Hasta La Creative!

Whether a casual user, raving addict, or total agnostic, you’ve come into contact with Social Media (SM) sites and are aware of their influence on our daily lives: We can be hired, fired, or even jailed as a result of Social Media use. We can find lost loves, ruin current relationships, and even fix relationships…all in the social media space. There are SM experts, gurus, and enthusiasts. And of course, there are even SM celebritites. Not to mention those few of us that use Social Media for business (imagine that!).

But, please realize this, oh SM narcissists: Even though you have 1500 Facebook “friends” and 40,000 followers on Twitter “being social ? having personality.” Luckily, for all of us, we can now rate your personality via HubSpot’s free Personality Grader, saving us the time of following you.

“People often forget that your personality itself is a powerful marketing tool. With our new free application, marketers can ask their personality, ‘How we doin’?’ and avoid devastating social interactions. A fully optimized personality is a key piece of any successful inbound marketing strategy.” -HubSpot

Want to see how you rate? Go to the Grader and enter your name or the name that you use as your alias…depending on which you use more, results may differ.

When you find your score, let me know if you exhibit personality or find yourself “…sorta social, demented and sad, but social.” (from the The Breakfast Club)

Jeff Louis is a Strategic Media Planner, Project Manager, and New Business Coordinator. His passion is writing, contributing to BMA as well as freelancing. He’d love to hear from you: www.linkedin.com/in/jefflouis or on twitter @jlo0312.

Not only known for making disturbingly bad movies and playing in, “That 70s Show,” Ashton Kutcher’s current goal in life is to gain one million followers on Twitter. Apparently, Ashton does not realize that social media is not something that we need ‘to achieve,’ but actually serves a purpose to us “littler folk.”

CNN has the highest number of followers as of 9am CST, at just over 900,000. Ashton has about 850,000 followers. It’s funny, but I thought that social media’s purpose was for people to ENGAGE with one another based on common interests, professions, passions, or just plain ol’ curiosity…not to COLLECT followers as if they were chattel. Mr. Kutcher seems to think that followers=(insert needed quality here) and will somehow get him somewhere. I personally have nothing against the man, and have even found humor is some of his Punks. BUT, this is merely a publicity stunt that simply mocks social media. Nothing more.

There among us that have something to offer. Then, there are those who just beg to be in the spotlight, limelight, and under the bright lights . Which type would you rather hang out with?

Jeff Louis is an experienced Senior Media Planner, Project Manager, and New Business Coordinator. His passion is writing, contributing to BMA as well as freelancing. He’d love to hear from you: www.linkedin/in/jefflouis or www.twitter.com@jlo0312.

Have you ever had one of those days where everything seemed out of control, and you weren’t getting anything completed? Then, when you finally realized that you made some progress, an itch in your brain was nagging you, saying that you missed something important. You think, “If I could only remember…I just wish I knew wha…It hits you. 
Mine was that I had forgotten my “blogging time.” Maybe that’s why I’m in such a crappy mood. I dig writing…it’s my down time. However, just like of you, ideas are constantly spinning in my head, and when I see something that grabs me, I write it down, email it to myself, put it in my Blackberry, or write a note on my hand. It’s quite a remarkable system. (I wonder if I can direct-tweet myself?)

Twitter was everywhere today! Releasing new apps, getting press, products launches were being announced on Twitter…there were so many things happening, it was hard to keep up.

Is your company embracing Social Media? Are you an early-adopter? You had better be. Where do you stand?:

We  have it and use it daily

We  have an account set up, but no idea what to do with it

We  just don’t get it (it’s all these damn kids today)

To determine the who’s who, I follow businesses on Twitter to see how they engage consumers. And, if you’ve read anything regarding Social Media,this is considered a “good idea”…some do a fantastic job and have real conversations. Engagement.Shhh! Dunkin’ Donuts would be one, with “Dunkin’ Dave Tweetin for the mother ship.” DraftFcb is another, offering insights on their blog, the latest podcast, newest campaign, and HR news. Although not implemented yet, DiGiorno Pizza is planning to use influential tweeters to host tweetups (gatherings) and Kraft will deliver DiGiorno Pizza…but wait, it’s NOT delivery, it’s DiGiorno delivered? Either way, good idea. Unfortunately, Kraft is nowhere to be found. Allstate has a fantastic page and great rapport. Companies that have accounts with nothing going on?  Sear has two accounts, no followers. Krogers, Dominicks, Safeway, Publix–all grocery stores, not a single one on Twitter. Whole Foods? You betcha, with over 400,000 followers. Cleverly, I decided to check ad agencys, but received a measely 155 members using “advertising” as my search term. Then, I decided to enter agency names to see if they had accounts, and for the sake of future employment, I am not going to list them. However, names that I thought would be there, weren’t.

Some Twitter Nuggets
Over the last two months, according to Socialmediaatwork.com, Twitter has exploded. Twitter’s demographic skews  female (53%) and is mainly made up of 18-34 year olds. However, Worldwide, the highest indexing group for users is A45-54. Twitter surpassed the NY Times in unique visitors in April, became the top social network used by hospitals in March, and also recorded that 17% of UK businesses are on Twitter. It seems that Twitter is not only growing up, but expanding it’s reach into business.
Don’t Use Twitter if
As a business, there are certain things that will keep you from using Twitter effectively. The entire list is is on AdAge, but a couple of the funnier entries were, “You have to run your tweets by legal” and, “You think a ghost-tweeter for the president of your company is OK.” For more reasons your company should not use Twitter, check out AdAge.

