The 7 Pillars of Digital Marketing Blog

Friday Fun: Eight Epic Retro Games January 20, 2012 – 11:07 am				Damjan Arsovski

Do you remember these retro video games that many of you used to play as a child? Few of the readers will not recall these games, but many will remember the endless hours they’ve spent trying to get to the next level on Final Fight or to act like the best team on Earth while playing  Cadillacs & Dinosaurs or Metal Slug.

Below are some of the top 8 retro arcade games that I could remember… let me know in the comments if you can think of any other awesome arcade game that I’m missing…

FYI: If you would like to go back in time and play these games, there’s an app for that! ) j/k, visit rom-world.com and download the MAME emulator. Then download a .zip file of the game you want to play and add it to the Roms directory in Mame32 folder and enjoy. Do not forget to configure your buttons and use 1 to insert coins.
Final Fight

Super Pang

Tumblepop

Snow Bros

Bubble Bobble

Cadillacs & Dinosaurs

Metal Slug

Street Fighter II

Posted by Damjan Arsovski
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Ad Click Of The Day: Sony Bounces Balls In Wimbledon June 15, 2011 – 4:14 pm				Abdul Fattah Ismail

The Wimbledon championships begin on Monday. Crayon, a London integrated ad agency, is pulling out an old campaign trick for new viewers.  Fallon created the memorable advertising spot with bouncing color balls in San Francisco back in 2005 for the release of Sony’s Bravia line.  Sony UK will be rolling out a 3D TV presentation during the competition’s last week.  The electronics giant is looking to promote 3D technology in England, and will attach social media widgets for users to comment on the action in real-time.  The 3D content will also be live streamed in cinemas for patrons without a 3D television along through the BBC network.  Matt Coombe, general manager of brand marketing at Sony, states the cross-reference which is clear from the start. “This project is based around a great creative idea that not only cleverly maximizes nostalgia around a previous Sony campaign, but explodes the idea digitally without having to support it on TV.”

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
Posted in 7 Pillars of Digital Marketing, blog, Business News, Content Marketing, Interactive Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Video Sharing, World | No Comments »
Tags: Blueliner Marketing, digital marketing agency, multichannel marketing, new york interactive marketing agency, sony news, video ads, video marketing

Business Principles From The Dalai Lama June 6, 2011 – 4:51 pm				Abdul Fattah Ismail

Few people in our modern society correlate The Dalai Lama with business.  It is easy to marginalize his propechy as nominal tenets of Buddhism and social justice for Tibet.  But many with greater insight know that his influence stretches far beyond these themes. It applies to marketing as well.  The American Express OPEN Forum recently collected some of his thoughts on how he maintains an enterprise which involves travel, speaking engagements, merchandise, and polity discussion.  Here is the list.

1.  Have A Team In Place

The Dalai Lama is 76 years old and has a demanding travel schedule.  He’d laugh at the itinerary of professional sports teams.  HIs team of translators, publicists, and strategists help to keep logistics running smoothly.  All sound business operations know that it takes a band of brothers to generate revenue and maintain success.

2.  Maintain Focus

The Dalai Lama focuses on three core principles in all of his public engagements.  He aims to: promote human ethics, religious harmony, and be an ambassador for the culture of Tibet.  When people inquire with him, he makes sure to reference these three themes to keep an even keel.

3.  Find The Funny (description from source)

The Dalai Lama deals with serious stuff. (This was an Amnesty International event featuring discussions of political prisoners and torture.) Nonetheless, he has quite a sense of humor. He donned a tennis visor. He giggled when an audience member asked an excruciatingly long question. The laughter helped everyone relax and illustrated that nothing’s quite as serious as we think. Try it the next time your staff is going nuts, your printer just blew a gasket and you need to defuse some tension in your workplace.

4.  Slow Down

I feel that in our hyperactive society, this is becoming more and more of a lost art.  The Dalai Lama, in this conference, took time to truly engage with everyone who was on stage with him. The person’s stature made little difference in his conduct. He spoke with, smiled at and looked into the eyes of each person. What would happen in our business lives if we all took the time to do the same?

