As a prolific status-updater I am in no way claiming innocence on this (my last status update was VIP at DMB with Carrot Creative, jealous yet?) But seriously, the reason I bring this to our attention is because as a creative agency, working with brands that consumers want to associate themselves with makes our jobs at Carrot a whole lot easier. We encourage “cool” brands to offer viral content users can share, blog, post, whatever you want to call it, giving the consumer more opportunity to “tag their brag.”

Here are a couple of status updates as good examples

• Just had an amazing 8 mile run with my new Asics“
• “Won free tickets to see Bruno tonight!”

(disclaimer we have no relationship with Asics or Bruno)
By using these brands to vindicate their bragging, these people unknowingly promoted the brand in perfect context… textbook marketing. Technology platforms that monitor this kind of “name-dropping” across the web give brands and marketers a direct link to how consumers incorporate the product with their lifestyle. Understanding a brands “social reputation” is an integral part of a marketers job.

So with that, take a minute to think about what brands YOU want to associate yourself with and do them a favor and find them on Twitter, join their Facebook Fan Page, or hey, tattoo their logo on your forearm. A good one to get started with? The Carrot Twitter page and Facebook Fan Page.

What do you think, do you have any examples of shameful bragging that put brands in a good (or bad) light?

This article is copyright © 2012 

I received this email from Johnnie Walker (I’m a member of “The Striding Man Society” that offers some really great events for tastings of the brand-if you get the chance, go!) I get emails from them ever so often about new events or promotions and click on them at leisure to see if anything fun is coming up.  This email today was different. They were letting me know that Johnnie Walker has created a Facebook Fan Page and offered an easy click to become a fan right from the email.

Curious to check it out, I clicked on the “Become a Fan” button which sent me to their custom designed Johnnie Walker Facebook page at facebook.com/johnniewalker. Tons of content: videos, photos, promotions, deals. I liked it and I “Became a Fan.”

While some may say that the initial email defeats the purpose of engaging with brands in social media through viral tactics, I think Johnnie Walker and team did this well on a variety of levels. Here’s why:

• Design. They designed it with customized tabs and information. It has custom content, it’s visually appealing and it provides content their fans want. (A lot of information they already put in their emails)
• Access. Their fans were on email already so inviting them to join the Facebook Page was a logical step. If they had not sent out the monthly newsletters it would have been a bit weird, but these are people who opted in to getting the emails.
• Opportunity. You can’t advertise on Facebook if you’re an alcohol brand. Facebook Fan Pages provide a space to have a unique presence with the community that’s attractive to engage with.

What do you think about brands asking you to engage with them on Facebook via email? I asked some people on Twitter what they thought of this and posted the responses below. As you’ll see, mixed answers with some strongly disliking and others open to the idea with some limitations.  Leave YOUR thoughts in the comments section below.

This article is copyright © 2012 

The benefits of sending to social sites are obvious including more interaction and an easier way to gather a group of users interested in your brand versus sending them to a corporate website.

Adam hits the point with something we’ve been saying for awhile: get your fans in one place. While corporate websites are great for branding and having a secure presence for all the information about your company, many are static and not interactive. Plus, you’re not offering any incentive to come back to the site and collect information about all of the interested people clicking.

By driving people to Facebook and having them simply click that they’re a FAN of the brand, you’ve got them. You may not have really exciting stuff to give them now, but that doesn’t mean you won’t later on. For your already loyal set of fans, they’ll gladly join the page. And for the “fans on the fence” or new fans, you’ll be able to entice them on a place they’re already familiar with.

