LOST IN MASTICATION

THEN

Marketing and branding were about pushing your message to consumers. You sold them what they never knew they wanted.

Marketing used to be all about the product or service. What made your product unique from anything else on the market? What was the value-add in your version versus a competitor? Did you have the best price or experience for the money?

Branding was all about the image of that product or service. What perception did you want your customers to have about your company? What did customers feel about consuming what you had to offer?

NOW

Marketing and branding are responses to real-time customer demands and needs. Customers are telling you what they want. You are listening – more than ever – to the consumer, instead of dictating to them what they can or cannot live without.

Marketing is now much more than the product or service.  While people still connect with an object such as a particular coffee brand or airline, it’s not enough to sell how tasteful your peppermint latte is or the extra 6-inches of legroom compared to a competitor.

Likewise, branding is now about customer interaction (not to be confused with customer service), corporate social responsibility, online culture and community, and much more.

Making this shift to social media isn’t an easy move. Wait too long to get on the bandwagon, and you’ve lost your first-mover advantage. Act too fast, and you may not have a well thought-out strategy.

So how do you know whether to jump into the next new web trend? How do you evaluate your presence in that landscape? How do you use the new media tool in such a way that no one else is using it? Thinking outside the box and being innovative with the new media tools will help in setting your company, brand and product apart.

Whether it’s a mobile app, interactive website that has nothing to do with your product and everything about your consumers, there’s definitely a niche that you can create for yourself within your industry that will accomplish the original goals of branding and marketing.

Here are a few new media integration examples that are successful at tying together “new marketing” and “new branding” into the digital customer experience:

Sonicare: Adopt-a-Tooth

The Sonicare Facebook application keeps the user engaged over and over again by encouraging good dental hygiene through a “pet” tooth.  Take better care of our “canine” and be privy to special gifts and promotions.

When someone takes action with their pet tooth, it can appear on their friends news feeds, and is always visible on the owner’s profile.

In today’s social network landscape where the popularity of social gaming such as Mafia Wars and Farmville are growing exponentially, it’s smart for a brand to jump into the arena with the right interactive app.

Coke Zero Facial Profiler

Coca-cola claims that Coke Zero has been one of the most successful product launches in its history. In the two years since its release, Coke Zero has sold nearly 450 million cases and is available in more than 100 countries. So why not take this success and broad reach to connect your fans online?

That’s exactly what cokezero.com does. The site says nothing about the product except for a wordmark that includes the tagline “Real Coke Taste. Zero Calories.”  Instead, their site is home to the Facial Profiler application, which uses Facebook Connect to troll tagged images of you to help find your look-alike.

The premise? A social experiment: If millions of people like you enjoy Coke Zero, then there surely is another person that looks like you that enjoys Coke Zero.

USAA Mobile App

Your new media presence doesn’t always have to be through a web browser. USAA takes personal finance management to a whole new level with their iPhone app. Unique features include:

• Deposit@Mobile — Depositing a check is as simple as snapping a photo.
• ATM Locator — Find the closest ATMs.
• Loan Calculator — Estimate monthly payments on a loan.
• Rental Car Locator — Find the nearest Avis, Budget or Hertz location.
• Accident Checklist — Record accident details to help you file a claim.

If you can sketch an idea on a napkin, then Prezi is the presentation tool for you.  Adam and I just gave our first Prezi-ntation using this “zooming presentation editor”, and it went off really well.

Prezi is a different way of thinking about presentations – not at all like traditional slideshows made in Powerpoint or Keynote.  In fact, Prezi is more like an interactive Flash video, but without having to use the Adobe Flash or know about timelines, paths or layers.

Prezi starts with a blank slate and you map out a presentation as orderly or disorderly as you want.  You can use frames to anchor areas to include photos and text into, similar to a single slide in a traditional slideshow.  Create the path which you want the presentation to travel in, by hooking assets (frames, images, video, PDF files, text) with anchors.

Click on the screenshot to view the Internet marketing class project for our client Surf City MX (@surfcitymx):

The toolbar/menu is also unlike a traditional desktop software.  And the “transformation zebra” – the blue striped concentric circles of the logo – isn’t immediately intuitive.  But if you take the short tutorials (complete with Hungarian accent), it’s pretty easy to pick up.  Here’s a look at the tool-cluster:

I like Prezi because it’s a different way to engage your audience with presentations.  Powerpoint and Keynote come out with new animations and other visual candy with each release, but you can’t get away from the old transperancy on an overhead projector frame.  Prezi is all online – no installation of software, upgrading or toting files on a thumb drive.

