This. . . this is just amazing.

After you click on one of the two choices at the end of this intro video you will be taken to a youtube page where you are able to type in what happens to the bear and an appropriate video is played. Super awesome. Super props and kudos to Tipp-Ex for an excellent idea executed amazingly well!

Oh Pepsi. . . why would you make such a bone headed mistake like using music that you haven’t secured the rights to use? Especially when there are plenty of options for music that isn’t tied down by any of these problems. Pepsi used the song “Why Can’t We Be Friends” by the band “War” in this commercial spot:

The guys from War claim Pepsi stole their “signature song” for a national ad campaign … and now the band is opening a $10 million can of whoop ass to make things right. -TMZ

As of now on Jamendo alone has 1552 albums (each containing several pieces of music) available, licensed under an attribution only Creative Commons License. Which means you can use this music in any of your productions for the cost of a line in the rolling credits!

Kevin MacLeod has skads of royalty free music available to use as you like as long as you give him credit and even has options for applying for a Sans Attribution License in those cases where you cannot credit him (such as in a commercial).

There are many other royalty free / creative commons music sources including Free Play Music and places like RoyaltyFreeMusic.com (which offers royalty free music at a low cost).

With all of the options for royalty free music. . . don’t be like Pepsi. Don’t use music that you don’t have a license for in your productions, especially since there are plenty of pieces of great music readily available.

Human beings have been altering their perception of the world for millenia, but finally we’re doing it in a way that makes the world a better place. It’s called augmented reality and it’s putting information as close as your eyes. Look at the world and know in depth everything you could ever want to know about whatever is before you.

Tim Folger over at National Geographic wrote an amazing article about the current state of augmented realty (AR) that pretty much leaves me speechless!

The U.S. Marine Corps is testing AR technology developed at Columbia University to train mechanics. They don headgear that projects animated 3-D computer graphics onto the equipment under repair, labeling parts and giving step-by-step guidance. “The marines worked faster with our AR program than with laptop-based manuals,” says Steven Feiner, a computer scientist at Columbia.

Early adopters can test out the world’s first augmented-reality glasses for consumers, from a U.S. company called Vuzix. They look like wraparound sunglasses, except you can’t see directly through the lenses. Instead, small cameras centered on the outside of each lens feed continuous video through a mobile computer (say, an iPhone) to an LCD screen mounted inside each lens. So you look at the world indirectly, through the two tiny cameras’ feed. (And without a panoramic field of view, you’ll have to be careful where you walk.) The price for the glasses with cameras is about $600.

When connected to an iPhone, an iPod, or a PC for at-home gaming, the glasses combine computer input with the live video, creating a single stereoscopic field of view on the LCD, where computer graphics merge with the real world. Paul Travers, president of Vuzix, says that in the near future video glasses will deliver spectacular AR effects. “Instead of a little cell phone display, you’ll have an image on the LCD that looks like an IMAX theater filling your field of view.”

The next stage in the evolution of AR is taking shape in the lab of Babak Parviz, an associate professor of bio-nanotechnology at Seattle’s University of Washington. Parviz has made a contact lens etched with a tiny, transparent electronic circuit that contains a single LED. Over the next several years he hopes to add hundreds of LEDs to the lens, allowing it to display text and images that would appear to hover in space at a readable distance in front of the eye. “With enough processing power, the lens could translate speech into text in real time and display it for deaf people,” says Parviz. The lens would be powered wirelessly by radio waves transmitted from a cell phone in your pocket.

Unbelievable. Folks, we live in the future right now.

A fig rig is sort of a steering wheel shaped rig for your video camera to help get steadier shots while still keeping fluidity of motion and control. Since I didn’t really want to spend $300 today or wait for one to arrive I decided to make a similar rig myself. I decided on a square design (hence squig rig) instead of circular since it’s easier to assemble and I think the benefits of a circular design is dubious at best.

This is a video showing off my Squig Rig and a short shot of it in action:

Here are a couple of still photos for a more detailed view of the squig rig iteself and the bracket after it has been put together:

This rig uses four equal length pieces of 3/4″ pvc pipe for the walls (make long enough to fit your camera), four 3/4″ pvc elbow connectors, one 1/4″ wing nut, two 1/4″ bolts, one 1/4″ hex nut, one 1/4″ locking nut, one pipe bracket with space for 1/4″ bolts/nuts, super glue, and flat black spray paint.

