They were known to be thrifty slower adopters, but not anymore.

I now have grandmothers commenting on my Facebook photos, and grandfathers showing me how to use an iPhone. They are also affluent, and the oldest of group are ready to retire comfortably.

If you think that this older consumer group is not interested in your latest products and services, think again.

According to Nielsen facts, Boomers:

• Dominate 1023 out of 1083 consumer packaged goods categories
• Spend 38.5% of CPG dollars, but only 5% of advertising dollars are currently targeted towards the 35 to 64 years old
• Watch the most video: 9.34 hours a day
• Comprise 1.3 of all TV viewers, online users, and social media users
• More likely to have broadband Internet access at home

It’s time show them some love?

Wouldn’t it be nice to create an ad that would trigger action from your target audience immediately? When I saw the ad below, I couldn’t help but to be impressed by it. It is one of the best ads I have ever seen. And I think it serves as a good reminder to always think action when creating an ad.

Always think about the thing you want your audience to do, and how you are going to make them do it. Sometimes, with all the bells and whistles, we forget about the fundamental goal.

[Click to enlarge]

Digital billboards with cameras fitted to read the gender and age group of passerbys are being tested in Japan. Billboards that can differentiate male faces from female faces are already running in Tokyo subway stations.

“The camera can distinguish a person’s sex and approximate age, even if the person only walks by in front of the display, at least if he or she looks at the screen for a second,” a spokesman for the Digital Signage Promotion Project told the Agence France-Presse.

This not only helps advertisers tailor their messages to cater to the demographic of individuals, it helps collect data on what sorts of people look at which ads at what times of day. This way, advertisers can schedule their ads strategically.

I like how old media is moving with the times, thanks to technology. I guess the Facebook advertising model can soon be implemented on billboards too; whereby advertisers can choose to display their ads only to people they target by demographics.

What are your thoughts?

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Source: CNET

Everyday, we find out consumers’ problems that they sometimes are not even aware of, and we look for solutions. Finally, we bring the solutions to their doorstep.

If only it is as easy as it sounds. To be a successful marketer, there are 5 things we need to know. Miss out one and we are screwed. So just in case, here’s the list to make sure you are on the right track.

1. Goals

In every thing we do, there’s always a reason behind it. If you don’t have one, you are in deep trouble. Whether it’s starting up a Facebook page, or setting a low price for a product, you must know the reason why you are making that decision. And that reason is your goal. It should always be the starting point of any plan or decision. Keep reminding yourself of it, to make sure you are moving in the right direction.

2. Strategy

How are you going to achieve your goals? And I mean, exactly how? When you think that a Facebook page would help you build online presence, you don’t say, “I will just set up a Facebook page.”

First, you must have good reason to think that Facebook is the way to achieve your goals. Second, you should be thinking about the things you are going to put on Facebook to value add your audience, the colors and images you would use to portray the right image, and so on. You go into the details, and think out of the box.

Strategy also includes choosing the best medium to reach your consumers. Whether you are using traditional or digital media, it is essential to integrate individual marketing efforts, and ensure consistency across all platforms.

3. Tools

Tools and marketers are inseparable. Now that our tools are getting more sophisticated and complicated, we really need to keep updating ourselves. We need to know what we have on the table inside out, to find out what is the best. And that includes digital media. We have done several workshops for marketers, and were initially shocked by their lack of knowledge of the digital world. We can’t afford to be worse than consumers at the tools.

Also, don’t look at the tools the same way every time. See how you can creatively transform the use of it to attract consumers’ attention.

4. People

Consumer behavior is one of the most interesting and important parts of marketing. If you know people, we can give them what they want. Don’t assume anything about your target audience. Research is key before you start working on your strategy.

5. And everything else

As a marketer, you can be promoting cosmetics one day, and beer the next. You can’t sell anything, or persuade anyone if you know nothing about your product category, and the people using it. You can’t just know about marketing, you need to know about cars, diapers, and everything else.

According to a research from recruiting platform, Jobvite, nearly 75% of companies surveyed look for their candidates through social networks, and 58.1% have successfully hired a candidate.

Without a doubt, LinkedIn was the top social network for hiring – nearly 80% of companies recruit through this professional network. Facebook and Twitter were less popular, used by 55% and 45% of companies respectively.

Naturally, companies are also spending less on job boards and search firms. Social media has become the most cost effective, and efficient way to find talent.

With that, if you are looking for a job, or a better one, where should you put yourself? Nowadays, we look for jobs by making it easier for employers to look for us. Unfortunately, not many people are aware of the change. If you are one of them, I advise you to start building your online branding now. No idea how? Check out our article on building online personal branding.

Source: eMarketer

Last month, NBC Universal’s Oxygen Media polled 1,605 U.S. adults who use social media, and found that 34 percent of them check Facebook before brushing their teeth, and nearly 40 percent of them are self-described “Facebook addicts.”

Women also don’t seem to have a problem with privacy, a controversial subject:

1. - 63 percent use Facebook for networking and career, but 42 percent don’t have a problem with posting photos of them “visibly intoxicated.”
2. - 32 percent think photos of themselves or others making obscene gestures are appropriate as well
3. - 56 percent of Twitter users surveyed are fine with letting their followers know their current location
4. - 53 percent post personal problems they are having at the moment.
5. - 85 percent of women think its okay to post photos of a “girls or guys night out.”
6. - 79 percent see no reason to post photos with kissing in them.
7. - 73 percent have no problem with someone posting images of a bachelorette party.

Pros and Cons

No wonder we see cases of jealousy sprouting out of relationships – thanks to social media addiction. According to The Nielsen Company, U.S. Facebook users spend 1 in 3 minutes of total time online, on Facebook. Are we spending as much time on our loved ones?

Even though social media has become a huge part of our lives, and business, we have to be aware of its dangers as well. You might just lose your job or insurance coverage due to lack of discretion. Remember, nothing is a secret online, and everything you post will live on forever, even after you delete them.

Most of us can’t go one day without our mobile device, and we are increasingly using it for different purposes. With our future going mobile, we definitely need to know more about it.

Not too long ago, I did an infographic on India’s social media landscape, and by popular demand, I have created another on India’s mobile landscape. It will give you a brief overview of India’s mobile statistics and usage. Hope it helps!

More infographics here.

Impression is powerful. It can distort our judgment and affect our evaluation. And it can have a long lasting effect, making it hard to change. Most of the time, even a great ad can’t help.-

Brent Coker of the University of Melbourne, Faculty of Business and Economics did a study, whereby three groups watched an ‘emotive’ mobile phone ad – one with no sponsor or logo attribution, the other labeled with a disliked brand and the third labeled with a liked brand.

He found that more than 70 percent of people find advertising ‘sinister’ and ‘deviant’ if they dislike the company. Participants also hated the brand more than before they saw the advertisement, because of sinister attributions.

Coker also said, “When asked why they rated the brand as they did, the overwhelming response was due to evaluations they had read online in social media forums. If a company is already disliked, good advertising can actually ‘go bad’. Spending thousands to turn things around may actually just make things worse.’

What does this mean?

Prevention is better than cure, and if you are already in deep shit, don’t try to sweet talk your way out. Start by addressing the problems that caused the negative buzz, be sincere, and make the effort to change things. Listen to your customers, and show them that you are delivering your promises. Leave the puffy ads till later.

In a presentation by Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project, we learn about their cell phone and social media use. Not only that, we are introduced to a new demographic – those who own 4 or more devices. They are more social media and mobile friendly, but also more cautious when it comes to privacy and online reputation.

Learn more about them below!

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The invention of paper, film, radio and the Internet has impacted our lives in huge ways. And now, more than ever, social media is changing the way we communicate, share, sell, and buy. It’s so amazing that statistics change significantly within months. Hence, this updated video, to help keep you up with the most timely information.

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Unless you are Apple, or a reasonably reputable company, I’m not convinced that the 4000 fans joined because they really like your brand.

But of course, numbers are easy to digest, and very useful in making quick judgments. Just make sure you are looking at the right ones.

For Facebook pages, insights are offered for free to all admins. For Twitter, monitor retweets, and @mentions (or you can check out ad.ly analytics). Also, access your web analytics and monitor traffic sources. They are a more accurate reflection of how successful your page is. If your fans truly enjoyed engaging with you on these platforms, their interactions would increase. This also means that they are listening to your corporate messages, and what you have to offer.

Starting out on social networks is not easy. It’s like moving to a new neighborhood. You have to knock on doors, bump into neighbors on your way to work, participate in social activities, to make your presence known. But it doesn’t mean that the number of neighbors you meet is more important than the quality of relationships.

It’s the same for social media. It’s okay to start with adding friends from your own social circle, even film producers look for funding from their own contacts. Just remember not to be too obsessed with the (wrong) number game.

As you move on, make sure the people you are inviting to become fans are relevant to your business. And then, let the magic of word of mouth begin!

Friends will always hear me say, “If we want to see how technology advances in the future, just look at Japan now.”

Accessing social networking sites through mobile phones has long been a norm for the Japanese. Now, we are seeing it happen in other places, such as the US.

