is a recession busting time, allow me to resurrect Old School Facelift for Butler's for marketing the restaurant:

OLD SCHOOL FACELIFT #10: 5 QUICK RECESSION BUSTING MARKETING TECHNIQUES FOR BUTLER'S

1. Revisit Your Web Designer to Talk Social Networking:  The way to build a business online is to tap into social networks these days.  It helps with a couple of things:  it helps your Google rankings and it gets people talking about your business online.  You don't need to change the site much, but you could link out to say a YouTube page or a Facebook page.  On YouTube you could post videos of your recipes, Saturday nights shows you are hosting, and on Facebook you could allow people to load up photos, comment, and Fan you (that's friending in business terms).
2. Online Coupons:  Sure, somebody is going to tell you that you need an email list to send out coupons, but that is too old school for you.  Build up your Fans on your Facebook page and push messages and coupons out there.  Simple stuff, like take a picture of a coupon you designed and load it up and let any fan get access to the photo.  Bingo cheap coupon marketing.
3. Cajun Cooking Contests:  Run questions in your Facebook page asking people to tell you what their favorite Cajun recipes are and then have a night of customer request menus.  Run other contests like showing people making their own Cajun recipes at home, naming menu items, or loading up reviews of the restaurant.
4. Display Ads:  Google now has a build your own banner ad product that you can geo-target.  Their network covers about 80% of the US so you can get a ton of cheap cost per click impressions or CPM ads and cover say a 60 mile radius around NJ.  Trust me I pretty much pioneered the Google Blast or Google Surge for politics and it will work.  Also, once you have a decent enough Facebook fans, you can use their DIRT CHEAP ad platform that also lets people know if anyone in their personal network is a fan of Butler's - that's a cool Word of Mouth Marketing tool.
5. GOOGLE PAY PER CLICK ADS - I saved the best for last.  Run pay per click search ads targeted to searches in a 60 mile radius around Long Valley.  I'd organize the campaign in this manner and if you make me a lunch or early dinner, I'll set you up for free.  Oh and before I forget, under no circumstances should you pay for print advertising.
   
   • Brand name
   • Cajun
   • Restaurants
   • Long Valley

If you want good Cajun food and are tired of the standard pizza stuff, try Butler's Louisiana Kitchen.  Get the ribs or the brisket and post your thanks below. 

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

AT&T's More Bars Network vs Can You Hear Me Verizon Network

I've been testing out my iPhone for about a month now and my conclusion is that the iPhone is by far the greatest cell phone currently on the market, but AT&T's network is either the worst or the best depending on where you are.  And before you flame me for not knowing anything a little back ground first.  I worked at AT&T for 10 years and pioneered from a marketing perspective marketing bundles of wireless and wireline communications starting in 1995.  The program I volunteered to work on called Cheetah in 1995 is widely considered the first marketing of a free cell phone for a new account.

I of course had an AT&T Wireless cell phone - one of those bricks back in 1995 and stuck with AT&T until about 2000 when I left AT&T.  I got a Verizon phone not because I was angry at AT&T but because of the horrible dropped calls I'd get on NJ transit and on Route 78.  After years of upgrading, I  had to get the latest iPhone because my Verizon phones just could not deliver on good wireless internet surfing and the applications were sub par.

Well driving around to NYC the past few days I've noticed that AT&T's network still SUCKs on Route 78 and Route 287.  It is so bad, that I've begin to seriously doubt AT&T's claim of of More Bars in More Places.  They may have more bars, but that doesn't stop the calls from being dropped.  Around my house, in my town, and neighboring towns the service is crystal clear, but once I get on one of those two highways, my old Verizon phone works a lot better.  Plus, on a recent trip to DC the iPhone was unusable but Verizon was fine.

Net, net around my home in Long Valley and Chester NJ the AT&T/iPhone is awesome, but once out on the main roads, Verizon seems to be a better shot.  The phone itself is something that I can't put down and often replaces my laptop even in my house.  AT&T's 3G is blazing fast when you get it too.  For me, unfortunately, I'm a two cell phone kind of guy now.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Other Local News Cos Should Follow The Daily Record into Twitter

I regularly read up to four newspapers during the week.  The Observer Tribune for local Long Valley news, The Daily Record for Morris County and NJ news, The Star Ledger, and The Wall Street Journal.  These companies all have the same problem which is dwindling newspaper subscriptions, advertisers that have become more sophisticated and realize that newspaper advertising is awful (exception is if it is really local advertising), and faster news stories available via blogs and Twitter.  What they've also probably have figured out is that online advertising, though the wave of the now, can't possibly make up for the shortfall in offline advertising.  Hence the cutbacks in staff and for papers like the LA Times, Washington Post, and The New York Times cutbacks in integrity.

Yes that's right, newspapers are figuring out that while the web is really their only future, the future probably won't be filled with as much ad revenue.  In order to get the ad revenue, they need to compete with finicky readers who demand instant news and with local blogs who can get stories out quickly.  This fracturing of the web means less traffic, but that's why I love that The Daily Record took the plunge into Twitter.

Yes Twitter.  The Wall Street Journal gets it, but The Observer Tribune doesn't.  So what does The Daily Record know that other local papers don't...

WHAT LOCAL PAPERS CAN GET FROM TWITTER

1. People demand instant notification when important stories come out
2. People don't hang out on local newspaper sites all day long, so you need to continually drive traffic
3. RSS feeds, believe it or not, are not the desired communication vehicle.  Heck, even if you knew what they are, you'd have realized that you need to visit a page or your outlook to get an alert.  This is so impersonal, yet a Tweet is personal
4. Tweets can actually drive traffic to your website.  I've found I get way more traffic from Tweets than I do from email/RSS subscribers.
5. Eventually there will be a revenue model so the more Twitter subscribers a paper has, the better it will be.
6. The Tweets and re-Tweets have huge pass on value and word can spread quickly and virtually for free

The Daily Records gets it.   Perhaps some day other local newspapers will wake up a realize that just having a website and hoping people show up is not to way to monetize websites or increase traffic.  Embracing new technologies like Twitter, Facebook, and the iPhone will help lead the way to more revenue.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Al Franken Wins MN Senate Seat - Who's Next Artie Lange?

Yes my wife will tell me that I've run out of Artie jokes here, but then again she bought me Too Fat To Fish.  Anyway, the Associated Press has reported that comedian Al Franken has been certified the winner of the Minnesota Senate Race. Norm Coleman will of course fight this in court, but thanks to the people of Minnesota and a little Barack Obama coattails we in this country have to deal with this clown in the Senate.  I did a little work in this race and I can tell you that of all the races that I've worked on that lost, this is the craziest one. 

Al Franken has no business being a US Senator.  He has no real policies, but he made it in by bashing President Bush.  His company failed to pay taxes or carry workers compensation.  The guy is a clown and broke the law, but the people of Minnesota overlooked that and elected him anyway.  When Minnesota elected Jesse Ventura a lot of people snickered, but not me.  That's their state and they can do what they want but the US Senate effects all of us.

Seriously, that's awful.  That's like New Jersey electing Artie Lange to the US Senate.  Heck, I think Artie would make a better Senator than Al Franken and here's why....

TEN REASONS WHY ARTIE LANGE WOULD BE A BETTER SENATOR THAN AL FRANKEN

1. Like a lot of members of Congress Artie has already been arrrested
2. Sure Artie has a drug problem, but at least you know that going in and won't find that later on.
3. Writing of drug problems, who better to help fight drug abuse then someone like Artie?
4. Artie is a true rags to riches to on the rag and back to riches person.  He never attended a classy place like Harvard to get his education
5. Artie is a true working class person - driving a cab, working as a long shore man in Newark NJ.  He understands the working man.
6. Unlike other Senators, you're pretty sure Artie won't get caught soliciting a male police officer in the men's room of an airport.
7. According to Artie he already has a long history of dealing with prostitutes but unlike Spitzer he won't need to transport them across state lines or overpay for sex.
8. You already know he will work with labor Unions and is very liberal.  That makes him attractive to NJ's most influential voting group the CWA which if it isn't already, will be representing the largest pool of workers - the NJ Government payroll.
9. No need to worry about ties to organize crime; although Artie can help represent the gambling and casino groups since he can explain what a vig is...
10. Finally, Artie has a huge following especially in the youth voting segment making it easier for Artie to get elected in NJ.  You won't have to worry about long recounts because the youth vote will go in mass for him, plus the Unions, gamblers, drug addicts, pro-legalization of pot people, prostitution, Italians, the arts and entertainment, casino and horse racing industry, cab drivers.  Heck he'd probably carry NJ by a much larger spread than Obama.

So since I'm pretty sure that Artie could win a US Senate Seat if he can survive until 2012 or until Frank Lautenberg goes on life support, I've bought the URL http://www.artielangeforsenate.com.  You can email me now if you want to help.

PardonMyFrench and my joke,

Eric

Obama's Economic Recovery = 600K New Government Jobs?

Catching up after being in Disney for the past week celebrating the end to one of the crappiest years in recent memory and I read and watched Obama's American Recovery and Reinvestment plan.  And while I want to give him a chance there are just a few things that make me very skeptical. 

