Is it that time of year again? Already? It feels like awards season just wrapped, but here we are again.

It’s been a great 2011 so far at Canyon. Business is up 30% – 30%!! – this year over last and we’re continuing to add great Canyonites to our team left and right. In fact, we’re running out of room to put everyone, and we had to expand the lunchroom so everyone had a place to just to sit and relax. (editor’s note: it’s a great problem to have when your lunchroom is just too darn small for all of the great people on your team.)

Not like there’s any time to relax.

We’re bringing new and amazing clients on board while we’re building out with other clients. We’re winning awards – real, big, prestigious Business Marketing Association B2 awards and we’re continuing to do great work, moving the needle for our clients. It’s been a great year for Canyon, and the future keeps looking brighter and brighter.

Back to Awards Season

At Canyon we’ve been building an impressive list of awards for the past 12 years – we’ve been recognized by the IABC, PRSA, TOCA, BMA, AMA, The Business Journals (among others), but we don’t do this for the awards and the recognition. We’re the best at what we do because of the people we work with – the people we hire (our Canyonites), and the clients we work with. We’re all committed to success, and when everyone is on the same page achieving that success becomes a little easier.

It’s always nice to be nominated (and even nicer to win) for awards. And that brings me to my (rambling) point…

Ranking Arizona has released their annual The Best of Arizona voting list, and Canyon Communications has been nominated under 5 categories – Best Advertising Agency, Best Internet Marketing, Best SEO/Social Media Marketing, Best Graphic Design, and Best Public Relations Firm.

So again, while it’s an honor to be nominated, it’d be really cool to win. But we can’t win on our own. We need your help!

Vote for Canyon

If we’ve worked with you and you’re happy, vote for Canyon. If you like our brand strategies and B2B expertise, vote for Canyon. If you like our people (or if you’re married to or dating one of us), vote for Canyon!

You get the picture – vote for Canyon! And it’s really easy, too:

• Visit the Ranking Arizona site
• Select Browse by Category
• Select Advertising/Marketing
• Select Advertising Agencies
• Select “Canyon Communications” and vote
• Then, select Vote for another Company and repeat process for Canyon in the categories of Graphic Design, Internet Marketing, SEO/Social Media Marketing and Public Relations

We’ll keep everyone posted as to how we do, and if we win we’ll throw a big party and invite everyone who voted for us (no, really – we will!). You like parties, right? So a vote for Canyon is a vote for parties!

It’s an honor to be nominated, and we’re proud to be recognized with our fellow nominees on these great lists. But it’d be great to win!

Vote for parties! Vote for B2B expertise! Vote for Canyon!

Did you know that the first online, clickable display ad appeared in 1993 for a now-defunct Silicon Valley law firm? Now, in 2011 display ads are on almost every site we visit and have evolved from a clickable image to formats including video and rich-media. These ads are critical to the success of the internet and have become a cost efficient way to engage your target audiences. Businesses continue to realize the importance of online and the proof lies in the increase of 2010 internet revenue growth to second, only behind TV.  

In B2B, display ads play a critical role in brand awareness and can be used to promote lead nurturing activities. Display ads drive traffic to webinars, support promotions and encourage prospects to download whitepapers and case studies. Like any marketing tactic, success of your display campaign relies on identifying and reaching your target audience with content that connects with them.

Thanks to a fellow Canyonite, I recently discovered Bizo. For those of you who haven’t heard of Bizo, it is a company that specializes in targeting business audiences through display advertising and offers an analytic platform called Bizographics. They analytics provide detailed insight into who is visiting your site by industry, company size, title and more. Bizo allows you to target a specific business audience through display advertising based on the segments you choose to target. Combining display with search will increase reach of your target audience and can increase your search conversion by up to 31% (salesforce.com).

If you have a success story with display ads, share it with us! If you have a favorite display ad, we would love to see it. If you are looking for a way to put display to work for your organization, contact Canyon.

If you read my last blog post, I discussed how Groupon would be extending its brand into traditional advertising, beginning with pre-game spots in the Feb. 6 broadcast of Super Bowl XLV, to add credibility to the Groupon brand and boost top-of-mind recall. Well, I think it’s safe to say that the Super Bowl ads lost major credibility to the Groupon brand and definitely boosted top-of-mind recall, but not in a good way. The group-buying company took a chance with their brand and decided to have some fun with the ads. Unfortunately, very few understood the joke and took offense to the ads. The management of this campaign leads me to believe that Groupon needs some major PR help.     

I came across an article in AdAge that discusses Groupon CEO Andrew Mason’s final decision to pull the ads and Mason’s apology to consumers on the company’s blog. Take a look at what he had to say:

“Five days have passed since the Super Bowl, and one thing is clear – our ads offended a lot of people. Tuesday I posted an explanation, but as many of you have pointed out, if an ad requires an explanation, that means it didn’t work.

We hate that we offended people, and we’re very sorry that we did – it’s the last thing we wanted. We’ve listened to your feedback, and since we don’t see the point in continuing to anger people, we’re pulling the ads . . . .”

The Groupon Super Bowl Controversy does beg the question of the “any publicity is good publicity” style of PR.  There is no doubt, people are talking about these ads, but the type of attention Groupon is receiving is not the attention they were looking for in regards to its brand development. 

I think that Mason’s decision to pull the ads with an apology was a good attempt in saving Groupon’s public image. However, the company needs to put forth a strong PR person at the center of management decision making to avoid permanent damage to their business ambitions for the future. I think the Groupon ad mess is one more reason to integrate PR at the center of business decisions. Do you agree?

What do you think Groupon’s next move should be? Do you think they should just stick to online marketing?

Using materials unique to your project is a great way to stand out. I was reminded of this when I came across this poster created by Anthony Burrill for his Happiness Brussels project. He used actual oil found on the beach in the Gulf of Mexico to create his poster “Oil and water do not mix.” Hopefully this poster will gain some much needed support for this great cause.

His poster got me thinking about other examples I’ve seen of using materials unique to your project: squid inks used on books about the ocean, match heads used to spell out the word love, even Canyon has made advertisements using our client’s actual fertilizer granules (this came complete with a lot of glue and many stuck together fingers—I’m sure the design department remembers fondly).

Best of luck to the project by Happiness Brussels and Anthony Burrill, great work! I want one of the posters.