While preparing for this blog post I was looking to find a ‘Marketing Blog’.  I have intentionally put this in quotations as the concept of a marketing blog was something quite foreign to me.  Fortunately, I did not have to search long to stumble upon Seth Godin’s ‘All Marketers Are Liars‘ blog.  At first I read his General Blog and was instantly intrigued, but although ‘Talker’s Block‘ was an insightful post, this did not quite seem to fit the bill of a marketing blog.

Luck seems to strike the same place twice, or at least it seemed so on this occasion, as on the left hand-side of the website there were links to other blog done by Godin in the archives, the one that caught my interest, mentioned previously, was his ‘All Marketers Are Liars‘ blog.  The title alone seemed to be suitable and the article ‘The iPod isn’t a Pod‘ spoke out on the ‘creativity’ or lack there of by the Apple corporation with their products.

His argument and main point of the article was to go after the lack of innovation while naming Apple’s new product, at the time this blog was published, the iPad.  He suggests that the name makes the iPad appear useless in the market, he writes, “We already have the “i” part, and we don’t value the Pad part.”  I agree with Godin, as I have never had a need or want for a pad and feel that the name, iPad, deterred me off the product from the beginning.  There are many benefits about the iPad that help to make life easier and entertaining, but I am in no rush to add a ‘pad’ to my life any time soon.

Interesting thought on the name, iPad

My name is Blake and this is my blog.  Before I get into the Marketing side of my blog I will first introduce to you Blake Matthew Trelawny Henley (That’s me!).

I grew up in Richmond, where I went to school at Westwind Elementary and then later at Steveston Secondary (Now called Steveston-London).  After graduating in 2008, I went to the University of Victoria, to study general courses while soaking in the University campus experience.  After finishing my first-year at UVic I decided to transfer to UBC with the goal of getting into Sauder.  I took second-year Arts at UBC and after failing to get into second-year Commerce I decided to take a gap year to work, but more excitingly travel.

During my year away from school (2010/2011), I was hired on with a Point of Sales company called Eigen Development as a Project Coordinator.  After a couple months at work I set off for Southeast Asia on a whirlwind journey that took me throughout numerous countries that included: Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia.  This ended up being the trip of a lifetime that lasted 94 days.  One of the major highlights during the trip on a personal level was getting accepted into Sauder while in Singapore.  My adventure abroad led straight back into work, where I joined back on with Eigen until June.  In June, I went to work at Anvil Island Daybreak Point Bible Camp as the Head Lifeguard.

This leads me to now, back into the mix of school with a shift a week at Eigen.

On to the Marketing side, I am taking this course to help broaden my view of business in addition to helping me determine which area I want to specialize in for third and fourth year business.  In the field of marketing my experience is mostly on the consumer side, where I have participated in purchasing products since I cannot remember.   My day-to-day life as a consumer extraordinaire can be challenging, but through many purchases; smart ones, pointless ones, impulse ones and regrettable ones, I am learning to be more market savvy and aware of the marketing aspect of business and my life every day.   My favourite commercial in recent memory is the ‘Magic Ball‘ Doritos commercial from the 2009 Super Bowl (Video below).  The commercial was rated as the most liked of the Super Bowl and surprisingly costed less than $2,000 to make by two guys who were not even from an ad agency.  If you want to read more on the side-story that comes with this commercial read this, a great article done by USA Today on it.

Finally, something about me that I would be comfortable sharing with everyone in the class… I enjoy baking cookies.