• We must demand vigorous oversight and strict accountability for achieving results. Hmm like the TARP bill he voted for?
• create three million new jobs, more than eighty percent of them in the private sector. 3 million * 20% = 600,000 public sector jobs.  That's just more politics of the same.
• we must restore fiscal responsibility and make the tough choices so that as the economy recovers, the deficit starts to come down. Hiring 600K new Government employees will kill our chances at ever digging out of this spending mess.  How will you get rid of them.

Tax cuts are a good idea and so is providing relief to businesses who we hope will not just pocket the money but actually add jobs (see TARP and Bank of America as the primary example of how this didn't happen).  However, adding 600K people to Government payrolls will kill our chances going forward.  The rest of these plans while HUGE are temporary expenditures, hiring people and putting them on payroll will cause HUGE problems for the future.   

OK, so you want to fixing crumbling bridges, roads, and school.  I get that.  That spurs contractors, banks, and etc.  You want to invest in green technology.  Check, get that too (BTW - I'm hoping for bigger tax credits so I can update my building in Union, NJ).  600K Government jobs - HORRIBLE IDEA.  Just visit NJ for a perfect bad example. Oh, I forgot, you like our Governor.

Sorry Obama, you won't get credit for meeting your 3 million new job goal by sticking it to the taxpayer.  That's just more politics of the same and offers no CHANGE.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

No Buzz At The Jersey Shore for Springsteen?

A few days ago I was reading a blog post on NJ.com called Bruce Plays Hope Show in Redbank NJ and I read a paragraph that sums up the current marketing of my rock star Bruce Springsteen: 

There was very little buzz around the Jersey Shore about Bruce playing this show this year.  He did play it in 2006, did not play it last year, and most people I talked to didn't even bring it up that we would see him this year. Of course it was a possibility, but when a friend called me at 5 p.m. today and said "Bruce is playing tonight" I was genuinely surprised.

I've been a little critical of my rock star as of late, but hey I can have my own opinion right?  I guess what bothers me the most is that there seems to be extremely little marketing to support his music, even if it has taken a turn for the worse.  Basically, I believe that Bruce on his own has hit his base of support too many times and that he is doing precious little to get them back or embrace new technology.  Simply here's what I think has happened to his fan base.

• The real oldtimers are well pretty old right now.  If you were a fan say going back to 1975 you are probably in your mid-50s and maybe even 60.  How relevant is Bruce in your life now?  How often are you going to just go out and follow him around like you used to?  10 years ago you and the second group were the buzz down the shore.
• If you are like me and joined the Springsteen fan base in 1984, you are now in your 40s and less likely to follow him around blindly or just go out and purchase music that just doesn't seem as good.
• Since Born in The USA Bruce has seemed to go out of his way to not embrace his fame, following that album up with Tunnel of Love (a great CD but not something that's going to increase a fan base).  Bruce then fires the E Street Bad, moves to LA, and produces Human Touch and Lucky Town again not exactly CDs to grow the base.  Then Greatest Hits and Ghost of Tom Joad.  Basically, other than The Rising and the E Street Reunion Tour, Bruce has done little to add new fans into a base that is growing older and moving on.
• Human Touch tour in MSG for a benefit show Bruce calls some fans that boo a bunch of rude mother fuckers when a different singer is brought up on stage.  That show ends abruptly at 3 hours but you leave that show knowing that Bruce was pissed at a vocal minority and probably cut it short (I was at that show).
• Speaking of Ghost of Tom Joad, that became known as the shut the fuck up tour because Bruce demanded that the concerts be quiet as he sang.
• At a Rising Show in Atlantic City Bruce tells fans that a few of them are crazy with the way they could interpret songs like Empty Sky (I was at the show).
• At a Devils and Dust show in NJ Bruce talks back to fans when one of them tries to yell down that the speaker is out.  Bruce thinking back to GOTJ believes he is being heckled and is rude back; I never noticed or heard an apology when Bruce is told what was really happening.
• Bruce than supports John Kerry and Moveon.org in 2004, pumps out a tribute CD to a known communist, and then releases Magic with its political tones and supports Obama.  Also, let's not forget the preaching from stage.  Finally following the Obama win, Bruce is now excited to put out more political music - witness the following from a memo found on his site 

Some notes on the beginnings of Working on a Dream. During the last weeks of mixing Magic, we recorded a song called "What Love Can Do." It was sort of a "love in the time of Bush" meditation

Basically, Bruce has not had a serious infusion of diehard fans since the Born in the USA days and has done much to hit back.  Plus by being so one sided in political viewpoints, you will eventually marginalize your available base of people to draw fans from and take away some of the passion from your die hard Republican fans.  Look no matter how impressive Obama's win was, roughly 50% of the people voted for him and 50% did not.  Plus the older you were the less likely you were to vote for Obama.  B

ruce has turned off large percentages of diehard fans and not replaced them.  This is similar to what happened with my favorite Christmas Tree Farm when they couldn't plant replacement trees.

What can Bruce do?  Well perhaps put out music that appeals to all political views but if that isn't in him, he needs to embrace the younger generation of fans and use the internet to communicate with them.  That means less emails and more social networking outreach.  That means widgets and more YouTube videos.  Seriously Bruce if you're really committed to your liberal side, stop trying to fake that your music is apolitical.  Just become the Keith Olbermann of Rock Music and market yourself that way.  Go after the Obama voters with new internet marketing tools.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Artie Lange's Too Fat To Fish - Too Good To Pass Up

My wife picked me up Artie Lange's Too Fat to Fish for Christmas or was it Hanukkah, I'm not sure.  At first I thought it would be odd to read a book written by someone you went to High School with, but then again, why not?  I saw Artie a while back at a Springsteen concert and to be perfectly blunt he was genuinely happy to see me and my son Jacob.   

I started reading the book yesterday and I'm more than half way through the book and it is a lot of fun.  Here's who I think would get a kick out of the book...

• Any Artie fans
• Any Howard Stern fans
• Anyone under the age of 50 who grew up in Union County, NJ
• Anyone from New Jersey or NYC
• Anyone who wants to get into show business
• Anyone from a strict family

The best way to describe this book is a regular guy, growing up in a decent town outside of Newark NJ who still is close to his High School friends that had a devastating personal loss right around age 20.  Any of this could have happened to you if something horrible happened to your Dad early in your life.  The book has some really great stories and chronicles Artie's life story hoping to answer why a guy who has so much success continues to try and self-destruct.

I went to High School with Artie and many of the names of his friends I also knew.  I can't say I was friendly with the same folks, I was kind of a nerd in High School.  Artie was the funniest kid and also one of the few people who was decent to me.  I can personally promise you he was a great athlete and did star on Union's Baseball team. 

Reading the book and knowing him when he was young and matching it with my own dad's death this year, it seems to me that Artie is just a decent guy having a good time.  If that means eating too much, drinking too much, doing drugs, etc whatever.  You never know when your time is up here on earth and you should just do what works for you. We should all just stop judging people and take them for what they are and in Artie's case it's the class clown making a boatload of cash and doing it on his own terms.

Artie Lange's Too Fat to Fish - Too Good to Pass Up and a quick weekend read.  Thanks for sharing.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Starting Early in New Jersey - Online Support for Jennifer Beck

In Sunday's Star Ledger there was a little blurb (I looked on NJ.com but couldn't find it in 5 seconds so no link for you) about a blogger starting a petition and a website to draft State Senator Jennifer Beck (R-Monmouth) for NJ's first Lt. Governor.  I was actually going to make a generic post on how politicians should get a jump start on 2009, but I'll use Anthony Del Pellgrino's grassroots effort as the example.

WHY IT IS IMPORTANT TO START NOW FOR 2009 ELECTIONS

1. Build Your Online Tools Now - It used to be you can throw up a website, hope people show up but in the end you'd rely on proven techniques like phones, mail, radio, and if you were big enough TV.  You'd work the backrooms in NJ politics and all of that takes time, money, and staff.  Building a website takes a fraction of the dollars needed to run a full campaign and like Anthony, you can put up a decent site with all of the tools using Wordpress (I put my board of ed site up in a few hours with a total amount spent of $15).  Basically to get started, you need a marketing plan and maybe ONE PERSON who knows what they are doing online.
2. Social Networking Supporters Don't Just Magically Appear - I wrote a great post called Why Weren't We More Social which examined some false conclusions regarding Senator McCain's social marketing techniques.  The net take away is that you must start early to really have a conversation and get people involved.  That means building a blog, a Facebook page, a YouTube channel, a Twitter account, and your email-supporter list.  Anthony gets it right by starting now.
3. If You Build It, Will They Come? - Grassroots efforts require seeding - that is people and supporters who are willing to put in time without any long term promises.  They need to make comments on NJ blogs, link to other sites, drive traffic, and put the tools at people's disposal to spread the messages.  Basically, you need to direct supporters onto NJ blogs, news sites, NJ popular sites, etc to generate activity.  As with any grassroots efforts and without paid advertising, this means you need time to gain critical mass.
4. Earned Media Is Your Best Friend - One of my major lessons learned from Senator McCain's campaign and specifically campaign manager Rick Davis is that even when you are down and out, earned media is your best friend.  That means you need to make yourself available to the press - radio, TV, and print in order to get free media. Whether you are officially running or not, the press can do for you what a branding campaign can do for you  - get you brand name recognition.
5. Get Online Experience - Once you put together your marketing plan, you'll undoubtedly have groups of voters that skew online and other that don't.  That doesn't mean that you can't use online tools to contact all of them, but you need to get experience with which ones work more effectively by your target groups.  Plus, when you look at what you need to win at the state level, who knows how many votes you can get in the long tail.   Anyway the beautiful aspect of online marketing is how measurable it is so you can optimize your efforts and get the experience needed before your competition does.

