Old Spice Man is a Viral Marketing Genius

posted by Anna Fleet on July 14th, 2010

As if he wasn’t already good looking enough, skilled enough, or romantic enough…now he’s a genius at viral marketing too!

It’s official, the Old Spice Man is sending out personalized messages to Tweeters with a lot of followers—and I’m not talking a short retweet; I’m talking a full-length, personalized video that talks directly to them!

Well not exactly to you, but to well-known folks with a lot of followers—like Digg founder Kevin Rose, Olympic skater Apolo Ohno, actresses Alyssa Milano and Justine Bateman, and super-techy site Gizmodo. The familiar, well muscled spokesperson is addressing even less famous folks on Twitter by name (i.e., the personalize message to Gabe) via more than 100 personalized YouTube videos.

Check out Old Spice Man’s YouTube message to Kevin Rose, after Rose posted a Tweet that he was sick. Its hilarious and social media doesn’t get more personalized than this.

Do you know why he’s doing this? Because these folks have a ton of followers, which equates to tons of social networking power. They will retweet the videos and spread them virally amongst their huge social media networks.

It’s viral marketing at its best—strong, sexy, smart, and maybe even on a horse!

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The Top 10 Social Networking No-Nos?

posted by Anna Fleet on July 6th, 2010

Are you a large organization that created a company Facebook page because you wanted to be plugged in?

Well the Washington Post has revealed the 10 biggest social networking mistakes that businesses make—one of them being signing up and then tossing the task of social media to the lowest or most inexperienced staff, like an intern.

This is a very familiar social media mistake and I have seen it happen over and over again. In fact, I’ve worked for more than one large high-tech corporation in the past who left their social media success in the hands of paid summer interns or net unsavvy junior staffers.

Why is this a BIG mistake?

Take it from Debbie Weil, a local corporate social media consultant, who says that a proper social media strategy “requires someone who is not only communication savvy, but comfortable with exposure to the public”.  So an entry level employee with no blogging or search engine optimization exposure just don’t cut it. Social media needs a personal touch that someone with a blogging background needs to take the reigns on or at least research before diving in.

Are you guilty of leaving your social media to an intern? Well you’d better read the article.

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The Power of Digital Word-of-Mouth Marketing

posted by Anna Fleet on June 30th, 2010

If you asked crème brulèe cart owner, Curtis Kimball, why his mobile business is so successful, he’d tell you straight up, “Twitter”!

Just three short weeks after starting his part-time business, Kimball asked a new customer in his line up how he found out about his cart. The stranger told him he’d read about it on Twitter. The power of Twitter’s digital word of mouth marketing was immediately apparent.

Today, Kimball works his cart full time (the success of his business meant he could quit his day job as a carpenter) and he uses Twitter to post his current location and flavors of the day to his over 5,400 Twitter followers.

Kimball’s is a good lesson for any small business with no marketing budget or a large business with a website in development.

Twitter offers the following benefits to businesses:

1.  It’s free

2. The service provides a sole means for marketing a mom and pop type shop

3. Twitter status is easier and faster to update than a webpage or even a blog

4. It’s ideal for a business on the go

5. It takes advantage of word of mouth marketing—Twitter culture urges people to spread news to others in their own social networks

6. It can spread word locally or nationally—depending on your business focus

7. It offers the ability to ask questions and share knowledge with other business owners

8. It allows businesses to talk directly to customers

Read more about how Curtis Kimball’s crème brulèe cart, a sushi restaurant, an antiques merchandiser, a bed and breakfast, a day spa and more businesses are using the power of Twitter’s digital word of mouth marketing from the New York Post.

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Another Look at the Value of Blogging Frequency

posted by Anna Fleet on June 24th, 2010

Yesterday we examined at the age-old blog dilemma: does blogging frequency or the quality of posts matter more? And while I let the Google experts weight in with their informative tips from Google Webmaster Central, this morning I came across A Simple Blogging Formula from Chris Brogan, owner of New Marketing Labs and chrisbrogan.com.

It seems that Chris, someone who blogs daily and is pretty darn successful at it (he has 50K daily readers subscribe to his RSS blog feed), favors the side of blog post frequency. However, he also claims that he thinks of way more valuable and relevant ideas to write about than he has time for…kudos Chris!

So check out Chris Brogan’s formula for blogging…it’s definitely worth reading if you’re considering starting a blog.

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11 Companies You Should Follow on Twitter

posted by Anna Fleet on June 22nd, 2010

Are you new to the challenge of engaging your customer base in 140 characters or less? Or does Twitter leave you as confounded as my first sentence? Sorry bout that by the way…

Twitter is a free online forum that has almost 100 million users—which means you should be taking advantage of it if you’re not tweeting already. Even better, Kermit Pattison from The New York Times recently introduced his small business tips for using Twitter—including 11 prime examples of large-middle-and small businesses that are commendably taking advantage of Twitter and all it has to offer.

My advice, check out Pattison’s list—it includes the likes of large corporations like Rubbermaid, UPS and my favorite shoe king Zappos, as well as mid to smaller companies like Naked Pizza and Kiss My Bundt what the heck wouldn’t you?—for some 140-character examples of engaging tweeting.

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Social Network Tips for Growing your Business

posted by Anna Fleet on May 21st, 2010

We’ll be enjoying a statutory holiday here in Canada this weekend, so as things get social at the cottage, around the campfire or on your back deck on our Monday holiday, I thought I’d whet your appetites with some social networking tips for businesses from Bloomberg Businessweek…to get you all caught up on Tuesday morning  :)

The article, ‘Get “Social” to Grow Your Business’, discusses how 70 percent of online customers are looking to the web—and specifically to social networks (Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, etc.)—for information and entertainment. The opportunities for businesses are obvious—start using social networking to:

  • Spread your brand identity
  • Expose your products and services, and
  • Build solid, personalized relationships with customers

How are you taking advantage of social networking to promote your brand and business?

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