Here are a few doing a great job in driving folks to their social sites:

• Universal Pictures: While they have set up basic websites for some of their summer movies, Universal is also sending fans to designated Facebook Fan Pages. (The official Bruno website is actually a MySpace page)  Land of the Lost. Drag Me to Hell. Public Enemies. Bruno. Funny People.  (I have to wonder what the marketing team at Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian is thinking about this. There site isn’t interactive at all besides a simple game, which is comparable to most movie sites. Think about all of the interaction they could have had on social media with the characters and content!)
• Southwest Airlines: The crafty crew at Southwest Airlines set up a photo contest using their official Twitter account where users submitted a  photo of a very specific travel or tourism-related picture. The company offered a travel package to the winners. If you check out the Twitter account, you can already see the overwhelming response. Why? Well, it’s easy. A simple upload of a photo and a tweet takes 2 minutes. Plus, people are on Twitter and thus familiar with the platform. Sending people to the official Southwest Airlines website for a contest would be a bit odd wouldn’ it?
  
• Skittles: And then of course there is Skittles.com, which is completely shifted into a social site. (Right now it’s YouTube. In the past, Twitter and Wikipedia were the backdrop of the site.) We all remember the backlash, but there website still has everything on it to get more information about their company from a social media perspective.

What do you think? What other corporate sites are driving people to social media sites?

This article is copyright © 2012 

According to MediaPost, “two months ago, Dos Equis introduced its “Most Interesting Man in the World” to the entire U.S. via an expanded national advertising campaign. Now, it is giving consumers the chance to become — if not as interesting — at least more interesting.”

The site now offers a chance to “Sign up for the Academy” (so you can learn how to be interesting) via an expanded national advertising campaign. You can learn from interesting people like Bear Grylls (Man vs. Wild fame—or “I slept in a gutted camel” fame) or globe-trotting explorer Chris Fischer. Both of these men (and others to be named later.)

MediaPost quotes Paul Smailes, Dos Equis brand director saying “The brand is all about helping those who want to live a more interesting life. The Academy is an extension of that proposition.”

I think the campaign is good. They’ve done a good job kicking off the start of it two months ago, and to continue it they’ve rolled out the second phase. This is important. You want to continue the hard work of brainstorming the theme and make sure it’s not a short lived two month trip.They saw success and used it to build up the momentum for round 2. Bravo.

While I don’t necessarily associate Dos Equis with “interesting” (I associate it with Spring Break)—the brand going out and claiming that interesting is the word to go with the brand raises some questions in my head. People don’t usually describe themselves as interesting. Ask your co-worker to describe themselves in 3 words. You’ll probably get things like: Funny. Smart. Friendly. Good-looking. (OK, maybe that’s just what I get here at >carrot but you get my point.) Interesting isn’t necessarily an attribute that people immediately classify themselves as. People want to be seen as Smart or Ambitious. Athletic. Fun. Youthful. Well-read. Brands can capitalize on those words and associate themselves with them. Good examples: Disney. Pepsi. American Express. Apple. You can probably associate one word to each of those brands easily. We just did it. Try it out.

What do you think? How do you associate INTERESTING? Do you strive to be it and do you hope to be classified under that term? Are there other brands out there that you would purchase/associate yourself with to become more interesting? Let us know in the comments.

This article is copyright © 2012 

There are more ways to bringing out your personality within your online profile. Facebook Fan Pages are a GREAT start to this. We love Facebook Fan Pages here at >carrot creative and I can promise you there will be more posts about this topic.

If you check out my Facebook page, you can tell that I like sushi, baseball, chardonnay and Dave Matthews Band. Sure, there are many OTHER things I like, but you already know  a little more about me than “she has a blog and a Twitter.”

Looking at this from a marketers perspective, brands need to have a strong presence on these Facebook Fan Pages. If I have a favorite type of perfume that I use every day, what’s stopping me from showing that off and adding that to my Facebook page? In fact, from writing this post I found that Burberry London is ON Facebook and I can become a fan of the brand. Now people know that I like this type of perfume.(And yes, that’s why I smell so good.)

When Facebook rolled out the new Fan Page redesign, PR people everywhere did a happy dance. An integrated place to push out a brand and everything that goes into it? Here we go! Mashable wrote up a great outline on these pages and how marketers will need to get involved when designing these out. We’ve had the opportunity to work with this for a bunch of brands already and the opportunity to really engage with your brands fans on these are amazing. The easy ways to share the content (there is a SUGGEST PAGE button—easy!) and have the content show up immediately in your news feed provides for a quick jumpstart to your viral campaign. There’s no reason to not be doing this.

