Archive for the 'Best of' Category

02
Jul
10

Adidas: The Model for Integrated Social Media Campaigns

By Mark Plumb 15 Comments
Categories: Advertising, Best of, Branding, Digital Media, Facebook, Marketing, PR, promotions, Public Relations, Publicity, Social Media, Social Networking, Twitter and YouTube
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As a part of ‘Every Team Needs a Fan’ campaign, Adidas is teaming up with recognizable athletes Reggie Bush, New Orleans Saints; Dwight Howard, Orlando Magic; BJ Upton, Tampa Bay Rays; and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. of NASCAR to engage sports fans across the U.S. for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Adidas is the provider of the World Cup game ball and is extending their awareness at the global event with these four brand ambassadors.

Reggie Bush traveled to South Africa, in addition to conducting interviews with multiple media outlets, he shared a picture (right) on his twitter account with U.S. player Jozy Altidore (also an Adidas athlete) minutes after the U.S. beat Algeria.

Each ambassador is posting Facebook updates, they are tweeting during and between World Cup games. Each one has shot YouTube videos. (Dwight Howard’s is the most entertaining.)  To get people even more engaged, there is a competition for the ambassadors to get the most fans and Dwight Howard is hosting a watch party in Atlanta for one winner that signed up through Facebook.

Here are many of the locations the integrated social media campaign appears:

Twitter

Facebook

YouTube

Individual Websites

Adidas has done an exceptional job of extending their brand presence through athletes they have endorsement deals and having them cross-over into different sports which exposes fans of these other sports to these athletes and Adidas.

BJ Upton’s participation has been limited in this promotion, however he recently became embroiled in controversy and it is possible that Adidas downplayed his role in this campaign.  This shows Adidas flexibility to adjust the campaign on the fly and the flexibility of social media as a marketing tool to enable such adjustments.

Let Weise Communications on Facebook know about the best thoroughly integrated social media campaign you’ve seen.

16
Oct
09

Musical stairs – A potential way to lower obesity rates in US?

By Joshua Woolery 1 Comment
Categories: Ads, Best of, Creative, promotions, Publicity Stunts, Uncategorized, Video Ads and Viral
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Can transforming a flight of stairs into an oversized piano keyboard decrease obesity rates in the U.S.? Probably not, but I’m sure they would add a few more smiles to the faces of commuters!

I was looking for a hip viral and found a Web site that ranks viral videos by popularity. The site, aptly named Viral Video Chart, has ranked one from Volkswagon No. 1 in the last 24 hours. The English version of the video is titled “Piano Stairs – The Fun Theory.” The creators of the staircase were successful in enticing people to take the stairs versus the escalator, increasing use of the stairs by 66 percent. Pretty good results in my book.

Great viral. I would like to see some executions like this in America centered around healthy lifestyle choices. Any ideas?

29
Sep
09

what is your blog serving today?

By Joshua Woolery Leave a Comment
Categories: B2B, Best of, Blogger, Blogs, Business Strategies, business to business, Businesses and Communications

HubSpot, an Internet marketing software company, has a great Webinar available to B2B professionals looking to step up their blogging game. The Webinar focuses on three topics; why your business should blog; the five keys to a successful blog and how to measure your blog. I’d like to focus on one of their five keys to a successful blog, creating a mix of posts.

Create a Mix of Posts:

I really liked how HubSpot broke this section up using food to represent different types of posts. Who doesn’t love food?!

Raison Bran – How-to posts. These are rich in keywords and require minimum time commitment to create.

Spinach – Healthy posts you put time into. These posts are designed to establish your blog as an industry thought leader.

Roasts – Just like making a roast during a cold Minnesota winter takes all day, these posts will require a lot of time. They will be extremely “meaty” and have immense amounts of content. Because these posts require ample amounts of time, choose your “roast” carefully.

Tabasco – This one is pretty self-explanatory. These posts are ones that will spark heated discussions due to bold statements.

Chocolate cake – My favorite! Chocolate cake posts are synonymous for fun-loving posts heavily laden with videos, pictures and links.

