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November 5, 2009 By splatter Leave a Comment

Chic-Fil-A cows cross two-way street causing traffic jam.

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During the yesteryears of the dot com craze, companies scrambled to get branded websites up more from herd mentality than from fully understanding why they needed one. For most companies at the time, websites were mostly used as a platform to broadcast their marketing communications to potential customers and brand evangelists. Today, there has been a tectonic shift away from broadcasting out to the consumer to inviting them in and allowing for them to play an significant role in branding and marketing efforts. We’re seeing a shift from the one-way communication model where brands blare out messaging to consumers (think old disruption-based media like television, outdoor, print etc.) to the two-way conversation model (think opt-in social networking, user generated content, blogging, etc.) where advertising and communication are taking place in real time.

One such company that has embraced this model and has transformed the way they communicate is Chik-Fil-A. For those of you who don’t know, Chic-Fil-A is famous for their “Eat more Chikin” campaign delivered by cows who started a quest to convince humans to choose chicken over beef. The humorous campaign started in 1995 and slowly has successfully integrated the two-way stance on communications. While the company has not abandoned traditional media, they have beefed up (sorry about the pun) their online media with a bevy of new outlets that enable their customers to take part in their marketing and communications. And they’re at it again. Along with a healthy Facebook and Twitter presence, Chic-Fil-A recently launched a microsite (EatMoreChikin.com) which, according to clickz,

“…is the latest attempt by the restaurant chain to turn its cows — well-known from TV commercials — into viral marketing thoroughbreds. Its launch follows the company’s successful build-up of one of the biggest Facebook presences in the restaurant niche.

Are you already a fan of the cows? Then you’re in for a treat this holiday season because according to a recent PRNewswire release, Chic-Fil-A is offering the coveted 2010 edition of their annual cow-themed calendar featuring spoofs on famous works of literature to discourage burger-eating throughout the country. Titles include: Ali Barbacue, Porter Pan, Jack the Flipper and The Three Brisketeers among others. You can pick yours up for six bucks at participating restaurants or you can order online. It’s a nice offering that makes for a great stocking stuffer. Hey, chalk one up for old media.

Filed Under: Brand Engagement, Digital Engagement, Facebook Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Twitter Marketing Tagged With: Chic-Fil-A, Clickz, eatmorechikin.com, New Media, Old Media, PRNewswire

October 27, 2009 By splatter Leave a Comment

Content: Cheap, fast and good enough. Pick three.

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I am in the business of creating high-quality content for companies in order to help them drive qualified leads, establish an online brand footprint and to increase search engine rankings. The competition for content providers is enormous. In a recent Wired Magazine Article titled “The Answer Factory: Fast, Disposable, and Profitable as Hell‘”writer Daniel Roth (daniel_roth [at] wired [dot] com)  uncovers the fast-paced world of cheap content creation by publisher Demand Media. To put it in perspective,

“By next summer, according to founder and CEO Richard Rosenblatt, Demand will be publishing 1 million items a month, the equivalent of four English-language Wikipedias a year.

Streaming video is about to go for overload. But there may be even more competition on the way. In a related post , clickz reports that AOL may be getting into the act. There goes the neighborhood.

Filed Under: Article Marketing, Video Content Tagged With: Clickz, Demand Media, Wired Magazine

September 16, 2009 By splatter Leave a Comment

Woody wants to meat you.

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TGI Friday’s restaurants launched what could possibly be the first ever character-driven campaign crafted exclusively for Facebook. They also may be the first ever brand to hit their goals way ahead of schedule, prompting them to scramble and add an additional mound of give-aways to their already successful promotion. The combo of a promotion and social media is fast-becoming a way to instantly build a fan base at lightening speed. In a July 2009 post, I wrote about the hugely successful promotional give-away by Moonfruit, a website building company that gave away free Macbook Pro laptops. Now restaurants are getting into the act by giving away free food. Early in September, TGI Friday’s aired a YouTube video by a fictitious character named Woody. In the video, Woody claims to have made a bet with TGI Friday’s. Woody claimed that if he could deliver half a million fans on his Facebook page by Sept. 30th, “you get free burgers”. The campaign initially intended to give away half a million coupons good for a free Jack Daniel’s burger or Jack Daniel’s chicken sandwich redeemable at TGI Friday’s. However, when the campaign surpassed it’s goals in just 11 days, and with television commercials just starting to air, Woody fans cried like little babies. Not wanting to disappoint, an additional 500,000 burgers were added to the deal.

