Last week, I decided to review the number of followers an official agency twitter account had versus some of their high-profile employees. For most Social Media Practitioners, the results I found were not surprising: More people followed the individual behind the Agency name, rather than the official Agency presence themselves.

But rather this data go to waste, I figure I share some of it with you…

A look at 360i, iCrossing, and SEOmoz and their high-profile team members.

.

How Does This Apply To Your Company?

If you have a consumer facing company (B2C) or are focusing on Twitter for customer support (like ComcastCares), a strong twitter-based brand is needed on Twitter for instant recognizability by current/potential customers on Twitter. But, if you’re looking at thought leadership and building B2B connections, you need to have strong people communicating and engaging with your industry colleagues on Twitter.

There will be companies that will be reluctant to throw their weight on thought-leaders representing the brand versus an official brand twitter account. What happens when the person says something inappropriate? Do they have to clear everything with legal? What if the person leaves?

It is all a matter of priorities and appropriateness. If you want your agency to be seen as a thought leader and build relationships with others, this is best communicated through the brightest and energetic minds at your company. If your agency values consistency of a message over creative energy, then stick with your Twitter.com/CompanyX account.

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Stanford's iPhone Application Programming Course Online

1 Million iPhone Application Course Downloads…

It was announced yesterday that Stanford’s iPhone Application Programming courses have been downloaded over 1 million times on Apple’s iTunes University. Stanford University’s move to allow anyone with access to iTunes to download a high-quality video of their iPhone Application Programming course was obviously not a move to convince people to apply to Stanford. It is part of a university’s value to provide greater value to the world at large. However, it was also very successful branding campaign to associate Stanford with the cutting edge and sexiness that is the iPhone.

…That’s 1 Million Brand Engagements

As a marketer, I consider each iPhone course download a branding engagement event. Those one million people are not only aware of Stanford’s iPhone courses, they are actively engaging the Stanford plan by downloading the videos. How much would you pay for 1 million people to actively interact with your brand (in this case a +300mb video file)?

And at least $1 Million Dollars of Branding Engagement

If you just put a value of $1 per brand engagement, you’re already saying that Stanford gained at least one million dollars worth of brand engagement by leveraging a very cheap form of social media (recording classes to post online). Of course, this is not counting the millions who are aware about Stanford’s iPhone courses online, but did not download it.

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Hello All,

Sorry for the radio silence lately, I’ve been losing my blog mojo with other activities going on. Anywho, ad:tech San Francisco is kicking off next Tuesday! As with last year, yours truly will be working with Steve Hall as one of the official ad:tech bloggers over at http://www.adtechblog.com. I’ll be playing press and covering both the sessions and the going-ons at the million parties going on at ad:tech.

So if you have any topic you feel needs to be more talked about or covered in the interactive advertising world, let me know. I’ll put on my reporter hat and investigate! Also, I will be live twittering at http://twitter.com/danielriveong

Now the parties!

ad:tech San Francisco Party List

BTW: There’s always ad:tech’s blog coverage on the parties for ad:tech San Francisco.

Tuesday April 21

Tattoo Media Party (invite only)
2pm at St. Regis

SFAMA 2:30-6:30pm
2nd Floor of the Metreon

Beer Garden
5:30 to 7:30 on Level 2 of Moscone West

Digital Social Media Networking Party
6:30 to 8:30
http://90421networkingpartysf.eventbrite.com/

Oldtimers Foundation Cocktail Party (Invite Only)
5pm to 7pm
Ettiquette Lounge, 1108 Market Street

Adventive Party with Eric Lewis (Invite Only)
5:30 to 7:30
Sir Francis Drake Hotel San Francisco, CA

San Francisco Bay Area Interactive Group (Members Only)
6:30 – 8:30 pm, following Steve Hayden’s keynote
Location: Moscone West, 3rd level lobby

The Media Social Party
6pm to 9:0pm
roe club & lounge 651 Howard St. San Francisco
RSVP: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=179025225470

ComScore (Clients of Comscore Only)
Press Room, 6-8:30 PM

Wednesday April 22

Notabale.TV Party (RSVP at Twitter: @notabletv)
Aventine 582 Washington Street San Francisco

RockYou Party (5:30 to 8pm ) Invite only
Lobby Lounge Bar 888 Intercontinental Hotel San Francisco, CA

AdverCircus 2, Apr. 6pm to Apr 22 9pm
1015 Folsom San Francisco, CA
RSVP here: http://www.mediablackbook.com/

Moss Networks Mixx + Mingle
6pm to 8pm
Infusion Lounge San Francisco
http://www.mossnetworks.com/mix

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Verizon Customer Service: Viral Video of the Day (February 5th)

Today, the FAIL Blog website posted a humorous recording between a Verizon customer and a customer service representatives over a billing issue. As of the the time of this writing (only 8:39 PM of the day of the post), there are over 1,000 comments on the FAIL Blog post, 469k views of the video on YouTube and over 3,900 mentions on other blogs and other websites. And oh, if you type “verizon customer service” on Google, the top 10 search results have two webpages pointing to the video.

