Japan's Dentsu Network Acquires Mitchell Communications Group ...

Mitchell Communications Group Inc. of Fayetteville has sold to Dentsu Network, a Tokyo-based company looking to expand its global operations into public relations.

Dentsu targeted Mitchell Communications, whose clients include Walmart Stores Inc., Sam?s Club, J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Tyson Foods, and Southwestern Energy, as its first PR company acquisition.

Mitchell Communications will keep its headquarters in Fayetteville.

"Mitchell Communications Group has built an exceptional reputation as a thriving midsize firm in the public relations industry for its work with some of the most iconic national and global brands," Dentsu Network CEO Tim Andree said in a news release announcing the acquisition. "Their integrated services offering and singular focus on creating solutions for clients across the enterprise have been major drivers in their rapid growth over the past five years.

"They are just the kind of innovative agency we were looking for to help us highlight the increasing importance of public relations to leading global brands. By acquiring Mitchell Communications, we intend to build out a full-service offering to benefit Dentsu clients globally that now includes public relations."

Mitchell Communications, which reports more than $13 million in revenue last year, has 75 full-time employees with 20 project employees in 14 states. CEO Elise Mitchell, who launched the firm in 1995, has been named to the executive team/operating committee of Dentsu Network. She?ll remain as CEO of Mitchell Communications, reporting to Andree and help build the company?s global efforts.

Sarah Clark, currently the executive vice president and chief strategy officer for Mitchell Communications, will become president.

"We?re excited to join the No. 1 agency brand and fastest growing agency network in the world," Mitchell said. "We?ve been fortunate to experience rapid growth ourselves, and we?ve significantly expanded our capabilities to serve client needs. Becoming a part of Dentsu allows us to offer clients even greater resources and access to innovation, technology and a global presence while maintaining our unique agency culture and intense entrepreneurial spirit.

"It will be a privilege to work with Dentsu going forward to continue serving Mitchell?s clients to the best of our collective abilities, and to attract other agencies to join the Dentsu global public relations network."

Mitchell Communications, named by Arkansas Business as 2010 Mid-Size Arkansas Business of the Year, has gained national attention for its rapid growth. Most recently it was named the 2012 Small Agency of the Year by The Holmes Report and was named among Inc.?s fastest growing companies in 2011 and 2012.

Dentsu Inc. has headquarters in Tokyo and Japan with offices in 29 countries. The company has been in operation 111 years and the company describes itself as ?a leading innovator in the ways people, ideas, technology and business converge.?

Source: http://www.arkansasbusiness.com/article/89962/tokyo-based-dentsu-network-acquires-fayettevilles-mitchell-communications-group

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Thumb drive-sized GameStick console launching in April

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7 days

Winda Benedetti , NBC News

The holiday shopping season is officially over?and that means the spasm of big game launches is over as well,?right? Well, no. In some ways,... Read more

2 hrs.

Winda Benedetti , NBC News

It looks like the Kickstarter-funded, Android-based, affordably priced game console known as Ouya has some competition.

Yes, it seems there's another Kickstarter-funded, Android-based, and?even-more-affordably priced console coming to town. It's called the?GameStick and???like Ouya???it is due to arrive in?April.

As the new year rolled in, PlayJam???a company that produces casual?games for mobile devices and digital TVs???launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund GameStick, which it calls "the most portable TV games console ever created." PlayJam asked for $100,000 in funding so it could ship out the first batch of GameSticks by April. But that goal has already been?surpassed, with?1,674 backers?pledging?more than?$164,000.

Like Ouya, the GameStick is made to bring Android?games??? originally?designed for smartphones and tablets???to your home TV screen.?The 2-inch?gadget, pictured above, is about?the size of a USB stick and plugs into the HDMI slot of any TV. It also fits inside its own controller for extra portability. And PlayJam says the price will be small as well???$79. (The small, cube-shaped?Ouya is priced at $99)

"For the first time ever, it puts big screen gaming directly in your pocket," PlayJam CEO Jasper Smith, explains in the Kickstarter pitch. Smith also says that the operating?environment will be entirely open to developers big and small (also like Ouya's).

