Spot-on's earned a little media - from a well-regarded industry publication - and we're doing some speaking gigs so we thought we'd spread the word.
This month's issue of Campaigns & Election's Politics magazine has a nice feature on the the Pollie-award winning campaign run by Whitehurst Mosher Campaign Strategy and Media in San Francisco last fall. The "Save San Francisco General Hospital" campaign combined online ad buys with a Facebook application to do some innovative voter awareness.
We talk a lot about that campaign here on the site because we think it's a great model of how online can be used to attract voter attention and interest across a range of online outlets. If you haven't seen the piece, "Mixing Old and New Media" by Mark Mosher you can download a .pdf version here. Or you can read it on the Politics magazine's site here.
As a follow-up, Spot-on Founder Chris Nolan will be appearing on a panel at Campaigns & Election's "The Art of Political Campaigning" conference in Washington, D.C. on Friday. Nolan and her fellow panelist Josh Koster, managing partner of the award-winning and well respected Chong and Koster, are going to talk about how voters can be found and targeted on the web. If you're at the conference, plan to attend!
Team Spot-on is jumping for joy! Two of our clients, JKW Consulting and Barnes, Mosher, Whitehurst Lauter & Partners have had their online campaigns recognized by the American Association of Political Consultants. Both won Pollie Awards! And it was our first year election cycle!
JKW Consulting was recognized for "Best Use of Facebook" for its "Save JROTC" campaign in Novmber. Spot-on built a Facebook "Doorhanger" application to help JKW leverage the Facebook platform to generate real world support for a San Francisco ballot measure on the public school's JROTC program.
"With so many current and former JROTC cadets online, Facebook became a critical part of our effort to organize volunteers and raise money online," said JKW founder Johnny Wang. Spot-on's Facebook 'doorhanger' was an exceptionally effective tool for organizing, communication, and outreach. As voters become more tech savvy and connected, it would be unthinkable to disregard the value of these applications in a campaign."
If you haven't noticed something new about our website then, well, we're doing something VERY wrong. Some of you loyal readers and visitors might have a few questions. So here goes with the answers.
Spot-on has launched an on-line ad buying service - we're calling it Pinpoint Persuasion - to serve a select and demanding group of clients, political consultants and campaign managers. We know they're out there and we know they want to buy ads - hey, who doesn't want to be like Barack Obama? But there's a lot of confusion over where to buy and how to buy. Pinpoint Persuasion aims to clear that up - for all advertisers, regardless of party affiliation, orientation or cause.
For details about what we do and how we're doing it, you can check out two brand new sections of our site. The "About Us" pages give you the low-down on the new team, our skills, background and how to find us. The "FAQ" and "How it Works" pages will tell you pretty much everything you need to know for on-line ad buying.
Our syndication business - the start or our on-line efforts - is no longer our only public face to the world but it remains a strong part of our business and a key element of our commitment to help readers better understand their world. We'll be renovating that section of site later this month, adding some writers, some new features as well as demos and links to our existing (and growing!) editorial clientele.
As always, you have our thanks for reading. And yes, you really should get a copy of our newsletter. If you're an editorial client, click here and we'll sign you right up.
For a few months now, we've been telling you that Spot-on's a syndication service. And we've been saying our writers are available for little or no cash. Today we demonstrate that our talk is not cheap.
Spot-on's pleased to announce the beginning of a syndication relationship with the East Bay Express, a weekly based in Emeryville, CA serving much of San Francisco's East Bay. We started this a few weeks ago - in the quiet holiday season - but the kinks are worked out and we're ready to go public.
And if you edit a news web site, produce a TV or radio show you might think about adding any of our fine writers to your editorial mix. Our syndication fees are reasonable - no cash needed - our writers responsible and our editorial as sticky as fly-paper. Interested? Drop Founder Chris Nolan a line. She's got all the details about pricing, availability and delivery.
We have a few other deals like this in the works as well as other changes in the new year. We'll keep you posted.
Our newsletter - it's free, it's fun and we won't sell your name to anyone - is also a nice way to stay in touch with what we're doing with all phases of our business. You can sign up here.
In a July post from New Delhi, "Living with Terror" Gopika Kaul wrote the following sentence: "This year is proving to be deadly for India - literally."