According to comScore’s MobiLens study, social networking apps grew their user base by 240% from April 2009 to April 2010.

Other apps have also seen exponential growth:-

With increased app usage, more people would be accessing social networks via their mobile phones. For now, and unsurprisingly, the most popular app across all operating systems is Facebook.

It is getting clear now that the future is going mobile. If your business is not part of any mobile app, you might want to reconsider your strategies. If applicable, Foursquare is a good start to mobile marketing. See how you can leverage it here.

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Source: eMarketer

With about 500 million active users, Facebook continues to grow rapidly, expanding into countries with a dominant “rival” – such as Orkut in India.

The infographic by Flowtown gives valuable details of how Facebook became the giant it is today, nowhere near slowing down.

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[Click to enlarge]

Facebook

Setting up a Facebook page is easy, but making it professional is another story. If you are a beginner who is not satisfied with default tabs, and wordy content, I hope this post would help shred some light!

But of course, I am not a pro myself. Part of my work in India is to create social media presence for SRF Foundation, a non profit company, and I understand some of the problems beginners might meet when they set up a page from scratch. So, here are the solutions!

Creating customizable tabs

The default tabs made available by Facebook are sufficient, but they limit creativity. To create and customize your own tabs, you can use an application called “Static FBML.” It should appear under “More Applications,” as a recommended app. However, to use this app, you would need simple HTML knowledge.

After adding the application to your page, you can add a FBML box to create your very own tab. If you are not good with HTML (like me), you can display your content as an image. It made my life easy, but I sacrificed SEO.

Some simple HTML codes

An image size of 750X853 worked very well for me.

1. To add an image, paste the following:

<img src=”IMAGE LINK” width=”750″ height=”835″ border=”" alt=”"></a>

2. To add an image that’s linked to another site, paste the following:

<a href=”WEB ADDRESS”><img src=”IMAGE LINK” width=”750″ height=”835″ border=”" alt=”"></a>

3. To add an image that’s link to an Email message directed to a specific Email address, paste the following:

<a href=”mailto: EMAIL ADD”><img src=”IMAGE LINK” width=”750″ height=”835″ border=”" alt=”"></a>

4. To add videos, you can find information here. Otherwise, Google is your best friend. (:

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Below is an example of what I did. I designed my content as an image and added it into the tab.

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After you are done, go back to “Edit Page” and click on “Application Settings” of the tab you just created. Then, remove “box” and add “tab,” to make your tab visible to visitors.

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To add another tab, you have to edit the tab you just created, go to the bottom of the page and click on “add another FBML box.” Then, go back to “Edit Page” and edit the new tab!

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Setting a username

Promoting your Facebook page can be difficult with a long and meaningless url. It also does not contribute much to your SEO efforts. Having a vanity url is essential for any page, but you have to be eligible for it first. To get your own username (http://facebook.com/username), you have to gather 25 “likes” for your page. After which, go here to set your very own vanity url! It’s that easy (:

Choosing a landing page

If you do not want your page’s wall to be the landing page, you can easily change that. It can also be very helpful in drawing the attention of your audience when they first enter. You can be like Adidas Originals, greeting visitors with a YouTube video, and an attractive background, or be like Pizza Hut, introducing a particular service or product with stunning visuals.

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To set your default landing page for everyone else (Page admins’ landing page will always be the “Wall”), go to “Wall Settings” under “Edit Page.”

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Additional Tips

To make your Facebook page more successful, here are a few tips to keep in mind:

1. Always use high resolution pictures. Blur images turn audience off.

2. Do not create too many tabs. Be concise and organized. People only have that much time to waste before they exit your page.

3. Be action oriented. Always create content that would lead to action, such as using links to direct your audience to a purchase page.

4. Bear in mind the importance of SEO. The “notes” tab provided by Facebook has helped many companies create more visibility on search engines. Remember to use keywords that would lead relevant people to your page.

A whopping 65% of the Fortune 100 companies, own a Twitter corporate account. On the other hand, about half of the companies own a Facebook page and/or YouTube channel. Blogs are less well received with only one-third adopting content strategy, with a low average of 7 post per month published.

Interestingly, one-fifth of the companies employ all 4 social platforms as part of their social strategy.

There isn’t any hard and fast formula to pick social channels for your business. A guide, if I can call it, is to understand your business needs, constraints, social strategy and audience. Only then, can one make an educated choice.

Social gaming

For the gamers, social games are free, easy to play, and very addictive. The social element just adds to the fun. For game creators, social games demand less time commitment. They can be launched in beta versions, and are easier and far cheaper to create.

What’s more, 80% of gamers are casual gamers. With the market maturing, social games are definitely getting more attention.

Thanks to games like Farmville and Restaurant City, this industry has generated a revenue of approximately $725 million in the US alone in 2009. Revenue sources include advertising, and virtual goods and currency. Trendstream and Lightspeed Research also estimated that 25% of US Internet users aged 16 to 64 played social games monthly in February 2010:

Of course, marketers wouldn’t be just siting by, watching opportunities pass their way. Advertising revenues are expected to increase from $62 million in 2009 to $124 million in 2012. Marketers can now advertise through custom games, product placements, in-game items, display ads and other branding plays.

Do you think social games serve as effective advertising platforms?

Source: eMarketer

While students in the US are checking out their new roommates via Facebook, most students in Japan have hardly heard about such a platform.

Social media might be a hot topic globally, but the tools and their usage might vary largely across countries. Hence, this series is conceived to help us understand (briefly) each country’s social media landscape more specifically.

Since I am currently working in India, the series is going to start with this rising country.

According to my younger colleagues, Facebook is huge in the more developed cities of India. However, checking Emails remains to be the primary reason why Indians go on the web. Broadband disturbances and the lag in technology advancement have become stumbling blocks in the adoption of social media, but that did not stop social sites, such as Twitter from gaining ground in India.

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The ads highlighted the key scenes of the video – heightening the World Cup enthusiasm and resonating with soccer lovers around the world.

Most interestingly, Nike isn’t the official sponsor of World Cup, but that did not hinder its leverage.

Brilliant.

Change history with just one strike

Arise, Sir Wayne

The moment lasts a second. The legend lasts forever

Play to be remembered

Weave your way to immortality

But how much do we really know about it? Even if we knew the Facebook story, there must be some things we have left out. (For example, do you know that Starbucks has the largest Facebook following as a corporate entity?)

Online schools has very kindly made an infographic to fill in those details. It’s time for a little Facebook re-education!

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More Facebook Infographics

1. The Facebook Story In An Infographic

2. Infographic: Facebook’s Amazing Growth

According to a study by Pew Research Center, there are more people who watched funny videos on the web than those who watched online news. Half of respondents to the center’s survey watched funny videos online, up from 31% in 2007. News was the second most-popular category, with 43% of adults saying they watched such videos, compared with 37% in the earlier survey.

I guess most of us are moving away from the negativity of news to something that can lift our spirits up. The ease of video sharing has also driven the growth in the number of funny videos found online.

One in seven adult internet users (14%) have uploaded a video to the internet, almost double the 8% who were uploading video in 2007. Home video is far and away the most popular content posted online, shared by 62% of video uploaders. And uploaders are just as likely to share video on social networking sites like Facebook (52% do this) as they are on more specialized video-sharing sites like YouTube (49% do this).

What does this mean? If you have a great video, don’t keep it to specialized video sharing sites, share it on multiple platforms!

With a powerful product, the social-networking site has aggressively opened offices around the world and doubled their sales people to preach their service to a growing global audience.

The result is pretty encouraging. Businessweek reported that the number of advertisers has more than quadrupled since the start of 2009. In terms of ad statistic, Facebook could serve up to 1.9 billion impressions per day.

Undoubtedly, Facebook has the asset and muscles to become the next digital advertising giant. The site is growing at such break neck speed that it has simply made other competitors seem irrelevant.

But it remains to be seen how its revenue would turn out to be.

According to eMarketer, social-networking sites are predicted to attract about two-thirds of the entire US Internet users by 2014.

In fact, we can all feel the social media rush. Facebook and Twitter, two of the more prominent social-networking sites, all reported phenomenal gain in their user base recently.

More impressively, Facebook has experienced an all time traffic high last month and was also reported to be the world’s most visited site, with a number of page views that no other website could match (note: Google is excluded in the list).

The social media revolution is for real and it is certainly time for marketers to start positioning themselves where consumers are largely going to be in the near future.

For marketers who are already building presence via social media, it is best to stay faithful with your strategy. Unlike other marketing channels, social media isn’t a channel that will allow you to hit home run in the first couple of months. Be patient and enjoy the conversations. It takes time to build relationship and thought leadership within the community.

According to eMarketer, 46% of B2B respondents revealed that social media is perceived as irrelevant to their companies.

Traditional marketing tactics were preferred, and even with social media engagement, 34% of respondents were not measuring ROI.

While it is indeed harder to relate B2B companies to social media, there are huge opportunities to look into. Companies, such as Pipersport, are successful examples.

Most companies engaging in social media use it for thought leadership, lead generation and customer feedback.

Even though social media is often deemed as irrelevant, 45% of B2B respondents have at least basic social presence, and 32% are engaging in it daily.

