Social Media Press Release becomes major tracking tool

/ Angelo Fernando / 1 Comment

From time to time I have been covering the development and adoption of the Social Media Press Release. A lot has happened since Todd Defren of SHIFT Communications came up with a great wish-we-thought-that-up-first idea.

But unless you dig deep into the press releases of companies you’d never know who’s using it. I found this one at Ford Motor company, using the SMPR template for its Ford Focus.

It’s got all the (standard) elements of a press release and more. Much, much more. The links, attachments, visuals and navigation give it the feel of a micro-site. They integrate well with the company site (for those concerned about branding), enrich the social experience (to Flickr photos, and the YouTube video on brand ambassadors) and add entry points for feedback and conversation. This is especially valuable for journalists looking beyond the happy CEO statement, to check the pulse of the market.

You could bet all these internal and external links, and commentary gets tracked by their SEO agency, PR agency, and ad agency giving the marketing folk a daily or even hourly reading of who’s looking at what.

Texting while driving

/ Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

Ford Motor company is using college students as Brand Ambassadors for the Ford Focus. While the presentation is quite bland, they demonstrate two features that their demographic would relate to – text messaging on the road and calling up music on their iPod.

The car actually uses a Microsoft application to sync with an MP3 player, and integrates with a cell phone so that the driver could have text messages read out, or displayed on the dash!

Give your blog focus and variety

/ Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

I received a link to this post about worst practices of a blog. Of the 41, these are what stood out for me.

  • The blog is too personal
  • Not sticking to the theme
  • Not enough variety

There are plenty more, but I think many people don’t pay attention to staying on focus and adding variety. They sound like polar opposites, but aren’t. One is all about not trying to be all things to all people, while the other is all about depth.

Variety could include looking at a topic from several angles, and often putting one’s personal bias aside to explore other what-if scenarios, considering possibilities that you as a person or organization may not adopt but might have value.

As for the blog being too personal, this is a fine line. Of course one expects a blog to bring out the personality of the blogger, but writing sprinkled with far too many personal details is a turn off.

Quotes for 13 Oct 07: Challenges, disruption, stealth and resignation

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“Martin Luther King Jr. and Bobby Kennedy didn’t change the world by asking people to join their Facebook crusades or to download their platforms. Activism can only be uploaded the old-fashioned way…”

Thomas Friedman, saying he is impressed and baffled by college students who are just too quiet about present issues. One climate activist group challenged him, saying it’s more committed and organized than he realizes.

“Twitter is simply a digital manifestation of this phenomenon of thinking “aloud” and seeing if there is a response. A bit like bat echo-locating, but on a social rather than topographical level.”

Member of MyRagan, responding to a question about whether or not Twitter could replace blogging. 90 percent of conversation is meaningless filler the writer notes.

“You will be ‘vanilla’. Bland. Inoffensive. Overlooked for more exciting flavours.”

Australian communicator, Lee Hopkins on why it’s important to blog. Actually this is a quote from 2005, from his blog Better Communications.

“My question is: What should I do with this PR stuff?”

Someone posing a question (at Ask a MetaFilter) about accepting an offer from a PR firm to place videos in her Facebook group formed around a movie.

“Practically speaking, I fought the good fight. I’ve variously made my points. Together, we’ve exposed a few frauds and killed countless sacred cows … BUT now I am tired; and now regrettably, I seem to spend all my time revisiting the same battles previously won.”

Amanda Chapel, who resigned from Strumpette on October 8th.

“Facebook has real competition coming. Competition they haven’t yet faced.”

Robert Scoble (who says he has 552 reasons to hate Facebook) on what to expect now that Google has bought Jaiku. world

“As long as it doesn’t mean a tumor is growing on my leg because of my BlackBerry, I’m fine with it … Some people have biological clocks, I might have a biological BlackBerry.”

Jonathan Zaback, PR Manager at Burson-Marsteller, quoted in an AP story on people imagining vibrations from a BlackBerry when no one is messaging them.

Pinch the firehose

/ Angelo Fernando / 1 Comment

This week I met a good cross section of business people who were intrigued and excited about the potential of new media. At meetings like this I try to explain what this media and marketing shift is all about by referencing the usual suspects: RSS, blogs, wikis, Search engine optimization, online video and networking.

But rather than further segmenting them into sub categories (and confusing the heck out of people) I tell them to think of it as not just technology fixes to marketing opportunities, but a way of rethinking what our marketing goals are. Are we trying to amplify the message –as in the old tactics of expensive media buys — or are we trying to empathise with our customers better? Are we trying to stuff our brochures into their inboxes or are we trying to get them to find us on their terms, on their time?

I also tell them not to drink from the proverbial fire-hose, and take these techno solutions in small sips. The fire-hose is not what you want opened when you’re trying to achieve specific goals. There are just too many tools out there that may not even be relevant to your marketing objective.

My take is that, in our exuberance, we might be opening the new media pressure valve a bit too far, making marketing look too complex, to “wild west,” too faddish. Sometimes it’s OK to pinch the fire-hose. Work with what you have. Maybe what you have is a marketing team of two-and-a-half people, a lean budget, and a CEO who first needs you to serve it out in sippy-cup. The big thirst could be filled down the line.