The GameStick runs on?Android Jelly Bean, uses an Amlogic 8726-MX processor, has?1GB of RAM and?8GB of flash storage. It also includes?integrated Bluetooth and Wi-Fi and?comes with a Bluetooth?controller that the GameStick itself can fit inside of?for portability. Additionally, the?GameStick can support up to four controllers for multiplayer games.

Though the GameStick isn't mean to play the kind of big AAA games you'd play on an Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3,?PlayJam says it has identified 200 mobile?titles that can be?played on your TV using?GameStick . The company?says it's working with more than 250 developers to create more?games for the gadget when it launches. As is the case with smartphone and tablet games, the average GameStick title will cost just a few dollars and many will be free, according to PlayJam.

The device is currently in the?closed Beta phase of development. But there is still plenty of time to support the GameStick cause if?you like the idea. Check out the Kickstarter page here.

Winda Benedetti?writes about video?games for NBC?News. You can follow her tweets about games and other things?on Twitter?here?@WindaBenedetti?and you can?follow her?on?Google+.?Meanwhile, be sure to check?out the?IN-GAME?FACEBOOK PAGE?to discuss the day's?gaming news and reviews.

Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/ingame/thumb-drive-sized-gamestick-console-launching-april-1B7822275

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Taking Advantage Of Facebook Offers - Marketing Land

We?ve talked at length about the importance of engaging your Facebook community beyond simply acquiring fans. Page Post ads are a great way to encourage this interaction. If you?re a retailer, consider Facebook Offers, a relatively new type of Page Post that allows brand pages to create coupons and share them exclusively on Facebook.

Offers can be beneficial to businesses both on and off Facebook. On Facebook, you can spread the word about your product or service to your fans, as well as to their friends. At the same time, you?re driving traffic off Facebook to your store or website and getting Facebook users to become actual consumers of your product. It?s a great way to see in real-time what your Facebook presence is worth.

What Is An Offer?

A Facebook Offer is a coupon created and shared exclusively on Facebook. Admins can create these Offers on their Page, and Facebook users can then claim the Offer to use at a business via an email confirmation.

Offer ads act like Page Posts, in that they live on the Page?s Facebook wall and can be promoted via Page Post Ads. When customers claim your Offer, stories about this redemption will appear in the desktop and mobile Newsfeed. You can also pay ?to promote the story to even further increase its reach and potential for claims.

Offers allow business owners to reach and engage with potential customers in the hopes that the coupon will encourage them to become actual customers.

How To Create An Offer

Offers are available to most Pages; simply visit the Content Creator box and select Offer. You can choose whether your offer is claimable in store, online, or both, and you can set?an image, headline, redemption code, terms and conditions, expiration date, and any targeting restrictions.

As always, eye-catching images and engaging text will advance the success of your Offer. Be very clear about what the Offer is: calling out dollar amounts or percentage off will do well. Make your expiration date and claim numbers reasonable, and the means of claiming, in-store or online, easy.

If you?re planning to run your Offer for an extended period of time, consider periodic creative refreshes to keep the post fresh. Try a new image or copy and see if those changes have a significant effect on the number of Offer claims.

Once you?ve set all the parameters for the Offer, you can select your method of promotion. Facebook has two options: to set a simple lifetime budget and let Facebook do all the work, or to promote later using another ads tool. The first method is more than sufficient for a first time poster who just wants to get the Offer seen by a number of people.

However, if you?re interested in targeting your offer to a specific group, or evaluating performance of different demographics or keywords, you?ll want to promote later. This will allow you to create your own customized ads for the Offer, being as specific as you see fit.

How To Promote An Offer Via Ads

Once you?ve chosen to ?promote later,? your Offer will remain un-posted on the page until you?ve created the first ad. This gives you the opportunity to design your ad strategy before the Offer has been claimed.

Promoting the Offer means you?ll be able to get your offer out to more potential customers. You can also learn a great deal about whom those customers are. Although (as with all FB ad types), you won?t be able to see which individuals claimed your offer, you?ll be able to see what types of people claimed it, based on the targeting you?ve set up.

