We write a lot about social media and social marketing at SmartBiz, but sometimes I worry that it's too removed from reality -- and also WAY too much work for the payoff for most small businesses.

Well check out this story from fellow small biz site Duct Tape Marketing. It tells the story of Jason Brown, 23 year old co-founder of Brown Lures.

Yep, fishing lures.

According to the site:

Brown credits his blog with changing the way people find him, he created a podcast that gives him great “fishing stories” and loyalty from guides up and down the Gulf coast, he uses RSS and content tagging to automatically produce fresh blog content, and email marketing to blow his competition away at trade shows.

Said Brown: “We have been running waiting lists for products for about a year now, and no one has any clue how we are doing it without spending big advertising money. I love this stuff . . .”

There's a nice podcast on the Duct Tape Marketing site with Jason...check it out there.