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April 2006 - Posts

The Chinese invented pasta

Posted Friday, April 28, 2006 4:33 PM by HeatherLeigh
We Americans....we bring you the Pasta Express . Because making pasta is so hard. I predict this little number will be giving the chocolate fountain a run for it's money come holiday season...what do you think? Yeah, me neither. Read More...
7 Comments

Product Naming Matters

Posted Friday, April 28, 2006 9:56 AM by HeatherLeigh
If you have to tell your customers how it say it, your product better be good . That's all I'm saying. Read More...
18 Comments
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I apologize ahead of time

Posted Friday, April 28, 2006 9:26 AM by HeatherLeigh
I guess I never want to be the one to break up a party. I was tagged by Robert Merrill . Now, I am going to have to share the love with 4 other unsuspecting bloggers (whose content I enjoy, because we all know I don't link to people whose content I don't Read More...
10 Comments
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Hot job for Marketing-Savvy Editor

Posted Thursday, April 27, 2006 5:47 PM by HeatherLeigh
I don't often recruit on editor positions, but the hiring manager for this position in MSN contacted me today and asked if I knew of any strong candidates. I'm pretty sure that some of you out there have editorial backgrounds; some of you have even sent Read More...
0 Comments

All the stuff I want to blog about but don't

Posted Thursday, April 27, 2006 2:30 PM by HeatherLeigh
I secretly want to blog about all sorts of things that probably interest me more than they do you. Those of you that have asked whether I blog for fun, you should know that if it was about fun, it would be all about fashion and shopping and college football. Read More...
7 Comments
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Jazzy Quotes

Posted Tuesday, April 25, 2006 7:44 AM by HeatherLeigh
I love these (from Presentation Zen). Why is it that the jazz man/woman is so eloquent? I suspect that it's the combination of the heart and mind that goes into their work. We should all be so inspired: “You can play a shoestring if you’re sincere.” -John Read More...
5 Comments
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Eat it!

Posted Monday, April 24, 2006 5:25 PM by HeatherLeigh
What do you do when your company accidental sends out hundreds of thousands of $4 checks to it's customers? Seriously, what else can you do? Just eat it. Though I suppose it depends on the size of the company and their marketing budget (but I'm guessing Read More...
4 Comments
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Speaking of the quest for green-ness

Posted Monday, April 24, 2006 8:13 AM by HeatherLeigh
Microsoft's Silicon Valley campus goes solar At least they have found something to do with that annoying sunshine (ahh, just kidding. We had a beautiful sunny weekend here as well) Read More...
5 Comments

"Excuse me sir, did I just kill my lawn mower?"

Posted Sunday, April 23, 2006 12:05 AM by HeatherLeigh
This was enough to give a lawn-maintenance freak like me heart palpitations. I'm one of the weirdos that is accused of loving yard work, but really I hate yard work; I just love having grass that looks like carpet. If it wasn't for Jonas, I'd roll around Read More...
13 Comments
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Life is strange

Posted Friday, April 21, 2006 4:25 PM by HeatherLeigh
In a good way. 1) Our head of staffing just started his own internal staffing blog. 2) We just got e-mail that our head of HR (that's our SVP, folks) is stopping by our building tomorrow (edit: oops, I meant Monday....note to self: don't blog last thing Read More...
9 Comments
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An answer to the question "what Microsoft teams sit in the Silicon Valley office?"

Posted Friday, April 21, 2006 3:20 PM by HeatherLeigh
is here. Of course I'm happy to get your resume to the recruiting team based there, if you'd like. Read More...
7 Comments

How to find a contact name inside a company

Posted Friday, April 21, 2006 2:52 PM by HeatherLeigh
Here's a good post , by Liz at the Social Networking Blog, about how to find contacts within specific companies. A couple things I would add: 1) do not *ever* use just one search engine. Different engines deliver different results. Yeah, yeah, go ahead Read More...
21 Comments

Ozzie impact

Posted Thursday, April 20, 2006 3:39 PM by HeatherLeigh
Here's another article on Ray Ozzie's impact on Microsoft . Here's why I'm a fan: "Ray really starts with the customer," says Windows and MSN boss Kevin Johnson. "He looks at things 'outside in,' as he says, not technology-out." Yeah folks, that's what Read More...
5 Comments

How important is self-awareness in the interview?

Posted Thursday, April 20, 2006 2:50 PM by HeatherLeigh
You've heard of the interview question "what's your greatest weakness?", so you know there must be some interest in this self-awareness thing when it comes to interviewing. Self-awareness is important in interviews, sometimes it's more important than Read More...
17 Comments

What if we all had to adopt a weather-person name?

