Gaining marketing experience from scratch: The Rob Shoesmith story (Appolicious)

The growing market for mobile device applications has changed the way some businesses promote products and services to customers, and it has changed another thing too – the way some marketing professionals break into the business. One example is Rob Shoesmith.

Shoesmith got his start marketing mobile applications by promoting an app he conceived, but did not develop. MEDL Mobile, a mobile application design studio based in California, launched the Problem Halved app in 2009, which is a venue for users to enter and help solve a variety of problems. Shoesmith submitted the idea for the app, and dozens of other app ideas, to MEDL Mobile’s App Incubator, which allows anyone to submit ideas for apps.

Shoesmith said it took the company a couple of months to complete its development process, and during that time he spent 30 to 40 hours a week researching media outlets and contacts that might be interested in covering the app, as well as preparing a news release.

However, 29-year-old Shoesmith, a Coventry, England, native who went to the University of Derby for Internet Marketing before dropping out for financial reasons, decided to pitch his story with something other app developers didn’t – his own life story.

Shoesmith was a bin man, or, as it’s known in the U.S., a trash collector. Several outlets picked up the rags-to-riches story of a garbage man turned app marketer, and Problem Halved took off. Today, the app has been downloaded tens of thousands of times, Shoesmith said.

iPhone users weren’t the only ones that noticed Shoesmith’s story. MEDL Mobile has since hired him to work part-time promoting other apps.

“Because I personally had a lot of success with my application Problem Halved a couple years ago, and MEDL saw that I sort of had like a knack and passion for it, they asked me to help out other people in a similar situation to myself to generate media interest, and a buzz about their apps really,” Shoesmith said.

In his work for MEDL Mobile, Shoesmith said he worked with other people that had great ideas for apps, and helped them attract media attention by providing a personal back-story with their ideas. Every app is like its own business, and Shoesmith’s experience promoting his own apps can be applied to others to make them profitable, he said.

Shoesmith said he expects his marketing work at MEDL Mobile to become a full-time position in the coming months. When he first found the App Incubator, he saw it as a way to get his foot in the door.

“I knew that if I went to a marketing or PR agency and said, ‘Look, give me a job,’ with no disrespect to people that do that type of job, I wouldn’t think that I would get to the next stage,” Shoesmith said. “So I thought I’ve got to think a little bit outside the box.”

While his workload increases with MEDL Mobile, Shoesmith said he is also planning a stunt to coincide with the release of the iPhone 5, which has been rumored to release in October. He plans on camping in line in front of the Apple Store in London on Regent Street awaiting the release of the new iPhone. Shoesmith has begun soliciting products and services from companies for his stunt, and hopes to attract significant media attention.

So far manufacturers have sent him a bag for his gadgets, a Paper Jamz guitar and recycled clothes pegs to hang up a line of laundry, he wrote on his blog. Restaurants have agreed to deliver food, a fitness trainer has committed to helping him stay in shape while in line, and a salon has agreed to style his hair.

“The whole point of the experiment really is to see how much free products and media attention I can generate indirectly from Apple, because Apple is such a hot topic of conversation online on tech blogs and in mainstream press,” Shoesmith said. “So I’m just seeing how absurd it can be.”

Shoesmith said he’s going to blog from outside the Apple store. He said he may have a lot of time on his hands, perhaps 48 hours. Shoesmith said he may ask companies to provide entertainment on the streets. He said all the products will be donated to a charity after the experiment.

Shoesmith’s path from bin man to app marketer illustrates an unconventional career path in a cutting-edge technology industry. He pursued his desired profession in Internet marketing by following tried-and-true methods, despite not completing a college degree.

“If people want to change jobs or get into a new vocation, then a lot of it can be self-taught, and you don’t necessarily have to spend thousands of pounds on college education,” Shoesmith said. “Yes, it is useful, but sometimes you do need the practical application of actually going out and doing stuff rather than being shown examples. It’s all well and good to have the theory behind a subject, but it’s the actual doing that makes the idea great.”