The only critique I'd make regarding Anthony's efforts are to ease up on the length of the posts and that's saying a lot coming from me.  I don't know how he is doing on the other points above (petition right now has 5 signatures including Anthony) so it is unfair to critique.  However, he is setting an example for NJ politicians on how to get a jump now on 2009.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

NJ's Holiday Triangle - Mackey's Orchard, Hot Dog Johnny's and Wycoff's Tree Farm

On Friday Mary, Jacob, Kaela, and I completed what we call New Jersey's Holiday Triangle.  That's when we visit Mackey's Orchard, Hot Dog Johnny's, and Wycoff's Tree Farm.  You'll remember these places from past posts.  Anyway, it is an annual family event, so I figured I'd make it an annual posting event.

First stop for us this year was Hot Dog Johnny's because we got a late jump on the day.  Johnny's was packed at 2:30 which surprised us, but what wasn't a surprise was all of the cars with Christmas Trees tied on (I wonder how many people actually read this blog).  There are only two ways to screw your order up - you try and order Hamburgers (not on the menu - see the name) or you try and order your hot dog with something other than mustard, ketchup, relish, onions, pickle, or some combination.  You want a recession proof lunch?  Here's what we got for $24 - 2 sodas, 1 birch beer in frosty mug, 3 french fries, black and white shake, and 9 hot dogs in various versions.

After lunch we went to Wycoff's Tree Farm to cut down our tree.  This year we got a 9 foot Douglas Fir for about $64.  This year the kids helped me cut down the tree and helped me bring the tree to the cashier.  We were told that we'll be able to drive up to the top of the hill for mountains of trees next year.  After securing the tree onto the roof of our 4-Runner we went to Mackey's.

This year we dropped a boat load of cash at Mackey's. The kids got free apples as long as they were new varieties which is no small feat since we love apples and have orchards within 10 minutes of our house.  I grabbed a jar of Mackey's home made zucchini relish, a dozen home made apple cider donuts, and apple cider.  Mary bought a Christmas Tree wreath, a bag of Papa Goes Nuts pecans, and a pine kissing ball for long hours of practice.  Plus, I picked up one of these awesome 6 inch apple pies which I'm eating right now as I type this (top shelf to the left of the ribbon is the one I'm eating).  The pies at Mackey's are the BEST HOME MADE PIES YOU CAN BUY.

After that we went on our way to finish decorating the house.  That's New Jersey's Best Holiday Triangle and if you are within 1 hour, you should give it a go.  Just make sure you tell Mackey's and Wycoff's who sent you.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Old School Facelift #10 Chris Christie Steps Down - Strategies for Running for NJ Governor

Chris Christie steps down as US Attorney fueling speculation that he will run for Governor versus Gov Jon Corzine or Richard Codey if President Obama mercifully rids this state of Corzine for an administration job.  Whether Christie runs or not or some other up and coming NJ Republican, running a campaign in NJ is extremely challenging.  We are a diverse state with large population centers in Hudson County, Newark, and Camden/Trenton plus we have the shore and the farming areas like where I live in Long Valley NJ.  We have a major newspaper in the Star Ledger but unfortunately TV is tough because you have to buy in the NYC and Philadelphia MSAs.  Finally if Corzine is still in office, he has boatloads of money so what's a NJ Republican supposed to do....

OLD SCHOOL FACELIFT #10 - CHRIS CHRISTIE RUNNING FOR NJ GOVERNOR

1. Build a website today.  Why?  Besides the obvious reasons, there are plenty of real-time NJ issues like the bailout, unemployment, taxes, NJ budget and you need to get on top of those issues NOW while people are paying attention.
2. Buy a list of NJ Voters  - You'd instantly have a starting database of emails, names, issues, voter registration, etc to start your marketing right.  You'd also get an idea of what your potential base of voters are and where you need to do voter registration.
3. Social Networking - Start building your base of supporters now.  Obama didn't wake up in October 2008 with millions of supporters.  It was started years ago.  Blogger outreach is critical and not just "A" list bloggers.
4. Your NJ Media Strategy Is This - Between now and September 2009, earned media on TV and prints, internet media via Google and other search networks, social networking, and direct mail only for donations when it proves out.  After Labor Day you could go into TV if you have more than enough money.
5. Online Strategist as Senior Advisor - No in NJ it definitely should not be the typical media consultant.  TV in this market costs too much money and the correlation between TV and behavior is sketchy now.  There are far more efficient ways of political marketing and you need someone at the Senior Level that understands how the internet works and why new media strategies are needed. 

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

The Value of a Political Lawn Sign - Too Much to Ignore

About a month back I wrote a post called What's The Value of a Political Lawn Sign where I looked at the local town committee race between Republican Jim Harmon and Independent turned Democrat Kevin Nedd.  Basically, Kevin made a no political sign pledge and Harmon did not.  Well the results are in and Jim Harmon won.  So what does that tell us about the value of political lawn signs?  Well it turns out there were probably other factors at work, but I wouldn't run a race without them especially the ones that go on supporter's properties.

As you can see from this chart Harmon received 5,413 votes and Nedd received 3,203 votes.  That turns out to be the second most votes for any Democrat candidate on the slate.  Greenberg for Freeholder had the least amount of votes which probably represent the base support of WT Democrats and Democrat voting Independents.  Nedd didn't get as many cross-over Republicans and Independents as Obama, so what happened?

When Nedd flips over to be a Democrat the way for him to win was straightforward but difficult.  He would get probably like 99% of Democrats, but would have to pull about 20% of Republicans and then split the Independents. Given that he was also the Morris County Chair for Obama he would live or die by Obama's coattails.

There were Obama signs in town but no Nedd signs.  Both Nedd and Harmon dropped mail (an ABSOLUTE WASTE OF MARKETING DOLLARS) and both made robo calls.  Nedd probably got slightly more earned media but definitely not enough.  There were three campaign related sites in town.

• Jim Harmon Alexa Rating = 3,745,622 (1,467 hits)
• ReelectNedd Alexa Rating = 3,343,600 (1,643 estimated hits)
• KevinNeddSaid Alexa Rating = 6,205,655 (885 estimated hits)

I don't know the actual traffic ratings but the Harmon site has a traffic counter and if we use his site counter to Alexa rating ratio we can estimate the other sites visitors (next to Alexa).  None of these numbers are impressive and show a lack of community interest.  To put it in perspective, my own failed BofE campaign generated almost 3,500 visits in less than one month.  The Harmon and Nedd sites were up for months.

Based on the data above, I can only conclude that:

1. Political Lawn sign are important especially with the way Jim Harmon used them which was on supporter lawns only
2. Nedd didn't get enough earned media support from local papers to balance out the lack of marketing from the local signs
3. You can drop all the wasteful direct mail that you want, but the majority of the town showed no interest in either candidate's websites or the attack site which had some press.
4. While Nedd did well with the amount of votes he received, being associated with Obama hurt him a lot more in our town.  Of course Nedd did help get Obama elected President.

There really aren't any other conclusions.  For a local election it was very civil and didn't generate enough press for either candidate.  With quiet campaigns and lack of visible support/interest except for the signs, people pretty much voted like the top of the ticket.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Hey Governor Jon Corzine - Where's NJ's Job Growth?

I woke up this morning to the following headline in the Star Ledger "Jersey's Budget Gap Triples to $1.2 Billion" and I'm angry.  Of course I didn't vote for Jon Corzine, but where is NJ's job growth plan?  Don't tell me it is because of the recent downturn.  Governor Corzine has done nothing to spur job growth and I can't even find any plans of his for growth.  When you Google "jon corzine job growth" you get this nice article from the Star Ledger back in September 2008 called Corzine's job growth strategy faulted with these tidbits...

When Corzine and Rose took over, they set a goal of 70,000 new jobs a year and said they'd settle for 40,000. The state came close in 2006, with a rise of 33,900 jobs. But it gained only 4,700 jobs in 2007, and has lost 16,000 in the first eight months of 2008.

Figures released by the state last week show unemployment at a five-year high of 5.9 percent. The national rate was 6.1 percent.

It ranked 46th out of 50 states in total job growth in the first half of 2008, even though its total employment base is the 11th-largest.

The state was 21st in job growth in 2006 and 36th in 2007.

