5 Easy Ways to Liven Up Your Facebook Stream

From Mashable:

As more advertisers and brand marketers realize the value of social media, they are flocking to set up Pages on Facebook, the largest social network of them all.

The stats are impressive. 50% of Facebook’s more than 500 million active users are creating and consuming content on the social network on any given day, and the average U.S. user spends nearly six hours per month browsing around on the social network.

With the shift to growing social media consumption, brands should be taking every step to improve their presences on social platforms, starting with the behemoth that is Facebook.

Whether your business is new to the platform or it has been around for years, there is always room for improvement. Here are five quick and easy ways to make your Facebook stream more lively for fans.

1. Showcase Your Customers

Paint Along NYC, a New York City-based company offering painting workshops, uses Facebook to build its online community. After each painting class, the instructor uploads photos of the attendees with their works of art to the Paint Along NYC Facebook Page. Each photo album is labeled with the date of the class and the item that was painted, so that customers can easily find and tag their pictures.

During class, the instructor makes sure that attendees are aware that their photos can be found on the company’s public Facebook Page.

2. Have a Sense of Humor

Humor is said to increase a person’s levels of happiness and hope, so why not share happiness via Facebook?

Jules Thin Crust, a group of organic pizza shops in Pennsylvania, runs its Facebook Page with humor and community in mind. Operated by owner John Ordway and multiple store managers, the Jules Facebook Page has a very homey feeling. The Jules social media team doesn’t take itself too seriously — an advantage that many small businesses have over large branding-dominated corporations. When Facebook fans joke around, Jules Facebook admins are comfortable jumping right in there with the fun. The casual tone used by Jules staffers — and the fact that they personally know some of the fans — makes the updates more personable, relevant and relatable.

3. Give ‘Em Something To Consume

With such high engagement stats, Facebook has brands and content creators turning heads. Etsy, the commerce platform for handmade goods, is among the brands on Facebook that understands its following and then creates and curates content to fit its needs.

As expected, Etsy’s Facebook Page features a stream of the quirkiest products that are offered on its site. But the page also features a fair amount of original and curated content, including blog posts and videos that would be of interest to its followers. Some of the content originates from the Etsy Blog. While many of the links and videos are purely for fun, these pieces often start conversations among Etsy fans on the Page.

4. Ask Questions

It’s not enough to be broadcasting promotional messages — brands should make an effort at engaging with their audiences. Asking questions is a great way to kick off that two-way dialogue.

Take a look at any brand page on Facebook — it’s quite likely that posts with questions get more action than ones without questions. ReadyMade magazine, for example, mixes up the format of posts on its Facebook Page. Posts with questions seem to prompt more conversation, especially if the question is easy to answer. People are inclined to offer their opinions, especially when it’s so simple to get involved.

5. Take Us Behind the Curtain

Whether you own a restaurant, a tech startup or a construction company, your customers are interested in who works at your company and what goes on behind the scenes. And so, providing a glimpse behind the curtain can be an effective and engaging way to populate your Facebook Page.

You may think there aren’t many ways to make a car dealership more interesting or welcoming, but a well-run Facebook Page helps one New Jersey dealership exude a friendly vibe. Lester Glenn Auto Group uses Facebook to promote the cars it sells, announce philanthropic projects and make small talk with customers. Recent posts about holidays and summer camps have seen success relative to other posts, probably because of their non-promotional and down-to-earth tone.

The page also features lots of pictures from inside the dealership, including ones that highlight employees and events. A recent post, for example, celebrates the birthday of Internet Sales Rep Stacy Myers. These depictions of life at the dealership give fans a look inside the company, and they also help to humanize the brand.

5 Steps to Successful Blogger Outreach

From Social Times:

Many businesses fail to realize that conducting blogger outreach is not the same as conducting traditional media outreach and outreach strategies need to be adapted. Scoring a hit in USA Today is great, but the value in reaching out to bloggers and other influencers online continues to grow.

A free e-book from BlogDash [download here] provides solid guidance for successful blogger outreach. With BlogWorld starting tomorrow in New York, I've excerpted sections for PR and marcom pros to keep in mind for the next few days and beyond.

What Makes Blogger Outreach So Valuable?

Targeted —There's a lot of value in having a clear and precise understanding of whom you're reaching with your message. Blogger outreach allows you to zone in on the specific interests that you'd like to reach. Remember, there is a blog for everything, or so it seems, each driving a specialized audience.

Long-Term Relationships — When you work with a blogger, you're getting more than just a blog post. It's a relationship that you can turn to time and time again. If the blogger's first experience with your company was positive, there is a greater chance that they'll want to work together again.

Trust — Bloggers tend to develop loyal readerships who trust them and their opinions. Trust is transferable. If a reader trusts a blogger, and that blogger trusts your product, the reader in turn will trust your product. When a blogger shares a positive opinion about your product, their readers will be inclined to adopt the same opinion. Of course, it works both ways. If a blogger is being honest and doesn't like your product, his or her readers may dislike it as well.

More Accessible — While it should be much easier to get an email in front of an average blogger than a big publication, there are bloggers who receive hundreds of pitches every week. That's why it's often smart to target the middle range of bloggers. They'll be the ones who will be excited to find targeted opportunities and make an impact for your business.

The Network Effect — Bloggers and journalists are flocking to Twitter these days. It can make them more accessible, though many mainstream journalists and high traffic bloggers aren't too responsive. The middle range of bloggers are the ones that will likely respond to you and interact on social networks.

5 Steps for Successful Blogger Outreach

1. Find

The first step in blogger outreach is to find the bloggers you might want to reach. All of the bloggers you find at this stage may not be the ones you ultimately pitch, but rather serve as a starting point to determine whom you might want to reach out to later.

Find as many bloggers as possible in your industry. In some niches, you may not find many. Even so, this step will allow you to get the big picture of the bloggers in the space.

2. Research

This is the most important step in your entire campaign. The quality of your research will determine whether you'll be successful in your outreach.

It's important to learn everything you can about each blogger to help you identify the right bloggers for each particular campaign — the bloggers who will actually appreciate your story — and to enable you to make your pitch as personalized as possible.

So what information should you look up? You don't necessarily need all the following information, but the more you can learn, the better.

• What does the blogger write about?
  
• What kinds of posts does he or she write? Reviews? Opinion? Lists?
  
• How "professional" is the blogger? Does he or she make money, have ads and/or appear to have worked with businesses in the past?
  
• Who is the blogger's audience? What are the readers' age, location, gender and other demographics?
  
• Is the blogger influential on other social networks? What is his or her total reach?
  

3. Engage

The more professional bloggers are on the lookout for great stories and opportunities, so they will be receptive to a pitch that's targeted and personalized. In this instance, engaging is less important.

For many bloggers, it's personal. Engaging first is important. How?

• Comment on their blog posts
  
• Reply to their tweets and retweet their links
  
• Email them
  
• Involve them in your project from the start
  

4. Pitch

All your hard work to this point can go down the drain if you don't do this part correctly. But if you've done the research and engaged the relevant the bloggers, the pitch becomes easy.

Here are several things to remember when pitching a blogger:

• Write captivating email subject lines.
  
• Always personalize the email message.
  
• Remind them of previous connections.
  
• Beauty in brevity. Keep it short.
  
• Be a knowledgeable and helpful resource.
  
• There are more channels than email.
  
• Make the pitch about the blogger and his/her readers.
  