I was thoroughly impressed with HubSpot’s Webinar, and I encourage you to visit their site and watch the full presentation.

The full list of the five keys to a successful blog are as follows:

1. Pick Your Target Personas

2. Create a Mix of Posts

3. Write Great Posts

4. Sustain It

5. Spread It

22
Sep
09

don’t make these blogging mistakes

By Joshua Woolery Leave a Comment
Categories: Best of, Blogs, BtoB, Business Strategies, business to business, Mashable and Tips

Josh Catone from Mashable recently wrote a blog post titled, “Top 5 Business Blogging Mistakes and How to Avoid Them.” Weise has a number of clients currently considering entering the blogosphere, so we thought we would repost Catone’s how-to guide and provide some of our own advice and experiences.

Business Blogging Blunders:

#1 Treating Your Blog Like a Press Center

Long story short of this section, don’t use your company blog to toot your own horn. This doesn’t mean you can’t mention a recent newsworthy event, usually reserved for the traditional press release, just make sure you add a personal touch to the post. Express how excited you are for a new company program or a new partnership.

One of the “ground rules” Weise established prior to launching The Side Note, was to avoid promoting the agency. We prefer to be contacted directly by readers who find our content interesting, rather than constantly using a push-messaging strategy about how great an advertising agency we are. If readers like your content, they’ll find you. (Having a link to your Web site on your blog doesn’t hurt, though.)

#2 Not Blogging Regularly

Now that you have started blogging, don’t lose steam! There is no benefit to gaining loyal readers and then not posting for a week, two weeks, etc. Catone’s point in this section is to commit to posting on a regular schedule.

“If you plan to put out new posts every Tuesday and Friday, for example, try not to start writing Tuesday’s post on Tuesday morning.” I agree completely with this suggestion.

#3 Not Enabling Conversation

This is one of the easiest mistakes to avoid! Enable commenting on your blog, reply to comments in a timely manner, and comment on industry blogs. Do these things to retain your readers and attract new readers to your business blog.

#4 Making New Content Hard to Discover

Josh offers four suggestions to make it easier for readers to discover new content on your blog.

  1. Include your blog’s link in you email signature, business cards and collateral.
  2. Make your “subscribe to RSS” feed easy to find.
  3. Use Twitter and Facebook to inform your followers/fans of new content. (Both allow you to automate this process!)
  4. Integrate into your blog posts and titles relevant key words that your audience would search for.

#5 Expecting Too Much, Too Soon

Cantone says it best, “Blogging isn’t a sprint, it’s a marathon. Your blog won’t be an overnight success, and for the first few months it might feel like you’re writing for no one. It can take time to build up your readership and have a regular community of people who participate on your blog. Don’t expect immediate returns from your blog and do expect to put in a lot of hard work.”

Good luck bloggers!

15
Sep
09

SEO best practices

By Joshua Woolery 2 Comments
Categories: Ad Agency, Advertising, B2B, Best of, BtoB, Business Strategies, how-to, internet marketing and SEO

Tom Pick, a B2B marketer with 17 years of experience, recently authored a posting on The WebMarketCentral Blog expressing his opinion on SEO best practices.

The post is a response to an article written by Adam Audette titled, “SEO ‘Best Practices’ Are Bunk.” Pick feels that the phrase “best practice” has lost its meaning and become another marketing buzzword. I agree.

After addressing Audette’s definition of “best practices,” Pick provides his own definition and then applies it to outline best SEO practices. I was elated to see that our agency is following almost all of these best practices and thought you would benefit from reviewing them.

According to Pick, SEO best practices would include but not be limited to:

  • Conducting keyword research to identify high-volume, low-competition search terms.
  • Producing clean code (e.g. CSS and HTML, minimal Flash, Javascript in separate files, descriptive navigation, minimal use of tables).
  • Optimizing title tags.
  • Crafting URLs with keywords included.
  • Including (but not over-doing) keywords in content and heading tags.
  • Incorporating keyword links in page text.
  • Basic link-building—social media sites, directories, business partners etc.
  • Advanced link-building—blogging, commenting, content marketing, guest posting, blogger outreach, interactive PR, etc.