I think this rig is pretty good, but I think shifting the weight of the camera more towards the center will help increase stability even more, so I’ve drawn up plans for version 2:

What do you think? Let me know if you give making one of your own a shot. Feel free to ask any questions about the rig and materials as well.

Some people say that social media optimization (SMO) is like herding cats. I say, “if you’re going to herd cats, bring a can opener.” Just like cats, the people on social media sites will run to where ever you are if you make noise in a way that lets them know that you have something that they want.

The denizens of social media are waiting out there, listening intently for any sign of interesting information. They will respond with a mass amount of activity if you let them know that you have something “cool”. You’re job isn’t over with just the first rush though. If you want to keep them near by then you’ll need to be responsive, keep them engaged, and keep the conversation active.

The people are waiting on Facebook, Twitter, Jaiku, and all of the other social media sites. They are waiting for other people (and that includes you. . . probably) to start making some noise about something interesting. They want to hear the latest news about their hobbies and interests and (lucky for you) most of these hobbies and interests are listed in the “interests” section of their user profiles. The users of social media also write about what they want to hear about.

All you need to do is look at what they post to their statuses/walls/twitter accounts and if they have a blog at the very least skim it. Keep in mind that they do have filters. They only want to hear about their interests and like cats they are indifferent at best to anything not interesting to them. They want to spend their time reading, watching, talking about their interests and they will never feign interest. They will in fact feel indignant and insulted if you talk about something they don’t care about. Their time is at a high premium and they don’t have extra time for things outside of their sphere of interests. They rightfully expect you and me (savvy marketers that we are) to cater to their interests.

You need to speak to them in a way that lets them know you have what they want. The first step towards that is to figure out their interests by checking profiles, looking at blogs, and generally using the abundant resources available in the social media era.

However, don’t overlook the basic method of simply asking them. You can do this via the use of online polling systems (some of which are built right into the social media sites) and by engaging them in the topical discussion boards. Once you know their interests you need to speak to their interests.

If you’re talking about something they write about, they will listen. Bloggers are always looking for information about and surrounding their chosen field and will usually be happy to hear from you if you’re on topic. Social media sites are full of individuals who may not be bloggers, but are just as passionate about certain topics and ecstatic to hear anything about those topics of interest. Remember though, stay on demographic with them.

Don’t drift into “uninteresting” things, because, just like a herd of cats, if you get boring they get lost. Don’t reach out to dog bloggers about the latest cat food. Try not to ask too much of your audience either. They want to interact just enough and if you take up too much of their time they will quickly grow tired and bored of you and your message.

You need to be responsive to your audience needs and desires. They will ask questions that you need to answer quickly, truthfully, and tactfully. Keep an eye out for these questions so you can respond quickly. You can do this via RSS subscriptions to searches on twitter or google blogsearch, email notification systems on discussion boards, and there are even entire services dedicated to being a watchdog for your keywords.

Do not lie. If you lie everyone in the world will know in 5 minutes, because they will figure it out in 2 minutes by using google and they will let everyone on all of their social networks know about it, and those people will spread the message, and so on. . . until one lie ruins your entire reputation. It’s not worth it. Be honest. Make sure you address people in a way that is both natural and respectful.

Don’t talk to the teenage demographic the same way you would your grandmother and definitely not vice versa. You might think that it’s too much trouble to respond, but ignoring questions is a death sentence that may be even worse than lying.

Being uninvolved in the social media sphere is like having no voice and that can only work against you. You’re going to run into both positive and negative responses to you, your brand, and your message. It’s okay. I promise.

Thank and promote the positive responders by commenting or emailing back, and offering to post cool comments on your blog with links to their blog or website. A little flattery and promotion goes a long way with people.

Respond to and work with the negative responders no matter how much you think you’d rather not. Do your best to change their mind with an open and honest dialogue about their issues.

At the end of the day stay calm and collected. By keeping your cool while your detractors lose theirs the world will see you as the good and reasonable one while your detractors will be seen as ranting nutcases. Let them walk into that trap if they want to.

Whether it’s handling your social media presence or herding cats the important thing to keep in mind is to appeal to the interests and habits of the ones you’re trying to attract.

Focus on what they are interested in and what they want and keep the tools and supplies handy that will keep them coming to you. Bust out the can opener and make the noise that lets them know that you have what they want and all they have to do is come running. Once they know you’ve got what they’ve been looking for they’ll be there faster than you can keep up with.

In a big announcement, OLX has finally publicly announced that they just received a strategic investment from South African media conglomerate Naspers in the range of $20 to $40 million.  The full story by Leena Rao is over on TechCrunch, Naspers Makes Strategic Investment In Craigslist Competitor OLX

We’ve been hearing recently that South African media conglomerate and recent DST investor Naspers was sniffing around Crasiglist competitor OLX. Today, we confirmed with OLX co-founders Alec Oxenford and Fabrice Grinda that Naspers has made a strategic investment in the online classifieds company.

While Buenos Aires-based OLX is not disclosing the amount invested, we’ve heard from sources that the investment was in the range of $20 to $40 million. Naspers also bought out the shares of all of OLX’s previous investors, which include Nexus Venture Partners, The Founders Fund, DN Capital, General Catalyst Partners, and Bessemer Venture Partners. Prior to this round of funding, OLX had raised nearly $30 million.

While the free classifieds site has trouble competing with Craigslist in the U.S., OLX has a strong user base internationally, and is the current leader in Latin America and Asia. The company, which is seeing over 125 million unique visitors per month worldwide, has a presence in 90 countries in 40 languages.

In 2007 OLX has made an investment in Edeng.cn, a Chinese free classifieds site and acquired Mundoanuncio.com, a Craigslist-like classifieds site targeting the Hispanic market, in 2006. OLX also has a hold on the Philippines market thanks to a white label partnership with Friendster. And OLX scored a similar deal with social network hi5.

So why does Naspers want a stake in OLX? The conglomerate has been making a number of investments in the emerging Latin American market, including BrandsClub, Grupo Abril, Movile and Buscapé. According to a joint statement made by OLX and Naspers, the South African firm’s long-term, general strategy “is to acquire/establish a core internet community within a specific country/region and to then expand the operations by adding additional services such as e-commerce, communication, social networking, content and gaming.”

Disclosure: OLX is a client of Abraham Harrison

Good old Stephen Colbert gives us some of the best advice for social media ever disseminated.

The Colbert Report Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c The Word – Control-Self-Delete www.colbertnation.com Colbert Report Full Episodes 2010 Election Fox News

Control-Self-Delete is the word on the street now. Apparently all you have to do is:

• Never make a mistake
• Change your name when you’re an adult
• Change your face with invasive surgery
• Replace all of your friends
• Replace all of your family

The clip is awesome.

Nicholas E. Kinports over at Admaven wrote a great piece reminding us all to remember what we used to say about social media:

Sometimes it’s useful to look back and remember what we were all saying about social media and the future of advertising. I was reminded of an article I co-authored in early 2009 that eventually made it’s way to Bloomberg-Businessweek.

Here’s an inspiring TEDx video from David Armano covering his current views on the topic:

It’s a great little piece and a nice call to think about our goals, ideals, and actions as we move forward.

FBML (facebook markup language) is a specialized language for rendering pages and portions of applications in facebook. It’s often changing and tends to be more of a tripping point than a sstepping stone for developers. Though it looks like we’re all in luck as facebook is moving away from fbml:

Last Thursday Facebook announced they’re moving away from FBML and towards a more dynamic platform in the form of iFrames for both canvas applications as well as Facebook page tabs. Also, soon Facebook will not allow the creation of any new FBML applications. -Via Ten Golden Rules

We are also moving toward IFrames instead of FBML for both canvas applications and Page tabs. As a part of this process, we will be standardizing on a small set of core FBML tags that will work with both applications on Facebook and external Web pages via our JavaScript SDK, effectively eliminating the technical difference between developing an application on and off Facebook.com.
-Via The Facebook Developer Blog

This is great news! Applications and facebook pages have a chance to become much more dynamic now.