As we said, Offer ads function in the same way as Page Posts. The content of the ad is pulled directly from the Offer (image and text), and you can run both standard ads and Sponsored Stories. The Offer ad will also highlight the number of people who have claimed the Offer.

The aspect advertisers have control over is targeting, choosing who will see the ad. As always, think about the type of Facebook user who will be interested in your Offer and what his or her interests might be. Fans are the most obvious choice, having previously expressed an interest in your brand or product. Take advantage of these users by targeting them heavily.

Geographic targeting is often important, as well. If the Offer is only claimable in stores, you?ll want to limit the ads to those areas that could feasibly use it. If the Offer is for a clothing or jewelry store, consider running your ads toward females and retail-specific keywords. An Offer for a food product would benefit from targeting fans of other similar restaurants or cuisines. You?ll learn only as much as you?re willing to put into it, so make sure to test a lot.

Post-Offer

Once the Offer has ended, take time to look at the engagement data and understand who claimed it and why.

If the response was less positive than you would have liked, was it the actual Offer that was unappealing? Or, could your targeting strategy have been more refined? If the Offer was wildly successful, consider making it a regular feature of your page to engage fans and encourage users to come back for more.

Use the demographic and keyword data to inform future campaigns. And, of course, make sure to measure the actual coupons used in store or online to assess if the promotion actually turned Facebook users into customers!

Opinions expressed in the article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Marketing Land.

Related Topics: Facebook Marketing Column | Facebook: Advertising | Facebook: Marketing | Facebook: Offers

Source: http://marketingland.com/facebook-offers-29864

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Study Reveals Best Color for Hot Chocolate Mugs | Daily Coffee ...

The last time you sipped a coffee or espresso drink, what color was the vessel? That matters, as cup color may also affect the perceptions of coffee-drinking consumers.

Two researchers from the Polytechnic University of Valencia (Spain) and the University of Oxford (England) recently tested that theory on hot chocolate, with respondents saying that it tasted better when served in an orange or cream colored cup, rather than in a white or red one. The study adds to recent research demonstrating how our senses perceive food in different ways, depending on the characteristics of the containers from which we eat and drink, they say.

?The colour of the container where food and drink are served can enhance some attributes like taste and aroma,? says Betina Piqueras-Fiszman of Polytechnic University of Valencia (Spain), who led the study along with Charles Spence from the University of Oxford (England).

In the study, 57 participants evaluated samples of hot chocolate served in four different cups of the same size but in different colors: white, cream, red, and orange with white on the inside. While the orange and cream cup got best reports for taste, although the sweetness and the aroma were hardly influenced by the color of the cup.

?There is no fixed rule stating that flavour and aroma are enhanced in a cup of a certain color or shade,? said Piqueras-Fiszman. ?In reality this varies depending on the type of food, but the truth is that, as this effect occurs, more attention should be paid to the colour of the container as it has more potential than one could imagine.?

Author: Nick Brown Nick Brown is the editor of Daily Coffee News by Roast. Contact Nick at publisher@dailycoffeenews.com

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Source: http://dailycoffeenews.com/2013/01/04/study-reveals-best-color-for-hot-chocolate-mugs/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=study-reveals-best-color-for-hot-chocolate-mugs

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This Is Why You Can't Stop Eating, Fatty

High fructose corn syrup is in practically everything we eat these days, and doctors and health nuts have been waxing poetic about its dangers for years. Now, a new study from Yale University School of Medicine may finally prove them the right: fructose is making us fat. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/Ft7E9W6trII/this-is-why-you-cant-stop-eating-fatty

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What the Fiscal Cliff Deal Didn't Solve

The best thing you can say about the New Year's Day fiscal cliff deal is that it's unlikely to hurt the U.S. economy. Unfortunately, it does almost nothing to help it.?Congress may have avoided the "fiscal cliff," but the economic issues that created this situation in the first place are far from being resolved.