LinkedIn and Facebook are favorite social tools used by B2B companies, and referring to Outsell’s “Annual Advertising and Marketing Study 2010,” the latter is more effective.

However, I wouldn’t advise anyone to choose their preferred social tool through a “popularity test.” Whether a tool is effective depends on what you are using it for, and how.

For tips on using social media for your B2B business, hear what the “masters” have to say.

The trending topic of the year, and the last, has been “Social Media.” But what is so special about it?

As far as I know, it has helped Dell earn $6.5 million through one single platform, and brought Justin Bieber undeserved fame, well, at least in my opinion. But one thing they did right was to be where the consumers are – no longer in front of Television (TV) sets, but on online social platforms. Changing consumer habits has caused a shift in business focus from print, to radio, to TV, to Internet, and now, to digital media.

Companies, both big and small, in so many cities alike, are scrambling to take advantage of this new tool. However, we have also witnessed the reluctance to engage in social media because of the difficulty to measure its ROI. Just like TV, it will take time for everyone to adapt and see its potential.

When TV took over the radio, marketers realized that it was different. This platform thrived on visuals, and not on the message alone. Same for Social Media, we can’t use old techniques; we need to move with changing consumer behavior. Marie Jacobson from Sony Pictures described succinctly with this quote – “TV people have to think like net people.” To succeed with Social Media, companies need to speak directly with consumers, and think like them. They need to create content that fits into our multi-tasking lifestyle. They also need to create content that’s entertaining enough to steal complete attention of the audience from other distractions.

There’s also no discrimination of industries when it comes to the use of social media. From advertising, gaming to Broadway, Social Media has opened new doors for each of them in very different ways.

The gaming industry, for one, is jumping on the social media bandwagon. The reason? 90% of the market is made up of casual gamers. We are talking about the people who play games like Farmville, Restaurant City and Mafia Wars; games with huge appeal and monetization potential, thanks to their social element. Advertisements, product placements, virtual gifts, coins and shortcuts are examples of moneymaking opportunities. Even with lower margins, casual games are attractive because they take a shorter time to develop, and can be released earlier in Beta versions, with measurable response to different pricings. With less commitment, developers also have less to lose, and more to gain.

It seems like Social Media is the silver bullet for success in business and marketing. Is it really the answer for the future? If we look closely, it is nothing more than a mere tool at its popularity peak. Companies realize that peer recommendations are more trusted by consumers than ads, and that communities are a powerful influence to individuals. These communities are now gathering on Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare and MySpace, all ready to listen to brands that can provide value to them. Facebook alone offers more than 400 million active users for companies to target. We are merely following consumers. We go where they go, and Social Media would one day be the next TV, stolen of the limelight, but not completely obsolete.

Basically, the hype will start all over again, but only with a new tool that can help us communicate more effectively to larger audiences.

No matter the platform we are using to communicate, the priority is always in entertaining and value-adding the audience. Without creativity, the medium is worthless. Goodby Silverstein lives by their corporate philosophy, “Art Serving Capitalism” – using creativity to sell more. Indeed, without art, even a silver bullet would not be able to save you.

Hence, it is clear that consumers are the ones driving media. It could be Social Media today, and mobile tomorrow. Whatever they might be, they are merely tools, and it is up to companies to make creative use of them to draw eyeballs, and ultimately, sales.

What your friends say about a product has more weight than an ad message; and the “friends” I’m referring to don’t necessary have to be the people whom we personally know.

We very often find ourselves searching for product reviews, which we find convincing enough to influence our purchasing decisions.

McKinsey and Co. estimated that 2/3 of the economy are influenced by personal recommendations, which are now more easily made and found through social media.

The slides below offer insightful information and case studies on word of mouth marketing:

Statistics have shown that TV networks are earning lesser advertising revenue over the years. People aren’t as interested in TV anymore, as Internet and other entertainment platforms steal time away from it.

Contrastingly, the amount of time that people spend on social networking sites has increased dramatically, and social platforms like Facebook, has experienced healthy revenue growth.

Such fragmentation has made the marketers’ job much harder. 2 decades ago, a business could survive just by advertising through TV networks. Today, most businesses take both an online and offline approach in marketing.

Source: onlineschools

To give a comprehensive look at social media activity among employees of the nation’s largest corporations, NetProspex Social 50 analyzed 100,000 contact records of employees at the largest corporations in America. The results are out, and the winner went to neither Dell, the company who made $6.5 million from Twitter, nor Google, the company with the largest presence online.

Microsoft employees scored highest in terms of average number of connections across major social networks, tweets, users following, and followers per employee. Unsurprisingly, the list is also dominated by technology companies, and LinkedIn has the highest membership among employees.

If employees are sociable online, does it mean their companies are too?

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Click to enlarge:

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Source: Flowtown

A survey by JiWire, a WIFI provider and location based advertising company, found that 53% of mobile WIFI users are willing to turn on their location services to receive more targeted ads.

Often, users have to bear with these ads when they download free mobile applications. However, this model benefits all parties, namely, the advertisers, app publishers and mobile app users. In fact, 76% actually prefer ad-supported apps over paid ones.

It was also found that most users have downloaded at least 10 mobile apps on average and about two-third of them spent more than 30 minutes a day interacting with these applications, notably, addictive mobile games.

As the name suggests, location based advertising match ads to a viewer’s current location. For example, a nearby restaurant, say 100m away, could be featured and might even provide discounts through mobile coupons. Such relevance is popular – 38% stated that they are likely to click on these ads to find out more about the offers. Comparing to normal display ads with average click-through-rate of about 0.05%, location based ads could offer more quality leads.

The brands behind them are Heineken, Samsung and Coke. Surprisingly, only one out of the three used humor as their viral strategy.

Heineken, like its previous walk-in fridge spot, retained its male centric humor. Samsung used a card throwing expert to show off its camcorder’s fast movement capturing ability. Coke smartly leveraged on the upcoming FIFA world cup hype with an authentic African flavor (this year’s World Cup is held in South Africa).

Let us know which is your favorite via a comment.

#3 Heineken – Men With Talent

#2 Master of Business Card Throwing

#1 Coke Quest

In a partnership between Findus (the top frozen food brand in France) and Dailymotion, an ad is developed to play every 3 minutes in thousands of selected videos. It might sound like spam but the creativity of this ad is going to compensate it, at least for the first time you see it.

We’re not going to spoil the show by telling you what exactly happened. Catch the video below to experience the ad yourself. Enjoy!

Creative Group Head, Jérémie Bottiau, of Grey Paris told us that the ad has accumulated more than 4 million impressions in a month. It is also highly rated in adsoftheworld.com. Check out this link to view the actual ad.

Advertising Agency: The Kitchen/Grey Paris, France
Creative Director: Andréa Stillacci
Creative Group Head The Kitchen/Grey Paris: Jérémie Bottiau
Copywriter The Kitchen/Grey Paris: Constance Godard
Art Director The Kitchen/Grey Paris: Raphaël, Ghisalberti
Webdesigner The Kitchen/Grey Paris: Xuan Pham
Webdesigner assistant: Vincent Requillart, Thierry Leroy
Executive producer: Hélène Duval Production
Agency: Dailymotion.com Production
Webdesigner: Julie Chabin Production
Executives: Guillaume Deve, Sebastien Trouillet
Media Company : Mediacome

Maybe Google AdWords can help! Alec Brownstein has shown how Google AdWords and a mere $6 can help you land a dream job.

Last summer, Alec had a desire to make a change in his career. He wished to work at “a really creative shop for really creative [creative directors].” So, he took the first step by Googling his favorite creative directors, and realized that there aren’t any search ads on the results page. He assumed that the creative directors, like him, would Google their own names and he decided to create and buy ads with their names as keywords.

Since there isn’t any competitor fighting for the ad spots, the ads are really affordable at 15 cents per click for top placement.

“Everybody Googles themselves,” Brownstein explained. “Even if they don’t admit it. I wanted to invade that secret, egotistical moment when [the creative directors I admired] were most vulnerable.”

Here’s a picture and video description on how the campaign works. Click image to enlarge

Alec’s creative approach has won him awards under the self-promotion category – The One Show and The Clios

When Mashable asked for advice on how to land a dream job via Internet marketing, Alec commented:

“Don’t be afraid to put yourself out there in an interesting way,” he said. “The people who you want to work for can’t hire you any less than they already are. So shoot for the moon.”

We have recently seen 7 creative digital advertising examples, and Alec’s awesome self promotion campaign certainly fits the list. Judging by the simplicity and effectiveness of this campaign, I’m pretty sure we would see others adopting a similar job hunting approach in the near future.

Via Mashable

However, as technology blossomed, it changed the way we interact and live. The burst of social media sites is one phenomenon we’re all witnessing at the moment. Mobile, too, is seen as the next big trend.

Each trend never failed to command a massive number of users (duh it’s a trend!) and with the company of user data, it makes these technologies perfect platforms for marketers to perform their work and reach out to millions.

As tech savvy marketers, below are 5 technologies, which we’re keeping under our radar.