Here’s a little proof that Twitter is now not simply location aware, in terms of latitude and longitude or address, but is now place-aware.  I checked in to both of these places on FourSquare and Twitter recognized these places by name:

Then, I decided to click on the Trader Joe’s, Falls Church link beside the little map marker, and lo! there was the following pop-up window, which is very much aware of not simply location anymore but they’re following the trend of Facebook Places and the other location-aware social networks by starting to connect to businesses:

I am here at the CVS at the corner of Pershing and Glebe in Arlington, Virginia, and I stumbled upon a $20 animated fish, Frankie the Fish, from the crazy Fillet-O-Fish commercial — you know the one.

I was actually a little tempted to get one.  I think it is genius that a company like McDonalds would be willing to hook my friends and I with one of the most maddeningly delightful jingles in the history of advertising and commercials.

This would be the absolute perfect gift for the kids of the people you hate and want to drive mad.  And, at just $20 it is a heck of a lot less than buying those kids drum kits, electric guitars, trumpets, or even a karaoke machine.

Increased amount of online coverage for World Habitat Day 635% over previous year – from 31 to 228 articles.

Challenge: To raise the profile of World Habitat Day online. World Habitat Day is held on the first Monday of October every year.

The theme of the October 2009 event was “Planning Our Urban Future” which tried to raise awareness of the need to improve urban planning in communities all over the world.

In August 2009, Abraham Harrison LLC was tasked with helping Habitat for Humanity raise the online profile of World

Habitat Day to encourage advocacy, foster education and increase donations.

Strategies/Tactics: Leverage the influence of bloggers in target demographics to increase coverage of World Habitat Day.

In order to broadly spread the word about World Habitat Day, Abraham Harrison reached out to over 2,600 bloggers covering topics relevant to urban planning and humanitarian aid.

To better equip each blogger with special content relating to World Habitat Day, the team at Abraham Harrison created a social media news release including embeddable pictures, videos, banner ads and message copy that bloggers could cut and paste into their blogs.

The purpose of the blogger outreach was to earn bloggers’ support and encourage them to act as repeaters and amplifiers of World Habitat Day messages to motivate readers to become involved in the effort.

Results: Increased amount of online coverage for event 635% over previous year – from 31 to 228 articles.

With a boost from Abraham Harrison’s extensive blogger outreach in September, online coverage of World Habitat Day 2009 increased 635% from the previous year; from 31 to 228 blog mentions.  That translates to an estimated 1 million people having seen a blog post about World Habitat Day 2009.

Reached 100,000 followers on Twitter, 19,000 Likes on Facebook and millions of impressions through Blogger Outreaches

Challenge: Raise brand awareness, provide customer support and produce measurable results through the use of Social Media.

Brandsclub, the leading private sales club in Brazil, operates 100% online and a strong presence on the internet was essential for the company’s success. In addition to increasing its customer base, Brandsclub was having difficulties with its delivery process, causing negative sentiments to spread all over the social networking sites and blogs.

Abraham Harrison’s challenge was three-fold: drive new users to the Brandsclub website, turn the negative sentiment into positive and track results to highlight the positive ROI.

Strategy/Tactics: Leverage blogger influence to increase awareness and good sentiment, constantly support customers on social networks by taking a position of transparency and willingness.

The team at Abraham Harrison implemented a comprehensive, multi-staged and highly targeted blogger outreach to encourage bloggers to share information about Brandsclub and its uniqueness.

Over 5,000 bloggers were contacted during the 8 outreach efforts. With the personal touch of having a team member follow up with every single response, hundreds of mentions were earned.

On social networking sites, the process also required that 1- A full research of all conversations surrounding Brandsclub and its competitors was executed. 2- A strategy to daily monitoring surrounding these keywords was drafted and executed. 3- Different methods were used to gain the attention of internet users and keep the content increasingly interesting.

By carefully executing strategic steps and engage people into the social presence of Brandsclub, Abraham Harrison was able to put its reporting tools to use and show extremely impressive results.

Results: 100,000 followers on Twitter, 19,000 Likes on Facebook and millions of blog-generated impressions.

The number of followers and likes are just as impressive as the tens of thousands of positive tweets surrounding Brandsclub and the average of 200 interactions per day, triggering thousands of impressions daily.