If you are in New York, take the time to attend Yahoo’s Internet Week Conference and practice these fundamentals.  Click on the Dalai’s image for more information.

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
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Tags: Blueliner Marketing, business news, content marketing news, digital marketing agency nyc, internet week

“Face-mail Me”, by Facebook November 16, 2010 – 11:39 am				Abdul Fattah Ismail

The executives at Facebook are about to announce the launch of a new method to communicate online.  Titled “Messages”, Facebook is offering their users the flexibility to communicate in real time regardless of platform.  Buzz circulated last week that Facebook was looking to challenge Google’s Gmail as an e-mail service purveyor, but this quote from CEO Mark Zuckerberg suggests otherwise:  ”We at Facebook believe that modern messaging is seamless, informal, immediate, personal, simple, and minimal. Facebook is going to provide every existing member an e-mail per request, but again Zuckerberg quotes, “It’s Not E-mail.”

It seems that Facebook’s new model is more interested in generating longer website visits to increase advertising opportunities for corporate accounts and online vendors.  This is another strategy in a step for Facebook being the portal for data integration and management.  The “Like” application was a major step in synthesizing personal statistics from the content of flailing media web providers.

By management differentiating this new service in public from e-mail yet providing addresses, I do not see another rationale. The website engine already optimizes indexes from Bing, a partnership that began late last month.  The traffic flows with millions of photography, art images, and video installations.  One more part of Facebook’s business transformation involves sourcing all of its data in a solitary environment.  As this piece in Financial Times explains, technology firms are looking to source their data centres independently from major city networks in order to load and transfer content at a higher pace.  North Carolina offered huge tax incentives for Facebook to build a prime facility for data management.  It will be interesting to see if the corporations reciprocate for those states subsidizing such grand projects.

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
Posted in 7 Pillars of Digital Marketing, blog, Email Marketing, Interactive Marketing, Marketing, Social Media Marketing, World | No Comments »
Tags: e-mail marketing, facebook messages, mashable, new york e-mail marketing agency, new york social media marketing agency, Social Media Marketing

Blueliner Kicks For Wild Soccer Bunch November 15, 2010 – 2:28 pm				Abdul Fattah Ismail

The international best-selling children’s book series Wild Soccer Bunch is now stateside.  The Wild Soccer Bunch is based on a recollection of a father’s experiences coaching his sons in the beautiful game.  Joachim Massanek is the series author, bringing a brisk, cinematic pace to the novel. He also stuffs universal proverbs in between kicks.  The series is thirteen volumes long and is structured around the story of each team member.  Kevin The Star Striker debuts in Book 1 against the team’s archrival, The Unbeatables.  The children’s book is currently available online at e-commerce purveyors like Amazon and Barnes and Noble, along with the parent shop.

The Wild Soccer Bunch executives have tapped Blueliner to manage the social media campaign of its stateside promotion.  Landon Donovan, as you see, is a factor in this strategy, and we look forward to dribbling the ball around with Wild Soccer Bunch in cyberspace.  Look for the Bunch in the traditional sites.

Our services within social media are extensive and offer flexibility that will reach various channels, developing a strong following.  Click here to learn more from our staff.

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
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Tags: blueliner india, Blueliner Marketing, kevin the star striker, landon donovan wild soccer bunch, new york e-commerce development agency, new york social media marketing agency, Social Media Marketing, social media marketing agency new york, wild soccer bunch, wild soccer bunch social media campaign

Weekly Blueliner Newsminer November 5, 2010 – 2:28 pm				Abdul Fattah Ismail

Good afternoon, everyone. We have another edition of the Weekly Blueliner Newsminer.  Let’s begin.

1.  Microsoft Kinect Launches Nationwide

The Kinect was released yesterday by Microsoft, and it aims to promote a whole new interactive experience where entertainment and communication merge to free consumers from gadgetry.  I spoke yesterday in more detail about the product, which can be found in the title. Microsoft has been aggressive in promoting their new products on several channels, through social media and e-commerce stores such as Amazon.  As the holiday season approaches, we’ll see the effectiveness of their efforts.

2.  Blekko Arrives To Slash

Blekko is a new beta search engine that aims to reduce spam content in your search list by using the slashtag.  I discussed the search engine in greater detail this week, and although the premise is good, I feel like it is more of a specialized engine for digital professionals.  In order to segment your searches properly, one must create their own slashtag by linking it to a specific URL, which seems to counter the current search trends which are running algorithms for consumers to interact less e.g. Google Instant.  I am not sure that the average person is interested in taking those steps to have a deeply personalized search.  One must also be careful of making sure that their slashtag is public or private. After you designate the tag public, it is permanent.  Beta sites always have funky glitches to be mindful, so it will be interesting to see their future development.

3.  H&M Launches Lanvin Collection Online

This week, the new collaboration between H&M and the French house Lanvin set the blogosphere on fire.  H&M has done these collaborations the last few Novembers to spur foot traffic and generate visibility for haute couture designers.  For Lanvin, they are using a higher price point for the collection pieces, which will improve profit margins but may decrease unit sales.  If unit sales beat expectations, then a good earnings report should surface come early 2011.  This time, H&M opened the lookbook to its fans with a vivid display of the collection in a dollhouse setting.  The website design is a tour de force of Flash, although the subject headings on the top right and left margins blend in with the color scheme and overlap messily.  H&M does not run an e-commerce store online in the States, but word is that will change in the near future.

4.  Privacy Breach Tops Google Index List

Google is guilty of crossing the line of personal data collection from wireless networks.  The cars that Google uses to catch Street View footage collected data from sources such as emails, usernames, passwords, and the like.  The FTC made a ruling that Google should halt the campaign immediately, but Google has yet to formally comply in public and private.

These incidents are appearing in the headlines constantly as consumers uses several channels to collect information on goods and services.  Technological firms are trying to keep up with one another in this race to tailor their online advertising campaigns, which will increase traffic, reset PPC rates, and so forth. Google may have taken a clandestine methodology in its acquisition of personal data.  Now, the search giant gets subject to further blockage in the European market, which has not been welcoming to the penetration of Google’s local strategy.  Be careful what you type for.

5.  Facebook Deals A Hand to Places

Facebook added further segmentation to its burgeoning application, Places.  The new “Deals” feature looks to align corporate entities with consumers that are purveyors of their products.  Gap started a promotion of giving away 10,000 pairs of free denim for those who check in with their iPhone or Android smartphone.  Currently, the four types of deals include these subjects:  Individual, Friend, Loyalty, and Charity. Facebook executives are seeking future partnerships that will manifest themselves into more chances over time.  At the moment, deals can be found with Chipotle, McDonalds, and 24 Hour Fitness.  For iPhone users, a quick refresh enables you to score by location, location, location.

That’s the Blue news this week.  See you next time.

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
Posted in blog, Business News, Click Fraud, Digital Media, Flash, Interactive Marketing, Marketing, Mobile Marketing, Pay Per Click (PPC), Search Engine Optimization, Website Design, World | No Comments »
Tags: digital marketing agency nyc, facebook deals, h&m lanvin, internet marketing ny, seo media agency nyc, website design agency, website flash, weekly biueliner newsminer

Weekly Blueliner Newsminer October 30, 2010 – 6:51 pm				Abdul Fattah Ismail

Hello, everyone.  My Friday wrapup was delayed due to a staff Halloween party.  Some key events happened that may not immediately affect the digital marketing world, but could be prominent in the future.  Let’s begin.

1.  Microsoft Experiences A Profit Boom

Could the tide be turning for Microsoft?  After recently unveiling their new portfolio of Windows 7 mobile phones, the blue chip posted a raise in profit margins of up to 51%.  The strength of this rise can be marked to an increase in purchases of the new Windows 7 by businesses at all levels.  While Vista was universally panned by everyone, the new operating system’s positive response bodes well for the health of computer sales.  As the WSJ mentions, this long-term growth will be dependent on whether they can enter the mobile market with technology that consumers want, ranging from mobile applications to tablets.