The Video is Actually Over Two Years Old

The viral video on Verizon’s customer service has been spreading on the Internet, but rarely is it mentioned when this recording occurred. Indeed, if you see multiple blogs citing this Verizon video you would think the customer service recording was very recent.

George Vaccaro, the man on the Verizon customer service call, actually recorded the call in December 2006!

Lesson for PR, Customer Service and Community Managers: Not only does bad news spread fast, it can have a second or third life spreading around the Internet.

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Last Sunday after brunch, I happened upon a sign in Noe Valley in San Francisco which said “Fuck Mormons” in bright pink (fuchsia?) colors that was a response to the recent Prop 8 Gay Marriage ban that was passed in California.

Click to See URL Referrals for photo (24-36 Hours)

I uploaded the photo to Flickr on Monday. That photo made it to SFist.com (a local website covering San Francisco) and quickly sparked an intense discussion of over 100 comments. In a mere 2-3 hours, it made it to Reddit, Facebook, Stumbleupon and other social media websites quickly generating over 800 visits (as of now, over 1,800 people have viewed the photo).

Click to Google Search Results. Achieved in 3-4 Hours.

What’s also interesting is that SFist became ranked within the top 10 Google search results for “Fuck Mormons” within 3-4 hours of the posting going live. But yet as of today, SFist has fallen off the top ten ranking, with SFCitizen and Reddit’s coverage of the sign in the ten instead.

And by Tuesday, the photo caused enough of a stir that the home owner was interviewed by a local news team from CBS 5, which asked him: “You’ve been following the discussion on SFist. While some comments support you, others are saying, ‘this isn’t going to help.’”

And apparently, some people thought it was photoshopped: “CBS 5 walked the neighborhood in search of the home. There have been concerns the photo might have been photo-shopped, but it does not appear to be the case.”

Yes, I’m kinda Internet famous now, but more important this event does have some interesting social media lessons….

Social Media Lesson

• Social Media travels fast. From a Flickr upload on Monday to a news reporter on Tuesday.
• Context is Everything: SFist editor Brock Keeling took a simple photo and turned it into a political question by posting the photo and asking if the sign was an appropriate response to prop 8. If it was uploaded to Flickr without any such questions, I’m sure news wouldn’t spread as fast (or far).
• Don’t underestimate traffic from “second tier” websites like Reddit, which brought more traffic than all other channels.
• Surprisingly, Facebook didn’t carry as that many visits to the photo as I thought it would, considering the size of Facebook.
• Google ranks news pages very fast, putting SFist within #10 for the “fuck mormon” keyword in 3-4 hours of the blog post going live. Yet at the same time, they got quickly outranked by Reddit and other local blogs covering the event.

Personal Feelings about the Photo

I wasn’t trying to be a citizen journalist or even trying to make a political statement. Additionally, I don’t want to make a political statement on this blog and would like to ask any commenter here to not do so either.

I took the photo because I found it humorous at the time and I’m surprised by the intensity of the discussion stirred by this photo. I hope everyone involved – from the home owners to their neighbors – are doing okay and I hope that photo generated positive discussions on political expression.

In any case, I feel that the photo is not really “mine” per se. Someone, somewhere would have taken the photo eventually and it is likely the same thing that happened to my photo would happen to anyone else’s. Obviously, the “F*ck Mormon” sign was exactly that – a sign – which by definition is made to be noticed by the public. And get noticed by the public it did.

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Google Analytics: Tracking Online and Offline Worlds

For some time now, Google Analytics have offered the ability to track both website visits and television commercial impressions (views), if the commercial was bought via Google.

The graph has always shown a peak of what multi-channel analytics can look like: a single dashboard to see everything from TV commercials to mailed newsletters influences your website traffic and online sales. But TV Impressions v. Website Visits graph also begs the question:

What’s the correlation between TV Commercials and Website Views?

Understanding correlation and causation -essentially, understanding your media mix – is the holy grail and end goal of Multi-Channel Analytics. It’s one thing to track something and say “Gee golly, I can see my radio audience reach and PPC campaign on one sheet!” and it’s another to solve Wanamaker’s question: “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half.”

Solving “How does this offline channel affect my website?”

For very easy graphs like the Google Analytics graphs, the equation is easy for any statistician to derive (yes, marketers need to re-read their college stat books):

• Total Website Visits = ~1.90 * TV Impression + 340,566.1 website visits

And here’s equation applied against my version of the Google Analytics graph:

Not bad, huh? Unfortunately, the real world is different with a lot more variables: multiple marketing channels, geographic differences, seasonality, public relations efforts, multiple cross-channel campaigns and more introduce a host of variables that effect a websites traffic and online sales.

Huge companies like Proctor & Gamble have entire teams dedicated to media mix modeling with some even using something called “agent based modeling” (used by the military) to determine how their massive multi-million dollar and cross-channel marketing campaigns effect sales.

So the question is: how will analytics companies like Omniture and CoreMetrics be able to extend multi-channel marketing tools into solutions that can solve the question:

“What types of marketing campaigns mixes generate the most sales?”

.

NOTES

Where did I get the data?
I carefully recreated the television data based on the 4,444,444 impressions over 30 days and created website data that would fit the Google Analytics graph. See below:

What analysis did I do to get the graph?
A simple linear regression analysis that any Microsoft Excel or TI-83 calculator can do.

How accurate is your analysis?
In real world applications? Probably not very. The equation works if we assume the relationship between the television commercial impressions and website visits is overly simplified: if you get X many commercials impressions, you’ll get Y amount of website visits.

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SMS from Obama Campaign for Opting-In VP Notification Text Message

As you may know, the Obama Campaign this week announced that supporters can sign-up to be the first to know about who Barack Obama’s VP nomination pick is via text messaging. Obama’s campaign has become the defacto case study on use new and emerging media for everything for fund raising, organizing and motivating his supports.

Garrett Graff writes an excellent op-ed piece in the New York Times, “Text the Vote“, on the three central reason’s why the text notification of Obama’s VP pick is more than just a candidate adopting the “latest tech fad”:

• Text Message increases turn out by 4% at $1.56/vote
  “A study conducted during the 2006 elections showed that text-message reminders helped increase turnout among new voters by four percentage points, at a cost of only $1.56 per vote — much cheaper than the $20 or $30 per vote that the offline work of door-to-door canvassing or phone banking costs.”

• New Younger & Minority Voters are Effectively Reached via Text Message
  “For Mr. Obama, who is building his campaign around bringing in new young voters and registering minority voters, there’s no more effective outreach than a text message. Cellphones, which legally can’t be called by pollsters and can’t be reached by campaign “robo-calls,” are the most intimate form of communication technology today.”
• Build a SMS Phone List: VP Pick Notification as the Hook
  “The move should add thousands — and more likely tens or hundreds of thousands — of cellphone numbers to what is already one of the most detailed political databases ever created.”

I’ve never heard of Garrett Graff before, but I’d keep his name in mind when it comes to how emerging media is changing the landscpae of marketing and PR – no matter if it’s for selling a consumer product or helping elect the next president of the United States.

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Conversations image from b_d_solis

Survey after survey have shown how word-of-mouth is a powerful force in helping people form decisions on what to buy or what to think of brands and products. Fresh Chat has list of some of the latest data on word-of-mouth:

• “Recommendations from family and friends trump all other consumer touchpoints when it comes to influencing purchase” (AdAge, April, 2008)
• Consumers trust friends above experts when it comes to product recommendations (65% trust friends, 27% trust experts, 8% trust celebrities). (Yankelovich)

Such trust among friends and connections only has been the basis of the allure of social media and why it is one of the pivotal forces in shaping a brand. But why? Why are anecdotal evidence – like user reviews – so convincing? It’s apparently hardwired into our brains.

Recently, an article in the Scientific American declared that “These anecdotal associations are so powerful that they cause people to ignore contrary evidence”.

The article goes in further to describe brains as more geared towards “belief engines” rather than scientifically-centric:

The reason for this cognitive disconnect is that we have evolved brains that pay attention to anecdotes because false positives (believing there is a connection between A and B when there is not) are usually harmless, whereas false negatives (believing there is no connection between A and B when there is) may take you out of the gene pool. Our brains are belief engines that employ association learning to seek and find patterns. Superstition and belief in magic are millions of years old, whereas science, with its methods of controlling for intervening variables to circumvent false positives, is only a few hundred years old. So it is that any medical huckster promising that A will cure B has only to advertise a handful of successful anecdotes in the form of testimonials.

The article goes on describe beliefs that continue to prove popularity despite like solid scientific evidence: from concerns about vaccines and autism to health benefits of wheatgrass.

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I’ve been busy at ad:tech San Francisco last week, covering sessions for AdTechBlog.com. A great, but slightly taxing experience to write for all of the assigned sessions. I look forward to having the opportunity to do it again next year.

Here’s some of my witting that has been published so far over at the ad:tech blog:

• Mobile Advertising: Does Adidas Show it’s Already Here?
  Showcasing case studies from Transformers, Verizon and a particularly great case study on Adidas’ “Basketball is a Brotherhood” campaign and how mobile helped Adidas’ NBA stars like T-Mac connect with people at a personal level. This was one of my favorite sessions.
• The Modern Agency: We’re Still Trying to Find One
  We’ve been debating the “Modern Agency” for some time. This session, with panelists from Carat to AKQA, shows we know we need a Modern Agency, but it is apparent we still have trouble understanding exactly what that is.
• A Socratic Dialog on Media and Entertainment
  Discussion with people from Martha Stewart Digital, Ogilvy West, CNet and a former Walmart exec on the fracturing of media – from Hulu to Video-on-Demand to podcasting – and how to formulate the right mix of media for your audience.

If anyone has feedback on the articles, please comment on the appropriate page above at AdTechBlog.com.

To everyone that has been twittering and commenting to my articles here at Emergence-Media, thank you for all of your feedback. I’ll be sure to respond to all of them this week. This week is Web 2.0 Expo week, but I’m still feeling exhausted from last week’s ad:tech madness.

