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!
Campaign Stat Box
Brand: Ford Fiesta (Automaker Industry) Campaign Website: http://www.fiestamovement.com/ Channels Used: Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Blogs Appeal: Win a car. Target Audience: 18-30 age group in the US Date of Campaign: 2009/2010
In Tough Economic Times: Can You Sell a Car Through Social Media?
After a gut-wrenching year for American automakers, Ford wanted to change its fortune with the all-new 2011 Fiesta.
After all, this Fiesta is not a very American car. Small, compact and fuel-efficient, the Fiesta is more tastefully European than insensibly American.
But it is not the functional design that has raised the numbers for Fiesta, it’s actually their fantastic social media campaign. The Ford marketing team spent a lot of effort in making sure it got buzz on the Web.
The Idea: Drive Your Car Through…
What they did was simple: they invited a 100 “social agents” to try the Fiesta for six month, and share their experience with the world. They had them promote the car through different social media sites, including Twitter, YouTube and blogs.
“Following my muse has worked out pretty well so far. I can’t see any reason to change the formula now”. Chris Van Allsburg
I have always been a great fan of the word “muse”. It has been the driving force behind each and every piece I write, whether on my personal blog or for Thoughtpick. Regardless what the topic might be, I have always found my muse there; leading me towards a certain writing style or approach.
To Blog or Not to Blog!
However, the muse is a little moody, conniving fox! It can run away from you and leave you dry of ideas; you can’t think of anything new or creative to write!
That’s okay if you are writing for your personal blog but really negative when you are a writer for a certain blog or even if your own blog is business related! Imagine being a writer for Mashable for example, yet having nothing to write about!
Therefore, and strictly from experience, I decided to share with you the top ten tips of getting your writing groove back!
1. Get Away!
And I mean that in every way possible! Don’t try to force yourself into writing; nothing good will come out of it! Just stay away! Put your laptop off and go out for a walk or watch a movie; anything which is as far away as possible for the topics you are supposed to write about!
In fashion, black has always been “the trend”; it is a classic and never gets old, dull or boring.
Nowadays, I see green mobiles having the potential to turn into trendy and highly used and adopted phones, if special attention and clever strategic thinking are used to decide how they will be marketed, where and to whom.
Stay Connected, With a Cause!
As I read The Most Exciting Developments In Green Cell Phones, my interest in this category of mobile phones grew, encouraging me to find a unique and fresh approach to promote them in order to be a part of a bigger cause: helping the environment! I mean, who wouldn’t want to have a phone that uses solar power cells, non-toxic recyclable plastic and eco-friendly paints?
Sticky Phone concept by Liu Hsiang-Ling
Since these phones are meant to reduce toxic waste without forcing you to give up your mobile communication habit – or even addiction, combining fashion, trend, creativity and eco friendliness in one product should be able to pay off depending on some major factors.
The Internet population is always on the top list of those reacting to a disaster. Sitting behind the safety of their computer screens, flustering the Internet world by tweeting, blogging, and digging in for news, and trying to take in the magnitude of the disaster. They also often try to organize digital relief campaigns and take action, complete with “Donate” buttons and “Send SMS Now”.
Having noticed this, charities are trying to utilize the social aspect of the Web, as we know it today, and get creative with their fund raising strategies. Social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are often used for creating a larger donor base and reaching a new, younger audience base. Recently, a non-profit working to provide safe drinking water to Third World countries raised more than a quarter million dollars using Twitter alone.
Live Example: The Internet Society for Haiti
Following the devastating 7.0 magnitude earthquake in Haiti this Tuesday, the Internet population was looking online for ways to help. Many global relief efforts immediately started popping up on the various social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.
Facebook spokesman Larry Yu said that since the quake, there had been over 1,500 status updates a minute containing the word “Haiti.” The Facebook application Causes posted a video of the destruction in Haiti. On Twitter, one of the most prominent campaigns to gather donations is from the American Red Cross, which is actively encouraging people on Twitter to test “HAITI” to donate $10. A day later, this initiative raised over two million dollars for Haiti. The Huffington Post, CNN, and The New York Times are curating special lists to track events related to the disaster.
Screenshot of American Red Cross campaign
The Internet is indeed a fantastic “tool” to help others in need. We will leave you with this video that explains the magnitude of help that the Internet is providing for the Haiti disaster, beyond donating money:
Have you ever donated online? Do you think that online charities are actually successful? Or is it just a few charities with cover stars?