5. Track

Be sure to know when the blogger writes about you. Then, appropriately join, but not hijack, the conversations and content sharing. Help them spread the post across social platforms.

Sock Puppets & Social Media: Inside Ford’s Risky Marketing Campaign

From Mashable:

Brands are littering Facebook, Twitter and YouTube with run-of-the-mill social media campaigns. Many are guilty of replicating the ideas of their more ambitious competitors while others simply hope to get additional mileage out of television spots by placing them on YouTube. Not Ford.

On the heels of its successful and well-received Ford Fiesta Movement and 2011 Explorer Facebook reveal initiatives, Ford has crafted yet another innovative social media campaign, this time to raise awareness and introduce consumers to the 2012 Focus.

At the center of the campaign is Doug, an irreverent and absurd tweeting, Facebook updating and YouTube uploading sock puppet serving as the spokesperson for the new car.

Ford has constructed multifaceted fictional characters in Doug and John. John is Doug’s human companion — the straight man of duo. Doug’s comedic, brazen and off-the-cuff personality is the perfect foil for John’s more factually-grounded act. Together, they flit about the country in a new Focus, frequently updating their social media accounts with an assortment of content and playful banter.

The idea, says Digital Marketing Manager Scott Kelly, whose team is responsible for the campaign, is to use social channels as a medium to create invitational content.

“Doug is a multilayered character that’s more fun to get to know in an interactive setting. A 30-second TV spot could never afford us the opportunity to engage with our consumers the way the social channels do,” says Kelly. “The videos are an introduction to him and John, but the real fun begins when people can talk to Doug and have him talk back.”

Untraditional and the opposite of politically correct, this social media and content-heavy campaign is the riskiest one yet for Ford.

Ford, widely regarded as a digitally savvy brand, is not guaranteed a home run with each swing. And with fictional characters engaging with brand fans, an outspoken socket puppet with a big mouth, and an agency that manages the social media updates, Ford is asking for trouble. Anything and everything could go wrong.

Mashable spoke with Kelly extensively to get a behind-the-scenes look at the campaign and a progress report on how its going.

Who is Doug?

In understanding Ford’s motives for the spokespuppet campaign, one must first understand who Doug is and what he represents.

“Doug is the latest addition to a long history of spokespeople for Ford,” Kelly says. “Like the 100 agents from the Fiesta Movement, he’s someone who’s been loaned a Focus for a certain period of time and expected to get the word out about what is, essentially, a brand-new car.”

Doug is symbolic of the redesigned Focus — he’s the opposite of what you’d expect. “The 2012 Focus is nothing like the past Focus, and Doug is supposed to serve as a provocateur who gets people to take a left turn in their day,” says Kelly.

The company intentionally made Doug a sock puppet so he could say and do things that might not be acceptable from a human spokesperson. Doug is Ford’s license to walk on the wild side.

Add to that John, “the straight man to Doug’s occasional absurdity,” as Kelly describes him, and you have a comedic pair in balance.

“[John] is the one with the real knowledge of the vehicle, so he can correct misinformation when Doug says something like, ‘Every new Focus comes with an ejector seat and a license plate changer,’” says Kelly. “Basically, he acts as a liaison of decency between Doug and the public, as well as letting us interject some vehicle features in a natural way.”

The Playbook & Cast of Characters

The ongoing campaign, launched in March and set to run through fall and possibly until the end of 2011, is quite intricate.

Here’s a rundown of who’s involved:

• Paul Feig: Paul Feig is the creator of Freaks and Geeks and an occasional director of The Office. For the Ford campaign, Feig directs the video spots that appear on YouTube.
• Rob Cohen: A writer for The Simpsons, Cohen is also the lead writer for the Ford campaign. He helps script the YouTube clips and craft the characters of Doug and John.
• John Ross Bowie: Actor and comedian John Ross Bowie plays John, the Ford Guy. Bowie is best known for playing Barry Kripke in The Big Bang Theory.
• Paul F. Tompkins: Stand-up comic and actor Paul F. Tompkins appeared in Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy. He plays Doug, and often improvises and ad-libs Doug’s lines.
• Ridley Scott & Associates: The production house being used for the campaign.
• WPP Team Detroit: Ford’s creative agency of record for the campaign. Two individuals at the agency are authorized to speak for Doug on Facebook and Twitter. They’ve been trained on Doug’s personality and are tasked to always stay in character.

The show is an always-on production. Doug uploads videos to YouTube once or twice weekly. The videos spawn a slew of responses from viewers, and responses are weaved into the plot as both Doug and John engage with fans. With the campaign so heavily tied to social media, Ford rarely lets Doug rest.

“[Doug's] Facebook and Twitter channels are buzzing on an hourly basis — even on the weekends,” says Kelly. “We try not to leave fans hanging for too long without some sort of response.”

Producing campaigns for social media is perceived to be a cheaper affair, but as you can surmise Ford’s not pinching pennies on this one.

“This is roughly what we would spend on a TV campaign that would produce 3 to 5 commercials,” says Kelly. “Yet we’re producing a lot more content and having a more engaged conversation — more bang for the buck.”

More Than an Anecdotal Success?

Anecdotally, the campaign is a hit. Kelly shares that while the company wasn’t anticipating a one-to-one correlation between consumer exposure to the campaign and a new Focus purchase, it has seen brand converts — it’s most coveted buyer — post to Doug’s wall announcing their new car purchases and giving Doug all the credit.

Those few Wall posts make for great stories, but they’re more flashy than they are indicative of real success.

We asked Kelly what the specific goals of the campaign are and how the company planned to measure success. Ford, he says, primarily set out to “raise awareness and increase consideration for the all-new Focus.”

Ford plans to measure whether it’s met this objective by surveying people who were exposed to the campaign, he says.

“We’re also measuring that success via engagement with our videos and ad units, and sentiment for the 2012 Focus and Doug.”

So far, so good, he reports. Here’s a breakdown of how Doug is doing:

• Goal: 10,000 total Facebook fans

  Actual: 35,650 Facebook fans in four weeks

• Goal: 2.5 million YouTube video views

  Actual: 1.7 million views, or 67% of the goal with several months to go

More Stats:

• Facebook post views: 725,000
• Facebook “likes” and comments: 7,019
• Facebook demographics: 70% of status updates reach Ford’s target 18 – 24 year-old audience
• Twitter followers: 1,000

Plus, 41% of all the online conversation about the 2012 Focus is related to Doug and the campaign. “We definitely see this as a successful measure of driving incremental conversation about Focus by using Doug,” Kelly asserts.

“The campaign’s style of humor is definitely working — smart, subtle humor as opposed to broad slapstick seems to resonate with the consumers we’ve wanted to reach,” Kelly concludes. “And many of them have admitted to going to take a test-drive because of Doug or actually buying a new Focus.”

Kraft Courts Mommy Blogger Readers With Online Talk Show

From Mashable:

Kraft is launching an online talk show hosted by former Punky Brewster star Soleil Moon Frye, a prominent mommy blogger.

Thirteen Kraft brands, including Jell-O, Mac and Cheese and Chips Ahoy!, will be featured in the series, HerSay, which will tap content and themes discussed by mommy bloggers. Frye, whose blog can be found here, is part of the draw.

The series, which goes live on May 17, will run weekly. Episodes will range from two to four minutes in length. Forty of the 72 episodes will feature Kraft bands. Mark Stewart, vice president of global media services for Kraft, says the show will be promoted across MSN properties and via search ads. The idea was “to be a part of conversations” that moms are having.