Is your business approaching SEO in the abovementioned fashion? What can you do to improve where your SEO is now to get it where you would like it to be?

I enjoyed Pick’s closing statement so much that I wanted to end with it.

“For the best companies, and SEO consultants, continuous innovation is the best best practice of all.”

31
Aug
09

real women in advertising

By Tracy Weise 2 Comments
Categories: Ads, Advertising, Best of and business to consumer
Tags:

image24

I was reminded of Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty last week when a flurry of commentary hit over the photo of a nearly naked woman in Glamour magazine. She has a bit of a belly, and I love the photo of her. LOVE IT. I applaud Glamour magazine for using it. Like Dove, the magazine is embracing what women really look like.

When Dove’s campaign launched several years ago, it did something no other beauty brand had done before — it used real women to promote its brand instead of paid models. When interviewing its target audience about which celebrity model they could relate to, Dove found that most women were intimidated and depressed by the “stick thin” model, and in no way felt that these models represented the majority of women. Instead of Dove saying, “Here’s this woman whose beauty is unattainable — let us help you look like her,” their messaging was, “Beauty is natural, and you’re beautiful because you’re natural — let us help you maintain it.”

image23

This is the message more health and beauty companies need to send, and it’s the message more advertisers need to encourage.

Of course, I am biased. This blog entry is being written by a mother of two who is closer to 40 years old than 30, and is painfully aware that her 20-year high school reunion is soon to be here. But, now thanks to this photo, my body looks like something you may see in Glamour magazine rather than in People magazine’s “Worst Of” edition.

These days, I want to focus on my daughter growing up with a healthy and happy body image and not with the insecurities of many women my age who didn’t have anything but unattainable skinny models to emulate.

As a professional in the advertising industry, I hope to have the opportunity to work on a campaign like Dove’s or select photos like the one in Glamour magazine. These are the images of women that make me proud to be an almost 40, still-haven’t-lost-the-baby-weight, woman.

10
Jun
09

expand your franchise with linkedin

By Joshua Woolery Leave a Comment
Categories: Best of, Business growth, Communications, Franchise, Franchising, Linked In, LinkedIn, Marketing, New Media, Profile, promotions, Social Media and Tips
Tags: , , , , , ,

linkedinpic1LinkedIn is an extremely popular social networking site used by professionals in all walks of life. A quick scan of your Gmail contacts will probably reveal that many of your peers are already using LinkedIn to network with like-minded professionals. But you are a franchisor. Why would you use LinkedIn? It’s not like you are trying to connect with CPA’s. You’re trying to expand your franchise.

LinkedIn can be used to accomplish your goals. Franchisors must focus on three areas to completely leverage LinkedIn to expand their franchise business. These include joining groups, participating in the “Answers” section, and creating a “great” profile.

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Joining Groups:

LinkedIn has hundreds of groups available to franchise professionals. Do a group search for “franchises” and you’ll find that you can join over 300 such groups. Why join?
LI Groups
The most important reasons for joining a group include:

1. Search functionality: Being a group member allows you to access the profiles of the other members in your group. (If you belonged to the “Franchise Networking” group, you would have access to over 2,200 LinkedIn profiles!)

2. Communication: Not only does being a group member give you viewing privileges, you’ll also has the ability to directly contact your fellow group members.

3. Showcase your group affiliations: When you join a group, LinkedIn gives you the option to display a digital badge on your profile. These show people visiting your page what groups you belong to and where your professional interests lie.

Becoming an Expert:linkedin-answers

LinkedIn’s “Answers” section gives anyone the opportunity to answer or ask questions on almost any topic in almost any industry.

You should seriously consider spending some time in the Q&A forum to find questions that you can answer. Why?

LinkedIn awards its users with expertise points for every answer they provide. According to LinkedIn’s Web site, “When your answer is chosen as (the) best by the question’s asker, you gain a point of expertise in the question’s category.”

