The Emerging Times

From print to picture: The Vice Guide to Everything

From print to picture: The Vice Guide to Everything
Here's a great example of a young modern day print publication turned content influencer. Vice has evolved into quite the brand and evolved their content across digital and now broadcast media. I'm liking it. Check out The Vice Guide to Everything.

 

 

CONAN - King of Integration

CONAN - King of Integration

Integrating a brand promotion within entertainment has always been a laughing matter. And rarely the kind of laugh you actually laugh along with. If it doesn't entertain you You simply ignore it.

Here's one you can really appreciate and laugh along with:

Conan Obrien's, 20 Pine Trees Air Fresheners in 20 days—Giveaway Spectacular.
*Chevy Cruze included

Conan and his writers have always done a brilliant job at placing the promotion at the center of the joke-that's why it works. So well in fact that they can actually run it or push it more because it simply doesn't suck.

The writers and creators of the promotion certainly understood that it didn't have to be just an ad, instead they made it a bit. So, now you know how to integrate a great promotion, and knowing is half the battle.

2010—The Year of the Social Media Microphone

2010-The Year of the Social Media Microphone
-Why we react more on the internet

Once there was a suggestion box where people could anonymously make a suggestion, comment, or submit a review of their experience. The usage of the suggestion box (in my estimation) was mildly successful. However, it did in fact make a few angry customers happy, and made the store owner look like he was trying. But all together the suggestion box always felt as if the suggestion could somehow go 'missed', or even tossed away. You just never knew if the owner really ever saw those suggestions. Then, many years later another store owner decided to put a chalk-board sign in our store and invited anyone to make a public suggestion. The turn out around that chalk board was much greater and far more constant than the old suggestion box, and it too made him look good. However, this store owner had to deal with the occasional yet very public and sometimes even nasty reviews of his own product-written inside of his very own store. Good or bad, that public feedback motivated him to: make the coffee hotter, serve soy milk, and offer student discounts.

Now let's skip ahead to 2010. In the age of Yelp, Twitter, and social networking we're in a time where that anonymous suggestion box meets that public chalk board. Sure consumer forums have been around for over 10 years, but today information is instant and it swells through our own personal media channels-social networks. People talk, Google and Yelp index it, and the feedback shows up right next to your product on searches.

Be Aware: Search results are the new face of your company

Today, people have a huge 'scale of voice'. Imaging allowing them to now also be able to take that chalk board outside, place it on a billboard, and publicize it to everyone driving by? That's how feedback happens in consumer culture today. You can't hide negative reviews, poor service, or even crappy product—you just can't. Today, the game has in fact changed-our opinions have 100x the impact they did 10 years ago. The good news for marketers is we're going to have to stick to making better products, running better companies, and making better contracts.

2010 was the Year of the Social Media Microphone
Consumers today react on the internet not just because there is that somewhat anonymous wall between them and the store owner, but also because they know their actions will be publicly displayed on Yelp, Twitter or whatever social microphone they decide to speak through. They know it will be indexed/documented, and possibly might even stick together with other similar feedback-making it 'bigger' feedback. Conan O'Brien fans know about 'swell', the bubble-up, the movement, the word on the street, and how to affect the way your brand is perceived. (and so does NBC)

Consumer have that power today. So the big question is your network, brand, or even yourself going to listen? And then are you prepared to do something to replace those negative reviews with some fresh positive ones?

I certainly hope so.