Chris Matthews will be a keynote speaker at the 2005 Mid-Atlantic Venture Conference, the Greater Philadelphia Venture Group said Monday.

Matthews created and hosts MSNBC’s “Hardball with Chris Matthews” and is the star of NBC’s “The Chris Matthews Show.”

Matthews will kick off the MAVC’s metting planner programming on Oct. 18. The conference is being held at the Pennsylvania Convention Center Oct. 17 and 18.

Following the address, the MAVC will include presentations by 60 companies seeking venture funding, luncheon entertainment by the Capitol Steps, and a closing keynote speech by celebrity mogul Harvey Weinstein, co-chairman and co-founder of Miramax Films.

Direct marketing turns 50, we should take a moment to salute the moguls: David Ogilvy, John Caples, and many more.

Zain Raj, executive vice president and chief marketing officer of Euro RSCG 4D, will keynote at the 50th annual meeting of the Chicago Association of Direct Marketing, which has “Directing the Future” as its theme.

Jim Sherman, director of direct marketing for the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, will receive the 13th Annual Natalie P. Holmes Volunteer of the Year Award, and Mitch Lieber, president of Lieber and Associates, will receive an award for winning the association’s “Toward the 22nd Century” essay competition.

The event takes place from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Wednesday August 7 at The 410 Club, 410 N. Michigan Ave.

Cost to attend for members and meeting planners is $54 and for non-members $59.

For information, call George Buckley at 312-849-2236, ext. 25, or visit www.cadm.org.

The other week I had the extreme pleasure of speaking to Jeff Bezos and his Amazon team. What an amazing thrill.

We used to be competitors (me as Half.com’s former VP of Marketing that grew Half from zero to 8 million customers)…and tremendously exciting to meet with the one-time foe you respected yet competed against.

In the 90 minutes I spent with him and his Amazon team, it’s clear that Jeff is one of the few CEO’s that gets it from a marketing standpoint. Years ago, he abandoned the conventional path of glitzy Madison Ave style advertising for marketing investments in free shipping etc.

I write about this same “convention issue” in my book, Buzzmarketing. Namley, conventional approaches will produce conventional returns…and nobody I know on Wall Street wants conventional returns.

Jeff clearly has a sense of humor, and intelligent playfulness, which exudes a sense of fun–and in this day and age, we’ve got to have fun at work. A key element for employee buzz (see my chapter 16 in Buzzmarketing).

The overall energy from the group, in turn, brought my energy level up exponentially and could sense that that same energy oozed all the way to the Meeting Planner (Paula Tawney) who treated me like a king.

Speaking is an adrenaline rush for any business speaker, but you find a few gems where that adrenaline rush peaks like no other. Amazon & Jeff…one of those special peaks.

Want to know how effective your marketing is? Hughes suggests that you ask your customers two questions. How did you hear about us? Would you go out of your way to recommend our product to a friend? If they would go out of their way to talk about you, you know you’ve hit it. That’s customer evangelism.

And that’s buzz.

Read More