It's Official...GM Is DUmping Pontiac?

One of our nations oldest corporations crumbling is terrifying for our countries economic place in this global market.

General Motors Corp. (GM) said Monday it will cut 21,000 hourly jobs and eliminate its Pontiac brand by the end of next year as part of a stepped-up restructuring plan.

The auto maker will also start an exchange offer for $27 billion of its unsecured public notes as the company looks to become viable, saying a successful exchange offer would allow it to stay out of bankruptcy court.

GM, which is surviving on federal loans, is racing to restructure by June 1 under close ...

‘Virgin Money’ Puts Financial Power Into The Hands Of The People

I don’t know how I missed this, but Virgin has launched a financial services company that takes all the lending power of banks and puts it in the hands of people’s friends and family. Virgin Money will act as intermediary for home mortgages, student loans, small business loans and the like. I suppose the plan is to snag back control of the financial markets from greedy bureaucrats and day traders and give the American people a chance to continue their financial lives without fear that they are behind a curtain while financial whiz kids rob them of their retirement funds.

While they timing may seem off, I’ve been saying innovation wins out, businesses need to start to reignite this economy, and education is the tool to taking our workforce to the next level. Personally, I normally shy away from mixing business with friends/family, but I think this is a time period where people are looking for someone to trust in their financial circle, and who better than their loved ones.

Bottom line, Richard Branson has the Midas touch, and I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt on this venture. From his own mouth:




Hello, and welcome to Virgin Money.

When I first started out in the record business, and was struggling to get by, my Aunt Joyce was kind enough to give me a small loan. That loan kept the Virgin Records recording studio afloat. It gave me the time and resources I needed to make my business a success. And many years, and many business ventures later, I still have her to thank.

So, obviously, loans between family and friends are very close to my heart. That's why I was intrigued by the team at CircleLending and their innovative approach to finance. And why I wanted to bring them into the Virgin family and help them launch Virgin Money in the United States. Like all Virgin companies, Virgin Money believes in getting customers a better deal. With money from family and friends, you can pick your own interest rate and loan terms to fit your situation. Rather than giving interest to a bank, you can keep it in the family – often adding up to thousands of dollars of savings.

The good people at Virgin Money have managed more than $300 million in loans. So there are few better suited to help you do these loans properly. They know how to manage these loans in a smart manner so you can stay close to your loved ones. They also help you get tax savings that would be silly to pass up.

In the coming months, Virgin Money will be bringing you new products such as a student loan for college. Sometime soon, we'll also be helping you get bank loans – but with a friends-and-family twist that gives you a better deal than any other lender can offer you. We want to change the face of money – and we want you to join us. And I promise we'll have a little fun along the way too.

Cheers,

Richard Branson

Marketing Has Trained Me To Be An Optimist

In the under- statement of the century, I’m generally sarcastic and wry. While it doesn’t always really affect my mood, it’s a skin I’ve developed to help keep myself entertained and humbled, (sarcasm allows you to constantly turn humor back onto yourself).

In the face of a struggling economy, stock market and the “new economy,” I’m truly flooded with jokes about the failures of current presidential administrations, economic policies that are laughable, and the general panic of the financial media. But I bought stocks last week. First time in about 7 years. And I did it because of marketing.

I bought Deutsche Telecom, owner of T-Mobile in the wake of the G1 arrival news. On a personal level, I think the phone is rather basic and is just an iPhone competitor, nothing revolutionary. But I genuinely believe it has the potential to take digital advertising to the next level. As TV and print budgets continue to get cut in the coming year or so, that money will continue to come online and whether we like it or not, it’s going to partly go to Google. Search continues to make up 40% of most online budgets, and with mobile search taking off, the G1 is going to send millions of searches to Google a day.

Did I drop the bank on DT stock and plan my retirement around it? Of course not, but I did feel I was playing my part in keeping this economy moving forward, and not yanking all my money because that is how the market crumbles. I felt it was symbolic to place some trust (and funds) into companies that are looking to grow in this time period, and online advertising companies are at the top of that list. Granted we are in a bit of a cocoon because major brands will always spend advertising dollars, and right now online happens to be the least expensive medium. And it’s growing. Online opportunities are not going backwards, they are going forward.

Maybe it’s selfish to be thinking solely for my own industry, company, colleagues etc., but I think we are going to be ok as a whole in this country. I think things will stabilize in time and I think we will all find ways back on our feet.

Bottom line, I think their is a right time and place for everything, and digital advertising is poised to support lotsof dollars in the coming year.