RELATED: The Death of a Drugged Pony, a Mayorless Town, and 2013 in Culture

First, let's look at what they did do. The budget bill passed last night raises the top marginal tax rate for people making more than $400,000 a year to 39.6 percent (the level it was under President Bill Clinton); raises the capital gains tax rate for those same people to 20 percent; makes the Bush-era income tax rates, including the?Alternative?Minimum Tax,?permanent?for everyone below that level; raises the estate tax rate to 40 percent (but raises the threshold to only include estates worth $5 million or more); and extends emergency unemployment benefits for one more year. Oh, and it includes an eight-month?extension?of the farm bill, temporarily avoiding an increase in milk prices.

RELATED: Democrats Are Now Pushing Mitt Romney's Tax Idea

All told, these tax changes will raise about $620 billion in new revenue over the next decade. That won't even make a small dent in the annual budget deficit. Those increases also come with no new spending cuts. Rather than reach an agreement on the automatic sequester that was set to happen on January 1, it merely delayed those cuts until late February, right about the time that a vote will be required on raising the debt ceiling.

RELATED: Bono Is Frightened of the Fiscal Cliff

So it's easy to see why, despite averting near disaster, no one is happy with this bill. Here are the other things it doesn't do:?It doesn't actually fix the "cliff," since as we said, billions in spending cuts will still need to be negotiated in the next few weeks?or will take effect automatically without another deal. It doesn't fix the debt ceiling problem, which was one of the President's original conditions for a bargain. A failure to raise the debt limit and thereby force the Treasury into default will do way more damage to the global economy then the cliff would have. That means another showdown?in a matter of weeks?one that Barack Obama vows not to back down from.?(Liberals are trying not?to get their hopes up?on that.)

RELATED: The GOP War Against Grover Norquist

It also doesn't address the payroll tax, which was lowered by 2 percent in 2010, and will now go back up in 2013. It's the one tax that affects nearly every American?(anyone with a job, that is) and will be felt immediately, as take home pay?and consumer spending?will fall with the first paychecks of the year. This is probably the most painful "non-action" taken on the cliff, yet extending that holiday was never even considered by Congress.

RELATED: How Awesome the Bush Tax Cuts Were Supposed to Be (but Weren't)

Worst of all, the deal does almost nothing to actually lower the deficit. All of these budget fights of the last four years have revolved around political calls to lower that nation's debt. The fiscal cliff was created as way out of the last debt ceiling fight in 2011, and was supposed to goad the two parties to strike a real "grand bargain" that would tackle our ballooning debt payments. (Even thought there's little evidence that investors care about our debt or that austerity will actually fix it. If debt was all that mattered, going over the cliff wouldn't have been a problem.) Well, the cliff didn't work, and another debt fight will happen again before the first quarter of the year is even out. We may have temporarily avoided a rather painful austerity crunch, but all Congress really did was put it off a little longer.

Finally, because Congress spent all of its time since the November election fighting over this non-deal, it has?neglected?several other important issues. Late last night, the House refused to vote on a $60 billion relief package?for areas affected by Hurricane Sandy, meaning that much-needed money will not show up?at least until the new Congress convenes later this week. That bill may eventually get worked out,?but it wasn't a good way to end the 112th Congress. Or considering their record-level of inaction and incompetence, perhaps it's the perfect way.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fiscal-cliff-deal-didnt-solve-121920879.html

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New law points to Philippine church's waning sway

MANILA, Philippines (AP) ? Twenty-six years after Roman Catholic leaders helped his mother marshal millions of Filipinos in an uprising that ousted a dictator, President Benigno Aquino III picked a fight with the church over contraceptives and won a victory that bared the bishops' worst nightmare: They no longer sway the masses.

Aquino last month signed the Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Act of 2012 quietly and without customary handshakes and photographs to avoid controversy. The law that provides state funding for contraceptives for the poor pitted the dominant Catholic Church in an epic battle against the popular Aquino and his followers.

A couple with links to the church filed a motion Wednesday to stop implementation of the law, and more petitions are expected. Still, there is no denying that Aquino's approval of the legislation has chipped away at the clout the church has held over Filipinos, and marked the passing of an era in which it was taboo to defy the church and priests.

Catholic leaders consider the law an attack on the church's core values ? the sanctity of life ? saying that contraceptives promote promiscuity and destroy life. Aquino and his allies see the legislation as a way to address how the poor ? roughly a third of the country's 94 million people ? manage the number of children they have and provide for them. Nearly half of all pregnancies in the Philippines are unwanted, according to the U.N. Population Fund, and a third of those end up aborted in a country where abortion remains illegal.