Kraft has tried its hand at online talk shows, a format that has yet to catch on with the mainstream. A program called MindBodyBalance featured actress Faith Ford and promoted the company’s Philadelphia cream cheese brand. Another, called You Gotta LOL, which was presented as “a comedy series for and about women,” was sponsored by Miracle Whip.

Budweiser Launches New Reality Show Starring Social Media

From Mashable:

Budweiser is stepping into the online entertainment arena again with Bud United Presents: The Big Time, a “social-reality show.”

The program, which goes live this week, will use Bud United’s Facebook and Renren fan sites to give young adults the chance to live out their “big-time” dreams, like working in the kitchen with a celebrity chef or racing Nascar. A Budweiser rep says a date for the first episode of the show hasn’t been assigned yet. The show is now in casting.

Bud United, which was created last year, is described as a “proprietary global experiential platform connecting consumers’ passion points with the brand.”

The intent of the program is to build the brand’s following in social media and generate online discussion. As a marketer of an alcoholic beverage, Budweiser faces some special hurdles in doing so, in particular, age-gating. The effort builds on Bud United: Bud House, an online reality show during last year’s FIFA World Cup.

Bud United’s Facebook site is age gated, a restriction that doomed the brand’s previous efforts to cultivate an online following before, most notably with Bud.tv, a $30 million attempt to create its own content behind an age-verification wall. Anheuser-Busch scrapped that effort after two years, in 2009. Nevertheless, A-B has recently been more aggressive on the social media front, in particular with Poolball, a video depicting a new sport that went viral this month.

5 great Twitter marketing campaigns

From SimplyZesty:

While Facebook gets a lot of the attention when it comes to ‘sexy’ marketing campaigns by brands, there are some great examples to come from Twitter, that show how brands are using the platform to their advantage, to engage with followers in new ways. We’ve put together a list of some of our favourite Twitter marketing campaigns, to provide you with some inspiration and great case studies for reference :



The Volkswagen Twitter Zoom

A great example of a live and interactive Twitter campaign from Volkswagen in February this year, to promote their sponsorship of the Planeta Terra Festival. They hid tickets to the festival all over the city, and shared the location with users via a map. The trick was however, that the map (using Google Maps) would only zoom in to reveal the locations based on how many people shared the hashtag #foxatplanetaterra on Twitter :

The campaign was a huge success for Volkswagen, as within 2 hours the hashtag was a trending topic in Brazil – not an easy feat. This campaign also worked because it was incredibly targeted to the right audience. They wanted to promote the festival to local people, and this was achieved by integrating the online element with the real-world treasure hunt. The great thing about this campaign is that it’s a relatively simple mechanic, just done really really well. There was no investment in an expensive app, just a creative an engaging campaign that got people hunting all over the city and engaging with the Volkswagen brand.

Ben and Jerrys Fair Tweets

An excellent , live campaign from Ben and Jerry’s that was recently launched to raise awareness of World Fair Trade Day. The application is run via a microsite that puts all your unused Twitter characters to good use, by filling them out with messages that promote the cause :

The site is incredibly easy to use. You simply type out your tweet as you normally would, and Ben & Jerry’s do the rest for you, populating your tweet with their messages, which decrease the more you write. The good thing about this campaign is that it requires very little from the user. Often you see campaigns that require you to connect with an app, perform a task and then auto-tweet it to promote a good cause, but this is simply fun, quick and quirky and a great way to spread awareness. The concept also resonates with Twitter users because it has such careful consideration of the platform as well. If you’re not going to use the characters yourself, why not virtually donate them to a good cause?

Radioshacks Promoted Tweets

A brilliant example here of a company using Twitter’s new Promoted Tweets product to create an engaging and personalised Twitter experience for people. Radioshack ran their sponsored tweet, asking people to upload a picture of themselves with their hand stretched out, accompanied by the hashtag #ifihadsuperpowers , for the chance to win a prize. At the time of the promotion, users weren’t really aware of why they were doing this, but given the chance to win a prize, people will surely give it a go! What came next was a surprise, as the team behind Radioshack spent the day transforming the photos to individually add a mask and a cape, and tweet the new photo back to the user :

The combination of an interactive campaign and the Promoted Tweets product clearly works for Radioshack, as it’s not the first time they’ve experimented with this. At a conference to discuss their previous Twitter ad campaign, CMO Lee Applbaum claims that the ROI was ‘stratospheric’, with a sponsored tweet receiving 65 million impressions within 24 hours. Though of course a tweet from Lance Armstrong helped as well.

Nestle Live Tweet Ads

A brave campaign from Nestle here, coming as an early example of a brand integrating Twitter into their ad campaign. In 2009, Nestle launched an innovative ad format that served up realtime tweets all across the web. They launched the ad units on different sites, and asked questions related to parenting such as ‘How do you stimulate your child’s mind?’. Users that were logged into Twitter could then fill out these ads directly with their answer. The comments then appeared in the online ads, as well as going into Nestle’s Twitter feed. All the comments were premoderated by Nestle, a fairly crucial part in the success of this campaign. This is one of the only Twitter examples I’ve seen of this kind, with a brand putting it’s ad messaging firmly into the hands of the user. It’s a great example of a company relinquishing control of their brand and deciding to let the their community do the talking. This was also a good example of a fully integrated social media campaign, as users who clicked on the ads instead of populating them with a tweet, were taken to a Youtube channel containing promotional videos, tips and advice on parenting courtesy of Nestle. They can get it right sometimes!

The Jeep Puzzle

An adventurous campaign from Jeep here, courtesy of Leo Burnett Iberia, to promote their latest model. They created the online puzzle using new Twitter profiles, which users had to follow in order to unlock clues. Each Twitter profile was following a further 12 Twitter profiles, that contained a picture clue. Each profile picture was a piece in the puzzle. This was brought back strongly to the Jeep brand, as the images were pictures of scenery only accessible with a Jeep. It might sound a little complex, so check it out in action below:



Now for some this might seem like quite a convoluted campaign, but what I like about this is that it shows a real understanding of the Twitter platform, taking an aspect we would all be familiar with (the layout of profile pictures of who you’re following) and bringing it to life in a new way. As with other examples as well, it shows what’s possible when you get creative and use the Twitter platform functions available to you, in a completely new way to entice your users into engaging with your brand.

Will A Brands Next Big Move Be A Journalism Department?

From Six Pixels of Separation:

Who should own Social Media in the organization?

The challenge in answering that question comes from a lack of clear definition. It depends on how you (and your organization) defines Social Media. Some see it as a communications channel, while others use it to extend their advertising. Other companies use it for customer service and some use it as a platform to experiment with content marketing. None of those are inherently right or wrong, they're just different uses (and there are countless more). The long-held debate (and yes, we're looking at over a decade of Social Media usage, at this point) was about whether or not Social Media should be a part of the Marketing department or the Communications department.

In the end, Social Media is everywhere.

The companies that tend to benefit the most from Social Media are the ones who are finding multiple blends, tactics and campaigns to find their sweet spot. Some have used short, mid and long-term tactics against an overall business strategy, while others have chosen to blend one-way with two-way communications and more conversational types of strategies.

It's the content, stupid.