Posted Tuesday, April 18, 2006 6:35 PM by HeatherLeigh
Ever wonder if weather people are actually born with names that denote environmental conditions? Like weather-person Dallas Raines? They insist that those are their real names. Alrighty, whatever you say. Wouldn't it be interesting if we all had to come Read More...
16 Comments
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Entertaining Tech Support

Posted Tuesday, April 18, 2006 7:48 AM by HeatherLeigh
I had to call help desk yesterday. Seems I had neglected to install some updates so I was having trouble accessing the network from home. I was connected to a very nice man we will call "Bob", mostly because his name is Bob. Did you know that help desk Read More...
8 Comments
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MSN tells you to play video games at work

Posted Friday, April 14, 2006 12:40 PM by HeatherLeigh
Go ahead, it's good for you. Just have this link to the Pause2Play initiative availble for when your boss catches you. The doctor told me to. Read More...
9 Comments

What does awesome look like on a resume?

Posted Friday, April 07, 2006 9:31 AM by HeatherLeigh
I met with a Marketing GM, Keith White, and his recruiter, Allison, this week to discuss putting together an invitational recruiting event for their team, which is responsible for outbound (audience) marketing. Usually, when I end up strategizing a recruiting Read More...
84 Comments

Coffee Coke: for reals?

Posted Thursday, April 06, 2006 5:53 PM by HeatherLeigh
Unfortunately, yes . OK, admission time: I've tried coffee flavored beer. Two great tastes that taste bad together. Ooh, I'm getting that pre-barf salivating sensation. Coffee ice cream? Yes! Coffee Liqueur? Yum! Double tall, sugar free vanilla non-fat Read More...
33 Comments

Small businesses and competing with Wal-mart

Posted Thursday, April 06, 2006 8:28 AM by HeatherLeigh
NPR's "All Things Considered" piece on Wal-mart opening 50 new stores in urban areas and offering seminars to small businesses on competing with Wal-mart. It will be very interesting to see how this is received. I suspect that it may be perceived as disingenuous Read More...
9 Comments
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There is such a thing as a free lunch but nobody cares

Posted Thursday, April 06, 2006 8:11 AM by HeatherLeigh
I have to laugh when I get e-mails offering a "free lunch" in the context of some kind of product demo. It's the time-share presentation of the technology age. They try to lure you in with lunch so they can get some of your time to review their products. Read More...
8 Comments

American Idol I don't get, but this I get!

Posted Tuesday, April 04, 2006 12:29 PM by HeatherLeigh
I can't tell you how many people have asked me whether I watch American Idol (I don't...really don't like it). But I sure was a fan of Rock Star: INXS (despite Brook Burke and her kind of stiff presence and the weirdness of those INXS guys...how come Read More...
8 Comments

GM: Viral Advertising Gone Awry?

Posted Tuesday, April 04, 2006 11:24 AM by HeatherLeigh
GM invited people to make their own Chevy Tahoe TV ads over on chevyapprentice.com . Lots of the ads are anti-Chevy, anti-SUV. Really, this raises a number of questions like "does GM understand viral marketing?" and "just because it's viral, does it mean Read More...
30 Comments
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Start-up position at Microsoft?

Posted Tuesday, April 04, 2006 8:35 AM by HeatherLeigh
Last week I was reminded that amidst all my ramblings about peanut butter and carbohydrates, I'm generally expected to slip in some stuff about marketing jobs at Microsoft (I think that is how Gretchen put it). She likes that this blog isn't "all business". Read More...
6 Comments

Weird but good

Posted Monday, April 03, 2006 1:09 PM by HeatherLeigh
Every once in a while I find a product that feels like it was made just for me. I tend to be a bit of an experimental shopper. I like to try new things. Also, lately, I've become a little bit of a peanut butter junkie...now all our British friends, gag Read More...
15 Comments
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I'm a Microsoft Blogging Poster-Child (pun intended)

Posted Monday, April 03, 2006 11:52 AM by HeatherLeigh
Over on BtoBOnline, Paul Gillin writes about my blogging efforts . I think that much of what he describes as the positive effects of blogging for Microsoft are cumulative...there are 2000+ of us doing it, though most are not in marketing. My marketing Read More...
2 Comments

What's worse than bad e-mail marketing?

Posted Monday, April 03, 2006 10:14 AM by HeatherLeigh
Overzealous, premature bad e-mail marketing: From: Amazon.com [mailto:promo-core@amazon.com] Sent: Monday, April 03, 2006 7:19 AM To: Heather Hamilton Subject: [placeholder for winning team] Wins the NCAA Tournament! Dear Amazon.com Customer, Congratulations, Read More...
11 Comments
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