Bush Marketing and Branding

Written by Jason Ferris-Bush Marketing's Scout

For many years we've had great applications which allow folks to maintain their own website content. A good Content Management System (CMS) will allow you to easily update text, photos, prices, etc. on your site without going through your web designer. Nobody wants to wait a week every time their website needs updating after the content gets out of date or you spot a typo.

I've just completed a large web development project at RMIT University in Melbourne. The bulk of my work involved the implementation of four customised content management systems for the School of Architecture and Design. RMIT uses literally hundreds of CMS applications to manage a multitude of websites. Without solid content management in place the University's web presence would stagnate very quickly and their core business would suffer. As such, RMIT places great importance on keeping their website's content fresh and engaging.

Too often though, I see clients with great content management systems installed, but they never update their website! Difficulty learning the application is no excuse as the CMS learning curve is not steep, and if you can use a word processor you're already most of the way there. For many people however, it seems to be more about having control than actually taking control.

If you're thinking about having content management features added to your website you must consider two things:

Money - This is actually the easy part. It's inexpensive to have a web developer implement a CMS and hand you control of your website.

Time - Don't fork out money for content management if you're not going to find time to use it. You should commit to updating your website regularly. After all, it's your business, you should take control of it. Don't squander the opportunity to leverage the power of a good Content Management System.

Jason Ferris has worked with the Bush Marketing team since it was founded in 2001. Mr Ferris is currently based out of Melbourne.

Earned Media. As an entrepreneur those two words mean getting the biggest bang for your buck. Earning media does not come easily--you truly have to earn it.

The secret to getting press to pay attention to what you have to say is a great hook. Just like a good fishing lure your hook has to attract the media, get them to bite and then all you have to do is reel it in.

Last week I was meeting with my Presso Partner, Mr. Prince, over a Pizza. "If only we could get some press" , Mr. Prince said with the hunger of a man who had not had a decent meal in a month. We spun and flipped a few ideas around about how to get the press to write about our precious Presso coffee machine. Then we came up with the perfect angle and its colour was Green.

Earlier that day I introduced Cameron to one of our favourite clients, Kelvin Davies of Rainforest Rescue and Rick Christian an invaluable Rain Forest Rescue board member. During our chat the term Green Wash came up and we talked about the demand for brands that are doing things to improve Green House Gas emissions.

My experience is that you can best judge the size of the fish you might catch by the headline in your press release. Here was ours after a few variations: CLEAN GREEN ESPRESSO MACHINE. Cameron and I took notes and talked about the unique features of our powerless espresso machine and how they translated into relevant angles to support the environmentally friendly nature of the Presso. We filled up pages with powerful points and powered our pizza down so we could get back to the studio to pound out our press release.

Within an hour Cameron had measured the energy required to make an espresso with a Presso and researched the amount of energy typical powered Espresso machines require. Excitement filled the air we googled and found facts and figures that supported our headline. We knew this bit of information would get us some bites and with any luck earn us some nice juicy media:

The Presso uses less than 1.2W of power to make an espresso. In “off” mode the average espresso machine tested by NAEEEC (The National Appliance and Equipment Energy Efficiency Committee) used a whopping 1.8W.

We passed our rough as fish guts press release over to our Bush Marketing copywriter and editor Kaleigh Wisman.

Here is a copy of the press release we sent out today using one of our best bush tools AAP Medianet.

For Immediate Release

17 October, 2007

CLEAN GREEN ESPRESSO MACHINE

There is now an Espresso machine available in Australia that uses less energy to make a coffee than regular electric machines use when they are turned off.

The Presso uses less than 1.2W of power to make an espresso. In “off” mode the average espresso machine tested by NAEEEC (The National Appliance and Equipment Energy Efficiency Committee) used a whopping 1.8W.

Presso has the smallest carbon footprint in it’s class- more like a fingerprint than a footprint. One espresso made with the PRESSO after boiling your domestic 2200 watt kettle costs under 0.02 cents per day. “You’d have to make more than a hundred PRESSO espresso’s before your energy supplier rounded up the charge to 5 cents,” said Cameron Prince of Presso Australia.

The NAEEEC conducted comparative studies of espresso machines, the well-known energy guzzlers. After these studies targets were set for energy consumption in “standby” and “off” modes for all Australian machines. The target was set at 1 W by 2007.


Patrick Hunt, the designer of the Pressso, says the materials he has used to create the PRESSO will out live us all. The multi award winning design will satisfy the most discerning connoisseur of coffee while limiting energy consumption.

For more information

www.pressoaustralia.com

Call Cameron 02 6684 9400 or
Greg Cromwell 0447755440
presso@bushmarketing.com

Stay tuned to see what our Press o Release earns.

19th November, 2007

Within minutes of sending out the Presso press release the phone started ringing. We had a local magazine on the hook for a story, but even better a writer for a google sydication and major magazine was keen to spread the green news. It was all too good to be true. And it was.

When the google writer followed up she wanted to confirm that we had a minimum of 16 people in our employ and that our annual sales were in excess of $1m. Very depressing...we had the biggest fish ever on the hook and they just spit us out.

Patience is a virtue, good things come to those who wait: both of these sayings have come true. This week we have had calls from a magazine who wants to feature the Green Story about the Presso in March 2008 and a very nice freelance writer has just called looking to feature the Presso in a major national newspaper.

Part of our recent website redesign saw the demise of my beloved shed. The shed was a part of our website, like sheds themselves, where I could put anything I wanted. Here are a few links I saved from the bin:


Brand Building Tools
Google
* adwords
A powerful business building tool that we have deployed successfully for a long list of clients. We first started using adwords back in 2002 for Australian Boot Company. If you want targeted traffic to your website adwords is a great place to start.
* analytics
There are statistics packages for websites and their is google analytics. Stats from this awesome google tool can help you build your online brand with ease and cost efficiency.
* documents and spreadsheets
This tool was formerly known as writely. Another technology best of breed that our faithful Scout discovered (as did google who bought them out last year). We use this for collaborating on strategic plans and other important group growps.

Government Resources
lending a hand - no really
* dsrd
* austrade

It's been a while since I have blogged. Way back before google bought blogger. Back then I was using blogger as a way of updating a Byron Bay website (bayweb.com.au). I ran with my partner's Jason and Nighean. So in fact you could say I wasn't even really blogging.

We turned quite a few clients and friends onto blogger as a cost effective and easy way to manage content for their websites; it proved to be a very effective CMS system at the time. The other great thing we discovered was that search engines just loved the fresh updated content. It was amazing to see how quickly search engines picked up our new posts and what was even more impressive was the rankings we got for anything that was referenced in our blogs.

Little did we know then that blogs would become a must have tool for businesses and organisations who altruistically want to share information to the world. Sure there are others who are jumping on the blog wagon in the selfish search for page one rankings on anything and everything they can imagine people searching for. With google in control of blogger now you can be sure that evil will eventually be 'rorted out.'

Over and out.