While advertising has its place in Social Media, it's all about the content. The platform allows everyone to publishing anything in text, images, audio and video instantly (and for free) for the entire world to see. It's humbling to know that the success of your content is almost entirely driven by how relevant it is (or, how it moves your audience). It's easy to make a case for content marketing, but it's going to wind up being the wrong case you should be making.

Death to content marketing.

The problem with content marketing is the marketing part of the equation. Marketing content rarely connects with an audience. Why? Because it's really just marketing material that is thinly veiled as content, and it's quickly becoming the kind of one-sided content that turns people off. What makes great content spread is how unique and inspiring the message is, not in how it slants into a direction that ultimately positions your company as the only one to buy from.

Flipping from content marketing to journalism.

I was thinking about this Blog. I was thinking about citizen journalism. I was watching Geoff Livingston present at Webcom Montreal last week, and things started to click. Maybe the reason this Blog has some level of success is because it's more like journalism than it is about what Twist Image offers and sells (I prefer to write relevant articles about this industry). Maybe citizen journalists are the best marketers that a brand could ever ask for, and maybe, Livingston is right that the problem with content marketing is the "marketing" part. Instead of plopping Social Media into your communications or marketing department, why not start a journalism department (or start off in a more humble way by hiring a journalist part-time to write content that your organization will publish)?

What could a journalist do for your brand?

• They could write articles about the industry you serve without slanting the piece to favor your brand (this would give you credibility and build trust).
• They could become valuable by commenting and adding more content in the many other primary spaces for Social Media that people in your industry follow.
• They could interview the industry leaders for you.
• They could add a layer of credibility to the content you're publishing, because you're very clear in your disclosures that this journalist's role is not to write favorable content about the company, but to write great content about the industry you serve.

We're not talking about a journalist who is working for you as a writer.

That would be missing the point. The idea here is to start creating content that is both valuable and needed. The idea here is to see if a tactic like this could lead to an entire department of journalists that are publishing the most relevant and interesting stories about the industry you serve. It's about becoming the de facto recognized authority for your industry. It's about adding so much value that your clients (and potential clients) need you in their lives because the insights and information that you're providing are so valuable. The challenge (of course) will be in doing this in an honest and credible way. Marketers don't have a strong history of being able to pull this sort of stuff off, because we just can't help ourselves but to push our own wares in the moment of truth (which is sad). The only way this will work is if the brand truly does let the journalist be an actual journalist (instead of a corporate shill).

Brands Beware: Consumers Use ‘Mutant Ads’ to Fight Back

From Mashable:

It used to be “buyer beware”, but with social media, it’s now brand beware. A study reveals more and more consumers are turning to social media to release their own “mutant” ads, changing the landscape of advertising.

So, what is a mutant ad? Contrary to what you’ll find by a quick search on YouTube, it has nothing to do with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Instead, a “mutant ad” is the name given to consumer created ads by a new study conducted at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, Canada.

Imagine an ad that begins like a typical coffee house advertisement. People are sitting around well lit tables, sipping macchiatos. There is light flooding through open windows and cleanly dressed baristas smiling. The camera centers in on a particular couple. The woman notes how good the coffee is – rich flavor, perfectly roasted, and cheap too! The man chimes in: “that’s because they aren’t fair trade beans. Coffee is way cheaper when child labour’s involved.” Something not right? That’s because this isn’t an ad made by a company; it’s an ad made by a consumer, specifically targeting a particular company.

The study – Understanding Consumer Conversations Around Ads in a Web 2.0 World – was published in the Journal of Advertising by Leyland Pitt and Michael Parent of SFU’s Beedie School of Business, Colin Campbell of Monash University in Melbourne, and Pierre Berthon of the McCallum School of Business at Bentley College in Massachusetts investigated not just the mutant ads themselves but also the conversation that took place around the ads.

They noted that not all mutant ads are bad; there are a variety of reasons why a consumer might be compelled to make a mutant ad. Some ads are a tribute to a brand they enjoy or a gentle spoof. However, when a mutant ad did cast a negative light on a particular brand, SFU’s researchers warned that the outcome could be very dangerous. Pitt notes: “The consequences, I think, are quite profound. Brand managers have lost control of the brand in this environment.”

Ultimately, the researchers conclude that the landscape of advertising and branding is rapidly changing and that companies need to develop strategies to navigate the new atmosphere.

For social media enthusiasts, the fact that consumers now play an active role in a company’s branding isn’t exactly a revelation. However, there’s often a lag between academia and current issues. That said, the study does make one very interesting point; Pitt notes: “You can’t just rush in [...]. You’ve almost got to be invited to be a part of the conversation.” So, what if, instead otrying to lead online conversations or try to stop them, brands found ways to join them?

In the coffee house example, this would mean instead of releasing a statement or polished television ad, the brand might consider creating a YouTube response video. They might even consider making a mutant ad of the mutant ad. Now, that would be new.

If marketing used to be a one way communication between brand and consumer, social media is changing that. However, innovative brands need not panic; instead, they need to find ways to join the conversation.

Why I Don’t Like Your Brand on Facebook

From Brian Solis:

I recently undertook a simple Facebook experiment, inspired by a brief Monday morning rant from my boss: “This morning my yoghurt told me to find it on Facebook. It didn’t tell me why, it just told me to find it. Why on Earth would I want to find a yoghurt on Facebook? It’s a yoghurt!”

He was right, of course. As social networks slowly become the default online presence for brands to drive their consumers to, adverts, marketing and packaging has started telling us where to go. However, it hasn’t yet started telling us why to go there.

For my experiment – “Find Us On Facebook” – I vowed to Like every brand that asked me to for one week. I would then blog and analyse the various offerings of each brand, in particular how they were attempting to drive people from the offline world to the online, social, world. Here are the results:

As a marketer, I found the results very disappointing. For an industry the focuses endlessly on providing consumers with “benefits” and “reasons to believe” here was a lot of marketing asking people to take an action, without telling them what they stood to gain from it. In 2011 it’s more or less a given that your brand can be found on Facebook, and consumers know that. What they don’t know is why they should bother.

What consumers want from brands in social media is a topic that has been widely written about already, and is fairly well understood by marketers. Research from advertising agency DDB Paris found that amongst the top reasons for Liking a brand were: “to take advantage of promotional benefits”,” to be informed of new products offered by the brand”,” to access exclusive information” and “to give my opinion about the brand”. Four very clear reasons to bother, which could easily be affixed or suffixed onto any “Find us on Facebook” message for greater impact.

Another key finding was the number of brand Liking requests coming from email marketing. These are brands that I had chosen to receive email marketing from directly into my inbox, and here they were asking to appear in my Facebook newsfeed too. They weren’t, however, telling me why I should open myself up to them in another channel.

Only 1 of the 16 brands provided an incentive to make the leap from email to social media. I literally had no reason to bother with the other brands, as I was already receiving their deals and offers, and they weren’t giving me another reason. Some brands have found interesting ways to incentivise people to make the jump:

• Dingo, a dog food brand from Ohio, included a promotion that would only kick-in when the Facebook page reached 5,000 fans (from a base of 300). They had an unprecedented take-up, with fans forwarding on the email to their friends and encouraging sign-ups to get the offer. They hit the 5,000 mark in just 3 days.

• Bag retailer Timbuk2 included an opportunity to win a bike, helmet and messenger bag in an email to its 100,000 newsletter subscribers. It received 6,500 clickthroughs vs. just 9 from its generic social call to action.

Consumers need these incentives, because they know that otherwise all they’re doing is agreeing to be bombarded with more marketing unrewarded.