Yesterday, with a series of violent attacks in southen Mumbai - the city you may know as Bombay - her fears and those of many other India citizens were realized. And while regular Spot-on readers may be shocked by the attacks in Mumbai you are probably less suprised than others. Gopika's been telling us about "India Mujaideen" since mid-summer.
For the past few months Gopika Kaul has been chronicling the growing sense of dread in her country. She's spelled out some of the roots of the conflict between the region's Muslims and Hindus in "It's Happened. Again" and she's wondered, with others, about the Indian police forces responses to the attacks in "A Constant Presence."
A year ago, Christopher Allbritton wrote a smart and prescient piece about piracy, terrorism and the Somali Coast. Today, the international news, a little less worried about U.S. automakers and Obama's cabinet than the U.S. papers, has the capture of a Saudi oil taker on the front pages.
With that in mind, a look at Chris' post "Piracy 2.0: Deadly and Dangerous" is in order. And you bet there's a terror tie-in. What do you think they're going to do with all that oil anyway?
There's more, plenty more, where this came from. If you edit a news web site, produce a TV or radio show you might join us out here ahead of the news curve and think about adding any of our fine writers to your editorial mix. Our syndication fees are reasonable - free in some circumstances - our writers responsible and our editorial as sticky as fly-paper. Interested? Drop Doug Page, Spot-on's syndication guru a line. He's got all the details about pricing, availability and delivery.
Our newsletter - it's free, it's fun and we won't sell your name to anyone - is also a nice way to stay in touch with what we're doing with all phases of our business. You can sign up here.
Every week, eVoter Institute president Karen Jagoda takes to the Internet to talk about technology and politics. The show "Digital Politics" looks at a broad range of issues. This week, it was Spot-on founder Chris Nolan's turn to talk with Jagoda about our recently launched Pinpoint Persuasion ad service.
The show - a breezy hour that also includes a talk with SunRun COO Nat Kraemer - is here. Give a listen.
Like pretty much everyone else out there, Spot-on's writers have spent a bit of time thinking about what an Obama presidency would - could - look like.
So today, we'll give you a short review of who said what.
Matthew Holt, ever the cynic, said that Obama wasn't serious about making changes in the health care system. Judge for yourself if his predictions are still accurate. President Obama's Health Care Head Fake.
Chris Nolan didn't get as excited as some in Silicon Valley when Obama first started talking about a Chief Technology Officer for the U.S. of A. Obama "Gets It".
Kevin Weeks added his voice to Berkeley writer Michael Pollan's insistence that food policy - that's right, food policy - be an action item for the new president. Eating Oil.
And while it's not exactly a column addressed at the new president, Jeanne Jackson had a few observations about how she'd like to see justice meted out for the current financial mess and the folks who caused it. Accountability.
Regular visitors here might notice something a little different about our masthead. It has a new tab "Ad service" that takes you to our Pinpoint Persuasion ad-buying website.
That's right. We're selling ads. Why? Well, because advertising and editorial go together like peanut butter and chocolate. Yeah, it looks funny. But it works great. Just ask Mr. Reese.
And just as Spot-on doesn't offer just any kind of writers, we're not selling just any kind of ads. We're set up to serve a specific market in a specific way. If you run a political campaign, do public affairs or crisis PR, place advocacy ad buys for unions, corporations or non-profits, Spot-on's Pinpoint Persuasion is should be your first stop to evaluate your on-line options.
The site's password protected. So not just anyone can take advantage of the powerful database we've collected. But if you do, you'll see that it includes a long list of established news outlets with demographic information and brief reviews of the sites' editorial and political orientation. Pinpoint Persuasion is THE site for evaluating and plan a campaign's on-line media buys so you can make sure your message is targeted at a receptive audience.
Pinpoint Persuasion goes public today. But we've been ad this ad stuff for a while and have a growing list of clients across the country. Drop us a line and we'll tell you how Spot-on's Pinpoint Persuasion can help you get your message to the right voters and readers.
The right ad, in the right place at the right time. Now that's Spot-on.
A string of bombings in India have everyone's nerves on edge. It's not Baghdad or Beirut, it's a situation - aptly described by Gopika Kaul's that simply unnerving.
Gopika has been writing about the bombings - and their effect on Indians and their relationships with one another - since the violence began. Today is yet another entry and it's a fine, chilling snapshot of life in today's India.
Her two earlier pieces, Living with Terror and It's Happened. Again. are fine examples of the kind of writing - timely and personal - that Spot-on prides itself on presenting.
