Archives for August 2012

August 21, 2012 By Brandsplat Leave a Comment

Progressive PR Problems and the Blogger Who Caused Them

Like so many dissatisfied customers, Matt Fisher took to blogging to air his problems with auto insurance company Progressive last Monday. Yet what has transpired over the last seven days has been a truly unique study in online brand management.

Just over a week ago, Fisher, a comedian by trade, published a blog entitled My Sister Paid Progressive Insurance to Defend Her Killer in Court. Fisher might make his living telling jokes, but based on that title, the subject on Fisher’s chest was no laughing matter. Back in June 2010, Fisher’s sister was killed in a car accident in Baltimore when, according to the blog post, the other driver ran a red light and crashed into his sister’s car. For the last two years, Fisher and his family have battled to get the financial settlement they say Progressive owed his sister. Progressive said they refused to pay out the policy because they didn’t have evidence the accident wasn’t her fault — and even paid the legal representation for the other driver.

Tired of courtroom back and forth, Fisher blogged and opened a branding and PR nightmare. The company’s Facebook page was flooded by angry customers and the television media was quick to side with the Fishers, too. Progressive finally caved and reached an undisclosed financial settlement with the family after the social media backlash late on Thursday.

But some wonder if the damage can be undone. As of yesterday morning, The Wall Street Journal reported that some 1,000 Twitter users and Progressive customers claim to have dumped the insurance company based on Fisher’s story. Social media, while certainly amusing, is no joke and Progressive has learned this the hard way. Fisher’s blog and the subsequent social media outrage have made this story stay around and even gain steam, regardless of the settlement. The smiley, happy veneer of spokeswoman Flo suddenly seems hollow and a brand that promises to protect its customers appears untrustworthy. These are big problems for Progressive that a few tweets and press releases might not fix right away.

August 20, 2012 By Brandsplat Leave a Comment

Blog Like the Big Brands: Kellogg’s

Here’s a blog marketing conundrum for you: How can a brand famous for one line of products use blogging to promote another line of products consumers might not automatically associate with their name? Well, if the brand is Kellogg’s and the goal is promoting its vast empire of non-breakfast snack foods, you do it by turning your blog into a slick, idea-filled magazine.

Snackpicks.com is Kellogg’s solution to the above problem — and pretty good looking one at that. Yes, we all know Kellogg’s as the creators of Snap, Crackle and Pop, Tony the Tiger and other fantastic cereal-related icons. But did you know that Kellogg’s also produces Keebler crackers and cookies, Cheez-Its and a plethora of other popular snack foods? To get consumers to associate the brand with snacking, the company created Snackpicks. This snacktacular blog not only prominently features Kellogg’s products but also gives families ideas, recipes and tips for healthy snacking. Given the time of year, the blog currently features ideas for kid’s lunches and after school snack inspirations. There’s even a blog post about using Rice Krispie Treats to teach fractions.

Sure, Snackpicks tagline is “ideas to snack on” but really the point here is to sell the products by featuring them in a different light, and this blog does that with no problems.

Kellogg’s created a new blog for an emerging part of its company’s business and this is something everybody — from the corner dry cleaners to the attorney’s office in the fancy high rise — can do. Hopefully, our businesses are growing and evolving. So our blogs should change right along with them. What you talked about six months ago in blog posts may not be interesting to your readers today as your company changes. While creating an entirely new blog for a different aspect of your company might be necessary, you can also do easy things like adding special columns or weekly features to talk about new changes, products and services. In the end, readers will come back to corporate blogs that give that something new and something to snack on.

August 17, 2012 By Brandsplat Leave a Comment

Five Things You Might Have Missed!

Some truly miraculous blog writing and energy-efficient Twitter marketing are a couple of the delights we have for you on this week’s list of Five Things You Might Have Missed. So let’s not waste any more time and get right to it!