I also went to the Department of Labor and created this spreadsheet of private jobs.  Basically, the Corzine administation has done a horrible job of creating jobs in this state (up slightly in 2006, flat in 2007, and probably loss in 2008).  Where's the plan Governor?  I thought you were supposed to be a financial wiz?  Sure we have to cut expenses, but the key to solving our budget problem is work the tax revenue line and the way to fix that is to GET JOBS in this state.

Well the only good news for NJ and bad news for the US is that Governor Corzine is being mentioned for a job in the Obama administration.  Plus if he doesn't leave he is up for re-election this fall.  I'm not sure what Corzine has done to impress Barack Obama, but he can have him.

BTW - why would we in NJ believe that Corzine can create jobs now in this economic environment when he failed to create jobs in 2006/2007 at an acceptable rate?  We shouldn't expect this (thanks to Kate K for that last thought).

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Springfield Acura Made My Car Beautiful Again

About 8 months ago I took my car into a local big chain auto shop (American Tire and Auto) where they did an inspection, servicing, and a complete brake job.  After that I noticed a loud whistle whenever I drove for 5 minutes and used the brakes.  So I took it back to them and asked them to check and they told me it was the new alloys used in the Acura brakes.  So I started waiting to see if anyone else's car sounded like mine and guess what?  I never heard the loud whistle, but I kept hoping it would work itself out.

I then called Somerville Acura in Bridgewater where I bought my car, but they have this new policy where I have to make an appointment with the service manager to discuss my car, but due to the campaign I missed my appointment.  I begged to drop it off and they said no.  So last week on my way to the office building I now own in Union NJ (1961 Morris Avenue), I dropped my car off at the Springfield Acura on Route 22.  They offered a free loaner car and two free car washes.  I didn't need the loaner because thanks to my Dad's death the other company I now own, leases two Jaguars (these are NOT chick cars).

I did meet with the service manager but it only took 5 minutes to write up what I was looking for.  They did a service and caught the heaviness I felt it my tires (nail in left front).  They took care of two minor recalls and did a complete detailing on my car.  Finally, they couldn't be sure about the brakes and since I still had 90% left on them they DID NOT recommend changing them.  They tried talking me out of spending the money (when was the last time you heard that?), but I gambled and had the back brakes fixed.  They did kind of confirm what American Tire told me so I'm not too angry at American Tire.

Guess what?  No more whistling.  The car is beautiful again.  Even two sales men said they were staring at my car all day and couldn't believe it had 75K miles on it.  Seriously, the car is brand new again, but I did pay $930 for everything.  However, that's OK but I feel sorry for Acura in Somerville and American Tire and Auto because they lost a customer.

If you own an Acura and live in NJ - go to Springfield Acura on Route 22.  Good servicing.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

You Want a Corn Maze Challenge? Visit Stony Hill in Chester NJ

About a year back I wrote a post called Old School Facelift #4 - NJ Corn Mazes where I gave some free advice on attracting new visitors to the Stony Hill Farm in Chester NJ.  Sadly they didn't see my post or didn't make the suggested changes to their marketing, but on a good note this year's corn maze is even harder than last year's maze.

As you can see from the video we were determined to make it through this year without any help and within record time.  We dropped off $44 for the four of us and bought a big bottle of water just in case we needed it.  I even snapped a photo of the maze to help with the our travels.  We also decided to ignore the puzzles along the way (they weren't that hard anyway because the questions were based on election trivia).

90 minutes or so later we were beat and needed help.  Like a lot of people we got lost in the orange section of the maze which much to my chagrin was the mule part of the maze.  Yes the Democrats did me in again, but this time it was Saturday with a ton of other maze travelers.  Even though I wanted to push on, Mary and the kids were exhausted and we were given directions out which was a slight improvement over last year when we were escorted out.

You want a challenge?  Go visit the Stony Hill Corn Maze in Chester NJ.  Bring or buy your 3D glasses and plenty of water because you will need it.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Old School Facelift #9 Laser Works by Carolyn Monday from Hackettstown New Jersey

I was at a birthday party Saturday night and I ran into Carolyn Monday who owns a company on Schooly's Mountain in Hackettstown, NJ called Laser Works Treatment Center.  The company uses laser therapy to treat smoking habits and since I've never smoked a legitimate cigarette in my life (more on that below) I really wasn't interested in whether it works or not.  I was more interested in whether Carolyn should have her own static website or not to promote her services.  So, let's take a look at:

Old School Facelift #9 - Laser Works Treatment Center by Carolyn Monday

1. Natural Search Dilemma - Carolyn needs to start here.  She needs to figure out which 10 keywords she'd like to appear on.  Searching for laser works, hackettstown NJ pulls up her nice Google Local listing but that type of search predisposes that people are already looking for her.  "quit smoking laser nj" brings up quite a lot of listings but it doesn't appear that any of the top 20 results have a strategic advantage.  Unfortunately her own name doesn't bring up any results (until this post).  When I browse the list of results none of them appear to be blogs which means Carolyn could have some nice natural search results by constantly updating the site.
2. Getting a Good URL - Going back to the natural search results there appears to mostly static websites and unfortunately for Carolyn laserworks.com seems to be taken as well as laserworksinc.com.  Laserworkstreatmentcenter.com is a long URL but is available as is carolynmonday.com and carolynmondaylaser.com.  stopsmokingbylaser.com also works.  Personally I'd grabbed quite a few of them, but depending on how Carolyn wants to market her company would mean I'd either go carolynmonday.com or some version of stopsmokingbylaser.com.  Me, I'd go stopsmokingbylaser.com because I bet people that are hearing radio ads or reading articles are probably more likely to type that keyword in.  If you Google "stop smoking by laser" you'll see that nobody is using that URL and it seems extremely popular with the paid search advertisers.
3. Blog Content of StopSmokingbyLaser.com - I'd avoid the typical static website and opt for the blog site.  Revisiting my old board of education campaign site which now points to longvalleymath.com you can see how you can have a combination site with static pages but one that is powered by a blog.  So, I'd recommend wordpress as the blog platform because it is a) free b) easy c) has many different templates to choose from and d) has easy to use add-ons.  As I recall for about $15 she can purchase her URL via wordpress and have a blog site up in running in a manner of minutes.  Plus, the blog content will enable her to update her site a few times a week, hit the blogosphere running where there doesn't appear to be any competition, and make some headway in the natural search. 
4. Video Content - Ok, now I'm not writing that her product doesn't work or it isn't believable.  It does seem a little far out, but then again I've never smoked.  The best thing Carolyn can do to prove it works is to use video.  So, I'd hop over to YouTube and grab the page YouTube.com/stopsmokingbylaser.  Now she has a page that will host her own video (read commercials) for free.  All she needs to do is have a decent video with a tripod and some free, easy to use video editing software (or not) and she can film her office, materials, procedures, and even do a video series.  Wordpress also makes it very easy to host the video on the blog.
5. Customer Testimonials -  Does anyone every believe the infamous "this product is great by John from Kalamazoo, MI" quote?  Of course not, but if Carolyn actually filmed satisfied customers and put it up on her YouTube page, how much more powerful would that be?

You'll notice one thing missing that has been consistent in most of my Old School posts is I never mentioned paid search.  My experience tells me that the majority of her keywords would be very expensive judging by the competition that is already there.  I think Carolyn should eventually use paid search instead of say a newspaper ad, but she'd have to be very smart about how much she pays and which words she buys.  First priority for her business is to take care of the free, social networking opportunities and then branch out into paid advertising. 

BTW - I made this post at 9:01 AM and the keyword search {"carolyn monday", hackettstown, nj} had no search results.  By 9:45 this post appeared in the results proving how quick Google is and how quickly a blog post can influence results.   Also, this post is #1 in the "Carolyn Monday" keyword.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

P.S.  I never smoked cigarettes because when I was growing up my father smoked a ton of Parliment cigarettes especially in the little Toyota he owned.  I can still smell that smoke blowing around that car and that pretty much ruined any chance I had to ever pick up a cigarette and put it in my mouth.  Plus, if you actually lit up a Parliment around me I'll actually ask you to put it out or go somewhere else.  Yes - any other cigarette but those vile Parliments.

Curious on Two Budget Items in NJ's 2009 Budget

So the state of NJ released its budget in detail and The Star Ledger had a write up on it, but I was curious about two items mentioned in the article.  One was that they restored $395K for the NJ Motion Picture and Television Commissions and the other was they restored $500K for the NJ Small Business Development centers.  This got me thinking.

We actually have a NJ Motion Picture and Television Commission?  So I Googled it and low and behold we do have one and there is plenty of updated information on the site.  I half expected to write a post about a story Ronald Reagan used to tell about the commissioner of Indian Affairs crying in his office because his last Indian died, but I was actually quite surprised.  There were quite a number of films and TV shows shot on location in NJ included Adam Sandler's You Don't Mess with Zohan so perhaps we actually need this commission because it generates some revenue to the state. However, what I don't know is how large their budget is and how many people work there.

