Two of my favorite things in this world are: (1) the world itself (Planet Earth) and (2) guerilla marketing. So, when I stumbled across a way to sustain one by doing the other, I was super ecstatic!

There is a fairly new “natural media” called clean advertising, which works by literally cleaning your ad or message into almost any dirty, smut-caked wall or walkway. Think of it as reverse graffiti—a way to make earth-conscious, artistic advertising.

Clean advertising is created with custom, high-pressure washers that selectively remove dirt, creating a contrast between the dirty surface and the good-as-new original color of the pavement. One of the great things about clean advertising is that it can be highly targeted around events or toward a specific demographic.

Clean Advertising done by Curb, the world’s first natural media company.

Just when you thought sustainable guerilla advertising stops there, just wait until you read the next sentence! Other simple, yet brilliant methods gaining popularity include snow tagging, water art, mow ads, solar art and one of my other favorites—moss art.

It’s time to clean up AND have fun doing it!

What are your thoughts on clean advertising? Have you come across any yet?

My grandpa turned 92 yesterday. Over his birthday lunch, grandpa told stories about the Ploiesti Air Raids in WWII. Sixty-six years ago to the day (on his 26^th birthday), grandpa was flying practice runs from Libya for this bombing mission that targeted oil refineries in Romania (a significant source of oil for Nazi Germany).

I’ve heard lots about Ploiesti over the years. Today, I Googled Ploiesti for the first time. It took multiple search attempts:

1. “Plueste mission” = 4 results in Spanish
2. “Pluheste low-level flying mission” = 0 results
3. “Plueste, Romania” (yes, I tried the wrong spelling again) = “did you mean Ploiesti, Romania?”

Why yes, I did. With the correct spelling, I tackled Google again.

4.  “Ploiesti mission” = JACKPOT! Wikipedia delivers the top listing

So, what does this have to do with B2B marketing?

Your potential customers can’t spell your “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” solution or product name!

And, they certainly aren’t going to find you online when your SEO strategy is based on optimizing it—your efforts will be fruitless.

B2B marketers need to focus on how users search. Users search for keyword phrases that describe a problem in order to find a solution; they don’t know your solution exists and, if they do, perhaps they can’t spell it.

There are free tools to help you research and logically deduct what keyword phrases will drive quality traffic to your site. Try WordTracker or Google Adwords to start. You may even consider a misspelled keyword as one of your keywords.

Are your SEO efforts centered on your product name? Can using a misspelled keyword pay off? Did you already know how to spell Ploiesti?

How many times have you heard the phase “Customer service is dead?” I’m always surprised that people actually believe this jaded sentiment. No matter what your profession—whether it’s dog walker, doctor or accountant—you provide some form of customer service. So, why not provide the highest level of service imaginable?

Giving your clients excellent service is more important now than ever. There are a multitude of companies out there, just like yours, waiting for you to slip up so your customer can take their business elsewhere. The better service you offer, the harder it will be for your competitors to get that chance.

Want to zap your customer service efforts back to life? Here are some tips:

• Listen: Take the time to get to know your customers—both professionally and personally. You’ll be amazed how many bonus points you score when you remember that your client’s son’s name is Matt, that they like to collect ceramic figurines or their favorite country is Italy.

• Stay in front of your customers: Everyone wants to feel like they are the most important customer. The more you communicate with them, the more they will appreciate you. Today’s technology makes this easy because you can talk to your customers through phone or e-mail, or use newer methods like Twitter or text messaging.
• Solutionize: Always push yourself to provide your clients with solutions to difficult challenges. Any time you can make their lives easier, you demonstrate your value.
• Admit fault: You are bound to make mistakes at some point. Admitting fault and, more importantly, making things right is always better than downplaying a negative situation or making excuses.

And don’t forget, people are more likely to remember negative experiences than positive ones, and it’s the negative ones that they share with others. We find this all the time with the Net Promoter Score research projects we manage for our clients.

For more food for thought, check out the top 25 ranked U.S. companies in customer service. What are your experiences with these companies? What aspects of your company parallel these organizations?

Alright. Let’s get this out in the open. I’m a mass of contradictions. Anyone who knows me understands that I see both sides of every issue and I have some seemingly hypocritical views and personality ‘traits.’

One of these happens to be that I’m a spelling and grammar fanatic. The other, is that I love to break the rules, especially when it comes to writing. I frequently get into super-hot debates over compound-modifiers, question marks, serial commas and prepositions.

It may surprise you to know that despite being a self-proclaimed, armband-wearing literary revolutionary, I also believe in things like starting a sentence with ‘and.’ And, (see!) if you use a preposition at the end of a sentence, I say right on. AND (twice now, are you fellow fanatics cringing yet?) using passive voice.

Why, you ask, do I stretch and break these sacred rules of writing? Because that’s how we talk, y’all.

One of the most brilliant writers I know (Steve Unger, our copywriter), taught me everything I know about writing—so you can blame him for this post. The most important lesson I learned from him is to write conversationally. People like to read copy that’s written the way they talk. And, (third time’s a charm) they understand concepts more clearly when they’re written in a conversational fashion.

Just look at this blog post. Doesn’t it seem like I’m sitting right next to you, chatting you up?

So, what’s this have to do with Business-to-Business marketing, Shakespeare? Well, you see, I believe writing conversationally is critically important in B2B, especially because B2B industries abound with buzzwords, acronyms and jumbled jargon. The more we can break it down into day-to-day language, the better we’ll be able to relay our clients’ important and valuable messages to their target audiences.

So go forth my friends. Use the word ain’t, because it IS a word. Just don’t say ‘comprised of’ or this will ‘insure’ us of success (unless you’re in the insurance business). Otherwise, I’ll have to whip out the dreaded red pen.

What do you think? Want to join the SuperScripters (my non-vandalizing alternative to TEAL)? Are you a grammar hypocrite, too? (Oh, and no comments about how horrible my spelling and grammar are. I meant to make all those so-called mistakes you found)