The sad thing is that some brands are actually building really fun, engaging content in these spaces, but not making people aware of them. The Fosters beer page, for instance, is full of great exclusive Alan Partridge content, starring Steve Coogan and written by Armando Iannucci. Their TV ad, however, had nothing more than a Facebook URL. Had they said “for exclusive Alan Partridge episodes” they would’ve opened their brand Facebook page up to a whole wealth of people, who felt genuinely motivated to click Like.

My week as a social consumer left me tired and confused. It left my Facebook newsfeed so crammed with nonsense to the point that I could scroll entire pages without seeing my friends. It left me a bit sad for the digital marketers and agencies who were building great content that wasn’t getting the attention it deserved. So, if you’re reading this and you work in advertising or are a brand manager – next time you think about telling your consumers to find you on Facebook, consider telling them why.

10 Proven Strategies for Greater Likeability on Facebook

From Mashable:

We all intuitively know what likeability means. We have friends who are easygoing, good listeners and there when we need them. But what does it mean for a brand to be likeable online? Now more than ever, when a “Like” is arguably more important than a “link,” brands must demonstrate core values of responsiveness, transparency and likeability across Facebook and other social networks.

Listen to your customers and prospects. Deliver value, excitement and surprise. And most importantly, truly engage your customers and help them spread the word. Here are 10 universal laws for brand likeability in social media.

1. Never Stop Listening

The number one benefit of a brand’s involvement in social media is the ability to listen to conversation about its brand, competitors and target audience’s wants and needs. Listening is 50% of communication. Just as nobody wants to be out on a date with someone who isn’t a good listener, consumer don’t want to feel ignored by brands on social networks.

For a good case study on how listening in social media has impacted millions of dollars worth of sales, check out IBM’s Listening for Leads program.

2. Leverage Facebook’s EdgeRank Formula

EdgeRank, Facebook’s algorithm for determining what appears at the top of people’s News Feeds, might be the single most important online innovation of our time. EdgeRank uses multiple factors to determine what’s relevant and appealing to users. So unlike email, through which we receive a constant barrage of pushed messages all day, every day, Facebook updates surface to the top of our feeds based on how likeable and relevant the updates are.

At any given time, as a brand, you’re competing with all of your fans’ friends and other brand pages for attention. This is a great thing for consumers because it means they’re not spammed with irrelevant, sales-heavy messaging. But it’s also a challenge to marketers. You’ll want to use photos and videos, keep the text short and drive as many Likes and comments as possible.

3. Improvise Your Engagement

There is a difference between talking at people and engaging with them. I often use the analogy of a Broadway show versus an improv show. TV advertising is like a Broadway show — a one-way communication in which a huge production and great creative can make a strong impact. Social media marketing is more like improv comedy — a back-and-forth between performers and audience, different every time yet totally effective at a fraction of the cost, when done right.

One brand that does an excellent job of engaging in social media is Zappos. Zappos goes back and forth with customers on Twitter and Facebook, discussing its product — shoes — or anything else customers want to talk about.

4. Respond Quickly to Negative Comments

Customers have taken to social networks to share their frustrations. Unlike 10 years ago, when you could get away with putting people on hold for an hour or responding to letters on your own schedule, negative sentiment can spread lightning-fast on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. The faster you can respond, the better.

The best practice is to respond publicly, indicating that you’re addressing the issue through a private message. The customer will feel that he or she is heard, and most important to your brand, the public sees that you care and are responsive. “I’m sorry” are the two most powerful words for brands in social media.

5. Respond to Positive Comments, Too

Many brands are not yet leveraging this opportunity, but your positive comments on Facebook and Twitter are likely from your biggest brand advocates, capable of spreading your messages far and wide and defending you against naysayers at no cost. If you owned a retail store and a customer walked up to you and said, “I just love all your products and have been shopping here for years,” would you ignore them? Don’t ignore them on Facebook either. “Thank you” are the other two most powerful words for brands in social media.

6. Be Authentic and Transparent

Take a guess at what actor has the most likes on Facebook. Is it the most famous, most talented or best-looking actor?

With more than 21 million fans, Vin Diesel is the most-liked actor on Facebook, probably because he’s the most authentic. He shares pictures of his family, videos and inner thoughts. Brands can learn from Vin: Share insights from real people, behind-the-scenes footage, and your brand’s personality.

7. Provide Value (for Free!)

Brands that provide real value to consumers will see long-term dividends, build trust and credibility, and grow contagious excitement. While 10% off is not value (it’s marketing), 50% off is value. Free is value. Business-to-business brands can give away white papers, share articles or do free webinars. Business-to-consumer brands can give away products or deep-discounts, hold contests and share entertaining content.

Extra Gum gave away a pack to every fan on Facebook — now that’s value.

8. Share and Inspire Stories

Stories bring brands to life in a way that nothing else can. Stories can be about the founding of the company, an employee who has overcome struggle, or a customer experience with your product. In order for brands to tell a story at scale, they used to have to buy a 30-second TV commercial. Today, you can tell a story through tweets, photos and Facebook groups.

Check out this Facebook group, inspired by a local McDonald’s employee in Chandler, Arizona. More than 1,000 people sing Mary’s praises and organically spread the word about McDonald’s.

9. Consistently Deliver Surprise and Delight

This is a marketing principle more than a social media principle. When brands surprise and delight on social networks, it’s public and part of an ecosystem where things can spread very quickly. When Cumberland Farms’ Chill Zone Facebook Page had 30,000 fans, they announced that if the page topped 75,000 fans, they’d give away a free Chill Zone to everyone on the Page. A few weeks later, without any advertising, the page was at 100,000 fans.

10. Don’t Sell

Just make it easy and compelling for customers to buy. While it’s essential for brands to create likeable, engaging communities on social networks, every CMO needs to move the sales needle. But there’s a huge difference between using social networks to aggressively sell versus making it easy for consumers to buy.

Flash sales provide urgency and excitement on social networks. One way to make it easy is in-Facebook commerce.

Ultimately, the most important rule for brands to remember is the Golden Rule: Take off your marketing cap and put on your consumer cap — would you click Like or RT?

SEO for your social media profiles – top tips

From SimplyZesty:

SEO (search engine optimisation) and social media have been moving closer and closer together as disciplines over the past couple of years. Now it seems they’re more integrated than ever, particularly as Google increasingly experiment with bringing in social elements into search results. You can’t really afford to know one without the other, as you risk doing half a job, or missing out on important potential traffic. To help with this, we’ve compiled some of the top SEO tips across social media profiles, so you can make sure you have your house in order. Bear in mind that all of the below are recommended as general good practice to stick to – not promises of top positions for your keywords. I would always always recommend that you run your social media profiles with your community in mind first and foremost, then consider best practice for SEO after this. These are tips to implement alongside the natural conversations in your community. Many of these tips apply for internal search, such as through Facebook Pages as there will be certain restrictions on the content Google will/can index.

Keywords in Facebook Page updates

It can often be a bit of a push and pull between writing content purely with the user in mind, and writing content that has one eye firmly on SEO. Good practice for SEO copywriting can still apply when you write your updates on your Facebook Page. Since everyone that searches on Facebook has the ability to show results by ‘everyone’, individual posts you write on your Facebook Page could be crucial for getting found by people searching for something current. I wouldn’t advise you let this guide your content strategy overall. Don’t try and write about the royal wedding if it bears no relevance to your brand or community, but when you are writing updates, think about the keywords that other people might be looking for, that could lead them to your Page.

