节目资讯
刊物:空中英语教室
日期:2013-06-13
难易度:High
关键字:DIY [do it yourself], level off, advertising, feedback
Hello, and welcome to Studio Classroom.
My name is Gabe.
And my name is Carolyn.
And you are joining us for a lesson about marketing.
It's called DIY Marketing - Do It Yourself Marketing.
Well, we're going to continue learning about Uncle Bob and Ben.
We've already enjoyed many of their conversations.
And Ben and his wife have started a business; and today's lesson is a little bit
about their marketing.
Well, within marketing, there are advertisements.
People create advertisements to try to get others interested in their product.
Carolyn, what kind of advertisements appeal to you?
Well, I really like ads that are very clever, that use a play-on words, so.
It really catches my interest because someone has thought a lot about what the
best way to communicate their ideas to me would be.
OK, so a clever ad, maybe a play-on words.
I also like ads or commercials on TV that are funny.
They do get me interested in a certain product.
But what kind of ads appeal to you?
What kind of ads make you want to buy a product?
Think about that as we get started with our first reading of today's lesson -
DIY Marketing.
(Music).
DIY Marketing.
Doing your own marketing may not be as hard as you think.
Ben! How are you?
I'm doing well, Uncle Bob.
It's good to see you.
It's nice to see you too, Ben.
Say, I've been wondering how things are going with your business.
They're going pretty well.
Business is still OK, but our growth seems to have leveled off.
Do you know why?
Not really.
Actually, Sandy and I were just talking about doing some marketing research to
help figure that out.
That sounds expensive!
(Music).
All right.
Before we continue that conversation, let's go to the very top of our lesson
today: Doing your own marketing may not be as hard as you think.
We're talking about DIY marketing.
You can do it yourself.
So let's take a look at those letters from our Word Bank: DIY, or do it
yourself.
This is pretty easy to understand, right, Carolyn?
Yes, it is.
It's very straightforward.
If you do it yourself, then you do it yourself.
No one else is helping you.
And there are many projects around your home that you could do yourself.
You don't need to ask other people if you have a little information.
Maybe you have a sink that is leaking, you could fix it yourself if you have the
right tools.
That's right.
And actually, nowadays online you can figure out a lot of information for how to
fix things or do things by yourself without professional help.
Do It Yourself Marketing is what we're talking about today.
So doing your own marketing might not be as hard as you think.
Let's take a look at that phrase: not be as something as you think.
Or you could use this phrase in many ways.
How else might you use that phrase?
Well, you might say: Well, it's not as hard as it looks.
When you first see something, "Oh, it looks too difficult. There's no way I
could do it." But really, it's not as hard as it looks.
Or maybe it's not as easy as it looks.
Someone is really good at doing something.
Maybe they're really good at juggling or playing a certain instrument, and they
make it look super easy.
You could say it's not as easy as it looks.
It's actually more difficult than it looks.
But marketing might not be as hard as you think.
That's right.
And in our lesson today, it's time for Ben and Sandy Johnson to do some
marketing for their company.
Do they need a professional, or can they do it themselves?
This is an important question for them to ask.
And we have a great conversation between Uncle Bob and Ben.
Gabe, who would you like to be today?
I want to be Ben today.
So you please be Uncle Bob, OK?
OK. I will be Uncle Bob. Hmm.
Ben! How are you?
Hmm, great question.
I'm doing well, Uncle Bob.
It's good to see you.
It's nice to see you too, Ben.
Well, hold on a second.
Hold on a second, Carolyn.
I'd like to say something here.
Yes?
This is a good way to greet somebody who you already know.
But I do know that some people like to say "It's nice to meet you" even though
they already met somebody before.
Some people make that mistake.
If you already know somebody, say "It's nice to see you," or "It's good to see
you again." Don't say: It's nice to meet you.
You already met that person.
You only say "It's nice to meet you" the first time you meet somebody.
All right. Remember that.
Let's continue this conversation.
Carolyn, it's all yours.
Yes. Uncle Bob continues.
Say, I've been wondering how things are going with your business.
Hmm, very good.