For more places to give online, the San Francisco Chronicle has created a list of legitimate organizations seeking donations.
Everyone aspires to be a good netizen, but it’s not an easy goal to achieve. To be beatified by the gods of the net, you will need to surf graciously and illuminate every spot on the web where you are present.
To achieve such lustrous status you need to follow the ten commandments of being a good netizen.
1. Thou shall be omnipresent
Having a blog with Facebook, Twitter, Friendfeed and Flickr accounts along with some forums and 2-3 email accounts is about the norm these days. To keep all your friends and contacts happy, you will need to keep everything fresh and updated, and that requires a lot of time and effort. To simplify the task you will have to aggregate your accounts and then consolidate your email accounts into one by using mail forwarding.
2. Thou shall not trust others to protect their privacy
Whether its Google, Facebook or any other company they will not be vigilant about protecting your privacy. So the user needs to be responsible for making sure his privacy is protected by reading about any changes, checking the news, or just making sure he has the correct settings to suit their needs.
“Telling a teenager the facts of life is like giving a fish a bath”. ~ Arnold H. Glasow
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!
“The companies that continues to innovate will be able to extend their brand and their business model longer than the people who don’t innovate“. Ivan Seidenberg, Verizon CEO
Hulu connects the physical world with the digital world yet through certain, often less than simple steps. Therefore, and logically speaking, Hulu is bound to become obsolete in a few years because there definitely will be other technologies which will certainly provide even simpler and more innovative grounds to allowing for a more integrated connection between our world and what’s on the web.
Verizon’s CEO refers to the Sixth Sense concept, which was introduced to the world a few months ago. According to him, concepts like these will render other available technologies useless in a few years, and I totally agree: who needs to sit at home to watch the news when it can be streamed at any time and place and projected on to a wall?
Finally and to wrap up this post, I’d like to ask you a few questions: Have you ever used Hulu? Do you agree that it will soon vanish? What other technologies do you know of and which have the ability to take over our world in a few years?
“At Nokia, we believe in seamless integration of devices with services…”
In general, this video promises a better, more comprehensive and interconnected platform for services and communication through the Nokia devices. This all seems well and good, however, there are some concerns that need to be addressed!
Constantly Learn from Consumers: Although this sounds very appealing, the first thought that crossed my mind when hearing it was: privacy concerns! Do we really want or need Nokia, or any other manufacturer, wholesaler or retailer, to know more about us; How we think? What we like? Where we go? What we do?
The OVI Platform: Despite the fact that the OVI platform seems interesting, I think Nokia is not the strongest player when compared to Google and Apple when it comes to web presence and mobiles.
Global Knowledge Sharing: How secure is this server where the data is stored? What if it was hacked? What are the measures to protect our information?
High Level of Dependence: Do we really want to reach a stage in life where we would be “lost without our phones”? Moreover, what happens when the system is down?
“Nokia believes that services and devices together will create the solutions our consumers will want in the future, the way we manage and analyze the information generated by these solutions will drive us to a whole new level of consumer understanding”...
We have heard what Nokia believes… Therefore, the question is: What do you believe: Do you support fully automated systems paving your every step? Do you trust sharing your intimate and detailed information with Nokia? What other concerns do you have after watching the video?
Compete shows that Facebook gets 104 billion page views a month, 2.29 billion visits from 125 million unique users. Those users spend a total of 10,230,335 hours per month (September 2009) surfing the site.
Users spent 10+ million hours on Facebook in Sept 2009
Doing the math: 10,230,335 hours per month divided by 30 gives the total number of hours spent per day on Facebook = 341,011.2 hours = 39 years/day!
Doing the math...
Does this mean that, roughly, Facebook users all together spend 39 years per day on Facebook.com? What a waste!
Beirut stumbled upon and forwarded this video to me a few days ago. It’s not a new video, but it does shed some light on some interesting facts about Facebook’s data collection and usage privacy policy - that we all agreed to upon signing up to their service. It also hints towards who’s really behind the curtains at Facebook Inc. – and it’s not Zuckerberg.
So, for our Saturday post, I’m sharing this video and would like to ask you: Why do we trust Facebook (Twitter, Myspace, and so on) and share so many personal details and secrets on their platform(s)? If something goes wrong, who’s to blame?
