com.motion is seeking a social media-savvy intern for our team in downtown Toronto.
We are looking for a dynamic self-starter with a passion for marketing, public relations and new media. The ideal candidate will have proven leadership experience and multi-tasking capabilities from academic and extra-curricular activities (clubs, associations, teams, etc.). A successful candidate will have experience with major social media networks. This is a three-month position with a great level of opportunity. Please apply directly to Andra Brigmohan at brigmohan@veritascanada.com.
Timing: Immediate
Friday, January 30, 2009
If you're social media-savvy and looking for an internship, we want you!
Monday, January 26, 2009
Watching TV while Online....
The folks at Ipsos Reid have confirmed what all parents of teenagers already know - when you are online, you are probably watching TV and listening to the radio also.
In fact, 44% of Canadians (and presumably, a similar number of multi-tasking Americans) say they are consuming other traditional forms of media while scouring the latest that the Internet has to offer. Further, a lot of folks don't bother with traditional media at all, especially quick-to-be-out-of-date categories such as magazine (40% don't bother with them).
Multi-tasking is only part of this story - the other part is that media with interactive & real-time characteristics is where the audience is. The more one-way and out-of-date the message, the less an entire generation of consumers is interested.
Recently, a lot of bleeding-edge folks have been getting their news from emerging micro-blogging sites, such as Twitter. Over here at com.motion we follow one particular Twitter-er who seems to beat CNN regularly.
Hold on to your hats, folks, media is changing.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Social Media This Week: January 23, 2009
Inauguration 2.0
The news: The inauguration made history in more ways than one. The web allowed people to connect globally to watch this historic moment take place.
According to this post, Twitter had five times the normal Tweet traffic. The word “Obama” appeared 35,000 times an hour during his speech in different Tweets. There have been over 300,000 new videos uploaded to YouTube with the tag “Obama” over the course of the week. Closely behind that number, 17,000 new videos were uploaded with the tag “Inauguration” in the last five days. Furthermore, there are 175,000 news results filed under “Inauguration” according to Google and Technorati reports nearly 18,000 blogs mention this week’s event.
Key learning: People aren’t just watching the TV anymore. When you have a newsworthy story, consider every medium that people are communicating in – and join the conversation.
If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say it over Twitter
The news: James Andrews, a PR executive from Ketchum in the States flew to
“True confession but I’m in one of those towns where I scratch my head and say, ‘I would die if I hade to live here.’”
An employee of FedEx followed Andrews on Twitter (on Twitter, you have “followers” which are people who have chosen to see your updates) and saw Andrews' comment and shared it with FedEx’s corporate communications team. The below response was sent to Andrews on behalf of FedEx prior to his arrival:
“Mr. Andrews, If I interpret your post correctly, these are your comments about Memphis a few hours after arriving in the global headquarters city of one of your key and lucrative clients, and the home of arguably one of the most important entrepreneurs in the history of business, FedEx founder Fred Smith. Many of my peers and I feel this is inappropriate. We do not know the total millions of dollars FedEx Corporation pays Ketchum annually for the valuable and important work your company does for us around the globe. We are confident however, it is enough to expect a greater level of respect and awareness from someone in your position as a vice president at a major global player in your industry. A hazard of social networking is people will read what you write. Not knowing exactly what prompted your comments, I will admit the area around our airport is a bit of an eyesore, not without crime, prostitution, commercial decay, and a few potholes. But there is a major political, community, religious, and business effort underway, that includes FedEx, to transform that area. We’re hopeful that over time, our city will have a better “face” to present to visitors. James, everyone participating in today’s event, including those in the auditorium with you this morning, just received their first paycheck of 2009 containing a 5% pay cut … which we wholeheartedly support because it continued the tradition established by Mr. Smith of doing whatever it takes to protect jobs. Considering that we just entered the second year of a U.S. recession, and we are experiencing significant business loss due to the global economic downturn, many of my peers and I question the expense of paying Ketchum to produce the video open for today’s event; work that could have been achieved by internal, award-winning professionals with decades of experience in television production. Additionally Mr. Andrews, with all due respect, to continue the context of your post; true confession: many of my peers and I don’t see much relevance between your presentation this morning and the work we do in Employee Communications.”
Facebook De-Friends Burger King Application
The news: In the States last week, Burger King launched a free application over Facebook that encouraged users to “sacrifice” 10 of their Facebook friends in exchange for a free Whopper. The application convinced users to dump over 200,000 of their friends. This week, Facebook put pressure on Burger King to make some changes to the application that more closely aligned it with Facebook’s philosophy. Facebook did not take a liking to the messages that were being sent to the “sacrificed” friends stating that their friends dumped them for a beef patty. Burger King concluded the application rather than making any changes.