1.) Hashtags with Power: Skillful and engaging Twitter management is hard to find, so when a brand like General Electric nails it, it’s definitely list-worthy. GE wisely uses conversational hashtags like #TeamHealthy to get people talking. The genius in GE’s hashtaggery lies in the ability to keep the topic broad enough that anybody can participate. GE takes it a step further by responding to tweets and engaging followers to talk to one another.

2.) Does Jared Know About This?: If you missed the anime-style porn on Subway’s Facebook page, you’re not alone. Apparently, so did whoever runs the restaurant’s social media marketing. More than a few followers of the sandwich giant were ticked off this week when images of pornographic anime appeared when users clicked the “Posts by Others” option on its page. Subway says it’s Facebook’s fault for not having stronger filters; Facebook says it’s Subway’s fault for not monitoring its brand’s presence online. We say, don’t worry about it, Subway. I mean, who actually clicks on “Posts by Others” anyway?

3.) Auto Anatomy: Volvo’s X-ray app for iPad got plenty of blog coverage this week so there’s really no need for us to talk about it too… except it’s so darn cool! If you missed it, the app gives a futuristic X-Ray look inside of a Volvo. While not a true X-Ray, the tech is clever enough to get folks talking about the brand and that’s exactly what great apps should do.

4.) Travel Blog Travels Time: Here’s a story that proves that you just never know how your blog will change the lives of others. Travel blog See Columbia helped reader Nicole Kisala reunite with her family after 36 years! By posting Nicole’s story along with photos, the blog was able to reach her family… something private detectives couldn’t accomplish. See Colombia also used Twitter and Facebook to get the word out. The campaign was a success and after four months Nicole’s family was reunited. Hooray for blogging!

5.) Flip n’ Sniff: Lastly, we close out this week’s list with a flipbook that really stinks. No really, it smells like old onions, and that’s exactly what Listerine wanted. This flipbook gives the illusion of a beautiful woman talking and the added odor makes it seem like she has really bad breath. In the back of the book is a coupon for Listerine. Since we’re cheering for things, hooray for good breath! And for engaging ways to hand out product coupons.

August 16, 2012 By Brandsplat Leave a Comment

Will Medium be Major for Bloggers?

We’re always keeping our eyes open for new innovations in blog writing and blog marketing. From plug-ins to new trends, the blogging world has a new talked-about tool almost every week. But new blogging platforms seem to have a tough time sticking around due to the massive stranglehold Blogger and WordPress have over the blogging world. So yesterday we were intrigued when we read about Medium, the new blogging platform from Twitter founders Biz Stone and Evan Williams.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Stone and Williams created Medium as a “new publishing tool, touted as a means to help create and sift through content on an increasingly cluttered Internet.” Medium, which is currently in very exclusive preview stages, is a blogging platform that hopes to inspire lots of photos and longer posts than you’d find on Twitter. “Lots of services have successfully lowered the bar for sharing information, but there’s been less progress toward raising the quality of what’s produced,” Williams tells the WSJ of Medium.

Medium hopes to change the way bloggers organize posts, too. “Collections” on Medium gather like topics together and can be viewed as one set of posts, either publicly or privately. “Look What I Made” is a public collection designed to inspire users to show off their creative blogging skills. Stone and Williams are taking their time developing Medium and have not set an immediate release date.

But will Medium mean anything to blogging for business experts or online marketers? We’re gonna say yes. It’s early in the game, but Stone and Williams can’t ever be counted out; after all, Twitter has transformed the way most companies do PR online. Medium, if developed in the same way, is sure to at least round up tons of followers if only for the curiosity factor.

August 15, 2012 By Dawn Walnoha Leave a Comment

Google+ and Minuses

With Twitter and Facebook marketing, there’s always that question: How effective is this social media stuff, really? Doubt seems to double when talking about other social networks like Pinterest, Tumblr and LinkedIn. But when it comes to social media platforms constantly questioned for their effectiveness, nothing beats Google+. Just barely a year old, Google+ has been simultaneously greeted with applause, disdain and indifference during its short time on the social media radar. A new report released last week shed some serious light on the Google+ topic and, while things don’t look great, they don’t look as bad as we might have thought.