So, brands—make sure you’re out there on these Fan Pages. Users are looking to add a bit more personality to their online identity. People are proud to say they eat Carl’s Jr. hamburgers any chance they get. They enjoy saying they watch Lost or wear Nike sneakers. Make it available for them and start bringing these fans to a place where you can interact with them directly.

What do you think? Do you build out your online presence on Facebook? Are you a fan of brands and objects?

This article is copyright © 2012 

Photo Credit: Kelly Samardak, Just An Online Minute

Yesterday I attended the “When Social Media Becomes Unsociable” panel part of this week’s “Social Media Week” in New York. The panel, held at Fleishman Hillard’s New York office was full of people who engage/work in the new media space including:

• Constantine Basturea, Converseon
• Steve Coulson, The Advance Guard
• Peter Himler, Flatiron Communications
• Brad Mays, FH Digital Dallas
• Amber Naslund, Radian6
• David Bradfield (Moderator from FH Digital)

A full recap of what was discussed (Social Media- Don’t be an idiot) can be found on Kelly Samardak’s “Just an Online Minute” post with some fun photos as well, but we wanted to address the theme of what was discussed further.

It’s nothing new. When engaging with social media – Don’t. Be. An. Idiot.

The panel covered on the Michael Phelps fiasco (end conclusion: Mixed- Who’s the bigger idiot? Him for doing the drugs? (YES) or Kellogg’s who now has a backlash against them for dropping him?) as well as other examples from the panelists about crisis situations where members of the community put in their 2 cents to negatively comment on a brand or product. Scott Monty, Head of Social Media at Ford was a favorite of someone who does it well. Why? He does it smart and isn’t an idiot.

At times, people want to rush in a fix a situation happening on the comments section of a blog that gets 50 readers a month. The rush to jump in causes a wave of bad responses and then an even bigger dilemma than what you started with. Just take a step back and think of how you can best have a conversation with the person being negative. Are they wrong? They could be and you could be the one to help answer them. Are they right? Well, admit it if you have to and provide resources for them to help. Just take a few minutes and figure out why you need to be involved. If it’s not THAT important, move on and worry about the bigger dilemmas.

Result: Less idiots. More happy campers (read: clients and customers)

This article is copyright © 2012 

Twitter is an interesting space. A space where you can connect with new people,post random thoughts, blah blah…we know we know. But, I’m really interested and grateful for this community and the constant feedback they provide.

For example. Yesterday, I was in the mood to hear some music that gets me pumped up for a big negotiation we have. We have a LOT going on here and YES I am an excited person, but I wanted to add my own personal soundtrack. So, where do I find my songs? Cue to Twitter. I posted this tweet. A simple one. Just asking for some songs to keep me going. Within 10 minutes I received over 30 responses to songs. From “Chariots of Fire” to Britney Spears, Rammstein to Queen—I had them all. And you know what? I listened to them ALL.

We’ve blogged before about the unique ways Twitter works when a community is passionate about something and willing to offer content. People like adding their two cents about things they like, things they’re interested in and things they don’t mind sharing. But people also provide insightful suggestions and commentary. Feedback that helps take a conversation or thought to the next level.

This holds true when thinking about brands and presence on social media as well. Suggestion is a powerful tool. It allows people to get the satisfaction of helping someone while at the same time allowing a glimpse into a person’s style. This is only exaggerated on something open like Twitter because it allowed everyone to show that they are willing to provide help to the community and the type of style that person has. Many brands are doing it. Engaging with the community and asking for feedback. This past weekend brand reps were involved in the Twitter conversation to hear what everyone was saying about their ads, responding to questions and discussing what worked and what didn’t.

It’s a great thing to see and we can’t wait to get more involved in these types of conversations.