Creating a “Great” Profile:

There are many articles out there that attempt to sort out the do’s and don’ts of setting up your LinkedIn profile.
The following list of three articles will point you in the right direction and help you create an outstanding LinkedIn profile:

LinkedIn Profile Extreme Makeover: Guy Kawasaki offers short easy-to-digest recommendations to vamp up your profile.

Six Elements of a Great LinkedIn Profile: Scott Cunningham offers great information and the details to help you implement his suggestions.

4 Minutes to Optimize a LinkedIn Profile for SEO: HubSpot offers two key pieces of advice and a four minute video detailing how you can optimize your profile for SEO.

Now that you have the skinny on LinkedIn, join some franchise groups, become an expert and create a great profile!

Drop us a line. We would like to know what tip(s) you found most helpful!

28
Apr
09

social media…does your company “get it”?

By Joshua Woolery 1 Comment
Categories: Ad Agency, Advertising, Best of, Blogs, Communications, Marketing, Media, New Media, PR, promotions, Public Relations, Social Media and Twitter

Adopting social media campaigns can be quite a challenge for many businesses. Leading executives are often hesitant to allow consumers to control what is being said about their brand. Many times, consumers aren’t looking for complete control; they are looking for innovative companies to meet them halfway.

Lee Odden recently posted an article on the Online Marketing Blog titled, “25 Must Read Social Media Marketing Tips.”  This post provides tips and best practices from major players in the Social Marketing arena, including representatives from Best Buy, Wells Fargo and General Mills.

The post offers great ideas, strategy and direction for companies who have yet to fully commit to pursuing social media in their marketing strategy. Because of the length of the post, I am only going to repost my favorite pieces of advice from Crayon’s president, Joseph Jaffe.  Below he shares five tips for companies trying to make sense out of defining a social media strategy.

1. Don’t cede control completely to your consumers. They don’t want it. Meet them halfway. Partner with them. Work with them.

2. Marketing is not a campaign; it’s a commitment. If you want lifetime relationships with your consumers, you need to invest in them…genuinely…for life. Begin with investing in what we call at Crayon, “commitment to conversation” (monitoring, optimization, response, outreach, etc.)

3. Learn to deal with negativity. You want the love, but can’t deal with the hate. Criticism is not your enemy; apathy and indifference are. Any negative response from consumers (whether by blog, email or customer service inquiry) is a cry for help AND an acknowledgement that they care (enough to reach out to you…).

4. As per my earlier point, think strategically. We’re currently working with some of our clients to define a social networking strategy. (BEFORE cart before the horse deploying a “Facebook App” for example)

5. That said, we also advise companies to invest in “well-structured experimentation”. We distill this into a very real and workable number – 4: 4 experiments over a calendar year. Is one experiment per quarter that unrealistic or irrationally exuberant? I think not.

Joseph offers some really good advice above. Click here if you would like to read more tips that other influencers have suggested.

13
Mar
09

best British television commercial

By Joshua Woolery 1 Comment
Categories: Ad Agency, Advertising, Best of, commercials, Marketing and TV

hovis The British television advertising awards (btaa) were recently held in London.  Hovis, a bread manufacturer that has been in business for 122 years, won the award for best television commercial.  The 122 second  ad, called “Go on Lad,” takes you through 122 years of Britain’s history. I really liked this commercial because it did such a great job of telling a story.  My favorite part was when the young lad was running past a window with a radio in it during WWII.  As he was doing so, Winston Churchill could be heard reciting part of his famous speech saying, “we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills, we shall never surrender.”  It was components like that that made me feel apart of the boy’s journey.

I have posted the video below for your enjoyment.  Click here for a full list of winners. (Courtesy of Brand Republic News.)

23
Feb
09

PHONE ADS RAISE THE BAR

By Tracy Weise Leave a Comment
Categories: Advertising, Best of and Funny

T-Mobile and Boost Mobile have found a way to make their ads stand out in an oversaturated market. We thought we’d kick off the week with their refreshing bits of humor. Enjoy.

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