Poptent Crowdsources For Best Creative

Awhile ago, I wrote an article about crowdsourcing and the affect it will have on our industry. Today TechCrunch contributor Jason Kincaid broke the below story about Poptent, who’s business model is built on the idea of crowdsourching. Poptent is an unbelievably cool product that could very seriously impact the way we look at developing creative. Personally, I think it’s a fantastic business model that can provide a fantastic resource to pure media agencies, as well as prove to be valuable to some of the larger agencies who may be looking to cut costs in the “new economy.”

Poptent Lets Brands Crowdsource Advertising On The Cheap

Poptent , a startup that crowdsources advertising to the public, has just launched in public beta. The site allows advertisers and brands to post requests for an ad, which are then produced and submitted by the pool of small studios and videographers that make up the site’s members. Poptent is a sister site to XLNTads (also launching today), which focuses more on the brand marketers rather than video creators.

Poptent CEO Neil Perry says that while Poptent is designed to encourage submissions from its thousands of members, it isn’t going for the “YouTube crowd”. Instead, it’s focused on catering to small but professional teams capable of producing TV-quality ads.

To participate on the site, advertisers pay Poptent a fee of around $25,000, and then post guidelines as to what they’re looking for, along with assets like company logos. Poptent members then film and submit their ads to the site. If an advertiser finds an ad they like, they can purchase it for around $5-7,500 (oftentimes they will purchase multiple ads at once).

A Response to 'Innovation vs. "New Economy"'

I received some interesting feedback to the last post titled, "Innovation vs. "New Economy."  One comment provided an interesting historical perspective on the staggering economy, and situations we've faced before.

Thanks to guest poster "Chuck" for allowing me to use his comment as a post:

We seem in the US to go from point A to point Z, find ourselves in economic trouble, and then wonder how we got there. what happened to points F or J.....at Z already? Well, it takes time and more than a few individuals from a few different administrations. 

We have economic crashes every few years always precipitated by an economic 'event' dreamed up by some Wall Street brainiacs. And they can dream up these schemes because Wall Street lobbyists have managed to tear down yet another system safeguard by sending some Congressman's daughter to Harvard or some such perk.

The last vestiges of the regulatory patches to the famous market crash of 1929 were eliminated in the past 15 years....that's a few adminstrations. The Community Redevelopment Agency was mandated in the late 1990's to help lower income folk get homes. The sub-prime Wall Street geniuses of the early 2000's finished that job....and all of us.

The REAL devil in all of this latest upset remains the hoaried Standard & Poor's rating service. As old as Wall Street itself, S&P was supposed to be the last defender of the good and true. Absolutely everything that has happened in the mortgage mess could have happened without it being a world-wide phenomenom. Mortgages could have gone under, mortgage companies could have failed, people that invested in those investments could have lost a bit. And it would have been localized as this business and investment area had always been.

What spread the infection world-wide was good old S&P being convinced, for $15 million a pop, was that this garbage was worthy of a AA rating, almost up there with good old US Treasury paper. So for every billion dollar mortgage-bond package rated, they got $15 million and their rating allowed the packages to be sold world-wide.

And that's why the Italians and French and everyone else are suffering from lousy mortgages in Arizona and Texas....

And that's why 

Innovation vs. “New Economy”

The economy sucks! Our financial system is crumbling due to faulty government intervention and uncontrolled spending. Recession is looming.

That was the last you will hear of me rant about the “down” economy, because negativity is only going to get us so far. From this moment forward, it is now the “New Economy” in my mind. I’m completely over what has happened in the past, and am looking forward to a new White House, and a new economic system to tackle the mess we are in now.

So how will this “New Economy” affect the world of start- ups? I am a firm believer that innovation will ALWAYS win out. That isn’t necessarily a prescription for guiding the next 6 months of change, but creativity and smart business people will always find a way to shake up a stale business period.

It’s no secret that green ventures and biotech will continue to grow. From both a social and economic perspective, these are business channels that are both in need and have potential for development. Outside of those categories, a new business will need to show solid plans for revenue generation, which may seem tough over the next 6 months. However I do truly believe that originality can prevail. And I believe there is always space for an idea that is either brand new, or is a modified version of something everyone takes for granted.

The online ad space will be a very interesting place for investors. The double edge sword of marketing is that ad budgets are the first to be cut in an economic downturn. However, it also means that offline dollars get shifted online where rates are cheaper and accountability is more prevalent. Web start-ups should theoretically be flourishing in this “New Economy” because you will be hard pressed to find a middle tier advertiser looking to spend $2 MM in television for 5 thirty second spots. That same budget can be taken online and be diversified over the course of a few months. And it can go towards emerging media channels, like mobile, online video, social media, etc. Places where consumers are turning for their most prized content.

All in all, I’m legitimately excited to see where the next 6 months take us. in terms of venture capital dollars, the economy as a whole, and for emerging media, there will be lots of changes and I’m interested to see it all play out.