Next up is the NJ Small Business Development Center.  I'm a small business (I work part-time for CDI) so I was wondering if somehow they can help me and is it worth it.  I've never been contacted by then and didn't know they existed and I've been out of corporate America for over 30 months now.  Nobody has ever mentioned them to me and I've run across a ton of local small business folks in Chester and Long Valley.  My local bank who also runs the local business association never mentioned them either.  Finally, my accountant and also my Dad who both do great jobs with their small businesses never mentioned them to me while every other tip they have given me has panned out or I've run into them.  So curious I went to their site to see what they can offer me.  So here's what I see on their home page:

1. A link for consulting where they can help me with marketing and management.  My favorite part was the link on eBusiness with strategies that are over 6 years old.  All kidding aside, why would I go to them when it comes to marketing when in 30 months I've never heard of them?
2. The calendar had some decent events so clearly there is some work being done.  Perhaps they are marketing through these colleges and events, but once again I've never seen them advertised anywhere.
3. The impact seems very impressive of what they have been able to accomplish.  I don't have time to figure out how realistic their numbers are or how direct they are to what they do, but what has me a little concerned is their closing point because it doesn't mention money "Since 1979, more than 293,000 people have received direct assistance from the NJSBDC in the form of free, confidential, one-on-one management consulting and affordable education."
4. The vast majority of in the news is from 2007 so either they were too busy or under funded to post more or perhaps they weren't in the news.

In the end, I'm not sure why NJ is funding them at all.  $500K seems like a small enough number to put back in, but to me this looks like a lobbying effort.  They do seem to push a lot about consulting and helping you so it seems like a giant networking effort. I could be wrong but in 30 months I have never heard of them and one of their offices is in nearby Hackettstown.  Unlike BNI which a lot of people have recommended to me and the NFIB which I've seen signs for, the NJSBDC doesn't seem to be very active.  So, I'm not sure what $500K is getting Small Business owners like me in NJ or why when the state is being described as draconian we should be funding an effort like this.  If I'm wrong, feel free to enlighten me.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

The Tobi Steamer Dominates NJ TV at 11AM on NBC

Yesterday I had a dentist appointment.  Nothing serious, but just a cleaning (and for you fans keeping score at home - NO CAVITIES).  When I got unto the chair, playing on the TV was this ad for the Tobi Steamer so I didn't pay much attention to it. After a few minutes I looked up again and saw more ads for the Tobi Steamer which got me a little upset.  Come on I'm a captive audience here so I stopped my dental hygienist and said "Why do I keep seeing an ad for the Tobi Cleaner?"  "Is Dr. Goodkin getting a $5 kickback from every Tobi Steamer that the patients buy?  That's a little unfair because I'm a captive audience"

After she stopped laughing with me, she called Dr.  Goodkin into my room even though it wasn't time for me.  BTW - Dr Goodkin is one of the top 5 nicest people you'll ever meet and a GREAT dentist.  If you are in the Long Valley area you should stop in.  Here's their website.  After I yelled (jokingly), he said "No, we aren't taking kickbacks but I know exactly what you are talking about.  It seems that Channel 4 runs this infomercial  everyday at 11AM."  So after some more jokes we flipped on MSNBC.

So, I was thoroughly confused that this wasn't a one time event and that NBC-NY actually runs this infomercial more than a few times as Dr.  Goodkin told me.  What happened to some game shows or reality TV shows like some crappy judge or some talk show.  Don't tell me that NBC actually figured out a new model for the 11AM slot.  So I consulted the TV Guide and found such behemoths as Price is Right and The View in there but the rest of the channels looked pretty lame.  Well maybe not as lame as a 30 minute commercial in the middle of the day.

Seriously, can't NBC figure out something else other than a commercial to run in that slot?  I know it is probably making money for them, but WHAT's the point of having a TV station if all you do is show a commercial the whole time?  I wonder at what point it costs NBC money to serve that ad for them? 

Wouldn't they be better off putting a show in there, even if it is reruns and then use Google TV to fill their unsold inventory on commercials.  Dr.  Goodkin uses satellite so it might fall back to DirectTV for that, but you understand where I'm going.  Seriously, how lame is daytime TV now?  It is lamer than root canal.  OUCH.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

The Day Before June 3rd Primary in NJ And All Is Quiet

The past week while I've been driving around, I've been on the lookout for signs or anything else that might tip NJ residents off that there is an election tomorrow morning.  It seems for the most part it is very quiet, but before I dive in with some examples, allow me to post Lincoln's 4 essential activities of campaigning via my friend Richard Kosinski:

1. Make a list of issues
2. Ascertain supporters with certainty
3. Have undecideds be talked to by supporters
4. Make sure every voter is brought to polls

OK, so back to NJ.  The county I live in has the second most registered Republicans (a mere 600 or so behind Bergen County) and there is precious little activity (BTW even less Democrat activity but that's expected).  The only Republican signs I've seen between here and Bridgewater (think Route 206) was for Joe Pennacchio (Senate), Rodney Frelinghuysen (House my District), Kate Whitman, and for Washington Township Committee Jim Harmon. 

That's it.  No other signs.  Nothing from Dick Zimmer (couldn't find a website) and nothing from Murray Sabrin and both of them are running for Senate.  We did receive one robo call from Frelinghuysen but before I could listen to the entire recording my wife deleted it.  Nothing from Kate Erber who is running against Rodney and she doesn't even have a website (more on how shameful that is in a second).  Google advertising for any of them? Nope.  The only ad I saw while Googling for them was from Frank Lautenberg who bought Dick Zimmer's name.  Banner ads anywhere?  I doubt it.  TV or radio?  Perhaps somewhere but you won't catch my attention with that.

Back to Kate Erber and a little of Murray Sabrin.  Both of these candidates are supposed to be self style Ron Paul Republicans but neither of them learned anything about marketing or using the internet from the Ron Paul campaign.  Sabrin's website does have a slight Paul campaign feel to it, but Erber doesn't have a site or at least none that I can find.  The Star Ledger confirmed this a few days back in an article that stated her and her Mom were licking stamps for their direct mail campaign.  No website, but direct mail?  This is someone influenced by Ron Paul?  Neither of them has any internet buzz. 

Why am I so surprised about the lack of quietness in NJ?  Well notice Lincoln's fourth campaign activity.  Get your voters to the polls.  How is anyone supposed to be motivated to go the polls if the candidates themselves don't ask for a vote?  Road signs are cheap.  Google ads are dirt cheap.  Heck for my own Board of Education campaign I ran banner ads in Yahoo for a $100 plus Google ads.  Email?  Pennies to send out.  How about some branding out there?  I know it is June 3rd but come on there is very little.  All it will take is for one well organized, internet or grass roots driven campaign to drive enough voters to the polls to steal a primary election and then everyone will say "how did that happen."

In fact the only email I received from any campaign was from the John McCain campaign urging NJ voters to go to the polls to vote for our slate of delegates.  An email costs next to NOTHING to send out.  The McCain campaign realizes this and understands that the Paul campaign has their own slate of delegates.  The Ron Paul campaign is hoping to catch people sleeping tomorrow.  Again, all it takes is for a low turnout with a motivated opposing group to shake things up. 

I can understand saving money for the fall, but a little branding and GOTV activity can't hurt.  That's why I was happy to see our own Washington Township Committee candidate Jim Harmon start a website, push out some emails, and put up some signs in town.  Running unopposed he obviously didn't need to do that work, but Jim is smart enough to realize that a little branding and asking people for a vote can be done cheaply and cost effectively.  Hopefully setting himself up for a battle in November.  Use the internet, people.  In a low turnout you can actually drive voters to the polls.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

New Jersey Is Getting More Blue

New Jersey Division of election released new voter registrations statistics today and there were 544K more Democrats registered than last year so now they number 1.68 million in total.  Republicans have 1.03 million registered, but the only good news (I guess) was that the number of unaffiliated voters still are the largest group even though they dropped from 2.8 million to 2.2 million.  Clearly a large chunk of the unaffiliated voters registered to vote in the Feb. 5th Democratic primary (600K drop in unaffiliated is approximately the total of the number of new registered Democrats (544K) plus the number of new registered Republicans (167K).  BTW for you folks keeping score at home, I used the number from June 2007 Registered voters with the June 2008 numbers.

I took a further look at the numbers (just eyeballing it) and the following had significant jumps in Democrat registrations:

• Bergen 103K - 162K
• Camden 88K - 130K
• Essex 150K - 199K
• Middlesex 112K - 162K

OK, so what does this mean to you where voter registration is a key strategy of major political campaigns.  Remember a key strategy is to register new voters for your party and they are more likely to vote for your candidates.  So it is hard to blow off the new registrations.

Clearly the Democrat Presidential Primary process motivated these unaffiliated voters to participate in the nomination process.  So, I'm not sure how much impact on the 2008 Presidential Election it will be.  NJ was already a Blue State and based on polls I've seen Obama was already leading Senator McCain.  I personally haven't given up the state for the Presidential election because Senator McCain appeals to all types, but then again I'm not involved in those decisions.  However, I think the new registrations loom large at the local level.  Here's why:

• NJ Republicans will have to motivate their base even more to Get Out The Vote.  The Democrats have much larger numbers on their side.
• NJ Republicans will have to come up with new ways of communicating their messages since the typical trickle down approach will be harder (online messaging and communications will be the way to go).
• When faced with a competitor that has larger numbers on their side, you have to be more nimble and smarter to get your message out
• Status quo will not work even for incumbents.  Presidential coattails have a habit of drifting downstream so you can't sit back and assume past strategies have worked.