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When reading U.S. Senator Barack Obama’s speech on race this month, one particular line caught this marketer’s eye:

And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and YouTube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way. (Emphasis mine)

In Obama’s pivotal election year speech to the American people, Obama not only mention YouTube but does it in the same breath as television. We’ve come along way from when YouTube was just a way for Americans to see clips of shows like Saturday Night Live.

While Social Media is not the end all be all of media, the influence is wide ranging – from the U.S. 2008 elections to the TSA Blog/YouTube Channel to helping organizing mass street protests against FARC in Columbia.

See below for a run down…

Contents:

1. TSA does Blogging and YouTube
2. Facebook helps organize millions of Columbians protests against FARC
3. Churches live stream their services on Ustream.TV

United States Transportation Security Authority

TSA Agent Bob explains why the MacBookAir can cause issues in airports

One of the biggest questions major brands have is “If we start a blog and someone comments something nasty about us, what do we do?” Our response always has been “there will always be someone being negative, but the best thing to do is to address it and be open”.

One major “brand” that has taken the step on sticking its own neck out is the US Transportation Security Authority (TSA), a name many travelers in the US has made synonymous with frustration. Starting last month, the TSA has started their very own blog called “Evolution in Security” in their attempt to address travelers concerns and frustrations.

And what happens when a bad comment arise? Surprisingly, for the most part, most of the comments are left uncensored and brutal. And they also respond to blog postings about the TSA:

1. “Rumor Alert: Conflict of Interest at TSA?”
   This blog post is a response to a blogger at PajamaMedia: “Blogger and pundit Annie Jacobsen published a piece titled, “Top TSA Officials in Cheating Scandal Also Ran Private Consulting Firm” on Saturday, March 15. This piece has been linked to from several blogs and other sites in the past day.”
2. MacBook Air YouTube Response
   There’s been a story circulated by a blogger on how he was missed his flight because his MacBook Air arouse suspicion from TSA agents who didnt believe the MacBook Air was a real computer. TSA did a YouTube response explaining the situation.

Facebook and Mass Protests in Columbia and the World

Source: Paul White/The Associated Press from IHT.com

As reported by IHT in February 2008:

Facebook has helped bring public protest to Colombia, a country with no real history of mass demonstrations.

A young Colombian engineer used the social networking site last week to organize a massive protest against the Revolutionary Armed Forces, known as FARC. On Feb. 4, millions of Colombians marched simultaneously in 27 cities throughout the country and 104 major cities around the world shouting “No more kidnappings! No more lies! No more deaths! No more FARC!”

The Churches are Steaming on the Internet

Beyond politics and government, Social Media is also possibly changing how many people worship. A quick look at the video streaming website Ustream shows over 150 churches using Ustream.TV delivering their Sunday services and sermons live on the Internet. Will the next Billy Graham, the famous TV evangelical preacher, come not from television but on some future version of YouTube? And yes, there is a service called GodTube.

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Among the usual top Delicious articles about twitter and social networks were three adult websites. All seeded by the same account and all had tags added by same users. Going back to what I’ve been talking about the past 2-3 weeks, Social Media Spam is a real problem. Just don’t call it an SEO problem.

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I recently asked the “Twittersphere” on their thoughts on wikis (specifically, I was thinking for use with Emergence-Media). Should I use PBWik or try out WetPaint? I’ve used PBWiki for a long time and belong to over 10 PBwikis, but I was compelled by WetPaint’s refreshing interface. What I didn’t find so refreshing was PBWiki’s initial response to my Twitter:

Now, I’ve met PBWiki folks and they’re good people. But, their simple comment “I would go with PBWiki” completely turned me off. Why?

I had a really bad taste in my mouth for being so directly pitched to by what felt like was a one-to-one person medium. I was expecting not a “pitch” but “customer service”: “What are you looking for in a wiki? Would you like to try our free trial?”

Am I nitpicking? Maybe, and again I love the PBwiki guys so I hate to use them as an example (albeit small example). But, I fear how may other consumers out there could be so easily turned-off by something so small, yet so big.

The ability to deliver context and proper conversation right off the bat is everything and in this one small case, that didnt happen.

The lesson (as best done in humor of Hugh MacLeod):

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Case Study in Crisis Management via Blogging

A few weeks ago, ValleyWag and others brought a story about how some blogger found out that certain Adobe software seemed to secretly send data to Omniture via an obscure looking URL. Of course, anything about company spying took off in a frenzy.

Interestingly, John Nack, Senior PM for Adobe, has been responding to the negative Word-of-Mouth via his blog on the Adobe domain, which is not technically an official Adobe Blog (so the disclaimer says).

However, he’s been the main spokesperson to address the issues and notice how non-PR the titles of the blog post are, e.g. “What’s with Adobe & the shady server name?”

The response to his blog post vary, but are relatively positive and open. Questions: How much did the tone of his blog post helped influenced a more tame and positive response? Would a traditional PR spokesperson be able to help do the same? And how much of John Nack’s blog postings have to be cleared by PR, Marketing or Legal?