And I for one LOVE it! I am an iPhone, Foursquare, Facebook junkie (as my wife and children can attest).

Facebook announced yesterday that they are rolling out location based check-in just like Foursquare and Gowalla (I hate Gowalla - see previous post).

I have been using Foursquare for about 6 months now and have to say that I am addicted to checking in. Just earning badges and becoming the mayor of some silly location can be a satisfying thing.

What I really found interesting and made me realize that this could be part of the future of social media is when I took my son to a Chili’s restaurant after he wrestled in a tournament a few weeks ago.

I checked in using Foursquare when we sat down and was prompted with a “special.” When I clicked on the special I came to a screen that said “Anyone who checks in at this Chili’s using Foursquare is entitled to a free nachos and salsa – show this to your waitress.”

I am never one to turn down free food, so this was a real treat.

I am glad that Facebook is taking the “location check-in” leap, however, I am disappointed to see that my location (just outside of Philadelphia) is not available yet.

**UPDATE** The “Places” for Facebook iPhone is now working in my area. I like it, but I still like the Foursquare concept better where you can achieve badges and status by checking in at more places. The Facebook Places uses Google Maps and Google to find places which is pretty cool.

Ning is ending its free social networks service and forcing all of the free network users to either upgrade to a paid service or get out. This is going to cause major blowback for the company in the real social media sphere (facebook, twitter, and blogs). Ning is going to find itself dead in the [...]

Ning is ending its free social networks service and forcing all of the free network users to either upgrade to a paid service or get out. This is going to cause major blowback for the company in the real social media sphere (facebook, twitter, and blogs).

Ning is going to find itself dead in the water rather than increasing profits. The better way to handle this would have been to make the premium services more appealing and leaving the free networks as they are, or not allowing any new free networks while leaving the existing free networks alone. Yanking the carpet out from under your users is always going to work out badly.

I for one am going to let my Ning networks die. I’m also out of reasons to suggest that anyone use Ning instead of just setting up a facebook fan page. The Facebook fan pages grow faster and instantly appeal to people already invested in a strong social media platform. Ning can’t really stand up against that if they’re not getting the added buzz of providing free social networks.

Jason Kincaid posted a copy of the letter that Jason Rosenthal sent out to the Ning team:

Team,

When I became CEO 30 days ago, I told you I would take a hard look at our business. This process has brought real clarity to what’s working, what’s not, and what we need to do now to make Ning a big success.

My main conclusion is that we need to double down on our premium services business. Our Premium Ning Networks like Friends or Enemies, Linkin Park, Shred or Die, Pickens Plan, and tens of thousands of others both drive 75% of our monthly US traffic, and those Network Creators need and will pay for many more services and features from us.

So, we are going to change our strategy to devote 100% of our resources to building the winning product to capture this big opportunity. We will phase out our free service. Existing free networks will have the opportunity to either convert to paying for premium services, or transition off of Ning. We will judge ourselves by our ability to enable and power Premium Ning Networks at huge scale. And all of our product development capability will be devoted to making paying Network Creators extremely happy.

As a consequence of this change, I have also made the very tough decision to reduce the size of our team from 167 people to 98 people. As hard as this is to do, I am confident that this is the right decision for our company, our business, and our customers. Marc and I will work diligently with everyone affected by this to help them find great opportunities at other companies.

I’ve never seen a more talented and devoted team, and it has been my privilege to get to know and work with each and every one of you over the last 18 months.

We’ll use today to say goodbye to our friends and teammates who will be leaving the company. Tomorrow, I will take you through, in detail, our plans for the next three months and our new focus.

Thanks,
Jason Rosenthal

I’m sad to see Ning go out like this, but I can’t see how it will survive with this new model.

Our very own Chris Abraham was included in Public Relations Blogs – 25 Essential PR Bloggers You Should Be Reading: Keeping up with what’s new and interesting in public relations news is important – vital strategies, tips and trends are shared each day that can impact your business. Whether you’re looking for best practices on [...]