1. Facebook Ads

Facebook’s new open graph concept, which is primarily all about the “like” button, would gather rich data on its users’ behavior and likings. The current Facebook ad platform is already pretty impressive, providing niche targeting for advertisers. With additional behavioral data, its ad platform can only get better. Its fast growing user base is also another factor that commands marketers’ attention (check out Facebook’s story in an infographic).

2. Promoted Tweets

Twitter’s Promoted Tweets has made little impact since its launch (as it seems), but is one factor that could possibly change the digital marketing landscape. Its resonance measurement has brought great balance between users and advertisers. Ads that remain on Twitter’s search results are the ones that have resonated well with users. Through this metric, advertisers can understand what works and what doesn’t; thus improving effectiveness and efficiency in their advertising investments. However, in our opinion, there is still much work to be done before Promoted Tweets can reach its full potential.

3. “On-game” Ads

Farmville’s creator, Zygna, offers a new incentivized ad approach to engage social gamers. In each ad, users will be asked to work on brand-related tasks. The tasks could range from filling in a survey form, watching a video, to performing a shout out. In return, users will be rewarded with virtual currencies to fund their virtual desires.

4. Foursquare

Businesses can leverage Foursquare at zero cost but it wouldn’t be surprising if Foursquare were to introduce a location based ad platform in the future. Currently, with only more than a million registered users, Foursquare needs to work on building a larger user base. This channel is one to watch because Foursquare has the potential to integrate both social and business elements into its mobile ad platform. On the contrary, it was recently reported that Facebook has planned to launch its location feature next month. With over 100 million users accessing Facebook through mobile phones (100x more than what Foursquare has), this move is certainly a strong threat to Foursquare.

5. iAd

Apple’s iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch’s market penetration prowess has been phenomenal. According to CEO Steve Jobs’s latest iPhone OS 4 keynote, 100 million of these devices are out in the market. In the same keynote, Steve Jobs also introduced the iAd platform, where he promised that the ads are going to be both interactive and emotional. The demos certainly has his back, but this ad platform doesn’t come cheap for early adopters. Promoting your business through iPhone applications is another way to grab mindshare. Publishers (e.g. The New York Times) and travel related industry (e.g hotels.com) have taken the lead in mobile app advertising.

For more marketing and social media news and info, connect with us via Twitter and Facebook.

Here’s a glimpse:

What’s bad, boring, and barely read by people? Business writing. If you could taste words, most corporate websites, brochures, and sales materials would remind you of stale, soggy rice cakes: nearly calorie free, devoid of nutrition, and completely unsatisfying…

One of my favorite phrases in the business world is full-service solutions provider. A quick search on Google finds at least 47,000 companies using that phrase. That’s full-service generic. There’s more. Cost effective end-to-end solutions brings you about 95,000 results. Provider of value-added services nets you more than 600,000 matches. Hmm exactly which services sold are not adding value?

Who writes this stuff? Worse, who reads it and approves it? What does it say when tens of thousands of companies are saying the same things about themselves?

Catch it full on Inc.

]]> http://www.techinasia.com/why-is-business-writing-so-awful/feed/ 0 http://placehold.it/350x150 http://www.techinasia.com/3-simple-steps-to-establishing-a-blog-strategy-in-your-business/ http://www.techinasia.com/3-simple-steps-to-establishing-a-blog-strategy-in-your-business/#comments Mon, 03 May 2010 15:10:25 +0000 Sarah Chong http://www.techinasia.com/?p=16989 Read more »]]> A blog is crucial in any long-term social media marketing plan. In general, it provides your business with a central topic for discussion and also helps build brand awareness (more details below). A recent study has also revealed that most marketers are keen to invest more in their corporate blog, highlighting its importance.

However, establishing a blog strategy in a business remains to be a challenge, especially to people who are new to blogs. As always, we attempt to tackle the issue in 3 simple steps.

#1. Set your goals and strategies

We often see how goals and strategies differ by a mile. For any plan to succeed, the goals and strategies have to be aligned. So, set your goals and pick a suitable strategy to achieve it.

As we have previously analyzed, there are basically 4 blog strategies that could be implemented.

(a)  Building thought leadership

(b)  Spreading corporate culture

(c)  Connecting with leaders

(d)  Branding

Let’s say we wish to achieve two goals: (1) build awareness and (2) generate sales leads. The appropriate strategies would be a mixture of (a) and (b). Why? To build awareness and generate sale leads, it is crucial for your business to be the thought leader in your industry. Adding in a corporate culture mix would allow potential customers to know you better. After all, everyone wants to work with someone who has an attractive personality. This works the same for your business.

#2. Find your source of content

Now that we’re done with goals and strategies, we are much clearer of what to blog about. But, who will the bloggers be? Here’s a checklist of criteria:

The blogger should:

- Understand what blogging is and what the blog sets out to achieve

- Know the business industry well

- Be opinionated and fun

- Have a decent writing ability

Remember that the content published on your corporate blog must be aligned with the strategy set out earlier. This will ensure consistency; helping readers understand your company better over time.

#3. Identify Measurement Methods

“You can’t manage what you can’t measure.” This old management quote still holds. So, to ensure continual self-reflection and improvement, set a couple of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to gauge your blog’s performance.

Back to the earlier example, our KPIs could be (1) the number of times the business is mentioned, (2) blog traffic, (3) blog comments and the (4) number of sales leads generated by the blog.

The first few months of the blog strategy implementation is probably not going to be a smooth sailing experience. Readership would start out low, which is a big reason why many disheartened businesses quit blogging. The key to blogging (besides the strategy) is perseverance. If your corporate blog were contributing meaningful content to the web consistently, you would be rewarded handsomely.

For more marketing and social media news and info, connect with us via Twitter and Facebook.

Stock photos powered by Pixmac

They intrude our mental boundaries and turn our want to a need. Nonetheless, many of us still appreciate them in terms of their art direction, copy-writing and creativity. This is what we have witnessed here in Penn Olson. We love sharing brilliant ads and we know they suit your taste when the share counts are high.

Here are the top 5:

#5 – VIDEO: McDonald’s Ad Produces Steam!

120 shares: 110 retweets, 10 fb shares

#4 – 15 Brilliant Building Ads

220 shares: 170 retweets, 50 fb shares

#3 – 25 Creative Guerrilla Ads

260 shares: 160 retweets, 100 fb shares

#2 – Durex Condom

380 shares: 150 retweets, 230 fb shares

#1 – 14 Brilliant Minimalist Ads

1,100 shares: 800 retweets, 300 fb shares

Promoted Tweets, since it first came into the scene, has promised much to both businesses and users.

Users will, for a start, be exposed only to relevant Promoted Tweets (a.k.a ads) and  ads in Twitter’s search results. Also, Promoted Tweets that don’t perform well under Twitter’s resonance metrics will be automatically removed.

Businesses, on the other hand, can promote not only to their own followers, but also to the entire Twitterverse. The resonance metrics also help businesses monitor and enhance their ads in order to resonate better with Twitter users, thus generating better ad performance.

Despite the advantages listed, Twitter’s Promoted Tweets platform, as far as I believe, needs to offer more to attract businesses.

1. Not Targeting The Right Audience

Targeting the entire Twitterverse isn’t attractive to all. Promoted Tweets, for now, is unable to target an audience from a specific geographic or demographic group. Advertisers wouldn’t want to spend on an audience that’s not potential buyers.

2. Not Targeting Through Search Terms

Targeting based on related keywords would also provide businesses with a more relevant audience for their ads. But Twitter obviously hasn’t implemented it.

I made a quick check on the keyword “coffee” and surprisingly, Starbucks’s ad didn’t appear even though I’m following its tweets (it’s supposedly relevant ads to me). This makes me wonder why Twitter bothers to place ads through search results when ads aren’t relevant to search terms.

3. Not Performing Well

Realize the low count in number of retweets? Given the large volume of page views on Twitter, the ads should have at least over 100+ retweets. Well, Twitter could argue that the ads aren’t resonating well with users. But how should one create an ad that resonates? The formula isn’t clear.

Perhaps, the entire Promoted Tweets system isn’t resonating well with the Twitter ecosystem to start with.

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For more marketing and social media news and info, connect with us via Twitter and Facebook.

Understanding the social media effect would help you a great deal in building your online presence. While businesses have started to adopt social media marketing, some have neglected the power of social bookmarking, especially if they own a blog.

From the infographic, it’s easy to see that placing your content at different sources is really effective in directing traffic to your sites. You never know who would pick up your content and spread it to a bigger mass of people.

[Click to enlarge]

More infographics here.

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[via infographicworld]

Update: Added another interesting ad space – fly. Thanks @YvonneDahler for the heads up!

Advertising messages can be successful not only due to how they are conveyed, but where they are placed as well. I am referring to the specific medium used to carry the content. It can be the usual media such as a poster, online banner, TV and newspaper.

However, some marketers (and ad hosts) challenge the norm, think out of the box, and redefine where ads should be placed. Call it weird or creative. They want a medium that can make their messages stand out – An advertising space like the 5 below:

5. Eggs

CBS used 35 million eggs to advertising its new fall programming in 2006.

