social media
Been spending some time looking in on some of the most successful viral marketing campaigns of 2010. Despite what would appear to me to be obvious, there is still an assumption among some businesses - especially small and medium sized businesses - that viral marketing is something cheap and easy to pull off.
I mean, really. To all the companies who still think this way, I say look at this viral centerpiece for Old Spice and see if this looks like something that can be produced in-house. Even the marketing departments of multibillion-dollar corporations can't compare. Without exception, it takes a great creative agency to build a can't-miss viral campaign.
I've been in a bit of a jaded funk of late looking for interesting marketing topics to write about. With my busy work schedule I only have an hour or so in the morning to get something posted, and that's not a lot of time to dig for something interesting. Late last night I was feeling a strong urge to get something written but couldn't think of anything especially compelling.
That was before former JetBlue flight attendant Steven Slater cussed out a passenger, grabbed a cold brew and slid down an emergency evacuation chute right into my lap.
Easily one of the hottest stories on the wire this morning, the buzz about this guy and his impulsive antics have turned him into an anti-corporate folk hero overnight. In the reader's forums of almost every online newspaper that ran this story, the public sentiment is overwhelmingly with this airline employee who flushed a 20-year career down the crapper because he got sick of the pressure, the pace and the unrelenting demands of the job - a state of mind that most of the American working public can relate to.
The question that immediately popped into my head was: How is Jet Blue going to handle this one on Facebook?
The Twitter feed isn't much, but the chatter there may entice you to jump onto their website for a look at what's going on with SF street food. The interactive map is almost as addictive as a Kung Fu Taco!
SF boutique Doe-SF isn't too aggressive with their merchandising; from a quick run through their website it would seem that half their categories are without product.
But if you're good at playfully beguiling the public about what you do have in stock, your irregular inventory issues might not be such a big deal. Doe-SF are a great example of how to use Twitter for small retail businesses. Have fun, get involved, don't just talk about yourself, and occasionally blow the whistle to your followers for a Twitter-exclusive 2-hour only 30% off sale.
I'm not a big fan of Facebook memes. The ones my friends send me are usually attempts to mine data employing gimmicky concepts that are built on transparently oversimplified algorithms. And applications from most businesses based solely on shopping don't really give me much value.
But one Facebook application I do like is Hallmark SocialCalendar. This app keeps tabs on important dates, including the birthdays of your FB buddies. For someone like me who is horrible at remembering birthdays, it's a great thing to have. Not only does it remember the birthdays, but gives you the opportunity to send e-cards - many of which are free - and buy virtual gifts.
Peeked in on a webinar this morning from MarketingCloud called Social Best Practices for Marketing in the Cloud. I was doing some B2B research and saw one of the folks at Magento was a presenter, so I signed up.
I didnt know what I was going to get, exactly. The term "cloud" is thrown around in marketing-speak so much of late that you have to dig a bit to find out what "cloud" people are referring to. Cloud e-commerce, cloud marketing, tag clouds?
(I was hoping that tag clouding didn't enter into it; I happen to agree with Jeffrey Zeldman, who postulated 5 years ago that tag clouds were the UI style equivalent of the mullet. Unfortunately tag clouds are still going strong, so much so that in a year or two they'll probably come full circle and have serious retro nostalgia appeal).