How things are going with Ben and Sandy's business?
Well, before we continue this conversation, say, I think Liz has something that
she wants to share with us in the Grammar Gym.
Hello, friends.
Welcome to the Grammar Gym.
My name is Liz.
In today's BUSINESS START-UP article, we see this sentence:
Say, I've been wondering how things are going with your business.
Our focus today is on the first word "say." Normally we use "say" to mean to
tell or to speak, like: Please don't say anything.
But in today's sentence, Uncle Bob is not telling Ben to speak.
Instead, he uses "say" to get Ben's closer attention.
"Say" is an expression that native speakers use to let their listeners know that
there's something important that's about to be said.
So let's pretend you run into someone, and you start out with some simple
greetings like "How are you? How's work?" But then you want to talk about
something more serious like:
Say, I heard your grandmother was in the hospital last week - how is she doing?
Now let's suppose you and a friend have been talking about weekend plans, and
you suddenly want to find out what time it is.
So you can use "say" to show you want to change the subject quickly like:
Say, what time is it right now?
If you turn to today's Grammar Tip section in your magazine, you'll find more
example sentences there.
And that's it for today.
This is Liz from the Grammar Gym.
See you next time.
Thanks, Liz.
And Uncle Bob had just said: Say, I've been wondering how things are going with
your business.
Ben?
They're going pretty well.
Business is still OK, but our growth seems to have leveled off.
Oh, it's leveled off.
And "level off" is from our Word Bank.
If something levels off, then it stops growing.
It's not going up and it's not going down.
It's just at the same level.
That's right.
It levels off.
I usually think of this phrase when I think about maybe a skill, something you
want to improve in.
Well, you work and work and work, and you get better.
But then sometimes it feels like you level off.
You're not improving that much.
You just feel like you level off.
Has that ever happened to you, Carolyn?
Well, it has.
When I was studying Chinese, I learned a lot very, very quickly at the
beginning.
And then things got very difficult, and it just kind of leveled off.
I didn't seem to be learning anything.
But what I needed was a new challenge to get me going again.
Maybe your English ability needs to be challenged as well so that it doesn't
level off.
All right.
Well, I think it's normal to level off sometimes.
But of course, you do want to try to keep improving.
Right now it's time for us to learn something new with Steve and Ken in the Info
Cloud, OK?
OK.
Let's take a look at a very simple but versatile expression today, OK?
OK. What's that?
"OK." That's the expression.
OK can be used as an adverb, as in "The air conditioner is working OK." It can
be used as an adjective.
Are you OK?
It can also be used as a noun.
He got his supervisor's OK.
It can even be used as a verb.
Let's hope she'll OK their request.
Very versatile indeed.
Now let's take a closer look at the adjective usage.
When a friend asks, "What do you think of my new haircut?" to answer "OK" is
bordering on impolite.
I agree.
Instead of "OK," you'd better use a value word like beautiful or perfect.
Even "terrible" shows more emotional involvement than just "OK".
Right, because OK... simply means passable or acceptable.
Well, it's affirmative, it's lukewarm.
Good point.
Now how should you write it?
You can either write it as an abbreviation with capital O and capital K with no
periods, or you can spell it out like a word: O-K-A-Y.
OK. Now let's also look at a variant of "OK." And that's very colloquial -
okey-dokey.
Yes. "Okey-dokey" is not only very colloquial, it's a lot more playful than
plain OK.
Even though both OK and okey-dokey are used for communicating agreement,
okey-dokey would likely bring a smile to the listener's face.
(Chinese).
Okey-dokey.
Well, Ben was just saying that his business seems to have leveled off.
The growth has kind of stopped; and Uncle Bob has a question for him.
Do you know why?
Not really.
Actually, Sandy and I were just talking about doing some marketing research to
help figure that out.
That sounds expensive.
Marketing research can be very expensive.
It's true, but Ben and Sandy want to figure this out.
And when you figure something out, you... you understand more what the problem
is or how you can improve.
You can figure it out.
Well, it's time for us now to learn something new with Michelle in the Language
Lab.
Hi, everyone. I'm Michelle.