2.  YouTube Hits 1 Billion Subscriptions

Many in the media industry feel that Google has yet to make a statement in social media, with the failures of Buzz and other efforts.  Regardless, its purchase of YouTube remains a seminal moment. YouTube now stands as the pioneer of video sharing, where anyone can upload content from multiple channels.  Performance artists have revolutionized the website’s ability to infiltrate cyberspace without the benefit of professional audial or video equipment.  Thus, the video for music studios was killed and reborn.  Lady Gaga’s video channel reached 1 billion views.  Her abilities are evident, but it is highly doubtful that she becomes an international superstar without YouTube, where corporate management can control content distribution without using a costly production budget. They also are not depending on her videos to elicit optimum record sales.  YouTube has offered a widget for video developers to embed on their sites.  Viewers can subscribe to channels even if outside of the site.  Click here for more details.

3.  MySpace Calls It A Comeback

I wrote a short piece this week on the rebranding of MySpace for the social media market, although it’s unclear how different those changes will be now that Facebook has become the leader.  MySpace plans to further segment themselves as a portal of media distribution for bands and singers on the rise.  As the Mashable piece mentions, MySpace also is developing a new user called the curator.  If a user gains a following in a social trend, you gain access to several tools to unlock exclusive content and engage with true fans.  The concept is similar to the true premise of social media marketing, but for MySpace, it’s all dependent on the execution.  At least they cleaned up the website.

4.  Opposition in Vietnam Silenced By Virus

This story was intriguing to me due to its coverage of a topic not prominent in mainstream media.  Internet security is becoming a task in which governments use web development for manipulate reasons, namely to silence communication. Vietnam long has been a nation of conflict where insurgencies from within and outside have sought control.  The story also mentions that viruses have been used in parts of Russia to counteract insurgencies.  Click fraud is real, people, and it goes beyond consumer products.

5. Politics of the Mouse

The midterm elections of 2010 next Tuesday represent another watershed in politics, as disillusioned voters have created online communities that have morphed into Tea Parties, who are stepping up their presence with demonstrations and activism in the public.  Business leaders and voters have foreshadowed the House of Representatives and U.S. Senate changing several seats with some suspecting a Republican sweep.  The results will come in by this time next week, and it speaks to the power of digital media as a force to organize discourse, emotion, and information.  We have seen the Obama administration use social media to incredible effects in the 2008 election. It would be the height of irony if Congress was flipped in the same method.

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
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Tags: Blueliner Marketing, Click Fraud, digital marketing agency nyc, internet marketing ny, new york seo media agency, new york social media agency, web development agency nyc, weekly blueliner newsminer

David Houle at Spaceport America, Thinks About Autumn October 25, 2010 – 5:07 pm				Abdul Fattah Ismail

David Houle, Blueliner’s chief business strategist, continues to provide insight into our strange, transitory times.  On his Fall Speaking Tour, he recently made a pilgrimage to Space Port America, where Sir Richard Branson of Virgin Enterprises is developing a private space travel service for commercial use dubbed Virgin Galactic.  Built in New Mexico, the runway is the first built of its kind and will generate mounds of discussion.  David Houle has also written some recent pieces discussing the freshness but urgency of Autumn, which is heightened today with the still heavily unemployed and uninsured.  Studies have already proclaimed that the enterprise could hasten climate change, but that remains to be determined. He also talks about the Digital Age and the meaning of 10/10/10 in the future. Take a look at this short clip with David at Spaceport.

