OMG. OMG.  take a deep breath.  i had my 2nd reality celebrity sighting (my first was Madison from Million Dollar Listing) last night…at Souplantation!  there I was mid-tomato bite and I spot a “hello there” looking fella.  that fella was Slade!  i quickly scanned the room, as i knew his fair haired maiden had to be only a soup bowl away.  and, there she was in all her beaming blonde beauty - Gretchen from The Real Housewives of Orange County.  no make-up, velour jumpsuit and size 00.  wow she is tiny.  out of the Housewives, she is my OC fav.  i don’t care about all that nonsense with what Tamra says.  i feel like Gretchen may have the capacity to grow and learn, whereas the other wifey’s - not so much.   Read the rest of this entry »

Following in the wake of my post last Friday about the opening of Twilight: New Moon, I found this article on BoingBoing absolutely hilarious. “Fangst.” Teeheehee.

Also, Melissa Balmer had this to say regarding Twilight branding.

“No branding? I humbly disagree, most of the branding has been done w/the face of the beautiful Robert Pattinson (I haven’t seen the movies, or read the books, but any female with eyes saw he was a winner in HP 4). Has everyone forgotten Titanic and that is was truly Leonardo’s beauty that launched a million+ ships? Oh and Twilight was super clever w/it’s stylish book covers - adult women could read them and only those “in the know” knew it was a book for teens.”

Excellent points, Melissa. Robert Pattinson is a brand unto himself. And my kid sister dragged me to the film this weekend, where I was overwhelmed by all the “Team Jacob/ Team Edward” paraphernalia. But I still haven’t seen much official branding except trailers. I’m not asking to be snide–I really do want to know what kind of secret Twihard stuff they’re doing, especially since there isn’t even a year between release dates. Descriptions and links would be greatly appreciated.

And Melissa, I’ve read the books and seen the films (my sister MADE ME) and you’re not missing anything. Stick to Harry Potter.

Nostrum loves the videos that Socialnomics are putting out.

These short bursts of facts and social stats are great for users to understand the potential of the social web. However, everyone must know - as socialnomics points out in each video they showcase - that with all of these success stories there is a substantial amount of TIME put forth by each brand’s marketing team. None of these cases were done on the “build it and they will come manifesto” that for some reason the C-Suite always seem to think will happen when starting a new social initiative. Most, if not all cases are of one key employee rolling up his or her sleeves and burning the midnite oil for the betterment of their brand for little to no compensation other than his/her pure passion for the product of service ( i.e. Gary Vaynerchuk, Scott Monty, The BlendTec Dude).

While we love this video, please remember social media may not require a lot of dollars to start - it still requires alot of capital - TIME!

For all you corporate denizens who have “issues” with social media and all of it’s iterations here is something from one of the biggest corporate behemoths in the world: McDonald’s.

Below is a presentation from Heather Olandi, the Director of PR for McDonald’s regarding how the brand utilizes social media and community building to leverage their message. There are some very interesting ideas and strategic insights included. Love to hear what you think…

my take on the 2009 AMAs.

i thought the award show was trying too hard and it showed.  way overly theatrical for me, and i have a high threshold for over the top.  all the light beams, the costumes, gravity defying sequences, over choreographed dance moves, badly scripted presentations.  don’t mix too many “best of” components from all the award shows and then throw up on me.

j lo - i didn’t see her fall, but I did see her outfit and the boxing number.  that was brow arching enough.  that louboutin song is ridiculous. Read the rest of this entry »

The next film in the Twilight series came out at midnight. And it’s already grossing off the charts.
The thing that eludes me is that there’s been little to no branding for the film (that I’ve seen) and it’s still the most popular thing EVARRRRR (according to my 16-year-old sister). At this point I can only chalk it up to the unholy power of teenage girls. Someone please enlighten me.

All I know is that I will be avoiding the movie theater like The Plague, and hiding under my bed, with a stake in one hand and a big plate of garlic bread in the other.

We’ve all heard the case studies (mostly done in-house) touting @comcastcares as the future of customer service. How it would change the negative image of cable companies…how Comcast customers wouldn’t be so cranky.

It hasn’t worked so far. A few individuals got good service, but were still annoyed. Not ever having been a Comcast customer, I can’t judge too much.

But other cable companies have jumped on the bandwagon as well. And that’s what I do have experience with–I recently canceled my account with Charter Cable. And they didn’t like it, not one little bit.

Here’s the back story–I was moving out of my apartment and didn’t want to transfer my account to my new place. I called May 17th and arranged to have my account stopped on June 10th. All good. I moved out of my apartment at the very end of June, all paid up and good to go. I returned my equipment. Good. I thought I was all done with Charter. Peachy.