Republicans in NJ have to start using new techniques and tactics to appeal to voters.  We need to motivate the base and attract those overwhelmingly large number of unaffiliated voters.  It is time to reach out with the internet where we can appeal to many different groups at the same time.  Use the political long tail to find many different pockets to appeal to and grab more of those unaffiliated voters because you need to.  That even goes for Morris County (where I live) where we have the second largest amount of registered Republicans and we still outnumber registered Democrats by 50%.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Mia Italian Restaurant in Oceanport - Good Food, Very Very Long Waits

So, this weekend we were staying over my father's house and went out to dinner in Oceanport NJ.  We had reservations for dinner, my father, my wife, and the two munchkins at 7:30 and were seated in 5 minutes with a larger group of other reservations.  As a walk in you had no chance. 

It is BYOB so we had our own bottle of wine and they served water and soda very promptly in addition to their delicious crunchy bread with olive oil, garlic, cheese dip.  The hostess took our order in a reasonable amount of time.  I ordered their calamari bianca  which is a special not on the menu, Jacob ordered two pieces of broiled tilapia, Kaela ordered tortellini soup as did my father, and Mary ordered Caesar's salad; the three adults ordered three entrees right off the regular menu.  I didn't ask her to put the kid's meals in with our appetizer's but they corrected it.

Our first course probably arrived about 15-20 minutes after ordering it and it wasn't that long of a wait.  It probably came out around 8:15/8:30 but that was the last piece of food the adults saw.  At around 8:45 we still hadn't received the salad course and neither did anyone else that was seated with us including the party of 12.  The kids were getting restless so we ordered them each a piece of dessert - Kaela got the carrot cake which she didn't care for (just the icing) and Jacob ordered the chocolate cake which he devoured.  The adults were getting restless and told the hostess not to bring our salads and asked her to bring out our entrees.   That was as close as we got to our main meals.

Then at 9:20 we gave up and told her we would just pay for what we ate and after we did that we left.  That was at 9:30 almost 2 hours after we were seated.  YES 2 HOURS AFTER WE WERE SEATED WE STILL DIDN'T HAVE OUR MAIN MEALS.    That's ridiculous.  We couldn't wait any longer especially after the munchkins ate full meals, including dessert.  Sure they liked their meals (Jacob wanted to order seconds on the tilapia) but 2 hours to wait for our main meals is fantastically horrendous.  BTW when we left we didn't see anyone else's meals coming out either.

Mia Italian Restaurant in Ocean Port NJ has good food if you can waste 3 hours waiting for your meal.  I did make up for it the next day by getting two Windmill Hot Dogs.  Perhaps I should have just stuck with the simpler Jersey food!

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

 

McCain and NJ's Morris County Results

You can tell when I'm so busy that I make next to no posts.  I was up very late Tuesday night waiting for the Missouri and California results that it pretty much knocked me out until today. 

Obviously John McCain took NJ, but what got me more excited was to see the Morris County results where we made a ton of calls and put up our fair share of road signs.  Hopefully by sharing these numbers with you, you can see how important get out the vote activities are in your local area. 

• 60,030 out of 96,916 registered Republicans voted Tuesday and that compares with 48,756 voters out of 41,280 registered Democrats.
• No, the Democrat number doesn't mean that people voted multiple times; that means that another 7,476 declared at the polls which is a pretty powerful statement
• John McCain received 55.2% of the vote which translated into 33K votes
• Obama received roughly 22K votes

What these numbers show is that yes you can make a difference.  I didn't tally up the calls we made out of Long Valley, but I'd guess it to be around 2K calls to ask people to vote.  Plus, we probably put up about 200 signs and I couldn't even guess how many people saw these signs.  The calling was very easy and seriously we didn't receive more than a handful of rude answers or hang ups.  Plus putting up the signs and making calls with other supporters is actually fun.

Please join up with a campaign, especially if it is John McCain's campaign.  Don't sit back and assume people will vote for the right person.  With Mitt Romney dropping out today you can bet a lot of his supporters are thinking what else could they have done.  Put up signs, make donations, tell your friends, and join up with other volunteers to participate in GOTV calls.  You won't regret it.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Feb 3 - Feb 4 2008 - Giants and John McCain in NJ

Wow - that was two awesome days for me.  First, watching the Giants beat the Patriots for my third Super Bowl win as a Giants fan and then to Hamilton NJ with my son Jacob to watch history being made with John McCain in Hamilton, NJ.  So let's take my weekend in order

1. Giants Game - what more can I say but it was the greatest football game I've ever witnessed.  I thought the 1990 Super Bowl was my best game but this one topped that game.  BTW - my wife bought me an Eli Manning jersey during his first season with the Giants and I NEVER STOPPED WEARING IT even after his 6 interception game versus the Vikings
2. Tiki Barber - This might be sour grapes, but I think every Giants fan should donate their Barber jerseys and buy Eli Manning jerseys.  Tiki showed his lack of class when he became a distraction last season, bad mouthed Coach Coughlin, and then ripped Eli Manning at the beginning of this year.
3. Super Bowl commercials - finally a year when these ads were shown to be what they always were - not entertainment but commercials.  For the most part they were not very good.  I thought the Bud and Bud Lite ads were very well done and I liked the Doritos mouse ad, but I question the value of buying an ad on the Super Bowl at $2.7 million per 30 seconds for a snack chip.  I thought the E*Trade baby ad was not funny at all and a step back for them.
4. John McCain in Hamilton NJ - It was a really great event today.  Jacob got a seat right on the stage with a home made sign that Kaela and my wife made; we were the only ones who were able to bring a homemade sign in.  I was all the way on the right with a spot right below Rudy.  The event was a who's who in NJ and National politics and had the energy of a Springsteen concert.  Tom Kean Jr, Gov. Tom Kean, Rudy, John McCain, Joe Lieberman, Phil Gramm, Lindsey Graham, Gov Crist, Cindy McCain, and Roberta McCain, plus more.  Jacob was patted on the head by Gov Crist, Senators Lieberman and Graham which caused Jacob to ask "why do they always pat me on the head?".  If you watched the event on TV you had to look for Jacob because he was blocked by as he said (I'm not making this up) "a bunch of celebrity butts!". Enjoy the Flickr photos below.

It doesn't get much better than this in the Frenchman household.

www.flickr.com

This is a Flickr badge showing photos in a set called John McCain GOTV in Hamilton NJ. Make your own badge here.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Can You Volunteer in NJ for John McCain?

February 5th is just around the corner and New Jersey is a key state for Senator McCain's campaign for President in 2008.  As you long time readers know, I'm Chief Internet Strategist for Connell Donatelli Inc the firm handling Senator McCain's digital strategy, online advertising, and search marketing.  In addition, I volunteered to help with Get Out The Vote Activities in New Jersey and run one of the two North Jersey Headquarters in Long Valley, NJ (surprise).   We could use a few hours of your time in the next 6 days or so with getting the word out, posting signs, and making calls.  If you haven't experienced GOTV activities check out this link of my GOTV activities in SC.

Things in New Jersey are really heating up now.  Here's what's on tap for the next few days:

• Trenton NJ today (Jan 31) at 11AM:  a formal announcement of the new NJ John McCain 2008 team (basically our NJ leaders lining up behind Senator McCain)
• NJ GOTV Rally in Hamilton NJ on February 4th at noon - Senator McCain will be there and I'll be there with at least my son in tow.  It is FREE and OPEN to the Public.  To RSVP call  609-587-0111 or email mccainnjrsvp@gmail.com
• If you didn't know already, Mayor Rudy Giuliani dropped out of the race and endorsed Senator McCain. 
• GOTV activities have already started.  To find a location near you, see the continue link at the end of this post for the list of NJ locations.

Seriously GOTV is a lot of fun and you can sway votes.  Putting up signs locally lets people know that Senator McCain wants your vote and there are people that are supporting him.  As silly as the signs look to some people, a lot of voters haven't made up their mind and want to vote for a winner or vote the way the larger crowd goes when they still are not sure which way to go.  To get you going, here's a video of the family and I going out to put up signs locally.

Everyone takes their vote seriously, but any little GOTV could sway undecided voters at the list minute or get your supporters to the polls.  Plus, activities like having volunteers make outbound calls to undecided and your base is extremely helpful.  Having a real voice on the end of a call is not only preferred, it cost little other than time and besides who would you rather take a call from an automated robot or your neighbor?