• “Adobe and Omniture: Further details“
• “What’s with Adobe & the shady server name?“
• “Adobe ate me baby!!“

PS: And yes, after a 2-3 month hiatus, I’m back on Emergence-Media blogging! Yay!

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Ever wanted to reach Halliburton Employees, 30-65, from Texas?
I’ve been playing around with the Facebook advertisement system, even posting a few ads here and there. The most fun I have right now is using Facebook’s ad targeting tool to mine the demographic data from their user profiles.

A marketer can target users by workplace (ranging from the French Embassy in the US to Exxon-Mobile), countries (over 30 countries representing +39 million users) and interest (”A Clockwork Orange” to Judaism) and other data. For example, I can now target about 40 people who work for Halliburton (They have a Facebook Network?), live in Texas and are from 30-65 years old.

And more then that, I thought it would be interesting to get some high-level demographic data on Facebook in the following areas:

1. Top US Geek Cities and Facebook Users (Geek Cities as defined by Wired Magazine)
2. All Countries Facebook Advertising targets for by Population: From Lebanon to the Dominican Republic
3. US Facebook Users by Age Group: College Age Still Dominates
4. US Facebook Users by Educational Background: 21% are Highschoolers?
5. Largest US Cities and Facebook Users: 20% of Chicagoans on Facebook?
6. Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Ask and Facebook Users: Where are the Ask/IAC people?
7. Microsoft Facebook Users by Age Group: Over 30% over 35 years old
8. Top Software Companies and Facebook Users (Software Companies defined by Fortune)

Top US Geek Cities and Facebook Users (Geek Cities as defined by Wired Magazine)

Note that while the data from Facebook is interesting, one should be cautious about the data:

• Self-reported profile data always has accuracy issues
• Many users do not report their age, workplace, full interests etc
• Just because there are 10,000 Microsoft employees on Facebook does not mean they are active on Facebook.
• Despite Facebook’s stringent policies there are fake and multiple profiles on Facebook

With that said, see more below graphs and data below.

All Countries Facebook Advertising targets for by Population: From Lebanon to the Dominican Republic

US Facebook Users by Age Group: College Age Still Dominates

US Facebook Users by Educational Background: 21% are Highschoolers?

Largest US Cities and Facebook Users: 20% of Chicagoans on Facebook?

Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Ask and Facebook Users: Where are the Ask/IAC people?

Microsoft Facebook Users by Age Group: Over 30% over 35 years old

Top Software Companies and Facebook Users (Software Companies defined by Fortune)

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Last week was a rough week for marketing and PR professionals in the blogosphere. Chris Anderson (Wire/Longtail), David Meerman and Marshall Kirkpatrick (Read/Write, TechCrunch) wrote critical posts to PR folks who are trying to reach out to bloggers. Chris even published a list of emails from PR people he’s blacklisting.

But what are the responsibilities and expectations of PR/Marketing Agencies and Blogggers?

While I am a marketer by profession, I am also a blogger. I’ve received plenty of horrible blog pitches, like the dreaded “Dear Website Owner” emails or even those completely misunderstanding who I am or who I work for. I’m right there beside with Chris, Marshall and others on this.

We bloggers embrace the long tail influence we have over traditional media, but we don’t like being on what looks like a “Press Release spam list”. Marketers and PR folks need to adapt to this. And as Bloggers, we’ll always be caught with horrible “Dear Site Owner” emails every once in while. It just shouldn’t be every blog pitch email.

As someone involved in e-Storm’s Social Media efforts, we spend time reading and targeting each blog we recommend our clients to contact. We build a list of bloggers along with a description of each, plus an “Approach & Messaging Recommendations” document for each blogger. Generally, these documents have to be approved both internally by e-Storm and externally by the client before any blogger outreach happens.

Bloggers: Help Educate us PR/Marketing on How to Do It Right

And to my fellow bloggers out there, instead of just being angry, write back and tell them what you’d prefer. Educate us marketers because in this ever changing Blogosphere, we’re all learning what it means to be a blogger, what is a blogger mindset and how can we reach out to bloggers relevantly.

Marketers and PR folks need to learn that the blogosphere is a community, not a place to send press releases to. Let’s show them by helping them join the community in a relevant and helpful way.

To those rightly annoyed bloggers, point us PR/Marketing flacks to the right direction:

• Emergence Media Blogger Relations Outreach Guidelines
• SHIFT Communications Blogging Guidelines
• Word of Mouth Marketing Association: 10 Principles for Ethical Contact by Marketers

I’ve also set-up a Wiki on Blogger Outreach, which is available here. Feel free to contribute as you wish and save bloggers from poorly targeted PR pitches and help PR/marketers from embarrassing themselves.

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The two businesses we had to do a marketing plan for were for:

• “Open Source” Musician: The musician wanted to recruit and play with other artist virtually via YouTube and Second Life and also promote him/herself purely online.
• Collaboration Service for Carpooling Parents using GoogleMaps: We showed ways how just because you have a web-based software doesn’t meet you cant promote effectively offline: Such as promotions via PTA meetings.