Special shout out thanks to those who responded:

@akeats @katherine925 @alexandergordon @bicoastalite @thoughtfarmer @MaryMassey @bellanyc1 @fbihop @davidaimi @LenKendall @littlemavs @claynewton @ceonyc @borismsilver @steketee & @Tucson_Cowgirl

Oh, and my favorite song that was suggested? “Swagger Like Us” by TI from @steketee. Thanks!

This article is copyright © 2012 

Everyone likes friends. Friends are there for you when you need them. Friends are there to talk to you, hang out with you, have good times with. Friends in the Web 2.0 world (ugh buzz word) can mean something completely different though. Friends on Facebook may mean something to one person and something completely different to another. Friends on Twitter? You have followers. You follow them back possibly. Are they your friend? Sure. Some of them are. Others? No way.

So what’s the big deal about having a bunch of friends online? From what we’ve seen,Web 2.0 friends are there to share your ideas with, retweet your tweets, post links to your blog and help create an online presence for you or your brand. When I saw this blog today about Burger King encouraging users on Facebook to ditch friends on Facebook to get a free Whopper, my first reaction was: WHAT?. Then I thought: BRILLIANT. Getting rid of friends is actually a positive thing these days.

There is too much noise out there on social networks. There is no reason to follow 5,000 people on Twitter or friend thousands on Facebook because honestly…you’re probably not going to listen to all that they’re saying so what’s the point? You need to listen to targeted people that supply content that you’re interested in. Then, you need to respond and interact. This builds your brand and adds value to the community.  Brands should do the same and interact with their audience—not just the mass community. While this may not be the overall goal of the campaign, I’m interested to see the results. How easy is it for people to just clean up some people they’re not interested in hearing about anymore for a free burger? Then, when they realize how great it is to clear out some of the clutter, will they continue to do so for their personal benefit?

What do you think?

Photo courtesy of Paul Watson.

This article is copyright © 2012 

While catching up on a weekend’s worth of news, I came across an intriguing New York Times article (which Mashable also commented on) dealing with the “struggle” certain advertisers are having creating successful social media campaigns. The article dealt with a certain subset of marketers who do not see the value in engaging the consumer with topical social media elements. It read like a textbook case of plug and play advertising, taking a circle peg from the past and trying to jam it into the square opening of the present.

My favorite example of  this”marketeering” lollygagging perpetrated by the offending party is their dismissal of targeted advertising. In their example they try to target individuals in their office by including such relevant activities as “Cereal and Sex.” Miraculously only one person in their office matched their query. Really!? They were shocked by this?

Another sweeping change occurring within the marketing community is in the metrics used to gauge the success of a campaign. Previous gross estimations of viewership and engagement are no longer acceptable. The architecture of the social web allows for scrupulous reporting tools, strategically targeted content, and superior engagement with branded content. In short, the revolution that has been prophesied for decades is now upon us.

Using the tools of the social web, it’s much more advantageous for a marketer to reach out to a targeted group of 200,000 users than a mass market audience of millions. The conversion rate on a blanket advertisement is around 4% according to a recent study by Integrated Media Measurement. The same report also deduced that the introduction of a second engagement point for consumers can raise that figure three-fold to 12% and higher. Social Media tools that are just now coming into prominence, serve as the perfect complement for an integrated campaign seeking to engage users in a multi-platform approach.

One very important thing to realize about social media, it’s not one size-fits all: There are some brands that don’t belong on Facebook.. Facebook is not the only social media tool in a marketer’s arsenal. Not all brands belong on all social media platforms. There is a reason that so many sites have popped up, each serve a specific purpose. To me, the bigger issue is the complete lack of understanding from members of the old guard. The game has changed, and few people want to admit it. The key to success in the new information economy is to leverage the data at hand to make informed decisions about what/how/and when your customers are interacting with your brand. Let your customers talk to each other. The marketer is there to guide the conversation, not be the monarchical overlord.

I call on journalists, marketers, and the media at large to take note: social media is here to stay, it’s relevant, useful, and will change the face of capitalism forever. Writing it off as a failure is an admission of personal and corporate ignorance. Embrace it, find new ways to harness its power, and most importantly write articles in support of its importance.

This article is copyright © 2012