Key learning: Sometimes social media is an end in itself. Sometimes it drives a PR campaign. Burger King’s decision to drop the campaign rather than modify it suggests this was one of the latter.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Social Media Without Borders
The one tricky thing about marketing and PR in this digital world is the globe-hopping nature of all those little blue links on web pages. For marketeers it is a bit daunting - one minute your target American consumer is visiting your carefully crafted microsite, and the next minute he or she is reading a review of your product by an Canadian blogger. There is a tremendous amount of "marketing message leakage" as campaigns in one country inadvertently reach consumers of digital media over the border. This leakage is especially true across the American / Canadian border. The leakage is so great it takes a misplaced "u" in the word color or a detailed evaluation of a clickstream to really spot an online Canadian.
This is a big deal for many brands where product offerings and regulatory restrictions differ tremendously: Auto, pharma, consumer goods - they all have this issue.
Social media marketing campaigns are a uniquely equipped to handle the nuances of today's cross-border brand leakage. Because social media conversations are authentic, one-on-one conversations, you have the luxury of pointing individuals to the information (or messaging) that is most appropriate for them. For example, you could direct a young Canadian to US sources of Scion info in advance of the Canadian Scion launch, and notify them of the Canadian offerings when they occur. You could facilitate conversations between passionate brand Molson drinkers on both sides of the border (does it taste different, really?) to spark debate. Same for Gatorade - does Gatorade taste better in Canada because it is served colder?
It is with this opportunity in mind that today I'm excited to announce the launch of com.motion USA. And to make sure we tap the brightest minds we are setting up shop in Boulder, Colorado - the heart of Social Media USA.
com.motion USA's goal will be to offer global brands the opportunity to embrace social media and inspire authentic conversations between real people. This is marketing in the 21st century.
I've been kicking around the social media industry for a few years, and have helped some of the largest global brands think about their social media strategies. (MicroSoft, Pfizer & Chrysler, to name a few.) I'm looking forward to talking with you.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Social Media - not just a Marketing Effort
One of the best things about managing social media pro-actively is that you get feedback from your customer and prospect.
However, one of the scary things about managing social media pro-actively is that your boss and everyone else in the organization also sees this feedback. And if there's one thing that customer service people have known for a long time, it is that the loudest voices tend to be the malcontents. Ask Frank at Comcast.
So the key lesson here is that if you are a brand manager and sprinkle a little $$$ behind engaging in social media, you need to be prepared to play a new kind of corporate quarterback. You are going to get feedback that is relevant for your brand far beyond the walls of marketing and PR. Your VP of Customer Service, your VP of Product Development, your VP of R&D, your SVP of Investor Relations and your head of Operations are all going to be interested in the nuggets you uncover as you start to talk with and get to know your social media influencers.
A lot of marketeers are at least somewhat familiar with this from their market research work, but the feedback from social media is a bit less scientific, so when you go to your CEO and say "the sentiment on our brand shifted negative yesterday and the main theme appears to be Britney Spears" be ready for some raised eyebrows. Most organizations are not yet equipped to handle the kind of rapid and detailed feedback that social media relationships offer - but this is the opportunity. The social media world can be a great hub of information for myriad departments - and as the purveyor's of great, relevant and timely information, they can become a powerful group.
So embrace the feedback, share it and manage it. Helping your organization get close to your customers is a really, really good thing.
Friday, December 19, 2008
Social Media This Week: December 19, 2008
You Got Served – Over Facebook?
The news: The Capital Territory Supreme Court in
Key question: What’s next? Marriages in Second Life? Oh wait. That’s been done.
The news: For years, physical holiday cards were considered a standard gesture between companies during the month of December. For the past couple years, e-cards have been the trend. In a somewhat cluttered holiday card giving season, organizations may find it difficult to have their greetings stand out to their clients and potential clients. Two years ago, Enlighten created a viral marketing hit called the Holiday Party Excuse Generator to send to their network rather than the traditional holiday greeting. On the site, consumers can create tongue-and-cheek excuses about why they are unable to attend one of the holiday parties they’ve been invited to. Enlighten didn’t promote the site this year, but the excuse generator gets a spike every year.
Key learning: The best viral campaigns get timing right. They involve a sense of urgency, but many are also timeless.
JC Penny Puts Men in the Doghouse
The news: Late in November, JC Penny launched a five-minute online video where a woman takes her husband and puts him in the doghouse in the backyard after he buys her a vacuum. When the character falls into the basement of the doghouse, he is greeted by men folding laundry and drinking chai lattes while a stern woman over a loud speaker is saying things such as “express your feelings” and “help with the cooking.” The video has been viewed more than 1.7 million times and has driven a ton of conversation (positive and negative) in social media as well as traditional media. On the “Beware of the Doghouse” website, women can send their significant others gift “warnings” over e-mail or Facebook.
Key learning: The best viral campaigns involve really good creative. And that may cost a whole lot more than a TV ad supported by paid media. After all, consumers are choosing to watch this.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Are embargoes going dodo?
Twitter has replaced Techmeme as my favourite source for knowing what's hot at this very moment. That's because people tend to talk on the microblogging tool before they take actions that require more time or commitment such as blogging or starting a Facebook group.
