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Robin Williams once said, "Spring is nature's way of saying, 'Let's party!'" At SicolaMartin, we tend to agree. Through Mardi Gras, St. Paddy's and South by Southwest, we've been playing hard and working harder. Thanks to your feedback, this issue of EP contains an extended play we hope you'll enjoy — everything from tips and tricks on search engine marketing to tidbits on Austin's history. And just like spring in Texas, it's short and sweet.
Speaking of short, the shortest English word that contains the letters A, B, C, D, E and F is "feedback." Please keep it coming!
Party on,
Steve
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Marketing Through Online Search:
It's Not Just For E-Commerce
More and more B2B companies are finding out what e-commerce companies have known from the Internet get-go: search engine marketing really pays off. According to MarketingProfs.com, this is especially true in B2B, where average dollar sales are typically much higher than in e-commerce.
SicolaMartin has capitalized on "new media" since it was actually new, so we've learned a few things over the years about effective search engine marketing. We've honed ways of optimizing keyword lists for a razor-sharp focus on users who are actively researching products and services online. We know how to make sure that content — both in search listings and in the pages they link to — is relevant to the target audience. And we continually evaluate search performance so that dollars can be concentrated on the most effective keywords.
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VoIP Could Change Everything
by Pete Hayes
Now that Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) has gone mainstream, there are three kinds of people in the world: those who have changed their local phone service to a VoIP digital phone solution, those who are relying on their cell phone for home phone usage, and those who are happy with their local phone company for now.
I'm in the first group. And after using it for the past year, saving around $50 a month, with a higher-quality audio connection and voice messages emailed to my office, I'm hooked. I use Vonage. A co-worker who uses Time Warner Cable Digital Phone tells me that her service even puts caller ID information up on her TV screen when a call comes in. Cool. And now, home VoIP service from my people has cleverly integrated voice recognition. With my people, there's no dial tone. You just pick up the phone and tell it whom to call. Or ask it for the weather. Or tell it when you want a wake-up call. It's not a phone at all. It's a voice-driven interface to the Internet. Very cool.
Across the board, these VoIP offerings have some very big implications for the way we think about phone service. And features perhaps attractive enough to eventually woo the other two kinds of people.
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 Number of rock concerts all SicolaMartians have been to (collectively)
 Number of Martians who regularly listen to music while working
 Number of Martians who have been in a band
 Number of Martians who live downtown
 Number of Martians who bike to work
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Sybase Ads Recognized by US Ad Review Magazine
Kudos to Sybase for being featured in US Ad Review last month. The magazine chronicles the 500 most powerful TV and print ads across the country in each issue, and two Sybase print ads were recognized. We're excited for Sybase, and for the SicolaMartin creative team who brought these ads to life.
Creative Director: Chris Wood
Sr. Art Director: Jeff Joiner
ACD: Mark Norton
Photographer: Jimmy Williams Productions
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Groupies Descend on the Live Music Capital of the World
March 10 – 19, 2006 marked the 20th anniversary of the South by Southwest Music Conference and Festival. SXSW has grown from 700 people in 1987 to more than 8,000 people this year — and that's just the bands. Thousands upon thousands of fans and fiends visit our fair city each year to scope out the latest talent, chill out and do some even-better-than-usual people-watching.
With film and interactive added to the event in 1994, SXSW brings together creative people and companies from a wide area to meet and share ideas. And Austin continues to be the perfect location for this creative convergence.
Austin has long been considered a fairly cosmopolitan town for its size because of The University of Texas, which draws people from all over the world. As home to the state government, it has also always been a popular party town, with a reputation that goes back to the 19th century when numerous nightspots and bars were populated by General Custer's troops after the Civil War. We do our best to keep many of these same nightspots in business today.
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Taco Bell® Ad Takes Patriots for a Ride
Ten years ago, the Taco Bell Corporation kicked April Fool's Day pranks up a notch. On April 1, 1996, Taco Bell took out a full-page ad in The New York Times announcing their purchase
of the Liberty Bell and their plans to
change
the name of this historic treasure to the
"Taco Liberty Bell."
Hundreds of outraged citizens called the National Historic Park in Philadelphia where the bell is housed to express their anger. Their nerves were only calmed when Taco Bell revealed that it was all a practical joke a few hours later. The hoax paid off for Taco Bell. Not only did they make the top five on a list of the best April Fool's pranks of all time, but they also realized a spike in sales during the week of April 1st upwards by over half a million dollars compared to the week before. See the full text of the ad and related story.
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