While trolling around on Wired Magazine’s website today I encountered a strange looking Ad from Honda. The Ad made no sense and I am still both baffled and confused by the message they were trying to communicate. If it wasn’t for Honda in the URL I wouldn’t have even been sure that this wasn’t some random string of non sequiturs. One person in the comment section even had this response…

Do you think Honda communicates a message or just really fancy camera work?

Nostrum has been using Radian6 for awhile now and honestly we rave about it all the time.  The real time analytics and the granular nature of tracking in the social space is spectacular for our client base and second to none.

We were extremely proud and excited to see last month how R6 integrated seamlessly with Twitter and MTV to showcase the VMA’s online attributes.  If this doesn’t show the masses (hint hint CMO’s looking for ROI) at the value in data, we have no idea what will.

Kudos R6 and continued success. Shout out to Chaffic and Tina: Two great R6 employees and wonderful people….thanks for all the help thus far….

Great slide share by author, blogger and social media educator Tara Hunt.
Check out her presentation (below) and next time you’re at a bookstore (yes the world still has those) buy her book The Whuffie Factor.

Finished it about a month ago…Good Read and nice understanding of social mindsets as opposed to social strategies.

Check out the clip from XPLANE - The Visual Thinking Company out of Portland. Kudos

I think we can all remember the PSA’s that would run on TV when we were kids. They all had great messages like Recycle, respect people, and don’t get involved with the wrong crowds (ie drug dealers) but they almost all failed. If the rest of the country were anything like my friends these specials were an opportunity to be funny. The kids who were already doing the desired behavior actually felt under social pressure to not do them anymore, the ads were that bad. As Teens and Pre-teens started using and abusing social media at increasing rates it was only a matter of time before the PSA would meet the internet. With the help of the Ad Council and Verizon wireless this has finally happened.
Bringing us…
http://www.thatsnotcool.com/

While I think it’s important for 12-22 year olds to understand that digital mistakes can stick for life does it need to sound this forced and inauthentic?

On the plus side they do offer some funny go away, give me some space cards like this one.

However they follow it up with Facebook and Myspace accounts are handled through a twitter API. This is okay for adults (#hash tags are annoying) but most teens and early twenty year old’s I know don’t like Twitter. The feed which is a great way to offer feedback and advice is so random and off topic it actually makes it hard to approach.

The website does offer some interactive elements with good advice but they are confusing and hard to index. This is a great idea with inauthentic execution. Sadly most teens will probably feel like adults are making their epic “true love” story seem petty. A real life story or two from people who haven’t been accepted into colleges or gotten jobs because of digital mistakes might go along way.

What do you think?

Great insights into social media from the NYU professor who speaks to the digital divide, Gov 2.0 and scaling social media…

When all else fails, go back to your roots.

There’s been a lot of talk about what Facebook is intending to do with Facebook Lite. Is it intended to allow users in countries with sporadic internet connectivity to access Facebook? Is it intended to compete with Twitter? Probably yes to both. But that’s not why I like it.

*I* like Facebook Lite because it removes distractions like apps, notifications, and “Highlights” (which I always found particularly obnoxious) and scales Facebook back to the way it looked five years ago, when I was a freshman in college. Ah, it was a simpler time. Maybe not so flashy-looking, not so completely-involved-in-every-moment-of-your-life…but nice. Easy to navigate. Clean. If only it were still open to users with a valid .edu email address, it’d be just like the good ol’ days.

Yes, that’s right. The reason I like Facebook Lite is nostalgia. Pure and simple. Incidentally, Tanya, I always liked Keropi.
Anyway, tangled, incoherent, 5pm on Friday waffle aside, the point is that I think it’s a great idea for a company that has overexposed itself to go back to its roots, its one core product, and start fresh.

Hello Kitty and I have been friends since I was in the 1^st grade.  I met her on a pencil set that was gifted to me and since that moment, we became best of friends.

Whatever she had, it always matched, was insanely cute and I coveted it all.  If the pencil was pink, so was the sharpener, the case and the eraser.  Same logo and color palette throughout and thoughtfully packaged.  Hello Kitty taught me about Branding.

Then she introduced me to her friends, Little Twin Stars, Tuxedo Sam, and My Melody.  Hello Kitty taught me about Product Extension.

When I needed appliances and interior decor, she had her with her own toaster, TV, bedding and more.  Hello Kitty taught me about Brand Extension.

When I went through a “Goth” phase, she started to don more black.  Consequently, she got a slew of new friends and a lot more popular.  Hello Kitty taught me about Brand Revolution.

You would think that Hello Kitty and I would drift apart over the years, but we didn’t.  Maybe because we were born the same year we seemed to grow up together. When I got my first Nirve beach cruiser, so did she.  When I started wearing MAC makeup, so did she.  When I entered into my career and needed a Mimobot USB flash drive, so did she.  Hello Kitty taught me about Brand Partnership and Brand Evolution.

HK is one wise little kitty.

Earlier this year Ford launched what could be considered a social media experiment. The goal was to produce sales with younger drivers via authentic social media buzz. Ford went after 100influencers and gave them Ford Fiesta’s (releasing 2011). These influncers were already fans who were then converted to agents. Agents had to (in order to keep their status) post reviews, videos, tweets, Facebook updates and photos over several months. They basically created a buzz. It is a very cool novel idea that required Ford produce a quality product and trust their Agents. Although Ford did not control the message they didn’t need to because they had ambassadors. The result was wildly successful witha lot of positive chatter heading Fords way. Before I explain how successful they have been check out this video.

The video is agent made, even though Ford and Blendtec posted it to their feeds on you tube. The agent not only highlighted the strength of the car, he naturally states and hypes the benefit of that feature. This positive brand exposure has had a very impressive and surprising halo effect on the Ford Fusion. The campaign paired with another social push titled “we speak car” has resulted in a substantial brand favorably spike for the Fusion (a brand which was near death in 07). The consumer is more in touch with the quality of the product. As a result the Ford Fusion is now in direct competition with the Toyota Camry, a feat which was unrealistic 2 years ago. Many of the sales in 2009 have been to people buying their first American car after years of driving imports. When the Fiesta arrives in 2011 Ford is going to have a huge stock of video for advertisements, all produced at a very low cost and all authentic.

In terms of reach it looks like more then 6 million people have had a touch point with the Ford messages (mind you only 100 cars). Many of these people have become avid educated fans in the process some even counting down for the Fiesta to arrive. If you are asking “Can social media actually produce an ROI?” I’d suggest asking one of the people that bought a Fusion instead of a Camry.