When I checked Twitscoop this afternoon to see what was hot on Twitter today, I noticed that the most discussed term was "embargo" - something that caught my eye as an erstwhile journalist and current PR guy. The news that everyone was buzzing about is that TechCrunch, arguably the most influencial online publication has announced that it will no longer honour embargoes. In a post titled "Death to the Embargo" TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington writes:
Arrington says TechCrunch will continue to agree to embargoes, but will then break them. The problem, he writes, is that there are no real consequences for publications that break embargoes.One annoying thing for us is when an embargo is broken. That means that a news site goes early with the news despite the fact that they’ve promised not to. The benefits are clear - sites like Google News and TechMeme prioritize them first as having broken the story. Traffic and links flow in to whoever breaks an embargo first.
That means it’s a race to the bottom by new sites, who are increasingly stressed themselves with a competitive marketplace and decreasing advertising sales.
A year ago embargo breaks were rare, once-a-month things. Today, nearly every embargo is broken, sometimes by a few minutes, sometimes by half a day or more.
We can’t continue to operate under these rules.
A year ago, when com.motion released our First Annual com.motion-Pollara Social Media Barometer, I decided to experiment with embargoes. I offered the Globe and Mail an exclusive embargo on a few questions and offered a dozen bloggers one exclusive question each. Several agreed to play, but some said embargoes and exclusives don't make sense in a blogging world.
This year, I tried a different experiment, sending out a message on Twitter that I would offer the full embargoed results to anyone who tweeted me back. Only a couple bloggers were interested. (Many more posted about our results after we formally released them).
Offering embargoes - especially on an exclusive basis - increases the chance of coverage. There are stories I wrote at the Globe because they were exclusive embargoes that I wouldn't have written if everyone had them at the same time.
But embargoes have no value when the news is sent to everybody if even one reporter breaks the embargo. Embargoes have become more common and mean far less. We need to get back to a place where they're less frequent, more exclusive and respected by both sides. And publications that break 'em need to be punished for the good of those that don't.
Friday, December 12, 2008
Social Media This Week: December 12, 2008
Ford uses Social Media to Clear the Air
The news: On Wednesday, Ford sent a fan site called The Ranger Station a letter from a lawyer about copyright violations. News spread quickly that Ford objected to the site using the name of its Ranger pickup truck line. Other Ford fan sites (which have Ford in their domain name) feared that they would be asked by the organization to change their material and domains. By the time this news hit the larger auto sites, stories were being published that Ford’s legal department was asking for thousands of dollars in compensation or the site gets automatically shut down. The head of Ford’s social media department, Scott Monty, stayed on top of the online conversation developing around the topic using sites such as Twitter. He quickly began chiming into the conversation and keeping online customers and fans aware of the situation. As it ended up, the situation needed to be clarified. The Ranger Station site was actually selling counterfeit Ford parts. Monty used different online avenues to get the word out, including The Ranger Station’s forum. The entire lifespan of this situation (that could of spiraled out of control online) lasted less than 24 hours.
Key question: News spreads more quickly than ever online. How quickly will this rapid response method spread?
Begging for a BlackBerry this Holiday Season
The news:
Key question: Facebook is by far the dominant social network in
Social Media and the Economy
The news: This week, in partnership with Pollara, com.motion released our second annual Trust Barometer. The results were telling in terms of how marketers will approach social media in the face of an economic slowdown. We found that Canadian business leaders say it would be a mistake to cut back on social and digital spending in tough economic times, with 7 in 10 recommending increased investment.
Key question: Just how much will social media grow in 2009, and how much will traditional marketing communications disciplines suffer?
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Social Media and the Economy
The 2nd Annual com.motion-Pollara Social Media Barometer is now live.
Detail and analysis coming soon, but here are the topline results:
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Despite the economic slowdown forcing marketers to modify their spending, 82 per cent of Canadian business leaders and senior marketers say they will spend as much or more on social media in 2009 than they did this year. That’s more than for any other marketing communications discipline, as seen in the table below.
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Canadian business leaders say it would be a mistake to cut back on social and digital spending in tough economic times, with 7 in 10 recommending increased investment.
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Facebook has established itself as Canada’s dominant social network. Among Canadians who use social media, 87 per cent say they have tried Facebook, compared with 33 per cent for MySpace and 13 per cent for Twitter.
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Two-thirds of Canadians (65 per cent) say social media is an important tool for developing, maintaining and nurturing friendships, up from 52 per cent a year ago.
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Two-thirds of Canadians (65 per cent) say social media tools are important for learning about products, services, organizations and brands, up from 59 per cent a year ago.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Tribune down: Will social media win or lose from economic slowdown?
Today's bankruptcy filing by Tribune Corp., which owns the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune underscores that times are tough for businesses that depend on advertising - and by extension - most businesses in the marketing communications space.
But what will the slowdown mean for social media in 2009?
There are lots of opinions. And later this week there will be some hard data to add to the debate.
In our second annual social media poll, in partnership with Pollara, com.motion asked hundreds of Canadian business leaders where they expect to cut marketing spending in 2009. One of the key questions: Is an economic slowdown the right time to cut or boost social media spending.
Click here for the results of last year's survey.
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