The crowd, while very business savvy, were not necessarily “Web 2.0″ savvy, which was great. We had to answer questions that helped explained why Web 2.0 applies to small business to non high-tech business. Also, in the Q&A sessions, instead of asking us the “difference between Twitter and Pownce“, we were asked what revenue models worked best for online business, what advertising opportunities would be available in 5 years etc. Real Questions.

Overall, it was a spectacular event that had many of us outside our comfort zone and giving us an opportunity to discuss Web 2.0 and Marketing with people outside the usual Web 2.0 San Francisco Bay Area circle.

Thanks to Mitch Posada for organizing the event and inviting me. I hope to return for the follow-up Digital Survivor in December/January.

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Below is a mini PowerPoint on integrating PPC & SEO, drawing from several of my posts. I’ll update this PowerPoint this weekend. I’m pushing this out today as part of a Citizen Agency event, otherwise I would of hold it over until tomorrow.

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Ok, maybe not that well known Survivor show.

This coming Thursday, October 11, I will be a panelist (contestant) at HispanicNet’s “Digital Survivor Challenge”, where I, along with others, will be in a “Digital Survivor” contest to show start-ups and others how to easily set-up “a dynamic business and web presence on the cheap”. I’ll be flexing my Web 2.0 and Social Media that day.

The event will be located at Febwick and West LLP in Mountain View, 6:30 – 9:00. Be There!

Other Contestants:

• Alex Rowland, CEO, CozmoTV.com
• George Revutsky, CEO, ROI.works Search Marketing
• June Dershewitz, VP of Analytics, Semphonic
• Liliana Townsend, TierraNatal.com
• Luis Miguel Ochoa, Stanford University
• Marjorie Kase, President, BloggerReps.com
• Mauricio Perez, Director, Business Development, Ccube.com

HispanicNet Event Information

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Summary: Mayor Gavin Newsom & the Personal Brand

There has been a lot of talk on the need to develop the “Personal Brand” and to help build connections to the audiences, customers or even voters via Social Media.

While there is a lot of theory and experimentation, one great example of this has been the Facebook profile of Gavin Newsom, the Mayor of San Francisco. This posting will breakdown and identify what the folks behind Newsom’s profile have done so well.

Quick Background on Social Media and the Personal Brand

Todd Defren and his SHIFT team have developed some interesting approach to apply Social Media as “connection builder”, such us with their Social Media Press Rooom (plus a must see powerpoint).

On the Personal Brand side, there is are two thought leaders I’ve been following Rohit Bhargava, who has written extensively on it, and Brian Solis who recently wrote on how to approach Facbeook as a “Personal Brand” builder.

Gavin Newsom’s Facebook Profile: Social Media Press Room and Brand Builder

Mayor Gavin Newsom’s Facebook profile, or who we call “Mayor McDreamy” at our office, is the first live example I’ve seen of taking “Facebook as Brand Builder” in a well executed way. While the profile is of Mayor Gavin Newsom, it is positioned as a profile for “Act Locally SF”, which is the official campaign group for Gavin Newsom.
The profile makes it feel very transparent on what Gavin Newsom’s interests and passion are and what he is involved in through simple “Notes” postings, “Group” associations, video, photos – the whole shebang.
At the same time, it is also an active profile: As his friend on Facebook, I’ve seen his status message change at least once a week (e.g. “Gavin Newsom is Proud of San Diego’s Mayor”) and received invites to charity events that he is involved in.

Let’s further break down the components that make the profile work:

Using Groups and “Causes” Application:

• Shows what Gavin Newsom is compassionate about, give a glimpse beyond what he cares about beyond local issues, such as “Doctors without Borders” and “Free the Jena 6″

Using the “Kyte” Application for Video Distribution:

• Use the “Kyte” application, to show videos of Gavin Newsom that also link back to his own video channel on kyte

Using “News” and “Post Items” to Inform the Community

• “Notes” and “Posted Items” acts as fliers on everything from what events Gavin Newsom is attending to job openings/volunteer opportunities

Flickr Photos on what Gavin Newsome has been up to

• This one is pretty self-explanatory

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This terrible LOLNinja image is based on an image from bluman

e-Storm is hiring again! This time we’re looking for a Search Marketing expert to help work with the SEM Team on PPC strategy with our clients and helping the team implement the latest tactics.

You’d be working in our downtown San Francisco office, right near Union Square and the Chinatown Gates. We were one of the first agencies (that is still around) that tried out Overture (remember that?) and AdWords. We’re looking for someone who can push the envelope like the way we’ve always have.

Plus, you’d get to work with me (that’s always a plus) and the rest of the e-Storm SF crew, which includes a known local DJ to one of our AMs who has an impressive furby collection.

If you know anyone that would be interested in working with a kick-ass, business/marketing strategy-orientated, and open office environment, please let them know! Full details can be found at the following location:

• Craigslist San Francisco > Search Engine Marketing PPC Specialist

Feel free to email me directly.