There are still things lacking in Prezi such as the selection of themes, the ability to customize your own theme.  I’d like to see Prezi allow embedding of video, images or text from the Web, much like Tumblr.  What if it could take a URL and have the screen shot appear on the Prezi with full navigability?  And hopefully a link to embed Prezis elsewhere on the Web (think YouTube videos).  All in due time, I hope.

Prezi is still in private beta, but you can apply on their homepage to be a tester.  Try it out if you can!

Exciting news! From the folks at Creative Commons comes an announcement that you can now CC-license your tweets via TweetCC!

It’s simple, just send one of the following tweets to @tweetcc, depending on which CC license you’d like to use (click on the link for an instant tweet):

CC Zero Waiver: @tweetcc: I dedicate my tweets to The Commons by waiving all copyrights under CC Zero Waiver http://icnhz.com/cc-0

Attribution: @tweetcc: I license tweets under CC Attribution http://icnhz.com/cc-by

Attribution Share Alike: @tweetcc: I license tweets under CC Attribution Share Alike http://icnhz.com/cc-by-sa

Attribution, No Derivatives: @tweetcc: I license tweets under CC Attribution No Derivatives http://icnhz.com/cc-by-nd

Attribution Non-Commercial: @tweetcc: I license tweets under CC Attribution Non-Commercial http://icnhz.com/cc-by-nc

Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike: @tweetcc: I license tweets under CC Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike http://icnhz.com/cc-by-nc-sa

Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives: @tweetcc: I license tweets under CC Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives http://icnhz.com/cc-by-nc-nd

Even cooler is they don’t ask for your password:

We don’t ask for your Twitter login or password as this password anti-pattern practice teaches people how to be phished. Don’t scatter your passwords around like chicken feed.

Join the founders of TweetCC – @malarkey and @briansuda – and some 1,300 other tweeters who have already licensed their tweets!

YouTube is bringing together the world’s first collaborative orchestra.  And though it’s too late to enter to be considered for the project, it’s not too late to participate by voting on 3,000 audition videos from more than 70 countries and territories spanning six continents. Submissions came from Kazakhstan, Mauritania, Eritrea, Venezuela, Vietnam, Russia and the U.S., and included everything from the violin to the toy piano and even an audition on the musical saw.

The selected few will perform this spring at Carnegie Hall. You can now vote from the selected finalists who have been narrowed down by a panel of musical experts from the London Symphony Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra and other leading orchestras around the world.  The final selections are based on such criteria as musicianship, vitality of performance and originality.

What a great idea to bring together musicians from around the world that otherwise would never have come together.  It’s all a twist of fate and a whole bit of luck bringing together these amateurs and professionals alike to perform on one of the most coveted stages in the world.

This is a great example of social media bringing together a community of musicians from around the world to accomplish a task that couldn’t happen in a 1.0 world.  Imagine the camaraderie that these musicians will enjoy… just because of simple videos and votes from strangers like myself that will bring them together for one night at Carnegie Hall.  And social networks – whether it’s YouTube, Facebook or another crowd-gathering site – will keep them connected for years to come.

Had I known about this earlier, I may have tried to get a hold of a contra-bass clarinet and entered myself. There’s something about being a part of a group of people symphonizing to make music.  It’s a beautiful thing, and I miss it a lot.

Rule #1: Give credit via Twitter name.  Examples: @SherryMain or @inculink.

Rule #2: Give credit via Twitter name.  Examples: @rww or @AdamAinbinder.

When I read an article or blog post online, I like to see Twitter links to the people who are being mentioned.  Why?  Because if I’m interested in something they’ve said once, I want to know quickly if there’s more to them.

A Twitter profile is a great way of getting a quick snapshot of someone.  In this day-in-age of information overflow, I can’t help judge a book by it’s cover.  I have 10-seconds to find out whether someone is interesting or not.  I can decide later if in fact that judgment was correct, as I get to know them via tweets.  But if you lost me in those first 10 seconds, then you’ve lost me forever.

On the other hand, if you hook me with your Twitter profile, well then you’ve probably got my attention on your blog or website… and probably even Facebook, LinkedIn, or Tumblr.

I find that I learn a lot more by reading the first two pages of a Twitter profile, than I can get out of a personal blog or website. Just yesterday, I connected with @swannny because she is a “tech-crazy, opera-loving geek girl”!

