The gang at Trolman, Glaser & Lichtman law firm in New York get it. Playing against the stereotype of stuffy, humorless law firms kind of makes you want to hire them, doesn’t it?

Can’t see the embedded video? Click here.See also:

• Starbucks’ $11,000 Coffee Maker
• Video: David Pogue Puts Twitter in Perspective (It’s Annoying and Useful!)
• Video: Renny Gleeson on Anti-Social Mobile Users
• Word-of-Mouth on the Half Shell

Steve Ells, founder and CEO of Chipotle restaurants, wants you to know something that most fast food companies try desperately to hide: where their food comes from.

See for yourself in the above video, where he talks openly about “food with integrity” on national TV while standing amidst the very pigs that will some day become carnitas burritos at his restaurants. (Can’t see the video? Click here.)

If that weren’t enough, he went so far as to endorse Food, Inc., a documentary about the sorry state of industrialized food production in the United States. (You can even find coupons for $2 off the price of the DVD at your local Chipotle restaurant.)

This guy is serious. But is it good for business?

You bet it is. The company has seen impressive growth and has plans to expand to around 3,000 locations.

So why does informing people about where their food comes from work for Chipotle?

The main reason, I think, is authenticity.

The marketing strategy here is simple but effective: set high customer expectations and then exceed them.

How many times have you been disappointed by a crappy product or tricked by a bait-and-switch promotion? Several, I’m willing to guess.

After decades of being bamboozled by old-school marketing tactics (hello airlines!), we are starving for good products and honest companies.

Chipotle’s tactic for dealing with this is simple: make exceptional Mexican food by sourcing the best ingredients they can find and then tell you about it, which holds them accountable. That translates into authenticity.

Is Ells the real deal? It’s impossible to know from the outside, but there seems to be no conflict between what customers’ experience and what the company is saying. At least if you like their food.

In my opinion, Chipotle gets it: brands must deliver on what they promise because today’s consumers are savvy enough to know when they are being lied to and connected enough to expose those brands on Facebook, Twitter and other social media.

That should scare most any company into being authentic.

How do you use Authenticity? What other companies use it? Leave a comment or email blog at keithmonaghan dot com.See also:

• A Cup Full of Clever
• The Art of Simplicity
• Help Your Fans Spread The Love
• Reality Check: How Augmented Reality Will Change Your Business

Lots of thought provoking ideas on marketing out there. Here are a few favorites found over my morning cup o’ tea. Enjoy.

• How do you grab the attention of thousands of business commuters at London’s Waterloo rail station? One company uses projected video to play with the lines of the building. Not sure if it increases business but it sure is pretty. Check out the above video. (Can’t see it? Click here).
• 5 Ways to Use Twitter’s List Feature For Marketers - Rohit Bhargava’s take on how to use Twitter’s long overdue (and desperately needed) new list feature. Bottom line: segment like crazy.
• Why Email Remains the King of Internet Communications – Open standards and universal availability mean good ol’ email will be around long after many of the hot Social Media sites bite the dust.
• How’s this for irony? 33% of PR pros see press releases as “a necessary evil”. Ouch. A nice summary from Steve Rubel.
• And finally, something good for the soul. YouTube: How to shoot an anvil 200 feet into the air…

See also:

• You’re a Social Media Expert!
• Is Seth Godin Wrong About Social Networking?
• Social Media Marketing in 30 Minutes a Day
• 10 More Ideas for Free Marketing in Tough Times

“I reject your reality and substitute my own.” — Adam Savage, host, Mythbusters.

Imagine walking down the street and spotting a pair of fancy shoes in a store window. You really like those shoes so you point your cell phone at them. It immediately tells you that a store two blocks down carries the same shoes at a lower price. Cool, you think, so you touch your phone’s screen and up pops a map that guides you, in real time, to the other store where you purchase your awesome shoes, saving a few bucks, and go on your way.