So imagine my surprise when I got a call in November. From a collection agency. Saying I owed Charter $130. BIG SURPRISE. So I called Charter customer service and got no help. They were very polite and looked up my account. And they saw that I had paid out and closed the account (I had actually overpaid) but they couldn’t do anything. I was going to have to drive forty miles to the local office and beg them to call off the credit agency and fix my credit score. I was NOT HAPPY.

Naturally, in order to relieve my feelings, I took to the web and made some very angry Tweets and went off to bed. After which, cue Surprise Number Two: when I woke up, I found an @reply from @Umatter2ChrtrG asking if he could help. I explained my situation to him in both tweet and email form, and he connected me with @Umatter2Chtr2. A couple hours later, I got a phone call from @Umatter2Chtr2 (aka Josh). He listened, asked me to wait while he called the billing department, and called me back shortly with the news that the bill had been reversed, the money I overpaid was on its way, and the problem hadn’t even been put on my credit record.

Score. The problem got fixed. After a lot of freaking out on my part.
So, many thanks to Josh at Charter for his help. But that doesn’t negate the months of screw-ups while I was a Charter customer. If all the customer service I received had been that good, I’d still be one.

Conclusion: having a social media VIP line won’t keep your customers from hating you if all the rest of your customer service is terrible. Customer service and product quality should be the priorities, not afterthoughts and Band-Aids.

Mashable’s 2009 Open Web Awards are going on right now! The Nomination period ends on Sunday November 15th with Voting set to start on Wednesday November 18th… If you would like to nominate us for best Social media Agency please click the badge below…

Some of my other Favorites include

@nhlblackhawks for best Brand use of Twitter … they are my Favorite NHL team

@rainnwilson  for best Actor/Actress to follow on Twitter… I love The Office its one of my favorite shows

@garyvee for Twitter user of the year

And of course I cant forget client Long Beach Transit for best Facebook Fan page

**FYI each of my favorites are linked to a pre-filled out form for your convenience

Let us know who your favorites are in the comment section below!

People may or may not know that we here at nostrum are extremely big fans of Gary Vaynerchuk and all the people over at VaynerMedia. Gary leads an amazingly eclectic conglomerate of social branding campaigns outside his core business of Wine Library TV.  From the launch of Corkd (@Ronga) to the NFL’s NY Jets’ Social Initiatives to a few packaged goods brands to the flipping NHL, Gary is leading the behind the scenes charge on so many levels, it astonishes me.

I recently attended his Pasadena book signing for his new book Crush It. At the event, an animated and intensely passionate Gary reared his dominate, yet endearing head telling all the Vayner-aics how toil, sweat and hustling got him where he is today. He had over 200 people salivating on his every word and trust me Vromans’ made some bank that night on Gary’s back. In fact, I overheard the manger say how floored he was at how many people showed up and continued to say that to his recollection only Bill Clinton and Howard Stern had more people for a signing than Gary.

Throughout the entire 2 hour session, Gary ranted and raved about the book, but what struck me as so amazing was that when it was time to sign books, he spent on average 3+ minutes with every single person autographing books, posing for pictures or just advising them based on a question or 2 they had prepared for him. He took the time and the energy to do it all with a straight face and a smile.

Post signing, I was lucky enough to spend an un-interrupted half hour with the man, the myth, and the legend. During our conversation his passion and charisma bubbled to the top (which I expected), but it was his listening skills that impressed me the most. As we chatted while driving the 110, I thought he would lead the conversation with overt references to his insights and lifestyle but that was not the case at all. He focused on what my concerns were (in relation to my business dilemmas) and addressed each individually based on how he felt he could assist. We talked business, ideation and passion and to each aspect he had his own take, yet never did I feel like I was being preached at; it was more like hanging out with a friend discussing the day over a beer (or sorry a glass a wine).

One response that rings ever so true is what he said when I asked if it is ever hard to continue to be “nice” for an event, even when you’re not mentally there. He responded with a wink and smile saying something to the effect that “these people came out to say hello to me and to purchase my book, the least i can do is honor them with a few words and/or an autograph.” He went on to say it all goes back to the early days of adding his personal posts to every single wine article he came across in order to obtain greater influence within the wine community. Trust me he still does this; if you don’t believe me check out how he wins over a negative reviewer of Crush it.

Few people have that ability to connect on so many levels with so many different types of people and still stay true to everything that they believe in: Gary is one of the chosen few.

Thanks for the ride Gary and see you on the other coast…robert