Jack, your response is exactly what I would expect. You're passionate and experienced and I salute you for that. Unfortunately, you're also saddled with a difficult marketing and media solution.

I'm not saying that marinas should ignore all guidebook advertising. I am definitely suggesting that if they placed a full-page ad last year, then a half-page would be a good money saver this year. Or a quarter-page. The money saved can be put into more current capabilities able to reach many more boaters at very low cost. I'm also offering smaller facilities that could never afford expensive media placement alternatives that might turn out to be incredibly effective.

The comparisons you make between your paper product and our electronic ones are silly. Quite frankly they show an ignorance of what is out there and how it works.

The amazing thing to me is this. If we're so wrong, so out-of-touch with what marinas want, so lacking in benefit to the boating market, why then would you invest so much time to draft your lengthy response?

Jeffrey Siegel
President
ActiveCaptain

"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win." - Mahatma Gandhi

Chuck, 

Your contention that, "the only successful advertising campaign is one that is well thought out, multi-faceted and targeted directly to my intended customers" might get you an A in a marketing class, but this is the real world. Successful advertising campaigns are the ones that bring in more business. Everything else is just income for advertising media. 

I'll go further... 

I've built multiple companies over my career. I've spent a lot on traditional advertising and wasted a lot of time and money with it. What I came to realize is that there are 4 important things to advertising: 

1. There should be no long term commitment or large up-front payments to the advertiser. 

2. Advertising results must be immediate and measurable. 

3. You must be able to experiment to find what works. 

4. It's all about partnerships. 

I'm a boater and cruiser myself. My wife and I are on our boat for 9 months this year. When we started doing long-range cruising 7 years ago we purchased all the paper guides and used them. It was out of a total frustration with them that ActiveCaptain was born. I wasn't looking for a project - it found me. 

Simply moving "print media" to the iPhone misses the whole point - it's not the media, it's the marketing. The world has changed, marinas are too savvy, and the old fashioned ways are going away. 

We'll continue to expand and create real value for the partners that work with us. That will surely cause heartburn for the traditional players. Competition tends to do that. 

Jeffrey Siegel 
President 
ActiveCaptain 

Hi, Jeff;

I do understand that each of us as business marketers have an agenda and a product to push. Both you and Active Captain have developed a respected reputation in the eyes of the marine industry and the boating public. So it saddens and confuses me as to why, in the promotion of your products, you would choose to suggest and promote the idea that any other form of advertising or promotion, other than that which you promote, is outdated and obsolete. In full disclosure, as the General Manager at Waterway Guide, I have to disagree with that assumption for several reasons.

First, as a former marina and resort manager for several years, I concluded that the only successful advertising campaign is one that is well thought out, multi-faceted and targeted directly to my intended customers. In today's markets, and especially today's emerging economy for the marine industry, a simplistic one-way approach will leave you far behind your competition. Today it will take a coordinated effort in print, web and mobile adverting to accomplish those goals. This may very well include your co-op plan, but perhaps not to the exclusion of traditional advertising to be successful. As a cruiser of almost 20 years, I see merit in your idea, but also pitfalls. I make my decisions on which marinas I will use sometimes the day before and sometimes the week before. This co-op idea, although it could be useful to me at times, would not be something I as a cruiser would use exclusively, regardless of my status with Waterway Guide. In addition I, as most boaters, do not choose to use a marina every night, so a guide with information on anchorages, towns and up-to-date navigational information is just one of the tools I use at the helm when we are traveling.

As General Manager of Waterway Guide, we are seeing record sales of our Guides that have been in continuous publication for over 60 years. Record sales does not lead us to believe our printed guides are becoming obsolete, but to the contrary, encourage us to continue to do a better job and provide the boaters with what they insist they need. We do recognize that technology is evolving and we, as will others, want to be part of that progression and are committed to moving into the future with our Waterway Guide Mobile currently in release. But we do not, nor have we ever held, that all one would need is to place an ad in our book or on our website and they would never need anything else to be successful. We wish you luck in your venture but hope you reconsider your approach.

Chuck Baier
General Manager
Waterway Guide