How can radio and other media brands do social media right? Why not ask the expert whose clients include NBC Universal, News Corp, and several OTT video players? Todd Beck is CEO & Founder of Beck Media & Marketing, the agency dozens of TV, OTT, and Tech companies look to for potent digital strategies that get results. Beck Media’s areas of focus span content creation and exploitation on TV, web, mobile, and social media, and whatever medium comes next. Todd was one of the fe

Dear advertisers: Our audience numbers are garbage! And… The road to Hell is paved with pageviews. Plus, rants and raves about the iPhone parody gadget which earned one startup 1.5 million visitors a day, the Brangelina wax figure divorce, and more. This is the episode to listen to if you’re a media brand perplexed that greater scale only drives down the value of your reach. It’s episode 51 of Media Unplugged with branding authority Tom Asacker and media strategist Mark Ramse

Here comes the digital media shakeout! And… A recipe to reinvent your legacy media company. Plus, rants and raves about the faux innovations from Staples, Pepsico, and others, and how KFC gets the media to do the marketing for them It’s episode 49 of Media Unplugged with branding authority Tom Asacker and media strategist Mark Ramsey. Listen as we go inside media to reveal the ugly truth! Click the play button below: And if you’re reading this by email, click here for the aud

Is NPR’s future all used up? And… What happens when Buzzfeed loses its buzz? It’s episode 41 of Media Unplugged with branding authority Tom Asacker and media strategist Mark Ramsey. Plus, rants and raves about pandering politicians, Domino’s Pizza’s new app that orders your pizza in ten second, thoughts on the Social Media Marketing World conference and some closing words about the legendary Prince. Listen as we go inside media to reveal the ugly truth! Click the play button

Surprise! Distribution is KING! And… Time is running out for Big Media. It’s episode 39 of Media Unplugged with branding authority Tom Asacker and media strategist Mark Ramsey. Plus, rants and raves about an app that allows you to exchange your time for money, the ridiculous idea that movie review ratings should correlate to box office performance, and Neil Patel’s amazing Instagram experiment. Listen as we go inside media to reveal the ugly truth! Click the play button below

Donald Trump’s ten brand secrets – revealed! And… From stodgy magazine to multimedia juggernaut – how The New Yorker did it. It’s episode 36 of Media Unplugged with branding authority Tom Asacker and media strategist Mark Ramsey. Plus, rants and raves on the meaninglessness of taglines, the platform that can turn your idea into a book in just 12 hours, and more. Listen as we go inside media to reveal the ugly truth! Click the play button below: And if you’re reading this by e

I could drone on and on about the lessons Donald Trump teaches media companies, but many of the lessons are so obvious that I need not bother. There’s one, however, that you may find surprising. The Trump campaign has on file the name, phone number, address, and email of every one of the tens of thousands who flock to Trump events nationwide. Can your brand say that? Now I’m not suggesting this is unusual in the political sphere. My guess is that it’s the norm (which is why i

7 predictions about the future of media. And… Great advice for musicians – and marketers! It’s episode 34 of Media Unplugged with branding authority Tom Asacker and media strategist Mark Ramsey. Plus, rants and raves on your chance to own your own movie theater for just $100 – and more. Listen as we go inside media to reveal the ugly truth! Click the play button below: And if you’re reading this by email, click here for the audio. For show notes go to the Media Unplugged site

5 must-hear trends in media and marketing. Plus… CMO’s say the darnedest things! It’s episode 30 of Media Unplugged with branding authority Tom Asacker and media strategist Mark Ramsey. Listen as we go inside media to reveal the ugly truth! Click the play button below: And if you’re reading this by email, click here for the audio. For show notes go to the Media Unplugged site. Sample and subscribe to Media Unplugged at iTunes. Or do the same at Stitcher. And if you like what

Once a radio industry – and radio station fan – mainstay, it’s hard for me to find a radio station bumper sticker on the road nowadays. “People won’t put bumper stickers on their cars anymore,” some say. That’s nonsense. People won’t put just any bumper sticker on their cars. Just as people won’t put just any vanity slogan on their license plate or just any branded frame around it. People brand themselves and their cars with symbols that give their lives meaning and tell thei

