Today, I received a call from a journalist wanting information about Paris Hilton’s web traffic. I took at look at the traffic to this blog on the matter. Unsurprisingly, there’s been an obvious uptick in Hilton related traffic since Paris was sent to jail.

Also, unsurprisingly, none of the queries had phrases like “paris hilton jail”, “hilton jail”, “paris jail”, “paris hilton gets out of jail”, “paris sent to jail”, “paris hilton” or “hilton prison” sent any traffic to this blog. I say unsurprisingly because I never wrote anything about “jail” or “prison” in my postings. Why would I? I was writing about branding. Of course, now, in the context of the young lady going to jail, that becomes a different question, as of course the words Paris+hilton+jail are forever linked on umpteen web postings. Who knows, perhaps this site will start getting “jail bedding” traffic as a result?

In that post a couple of years ago, I originally started off by writing how Hilton Hotels needed to incorporate a way to capture all the Hilton related traffic which was relevant to their branding. Amazingly, when you type Hotel into Google, Hilton Hotels itself still not in the top 10. At the same time, Paris Hilton was (and remains) a marketing juggernaut. She got it. Hilton Hotels didn’t. They didn’t need to be tied together, but Hilton Hotels had to do something to raise their own brand visibility.

Branding is a key element in any marketing strategy. For many organizations, such as Hilton Hotels, their association with the Hilton family is a marketers dream. Some in marketing say there’s no such thing as bad press. Yes, there is the downside to all the media attention to Paris Hilton, and no, she may not be the ideal spokesperson. But she’s not their spokesperson at all, and while there’s a downside to Paris Hilton’s media attention, that downside brings a broader awareness of the Hilton brand.

I’ve had calls over the years from people wanting to optimize their web site to “get rid” of bad press and / or negative commentary. I’m not sure that Hilton Hotel needs to worry about that, but with Hilton Hotel’s impressive branding footprint, it’s surprising that they have not acted to improve their overall Internet visibility. The first thing people say when they hear the word “Hilton” should not be “Paris”, it should be “hotel” (and comfort, sleep, clean, value, etc..).

On that note, two of the phrases that brought a visitor to this blog recently was “paris hilton’s brand impact” and “paris hilton’s brand impact on hilton hotels”

p.s. I rarely blog here anymore, for a few reasons. 1) I’m focused on Enquisite; 2) I’ve got another http://www.enquisite.com/blog/>blog there (which I need to post to more often); 3) Everything at Enquisite is tightly focused on the upcoming release of our first revenue product. 4) I just figured that since I blogged about Paris Hilton here before, it was only appropriate that I do the follow up here as well.

A year and a half ago, I purchased a Bose LifeStyle 48 system for a house we’re building. It’s (finally) nearing completion, and I went to unpack it. It had been opened in the store, and resealed. The store where I purchased it has since gone out of business. I pulled out the components to test that I had wired everything properly, and discovered that the remote control was missing. I ought to have checked sooner.
Last week, I was in NYC and popped into the Bose store to purchase a replacement. Strangely, they don’t sell replacement units in the stores. They told me to call technical support instead. Today, I did so. I told the fellow on the line what had happened and explained that I wanted to purchase a replacement. He quickly looked me up, (I’ve also purchased their Quiet Comfort 2 headphones – they are fantastic on planes), pulled up my information, and cheerfully let me know that Bose would send me out a replacement at no cost; it should be at my door within a week!

That’s service! Quick, efficient, and far beyond my expectations.

How does Jim Hedger plan on relaxing during the middle of a storm?

By going to the dentist :-)

Richard

I love the catch phrase “It’s better now… Like seriously”, and the minimum required specs. The person takes opportunities to swipe at everyone; Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, every manufacturer of anti-virus software, you name it.

I’m not sure how long this site will survive.

There is a download feature available, and it does trigger an actual file transfer request. Somehow, I don’t think I’ll try it out. Anyone willing to give it a whirl, please let me know…

This morning I received this letter from our bookkeeper Yvonne, who moved here from China six years ago. It was written to all our staff, but I asked her if I could copy the letter, to share with you.

Dear Staff,

Yvonne

Thanks Yvonne.

She’s got the right attitude.

Richard

hmmmmmm???????

I miss Jeeves. But anyhow, for those who didn’t see it, I thought a side by side comparison would be interesting.

I wonder why he didn’t go with the bowtie and vest?

The Food Bank Challenge is not limited to VIATeC members – so I’m challenging other local firms who are not members of VIATeC to participate in helping the needy this year. There’s a few SEO / SEM firms in town; I hope they’ll participate. The local technology community is vibrant, and thriving. If you’re here on the Island, participate in the FoodBank Challenge. If not, please find one in your local community, participate, and help.

Essentially, companies hope that by bringing their SEO / SEM in-house, they will be able to improve the ROI, and effectiveness. Unfortunately, it doesn’t really work out that way, and repeatedly, companies have been forced to give up on fully in-house operations, and they slowly migrate back to outsourcing. Outsourcing to specialist SEO & SEM firms makes sense. Fiscally, and from the perspective of ensuring the expertise is constantly at the cutting edge. What we’ve observed is that if you’re dealing with a number of clients, you’re forced to keep up with more thats happening in the Search industry than if you’re in house, only dealing with one client. There are always exceptions. But exceptions prove the rule.

Anyhow, Gord Hotchkiss wrote an excellent article about Search Crossing the Chasm, and how SEO and SEM firms are getting more C-level interest when talk turns to search. I would agree with Gord that there’s been a realization in the marketplace that future success of every facet of companies will be tied to the Internet.

Until recently, search marketing did not get much real attention, beyond the early adopters within organizations. But they saw rewarding results, and people started to notice. As Gord put it, that’s changed. It’s not just early adopters anymore. Companies that don’t get on now, probably won’t be able to catch up without spending inordinate sums in the future.

Unlike Danny’s excruciating experience with IE7 and the update, I haven’t had quite the same level of difficulties. But tons of problems nonetheless.

About 10 days ago, I received the latest round of updates from Microsoft. I’ve been using IE7 for a little while, and have gotten used to it. I like the improved presentation of graphics, fonts and the like that came with it. After the latest update however, things started to get flaky. Two applications in particular have been giving me constant headaches. IE7 and Outlook. Outlook really has turned into LookOut mail. Inevitably, I now have to restart Outlook twice each morning for it to operate stably. IE7 randomnly becomes unusable, displaying blank pages. Fortunately, I also use Firefox, so while annoying, IE7’s issues are only forcing me to spend more time using Firefox. That’s a shame. I like IE. I like using both browsers, and am used to doing different things in each. I can’t do that right now, and it bugs me.

Over the last 2 days, I’ve received a whole bunch of additional updates. These were not optional. They just downloaded. I expected that they were fixes for the previous week’s updates. I don’t know what they were; they haven’t helped. Or perhaps they have; I’ve only restarted LookOut once so far this morning!