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10 Spock.com Invites

1 ImInLikeWithYou Invite

1 Joost (Watch the Transformers!)

I’ll be handing out these randomly to whomever comments. Of course, I maybe influenced by people linking back to this blog. ;)

Just passing along the invite love!

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Just recently I wrote:

If you’re search engine optimization campaign is targeting Google, then what are you doing about the “searches” on Del.icio.us, Technorati, StumbleUpon, Yelp, Wikipedia, Oodle and even Digg? Maybe those searches are not for the mainstream (yet), but it maybe where the Linkerati, the savvy “Influencers”, go?

Now, Google Universal Search makes us ask: What other channels do we need to optimize in (YouTube, Google Video, Google News) to get on the Google SERPs? A reverse question.

As state by David Wilson:

What GUS does in short is reduces the number of organic listings available on the home page. No longer is getting to the first page of Google good enough. Now you need to be in the top 5 or 6 positions as the rest will be taken by video and news.

Seems like we’re practically on the same page here.

SEO no longer means optimizing only one’s website, or links…it means being active promoting and staying relevant through a variety of channels and mediums. It means distributing your content on YouTube, Yelp, Wikipedia, Press Releases etc.

Google Universal Search really presents no new known challenges of SEO. It just brings the message home: Old SEO is Dead, New SEO is a form of Multi-Channel Content Optimization and Distribution.

It’s all been said before:

1. SEO as Website Positioning Strategy? – Updated
2. Quick Post: Editorialization of Google Results, And the Change in SEO
3. Google’s Personalized Search: How Much Should We Care?

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Aaron Wall of SEOBook has a great write-up on the changing face of Google’s Search Results (SERPs). They now include Vertical-Creeps of its various properties and the integration of Google News into the *organic* listings.

Where does this bring SEO?

Going Beyond Vertical Search Creep

We are now seeing Google pulling information beyond its own vertical search engines with the actual integration of editorial information with Google News *inside* the organic listings.

SEO’s purpose is to optimize Search Engine Listings (SERPs), but how people are getting their information is evolving:

• Google/Yahoo’s main Search Page now includes information from Local Search, Real Estate, Maps, Weather, TV Listings, and Google News (inside Google’s SERPs), Yahoo Answers (Bottom of SERPs in Yahoo), etc.
• Than there is the increasing use of specific communities and content where people are also searching: Yahoo! Travel, TripAdvisor, Yelp, etc.

So again, what does it mean to do SEO? What is the point of doing Local SEO, if you’re local business (or saw local branches) are not listed on Yelp?

How Google and Yahoo are handling search is changing. How people are now using sites like Yelp is also changing. How will SEO Change?

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The recent 2006 and coming 2008 US elections has been heralded as the moment when blogs and social media make their play on election campaigns. Indeed for the 2008 US presidential elections, much has been made regarding John Edward’s involvement with dozens of social networking site, plus web 2.0 sites like Twitter. Additionally, Barack Obama’s website includes its own social networking website.

But the real factor has been on the grassroots level, which the new video on Hillary Clinton is an example of (link of video above). San Francisco Chronical describes the video :

Groundbreaking 74-second pitch for Democratic Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, which remixes the classic “1984″ ad that introduced Apple computers to the world, is not on cable or network TV, but on the Internet.

This video, at the time of this writing, has been viewed over 200,000 times since it was posted on March 5th. This is powerful for a video that was apparently created on a grassroots level by a Barack Obama supporter.

Blogs have been a large political factor for some time, especially with the Little Green Footballs, a conservative news/blog website, which revealed the “Killian documents” forgeries that was in a Dan Rather’s segment in CBS’s “60 Minutes” and helped call attention to the photoshopped forgeries by an Reuters Photographer that exaggerated damage from the 2006 Israeli-Lebanon Conflict. Maybe this time online videos will raise to be the major influencer?

With the 2008 Presidential Elections just getting a start, the “Vote Different”/1984 Hillary video is just one example of how social media will impact the cultural landscape – beyond a marketer’s viral video, college kids on Facebook and Mentos viral videos. The Lesson: While avoiding the whole kool-aid, marketers should could watch to understand social media is more than just viral videos.

PS: Of course with politics being as it is, this video could of been an inside job by the Obama camp, but for the sake of avoiding political speculation we’ll avoid that discussion.

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Making Video Ads Viral. But how about Direct to YouTube Viral?
I’ve been noticing that LinkedIn has been very aggressive in displaying video ads for Cadillac, a film called “Reign Over Me” and Google’s Gmail video. Yet, while being all videos advertisements, they share three very different paths when looking at what the ads link to:

• “Reign Over Me” goes to a horrible Moviefone page with no call to action. What exactly am I supposed to learn or do when I get to this page?
• Cadillac goes to a very slick looking “My Cadillac Story” minisite, with video profiles of famous people that have been changed by Cadillac, and includes the usual “Send to a Friend” links. This is very similar to the Blackberry Pearl minisite.
• The Gmail Google Video is a quirky lo-fi video that links straight to the YouTube webpage for that video.