If you have the time, please contact one of the NJ volunteers found on the continuation link below.  If you are in Morris County or west of Morris County, drop me a line (eric@pardonmyfrench.net) and we can get you started today.  If you can't and you are Republican, VOTE FOR JOHN MCCAIN FOR PRESIDENT ON TUESDAY.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

 

I Still Hold a Record at Temple Israel

I read this article called A New Home Marked with Tears and Ceremony after my father tipped me off that my old Temple in Union, NJ was finally closing its doors.  My old Temple with dwindling attendance is merging with one in Springfield and my old Rabbi who supervised my Bar Mitzvah, Rabbi Meyer Korbman is likely retiring.  While the Star Ledger listed off a few key events in the Temple's history it neglected an important record.  I as a 13 year old boy held the record for the most bagels and lox eaten at one sitting - the record was 7!! (you didn't actually think I didn't have a story did you?)

You see, newly Bar Mitzvahed boys were given free admission into the Temple's Men's Club and after Sunday service (it was a Conservative Temple so I went Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays until I started running Track), there was a smoked fish breakfast.  You know the kind that featured assorted bagels, cream cheese, lox, herring, onions, tomatoes, and etc.  So, the breakfast was included with your dues.  Back then I was (kind of still am) a tremendous eater and because I was very active in sports I weighed next to nothing.  To put it in perspective, 2 years later I ran track, played baseball, and trained to be a summer lifeguard.  So I was skinny and could eat like a horse. 

One Sunday after services, one of the members wanted to see how much I could eat.  It all started when I was making my first bagel (onion bagel, lox, cream cheese on one side, butter on the other, tomato, and onion) and he didn't think I put enough cream cheese on it.  So he said to me "put some cream cheese on that", so I did but that started a contest.  He wanted to see how many I could eat.  After the final count, I put away 7 bagels of cream cheese, butter, tomato, onion, and lox and washed it down with like a half a gallon of OJ.  I walked out without a problem and went on with my day.

That night as payback my father received a call.  It was the President of the Men's Club and he uttered the now famous words in the Frenchman Family.  "Mr. Frenchman.  I'm sorry to tell you this, but your son eats too much.  Instead of a free membership into the Men's Club, we have to charge you full Men's Club dues.  I'm really sorry but he eats too much."  HA!

It's sad when a part of your childhood goes away, but then again I left Union a long time ago.  I still eat bagels and lox every Sunday and sadly the most I can put away on an average Sunday is 2, but they are still made the same way and I always "put some cream cheese on that bagel."

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

So What Happened to Political Ads in New Jersey

This article called New Jersey part of big gamble by Giuliani in Sunday's Star Ledger really, really upset me.  No it wasn't because the article was on Rudy.  It was because we had our voice in the election taken away once again and the NJ businesses that were probably counting on some election dollars are not going to see a dime.  Since most of you readers are probably not deep into politics like I am now, let me give you some background before my little rant.

1. The primary schedule is more compressed than ever.  See this screen shot from McCain Path to Victory discussion (see below in a second).
2. As outlined in the McCain Path to Victory (watch the video even if you aren't a McCain fan, it is very interesting as a learning opportunity), there is little time in between the early states and February 5.
3. Rudy Giuliani is employing a late state strategy with his marketing and campaigning.  What this means is that Rudy is trying to "hang on" long enough with his support biding time for February 5th where 45% of the delegates will be selected.
4. NY, NJ, CT, and DE are scheduled for Feb 5th and those 4 states account for 201 delegates.
5. Buying TV media in NJ is very, very expensive because of the NY and Philadelphia MSAs
6. NJ moved its primary date from June to Feb 5th to participate more in the election process and of course reap some benefits in ad dollars.
7. NJ Republicans decided to change the format of how we awarded delegates to a winner take all; the Democrats did not make this change.
8. Rudy has a commanding lead in NJ according to polls at Real Clear Politics; averaging 48% versus McCain at 10%.
9. According to The Star Ledger the change in how our delegates are to be dispersed  are "Thanks to a rule change engineered by his supporters (Giuliani) earlier this year"
10. On the Democrat side where winner take all is against the rules, Obama continues to campaign here even with a big lead by Hillary.

So how are we doing with these rules changes?  Well, again according to The Star Ledger "Which means that despite moving its primary from the doldrums of June to the frenzy of February, New Jersey is, once again, getting very little campaign action.  "Practically speaking, I'm not sure much changed by us moving to February 5," said Tom Wilson, the Republican state chairman".

What this means is that NJ does not have an impact in the Primary Election.  We are not benefiting from Republicans campaigning here.  We are now just one of the states going on Feb 5th and we will see no advertising and no attention from Republicans.  Even with the scenario that unfolds in the McCain Path to Victory occurs, there would be little time between Florida and Feb 5th to spend money and if The Late State Strategy fails to work, it wouldn't matter anyway.  For anything to occur, Rudy would still have to viable by then but then time and the expense of NJ media would work against any major advertising here.

So what did we get as citizens and small business owners for this switch?  Nothing.  No attention.  Just another slap in the face for living in NJ.  No visits.  No mention.  No, oh how are the polls looking in NJ?     We moved our election day up to participate, but now nobody cares because we allowed the way we divided up the delegates to be changed.  Does anyone really think that Rudy in the Oval Office will return some favor to NJ for this?   

That's why there is no attention being spent in NJ from the Republican Candidates and why we need to watch Iowa, New Hampshire, and Florida garner all of the visits and strategists.  Some day, we'll get something right in NJ.  Your only hope is the General Election.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Hoping for A Buttzville NJ Stamp on Christmas Cards

On Friday at lunch time we took a ride to the Buttzville NJ post office in the hopes of having our Christmas cards stamped from there.  The ride took about 20 minutes and of course we stopped at Hot Dog Johnny's for lunch afterwards:  6 hot dogs with toppings, 3 fries, black and white milkshake, sprite, birch beer in a frosted glass mug, and tax came to $17.  We had high hopes  for the stamp until just after filming we saw a giant USPS truck pull up; he didn't empty the mail box so there still is an outside shot for such a marquee post office stamp.

If you were one of the lucky 55 in the pile let me know if you got a stamp; I'm sure it will add to your holiday cheer if it said something else other than "North Jersey".  Here's hoping a little local diversity survives the US Postal Services.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Wyckoff's Tree Farm - Still The Best Place To Cut Down Your Christmas Tree

The other day I made one of my favorite posts type - Old School Facelifts.  They are one of my favorites because it usually involves some of my recent experiences in NJ coupled with a new way of advertising for them.  I also always get a lot of positive feedback and often hear from one of the folks that runs the company I profile.  Last week's post chronicled our recent annual tree cutting experience out in Belvidere, NJ with stops at Wyckoff's Tree Farm, Mackey's Orchard with Papa Goes Nuts outside, and of course Hot Dog Johnny's.  One of the other reasons for these posts is to help out these folks with some good search results and I'm happy to report it actually worked for Papa's Gone Nuts.  Up until that post Papa had no search results and today as you can see there are 7 results with mine up at the top.  Ok, so search works, but what does that have to do with today's post?

Well a few days after that post I received a comment in my best post link (some reason doesn't seem to be working) from John C. Wyckoff who also left a post over at Marketing Prof's.  The comment reprinted below almost brought a tear to my eye, but I'm way too manly for that :-).  Here's the comment which I thought you'd enjoy:

Dear Eric,
Your posting from December 4, 2006 regarding our farm, Wyckoff's Christmas Tree Farm, was just brought to my attention today. First and foremost I would like to say "Thank You" to you and your wife Mary for being such faithful customers of our Family Operated Christmas Tree farm. Families, such as your own, help keep the small family farmer in operation.

Regretfully, you are correct, my father was diagnosed in 1995 with Lymphoma. Yes, he is doing fine. Now, the "Big Picture"... during the treatment process for the Lymphoma, trees were not planted as the direction of the farm was in question. Annual planting once again resumed in 1999, the trees looked great, until...drought struck during the summer months. The entire planting was lost. Now, you get the picture as it takes eight to ten years to grow a harvestable Christmas Tree.

I am glad to say however, we have planted every spring since and are on our way back to having, as you put it, "Mountains of Trees to Choose From". We currently have 35,000 trees in production and are planting more come spring. We have been rationing the "cut your own" trees and supplementing with quality, fresh cut trees. We are working hard to maintain the experience for our dedicated customers such as yourself. Eric, if you or any of your readers are ever in the area, or perhaps before this Christmas, please look me up. I would like to give you a tour of the farm and show the "Mountains of Trees" that once again are growing in our fields.

"Thank You" to the faithful customers who have stood by us through this difficult time. The farm has been in our family since 1839 and we hope to continue for at least another 168 years...

Wow, that comment was awesome which was why I wanted you to read it.    Yes we went back this year and yes you can cut down some great trees and I was told next year we can go on top of their hill to get some trees from there too.  Going up their hill was always a special thrill for Mary and I; the kids never made it.  Anyway, here's a picture (I was too lazy to scan it) from our first visit there in 1990 with the mountains of trees.