Life beyond YouTube

/ Angelo Fernando / 3 Comments

There are several video plays trying to grab a piece of the YouTube market.

Two alternatives to think about when the geeky guy at your next meeting drones on and on about his YouTube strategy.

Kyte TV: It’s a place where you could go and create your own video channel, but the difference is you get to edit the video, add music tracks, effects, links etc. You could then grab the embed code and host it on your own site (and avoid being slotted in between some seriously embarrassing lip-syncers, or cat mutilations.) It’s still in beta, and is free!

VideoClix: A way to link elements in your video to specific landing pages. Let’s say your story has images of buildings, or objects that you like to link to other parts of your site. You create hot-spots in the video that can take the viewer deeper into the story, or off to an e-commerce site should you want to sell a subscription or merchandise. The site gives you detailed metrics so you know what the viewers clicked on, how much time spent on different parts of the story. The Lite edition is free, and the version for Educators is under $250.

Free copywriting seminar

/ Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

Who is this guy and why is he giving away free advertising advice?

If you’re a copywriter, you may want to check this out. Trevor Crook, an Australian writer, is giving away a copywriting seminar. It’s called the Copywriting Blueprint Formula.

The catch? Apparently none. He simply believes in the pay-it-forward principle, and expects everyone who listens to the 10-part audio seminar (downloadable MP3files) to share the knowledge. In a world where everything that could be is “monetized,” it surely stands out. Check it out!

Thanks to Lee Hopkins, a fellow IABC member for the tip.

Facebook critic calls it fake “theater”

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Facebook is being described as many things today, as pundits, marketers, social scientists and educators try to get a handle of what’s going on in this space. Is it the ‘”connective tissue,” or a “social graph,” a resume, or a utility?

New York Times Op-Ed writer Alice Mathias has a different take on all of this, dismissing it as an place that encourages performances and escapism –a time-sucking hangout of the “Fakebook Generation.” Here is how she describes it:

I’ve always thought of Facebook as online community theater. In costumes we customize in a backstage makeup room — the Edit Profile page, where we can add a few Favorite Books or touch up our About Me section — we deliver our lines on the very public stage of friends’ walls or photo albums. And because every time we join a network, post a link or make another friend it’s immediately made visible to others via the News Feed, every Facebook act is a soliloquy to our anonymous audience.

I know we instinctively want to challenge this notion. But wait. Mathias is not some angry pundit –she’s a grad student who’s grown up on the thing. She makes a solid point that’s worth addressing: Networks like FB, she says, make us miss other valuable parts of human interaction. “Dwelling online is a cowardly and utterly enjoyable alternative to real interaction.”

Not again, Southwest airlines!

/ Angelo Fernando / 5 Comments

Once again Southwest Airlines attempted to make someone change his T-shirt (or wear it inside out) because it was deemed offensive. Southwest Airlines makes man change T-shirt

CONSIDER THE SIMILAR INCIDENTS:

Southwest boots woman for T-shirt: October 2005
This was the “meet the fockers” slogan with Bush, Cheney and Rice.

Southwest fashion police set no-fly zone: Sep 2007
Just last month, the Hooters girl was asked to change her mini-skirt, or else.

On the Nuts About Southwest blog the post about that mini skirt flap got 235 comments. One commenter had this to say:

“Are your guys (no sic) in advertising there clueless? … If you really want to make a statement, create a dress code for the airline, publish it and then enforce it.”

About time, huh?

If you’d like to help craft that dress code, step this way.

Defending one’s logo. Pitchforks not required.

/ Angelo Fernando / Leave a comment

ASU‘s other logo, “Sparky,” is in the news. E.J. Montini of the Arizona Republic writes an interesting commentary this Sunday, looking at this as a David and Goliath story.

The story? Sparky’s likeness is being used by a Virginia, Salem high school.

  • ASU’s student newspaper The State Press reported the story last week, quoting a school official as saying “We’re 2,400 miles away from ASU, and we don’t think we’re infringing any laws.”
  • The Virginian Pilot also takes on the issue, calling it “a display of overprotective, greedy and heavy-handed behavior.”

I must admit to a bias here. Being an insider at ASU, I believe framing this as a David and Goliath story is a bit out of proportion here. The university doesn’t see someone misusing a logo or mark as the enemy. Organizations don’t defend a registered mark because they want to crush the little guy.

Last week Dan Ziegler at the Tribune reported on this story differently. He cited Fernando Morales of ASU’s trademark office saying:

“You don’t want to turn people off to ASU by being too heavy-handed,” Morales said. “If a school has invested a lot of money in a basketball floor with Sparky on it, we’re not going to make them rip it up right away. We will be flexible. You can look like an ogre if you do it wrong.”

Flexible? Definitely not a Goliath trait. But that’s not the narrative that grabs readers –or Google juice.

In time organizations realize that a settlement involves a win for both parties. If you recall, Cisco sued Apple over the word “iPhone,” one of Cisco’s registered marks. (They settled in just six weeks.) Likewise Apple settled with Apple Corp, the company that represents the Beatles after a long dispute over the name.

Should ASU stand up for it’s logo? Sure. Could it soften its stance? Certainly. I agree with Montini in one thing: A little savviness wouldn’t hurt.