4. Body Parts

Many people have offered their head, pregnant belly and face as advertising spaces for companies to “rent.” A permanent space can even be made possible with a tattoo and a bigger sum of money.

3. Straw

Y-Plus Yoga Center in Shanghai advertised their yoga services through a straw, illustrating how flexible you can get if you sign up with them.

2. Urn

A dying man, suffering from colon cancer, offered his urn as an advertising space to raise funds for his own cremation.

1. Test Paper

When faced with a shortfall in his copying budget, math teacher Tom Farber decided to pay for the paper he puts his calculus tests on by selling ad space on them.

Bonus: Fly

To promote their exhibition stand at the Franfurt Book Fair, Eichborn the publisher prepared 200 flies attached with an ultra light banner. The banner was attached with natural wax. After a short time the banner dropped off by itself. And worry not, the flies remain unharmed.

For this article, we will take a shot at explaining Twitter marketing in 3 simple steps: (1) Design, (2) Connect and (3) Evolve.

We also kept to less text, more visuals to ensure that your patience lasts through the post.

1. Design

In any business, design plays a major role. Create a nice avatar and background to make your twitter profile visually attractive. MailChimp, the email marketing solutions company, has a nice and consistent background and avatar design.  Check out more here.

2. Connect

Twitter is a social platform. Hard selling your company or products wouldn’t work well (your business will end up like that yellow bird above). Have a right balance between corporate and casual tweets. Sometimes, being 100% casual is the best thing to do.

3. Evolve

Once you have gotten the basics right, you can experiment Twitter for other purposes. Majority of the companies are leveraging Twitter’s reach and speed for customer service. Some create viral buzz by providing free gifts; with iPad as the most recent hot gadget giveaway.

Design, Connect and Evolve: These are the 3 simple steps towards Twitter marketing.

A joint report, Advertising Effectiveness: Understanding the Value of a Social Media Impression, by Nielsen and Facebook, which analyzed survey data from more than 800,000 Facebook users in response to more than 125 Facebook ad campaigns from 70 brand advertisers, showed promising results.

Focusing on 14 Facebook ad campaigns that incorporated the “Become A Fan” engagement unit, ad effectiveness is measured in three ways -  (1) Lift from a standard “Homepage Ad”; (2) Lift from an ad that featured social context or “Homepage ads with Social Context”; and (3) Lift from “Organic Ads,” newsfeed stories that are sent to friends of users who engage with advertising on a brand.

Results

Comparing to the control group,

• Exposure to (1) engagement ads increased recall, awareness and purchase intent by 10%, 4% and 2% respectively
• Exposure to (2) ads with social context increased recall, awareness and purchase intent by 16%, 8%, 8% respectively
• Exposure to (3) organic ads increased recall, awareness and purchase intent by 30%, 13%, 8% respectively
• Organic ads and ads with social context are more effective in general, supporting the argument that peer recommendations are more effective than other forms of ads

In theory, social ads , especially organic ones, are obviously more trustworthy than normal ads. However, skeptics have been concerned with their effectiveness. This survey has proven that social ads do work better than any other ads, at least on Facebook.

As other media are seeing a fall in time spent per day, mobile is seeing a rise, at 1 h 18 min. People are accessing social sites/apps, casual games, messengers, music and videos with one device, and on the go.

According to eMarketer, “talk time on mobile was up 12%, while average daily mobile Web use rose 36% to 11 minutes. Texting was also up, by 55%, to take up 27 minutes a day in 2009.”

Companies with foresight are already engaging or planning to engage in mobile app marketing. If you are planning to create an app or get involved with existing apps, including location-based ones, make sure you have your consumers in mind and create value for them.

Network Box reported that 7 out of 100 URLs accessed by businesses were directed to Facebook and 10% of Internet bandwidth went to YouTube.

According to the SC Magazine UK, Simon Heron, internet security analyst for Network Box, said: “The figures show that IT managers are right to be concerned about the amount of social network use at work. There are two real concerns here: firstly that employees will be downloading applications from social networks and putting security at risk; and secondly the amount of corporate bandwidth that appears to be being used for non-corporate activity.”

Is this really a call for concern? Not if you have proper regulations. Instead of prohibiting social media use, trust employees and encourage them to be ambassadors of your company through their own social profiles.

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[via allfacebook]

Don’t know what I am saying? Check out the ads by IESP, João Pessoa, Brazil below. Books are always a great companion when I travel, and I strangely like the feeling of having one with me when I am overseas. I was immediately attached to the ads – Travel with words, meet the world, illustrated so well by Penguin books.

Somehow, this feeling can never be replaced by a kindle, or an iPad.

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Advertising Agency: IESP, João Pessoa, Brazil
Creative Director: Elias Figueiroa
Art Director: Elias Figueiroa
Copywriter: Elias Figueiroa
Published: January 2010

According to research and consulting firm Morpace, 68% of US Facebook users were more likely to buy a product or visit a retailer based on a positive Facebook friend referral. This might explain why 1 million fans could equate up to $3.6 million in media value for brands.

Majority Buy Based On Friend Referral

Facebook Fans: Industry & Race

Other findings – on average, respondents were fans of 9 Facebook fan pages. White Users were generally less likely to become fans of brands, while it was the opposite for Hispanic users.

This is why Facebook is so great for business. It has a large audience and its fan pages are highly customizable. Another bonus is its “X number of friends are a fan of brand XYZ” feature, facilitating friend referrals. If you are thinking of creating a presence on Facebook through a fan page, check out how other brands do it here and here!

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Source: eMarketer

The idea is simple. Google uses cleaner sources of energy and recycles its old servers. The main aim is to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide released.

Some interesting facts include: (1) Google can harness enough clean energy through its solar panels to power 1,000 average homes. (2) A large group of employees uses Google’s shuttle bus, which is powered by biodiesel. This is equivalent to taking 600 cars off the road each year.

As expected, Twitter would be rolling out phases of the platform. The first phase of the Promoted Tweets platform is already supported by advertising partners like Best Buy, Bravo, Red Bull, Sony Pictures, Starbucks, and Virgin America. The tweets would appear on top of Twitter search results, but limited to one per page.

To provide a targeted audience and help advertising partners track ad performance, Twitter has a “resonance” metric that takes into account number of retweets, favorites, impressions, and clicks to make sure that ineffective ads are removed.

Example of a Promoted Tweet from AdAge:

In the words of Biz Stone:

“We’ll attempt to measure whether the Tweets resonate with users and stop showing Promoted Tweets that don’t resonate. Promoted Tweets will be clearly labeled as “promoted” when an advertiser is paying, but in every other respect they will first exist as regular Tweets and will be organically sent to the timelines of those who follow a brand. Promoted Tweets will also retain all the functionality of a regular Tweet including replying, Retweeting, and favoriting. Only one Promoted Tweet will be displayed on the search results page.”

How It Will Benefit Business

1. Bigger audience: Besides Twitter followers, brands can now reach out to other Twitter users who are probably interested in its brand and products (since they searched the keywords set by advertisers.)

2. Solution to flushed down tweets: Some people have criticized the point of promoted tweets when brands can already tweet for free to their followers. Besides the first reason pointed out above, brands might find promoted tweets helpful since they will come out on top of search results. No more flushing down of tweets = more impressions.

3. Resonance Measurement: Biz Stone also said, “There is one big difference between a Promoted Tweet and a regular Tweet. Promoted Tweets must meet a higher bar—they must resonate with users. That means if users don’t interact with a Promoted Tweet to allow us to know that the Promoted Tweet is resonating with them, such as replying to it, favoriting it, or Retweeting it, the Promoted Tweet will disappear.” This would definitely help businesses measure their ad ROI better.

“Clickablility” of Promoted Tweets Depends On Advertisers

Some users are not supportive of having promoted tweets in their personal stream of tweets (which Twitter would soon go into.) Even in search results, some users expressed that they would not be clicking on ads. I would understand that if we are talking about typical ads. But now we are talking about tweets that can be personal and valuable to users. Promoted tweets do not have to look like ads.

Users are able to reply to it, unlike normal one-way ads. It is also important for advertises to avoid hard selling and provide value. Starbucks has been tweeting promotions, such as free pastries, and I certainly wouldn’t mind those tweets showing up on my search results or personal stream. Contests can be created through the use of retweets, @replies and so on. Businesses could do it with regular tweets, now they can extend their reach to a bigger part of the Twitter community.

This post is based on the limited information we have about Twitter’s new ad platform. We will share our updated views as Twitter rolls out other phases in 2010.

Here are several interesting statistics:

(1) Richest: LinkedIn, Reddit and Twitter are three sites that have the largest proportion of people earning more than $150k annually.

(2) Youngest: Over 30% of MySpace users are below the age of 18. Would MySpace bounce back?

(3) Ladies: MySpace also has the largest proportion of female users. On the contrary, Reddit has the lowest.

(4) College: A huge bulk of social media users are studying in college.

We’ll leave the rest of the exploration to you. To understand the infographic, remember that each square represents 1%.

[Click the image to enlarge.]

Check out more infographics here.