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
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Tags: Blueliner Marketing, David Houle, evolution shift, private space travel, richard branson, spaceport america, the shift age trend report, virgin galactic

Weekly Blueliner Newsminer October 22, 2010 – 4:42 pm				Abdul Fattah Ismail

1.  Networks Not Googling For TV

In an early strike, television rivals, set with websites that spool their programming such as Hulu, are balking to offer the same liberty for Google’s nascent television module.  Seeing the cannibalization of music from Google’s legendary search algorithms, networks are smart to hold onto their valued assets until an appropriate structure of online advertising can be developed.  Google in turn has asked network televisions to do a quality search engine optimization to ferret out piracy sites.  They have also offered to do an automatic deletion of unauthorized results.  The model is still in construction, so return to your regularly scheduled program.

2.  An Acid Tablet Market

Apple CEO Steve Jobs ripped the tablet competition earlier this week, saying that smaller models are not capable of creating good mobile applications. In his words, the 7-inch tablet is “DOA.  Dead On Arrival.”  Other people aren’t so sure, thinking that everyone could find a niche for their device.  It’s clear that Jobs is feeling some heat from Android’s burgeoning rise in the mobile sector for both smartphones and hardware.  The MacBook Air was released this week with a new Mac App store that lists guidelines for development.  Earlier this year, that move would have been unthinkable.  The tablet competition is interesting right now.

3.  HP Releases The Slate, at $800

After a lot of press snippets and some kinks ironed out, H-P releases its own tablet, The Slate.  As mentioned earlier, the consumer demand is unclear, but HP will give it a shot.  The device runs on a Windows 7 platform and has a USB Port with a megapixel camera.  Here’s a longer write-up on Endgaget with a short video.  Check there for a future recap.

4.  China Launches Own Map Service

As Google still fights for its web marketing presence in the People’s Republic, Map World was released for the populance by The State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping. The website is quite rudimentary, looking like it was created back in 1999. It promises to possess millions of topographic images taken via satellite of the global parameters.  Google Earth does this scanning in milliseconds.  I don’t know who is playing who here, but Google Earth is still the champion of online map surveillance.

5.  USPS Plans To Appeal Price Increase Rejection

The USPS, in response to a ruling made on September 30 by the Postal Regulatory Commission, is not leaving their demand for an exigent price increase to grow cold.  After the USPS files with the Court of Appeals, then other parties can make their case for either side.  Direct marketers have already sides with the Postal Regulatory Commission, claiming that the law was interpreted correctly regarding the ability to set postage pricing under extraordinary circumstances.  This ruling could be crucial for philanthropic organizations that depend on direct marketing to engage loyal donorbases.  A continuing shift to e-mail marketing could be in the cards if the ruling is overturned.

That’s the Blue News.  Have a good weekend.

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
Posted in blog, Business News, Digital Media, Interactive Marketing, Marketing, Marketing Agencies, Mobile Applications, Mobile Marketing, Website Analytics, World | No Comments »
Tags: apple, Blueliner, Blueliner Marketing, digital marketing agency nyc, e-mail marketing agency nyc, hp tablet, online advertising agency nyc, seo media agency nyc, usps, weekly blueliner newsminer

A Caterpillar Shoot, Starring Shontelle October 22, 2010 – 1:50 pm				Abdul Fattah Ismail

Rising songstress Shontelle collaborated with Caterpillar this past week at Blueliner‘s own Anar Studios in Jersey City.  Eric Giovon was the photographer in residence, with set coordination coming from Amit Mallya.  Caterpillar asked Shontelle to star in a new commercial aiming to market their women’s boot collection and other apparel.  Blueliner secured some great images from the shoot. Get behind the scenes now.  If you are too impatient for a photostream, then we have a collection of videos on the Blueliner Podcast Channel.  Here’s a sample.

Posted by Abdul Fattah Ismail
Posted in blog, Blog Marketing, Digital Media, Interactive Marketing, Marketing, Mobile Marketing, Social Media Marketing, World | No Comments »
Tags: amit mallya, Anar Studios, Blueliner Marketing, caterpillar, caterpillar women's apparel, digital marketing agency nyc, digital photography agency nyc, eric giovon, shontelle, shontelle impossible, shontelle perfect nightmare