Writing anchor text on your Facebook Page

The same rules of good linking still apply on your Facebook Page, such as linking often and to relevant Pages. In certain places, Facebook also gives you the option to use anchor text in your links, which is a good practice to adhere to. You can do this in the ‘notes’ section of your Page for example. Here you simply write out the code for anchor text as you would normally, replacing the content with your own website and desired anchor text

Offering creative social media campaigns

When you publish this it will appear as anchor text on your wall. Remember to use relevant keywords in the anchor text, that relate to the page you’re pointing to.

Link Often on your Facebook Page

Sending links out from your Facebook Page in general is important in helping to improve your SEO rankings within Facebook search. You should take advantage of the places that Facebook give you to do this, including the wall and Info text. One of the most important places to link from your Page however, is in the ‘About’ box on the side of your Page. While you can’t put anchor text here, you can include a standard link, such as in the screenshot below :

Keywords in Facebook photo captions

Even though certain activity within a Facebook page is ‘no follow’ by Google, you should still retain good keyword and linking strategies in all places. This is often overlooked in the ‘photos’ section of your Page, where it can be tempting to stick it up quickly and share it on your wall. The description is on your photo permanently however, so remember to include relevant keywords in the photo description text. Again bear in mind meeting the needs of the user and the search engine. You’re talking to your fans first and foremost, so include the keywords naturally in the text, but paying careful attention to those keywords you might want to be found for, both in Facebook and Google search.

Keywords in your Twitter bio

In your Twitter profile ,your ‘bio’ is actually the meta description of your Page, making it an incredibly important aspect of SEO on your Twitter profile. Make sure you’re including relevant keywords here, that relate both to the general content of your tweets as well as the website you want to promote. This can often be overlooked in terms of keyword optimisation, but should be well considered, albeit within 160 characters!

Use bit.ly to shorten links on Twitter

Using URL shortners is often done on Twitter profiles mainly as a way of making links more readable and easily shareable as they reduce the amount of characters used within the tweet. They are also incredibly important in terms of SEO as well. Using url services such as bit.ly or tiny.url use permanent 301 redirects to your content, meaning that your original url benefits from the SEO juice, and not just the tiny url itself.

Keywords early in tweets

In an individual tweet, the first 27-40 characters count as the title tag within a Google search result. It’s important therefore to include your desired keywords early on in the tweet itself, to make it more likely to rank in searches. This is what will be indexed by Google so it’s important to keep to this structure as much as possible, while not distracting from the actual conversation in Twitter. Keep these keywords relevant to the rest of the tweet and any URL you include, as much for consideration of the user as well as search engines.

Followers boost your PageRank

This might not be a direct tip, but it’s an important consideration. The more high profile or popular Twitter followers you have, the more your PageRank will improve within Google, having a positive effect on your search results. These followers are indexed as ‘inlinks’ to your profile – i.e. Google recognises one Twitter account as linking to yours as a relevant link. Try and attract these followers by tweeting popular, relevant content, which would sit very much in line with your natural Twitter strategy :

Use Twitter directories

There are some very easy ways that you can build links to your Twitter profile, while also getting in front of new followers that may be interested in your content : Twitter directories. Through different sites you can link to your Twitter profile, often with the option to add in additional keywords, that should strongly relate to the page you’re linking to. Check out this article from CNet, for a great list of Twitter directories you can add your profile to.

Tweet Often

As much as this is a consideration for your natural Twitter activity, it’s also important for Google search results, now that they integrate tweets into their main search results. If you’re tweeting often about current topics then you can help to improve your chances of appearing in Google results. These Twitter links are also contained prominently above the fold in Google search engine result pages, so is a great way to attract new followers, provided the content is in some way related to your core product or service.

Name your Twitter profile picture

A nice little SEO tip to follow here. When uploading your Twitter profile picture, make sure to name it with a relavant keyword that relates to your Twitter profile. The image file name is contained within the link when you click to expand, so avoid just using the file number, as shown in the example above. You can see this yourself by hovering over your profile image in Twitter. Also be sure to use hyphens in between words in the file name, not spaces.

Double keywords in a Youtube video

Obviously, using relevant keywords throughout the title, description and keyword section of your video on Youtube is important. But a good tip to follow is including a keyword twice within a title, such as ‘Facebook Tips : SEO Facebook tips for your business page’. This is good in terms of SEO to get an incredibly important keyword listed twice, but is also good from a usability point of view, as you provide an easy to read format, telling people what your content is about. This is the perfect balance between writing for people and SEO.

Repeat keywords in the video title

Often when it comes to adding in keywords to your Youtube video, you try and add as many relevant keywords that you can think of. While this is good practice, help Youtube out a bit when it comes to displaying your video, and repeat words contained in your video title throughout the description and keyword section, as it will help your video to be shown both within Youtube and Google search (as this pulls in Youtube video results as standard).

Leave a video reply

Google and Youtube like video pages that have a lot of links built into them, as it shows the relevance of the video content. A great way to do this, which also provides a new organic community around your video content, is by leaving a video reply to related videos within Youtube. You can do this while you’re logged into the correct profile for your Youtube video channel. When you’ve found the video you want to reply to, click on ‘Leave a video reply’ on the right hand side. This will bring up your videos, which you can select and leave as a video response on the page. Use this according to best practice and avoid being too spammy a this could have an adverse effect on your actual content!

Write a full script for your videos

A great way of adding in extra text around your video is to consider writing a full script in the description. Here you can put in additional keywords that are featured in the video and it also allows people to find out more about the content of the video if they’re looking at it in work for example, or not able to view videos. Next to the title, the description is the second most important thing about your video so make sure it’s well optimised.

Get active on Quora

Google recently announced that they were adding activity on Quora such as asking questions or adding answers into their indexed realtime search results. Quora is a great place to network and build your community anyway, but now that this has such as direct effect on Google search, it should be considered by most marketers and businesses. As these feature in the ‘realtime’ section of a Google SERP, best practice both for search and your community is to make sure you’re answering and asking questions often.

Ben & Jerry’s Fair Tweets Campaign

From Digitalbuzz:



Ben & Jerry’s have just launched a new social campaign highlighting the importance of World Fair Trade Day. Called “Fair Tweets“, the campaign leverages your unused twitter characters as messages, hash tags and links to help promote World Fair Trade Day… And depending on how many characters you have spare in each tweet, the Ben & Jerry’s Fair Tweets app automatically generates a relevant message to fill that space, and is then posted with each of your tweets!

Startup Makes Facebook Likes Searchable

From Mashable:

Facebook invited the web onto its platform when it launched the Like button a little more than a year ago. The invitation has been largely accepted: As of August, more than 2.5 million websites have installed it.

In all of this Liking, there is buried a mass of data that would be valuable to brands. But it’s still difficult for even one individual to keep track of what is popular among his or her friends, thanks to Facebook’s habit of hiding repeats from newsfeeds.

Likester aims to solve the problem for both individuals and brands. Its consumer-facing website, which launched in late April, shows you what is most popular among your friends and among all Facebook users. You can also search for top-Liked sites in a specific location or for what a specific friend liked and see what Likers of a specific page were also inclined to give a thumbs up.

Facebook search engine Booshaka has long provided searchable “trending topics.” Booshaka recently launched a more competitive approach. It assigns points for comments, posts and Likes on a fan page, and shows users where they and their friends stand in the ranking of fans.