Cadillac and Gmail both wins points for execution, but the Gmail Team has a very interesting link back to YouTube. And here’s why:

• Familiarity for the Users: This YouTube tie-in brings the user to a website that she/he is very familiar with and most likely has probably played around in, forward clips to friends from, copied and pasted YouTube videos to MySpace, etc.
• Increased Exposure: Instead of having the video siloed on a standalone minisite – say GmailMuppetTheatre.com – the Gmail Team has positioned the video within YouTube itself, where it maybe found by a search on YouTube or because it made it to one of the top viewed videos this month (yep, it did).

This method is not for every client or advertiser. But for those who feel their video has strong “viralbility” and probably has strong attraction for a young adult audience, a YouTube-based Video Ad like Gmail’s should be considered.

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Beyond Mobile 2.0, Here Comes Consoles 2.0
(We’re on the roll with Web, Mobile, Marketing, [Insert Word Here] 2.0s. )
Just as the idea of Mobile 2.0 (the integration of internet with the uniqueness of mobile phones) is picking off, so will the idea of gaming consoles integrating into the internet gain currency.

Recently, Read/Write Web discussed the “55 Piece Mobile Search Tool Kit” that are shaping the mobile landscape along with who are active in providing these particular “mobile tools”. Some of those mentioned include:

• Mobile site builders
• Mobile search engines
• Local sites
• Mobile portals
• Mobile social networks
• Mobile visual search (matching your cell phone camera’s pictures)
• Mobile video search
• Mobile downloads
• Real estate search
• Mobile map apps

Soon, there maybe a need to think of adapting these “tools” to gaming entertainment consoles themselves. The online world is moving to the Consoles too, not just Mobile.

What is the Wii up to on Social Media?

Nintendo’s Wii has seen to movements on territory that is usually found in traditional social media: 1) StumbleUpon Video; and 2) Online Group Polling.

Nintendo’s Wii partnership with StumbleUpon Video creates an interesting integration of TV-based Entertainment Consoles (Wii) and StumbleUpon Video (Social Media Video).
Wii also has a “Everybody Votes Channel” as discussed by lifefilter and TC399, which allows:

• Vote on regional or worldwide polls
• After vote is placed, predict how the majority voted.
• Allow users to submit questions that they would like to be asked

Just like Hot or Not evolved from a online polling website into a social network/dating website, the potential evolution of the “Everybody Votes Channel” can clearly be seen.

Overall, it is way too early to tell, but it will be interesting to see how all of this evolves in 1-3 years.

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Taking a Look at mywaves: A YouTube/iTunes on Your Mobile?

This week I attended presentation on new mobile technology at SF New Tech Meetup, organized by Myles Weissleder and Joel Sacks. There were several mobile technology starts-up presenting: ComVu, mywaves, Pinger, Zypsy, and Veeker. You can read a full description here. It was a very interesting event with very interesting companies presenting with VCs and other mobile tech companies in the audience.

But this post will focus on mywaves, a very interesting company bringing video sharing to mobile phones, letting folks transform video podcasts/mobile videos into mobile video channels with sharing and editing capabilities.
What is mywaves

mywaves is a very young company with a public launch in December last year, yet has a very mature and well-developed interface and with over 17,000 channels of content.

mywaves Capabilities

• YouTube-ish & iTunes-ish in approach:
  Like YouTube user to upload videos and let mywaves figure out the proper video encoding process, and like iTunes you can subscribe to channels easily.
• Users can create a “channel” by uploading their own videos (from mobile or PC) or via RSS feeds.
• Has basic video-editing, allowing you to add pre-rolls, mid-rolls and post-rolls. This allows users to make their own ad-system for their videos or their video channels.
• The web-based interface, Lounge, has a very clean iTunes feel
• No mobile software is required for viewing videos (though there are phone compatibility limitations)
• Currently ~17,000 channels are featured, but more can be added easily via RSS or simply uploading videos to a new channel

Business/Marketing Opportunities

• Online video content provides can shift their videos into mobile, quickly and easily
• Like with YouTube, create sponsored channels for promoting mobile video videos
• Video owner’s control over pre-role, mid-role and post-role function allows quick path to monetization, assuming large amount of subscribe – and that pre/post rolls work :)
• Integrated “Three Screen” Campaigns: TV Screen, Computer Screen and Mobile Screen.
• Become an early entrant into the Mobile Video Viral marketing, with buzz potentially moving far faster than web-based videos like YouTube

While this is a young market and the mobile market is not quite “Mobile 2.0″ despite the buzz, it is interesting to imagine how fast mobile viral videos could spread compared to web videos. People have their phones on them all time.

There are still kinks to work out for sure. When signing-up, I encountered some strange issues and I still have difficulty getting my Blackberry Pearl 8100 working with mywaves properly. However, mywaves looks an ambitious company and one to look out for.
Note: This postings are based on the SF New Tech Meetup notes I have taken. If any of this is inaccurate or should be take down, please shoot me an email and let me know.