In a post at his Web Ink Now blog, David Meerman Scott says that one of the best ways to generate exceptional marketing content for the Web is to hire a journalist. His prime rationale is that they are often attuned to the content an audience wants to see.

Scott cites this video by Neighborhood America's Kathy Boyd, formerly an on-air reporter for a Fox affiliate in Florida, as a terrific way to present a case study. Styled like a news report—and remarkably free from marketing overkill—the two-minute piece details an interactive mobile messaging campaign for Adidas during the 2007 NBA All-Star Week in Las Vegas.

Voiceover narration posits the challenge: "In a city that never sleeps, how does a company like Adidas capitalize on the opportunity to connect customers to their brand, create a buzz and generate more revenue if people are always on the move?" The video proceeds to explain, and show, how the campaign worked. It waits almost until the conclusion to mention that a local Adidas store saw business soar to 20 times the sales it recorded on an average day. Writes Scott, "Note how different this approach to a case example is [when] compared to most written case examples that are either a) dreadfully boring or b) prattle on about the product or c) both."

"Journalists (print or broadcast) are great at understanding an audience and developing information that buyers want to consume," says Scott. And we think there's plenty of Marketing Inspiration in that concept.

More Inspiration:
Jeanne Bliss: Visa—Pavlov Would Be Proud
Leigh Duncan: FREECONOMY
Ted Mininni: Caffeinated Candy: What's Next?

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