Brands can use Booshaka to install a similar leaderboard on their own pages — a feature that is free for now but seems like a promising future revenue stream.

Likester doesn’t have a revenue roadmap yet, but founder Kevin McCarthy says that he’s interested in using the catalog of Likes to help e-commerce sites better understand how to leverage the Like button. For now, he’s established what is possibly the only efficient way to find out what the most-Liked local business in your hometown is.

How Converse Became the Biggest Little Sneaker Brand on Facebook

From Mashable:

Converse doesn’t have a huge advertising budget, but, judging by its social media fan base, it doesn’t seem to need one. Converse now has more than 15 million fans on Facebook, which is almost four times the number for its parent company, Nike and about eight times as many as Adidas.

How did Converse do it? Geoff Cottrill, Converse’s chief marketing officer, has said that one day he discovered that Converse had 8 million fans and was asked what the brand should do. “Nothing,” he replied. But, as the interview below reveals, there’s a bit more to it than that. In fact, Cottrill has engineered some clever social media programs for the brand that raise awareness for Converse without compromising its image. For instance, the brand is planning to open a recording studio in Brooklyn for up-and-coming bands this summer. But Converse is careful not to ask the bands plug any of its products. (Converse is also not planning to get into the music publishing business, Cottrill explains.) In the following Q&A, Cottrill discusses how he navigates social media, which is instructive to any marketer contemplating the space.

Q&A With Geoff Cottrill, Chief Marketing Officer, Converse

You’ve said on a few occasions that when you found out Converse had 8 million Facebook fans your reaction was “do nothing.” If that’s the case, what do they need you for?

By doing nothing, I meant doing nothing special. Our philosophy in social media has been to bring our voice to the medium, which includes acting like a good party guest — we bring something to the table, and we listen more than we talk. It also means not bringing campaigns from other channels verbatim to a platform that’s about conversation.

We think that the fans of any brand want to know about product and like offers too, but they also want to have an emotional connection -– we’re trying to be a good host for that connection. The bottom line is that in social media you have to “let go.” Forget about the old methods of one-way communication. Social media isn’t even a two-way conversation –- it’s more complicated than that. We’re lucky that we’ve got a brand that people have used for years to express their own personal style. Our job is to keep focused on making great products our consumers want to wear and to be a participant in the discussions going on in the social media space. By showing respect and trusting your consumers, I believe your brand benefits via strong advocacy –- having millions of advocates can be a powerful thing. You just have to let go and trust your consumers.

Aside from doing nothing, what’s your advice for engaging fans on Facebook

We mix it up with posts about product, posts about content and questions about topics of the day. Last year, for example, we posted a design-your-own shoe contest inspired by the Double Rainbow guy, who was blowing up that week on YouTube. Some of what we do is planned, but a lot of it is spontaneous. You have to be flexible and ready to talk about lots of topics — just like at a dinner party. We’re also learning a lot about posting tactics –- time zones, language, regional relevance, etc.

I go back to what I said earlier –- you have to have the courage to let go and not try to control the conversation or broadcast advertising messages every chance you get. Be respectful of the time between purchases of your product by adding value and contributing to the conversation. When it comes time again to purchase, your relationship with them should pay off.

How has Converse’s forays into music publishing helped the brand?

First off, we’re not in the music publishing business. Converse makes footwear, apparel and accessories. Our primary focus is and always will be to make great products that people want to wear for lots of different occasions. At some point in history, many within the music and artistic community adopted the Converse Chuck Taylor All-Star as their expression of individuality and independence. We’re extremely proud of the music initiatives we’ve done in the past. One of our goals as a brand is to give back and help inspire a new generation of musicians. This summer, we will open Converse Rubber Tracks, a new state-of-the-art recording studio in Brooklyn, New York, where artists can record at no cost. The studio will provide a platform for new musicians to overcome one of the biggest hurdles in their careers — affording studio time. Converse Rubber Tracks is one important way for us to say thank you to the creative and music community, and to provide a place for new artists to have access to resources they may not be able to afford. We’re looking at it as an investment in making sure that new voices have the means to be heard. We won’t own any of the content — it belongs to the artists who created it.

How do you measure success in social media? By raw numbers? Engagement? What’s the best metric out there?

We’ve definitely been lucky to grow and connect with a very large audience on Facebook, but aggregating fans feels like it’s coming to a close in 2011. The real metrics are the ones about engagement and ultimately, about connecting a conversation or brand affinity to results. I think a lot of brands are trying to figure that out right now — can social play a role in generating sales?

You ran a very clever campaign using Google search with terms like “How do I kiss a girl?” a few years ago. Have you done anything like that since then? If not, why not?

The insight of the program you mentioned, where we analyzed Google Trends to find out the how-to kinds of questions kids were asking, remains true today, except in a different place — Facebook. We continue to engage with kids on the topics they care about. We just finished making a few videos for kids to use to ask out their prom dates, for example. In another two years, we’ll engage via that same spirit of helping our kids out, in whatever new place they hang out.

A few sneaker companies have includes USB devices in their shoeboxes with “value add” media. Has Converse tried anything along those lines? What do you think of that?

Converse shoes aren’t about added technology or even about us. They’re about what our customer does in them. It works for other companies for sure, but that’s not our MO.


What is the most overhyped form of social media right now? Why?

Social media itself is a lot of hype, except for the potential for companies to act more like human beings and be forced into thinking about marketing and message control in a different (or now obsolete) way. But social media has the potential to mature into a powerful hybrid of traditional marketing techniques and community engagement, especially if that community becomes your brand advocates. Which is why we focus on a couple of core marketing truths via social –- be relevant, make a connection, be useful, etc.

How does Converse keep a consistent brand image across various forms of social media?

We focus a lot on tone of message, but modify those messages according to platform. For example, on Facebook and YouTube, we might feature video of new bands we caught at a music festival. Simultaneously, we’ll run a call-and-response for interview questions with those bands on Twitter. The key is to know yourself as a brand, be confident in your POV and act that way wherever you are.

The Hangover Sequel Launches SCVNGR Hunt at 7-Eleven

From Mashable:

The Hangover Part II doesn’t hit theaters until May 26, but consumers can start playing along Monday in a SCVNGR promotion at 7-Eleven.

The convenience store chain is hosting a mobile scavenger hunt based on the application. To play, consumers download the app and then amass points by checking in to stores and completing tasks for points, like taking a picture with a Super Big Gulp featuring a character from the movie. Fans can cash in points for prizes including temporary tattoos, T-shirts, 7-Eleven gift cards, movie tickets and a chance to win a Las Vegas trip.

Another component of the 7-Eleven tie-in includes a Get Well Card app on 7-Eleven’s Facebook Page where fans can make and send a card by choosing a message and still from the movie.

The original Hangover, released in 2009, grossed more than $467 million, and there’s a lot of interest in the sequel. The trailer for the film has gotten more than 3 million views on YouTube.

SCVNGR, which just completed a promotion with Reebok, helped publicize a movie opening before. It ran challenges based on Eat Pray Love last year.

Meanwhile, a brand that didn’t tie in with The Hangover or The Hangover Part II is attempting to get in on the action as well. Hotels.com has launched an online promotion called Trip Your Face that lets you superimpose your Facebook profile picture and those of up to three friends into a game that, like the movie, challenges you to piece together the events of the previous night.