Here’s what I find helps when it comes to general Tweeting habits:

Take advantage of the 160 character profile. Be selective in your words used to describe yourself – and take advantage of the 20 extra characters!  What I’ve tried to do in my profile is to connect with others in higher education communications, entice conversations with people who share similar hobbies, and market a personal venture:

Comms Director @ UCIrvine. Business, political, technology and culinary junkie. Enjoy travel, outdoor adventures and photography. Also, co-founder of @inculink.

Diversify your tweets, often. If the entire first page of your Twitter profile are @ replies or purely about your state of mind, I can’t be convinced that I have a connection with you. But a useful business tip coupled with a personal misadventure, plus an intriguing conversation with another Twit will intrigue me enough to follow someone.

Twitter is still a very nascent tool, but its community and its power are growing exponentially.  The ways and means in which Twitter can be used could never have been predicted by it’s founders (@ev, @biz and @jack).  But online habits have changed the culture of information flow, and I think as content creators on the web, we need to be sure to provide quick links to readers and other creators alike!

I just read this fun op-ed from the Washington Post by Jeanne McManus.

It comedically devalues life in a Twitter world:

Which comes first? The Twitter or life itself? Are we writing about what we’re doing or are we writing about what we’re going to do or are we doing it because we need something to write about?

I enjoyed her short musing.  But now, I can’t find a link to follow her tweets anywhere on the entire op-ed page!  Nor have i been able to locate her through Twitter’s “Find People” tool. I’m bummed, as she sounds really interesting, whether these are her real tweets or not:

Jeanne has measured out her life with coffee spoons. Huh?

So I write my own public request to Ms. McManus… and to any other editor, writer, reporter who covers new and social media seriously or comically – on TV, in print or online: please share how we can follow you or become a fan on these new tools which you write about.

NPR’s Science Friday does a great job of this.  While driving from Annapolis to D.C. several weeks ago, @Padrepablo and I listened to Ira Flatow (@scifri) interviewing Tim O’Reilly (@timoreilly).  Ira repeatedly mentioned how we could follow them.  And caller Jeff Levy (@levyj413) – the EPA’s web manager – who talked about government and social media also shared how listeners could follow him. I’ve since learned a lot from following Mr. Levy.  I’d like to easily do the same from others.

Of course, privacy is a concern, so I understand if you don’t easily share your Twitter name with your article… but then could you consider separate public and private personas? When used correctly, I can only see sharing Twitter accounts as a great learning and conversation tool.

Taking my own advice, you can follow me @sherrymain.

The New York Times and Washington Post probably do the best interactive graphics and stories. If more newspapers did original “interactivities,” I think their online readership could be sustained, or even grow.

Here’s a snapshot of Twitter Chat During the Super Bowl from the New York Times today. Click on the image to see the interactive map, and navigate the different categories in the left menu as you play the Game Timeline up top:

The Washington Post has done mash-ups of tweets, videos and photos on Google Maps, which is really, really easy to do. Here is the official Washington Post announcement that describes what they did for the 2008 Presidential Elections.

Perhaps there’s an advertisement opportunity here for papers to highlight particular buzz in unique colors for products (or brands) that are willing to pay the papers. (Of course, the anti-conglomerate, free-press side of me hopes this won’t ever happen. But the business degree side of me tells me it’s probably already in the works.)

On the flip side, another opportunity here is for market researchers to take a tweet-grid such as these and geo-locate where their products/brands are most or least popular. We’re definitely at the dawn of a new era of reporting and micro-marketing…

(Although I write this post with specific focus on higher education and non-profits, I think it’s a useful guide for start-ups looking to establish themselves on the Web as well.)

New and social media have been around for the last 15 years.  But not until recently have they truly become interactive and conversational.  The tools and communities that make up this medium continue to change the way we see, hear and touch the communities around us.

When I was hired as a communications director a few years ago, my job description in short was to educate the public about research, maintain a static website, and design print publications.  It quickly became apparent that the old ways weren’t working:

1. Information changes too fast. News gets old quick, and to print/re-print to keep up with changes became expensive, and environmentally unfriendly.
2. Were we telling the right stories? We were feeding what we thought our audience wanted to hear.  There had to be a way to “listen” so we could better apply our efforts.
3. Money and the Environment. The cost to print and mail materials – in dollars, trees and carbon footprint – are constant concerns in our world today.  In other words, corporate social responsibility.
4. Walking the talk. This is unique to us, but as a leading computing- and technology-focused institution, if we cannot connect in a way that demonstrates the power of computing and technology, then we have failed to communicate.

