Thoughtpick: A unique perspective of the Web and social media...
A unique perspective of the Web and social media...

March 6, 2010

DoSomething’s Campaign for Cancer Prevention — Learn Social Media by Example

Stat Box

Brand: DoSomething.org
Campaign URL: DoSomething.org’s Campaign For Cancer Prevention
SM Channels Used: Facebook & Website
Appeal:
Emotional/Causes
Start Date: May, 2007
Duration: Ongoing

According to DoSomething.Org:

Campaign Symbol

Canceris the second leading cause of death in the world, killing 58 million people each year. The leading cancer in women is breast cancer, with 1.2 million diagnosed globally and killing 500,000 each year. Overall, 1 in 3 people will develop cancer in their lifetime, and 1 in 8 women will develop breast cancer – affecting almost everyone via a parent, sibling, child, other relative, or a friend. Moreover, cancer strongly disproportionately affects the poor, who have no access to modern medical care”.

Idea & Objectives:

Since cancer weighs heavily on the lives of those who suffer from it, this campaign has been developed in efforts to fund advanced health education and cancer research for cancer prevention (since the pace of cancer research is depressingly low, partly due to sparse government funding).

[read full article >>]

January 27, 2010

Facebook’s VitaminWater “Connect” Flavor

Social media is what we love to talk about at Thoughtpick. In a effort to allow you to better understand and grasp the right use of social media for your upcoming campaigns, we are dedicating this regular section for you tailored to analyze old, new and current campaigns in terms of audience, success, lesson learned and more so you could learn about social media by example!

Stat Box:
Brand Name: VitaminWater “Connect”
Campaign URL: Facebook Fanpage
Social Media Channels Used: Facebook & Twitter
Appeal: Cash prize, sense of belonging & quenching thirst in a healthy way!
Target Audience: Mostly US based Facebook & Twitter users, Vitamin Water consumers, both females & males of ages between 13 and 28
Date: 7 January, 2010
Campaign Duration: Mid January

“Vitamin Water has just launched a new Black Cherry-Lime Facebook flavored drink with Caffeine and 8 other nutrients. Now you can hydrate, take your vitamins and connect with thousands of others on Facebook all at the same time”.

First it was Reddit’s Bacon Soap, and now it is Facebook’s VitaminWater: “Connect”! What is going on with those social media sites and venues? Are they going nuts? Trust me, they are not; they are seeking to gain attention and loyalty and further expand their target audience!

Good move VitaminWater and consequently Facebook, although I have to stress the fact that I saw this coming and I think Twitter is on the way! [read full article >>]

December 17, 2009

Youtube: Unintentionally Marketing Drug Use to Teens!

“Telling a teenager the facts of life is like giving a fish a bath”. ~ Arnold H. Glasow

Teens...

Teens...

Dealing with teenagers’ emotions, mood swings, habits, behaviors and even their rebellious nature can be really difficult for parents and older siblings for many reasons which hundreds of studies and researches have been trying to uncover for years!

Recently, and based on the above statement, I found myself deeply entrenched into the thought about teens and web marketing, especially after having spent a few hours watching different Youtube clips aiming to warn about certain harmful practices such as drug abuse. All of a sudden, I realized that with no supervision or control, there is a very thin line between warning and motivation for those teenagers!

How Can Web Marketing Confuse Teens?

An old saying I faintly recall goes something like this: “What you don’t know can’t harm you”! And here, for this particular post, I strongly agree!

Although the internet has taken over almost every aspect of our daily lives, through certain random eye opening “awareness” campaigns being advertised over mediums such as Youtube, we are taking a risk of actually being the reason for introducing teens to many practices they might not need to be aware of!

[read full article >>]

September 15, 2009

Does More Social Media = Shorter Product & Service Life Cycle?

Is the relationship between the life cycle of products and services inversely related to the use of social media? How does social media influence the perceptions and even usage of products and services, especially when it comes to the trendy, fashionable and high tech ones?

We’ve Heard it All!

Throughout the past 2 years or so, we have heard almost everything related to social media and how it plays a role on almost every stage of its users’ lives! Whether it be how social media could kill us, its effect on our mental health or how its use can positively or negatively effect an enterprise, social media has been taking the lead amongst all online related news!

But, from a marketing point of view, and after seeing how social media is able to highly spread or deeply bury a marketing/promotional campaign, one must take a moment to think: How does social media affect the life cycle of all those products and services it touches?

The Past… The Present…

Beware Products & Services!

Beware Products & Services!

Scientifically, it is well known that “an inverse or negative relationship is a mathematical relationship in which one variable, say y, decreases as another, say x, increases”. When applying this to my topic of discussion, if y is social media use and x is product/service life cycle would mean the more the social media use increases the shorter the life cycle!

But the question is: Why?

It is very simple: sometimes what is more is less! (My favorite example here is salt: a great addition to food yet when heavily used it could cause serious health problems!)

Long before social media ever emerged, even more so, way back when the Internet was just a distant concept, I truly believe that products and services used to live longer.

Allow me to further explain by sharing with you my reasoning for such a rationalization:

[read full article >>]

July 6, 2009

Social Media: The New Path to World Peace & An End to Racism?

Will world peace always be a “Utopian” dream? Is open unrestricted communication, amongst different cultures and across unlimited boarders, the way to  achieve world peace? Are social media platforms and services slowly paving the path to a better, more peaceful tomorrow for all?

World peace is a concept which all religions call for and yet seems to be almost unachievable taking into consideration the vast variety of global issues and world wide problems we are facing every single day at an incremental rate!

In theory, world peace is “an ideal of freedom, peace, and happiness among and within all nations and/or peoples. It is the professed ambition of many past and present world leaders.” Leaders aside, there seems to be a great power which accompanies a greater responsibility when it comes to nations and their peoples. Enter the role of social media.

Twitter Visitors Country Rank

Twitter Visitors Country Rank

Through monitoring my followers’ updates, I was quite shocked to find out that probably all of their tweets were utterly unbiased and even more so of an understanding and forgiving nature. Most of my followers actively try, continuously, to spread advice, tips and words of love, peace, awareness, motivation and unity although their ages, ethnicity, race, backgrounds, social status, traditions and country of origin may widely differ.

I was intrigued to find out more, therefore, through Twitter search, I made an effort to look for some of the global controversial topics using keyword search in efforts to see if what my followers are doing applies to every other Twitter user or not.

I searched a few hundred tweets for certain sensitive and racist keywords and our humble results were impressive: