Douglas Karr's Articles on Martech Zone
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Content Marketing
ASP RSS Parser, Feed Reader
This weekend, I’ve been glued to my laptop, searching the net for web-based RSS feed readers. The reason is that I wanted to write an ASP RSS feed reader that would display the feed so that the content could be automatically scraped into an HTML email. So, for folks who want to reserve a portion of their email newsletter for…
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Content Marketing
Why the Movie Industry is Failing
Me and my kids went and saw King Kong yesterday. The special effects and computer-generated graphics were fantastic. I think the true test of a movie (that depends on special effects) is whether you find yourself empathizing with the computer-generated character. Kong, indeed, had his own character. I thought the end was a little hokey and didn’t match the sadness…
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Content Marketing
What’s Your Bailiwick?
Understanding and effectively describing one’s authority is paramount in sales and marketing. How a brand, person, product, or service conveys authority can significantly impact its success and reputation. bailiwicknoun, pronounced [bey-luh-wik] A person’s specific area of interest, skill, or authority. The office or district of a bailiff. Dictionary Describing your bailiwick and your Unique Value Proposition (UVP) are related concepts,…
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Social Media & Influencer Marketing
Blogs Heating Up
This week was a difficult week. My job is fantastic, and my peers and my clients appreciate me. For the first time, though, I believe my blog interfered with my professional relationships. Having spoken with them at length, I don’t believe there is a concern with my employer. My leaders believe in blogging as a healthy expression. Of course, they…
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Sales and Marketing Training
American Managers are Spoiled…
American Managers are spoiled. Some are even brats. Imagine managing on an island. Your island has limited human resources, was hours away from anything, and you spoke a different language. Attracting employees to your island is difficult due to the native language and the island. The island isn’t in the Orient or the Caribbean; it’s cold and damp, with some…
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Social Media & Influencer Marketing
What’s Your Corporate Caring Strategy?
I was attending church this weekend and heard a fantastic quote: People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care! That said, the question relates directly back to your marketing efforts. We always talk about Advertising and marketing as this cohesive strategy. Isn’t it true that how we care for one another is just as…
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Sales and Marketing Training
PowerPoint Keyboard Shortcuts
It doesn’t take much to get me excited. I was in a PowerPoint training class the other day. The class was okay… I got a couple of tips and a nice list of keyboard shortcuts. The best keyboard shortcut isn’t even specific to PowerPoint. Have you ever wanted to crop a portion of your screen and put it in your…
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Sales and Marketing Training
Scope Creep: Less = More
I’ve wanted to follow up on my Open = Growth post for a while. Described in that post is the likelihood of success when folks concentrate on how their solutions can be integrated with other solutions. There’s a flip side to this: for companies to limit the functionality of their solutions to the core of how they are used. Adding…
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Email Marketing & Automation
Open = Growth
I worked with a national NFL Team to evaluate their database and email marketing tools and provide vendor recommendations. It was a comprehensive evaluation of their internal resources, budget constraints, timelines, as well as the multiple platforms that were central to their organization’s operation. As I looked at viable solutions, the areas I focused attention on were: Ability to integrate…
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Advertising Technology
The New Breakfast Beverage – Mountain Dew?
Listening to the radio on my way to work is a quiet time for me. Regardless of traffic, I am a happy camper. Traffic slowdowns? No problemo… my DJs will pull me through and start the day off right… Until yesterday… I can’t stop thinking about it. I’m listening to a nice ad on the radio about a guy who…