Our very own Chris Abraham was included in Public Relations Blogs – 25 Essential PR Bloggers You Should Be Reading:

Keeping up with what’s new and interesting in public relations news is important – vital strategies, tips and trends are shared each day that can impact your business. Whether you’re looking for best practices on press release distribution or simply how to take advantage of social media, these blogs will prove invaluable. To keep up with the hottest and highest quality content, below are 25 essential public relations blogs you should be reading:

PR Squared — PR Squared is a blog by Todd Defren, a principal at SHIFT Communications, which focuses on conversations about social media and marketing.

Brian Solis — Brian Solis, Principal of FutureWorks, gives insights into the convergence of PR, Traditional Media and Social Media at his popular blog.

Peter Shankman — Peter Shankman’s blog looks at thinking about Social Media, PR, marketing, advertising, creativity, and customer service.

Dave Fleet — DaveFleet.com is about communications, public relations, marketing and social media, and the areas where those topics intersect.

Danny Brown — This blog by Danny Brown, co-founder of the SRM group, focuses on the use of social media, PR and marketing,

Conversation Communications — This blog by Arik Hansen, principal of ACH Communications, covers all things related to digital PR strategy and community building.

Social Media Explorer — A blog by Jason Falls, Social Media Explorer, covers public relations, social media, search marketing and many topics in between.

Chris Abraham — Chris Abraham, President and COO of Abraham Harrison LLC, writes this blog on developing news and updates in the world of public relations and social media.

PR in Your Pajamas — A blog about integrating using public relations and business coaching for results, Elena Veis, tells how integrating these areas will lead to success for your business.

O’Dwyer’s PR Blog — O’Dwyer’s blog covers PR, public affairs, marketing and the world of communications.

TopRank Online Marketing Blog — The Online Marketing blog maintained by the team at TopRank Online Marketing provides helpful information on areas such as SEO, social media marketing, business blogging and online PR.

Influential Marketing Blog — Rohit Bhargava maintains the Influential Markeitng Blog, a site that focuses on information and resources on creating compelling marketing, advertising and public relations strategies.

AimClear Blog — The aimClear blog is a resource for search engine marketing for advertising agency, in-house and public relations professionals.

A Take on Tech PR by Drew Benvie — A blog by Drew Benvie, managing director of 33 Digitial, that gives insights and information on tech public relations and how it can help you.

Media Culpa — Media Culpa is a blog about media and public relations – with a focus on social media – written by Swedish PR practitioner Hans Kullin.

The Buzz Bin — The Buzz Bin provides a point of view on integrated communications, including PR, social media, interactive and general marketing topics.

Spin Sucks — Spin Sucks is the agency blog of Arment Dietrich and covers social media, online PR and all things in between.

PR Couture — PR Couture explores the ever-evolving role of public relations, marketing and social media in the fashion industry.

PRSA ComPRehension — PRSA ComPRehension is a blog on PR best practices from Public Relations Society of America members.

Beyond the Hype — Beyond the Hype conveys the opinions, insights and experiences in public relations and advertising from senior communications counselors at Lois Paul & Partners.

Adam Sherk — Adam Sherk is a Search and PR strategist, helping news and content sites with enterprise SEO and audience development, including social media marketing and other forms of online public relations.

Measurement Matters — Measurement Matters gives insights and information on the areas of public relations, social media and how media analysis and evaluation relates to them.

College Web Editor — College Web Editor is a helpful resource with information about the Web, marketing, and PR in higher education.

Deirdre Breadenridge PR 2.0 Strategies — Deirdre discusses social networking, blogging, microblogging, podcasting, streaming video, RSS technology and how communications is changing the way that businesses need to think.

Journalistics — Journalistics is a blog dedicated to covering all topics at the intersection of public relations and journalism today.

Be sure to check out the original post.

I am here with social media and monitoring and metric goddess Wendy Scherer on top of the bus heading off to the Cubs game against the Padres at Wrigley Field. Thanks to the gang from Alterian as this was part of the NA Engaging Times Summit 2010

I am here with social media and monitoring and metric goddess Wendy Scherer on top of the bus heading off to the Cubs game against the Padres at Wrigley Field. Thanks to the gang from Alterian as this was part of the NA Engaging Times Summit 2010

Abraham Harrison was named a finalist in PR News’ PR Digital Awards in the Digital PR Campaign category for the work we’re doing in developing new communities through online outreach for The Fresh Air fund Digital PR Campaign Abraham Harrison LLC – Building Support in New Communities Through Online Outreach for The Fresh Air Fund [...]

