I’ve known Paul Peic a long time. I took that picture of him above by snapping a shot of my own TV screen using an older model digital camera set to record night shots. Paul was on CBC Dragon’s Den at the time, a groundbreaking venture doc series in which he appeared in 2009 alongside three other entrepreneurs in a clever cell phone contract crowd-sourced program engineered to lower rates called MyCellMyTerms, which was years ahead of its time, but ultimately failed to make any money. Today Paul runs Paddleboard Addict, a stand-up paddleboarding school in Toronto from his floating house in the Brimley Marina on the east lake shore. Paul is a serial entrepreneur with a hard body and a big heart. He made quite a name for himself in the early 2000 as home renovations and house flipping TV star for a couple of different DIY television shows. He… Read more »
Posted in: business storytelling, Personal Blog, Social Media, Web Marketing, workshop
Taged with: fitness training, paddle boarding, Paul Peic, Stand Up Paddleboarding, SUP night classes, SUP yoga, Toronto, Yoga for kids
Sometimes things happen for a reason. When I last visited my parent’s farm, they insisted I remove a stack of glass jars that I’d been warehousing in their garage. Four years earlier, I had purchased 40 cases of 8oz glass jars for packing honey, only to discover they are the wrong size. The eight ounce jar is perfect for olives, pickles, sun dried tomatoes and hot peppers, but not pure Canadian honey. Little did I know when I bought them, this odd size is actually illegal for food producers to use (in Canada) because its not on the list of approved sizes. There are six different sizes for producers to use. This is because consumers get confused and cannot shop for honey in all different size jars with different volumes and prices. So anyone selling honey in Canada has to do so in one of six different sizes, and this… Read more »
Posted in: Charity Event, corporate social responsibility, Friends of Smojoe, Personal Blog, Photography, Social innovation
Taged with: 28 dozen jars, Bleecker Wellesley Activity Network, breaking isolation, BWAN, food safety, glass jars, green living blog, Toronto, Vicky
I feel sorry for Tish Harkus, Manager at Canadian Club Whisky for it’s obvious she has a real passion for this beverage, and a powerful gift for communicating the essence of the Canadian Club experience, but sadly, even her professionalism and compelling stage presence couldn’t cut through the lunacy of the Apr 18 tasting event. On April 18th 2013 Praxis PR invited me to join the Canadian Club Chairman and share his Whisky Whisdoms at the inaugural #CanadianClub national meeting in the Great Hall at Hart House. It was a boondoggle. Honestly, I would like to report nice things, and ‘give back’ to the PR community, but it was like this gathering was organized by people who had never thrown a party before. There were so many rookie mistakes. The huge Twitter wall was impressive, and I liked the Prezi style presentation. Congrats @TheDanLevy who won a nice prize for composing… Read more »
Posted in: Friends of Smojoe, Interactive, Personal Blog, Photography, Toronto, Video
Taged with: #CanadianClub, Canadian Club whisky, Chairman, no common sense, Praxis PR, rookie event mistakes, Tish Harkus, Whisky Whisdom
This is VERY convincing. And even more convincing is this slide show of crowdsourced images. I am very curious to see if the mainstream media will have anything to say about this in the days to come? Which station will dare to suggest that maybe perhaps this was orchestrated by factions within the US government?
I got a new job. Last week I accepted a role in the marketing dept of a tech company called Transparent Inc. They’re located in the King Dufferin corridor, and like so many other companies down there its hard to tell exactly what they do for a living. I’ve been here a week and still don’t know. This firm is part of another enterprise called LAUNCH!, an experiential advertising agency. I have new responsibilities, input into the design of some really interesting things being built, and a clean window overlooking the shifting digital landscape in Canada; the company chair gives me a fresh perspective and a lofty perch from which to study the art and science of web marketing in the early 21st century. I’m the Content Manager at Transparent I came up with the title ‘Content Manager’ myself. They wanted to label me the Social Media Manager but I… Read more »
Posted in: Actually sharing secrets, corporate social responsibility, Search Engine Marketing, Social Media, Toronto, Web Marketing
Taged with: Andrew Dick, dog app, King Dufferin corridor, Mike Smith, Toronto, Transparent Inc
Post by Robert Campbell on Mar 06, 2013 On Saturday Feb 23rd 2013 I was at Podcamp Toronto. The first familiar face that greeted me as I walked in the door at 9:30am was Karim Kanji co-founder of Third Ocean. “Rob Campbell” Karim announced as he shook my hand. “You showed up early, and you wore a suit!” he said, suddenly suspicious of me. Karim was helping organize Podcamp Toronto 2013 because, like a moth to a flame, he must love the excitement of being an inside man at these things. Taking it all in over two days you can sort the facts out later – identifying new and old trends and most exciting, using new information to conceive new possibilities. Yes I felt a little overdressed right at that moment, but you know, as the day went on I came to believe again that you can’t dress up too… Read more »
Posted in: Actually sharing secrets, Friends of Smojoe, Personal Blog, Search Engine Marketing, Smojoe Clients, Smojoe Events, Web Marketing
Taged with: #PCTO2013, Karim Kanji, Laurie Dillon-Schalk, marketing, Podcamp Toronto, Rob Campbell, search engine optimization, SEO, Smojoe
Once again in 2013, Canada’s top professional hair school, AVEDA Institute challenges young people to step up and prove they were born to style on home video. They did this last year too, and it was very well received; I went to the showdown in Toronto. Making a User Generated Media UGM challenge around hair school is a great way to share the creativity and sell the dream of being a professional stylist and this is a smart social media engagement from many different angles. Here’s Winnipeg’s 2012 Winner, Robyn Thompson with a cheque symbolizing her full ride scholarship awarded last year. The Aveda Institute blogger did a good job just recently summarizing her last year in Catching Up With Winnipeg’s #BornToStyle 2012 Winner, Robyn Thompson. Are you Born to Style? Prove it. 2013 Born to Style Hair School Scholarship Contest is now accepting submissions from Canada’s next top hair… Read more »
Posted in: business storytelling, online business, Photography, Search Engine Marketing, Smojoe Clients, Social innovation, Social Media, User Submitted Content, Web Marketing
Taged with: Aveda Canada, best hair styles, Devin, hair stylists, Jen McNeely, judge, She Does The City, training, win your tuition
Famous all over the world for their high quality, air tight, glass and stainless steel food cans, Onyx Containers recently asked Rob Campbell of Smojoe to put together a rich media content marketing strategy to help them launch their new retail website e-store The Tickle Trunk . Now anybody, anywhere in the world can buy Onyx Containers and have the units shipped to their homes! Watch below how Rob Campbell sets up keyword targets, and then creates useful, contextual media, business stories, that will put his clients on pg1 of Google where they will enjoy traffic and sales for free, for the rest of time. TheTickleTrunk.com website is well stocked to sell Onyx’s signature air tight food containers, lunch containers, steel popsicle molds and ice cube trays direct to the public. Starting Jan 1st 2013, Rob’s primary goal is to increase traffic and sales at this brand new property. Smojoe… Read more »
Posted in: Canada Blog Friends, Friends of Smojoe, Search Engine Marketing, Toronto, Uncategorized, User Submitted Content, Web Marketing
Taged with: airtight glass containers, bloggers, content marketing, discussion forum posts, ice cube trays, Meme Weaver, Miss Teen Canada, Onyx Containers, popsicle molds, stainless steel, The Tickle Trunk, Toronto Zombie Race
Article marketing has really changed since I first started writing on the web in 2006. Back then we used to submit content to article replication websites which, although they still exist today, I wouldn’t bother using any of them now. They are yesterday’s news. Look here at my old author profiles! http://www.ignitepoint.com/library/profile.cfm?writerid=33502 (used to be IdeaMarketers) http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Rob_Campbell I also used to employ Amazines.com, FreePressReleases.com, HelloArticles, FastPitch… I’m trying to remember more. But all this is just garbage now. I hope you are not using these sites?! Myself, I wouldn’t waste precious original content by publishing it in these mud puddles… nor any site that has the word ‘article’ as prefix or suffix i.e. ArticleSpinner or GoArticles or HelloArticles etc As you can see, I no longer upload content to those sites. They are bastions of ‘useless’ text that nobody reads except robots. No actual humans navigate to an article… Read more »
Posted in: Actually sharing secrets, article marketing, business storytelling, online business, User Submitted Content, Web Marketing
Taged with: ad agencies, Amazines, article marketing, Digital Journal, ezinearticles, Google analytics, Knoji, PR firms, SEO, Triond, Yahoo Contributor
Earlier this week I published an inspired piece of content entitled Find me a dentist on Dr. Archer’s website blog. The long copy article was reasonably well researched and expertly fashioned to be really findable as it explores the various different dentist index websites that have evolved to help consumers secure appointments with nearby dentists. But how do these services collect the rich data they need to make useful results? The data they purvey, the source of the information and its deliverance is the primary distinction we can use to judge these local search providers; deep down inside these small competitors, they have to believe they can create an information delivery system that surpasses Google’s own local search abilities. As in most business niches, Google is the market leader in connecting Canadians with their dentists, but that hasn’t stopped half a dozen competitors from trying to do it better… and… Read more »
Posted in: Actually sharing secrets, article marketing, business storytelling, Future Technology, Interactive, Search Engine Marketing, Toronto, Web Marketing
Taged with: Canpages, dental referral, dental services, DentistFind.com, Dr. Archer, find me a dentist, local search
