How Creative Are You?

Can one individual be the driving force behind a company's brand, infusing it with excitement and buzz? Well, it's a difficult question to answer, but there is one person who comes to mind. And he offers a lesson for every VAR out there. Meet Peter Weedfald, a high-tech publisher turned technology marketer. He had an extraordinary impact on the brands and channel perception of ViewSonic and Samsung, selling them as more than just display-makers and manufacturers of consumer electronics. He defines savvy, new-age marketing; possesses an uncanny ability to network; and has a flair for leveraging celebrities. Now Weedfald is taking his expertise to Circuit City, one of the nation's largest electronics retailers.

So, why am I writing about him? Because solution providers could learn a thing or two about marketing their businesses by observing this maven in action.

Here's an example. Curtis Sliwa, founder of the Guardian Angels, hosts an incredibly popular morning drive-time radio show in New York. I tuned in recently one morning to hear him talking about--guess who? That's right...Weedfald. Sliwa was bragging about Weedfald's work with Samsung's Four Seasons of Hope campaign, which raises money for various charities; he had generated millions of dollars by enlisting four popular athletes to join the network.

Weedfald had done a similar project at ViewSonic--he was smart enough to find a way to attach the vendors to altruistic endeavors while boosting their brand visibility. In addition to recruiting celebs, he made e-mail his canvas. Weedfald's missives, sent at least once a week, would come directly from his inbox, so they weren't spam. And since he personalized all of his messages, people felt compelled to read them and respond.

How could VARs use some of Weedfald's strategies to get their names out and build their businesses? I do know of one VARBusiness 500 CEO in New York who gets local professional athletes to make appearances at some of the events he sponsors for his customers and partners. He's already borrowing a page from Weedfald's playbook.

Could any solution-provider CEO use the same techniques to circulate news about their company? Or could they post opinion columns at local or national media outlets, waxing on current events affecting the technology arena? Absolutely. Weedfald was able to channel his creative energy at Samsung and ViewSonic. Of course, he doesn't deserve all the credit for polishing the brands' images, but he did have the power to unleash a tsunami of creative marketing ideas. Do you?

Avnet basks in the sunshine of new deal Sun has taken a beating in the past few years over a litany of channel miscues and missed opportunities, but its latest move to expand distribution of its own storage products--and those of recently acquired StorageTek--deserves some applause.

Sun executives aren't admitting as much, but their latest move signals their belief that the company can expand beyond the small cadre of Sun solution providers that have endured beatings more traumatic than those of Joe Frazier at the hands of Muhammad Ali.

Under the recently inked deal, value distributor Avnet will carry not only Sun's storage gear but its servers as well. Undoubtedly, the agreement will test the political adroitness of Fred Cuen, who runs Avnet's computer-distribution business. Cuen's organization has long offered storage lines from EMC, IBM and Hewlett-Packard, in addition to midrange systems from the latter two. Avnet can't afford to cannibalize its critical HP or IBM business, so now it has to grow its Sun storage gear through new customer acquisition.

While the deal does make Avnet more competitive with longtime rival Arrow, which operates the large Sun-oriented Moca unit, it also puts more pressure on disty GE Access, which relies almost exclusively on the Sun line for its revenue. It seems like a golden opportunity for Avnet and Sun.

VARBusiness Trivia Contest

Congratulations to Robert Nitrio of Orangevale, Calif.-based Ranvest Associates. He answered the July 24 trivia question correctly: The first AMD processor was the reverse-engineered 8080A, which ran at 2 MHz and was introduced in 1975. Robert, your prize is on the way. Meanwhile, stay tuned until next issue for another trivia question.

Robert C. DeMarzo is vice president/publisher of VARBusiness and GovernmentVAR magazines.