Specsavers tried it and enjoyed huge success. The ad is a parody of another viral ad titled, “The AXE Effect – Women – Billions” (over 3 million views), in which a throng of women dashed and swam towards a guy, who was vigorously spraying Axe deodorant on his body.

Specsavers created the exact same ad, except the women were turned off by the spectacle instead. The ad ended with a line of promotional texts that spotted the same typeface as the original.

Just 3 weeks after launch, the ad has gathered over 600,000 views. An impressive statistic + guaranteed good laugh.

‘The Specs Effect’ Advert (parody)

The AXE Effect – Women – Billions

Even though the basic social media principles of B2C marketing apply to B2B businesses, we must note that B2B companies are targeting a niche market with products that might require a steeper learning curve. Hence, it is definitely a more difficult task to make social media work for them. Nonetheless, those that see an opportunity and harness it would reap the rewards!

1. Increasing brand awareness

Branding is a crucial process for any business. It basically acts as a quality cue for  potential buyers. An unknown brand signals lower quality, and when in doubt, customers would go for a brand they are familiar with.  This is especially so for B2B brands, with products that are sometimes unheard of. Being on social media allows B2B companies to connect with B2B buyers and also end users on a more personal and interactive manner. Instead of waiting for buyers to go search for your website and information when they need you, reach out to them, so that you would be the first company they seek when the need arises.

2. Educating potential consumers

B2B products usually require detailed explanations and/or demonstrations. A corporate blog or a YouTube page that provides digital educational material would allow B2B buyers to learn about your products in their own time. Make your content fun and easily digestible. If they need a wordy and boring essay of how your product works, they might as well go to your corporate website. Allow them to ask questions and provide feedback through comments, which you should also reply to promptly.

3. Creating visibility

Online visibility can be enhanced through a blog and conversations with your fans on social networks. Every blog post or social media profile is a new link that would be indexed by the search engines. However, relying on these techniques would take a long time to build visibility. What we really want to achieve is a multiplier effect through word of mouth – more brand mentions. Be on social media, attract people to talk about you in their networks and gain likability.

4. Building thought leadership

Thought leadership can be built over time by say, blogging consistently on tips, issues and opinions within your industry. This is best illustrated through an example. MailChimp is a business that provides email-marketing solutions for businesses. It has a dedicated blog that provides tips and views on email marketing, and has gathered large followings on both its blog and social profiles. Value add your potential buyers and show that you are the expert in your field. If they consider your company as the leader that knows what it is talking about, they would purchase from you.

5. Gathering positive online reviews

This point basically sums up all the points above. The key idea of being on social media is to build online credibility and generate positive reviews. A review can be in the form of a blog comment, a good conversation with a customer, or even the way you handle a demanding customer via Twitter. All these reviews would be searchable on the web, acting like your advertisements.

In Enquiro’s Business to Business Survey 2007, it was revealed that search engines remain the most popular source of information for B2B buyers. Besides relying on search engine marketing, creating social presence on the web could help differentiate your business from competitors.

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For more marketing and social media news and info, connect with us via Twitter and Facebook.

Stock photos powered by pixmac.

Our pick is BMW’s viral ad, which features a stunt act. It involves pulling a table cloth off an extra long dining table, while keeping the nicely placed dining utensils intact.

Though there are doubts on whether the act is real, the video has  gathered over 2.6 million views so far. Stunts never fail to captivate -  BMW leveraged on this fact to illustrate the speed of its S1000RR superbike; all within a minute.

Catch the videos and let us know your pick via comments below.

#4 BMW S1000RR

Description: From zero to 100km/h (62 mph) in just 2.9 seconds sounds very nice. But would that help in our XXXL-experiment?

Stats: More than 2.6 million people have watched the video and over 1,800 tweets were generated.

#3 Pedigree Dogs

Description: Dogs in slow-mo, catching treats.

Stats: The video has generated over 2.2 million views, 990 blog posts and 4,900 tweets

#2 Nike: The Human Chain

Description: From Lance Armstrong on his bike, to a six-year-old in China learning martial arts, movement is the universal language that connects us all. It’s a language of beauty, drama, tragedy and triumph. And the road to athletic greatness is not marked by perfection, but the ability to constantly overcome adversity and failure.

“It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish. It’s not where you’re from, it’s where you’re at. Everybody gets knocked down, how quick are you going to get up?”

Stats: In five weeks’ time, the video has reached 405,000 views and 375 blog posts.

#1 Adidas Originals

Description: Welcome to the street where originality lives – the adidas Originals neighborhood. This is where athletes, musicians, skaters, artists, entertainers, and more, come together to show their colors, their style and their originality.

Stats: The video has reached more than 1.2 million views and 355 blogs.

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[Stats from goviral]

For example, “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” was an instant hit, and Las Vegas can’t seem to find something better to replace it. On the flip side, Australia’s “Where the bloody hell are you?” tagline didn’t work too well for her.

With a new tagline, “There’s nothing like Australia,” and a $4 mil campaign, we thought all would be well again. But I guess the tourism board didn’t see this coming: someone went out and registered the domain NothingLikeAustralia.net, and started posting spoof versions of the campaign.

Having no clue how to deal with this, Tourism Australia (TA) considered taking legal actions against the site. If you know anything about the people online, you wouldn’t want to consider legal actions. Laugh it off and leverage on the situation instead. Luckily, TA came to its senses before getting a severe backlash.

If concocting well-received slogans is so tough, and tourism campaigns are so expensive (and might go terribly wrong), what else can a tourism board do? It surprises me that tourism boards are taking so long to try out social media. Those who are already on it are seeing very impressive results!

Here are some things they did that I love:

1. Creating Valuable Information Platform

Planning for a vacation can be a complete nightmare. Sometimes, I don’t even know where to start. Having a place I can turn to for information would be a blessing.

Visit Japan 2010 has a Facebook page that aggregates all the travel info and links you’ll ever need! The layout is clean and information is organized. It’s the first place (not Google!) I would go to when planning for a Japan trip. Get updates through the page, ask questions and share your experiences with others. Who would you trust more, the tips and views of a fellow tourist or the tourism board?

New Zealand has a YouTube channel that not only shows you great videos, it helps you plan your trip as well (under slogan)! The channel links you to information about New Zealand, getting to New Zealand, places to stay, and a New Zealand map.

A twitter list, like what Vegas did, might help too!

2. Promoting Social Media Presence

Las Vegas tourism board has dedicated a significant amount of space on its official site to direct traffic to its social media accounts. It is crucial to engage potential tourists outside of a website. People are spending hours on Facebook everyday, but maybe 15 minutes on websites, and only when they need them. Social sites are a great opportunity to let organizations become a part of consumers’ daily life.

3. Checking Tourists In (Foursquare)

I absolutely love this. Chicago users of the Explore Chicago section on Foursquare can earn three badges, themed around the city, by visiting locations such as historic sites, film locations, restaurants and clubs. This is to help boost awareness of both the popular and less well known tourist attractions.

Mobile Apps

With more Smartphone users wanting travel-related apps, it is a good opportunity for tourism boards to start thinking of how they can value add people on the go. Well, Tourism Vancouver is already doing it! It has launched an interactive tourist guide with integrated street navigation of Vancouver and Whistler. Check it out.

Being on Social Media Comes With Risks

Word of mouth is a powerful thing, and it has been made even more powerful by the Internet and social media. While writing the post, I visited the “Visit Japan 2010″ Facebook page again. To my surprise, users are posting videos and pictures on its wall, asking Japan to stop killing whales and dolphins. Some are asking people to boycott Japan until  she addresses this issue. With such an awesome Facebook page, it is a pity that something like that has happened. Japan National Tourism Organization has deleted all the negative posts, but can it keep doing this? Maybe this would help.

Just because social media comes with risks does not mean we should avoid it. That’s what a fool would do. All we need to do is prepare for social media disasters and unpleasant situations in general. Handle it well and reap the vast benefits of social media!

Other Business Resource:

1. 4 Important Social Media B2B Marketing Lessons

2. How A Restaurant Uses Foursquare To Gather 161 Users

3. Brewerkz Singapore: How It Uses Social Media

4. 5 Ways To Leverage Foursquare For Business

5. 5 Social Media Marketing Case Studies

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For more marketing and social media news and info, connect with us via Twitter and Facebook.

By speaking directly to them, consumers feel that they can finally have a two-way communication with brands.

However, do consumers trust what brands say on social networks? Is this really different from TV ads?

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Apparently, consumers trust brands on social networks almost as much as they trust their peers. According to eMarketer, a January 2010 research from InSites Consulting revealed that 32% of respondents trust “the brand itself” while 38% trust a fellow consumer.

This could be due to brands abandoning the “push” strategy on these platforms, choosing to value add their consumers instead. Tips, videos, pictures, games and friendly conversations have managed to capture the attention and heart of consumers – About 35% of respondents have become fans of brands on social networking sites.

If you are thinking of building a brand presence on social media, get a headstart here.

Not convinced? This might help.

In the video below, Richard St. John summarized seven years of his research into a powerful 3 minute TED presentation on the real secrets of success.