The secret to marketing movies like brands. And… Will Vessel crush YouTube? It’s episode 18 of Media Unplugged with branding authority Tom Asacker and media strategist Mark Ramsey. Plus, rants and raves on what a Vine superstar has in common with one of the Staples Singers, faulty statistics in determining that millennials are flooding back into movie theaters, Ben Affleck’s Slave-gate coverup, and a great co-promotion between HBO’s Game of Thrones and UBER. Listen as we go i

Interruption marketing is bad. Right? People hate ’em – those ads that stop you from enjoying the content you love – blah! But wait, if this type of advertising is so bad – so hated, then how come there’s more of it now than ever? There are more spots on TV than ever. In 2009, for example, cable networks averaged 14 minutes and 27 seconds per hour. Last year, the average was 15 minutes and 38 seconds. Meanwhile there are more spots on radio than ever. There are more spots on

It’s episode 4 of Media Unplugged, and Tom Asacker and Mark Ramsey reveal the secret to BuzzFeed’s video success and uncover the real story underlying Netflix’s attack on the movie business. First, we discuss the magical pixie dust that makes BuzzFeed’s viral videos go viral and what that has to do with tapping consumer desire. Second, Netflix fires a bullet to the heart of theatrical distribution with their first-ever original motion picture, a sequel to Crouching Tiger, Hid

Quick Summary: How do today’s tech startups launch and scale big and fast? By using a new union of traditional and direct marketing and business development that adds up to one thing: Growth. How can radio and other media brands become “growth hackers”? Ryan Holiday is the former Director of Marketing for American Apparel. He has promoted the works of authors like Tim Ferriss, Seth Godin, Marc Ecko and Tucker Max. He is a devious genius when it comes to the art and science of

Tongues are wagging about NAB keynoter and self-styled “ad contrarian” Bob Hoffman’s profanity-laced critique of online advertising. Wagging for all the wrong reasons. See, Bob conveniently chose convenient facts and then conveniently wrapped those facts with absurd conclusions. On Online Advertising Says Bob: “the advertising industry has become the web’s lapdog – irresponsibly exaggerating the effectiveness of online advertising and social media, ignoring the abominable res

“If you repeat something often enough, folks will believe it.” That’s one of those old radio maxims that results from years of radio stations repeating positioning messages and years of consumers repeating them back to us. But do they really believe the messages? Or are they just skilled at repeating them back to us? And what if the message they’re repeating isn’t credible? And what if you know it isn’t credible and they know it isn’t credible? Or, worse, what if they don’t c

Is your radio brand just a radio brand? This past holiday season one movie changed what it means to be a “movie,” and there’s a lesson wrapped up in that change for any radio brand, too. The movie was Anchorman 2, and the “change” is outlined in the Slideshare presentation below from Gary Vaynerchuk: Anchorman 2 Changed what it Means to Be a Movie from Gary Vaynerchuk To quote Gary: What makes this different is that they’re not just using pre-existing assets [and repurposing

Before 1960, the drive-in was king. It was ground-zero for a demographic segment Hollywood had forgotten in its obsession to meet head on the challenge that was television, and that demo was teenagers. So a generation of films and filmmakers arose with that segment squarely in their sights. And chief among them was a director and producer who is still working today: The legendary Roger Corman. Even if you don’t know Corman you know the names of the A-listers whose careers Cor

Since then we have relied on bowing our new brands with stunts: Events or circumstances designed to garner attention and trial that give fans more of what they are likely to want – right up until it becomes less of what they are likely to want. Take the introductory-tactic-du-jour: “10,000 songs commercial-free.” We know folks don’t like spots, right? And we know they like music. So let’s give them an economically unsustainable train of music to win their attention and trial.

What could radio broadcasters possibly learn from a Zoo? Ask the folks at hivio, the first inaugural radio ideas festival, because this conversation between me and San Diego Zoo Global Brand Manager Michael Warburton turned out to be one of the “hits” of the event, and it had the room buzzing. Some highlights: How legendary brands can keep fresh Why bother to go beyond “good enough” in all the actions of your brand (hint: Because the extra effort matters to fans and they appr