Marketing Myths

By Mitchell Schmale

In a struggling economy, many companies fall into the trap of cutting certain internal budgets to manage costs and survive the tough times. Often, the marketing budget is one of the first to be slashed.

Effective marketing is vital for a company to remain competitive during the tough times so that they are poised to be successful when the economy improves. Companies may have to make tough decisions in managing expenses, but slashing its marketing budget should not be the easy fix. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth.

A slow economy is one of the best times to raise your corporate profile as a leading company in your respective industry and capture valuable market share. Rather than turning to traditional advertising to raise brand awareness, many companies find a greater return in investment in public relations. PR and marketing support can grow customer awareness, create an exciting buzz around a company and help gain strong third-party endorsements in the media. During a down economic time, corporate and customer success stories shared through an effective public relations and media campaign often resonate much more powerfully with consumers than a stand-alone advertising campaign.

It’s time to dispel the myth that a company has to cut its marketing budget because it is not yielding the expected returns, when in fact, the truth may lie in spending its marketing dollars more creatively.

Mitchell Schmale is the Vice President of Maroon PR's Corporate Division. You can contact him at mitchell@maroonpr.com.

The Repercussions of an MLS Lockout

By Stefen Lovelace

2010 should be the year for soccer in the United States.

The World Cup will begin this summer in South Africa, which always brings American viewers interest to a peak. The current US team is already gaining tremendous support, thanks to great play in qualifying leading up to the Cup, and our best players (Landon Donovan, Tim Howard, Jozy Altitore) all playing against the best in the world overseas.

Soccer’s always had a hard time gaining mainstream exposure in the US. One reason is that our professional soccer league, the MLS, has always been looked at as inferior when compared to the top leagues in Europe. Still, with soccer on the mind of most Americans, the MLS could have hoped to see a boost in popularity based on the overall hype of the upcoming World Cup.

It looks like the MLS may actually be going in the opposite direction. It was reported today by USA Today that the MLS is in very real danger of having to lockout its upcoming season.


The league's first collective bargaining agreement expired Thursday after the sides twice extended the five-year deal, which originally was to have run out Jan. 31.

The MLS Players Union failed to match league management's no-lockout pledge with a no-strike offer, leaving the start of the season on March 25 in doubt.


The owners - seeing the importance of getting a product on the field during a year where soccer will be on the front of sports pages around the world - have agreed not to lock out the players. The players though, have not agreed to not strike if the owners don’t make concessions.

In this case, the player’s have a legitimate gripe. The MLS tries to market itself has a major league composed of the best talent the United States has to offer. Yet, according to a SportsBusiness Daily story last week, some of the players make less than $30,000. That’s a laughable amount for a professional athlete.

The timing of this argument couldn’t be worse. The MLS will probably never have the popularity of the NFL or NBA in this country (or even the NHL for that matter). But it can certainly fill a niche, and utilizing the exposure of the World Cup to bring attention to the league is an absolute must if the MLS hopes to survive.

The owners and the players need to come up with some resolution, and quickly. If they want their league to hold a torch to the big guys, the owners have to open up their checkbooks a bit. And the player’s need to realize that they’ll never command the salaries of their counterparts in the other sports leagues and accept it.

Time is running out for both sides too, as the league opener is a mere three weeks away.


The Philadelphia Union plays at Seattle in the MLS opener on March 25 and [Major League Soccer commissioner Don] Garber acknowledges that talks could go on until then.

"It's conceivable, but my expectation is not to be negotiating an agreement an hour before kickoff," Garber said. "I would describe these as big-league problems. Years ago we had nothing to fight about, so we didn't have labor issues.

"Now that the league is growing and there is a bit more at stake, the players want to see improvement in their salaries and their working conditions. And we need to understand, we need to listen and take their issues into consideration."


It’s good to see that Garber realizes how important it is to get this issue fixed as soon as possible. Time will tell if the rest of the MLS see that importance before its too late.

Stefen Lovelace is an Associate Account Executive. You can contact him at stefen@maroonpr.com.

Video Blog: Thoughts from the Intern

By Chris Grant.

Interview by Stefen Lovelace; Video by Abby Draper

Chris Grant is the Maroon PR intern. Contact him at chrisg@maroonpr.com.

Facebook the Top Social Media Tool During the Olympics

Author: Abby Draper

Date: Tuesday, February 16, 2010

There was a lot of speculation amongst social networking nerds like myself about which would prosper during the Olympics- Facebook or Twitter? Prior to the Winter Games many assumed that Twitter was the more likely winner, allowing audiences to follow each athlete through training, opening ceremonies and several competitions.