The key question is: “Out of the 8, how many have you followed?”

According to eMarketer, close to 40% of smartphone users reported doing travel research on their mobile device, and more than 25% have done their bookings through it before. 20% also revealed that they were interested in receiving travel website advertisements on their device.

This sure sounds like an opportunity!

So, what kind of apps are users most interested in?

PhoCusWright predicts US travelers will spend $76 million on direct domestic hotel bookings through a mobile device. If hotels are not leveraging on mobile marketing yet, they ought to do so soon. Thankfully, majority of hoteliers surveyed plan to implement some sort of mobile marketing, with SMS text marketing being the most popular and iPhone app coming in 3rd.

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No idea what a travel app can do? Check out the 2 examples below:

Hotels.com

The application lets you view information for properties worldwide, check availability and book hotels, view existing hotel reservations through hotels.com and get in contact with customer service with any issues.

Royal Riviera

The application lets you browse award winning five star luxury hotel, Royal Riviera’s services, view photos and videos, and book your next stay. Don’t know where to go? Find nice places to visit with a few taps. Lost? Use the app to find your way back to the hotel. Hungry? View the restaurant menu and make a reservation. It’s everything you need!

Now, the premium water company has created a series of print ads to ride on its viral video success. The ads feature adults wearing t-shirts with baby bodies imprinted on them to trigger recall. Unfortunately, l doubt these ads would gain even a quarter of the success of the video.

Check out the print ads and leave your thoughts below. We have also included the Roller Babies video for easy referencing.

Well, I must say, it is a positive contribution!

Last month’s series of Super Bowl ads has dominated the charts, but we have managed to pick out 4 non Super Bowl ads that are definitely worth your time.

2 out of the 4 are beer ads, which are normally famous for their creativity and huge spending. The other 2 ads are about the importance of wearing a safety belt, and erm, strong cheese.

Which is your favorite?

1. Bud Light – Clothing Drive

Description: Clothing drive in an office for a homeless shelter. The prize for each item is a tall cold Bud Light.

Views: 1.5 million

Media impact: Featured on 144 blogs

2. Sussex Safer Roads Partnership – Embrace Life

Description: The emotional response that is evoked by this video is much stronger than the usual bloody scenes and loud crashes. The message is very clear; wear your safety belts.

Views: 4.1 million

Media impact: Featured on 952 blogs.

3. Nolan’s Cheddar – Mousetrap

Description: Nolan’s cheddar – seriously strong. Even for the greedy rat.

Views: 0.8 million

4. Cerveza Andes – Teletransporter

Description: Want to hang out with your buddies in the bar, but your girlfriend says no? Andes has a solution for you!

Views: 0.4 million

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[Source: goviral]

The way marketers communicate messages to others depends heavily on the technologies that are invented. With that said, the past two centuries of technologies have rapidly changed the way marketers push their messages – radio, phones, television, Internet (some technologies aren’t highlighted in the infographic though).

Social media is of course the current “trending topic” in the field, but like any other medium, it would just be another day-to-day communication tool one day. How long would the social media hype last and what would be the next technology to revolutionize how marketers work?

Could location-based advertising be the answer?

To be a brand that is valued by customers is tough, but to be admired by other businesses? Now, that’s a real feat.

Fortune‘s annual comprehensive Most Admired Companies survey this year shows that Apple, for the third straight year, takes the No. 1 spot as the most admired brand in the world. This time, with the highest survey response rate in history and by the highest margin ever, according to Hay Group, the management consulting firm that collaborates with Fortune on the list.

In 2009, 51% of corporate leaders surveyed said they admired Apple.

“What exactly does it mean to be admired? Whether you call it a sterling reputation, integrity, or trust, this aspect of a company’s DNA can seem like an imprecise concept in the numbers-driven world of business. But for the companies on the list, trust and integrity are not just vague terms: They’re durable assets with a financial payoff. And in 2009 trust took center stage.”

As Ken Chenault, CEO of American Express, puts it, “The competitive advantage of trust has never been more important or more valuable.”

This result would probably come as no surprise to no one. Apple is the most talked about brand and dominates in many brand rankings. It revolutionizes every product it produces, even though it is not the first company to produce it. From the iPod to the iPhone, Apple has changed the way we do things and provided a great learning example for other companies. What’s even more amazing? It doesn’t even need a wide range of products in each product category to grab significant market share from competitors.

The next on the list is Google. Well, it must be, seeing how it is putting a finger into every important part of our life. It is a company built on a simple revenue equation. And it works. Businesses and consumers trust that Google will bring them everything that they need to know and everything that they need to make their lives easier.

Below is the complete list.

The turnout was so amazing, we hardly had enough space to fit everyone!

I’ll let the pictures do the talking. Don’t miss how well Singapore did this year at the end of the post too (:

The Pictures

@BrewerkzSG, our friendly tweet up venue!

@mikefoong (left) busy at work. Thanks to him for making Twestival happen again this year (:

The awesome peeps, @mediumshawn and @daphnemaia (who “sacrificed” her birthday yesterday to help out) manning the booth.

@groovygenie registering!

@danielgoh who has been handling all PR and media relations relating to Twestival, here with @mediumshawn.

@blackawfee and @omgzam, the cool people behind the TwestivalSG blog and Twitter account.

@inrsoul, the man behind the rockin’ photobooth.

The less crowded side of the venue.

The best emcee in Singapore, @JoeAugustin!

@sm7catscan, the in charge of all media and PR, speaking with @JoeAugustin.

Superb performance by Jack and Rai.

Lucky Draw! Thanks to our generous sponsors – Samsung (Daniel Goh), Cisco Systems (Supriya), Crocs (JP and Nick) and Whole Earth/Naive (Pat) (:

This is us, laughing for no apparent reason.

@Smithankyou with his blue Twitter bird, courtesy of Terence, our talented magician and face painter.

The Team!

The Swarm Badge!!

With more than 150 participants, we were able to unlock Foursquare’ swarm badge!

@wilfredphua, @mgGuGu and us showing off our swarm badges.

Singapore, top 10 nations in total funds raised and top 3 in amount raised per 1000 inhabitants

Thanks to everyone who participated, in ways big and small, we are proud to say that TwestivalSG 2010 raised USD 6112.41, excluding all the other sponsorship figures for Concern Worldwide. With the help of cities all over the world, Twestival Global raised more than USD 300,000 this year!

Of course, charity doesn’t end here and it takes more than one day of effort to provide resources to the needy worldwide. No matter who you are benefiting, please continue to spread the word, volunteer your services and donate resources!

We will see you next year, or sooner! (:

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Kudos to @inrsoul (right) and @dazzachazza (left) for the wonderful pictures. Check out the rest here and here.

Artists are offering their music downloads free on platforms like MySpace. Their goal is to gain a bigger fan base that would eventually pay to go for their concerts, events and tours. However, it is still important to minimize piracy through education.

Don’t voodoo your musicians, buy music!

The ads below show how piracy, with a few clicks, can harm your favourite artists. Though the idea is pretty cool, would it help reduce piracy? Fans who really care that much about the artists wouldn’t be downloading music illegally in the first place.

50 Cent

KISS

Lady Gaga

The Making Of

Click to enlarge

Advertising Agency: Publicis India
National Creative Director: Emmanuel Upputuru
Creative Directors: Vivek Nayyar, Vinay Kumar
Art Director: Siddesh Telang
Copywriter: Tejas Ravindranath
Photographer: Aditya Bobhate
Doll Artists: Madhukar Bonkar, Danica D’souza
Published: October 2009

Celebrities go on social networks to develop a following that they can promote their music, movies, events and causes to.

According to the parasocial hypothesis, fans misperceive celebrities as part of their social networks and become more loyal, and receptive to their idols’ messages. This is one reason why social networks are so attractive to celebrities.

Celebrities are also one of the first to monetize their followings and social space, something even social networks like Twitter are finding hard to do.

For a summary of this mutually beneficial relationship, take a look at my slides below!

Celeb 2.0

Special thanks to my BSM group mates, Leon, Kimberly and Jia Qi for exploring this topic with me.

This year, the committee is holding the annual event @BrewerkzSG to raise funds for Concern Worldwide, an international humanitarian organisation dedicated to reducing suffering and ending extreme poverty. All proceeds will be going to providing education to needy children.

Below are 6 ways you can help.

1. Donate directly via paypal

To ensure 100% proceeds to the needy, Twestival’s all-volunteer organizers have partnered with PayPal to allow donations via widgets, and waiving all fees up to $1 million. Also, Citrix Online will donate GoToMeeting to all those who are organizing Twestival events, and Amiando will waive all credit card ticketing fees to Twestival events.

Donate here (right corner).

2. Need Opticals? Purchase them from @thelensmen

Thelensmen has raised $478.40 for the first 2 days and if you are looking at buying glasses, contact lenses and engaging eye care services, do so at their stores from now till March 25th!

3. Join us at Brewerkz!

Supporting a cause can’t get any easier.  Eat, meet and be merry with us this coming Thursday, 25th March at Brewerkz Riverside Point. 10% of the earnings during this event will go to Concern Worldwide! Expect performances by Jack and Rai and Deborah Lee and Thomas, with excellent sound systems provided by NutzStudio. The world class emcee of the day is also Singapore’s very own radio guy, @JoeAugustin!