Thus, we slowly began to transform our communications strategy and have arrived at the tools that make up new media and social communications today. (All this, in addition to many traditional media efforts that we still practice.)  Here’s what we’re doing in higher education at UC Irvine’s Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences:

• RSS. If you do nothing else, offer an RSS feed to your news, blogs, event calendars, videos, etc.  You can probably gain 50% of your value simply by allowing your community to stay in touch with you, without having to actually check-in.
• Blogs. Both students and alumni blog about what’s on their mind.  Students most often talk about classes and social activities which paint a true picture of college life.  Alums keep in touch and share their experiences about ICS and being in the real world.  Both serve as great recruiting tools for students, parents and faculty.
• Multimedia. Video profiles, audio snippets and podcasts engage the audience in unique ways. Digital media is portable, and when done correctly, engaging.  We create videos profiling students, special lectures and events, etc. We maintain a presence on YouTube and Flickr.  Here’s an example of a marketing video:

• Social Networks. Today, we exist on LinkedIn and Facebook.  But only on these two networks, for the reasons that they are the most reputable, and our particular community are most active on these two social networks.  The beauty of participating in a social network it that its content is crowd-sourced – your community helps contribute to the cause.
• Twitter. This is an experiment, but an inexpensive one.  In fact, we automatically feed news through Twitter so that prospective students (@BrenAdmissions) and interested community members (@UCIbrenICS) can quickly follow us.  We also “listen” to buzz in our community through Twitter and make efforts to engage with the “twitterverse”.
• Second Life. TechCoast Island, our presence in Second Life houses a virtual Bren Hall.  For our ribbon-cutting ceremony, we invited guests from afar to join in the virtual celebration concurrent to the live events. Today, it is used to model real-world research in a virtual setting… an innovative solution to conserving resources and money. We’ve even held lectures and meetings at TechCoast.

• Share Functions. If someone wants to share and offer feedback on anything that is a part of your Web presence, let them.  It’s the best way to create buzz and spread news organically.  These functions can range from digg to del.icio.us to StumbleUpon and more.

These new and social media applications may not work for all ventures.  In fact, I urge that each organization explore and understand their community and resources before investing too much time into these mediums.  But given that you have an active online community that is willing to participate, and that you can produce enough content to keep your online presence from becoming stale, it’s worth at least giving the free resources a try.

Our strategy continues to change as quickly and often as technology and social media do.  I’m curious to hear what other non-profit and educational institutions are doing in this arena.  Do share!

I’m really fascinated by tag clouds.  I’m always on the look out for them, and I’m glad they are being used by the media more.  According to Wikipedia, tag clouds were spun originally from Flickr.

Tag clouds are the best way to find out in real-time what’s being talked about most, and how frequently.  Popular terms appear in a cloud, and the most popular appear in large, bolded font.  What makes tag clouds interesting – particularly when taking a snapshot of one document, such as Obama’s inauguration speech – is that you get a “sense” or “mood” for the tone of the speech, website or other collective of words and tags.

TweetDeck has an application called TwitScoop which lets me know what’s abuzz in the Tweetdom.  This is great for finding out about the latest news, like the recent USAir incident.

Above is a tag cloud from Obama’s inaugural speech today (via the LA Times).  To see comparison tag clouds from Obama, Bush, Clinton, Reagan, and Lincoln, visit Read, Write, Web (@rww).

And here are a few cool tag-cloud generating tools around the web:

• Wordle (My favorite so far)
• Tag Cloud Generator
• Tag Crowd

I often get the comment from my Facebook friends that I must be updating my status all day long.  In fact:

Twitter integrates really well with Facebook.  Let your Facebook friends know what you’re up to or what you find interesting by updating your Tweets (hopefully through a third-party Twitter app).  If you’re not already integrating the two, here’s a simple look at how.

1. Search “Twitter” in the upper right search box.  The Twitter App should be the top result that looks like this:



2. Click on “View Application”, then “Go to Application” and “Allow Access”:



3. Sign in at the prompt to your Twitter account from Facebook:



4. Once you’re signed in, “Allow Twitter to Update Your Facebook Status”:



5. Finally, click on “Allow Status Updates:

To see the Twitter App setting after setting up your Twitter feed to Facebook, simply click on “Edit” in your “Applications” window at the upper right of your “Home” page:

The Twitter App will default to the following setting, which I recommend:

That’s it!  If you have any questions, feel free to message me in Twitter @sherrymain or in Facebook.