The Future of Advertising Will Be Integrated

From TechCrunch:

Banner Ads. They first started in 1994 and are therefore almost as old as the Web itself. They were very effective back then, with the original ad garnering a 78% click-through rate (CTR)! I guess from there we had nowhere to go but down.

Nowadays banner ads get on average 0.2% CTR meaning for every 1,000 ads that are served up only 2 people click on them. And as Jon Steinberg of Buzzfeed points out, the CTRs for social media banner ads are just 0.08%.

Holy Shiitake!

Despite its creation more than 15 years ago, banner ads have been surprisingly resilient despite their lack of efficacy. In the IAB study that revealed the graph above, brand advertisers indicated that their number one objective in online advertising was “creating awareness” followed by “creating purchase intent” or “likelihood to recommend” the product. Yet these seem to be the least effective attributes of banner advertising.

The fundamental problem with banner ads is a condition called “banner blindness” meaning that our eyes are really quickly trained to look at what is most relevant on the page – the content we want to see. Check out this chart from eye-tracking research conducted by the usability guru Jakob Nielsen published in this piece. It shows that our eyes are trained to focus on the text, not the ads.

I’m sure it probably resonants with how most of you read the web.

So I’ve spent the last few years checking out companies that are trying to solve for this problem. The global advertising market is estimated at around $475 billion / year with only 12% of this online and measurable. (some data sources have this estimate much higher.) We believe that the structural industry changes will continue to create big opportunities for technology firms that enable the changes in media consumption for television, radio, inbound calls, online & social media. We are investing heavily in these changes.

One company that I previously wrote about trying to change this industry is, Solve Media, (I am not an investor) has created an interesting ad unit designed to drive up brand “engagement” and recall. The idea is that if I can serve you an ad for a function that you already need to perform on the web anyways – a captcha – with a brand message I can drive recall. And market research seems to confirm this.

You’ll see a clear problem here. Traditional banner ads only drive 16% brand recall and almost ZERO message recall. So it’s hard to argue that brands shouldn’t worry about CTR rates when it doesn’t seem that banners are very effective for branded advertising or awareness either.

It’s no big surprise that the overwhelming majority of online spend has therefore been “direct response” advertisements (trying to elicit an action) rather than branded advertising as pointed out in this good summary by Jeremy Liew.

So people will spend money online to get you to sign up for credit cards or Netflix but not to change your laundry detergent. I decided to look up one branded company in the chocolate segment to get a sense for the magnitude of spend online. Hershey’s chocolates spends about $365 million in advertising per year. Just $460,000 of this is spend on online display ads (0.1% for those without a calculator handy).

The reality is that advertising has got to become more integrated with content in order to drive efficacy. I know that any time ads are mentioned it makes the blood boil on any self respecting technologist the same way it did when HotWire ran their first ad in 1994 and the way it made Google’s blood boil when Overture launched the sponsored search category.

Ask anybody if they like product placements in movies or TV and they’ll resoundingly tell you “no” but marketers know better, which is why the celebrity endorsement industry is a $50 billion industry.

But even for the consumer reality sets in. Firstly, we care more about getting cheap or free high-quality media than we do about whether we see ads. Give people massive price increases on most media and they’ll abandon it. So how people behave and what they verbally say they stand for are often at odds.

Integrated Advertising

I believe that “integrated advertising” is one of the more effective types of advertising out there. You have to find a way to get your audience to actually “engage” with the content in the way that Solve Media is doing, in the way that in-game advertising works for video games or the way that celebrity endorsements work.

It’s why I still believe passionate in companies like Adly (I’m an investor) who have created ways for celebrities to integrate endorsements “in stream” in a Twitter feed. Yes. Oh, sacred cow. In the stream. Integrated with where our eyes & attention are. I advocated strongly for this 18 months ago and my belief system is as ardent as it was back then. If you’re interested here is my case.

But the simple facts are:

• Our attention is all in the stream. As evidenced by the eye-tracking studies – they will remain in the stream.
• We know that celebrity endorsement works. It has for decades. Celebrities care about their personal brands so will naturally rebuff requests to sponsor inauthentic products.
• The beauty of social media is that consumers can vote with their “unfollow button” so it has a natural self-correcting mechanism. If you get economic value out of having followers you don’t want to lose them over one ad.
• Sure, there needs to be ad disclosure. And naturally we have built in quality controls like: frequency capping, automated measurement so we can pull ads that people respond poorly to, A/B testing tools, data analysis to tell celebrities & brands which products will resonate, etc.

But I can tell you as my firm invested in Overture who created the category of pay-per-search that Google perfected – our company underwent three years of ridicule in Silicon Valley until people looked at the performance data and realized that efficacy matters.

The technology blogs will be aflutter with continued criticisms of in-stream ads while mainstream consumers continue to click on links provided by the celebrities they respect and will buy products accordingly. We already have the data that proves it.

In Image Ads

Another areas that I’ve been really focused on over the past 2 years is “in-image ads” as another form of integrated media. When you think about the eye-tracking we know that people care about the story and the images. And it is already an accepted fact that in many cases the ads & images are blended as any lady who reads Cosmo or Vogue will tell you. The big splashy image ads is part of their reading experience.

So we put our money where our mouth was an invested in the largest in-image advertiser on the web, GumGum, whose network now reached over 100 million monthly uniques with 3 billion ad-compliant images, delivering an average CTR of 0.4% (2x industry average for banners). The eyes are in the image. We believe this is why Google Ventures invested in Pixazza.

As you can see from this image, the ad is unobtrusive and potentially valuable to the reader. The ad unit is served up based on algorithms that determine what is actually in the image and also for whether an ad placement would impair the image. We could even target ads better based on who the end consumer was.

What else is out there in the field of integrated advertising?

Vibrant Media & Kontera have both built large and fast-growing businesses around text-based advertising and there are new entrants doing it in new ways like SkimLinks. Vibrant has a reach of 250 million uniques, making in the 12th largest ad-focused property online and has 3rd-party verified studies suggesting up to 50% increase in brand lift following their in-text ads (I’m not an investor in any of these companies). Text is shown to deliver higher CTRs than banners. Text is what we’re reading. It’s integrated.

There is a whole industry being spawned in the Internet video world and especially in the integration of devices (second screen TVs) and the TV experience. Some of the interactive experiences I’ve seen in recent demos are simply mind boggling and are starting to form new opinions in my head about how we will consume big screen TV in the future (I’ll save that for a future post).

The games industry has massively changed over the past several years to more of an integrated advertising / purchasing media with the growth of virtual goods and ads. An obvious example of integrated media would be the new Rio Angry Birds version. It’s actually very cool. There are increasingly incentivized offers to get more powerful swords & shields in battle games. This has proved far more effective than small crappy banners at the bottom of each screen.

There will always be a tension between advertising wanting to reach audiences through whatever means they can to capture their attention and help them discover new products and consumers who claim a strong preference for ad-free products. Yet the other tension between ad-free products that cost more versus ad-supported models have a clear winner: ads. On products where I’ve seen data the “ad free” versions have converted at 4-6% of the user base at maximum.

So the future of helping make the ad industry more measurable (and more online) I believe will be one of helping make ads both authentic & integrated. Trying to relegate ads to the least intrusive real estate of our computers is missing the point. Advertisers pay for efficacy.

If not, we’d be telling advertisers to just leave all of their branded advertising spend on traditional television in the future. And to stick with their old adage, “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted. The problem is, I don’t know which half.”