Eric Ungs

As I was relaxing and enjoying the Iowa vs. Penn State college football game over the weekend, I was shuffling through a recent Sports Illustrated issue. To my amazement I stumbled upon an advertisement for the University of Northern Iowa. My initial thought was, Wow! UNI is not messing around during these tough economic times for national advertising. But then I pondered for a minute and came to a consensus that most likely Sports Illustrated is offering a targeted demographic advertising approach through its national publication.

The direct/targeted advertising made my browsing experience create a whole new intimate connection with both UNI and SI.

With SI’s national presence the ad drew me in to feel a sense of connectedness. I was extremely shocked to see this ad, the ad itself is nothing to hype about but the logistics of the full page placement is very powerful. I am not certain how long they have been doing this or if it indeed was a national ad placement, though I doubt it. This type of targeted placement is what the industry needs in a time where content is moving all online. This could definitely buy the magazine and (national) newspaper industry some more time before the unthinkable occurs.

Am I a little late to notice this concept or is this relatively new? Or was this ad placed in all issues?

September 14-21

“Champions aren’t made in the gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them; a desire, a dream, a vision.” – Muhammad Ali

RedBeacon: This site is pretty neat. Ever need your house painted but didn’t feel like doing it yourself? Go to RedBeacon, enter your projects details, and businesses will then compete for your business. Once logging back into your account when notified by Redbeacon it lists out businesses that have given you a bid, also displaying their complete profile. Redbeacon does all of the price quoting and searching for businesses that best suits your project. Check out the video on their homepage.

Media Hacks: Nothing specific here, but I wanted to share with you one of my favorite podcasts — Media Hacks. It’s home is on Six Pixels of Separation by Mitch Joel, who I find is brilliant. He does Media Hacks with several others including; Chris Brogan, Julien Smith, C.C. Chapman, and a couple of other folks discussing new media and personal branding. It’s quite interesting and everyone has their own unique perspective that really gets the gears turning… and sometimes they’re pretty damn funny. You should definitely stop by their site and check it out, I promise you won’t be disappointed.

This post is archived here: www.ericungs.blogspot.com

Trust Agents: Using the web to build influence, improve reputation, and earn trust.
Chris Brogan and Julien Smith

The intro and first chapter gives you a background on who a trust agent is and gives you an outline of what to expect throughout the rest of the book. The second chapter is really where my mind started to take actionable notes.

This is where the motivation, aspiration, passion, and goal setting started to form.

It really got me fired up in wanting to take my brand to the next level. At this time, my online presence is just that, I’m just there in a space with millions of others. Although I have made some connections and established some relationships through online networking, I want to take my brand/product/company to new heights. This chapter gives you that push. This push really sprang into action early on in the chapter when reading the following:

“When you conclude that talent, though not quite a myth, is certainly overrated, you start to realize that you never need to see yourself as below anyone. Instead, you should only believe that you don’t yet have the experience that person does, then find a way to get it.”

Experience and knowledge

Just because and individual has more of these than you do, doesn’t mean you aren’t able to develop those same things, you just need to find a way to get it and exceed it.

Throughout the chapter I set myself a couple of goals; one is to be more transparent and not being afraid of how others may view it. I am genuine, I am authentic, but I need to be transparent. I need to express my opinions, beliefs and thoughts. I need to have insight on what it is I do. I need to be able to point others into the right direction with sound advice. Currently, my blog is more of a ‘review’ based platform and leads readers to different sites. Though I think this is highly beneficial, and still want to maintain this, I need to incorporate my own insights. In short, this chapter really gets the blood flowing and excites you for the rest of the book (which is a good thing right, to establish that early on before a reader gives up).