It’s going to be a blast!

RSVP on Twitter or Facebook!

4. Connect with @TwestivalSG

Connect with the crew via Twitter (@TwestivalSG) and get updates about the event at the TwestivalSG blog (managed by @omgzam). You can also join other Twestival enthusiasts via Facebook. This Twestival Facebook page updates news about all the Twestival happenings around the globe.

5. Download Twestival Icon Pack

If you’re an avid blogger or a design lover, you may want to download this Twitter icon pack and share it with your friends. Every blog post or tweet is a small step towards doing social good. Download it here.

Credit: This Twestival Icon Pack is designed by Chethstudios.

6. Spread The Message!

The success of each Twestival depends heavily on word of mouth and we hope (no matter which city you belong to) you can help us spread the message out – Tweet it, blog it, Facebook it or bookmark it.

You kindness is very much appreciated!

[Donate here ]

Last year, talents and resources went to providing clean drinking water to 17,000 people.

Amanda Rose, founder of Twestival commented, “At last year’s Twestival, more than 1,000 volunteers and 10,000 donors raised more than $250,000 to provide clean and safe drinking water for more than 17,000 people. We know this works—and we’re excited to make it work for every child in the world that deserves an education.”

To Give Every Child An Education

Hence, this year, all proceeds generated from the 2010 Twestival will support education (An estimated 72 million children worldwide are not enrolled in school), and be donated to Concern Worldwide, a non-governmental, international, humanitarian organization that since 1968 has dedicated itself to reducing suffering and eliminating poverty.

100% Proceeds To Needy

Twestival’s all-volunteer organizers have partnered with PayPal to allow donations via widgets, and waiving all fees up to $1 million. Also, Citrix Online will donate GoToMeeting to all those who are organizing Twestival events, and Amiando will waive all credit card ticketing fees to Twestival events.

This means that 100% of the proceeds will go to the people in need.

Online Activities

Other than offline events, Twestival also has online activities such as TwestivalFM, allowing high-profile artists and musicians around the world to donate their songs to download for donations; Auction140, a global online auction of celebrity-donated items and experiences on eBay that will feature a live Twitter stream for the first time; an iPhone application; and live donations and results widgets that will enable real-time donations at local events. Twestival also has partnered with Ustream to live stream the day’s events, starting in New Zealand and ending in Hawaii.

Visit twestival.com to get information on how to get involved, and how Twestival donations would be used to help the needy.

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Stock photos powered by pixmac

These ads daringly used the names of three famous people and matched them with made-up job designations that would not have gotten them the level of success their real jobs have.

The ads bring not only humor but provoke our thoughts with questions like these as well:

“Could I be in this position?” “Am I maximizing my potential?”

So, have you found the job you are suited to?

But according to Outsell’s “Annual Advertising and Marketing Study 2010,” B2B companies think that Facebook is the most effective social tool.

Also, marketing spending on social media sites are predicted to increase by 43.3% this year.

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Contradictorily, when HubSpot surveyed B2B companies in North America, 45% rated LinkedIn effective, while only 33% said the same for Facebook.

So, what’s happening here?

Well, akin to clothes, if you want it to fit well, you can’t just pick one social tool that’s a one size fits all. The effectiveness of a selected tool is largely based on how it is being used and who it is supposed to be reaching out to. No matter what the research says, always find tools that would help you achieve your social media goals and that majority of your target audience is on.

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Stock photo powered by pixmac.

What is most important to marketers? According to the Marketing Trends Report 2010 from Anderson Analytics and the Marketing Executives Networking Group (MENG), marketing ROI is currently the most important.

This highlights the fact that marketing is not entirely an art but also a science. Other top priorities of marketers include customer retention, brand loyalty and company positioning.

Social media, too is part of the list, ranking at 8th position while social media ROI is the most important to 36% of marketers surveyed. I guess we can expect an increase of professionals measuring social media ROI from the 16% we saw last year.

Top 15 List

Social media might be a buzzword but we all know that having too much of the same thing is dull. Social media was considered the most annoying, with nearly 30% of executives tired of it. Twitter, came in second, irking nearly 15% of respondents, and social networking came in third.

It seems very much like a love-hate relationship we have here. At a time like this, social media is definitely as important, if not more important to marketers as other types of media. However, it might have become an overused term, especially with gurus offering nothing but fluff to the table. Social media is not the silver bullet most people make it up to be.

On the contrary, social media requires more substance, time and planning than most other platforms. We need to look at the big picture and see how social media fit into your business strategies.

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Source: eMarketer

Employers are watching us on social media, and so are employees.

Last year, a research done by Harris Interactive and commissioned by CareerBuilder.com found out that 45% of employers have used social networking sites to screen potential employees. I was also asked once for my resume not by paper but by LinkedIn only.

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Your digital footprints can land you opportunities or strip you of them. Social sites are your dynamic resume, and like any resume, you write them with care.

DO: Show them what you’ve got

If you are looking for business or job opportunities, you got to show what you’ve got. It doesn’t matter what platform you use – a blog, Facebook or Twitter. We have seen pros teaching make up techniques on YouTube, finance students offering tips on blogs and foodies giving reviews on Facebook and Twitter. We can expect many more Justin Bieber and iJustine getting spotted for their talent.

DON’T: Leave them with any dirt about you

Employers are validating your paper resumes by checking on you through Twitter and Facebook, so you better be telling the truth. Calling in sick? Make sure your boss doesn’t catch your partying photos on Facebook when you are supposed to be in bed. Want to spew vulgarities and talk bad about your boss on your blog? Think twice.

Don’t hide from social media, embrace it

You might think that social media is robbing you of privacy. But instead of hiding and making yourself unsearchable, use social media to your advantage. Besides displaying your capabilities, you can check out your interviewers before meeting up with them. Know the kind of person they are so nothing comes as a surprise. Befriend your prospective company or boss to get noticed even before they see you in person.

From Chicago Business:

Ms Fisherman, managing partner of the Chicago office of BGT Partners, an interactive marketing firm with headquarters in Miami, says that candidates who initiate contact with BGT Partners on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn have an advantage in the hiring process because of those interactions. She expects to hire 10 new employees in Chicago in the first quarter of 2010 and says that many of the candidates she has met online have gotten her attention.

JetBlue

This time, to celebrate its 10th anniversary celebration, it announced on Twitter that it would be giving out about a thousand free round-trip tickets at three undisclosed locations in Manhattan on 10th March, Wednesday.

To make the task more challenging and fun, not only must interested people show up at the locations, they must bring something along with them.

From CNET:

“at the first stop, a “birthday card” for JetBlue (“Apparently there was a Hallmark store nearby that was very thankful for our presence,” Johnston said); at the second, an item of blue clothing and something related to planes (there were a lot of bags of peanuts in line); at the third, a postcard (handmade was OK) depicting the tenth city out of which JetBlue started operating flights. That, of course, meant the person in question would have to do some Googling to find out what that city is.

The tickets–about 300 in each location–were gone within about 20 minutes of each Twitter announcement going up, Johnston said; it took only three to five minutes for the first person to show up in line, even at the location where people had to make a postcard for the mystery destination (which turned out to be West Palm Beach, Fla.).”

One of the purpose of this cool promotion is to get more people to follow JetBlue. Seems like they have achieved their goal, gaining close to 4000 followers in a day (from Twittercounter.com):

With such a strong presence online and periodic generous giveaways, who are we going to think of when we want to fly cheap?

But in a good way.

Each print ad conveys strength while all that is shown are athletes with missing limbs. Oh the irony, these athletes are no where close to what we call, “disabled.”

The ads communicated two messages succinctly: (1) they’re handicapped, but (2) they’re tough. It is the usual message made simpler and more striking.

There is no room for sympathy, only admiration.

Also, when we look at the TV commercials, both ended with the athletes adopting the same posture as they did in the print ads, subtly increasing audience’s recall-retention of the message.

Advertising Agency: BBDO Toronto, Canada

Print

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TV

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via: adsoftheworld

However, are the affluent really into social networking? According to a study from Unity Marketing, some 78 percent of affluent (avg. income $239.3k) consumers (and 70 percent of them aged over age 40) have at least one social networking profile (usually on Facebook).

Here comes another question: Do the affluent like the idea of becoming a fan on Facebook or a follower on Twitter? The same survey found that about half of the affluent have used a social media site to connect with a brand, such as viewing new products or commenting on a brand, but only one-quarter have become a follower or joined a group.

Here are the reasons why they use social networking sites:

At the end of the day, it is the value you provide that attracts the affluent to view or even follow your brand. Are you using this platform to sell or to offer entertainment and the information customers need?

“Affluent consumers have flocked to social media, but they use it as one more tool to gather information to make purchase decisions,” says Danziger. “Smart marketers will tap the interactivity of these sites to reach out to affluent consumers, ask for their input, and really listen to what these consumers need in order to decide to make a purchase.”

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Source: eMarketer