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Posts Tagged ‘Facebook’

Facebook Takes on TV

Thursday, August 12th, 2010

Facebook will soon offer content from the UK’s Channel Five TV network.  Viewers based in the region will be able to watch the network’s programming through an embedded player on their Facebook page, making Five the first broadcaster to offer a wide range of on-demand TV programming through the dominant social network. 

Five is a relatively new (established in 1997) and progressive network that currently funnels their video content through Demand FIVE, a Web site and online video player that offers free and paid downloads for rental or purchase.  This is the same player they will use to offer content through Facebook, though it seems all programming will be free (at least to begin with).  According to the site, “Demand Five is all about giving you the choice to watch telly when you want to, not according to rigid schedules.”  

Just as CBS now offers the “Watch & Chat” functionality on their site, it’s easy to imagine how TV viewing could become much more social when it literally takes place on Facebook.  Revenue could come from traditional video advertising through the player, social gaming tied to programming, contests and more.  Imagine video downloads that users pay for with the Facebook Credits they’ve earned on FarmVille?

Will we soon be logging into Facebook to catch up on our favorite TV shows?  Do you think the social network will become a viable competitor to Hulu and YouTube, or will the existing broadcast content partnerships prevent that from happening?

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Posted in Marketing Innovation, Pop Culture | View Comments

Happy #smday, Tweeps!

Wednesday, June 30th, 2010

Today marks the very first Social Media Day and its all thanks to Mashable, who believes that social media has changed our lives. And here at GY&K, we believe this to be true. It’s changed the way we communicate, connect with one another, consume our news, conduct business, organize our lives and market our brand.

And with 80 percent of social media users interacting with companies or brands online, there’s no better time to get in the game. Online engagement, especially, social media can be your friend as it offers an opportunity to have a person-to-person dialogue, in real time. Here’s how to apply social media to your brand, company or business:

• Integrate – Don’t treat your social media activity as something separate from your other marketing initiatives. Feature links to your Facebook and Twitter profiles, in your email signature, on your business cards, in your ads, and as a standard block of copy in your weekly e-newsletter.
• Drive Traffic – Use your social media activity to create awareness for and amplify your content housed in other places – on your blog, on your website or on your Twitter account. Use newsletters and blog posts to send to your subscribers, archive it on your website and tweet it too. You can also add social features to your newsletter to make it easy for others to retweet and share on social sites.
• Be a Content Sharer – Be a thought leader and content sharer by filtering other people’s strong news stories, links and posts, and retweet them to your followers, fans and subscribers, helping to build your overall reputation and helping you bring value to the conversation. 

So, today, we celebrate Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Foursquare, Gowalla, Vimeo, Friendfeed, Flickr, Blogger and WordPress. And so should you.

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Posted in Pop Culture, Uncategorized | View Comments

Still Buzzing – Do we really want to combine our email with updates from our social networks?

Wednesday, February 24th, 2010

From Google Earth and Gmail to GOOG-411 and Nexus One it is clear that its wide range of products and service offerings have molded Google into one of the most dominant companies on the Web.  As if Google wasn’t already a huge threat, it developed Google Buzz.  As you’ve probably heard, or experienced, Google’s new development aims to combine the best features of different social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Picasa and YouTube, sending many of those sites scrambling to re-examine their features to make sure Google Buzz does not become a monopoly in the social media space next.

So, what supposedly makes Google Buzz more appealing than Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites? Well, according to an article in Channelweb, the top reasons are that Google Buzz:

  1. Integrates with Gmail
  2. Drowns out the noise
  3. Cuts out the hunting and pecking
  4. Works well with cell phones

Ok, so do you want to know what this really means?  To start, Gmail users will now have access to all of their status updates, photos, new comments and other content mixed in with their email.  Cool?  Not so much.  Do we social networking fanatics really want ALL of our updates mixed in with email?  I think this will make emailing and social networking more of a hassle.

Google claims Buzz will “drown out the noise,” by using algorithms and history to sift through unwanted status updates or photo uploads based on a user’s previous activity.  Yes, I do not want to know what Friend A is doing every second of the day, but that doesn’t mean that I never want to know what he’s up to.  Google Buzz also has an “auto-follow” feature where all of your previous Gmail contacts can automatically connect with you.  Imagine all of the people that you email:  your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, coworkers and children.  Is this option really preferable?  Well, if you are a fan of Google Buzz so far, AND if you are an Apple or Android user—don’t worry.  Google has developed mobile applications for the iPhone and Google Android.  Google is also developing an enterprise plan for Buzz.

Yes, Google Buzz compiles email and social networking content all into one program, but should this really make Facebook and Twitter that worried?  I would rather keep social networking separate from emailing.  It is quite clear that Google can do it all, but is Buzz really going to attract current Facebook and Twitter users?