First the good news: According to a new SocialShare report from BrightEdge, brand presence on Google+ continues to grow. Brand superstars like Visa, Hermes and Wells Fargo have all joined Google+ in the past two months. Also, Toyota and H&M have recently passed the 1 million followers benchmark while Red Bull, Mercedes and BMW are all very close to reaching that milestone, as well. The BrightEdge report also showed some serious growth for social integration into searches. Marketwatch.com reports, “More than 30 percent of brands with Google+ pages have these pages show up in search results six times higher than reported in February.”

Now for the bad news: Even though brands are flocking to Google+, less than 30 percent are linking to their respective Google+ pages on their websites. And brand-user engagement is still a big problem for Google+.

“The exponential increase in Google+ pages showing up in search results means consumers are starting to engage with brands more regularly on the platform and vice versa,” said Jim Yu, CEO of BrightEdge. “However there is still much higher adoption on Facebook and Twitter, whose offerings some feel include deeper engagement models which they have built and matured over time, thanks to their earlier start and sustained investment. Brands need to continue to assess and adjust how they leverage all of the social signals to capture the digital engagement and sales they’re looking for.”

The consensus on Google+ marketing seems to be stuck at a solid “wait and see.” Until engagement really clicks with followers, it might be stuck there for a while. But you tell us: Have you had any luck pushing your products on Google+? And do you use the “+” button as much as Facebook’s “like” option?

August 14, 2012 By Brandsplat Leave a Comment

Social Media the Real Winner in 2012 Olympics

Even before the London 2012 Summer Olympics were at the halfway mark, social media experts and marketers had proclaimed the event “the first social media Olympics.” This lofty prediction turned out to be dead-on. From gripes about tape delay and tweets about Gabby Douglas’ hair to rating the physiques of international diving stars and riffing on event advertisements, Twitter and Facebook served as the global hub to cheer, complain and kvetch about all things Olympic.

An article by David Bauder in the Huffington Post illustrates the power of social media over the Olympics games like this: “Twitter estimates there were more than 50 million tweets about the Olympics, at a pace of 80,000 per minute after Jamaica’s Usain Bolt won the gold medal in the 200-meter sprint. Facebook saw the number of fans of Olympic athletes soar: American gymnast Gabby Douglas had 14,358 followers on July 27 and 540,174 less than two weeks later.”

And that is just the tip of the iceberg. For more than 20 days in a row, most of the top Twitter trends were Olympics-related and Twitter became the instant news breaker for stories developing from London. Twitter’s “Trending Event” tag was also introduced to instantly inform users of an Olympic topic currently generating tweets. On Facebook, friends used the social media platform as a way to celebrate/commiserate wins and losses of their favorite athletes. Naturally, brands got a lot out of the social media-Olympic synergy, too. Sponsors like Adidas and McDonald’s used Twitter and Facebook to give inside Olympic scoop while pushing products. Non-sponsors got in on the conversation while cleverly chatted about the games — without breaking any of IOC’s strict branding laws, of course.

As social media evolves into a platform dedicated to sharing information and thoughts on what’s happening right now, events like the Olympics are a hotbed for engagement from both brands and individuals alike. Readers, did you tweet your way through this year’s Olympic Games, did you watch old-fashioned style or did the heavily-branded event turn you off completely? Give us some gold-medal quips and pearls of wisdom in the comments section below!

August 13, 2012 By Brandsplat Leave a Comment

Blog Like the Big Brands: Target

Blogging for business can be tricky if your company has a definitive style and unique language. It takes precision and experience to get blogs to have the same feel and flavor as the rest of your branding. This week, we take a look at Target’s Pulse blog to see how to make our blogs look and sound as awesome as the rest of our branding.