Even with 160 Winter Olympic athletes actively using their Twitter accounts during the games, currently Facebook is the frontrunner for the gold.

Alex Huot, the director of social media for the International Olympics Committee created an “Olympic Games Page” on Facebook that in only a month reached nearly one million fans. This page collects Facebook updates of popular athletes like Lindsey Vonn, Rachael Flatt and Shaun White. Through this page, fans can also stay updated on activities at the Games, share stories about what the Olympics mean to them, and upload their own photos with a chance to win tickets to different events.

In addition to the Olympics Game Page, there is also an application you can add to your Facebook account called “Vancouver 2010 Official Minigame,” which allows users to compete virtually in any of the Winter Olympic events.

In Huot’s blog, he writes “it is clear that without fans the Olympic Games would not be the same. By bringing together the more than 2,000 athletes and millions of spectators in Vancouver with 400 million people on Facebook, we think the 2010 Winter Games could be the most magical yet.”

While following the tweets of Olympic Athletes is fun and exciting, Facebook is winning the battle of which platform can better engage its fans.

Abby Draper is an Associate Account Executive. Contact her at abby@maroonpr.com.

Video Blog: The Cal Ripken, Sr. Foundation Aspire Gala

Author: Stefen Lovelace

Date: Monday, February 15, 2010

Google Buzz: Next Great Social Networking Tool

Author: Abby Draper

Date: Thursday, February 11, 2010

As a huge Google fan, I always look forward to what they’re going to produce next. After reading about Google Buzz for the past few weeks, I was slightly intrigued, but remained pessimistic because Google Wave has yet to take off yet.

That is, until I logged into my GMail account and met Google Buzz.

If you are unaware of Google Buzz, it is basically another social networking site, only it is created through your other Google accounts. Google Buzz goes beyond status updates and “what is on my mind.” It automatically pulls images from links, shows videos in line, and allows you to flip through photos. You can connect to your other favorite sites like Picassa, Flickr, Google Reader and Twitter, and your friends are able to keep up with what you are doing on the web… all in one place.

One of my favorite features is when someone responds to your post, their comments are sent straight to your inbox. This ensures that you’ll never miss out on anything said.

Google Buzz also identifies posts from people you are not following yet, who may be of interest to you or who are popular among your friends. Google Buzz recommends them to you so you don’t miss out on the “Buzz.”

Instead of having to add or find friends like you do on other social networking sites, you are automatically friends with those you email and G-Chat with frequently, making it much easier to use right off the bat.

While there are a few kinks to be worked out, I am excited to start a new social networking journey with my “Google Friends”.

Abby Draper is an Associate Account Executive. You can contact Abby at abby@maroonpr.com.

Targeting the “End User” with your PR efforts

Author: Chris Daley

Date: Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Erica Morris from PRWeek wrote an interesting story today regarding a protective baseball glove company, XProtec, who has teamed up with Dotted Line Communications on a social media campaign. They will focus largely on promoting their product by reaching moms of youth baseball players through “Mommy Blogs.”

I think this is a great strategy and with the changing media landscape it has become more important to focus your PR efforts through targeted channels rather than a mass audience.

When I used to work on the DEWALT Tools account at my previous firm, we followed this model by largely focusing our efforts on earning attention for their various industrial tools in construction trade magazines that are read by construction workers and contractors. They were the “end users” of DEWALT products and they were the primary audience we wanted to read about DEWALT'S tools.

I believe this to be the same approach by educating Mommy Bloggers on your organization’s product or service if it’s something that’s related to parents, kids and families. Developing a relationship with Mommy Bloggers has especially become important to our PR Firm because we work with many great organizations that can serve as a credible resource to Moms and Dads. The fact that Mommy Blogs have a targeted audience and large passionate following makes them a great outlet to get your message out.

In December 2009, we reached out to Alison Rhodes, the Founder of SafetyMom.com, about USA Football's Concussion Awarness Plan. Rhodes has been a contributer to national outlets such as The Today Show, The New York Times and CNBC, and was very receptive to USA Football's plan. Since USA Football's information was newsworthy to her audience, she wrote about it in one of her blogs, and she now wants to keep in touch about future USA Football initiatives.

As PR professionals, we all want to secure coverage for our clients. But it's important that we are securing coverage in outlets that will reach the audiences that would benefit from our client’s news. It's refreshing to see various PR professionals implementing this tactic.

Chris Daley is an account executive at Maroon PR. Contact him at Chris@MaroonPR.com.