Jenaleigh Landers is an intern with Griffin York & Krause.  She is currently a full-time Business Major at Saint Anselm College.

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Farm Aid – Social Gaming Drives Major Dollars

Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009

Are you sick of reading about FarmVille in your Facebook news feed?  You have the option of filtering these updates, but get ready for more invitations to join the party.  

“Social gaming” has become a huge industry and a few companies are betting it’s here to stay.  Earlier this month, Electronic Arts acquired Playfish, a social gaming company, for approximately $300,000,000.  Yes, that’s three hundred million. 

While they have 60 million monthly users, Playfish isn’t even the top company in this segment.  That title belongs to Zynga, the makers of Mafia Wars, Vampires and the aforementioned farming game of which many of my friends are apparently addicted.

If you have yet to experience these games you may be wondering where the money is coming from.  That leads us to the world of virtual goods and micropayments.  Many of these games offer players the chance to upgrade their accounts or accomplish various tasks by making small purchases.  Do a search for Zynga and you’ll see a sponsored link pushing sales of virtual poker chips. 

In the near future you will see even more transactions like this happening through Facebook, but that’s a topic for another post.

What does all of this mean for consumer brands?  One thing is for sure, they want to play! 

Know of any brand sponsored social games or virtual goods that are gaining traction?  

 

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Posted in Pop Culture | View Comments

The (Facebook) Rules They Are A’Changin

Friday, November 20th, 2009

Rules. From our earliest recollection as a toddler, we were taught to “obey the rules.” I’ve always been a do-gooder (yep, I was that kid) so this has been easy for me. However, if rules are written in legal-ese, it takes a bit longer for me to figure out how to do right.

In our industry (marketing, and in my case in particular, PR) we have a responsibility to be current on the rules set forth by the mediums we use in order to best serve ourselves and our clients. For example, there are rules to using Twitter. Some are common sense (don’t say anything inappropriate while representing your brand), some are best practices (RT people whose work you admire and you found helpful), and some are set forth by the medium itself (follow, update, and API limits) .

Today I want to highlight a very important “rule change” the happened in November one of our most popular mediums: Facebook.

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Vitaminwater Flavorcreator

Thursday, October 29th, 2009

Vitaminwater was first introduced to Americans in 2000 as an alternative to soda and positioned as a drink that both hydrates consumers while providing essential nutrients they are likely missing.  Over the past nine years the company has exploded in popularity quickly becoming one of the largest beverage brands in America.  In 2007, The Coca-Cola Company purchased Vitaminwater for $4.1 billion dollars.  Today, the brand is bigger than ever and endorsed by some of the largest stars in entertainment including Steve Nash, 50 Cent, Shaq, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James.  Just recently Vitaminwater launched a unique fan contest that utilizes the power of Facebook.  The contest was announced by Steve Nash and 50 Cent in a humorous internet commercial.   

 

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Hospitals in the Social Media space

Friday, October 9th, 2009

Over the past year and a half I have heard the phase “social media” 100,000 times.  No matter where you turn your attention someone is discussing social media and how it can help your business.  For brands there is no escaping social media, their only choice is to embrace it.  One industry that has embraced social media as a means to communicate with their target audiences is the hospital industry.  Since 2006 the number of U.S. hospitals engaged in social media has skyrocketed.  Over the past three years more than 350 hospitals throughout America have engaged their brand in one type of social media.

 

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Ultimate Consumer Contest

Monday, September 21st, 2009

Frito-Lay, the world’s largest snack food producer, is revamping last year’s ultimate consumer contest titled Crash the Super Bowl.  For the past four years Doritos has asked the consumer to take control and create the brand’s Super Bowl commercials and as consumers answered the call the contest grew in popularity.  Last year the contest was extremely successful for the brand and for the two unemployed brothers who created the winning spot.  Not only were these brothers successful in winning the grand prize of $1 million; they also created a spot that beat out all of the Madison Avenue executives and won the USA Today Ad Meter poll.  

 

It was the success of those two brothers’ commercial that helped to restructure this year’s Crash the Bowl Sweepstakes.  The potential prize money up for grabs is $5 million this year; but Doritos is not just going to give the money away.  In order to win the cash, consumers have to not only beat out the thousands of entrants Doritos receives, their ad also has to place within the top three of the USA Ad Meter.  Here is how Doritos plans on breaking out the winning money; $1 million for placing first in Ad Meter; $600,000 for second and $400,000 for third and if the spots finish 1-2-3, each will get a $1 million bonus, for a total of $5 million in prizes.  The last time an advertiser was able to sweep the top three spots in the USA Today Ad Meter poll was in 2007 by Anheuser-Busch. 

 

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