Target’s bulls-eye and its pop art style commercials and print ads are immediately recognizable. Fans of the superstore are enthusiastic, protective and hyper critical the minute they sense something is out of place. As a company, Target has tried to become more transparent after a series of controversial political affiliations became public a couple of years ago. Today, Target is back to being the stylish, conscious store consumers love while promoting a more self-aware and open image.

And what better way to get to know Target, inside and out, than from the people who work there? We’ve talked about the benefits of having employee bloggers before in these pages and Target’s blog takes this idea and runs with it. The Target Pulse Blog is, according to its tagline, boldly “following the daily beat of daily life at Target.” The blog’s look matches the rest of Target’s branding: modern, chic and peppered with the brand’s signature colors of red and white. Much like a traditional newspaper, readers can see the most recent posts from employees on the front page without having to scroll their fingers off. Also, the blog is cleverly organized by contributor. Blogs written by interns, blogs written by a Target apparel buyer, blogs from a store logistics leader and so on are all grouped to give visitors to the blog a variety of Target employee perspectives. Pulse looks great, but the content is what really shines.

There’s a variety of things small business bloggers can swipe from Target. From on-trend layout ideas to using blogging as a way to give your enthusiastic employees the chance to talk about the company, Pulse is chock full of great ideas. Yet the main thing we think businesses should take away from Target is the idea that a fabulous looking blog can also be a great read. Once you’ve picked a chic blog theme, the real work begins in terms of making the content as memorable and compelling as the design elements of your blog. In short, don’t spend a bunch of time or money on making your company blog look terrific if you’re not going to fill it with all kinds interesting posts, great photos and the latest company news.

August 10, 2012 By Brandsplat 1 Comment

Five Things You Might Have Missed

Sorry, Florence. The dogs days of summer are far from over. But hopefully our weekly, breezy roundup of online marketing news will refresh you!

1.) The Babymaker: Topping the list this week is this viral video from Singapore for Mentos. National Night, which happens on August 9th, encourages citizens of the small country to do their part to help the country’s low birthrate. So desperate for a new generation, the government in Singapore is even giving away financial incentives to new parents! Mentos is pitching in with this funny, cheesy R&B music video. Head scratching, hilarious and wildly straightforward, this is viral marketing on a totally different level.

2.) Fake Friends: This week, people couldn’t stop talking about people who don’t exist. A new study from the struggling social media giant claims that 83 million Facebook accounts are fake. While social media marketing gurus see the millions of phonies as a big red flag, Facebook is not taking the numbers lightly. The company issued a warning that b.s. Facebook accounts will be disabled and the creators of those accounts won’t be allowed back on the site.

3.) Hot or Just a Hot Mess: We haven’t had a good controversial blogger story in some time, so if you missed WSJ’s piece on Cat Marnell, we’ve got it for you. Marnell is a former beauty blogger turned blogger for Vice Magazine who now writes about her adventures as a drug addict. Marnell claims to be on the way to taking the literary world by storm while others say she’s a cheap imitation of a New York party girl. Whatever Marnell’s real story is, blog writing has never been a more powerful platform for launching talked-about personalities as it is right now.

4.) Corporate Cattiness: While all of these rivalries at the Olympics are keeping the masses riveted, most of us missed the serious smack down brewing between Samsung and Apple in a major lawsuit revolving around patent issues. Apple says Samsung directly ripped off ideas and technologies behind its hit products like the iPhone and iPad. Samsung denies the accusations — and bloggers are eating up the daily courtroom happenings with a spoon. Only time will tell what the financial fallout will be from this branding battle royale, but for now, it’s the best legal drama we’ve seen since LA Law.

5.) Tag, You’re It: Closing out our list this week is an awesome game from Expedia Australia and New Zealand. Tag Me if You Can sends famed Aussie surfer Nathan Jolliffe around the globe while followers try to guess where he is and correctly tag the travel videos. Players get more points if they share the game with Twitter and Facebook followers.

Archives for August 2012

Blog Like the Big Brands: Kellogg’s

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Five Things You Might Have Missed!

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Will Medium be Major for Bloggers?

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Blog Like the Big Brands: Target

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