In today's Brain Storm! Business Podcast, we will review the new Sprint Commercial and what they are doing DIFFERENT from all of the other mobile phone companies, and how we can apply it to our businesses.

Have you seen the black and white, simple commercial from Sprint, telling existing and potential customers that they can come in and have their phone explained to them? Brilliant - they are actually acknowledging that the majority of their cell phone service users have NO CLUE what their phone does, and therefore wouldn't pay to use those services! Nobody wants to buy what he doesn't know exists - so tell them what they are missing in hopes that they will buy it!

The big things I focus on today are the different ways they are marketing. Their choice of going black and white, their simplistic setting and message all reveal their recognition of their most neglected target market - the non-techies. These people are probably like my mom, who only turns on her cell phone when she's out and it's an emergency. That's it. But what if she found out there were cool things to do on her phone? She already spends hours using games on her computer - cause that's the ONLY thing that she can do easily.

What are you doing differently to promote yourself, color and content wise. Are you tailoring your message to your target market, or just trying to look like everyone else? Are you offering the human touch, as Sprint is doing, to make the difference in the sale and in customer satisfaction? Are you reaching out to a new segment of the market who may be a little slower to respond, but whose sheer mass could make the investment of your time very worthwhile?

Just some things to brainstorm about today. If you'd like to brainstorm with me about your own podcasts, the Commercial Creation Center is now offering weekly sessions about what to put in your podcast and how exactly to do it in audio and video. We are also offering monthly how to sessions - all for members only, however. But if you need that accountability and creative brainstorming, as well as simple software to create your audio and video, that's what we're here for!

Penny Haynes, Commercial Creation Center

P.S. remember that the new feed is http://feeds.feedburner.com/brainstormbusinesspodcast, if you want to keep following. This RSS feed's days are numbered! :)

Hello Brain Storm Business Podcast followers - if you are still out there. No, Penny Haynes is not dead - she has just had to switch hats from entrepreneur to geeky programmer for the last several months. Today she has been liberated as the Commercial Creation Center multimedia production software went public. So now I'm back to doing the thing I love to do - like podcasting and learning about business ideas and successes!

Brief review of what has happened over the past 4 months: my programmers abandoned me mid-project, leaving me with promises I had made to others regarding availability. My immediate reaction was to have a panic attack and breathe into a paper bag. My other strategy was not getting out of bed out of sheer terror of what other bad news the day would bring.

But eventually, I had to push myself beyond my fears and pick up the project, re-learn VB6, learn php and mySQL, learn about Active X programs, and learn more about xml. It has been horribly challenging, but in the end, I have to say it was worth it. Now, I have more valuable skills and basically the ability to program whatever the heck I dream of - without hiring someone else. Of course, I do have a "Technical Advisor" whom I refer to as Yoda, without whom I never could have learned as fast, nor could have dealt with the technical support issues. YODA rules!

So today's business podcast is just a quick re-introduction of myself to you, sharing a few lessons learned, and the public intention to return to podcasting now that I have the time to do so. Also, I want you to know that we'll be permanently moving the Brain Storm podcast RSS feed. It will all go through FeedBurner at http://feeds.feedburner.com/brainstormbusinesspodcast. I've had that feed for a while and put the quikonnex feed through it. Now, my new feed is coming off of one of my Online Community Magazines (http://www.AllBusinessMagazine.com) - so I'll assign it to Feedburner.

Well, that's all for today. I'm looking forward to reviewing my stack of business magazines and sharing with you the cool stuff that we can all learn from.

Penny Haynes, Commercial Creation Center & Online Community Magazines

P.S. Combination video made with the CCC: http://tinyurl.com/ccc-creativemom