Abraham Harrison was named a finalist in PR News’ PR Digital Awards in the Digital PR Campaign category for the work we’re doing in developing new communities through online outreach for The Fresh Air fund

Digital PR Campaign

• Abraham Harrison LLC – Building Support in New Communities Through Online Outreach for The Fresh Air Fund
• The Clorox Company with Ketchum Public Relations – Clorox Introduces Bleach to a New Generation with Bleachable Moments
• The Coca-Cola Company – Expedition 206: 365 Days, 206 Countries, 1 Mission
• Discovery Communications – LIFE Digital Communications Campaign
• Entergy Communications – Digital Communications Promoting Grand Gulf Nuclear Station’s 25th Anniversary
• Fleishman-Hillard – Gatorade Super Bowl XLIV Campaign
• Hunter Public Relations – Hasbro Family Game Night
• JB Cumberland PR – Curious Chef: A Digital PR Success
• MS&L/Procter & Gamble – Tampax Pearl Outsmart Mother Nature PR Campaign
• National Association of Home Builders – Federal Home Buyer Tax Credit Public Awareness Campaign

If you’re making videos for your social media marketing campaign then you’ll want nice steady shots. I recently put together a shoulder rig for my Canon EOS T2i and my H2 Zoom audio recorder so that I could take more stable moving videos and record better audio than with the built in microphone. It’s made [...]

If you’re making videos for your social media marketing campaign then you’ll want nice steady shots.

I recently put together a shoulder rig for my Canon EOS T2i and my H2 Zoom audio recorder so that I could take more stable moving videos and record better audio than with the built in microphone.

It’s made out of 2 pieces of PVC pipe, a PVC “T” connector, a pipe bracket that has a place for a bolt to fit through, two 1/4 inch bolts, one locking 1/4 nut, one regular 1/4 inch nut, two 1/4 inch wing nuts, and duct tape where needed or cool. The shoulder padding is made of some pantyhose, rags, and rubber bands. Not very expensive, not very pretty, but steady and useful. :)

Here’s a video that shows it off pretty well (though my Sony Bloggie has trouble in the low light and close up):

Here are some stills taken with my Canon T2i so you can get a clearer look at how it’s all put together:

What do you think? Please, let me know if this helps you out or if you make a variation on this design. :)

Social media is a new platform for communication, marketing, and advertisement. But the world of social media is much larger than most marketers are aware of. The growth and the power of online communities is changing the consumer market to be user-generated, with new ways for companies to actively engage their customer. When implemented correctly, [...]

Social media is a new platform for communication, marketing, and advertisement. But the world of social media is much larger than most marketers are aware of. The growth and the power of online communities is changing the consumer market to be user-generated, with new ways for companies to actively engage their customer. When implemented correctly, social media marketing can be extremely beneficial.

Liana “Li” Evans is an expert in social media and search marketing and author of Social Media Marketing- Strategies for Engaging in Facebook, Twitter & Other Social Media. In this brand new, ultimate how-to guide to social media, Li looks deeper into the social media realm and provides everything you need to know to develop (or improve) a successful social media strategy.

Li introduces the book with her insight on social media: “I believe that social media is changing the way that companies need to interact with both their audiences and customers by listening and directly engaging with them.”

Li has created an informative framework for social media marketing, including examples of notorious cases of social media success and failure, which made it a fun and interesting read. Below are some words of advice that I have summarized from Li’s book that are important when crafting a social media-marketing plan.

Understand Your Market
All companies are different; so keep in mind that your audience could be different from the audience of your competitors. A common mistake made when crafting a social media strategy for your company is not knowing your audience. It is so important to understand your market, because all of the effort put into crafting a plan and engaging in conversation will go to waste if you’re not reaching the right people. So often will companies attempt to reach out to customers via Twitter or Facebook because they are popular uses of social media. Li presented an example on page 153 about Pizza Hut’s announcement that they were hiring a “Twittern” to reach college students through Twitter. Their clever attempt to enter the social media world was not a successful one because they did not thoroughly research their market. Evidently, the majority of Pizza Hut customers (and college students) are more active on Facebook, not Twitter. So their “Twittern” would have been engaging with the wrong people. It is so important to know your target market and understand how they consume data. How do you learn about your target market? Research. Explore the social media world. Read the conversations that people are having. Guaranteed you will find your proper audience. There are so many online communities with people communicating and sharing information with one another. Join them!