But if you haven’t already registered with an email address at Woody’s official Facebook page, you better git while the gitten’s good because the meat is going fast. Whether you like character-driven advertising or not, you have to give Publicis New York, the ad agency that helped create the campaign, some serious props for getting people to sign up in droves and so quickly. According to an article on clickz.com,

“the brand now has a presence with 900,000 consumers on the social media site. And there are still two weeks of ads and 300,000 free burgers to go.”

While some character-driven campaigns can be cheesy, the Woody character is a somewhat lovable goof ball, so you end up liking the kid. If you go on his Facebook page, the use of puns is so blatant, it makes you laugh. At least i did.  While I was fully aware that I was being advertised to, I let my guard down and ended up considering a trip down to my local TGI Friday’s. I think it’s good stuff. Especially if you like meat.

Filed Under: Social Media Marketing Tagged With: Clickz, facebook, give-away, moonfruit, Number One Fan Woody, promotion, Social Media, Social Media Marketing, TGI Friday's, YouTube

September 1, 2009 By splatter Leave a Comment

You got your digital in my print.

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Contrary to the phrase coined by Marshall McLuhan in the 1960’s, the medium is no longer the message. Take print for example, the once holy grail of advertisers is once again becoming a vehicle to deliver advertising to the masses but not in the form of ink. According to The Gaurdian,  Entertainment Weekly magazine is about to debut two video-in-print advertisements in the September issue of the publication for subscribers in the Los Angeles and New York areas. These auto-play videos will come in the form of tiny cell screens that will display short clips when the magazine is open to that page; similar to greeting cards that play a tune when you open them. Advertisers CBS and Pepsi will promote various products in the micro-video ads and are hoping to target their messages to people who enjoy getting their entertainment information from print. But are they going too far? Clearly the novelty of the medium can be a good thing and to be honest, I can’t wait to get my issue in the mail. But the message in these videos had better be pretty entertaining for readers like me not to get annoyed that advertisers snuck in a video in their favorite magazine. Recently I had the pleasure of going to AMC theaters to watch “Inglorious Basterds” and was not shocked to see television commercials being played before the movie previews. The first one was for Starburst and I have to admit, it was entertaining and funny, so I gave them a hearty thumbs up. The next two were pretty lame, which led me to direct my displeasure at both AMC and the advertisers. I say if you’re going to shove advertisements in front of unsuspecting faces, you’d better at least give your audience something more than a sales pitch. But I suspect that television commercials running before movie trailers will become the norm unless people start to complain about them, or ignore them. In regard to the micro-videos, Clickz says this may be a moment in history akin to the old VW lemon ad that supposedly marked a change in how advertising agencies got their message across to the masses. According to Clickz,  “We can start sprinkling interactive experiences all over the place.” I say, please don’t! We already have enough “sprinkling” of advertising out there. In fact, so much so sometimes I even step in it. Outdoor media companies like Clearchannel and CBS have a networks of digital billboards all over Los Angeles. Drivers and pedestrians rubberneck to see the scrolling ads that flash full color messages even in the light of day. Digital billboards are not new, but they are novel. Now, you can expect to see a proliferation of next-generation media coming at a (fill in the blank) near you. Will this mark a new era of in-your-face advertising? Or will it be accepted as the norm as advertisers continue to find innovative ways to get advertising messages in front of you? I believe it will depend not on the vehicles (billboards, in-print videos, etc.) but on how entertaining or interesting the ads are and if viewers get some kind of value out of them. Will advertisers give viewers something to ignore, or will they offer up something of interest? If advertisers want to continue their conquest of innovative media, I would suggest they focus on the latter.

Filed Under: Video Content, Viral Marketing Tagged With: AMC Theaters, CBS, Clearchannel, Clickz, Entertainment Weekly, in-your-face advertising, Inglorious Basterds, Marshall McLuhan, Pepsi, print advertising, Starburts, The Gaurdian, The Medium is the message, video-in-print, Volkswagen, VW

BRANDSPLAT creates articles, blogs, social media, and all written content in the voice of your brand. Our clients include entrepreneurs, personalities, mid-size companies, and some of the world's biggest brands.

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