It sounds like science fiction, but it’s not. You can see it at work in the video above in which a phone pointed at the Amsterdam skyline immediately shows which houses are for sale. (Can’t see the video? Click here.)

Awesome, isn’t it? It’s called Augmented Reality and it’s coming very soon to a smart phone near you. In fact, it is available right now for phones running Google’s Android operating system (Layar) and phone maker Nokia is currently beta testing its Point and Find system in the US and UK.

What does this have to do with marketing your business? Everything.

If you’ve paid attention to technology and the web over the years you probably know that you as a business are not in control. You never were. There is no stopping negative reviews online, only dealing with them honestly and head-on. The best strategy is to make a great product and reach out to people who will hopefully spread the word. That’s lack of control if I’ve ever heard it.

The Bad News

Augmented Reality is lack of control on steroids.

Now I can just point my phone at the front of your restaurant and see your reviews and health board rating. No more wasted time digging around on the web to see what others are saying about you. Everything about you now comes to my phone quickly and effortlessly. I can decide on the spot whether or not to eat at your place.

Or I could scan the conference floor with my phone, identify you, and see those embarrassing pictures on Facebook or that nasty twitter fight you had with a customer. I’ll know your dirty little secrets before we ever shake hands. If you’re smart, you’ll look for mine too.

And that shoe buying scenario I described earlier? It’s not possible yet, but it will be very soon. Retailers should be shaking in their boots.

Scary, eh? Sure, but only for the unprepared. And you’re definitely not one of them. Augmented Reality stands to be a very powerful tool in the hands savvy marketers.

The Good News

There is huge potential to engage customers and extend brands with Augmented Reality. Admittedly, the Wow Factor is a major part of the impact these campaigns will make, but I believe that with care they can be developed into highly effective marketing tools. A few ideas:

• Digital ads or promotions that “appear” on the front of your building and are only visible through the screen of a phone.
• Beautiful high-def pictures of your food on the gadgets of passersby when they scan your restaurant (coupons too).
• Give customers who hold your product up to their computer’s web cam special access to exclusive online content like music, e-books and downloads.
• Get people together and talking by providing Social Networking info on local customers who also love your products (opt-in, of course).
• Finally, check out video of Disney and GE’s impressive early efforts with AR on YouTube: Disney’s Nightastic and GE’s Wind Turbine campaign.

Conclusion

Augmented Reality is here and I believe it’s going to be hugely popular in the near future, it’s just not widely distributed yet. But it will be. Now is the time to get ahead of the trend and start thinking about how you can best use it for your product and situation.

After the hype has died down I suspect we’ll find that the best way to use AR to market our businesses is the same as it’s always been: have a great product, be genuine, add value and, most importantly, remember that there are humans at the other end of the technology.

What do you think? How will Augmented Reality affect business? How can it be used for marketing? Leave a comment or email blog at keithmonaghan dot com.

Thanks for reading.See also:

• The Augmented Reality Future is Here
• 5 Steps to Better Marketing
• In Praise of Half-Baked Ideas
• Context Sells: Why Hands-On is the Best Marketing

Good Stuff From Around the Web

Lots of good marketing writing out there despite this being the slow season–end of summer and all. Here are some particularly insightful thoughts found over my morning cup o’ tea. Enjoy.

• Jonathan Salem Baskin asks, “Why don’t we focus on making the conduct of our businesses meaningful and useful, and then structure the marketing communications to deliver that information?” Amen to that. Dim Bulb: True Lies
• Jeremiah Owyang on the impending “ambient intimacy” of appliances, cars and other machines texting, blogging, and tweeting maintenance alerts. Not sure if I’m ready for my refrigerator to text me. Web Strategy: When Appliances, Pets, and Plants Start to Tweet
• Nice piece on the risks of dropping your prices to compete. Bottom line: Think long and hard before giving into the temptation because there may be serious brand-damaging consequences. Are You Dropping Your Prices?
• Another post, similar to Dim Bulb’s “True Lies”, on the benefits of embracing honest marketing for your branding strategy. The Edgy Entrepreneur: Marketing and Telling the Truth
• There is no shortage of Social Media marketing guides on the Interwebs, but this one nicely sums up much of what you need to know. Web 2.0 + Best Practices = Connecting and creating value
• Finally, something good for the soul: 8-year old Emma rocking the house at the 2009 Spring Coffee Shop Jam in Seattle with her song “Snow Day”. Rock on!  YouTube: “Snow Day” by Emma

See also:

• The Sound of Conformity: Beep!
• Context Sells: Why Hands-On is the Best Marketing
• Help Your Fans Spread The Love
• Authenticity Sells: How Chipotle Turns Openness Into Profits

“What’s twitter?”

“Gasp! It’s the latest social networking… micro… bloggy… thingy.

That about sums it up.

From Current.See also:

• Video: David Pogue Puts Twitter in Perspective (It’s Annoying and Useful!)
• Is Seth Godin Wrong About Social Networking?
• Social Media Marketing in 30 Minutes a Day
• Podcast: Blogs and Twitter and YouTube! Oh My!

A great introduction to the insanely popular twitter by technology journalist David Pogue. He puts it this way:

“Is twitter a time drain? Yes. Is it another one of those ego things like How many friends do I have? Yes. It it a fad? Yes. But is it addictive, powerful and very entertaining? Yes.”

That about sums it up. I’d add that it’s especially powerful if you already have some kind of authority or popularity like, oh, I don’t know, a best selling technology journalist.

The rest of us have to work it like a monkey cracking a coconut–banging away at it until something gives.

Definitely worth your time if you want to get up to speed on social media’s current craze. You can watch the video here (sorry, no embed option):

NYTimes.com Video: Twitter – David Pogue answers a few questions about Twitter, a free Web toolSee also:

• Is Seth Godin Wrong About Social Networking?
• You’re a Social Media Expert!
• Social Media Marketing in 30 Minutes a Day
• Video: Twouble With Twitters

A very funny and insightful TED talk from marketer Renny Gleeson about the social sins we all commit with our smartphones. Best line:

“Please, let’s make technologies that make people more human and not less.”

Amen to that.

From the TED web site:

In this funny (and actually poignant) 3-minute talk, social strategist Renny Gleeson breaks down our always-on social world — where the experience we’re having right now is less interesting than what we’ll tweet about it later.

If you can’t see the embedded video, view it on the TED site here.See also:

• 5 Steps to Better Marketing
• You’re a Social Media Expert!
• 10 Ideas for Free Marketing in Tough Times
• Scarcity Sells

From the always interesting TED.com, author Joseph Pine answers the age old question, “What do consumers want?”

Customers want to feel what they buy is authentic, but “Mass Customization” author Joseph Pine says selling authenticity is tough because, well, there’s no such thing. He talks about a few experiences that may be artificial but make millions anyway.

Fascinating stuff and well worth fifteen minutes of your time.

TED: What Do Consumers Want?See also:

• Authenticity Sells: How Chipotle Turns Openness Into Profits
• Help Your Fans Spread The Love
• In Praise of Half-Baked Ideas
• Video: David Pogue Puts Twitter in Perspective (It’s Annoying and Useful!)

Marketing news found while I was avoiding busywork this morning. The first one almost made me laugh tea out of my nose. God bless the Interwebs.

• GPS makers tomtom announced their new model, the XL 340S, featuring the voices of celebrities, including Monty Python alum John Cleese and the A-Team’s Mr. T. Turn here, fool!
• Via the always interesting kottke.org, a fascinating piece from 1960 arguing against roadside billboards. It’s surprisingly thought-provoking. Here’s the background, and the original article, How to Look at Billboards.
• Chocolate sales are a sweet spot in the recession.
• Finally, something good for the soul: World War I re-enacted by dogs. [via boingboing]

See also:

• Don’t Read This, Read That
• Link-o-rama: Good Stuff From Around the Web
• Word-of-Mouth on the Half Shell
• Smart Talk About Marketing