Rampant poverty, overcrowded slums, and rising homelessness and crime are main concerns that neither the church nor Aquino's predecessors have successfully tackled.

"If the church can provide milk, diapers and rice, then go ahead, let's make more babies," said Giselle Labadan, a 30-year-old roadside vendor. "But there are just too many people now, too many homeless people, and the church doesn't help to feed them."

Labadan said she grew up in a God-fearing family but has defied the church's position against contraceptives for more than a decade because her five children, age 2 to 12, were already far too many for her meager income. Her husband, a former army soldier, is jobless.

She said that even though she has used most types of contraceptives, she still considers herself among the faithful. "I still go to church and pray. It's a part of my life," Labadan said.

"I have prayed before not to have another child, but the condom worked better," she said.

The law now faces a legal challenge in the Supreme Court after the couple filed the motion, which seems to cover more ideological than legal grounds. One of the authors of the law, Rep. Edcel Lagman, said Thursday that he was not worried by the petition and expected more to follow.

"We are prepared for this," he said. "We are certain that the law is completely constitutional and will surmount any attack on or test of its constitutionality."

Over the decades, moral and political authority of the church in the Philippines is perceived to have waned with the passing of one its icons, Cardinal Jaime Sin. He shaped the role of the church during the country's darkest hours after dictator Ferdinand Marcos imposed martial law starting in 1972 by championing the cause of civil advocacy, human rights and freedoms. Sin's action mirrored that of his strong backer, Pope John Paul II, who himself challenged communist rulers in Eastern Europe.

Three years after Aquino's father, Benigno Aquino Sr., a senator opposing Marcos, was gunned down on the Manila airport tarmac in 1983, Sin persuaded Aquino's widow, Corazon, to run for president. When massive election cheating by Marcos was exposed, Sin went on Catholic-run Radio Veritas in February 1986 to summon millions of people to support military defectors and the Aquino-led opposition. Marcos fled and Aquino, a deeply religious woman, was sworn in as president.

Democracy was restored, but the country remained chaotic and mired in nearly a dozen coup attempts. The economy stalled, poverty persisted and the jobless were leaving in droves for better-paying jobs abroad as maids, teachers, nurses and engineers. After Aquino stepped down, the country elected its first and only Protestant president, Fidel Ramos. He, too, opposed the church on contraceptives and released state funds for family planning methods.

Catholic bishops pulled out all the stops in campaigning against Ramos' successor, popular movie actor Joseph Estrada, a hero of the impoverished masses who made little attempt to keep down his reputation for womanizing, drinking and gambling.

But few heeded the church's advice. Estrada was elected with the largest victory margin in Philippine history. Halfway through his six-year presidency, in January 2001, he was confronted with another "people power" revolt, backed by political opponents and the military, and was forced to resign.

His successor, Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, styled herself as a devout Catholic and sought to placate the church by abolishing the death penalty and putting brakes on the contraceptives law, which languished in Congress during her nine years in power.

It mattered little. Arroyo's mismanagement and corruption scandals set the stage for Aquino's election on a promise to rid the Philippines of graft, fix the economy and lift millions out of poverty. The scion of the country's democracy icon took power several years after Sin's death, but it was a different era in which the church was battered by scandals of sexual misconduct of priests and declining family values.

The latest defeat of the church "can further weaken its moral authority at a time when this is most badly needed in many areas, including defense of a whole range of family values," said the Rev. John J. Carroll, founding chairman of the Jesuit-run John J. Carroll Institute on Church and Social Issues. He said he wondered how many Catholics have been "turned off" by incessant sermons and prayers led by the church against the contraceptives law, and how much it contributed to rising anticlericalism and the erosion of church authority.

"People today are more practical," said Labadan, the street vendor. "In the old days, people feared that if you defy the church, it will be the end of the world."

___

Associated Press writers Jim Gomez and Teresa Cerojano contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/law-points-philippine-churchs-waning-sway-103407218.html

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