Jeff Louis is a Strategic Media Planner & Buyer with over seven years of B2B & B2C experience. His interests are emerging media, schweet  ideas, and redefining the status quo (not necessarily in that order.)  He’s passionate about writing and digs great creative that is on-strategy. Follow him on twitter @jlo0312, or LinkedIn, www.LinkedIn.com/in/jefflouis

Google and Twitter, rumored to be meeting late last week, were huddling to discuss: a) new applications, b) mergers, c) acquisition, d) monetizing strategies, or, e) “We didn’t huddle, we didn’t even talk!”
The answer, much to our curiosity’s disappointment, was “none of the above,” and we were left, yearning, with no juicy story. Until that is, we looked a little deeper: There it was, a story, neatly nestled inside the rumor…our dusky jewel, ripe for choosing.

Whether Google buys Twitter, doesn’t buy Twitter, or marries them is not news…it’s a forgone conclusion. Some company, (probably Google), is going to purchase Twitter. But, it could also turn out to be MSN, Yahoo!, AOL, NewsCorp, or even Verizon.  The real content, the actual tale to be told is this: Whenever Google acts, we, the denizens of the Internet, pay attention. We sit up, sign in, and search for news. Once found, like kids with secrets, we repeat it. Discuss it. Argue about it.  Text it. Blog it. E-mail it. Tweet it. Opine it. Feed it. Post it. Which leads us to face it: Google is more respected than Bill Gates, Jack Welch, Bono, and Perez Hilton, combined. Google is the Internet’s darling, the sweet Lindsay Lohan before she was arrested. Twice. Google is young and beautiful, the little girl from Disney that won our hearts. Google is the online business’ shining star. In December 2007, FastCompany had this to say about Google:  

“… Its performance is the envy of executives and engineers around the world … For techno-evangelists, Google is a marvel of Web brilliance … For Wall Street, it may be the IPO that changes everything (again) … But Google is also a case study in savvy management — a company filled with cutting-edge ideas, rigorous accountability, and relentless attention to detail … Here’s a search for the growth secrets of one of the world’s most exciting young companies — a company from which every company can learn.”

Which is not to say that Google is perfect, or has not made mistakes; they just don’t make many. As a highly respected company, with the starlet flair, Google is in the spotlight, the subject of speculation, rumor, innuendo, and gossip. So, as in the case  of the Twitter reporting last week, online and traditional media sources, thirsty for being credited with announcing Google’s next venture, often print rumors before the facts are known. Although it’s shoddy journalism, many of the online sources probably don’t care about being wrong, as long as they’re first. Headlines and copy can be changed in seconds. The take-away is simple: Not only does Google play an important part in our lives, but we spend a lot of time and energy making Google important to society.

Google’s other major foray into Social Media, YouTube, is expected to lose $470 million dollars in 2009. But, it’s not all bad news: Revenues are expected to increase by 20% YOY (Google will only lose 80% of what they could have). Not asking for government handouts as of yet, YouTube’s major challenge is no different from that of  Twitter and other Social Media sites: Monetization. In the short-term, Google has signed a deal with Disney-ABC Television Group and ESPN to provide “professional” content, driving advertiser demand “through standardization of ad formats and improved ad effectiveness.”  Or, to restate it clearly, YouTube will provide better videos to reel in bigger advertisers. It remains to be seen if having Disney on YouTube will provide the revenue needed for YouTube, but the main question is how the users will react to the site “incorporation.”

A unique chart presentation to sum up everything about social media planning!

Social media is like teen sex.
Everyone wants to do it.
Nobody knows how.
When it’s finally done therie is surprise it’s not better.

David Armano, a prominent blogger and twitterer in advertising, has used Twitter to raise money. That’s right. It’s happened. Twitter and it’s attached 140 clipped, social network has generated actual dollars. Not for a brand, but for a good cause. Armano’s friend, Daniela, left her husband after she was being abused. Armano took in the woman and her three children. Then, he reached out to his 8,000 Twitters followers, asked for donations and ended up raising over $12,000.

David just wrote an editorial in Businessweek all about the problem of ROI and rebranding that term, “Return on Insight” rather an investment. Oddly enough, he has actually ended up proving that Twitter can be monetized; that there is more than insight available through social media networks. This is a case study for the century.

Now, what is the larger lesson for brands? Armano has proved a few things:
1) the power of authenticity
2) the power of a community
3) the power of authority and the devotion that is engineered through online connections
4) that even in a tough climate, people are willing to give away their hard earned dollars for the right cause

Traditionally, brands have trouble with number 1. Many have also had trouble creating an active and devoted community, which is 2 and 3, which almost always comes back to problems tackling number 1.
And getting consumers to spend money? Again, lets go back to their issues with number 1.

If brands could actually get their head around the idea that they need to be more than shallow corporate logos, to have a mission beyond their articles of incorporation, perhaps their work in social media might actually pay off in real dollars. Social media experts from Alan Wolk to PSFK will tell you all these things. This blog, Adrants, Adfreak and you guys, too have been screaming the same thing. So now what? Will Armano’s amazingly wonderful Twitter effort be enough to prove to brands that there is value in this whole social media thing? The truth is – only if agencies can coax brands into being authentic, to being open to a community that acts without borders and can create a campaign that actually makes sense to consumer concerns. That’s a big task. We can’t wait to see what agency can take this case study and turn it into an actionable, ROI generating campaign for a brand.

More: Introducing The Social Media Advertising Council!!!

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