Be Real
Bloggers and others that belong to these online communities are very passionate about whatever they are talking about. Of course they are talking about it during their free time and it is their hobby! They are willing to talk to just about anybody who joins. Mind you, it is very easy to join a conversation but also very easy to get kicked out. Don’t make it obvious that you are trying to market your product, expand your business, gain more Facebook friends, etc. Don’t jump right in and ask them to “like” you business page or follow you on Twitter. Approaching it this way is offensive and will easily get you shunned from the community. Instead, be real. Join the conversation and don’t say right away that you are working for a PR agency and here is a press release that you think everyone should post on his or her blog. This will take you nowhere.

Participate
The more active you are in online communities, the more they will trust you and not mistake you for some marketing robot. Be patient and build relationships to gain their trust. Because once they do, word-of-mouth marketing is a very powerful thing. Especially in a world where TV advertisements are ignored by fast-forwarding commercials, and people are now going on blogs and searches for ratings and customer reviews. People don’t like to be marketed to. They want the honest truth.

But be careful not to get carried away with disguising your marketing strategy. In chapter 23 called Be Transparent: Trust and Readership Must Be Earned, Li talks about the notorious case of Walmart fooling the public with its social media campaign. “Walmart and its PR company, Edelman, launched a blog called “Wal-Marting Across America,” which was suppose to tell the story of a couple who traveled across America in their RV staying in Walmart parking lots” (Li, 185). In reality, the two people were the sister of an Edelman employee and her boyfriend. Everyone found out about their attempt to trick the public as a part of their social media strategy.

Embrace the Negative
Companies are often reluctant to get involved in social media marketing because of the fear of negative talk and the inability to control what people are saying. Thinking that you can prevent negative things being said about your company by avoiding them is a huge mistake. Li states that “In today’s world of online reviews, blog posts, and picture sharing, the conversation about your company is still going on, whether or not you are actively involved” (Li, 67). People will talk about you with or without you there, so instead or avoiding, try participating and handling it with style. Here is an example of a conversation on Twitter that demonstrates how a company turned negative feedback into positive buzz (Li, 36).

Your company, like BrasseriePavil, can use instances like this for constructive criticism. Monitoring and engaging in the conversation gives you a chance to mend the situation and change someone’s negative opinion to a positive one! And if you still haven’t satisfied your customer, don’t be discouraged. Keep listening to them! By monitoring conversations you can gain a deeper understanding of your customers dissatisfaction and use it to brainstorm and create new ideas!

Embrace the Positive
Bloggers can be very helpful by promoting your brand and reinstating your bottom line. There exists social media “star” bloggers in every community with huge followings. If they were to write a positive post regarding your company, it would go a long way and will be seen by many others. Therefore, it is not a bad idea to come bearing gifts. Freebies, samples, coupons, you name it. It doesn’t hurt and it is a kind gesture, as long as you don’t expect something in return…immediately. To get the most appreciation and attention of a community, give when least expected. A simple gesture of kindness can go a long way. Li tells a sweet story about the company Freshbooks and one of its followers on Twitter. Rayonne Langdon, the marketing director, noticed that one of the company’s followers tweeted about being stood up on a first date. Rayanne tweeted back, “At Freshbooks, we’d never stand you up!” And there’s more. She proceeded to the follower’s blog, found her office address, and sent her a bouquet of flowers the next day. This created a long-lasting buzz for the company, and reminded customers that Freshbooks and Rayanne are sincere and good.

It is important to be liked in the social media world, because everyone now has a voice and their opinion can be heard. Each and every one of your consumers can potentially affect the bottom line of your company. But don’t let that discourage you. Any kind of engagement in social media is better than no engagement at all. In Social Media Marketing, Li describes the different types of social media (social news sites, social networking, social bookmarking, social sharing, social events, blogs, microblogging, wikis, or forums and message boards) and explains further how social media fits into the online marketing picture. Definitely a must read for anyone interested or already involved in social media marketing.