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Four agencies propose strict health limits on marketing food to kids

WASHINGTON — Commercials promoting sugary breakfast cereals could be put on a strict diet under proposed government guidelines urging food companies to limit marketing of unhealthy products to children.

Cafeteria workers prepare lunches at the Normandie Avenue Elementary School in South Central Los Angeles in this file photo.

By Mark Ralston, AFP/Getty Images

Cafeteria workers prepare lunches at the Normandie Avenue Elementary School in South Central Los Angeles in this file photo.

Under a proposal announced Thursday by several government agencies, companies would be urged to only market foods to children ages 2 through 17 if they are low in fats, sugars and sodium and contain specified healthy ingredients.

Specifically, the agencies recommend that companies only market foods that have a significant amount of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, low-fat milk products, fish, extra lean meat, eggs, nuts, seeds or beans. Foods that have any trans-fat, more than 1 gram of saturated fat, more than 13 grams of added sugars or more than 210 milligrams of sodium in a serving would not be eligible for marketing to children.

The agencies suggest the industry focus its efforts on foods that are most heavily marketed to children, including breakfast cereals, carbonated beverages, restaurant foods and snack foods.

The guidelines set parameters that are stricter than many companies have set for themselves and, if the companies agree, would eliminate much of the advertising consumers see now ? on television, in magazines, in stores and on the Internet ? for foods that appeal to children.

If many companies sign on to the guidelines, children could see much less of the colorful cartoon characters used to advertise cereals or other gimmicks designed to draw their attention. If the companies want to continue that advertising, they would have to reduce unhealthy ingredients in their products.

The food industry has been successful in reducing the number of television ads aimed at children in recent years, and much of that advertising has moved to the Internet, social media and other digital platforms such as smart phones. Public health advocates have argued that the industry's self-regulation is not enough and has pushed the government to set guidelines.

In 2009, Congress directed the Federal Trade Commission, Agriculture Department, Food and Drug Administration and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to form a working group and develop the recommendations. The guidelines they wrote are broad, applying to almost any promotion a child might see for a food ? including text messages, product placement in video games and celebrity endorsements.

The agencies said the proposal, which would be phased in over five years and is open for public comment until the summer, is "to encourage a marketing environment that supports, rather than undermines," parents' efforts to get children to eat healthy food.

"While the goals (the guidelines) would set for food marketers are ambitious and would take time to put into place, the public health stakes could not be higher," the working group said in a statement. "One in three children is overweight or obese, and the rates are even higher among some racial and ethnic groups."

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, who authored the original bill asking for the guidelines, said Wednesday he is pleased with the agencies' recommendations.

"Kids are being bombarded daily with ads for unhealthy foods and it is long past time that we limit the amount of junk food advertising," he said.

It is unclear whether government pressure will be effective enough to get many companies to sign on. Some of the country's largest food companies, including McDonalds, General Mills, Kellogg, Kraft Foods Global and PepsiCo, already have joined an initiative sponsored by the Better Business Bureau to limit their marketing to children. The standards are similar but not as strict.

Scott Faber, lobbyist for the Grocery Manufacturers Association, says the industry has reformulated recipes to adhere to those standards as it has also limited marketing of the unhealthiest foods. He says the number of food ads on children's shows has fallen by half since 2004.

"The number of ads for cookies, candy, soda and snacks has dropped even more dramatically," he said.

As they have had to move away from marketing to kids, many food companies are stepping up efforts to reach the primary shoppers in family households, which are often moms. More ads are popping up on blogs directed at mothers and recipe sites.

The food industry's efforts to change recipes and limit advertising have come as consumers are increasingly educated and aware of what they are eating. The president's wife, Michelle Obama, also has been leading a campaign to fight childhood obesity.

Still, public health advocates say they believe a lot of work remains. Margo Wootan, director of nutrition policy at the advocacy group Center for Science in the Public Interest, says advocates hope the guidelines will make a greater impact.

"As a mom watching television with my daughter or walking through the aisles of the supermarket, it seems like nothing has changed," she says. "If companies applied these standards it would get rid of almost all junk food marketing to kids."

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