We pass several tree farms on our way up to Wyckoff's and I'm sure they are all fine; we even have a few in Long Valley, but when a place delivers year after year for you and has brought such good memories, why not keep going there?  Wyckoff's delivers a great tree cutting experience and when you couple it with the rest that the area has to offer, cutting down trees at Wyckoff's is a great family tradition.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Old School Facelift #5 - Papa's Gone Nuts

So as some of you long time readers know the family and I make our annual trek to Belvidere NJ to cut down our Xmas tree at Wycoff's tree farm (BTW - unlike the older post the tree farm is back better than ever).  We stopped going to the GroRite farm because they still haven't reopened the beautiful Poinsettia farm, but we did go to our favorite hot dog stand Hot Dog Johnny's in Buttzville NJ or as I've been telling my wife, the place we will be mailing our holiday cards from this year.  Side note - if you do go to Hot Dog Johnny's do not and I repeat DO NOT order your hot dogs with anything but mustard, onion, pickles, or relish.  Anyway, we also went to Mackey's Orchard where we get their delicious apple cider, their awesome home made pies made by a little old lady every morning at 3AM, and their great tasting cider donuts.

When we pulled into Mackey's parking lot there was a man sitting under a tent with a nice setup of roasted nuts.  Since we've been going to Mackey's for like 13 years we were curious and walked up.  The sign under his tent read Papa's Gone Nuts LLC and he allowed tasting of his roasted almonds, pecans, and walnuts.  I have to tell you - they were awesome and we bought quite a number of bags.  The nuts are coated  - no wrapped by sugar, cinnamon, vanilla, and other ingredients so you get your sugar fix as well as protein fix.  Papa told me he lived across the street so I asked him if he had a website and he said '"no".  So, in honor of Papa's nuts (hmmmm)

OLD SCHOOL FACELIFT #5 -Papa's Gone Nuts

1. Papa you need a website.  You can't rely on your customers to show up at Mackey's; that's fine to start but you are limiting yourself especially on repeat business. Papa, you also need eCommerce and for that you need Google Checkout; but, more on that in a second.  The website doesn't have to be flashy, heck the folks at Mackey's have a home grown one.  You should too.
2. Go Google for Your Small Business Needs - As you can see from the Checkout link, you get the following benefits: If you're an AdWords advertiser, you will also be eligible for free credit card processing for some or all of your Google Checkout sales.  You also get a cute little icon for your search campaigns - see this screen shot from a search in Google on roasted nuts, NJ.  That little icon is golden for your search campaigns.
3. Search ads - I know you are not selling expensive products but clearly there is some business for you in search, otherwise you wouldn't have all of those ads.  I'd recommend something small like $5 per day for Google and then the same amount for Yahoo.  Think of that as advertising.  You should also setup two identical groups - one for local NJ for in-person sales and one for national for internet sales.
4. You, Mackey's, Wycoff's Tree Farm, and Hot Dog Johnny's ought to get together and provide links to each other's sites, including comments or articles.  That way you can get some inbound links for each other to help with natural search results.
5. Finally, I'd normally recommend some blogs, but you probably don't have time to blog and besides, not sure how much content you can generate on roasting nuts; however, the four of you together from #4 above could have a great blog to send traffic into each other.  Anyway, besides that I'd turn to Facebook and Myspace to see if you can generate enough nutty friends.  You could have a lot of fun in there and you might actually generate some sales.  BTW - come to think of it, the blog idea from above isn't all that bad.

Well that's enough for Papa's Gone Nuts and besides I need to seal up this bag before I finish it.  If you want a great treat this year for yourself or just a nutty lover, give Papa a call and order some nice stocking stuffers.  You can call Papa at 908-475-8132 and send your order in.  Trust me, you or your giftee won't regret those nuts.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

BTW - on a side note, as I make this post there are no search results for "Papa's Gone Nuts".  I wonder how long till this post shows up in Google (11:31 PM my post showed up).

My Thankful View Revisited

I made the following post two years ago while I was still with Harrisdirect.  It was right after the E*trade acquisition was approved and the folks like myself that weren't retained were just waiting out our time to be officially shown the door.  It was one of my earliest posts and I brought it over from my original blog at Blogger.  I thought it was still interesting to read two years later and even though a lot has changed since then, it is worth re-posting.

In those two years I've met a lot of great people and worked on a lot of interesting projects including John McCain for President.  To be honest, I didn't think I was going to last this long outside of corporate America and days like today, I'm not sure how much longer I can make it.  Anyway, the post helped me out, hopefully it does for you too.  The picture wasn't originally included but my friend Cyrus from the RNC sent it on and I thought it was funny.  Oh, and finally, the friend mentioned at the top of the post is Becki Donatelli.

*************REPOST FROM NOVEMBER 2005************************

My Thankful View                                                  

Sure, every website you visit these days has some schmuck writing about why they are thankful this year. I guess if the malls can window dress on a seasonal basis than why not your favorite columnist. Well, this site will not be the exception, but of course I'll give a different spin. What am I most thankful for these days? Simple, I thank the big guy upstairs for making sure I wasn't retained by the firm acquiring my current employer. Sure it is a little scary with a wife at home that needs medical treatment and two little kids, but what was the alternative? Bad benefits, a commute from hell (not the current one that sucks the life out of me), and trapped in an industry that I only joined because the Monster.com ad looked interesting. As a good friend of mine said, "Eric, it is time for a course correction". So, what has this change resulted in and why do I seem so happy? 

1. Severance and bonus that would take me to September 2006 if I had NO income coming in.
2. I started my own website and this blog and considering I've been marketing on the internet since 1998, it is about time.
3. A chance to start my own consulting business so I can work on interesting projects with interesting people of my own choosing.
4. The consulting business lets me alleviate one source of anxiety, you know, the one where you can't control your own destiny no matter how hard you try and succeed at your current job.
5. A chance to stay in touch with people that matter most to me and cut off the people that are obviously only interested in me because I could buy a lot of media from them.
6. No more bad commutes.
7. The world out there seems new to me again with a lot of possibilities - with all of the positions out there I feel like a kid in the candy shop.
8. I always wanted to write a children's novel about time travel and now I'll have the time.
9. I booked a trip to Disney World and didn't need to check with my boss first.
10. For the first time since I left AT&T in June 2000, I feel like I belong somewhere; not with the unemployed of the country, but with people who work for themselves. You know, what the country really produces today - services.

Ok, so why did I really write this post today? It wasn't to brag about how good I feel, but it was meant to help anyone in a similar situation. Don't sit around waiting for something to happen or a mentor to pull you into a new position. Grow up and make your own luck and use the time and new found freedom to pursue something you always wanted to do, but a company's golden handcuffs prevented you from going after it. With a little luck, you too could have a cheesy website and a little

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

Check out The Snow in NJ Today

We had a bit of a dusting yesterday that stuck to the trees and the grass, but we woke up this morning to almost 2 inches in the street and about 4 inches in the lawn.  Wow.  We still have baseballs and footballs in the back yard and leaves on the trees.

That first picture is a view out our front porch and the picture below is out the back featuring our newly redesigned deck that includes a hot tub ready for our use tonight in the snow!!!  104 degrees will feel great with snow around us.

Today will be one of those days where it is great to work out of the home office.  It would have been one when I would have taken a white knuckled drive to Jersey City because nobody else would have had to deal with snow.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

It is still snowing here right now at 8:45 AM.  Check this 9 second video out!!

Long Valley Independent Rich Reilly Shows How To Use Internet Marketing

Here in beautiful Long Valley NJ we are in the midst of a pretty hotly contested race for 2 seats on the Township Committee.  One of those seats looks like it is going right back to current Mayor Kevin Walsh but the other seat looks like a battle.  There are 2 Democrats running, but well in Morris County that's a bit of a challenge (that was nicely said, right?).  Howard Popper is the other Republican running and this spurred another Republican (that's what I was told) to run as an Independent and his name is Rich Reilly.

Now not going into who I'm going to vote for (secret ballot kind of thing), Howard Popper made what looks like a huge error in dropping a negative direct mail piece Personally being involved in politics I know and understand what it means to go negative, but in this town that's a  risk because people here don't like to see their dirty laundry, right or wrong.  The other mistake Popper made was sending a direct mail piece which of course yours truly didn't read.

So how does Rich Reilly respond?  Simple with an email blast that goes point by point to show how Howard Popper was stretching the truth and running a negative campaign.  This is BRILLIANT.  The email which may be the last word on the direct mail piece can live forever and get circulated among friends while the direct mail piece that Popper sent out is most likely ending up in the trash heap.  I friggin LOVE THE RESPONSE and it also came very quick.

Continuing the response on the internet is really the way to go where people can have an ongoing conversation.  Reilly's website could have used a little help because this Firefox user couldn't read the mouse print.  One more trick he could use is post the email response on his website and for the next 5 days run some Google and Yahoo ads geo-targeted to Long Valley to drive people to the response.  Nicely done, Rich.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric

NJ Should Outlaw Smoking on The Beach

Yes, I can't stand smokers on the beach, but it isn't because of the foul smell it causes or any health concerns.  It is because these rude people are slobs.  Who says that they can use the beach as an ashtray?

It is foul and disgusting.  They flick their cigarette ashes into the sand and then leave their venom coated butts in the sand for kids to play with.  Seriously, the smoke really doesn't bother me as much as these pigs dropping their dirty, disgusting cigarettes in the beach.  I really wish the state would just pass a law outlawing this just because these people can't clean up after themselves.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric