As Craig McGinty put in his recent appraisal of the NUJ boycott of Israel, the union really needs to concentrate on defending the rights of members, which is more than enough of a challenge.

This blog has reported a number of instances of redundancies of journalists this year, the last being the possible redundancies at the Manchester Evening News (22nd April) .

With all stories the theme has been the pressure from online media, declining sales spend and the need to re-employ budget to other media to ensure that the organisation can compete.

It is unfortunate but understandable.

The NUJ has illustrated that the reasons for redundancy are not so necessary in each case.

The Gannett/Newsquest group is cutting jobs despite record profits and assurances they provided to the Competition Commission hearing in 2003 on the transfer of The Herald, Sunday Herald and Evening Times to not cut numbers.

• Newsquest has a return on investment of over 35% in the last 3 years. This is more than double the average company performance in the UK (14.8%).

• Profits from the three titles more than doubled last year to almost £20 million.

• Parent company Gannett has a current operating revenue of $8033 million.

The reward for journalists: Chief Executive Tim Blott is demanding up to £3million savings from staff.

The NUJ is campaigning for its members and readers, if you feel this is of interest please sign the petition.

Are those really the best business minds of the future? Sir Alan is having a joke.

Last night’s The Apprentice, or should I say An Apprentice, was excruciatingly funny.

I watched last night’s episode with curiosity as the teams were given the job of creating a brand for a trainer.

Of course two days is little time to achieve much, but even if they had a lot of time they would have achieved little.

To use an Alan Partridge saying, “Your act is very poor.” However, Cheeky Monkey and Joe Beazley (I preferred to picture someone with more talent than the contestants) - who had that criticism levelled at them - would have been better bets.

Camel like (in the nicest possible way: doe eyes, long eye lashes) Ghazal was a clueless team leader. But it would be wrong to mark her out as others who were supposedly brand consultants were not much better.

The contestants had to simply come up with a big idea and create an advert. They got caught up in being creative. They did not think strategically:

Who were the trainers suited for; they looked like trainers for older people?
Where are the gaps in the market if any?
What appeals to the market?
How can they differentiate their product and image?

Instead it was all about street and was toe curling and unconvincing.

I would have aimed a campaign at the older market, say 50-60s. Market it as an all round trainer. One you can go shopping with, relax, take the children to the park. This would have fitted better with the design. The tag line a shoe for all seasons.

Not much of an idea? Well, the teams were so obvious and lacking an originality that anything is better. Indeed, the winning team won by default as the standard was so awful.

They did not consider any market outside teenagers. Showing that spark would have shown some intelligence.

Sir Alan is not without fault. He wanted an advert that sells kit not one that wins Montrose film awards. My marketing communications teacher said that he won many advertising awards but the product did not sell and that he had many adverts that sold but did not win the prizes. The secret? There isn’t one. It is impossible to tell what will work until tested. Surely Sir Alan had experience of that.

And without a properly thought through campaign using other marketing channels it is a silly brief.

Have you heard the one about the three contestants who claim that they are global brand consultants and advertising geniuses? The are really comedians without a joke.

Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) in conjunction with the E-consultancy is offering a masters course in digital marketing communications.

From a read of the syllabus it is a welcome and attractive proposition. Indeed, you might, as I am, be surprised that no other UK university has designed and marketed the course before. Maybe there are similar courses out there I don’t know, but it is good to know that the course is available on our doorsteps and that has to be positive for the digital media industry in the North West.

I think anyone that understands and is able to utilise the skills and knowledge that are given is going to be in some demand, especially if they have the experience.

My only issue is cost. The certificate stage is £3450 plus VAT and the same for the diploma stage. The dissertation stage and the award of the masters will take more than £2000 out of a training budget or a personal bank account.

All education is an investment and I completed a marketing diploma at MMU, which cost considerably lower if I am not mistaken. My CIM (as distinct from my marketing diploma at MMU) cost a few hundred pounds.

Will a lot of the potential intake be priced out? Will they recoup a return within a short time I don’t know? Is it essential or will it give you a head start that justifies the outlay?

Please let me know your views.

With any new technology there are early adopters, later adopters, followers and royal adopters.

Reports are circulating that Prince William (not pictured) has joined Facebook, the social networking site.

Even though it is hard to confirm that this is the real deal, many of the prince’s friends have joined up and so it lends credence that this is him.

William names that amongst his Old Etonian and socialite friends he can also count Basil Brush (pictured) in his exclusive circle. That is impressive, the guy’s got class.

No don’t worry they are not looking for funds.

In its short lifespan Boo.com spent £160 million of investor funds (although some reports say it was as low as £125m) for little return except a website that could not be used by potential users because it took too long to upload and a very expensive advertising campaign to a holding page because they were so behind schedule getting the site up.

Boo.com was and is emblematic of the disaster that was the dotcom boom… and bust.

Now it is back in business. It is has nothing to do with the two Swedish entrepreneurs that originally set-up the site. A travel company Web Reservations International has bought the name. Their reasoning?

“Even though we have no association with the previous boo.com, we like the name because it’s short, snappy and easy to remember. We hope you like it too.”

Surely you do not want the association even if its a name? There must be another catchy name you could use?

If there is someone out there that can explain the whys and the advantages of taking the name of a brand that is associated with disaster please let me know.

I wonder whether they should have used a more positive url: stevemclaren.com or stevenbyers.co.uk or edwinacurry.org

And for anyone who wants to relive those glory days please have a look a CNET’s top ten dotcom flops.

That was one of the more intriguing and interesting insights at a recent CIPR / MMU “Meet the editors” event.

Helen Carter, northern correspondent of the Guardian, advised that PRs should send key releases in the post because they stand out against the volumes of releases that can be “lost” in her e-mail. Postal releases are less likely to be ignored or missed.

Not sure about whether this preference applies to many journalists although things can get lost in the deluge of correspondence.

Helen and James Wilson’s (FT) key points are that they do read blogs (Helen more than James). They do use search engines to find stories but blogs can be too slow for some stories as a source.

There is “a shift in thinking” according to Helen. The newspapers have been slow to adapt to the Internet but that is changing as younger readers do not buy many newspapers. The Guardian’s foreign and city stories go on the website first. Podcasting is becoming common as is video camera.

And as Craig McGinty, fellow blogger, says newspapers will be replaced by mobiles to receive news or some other technical device is echoed by Helen. I think this is still open to discussion. The paperless office was touted first in the 1970s and my office is a mess of paper today. I aim to resolve that shortly. Sitting on the fence on this.

Lastly and encouragingly, nationals do pick up local stories regularly and see this as a valuable resource.

Thanks to all those who organised the event.

In response to the Guardian’s great speeches series to promote sales I thought I would take an alternative approach to promote my visitor numbers. My calendar of George Bushisms has a real peach for today:

“I’m honored to shake the hand of a brave Iraqi citizen who had his hand cut off by Saddam Hussein.”

Washington D.C. May 25, 2004

Winston Churchill has got nothing on that.

CTI (pictured left) has featured in the Manchester Evening News, including the business media section, and the South Manchester Reporter this week to establish that they are up and working only one day after the Dale Street fire.

As part of the PR I used my blog to get the message out. The blogs of friends to link into my blog helped achieve high search engine ranking.

The combined Manchester Evening News and South Manchester Reporter readership is about 400,000. The readership of my blog and I suspect (with respect) the blogs that covered the story would not combined amount to 1% of that figure for one day’s traffic.

Some comments I come across on blogs, portals and other media ask is there any point to blogs when the comparative readership is so low in many instances.

I do not believe a blog is the PR or marketing answer, which some detractors mock it for not having achieved this status. However, not everyone reads newspapers. Moreover, the traffic that came to my blog, in many cases, was coming to view specific content relating to the fire.
In this case the readership of my blog was highly targeted; they wanted exact information and it was delivered.

Blogs are not the major media channel but in an increasingly fragmented media world they cannot be ignored.

I recently placed an article in a marketing publication for Jim Symcox of Acorn Service, which essentially said, “brands deflect companies from what’s really important: a great service that customers want. Great branding cannot save a company and it cannot make a company.”

It was an well argued interesting article that really went against the grain of the other views expressed but as a society and as marketers we are still obsessed with brands.

Marketing magazine has placed the best loved brands for 2007 as:

1. Google
2. Nokia
3. Amazon
4. Tesco
5. eBay
6. British Airways
7. Coca Cola
8. Persil
9. Heinz
10. O2

And the brands we hate:

1. Pot Noodle
2. McDonalds
3. AOL
4. Sunny Delight
5. Novon
6. The Sun
7. Man Utd
8. The Star
9. 3
10. Irn Bru

Of course there will be some argument on the order: Man Utd at only number 7 for the brands we detest. Surely the methodology must be at fault.

The best loved brands share one common denominator, according to Marketing’s editor they all provide easy-to-use technology.

Interesting.

The identities of those mentioned will be kept intentionally vague to protect someone who should have more knowledge than they do.

I was recently talking to an online search marketing professional and he was relating an episode that shows that the level of knowledge of the online world, within business, is poor. You probably knew that. But it strikes you that there is something drastically wrong if it involves someone that is actively involved in digital media that has a deficit of knowledge.

The online marketing professional had to relate a case study to a fellow digital marketing professional that utilised organic search marketing techniques, such as reciprocal linking and the use of bookmarking sites.

After a thorough explanation, which by his account was described in plain English, the digital marketer was no better informed. The response was, “What about the pay per click?”

The concept of building traffic to a site, and better quality traffic, through another means, was beyond his comprehension. He could only think in narrow terms of reference. For someone that is involved in a field that changes all the time this is a poor sign.

When you have to not only sell yourself, the company and the level of service it makes the task much more challenging when the actual concept / service / product is completely new. And not only that, not even understood.

In such circumstances the professional in question would have to educate the market before the prospect even knew if it is of interest.

In such a scenario the PR and marketing resource will have to accommodate the role of educators as well as promoting the company. This weighs more heavily on resource.

In such instances the chances of a successful campaign to promote the service can be more risky. Not because the product or service is of insufficient value, quite the opposite, but because the PR and marketer have to create the market as well as convince the market that their client has the best offering. It is a big ask for one or two agencies and their marketing resources to undertake.

However, should it be successful the rewards can be worth it.

My future references will be less vague because if the guilty party was named it would be shocking.