My New Social Media (Wedding) Plan
Posted by: brandi111 on: November 3, 2009
How the proposal happened!
I got engaged.
Afterwards, we spent a lot of time calling everyone special in our lives. It took a while. The funny thing: one of the first questions a friend asked me was: Did you Tweet about the engagement yet?
Yes, I guess my friends know me – I love social media. I had friends congratulating me on my engagement before I even posted anything—and when I did post it, the response was overwhelming! But my focus has shifted from spending hours on social media to spending that time checking out various wedding websites, gathering ideas and trying to figure out how we envision our ‘big day.’ The time I used to spend reading my favorite blogs, brushing up on the latest social media trends, and connecting with everyone on my social networks has decreased significantly.
Last night, I got a bright idea – why not mix these two activities? Why not use these social networks to help get ideas, references and advice on all things wedding? And so it begins…
What’s your favorite online wedding planning resource?
Anyone have any ideas on creating a low budget, casual beach wedding?
Where can I find great beach house rentals in Florida? (I want a beach wedding…☺)
Social Media Cupcakes
Posted by: brandi111 on: August 28, 2009
I have a presentation for my company tomorrow on Social Media. It’s a Lunch and Learn, so I figured I could at least provide dessert. Behold, social media cupcakes!
I came up with this idea initially and wasn’t sure if it would actually come to fruition. Some may call it being bored, but I call it being inspired by awesome social media entrepreneurs like @foiledcupcakes. I decided to spend my Thursday night baking up a storm and creating banana and chocolate fudge cupcakes topped with Twitter, Facebook and Yammer icons made out of Lorna Doone cookies and icing.
I decided to share my masterpiece with you – enjoy!
Ingredients: Cake Mix + ingredients, white icing, Lorna Doone 100 Cal packs, blue cookie icing.
How-to: Bake the cupcakes per the cake mix package directions. Put blue cookie icing on the backside of the mini Lorna Doone Cookies and let set. Put a spoonful of white icing into a ziplock bag and poke a very small hole in one of the corners. I practiced creating the letters for a while before I actually started to pipe them onto the cookies. Lastly, I iced each cupcake with the white icing and put an iced cookie on top. Voila!
The Ingredients
Creating the Icons
Assembling the Cupcakes
Yummy Social Media Cupcakes!
Whole Foods Dives Into the Social Media Deep End
Posted by: brandi111 on: July 31, 2009
This post appeared on VitaminIMC – Medill IMC’s student-run blog.
While some companies are slowly dipping their toes into the social media waters, Whole Foods Market has dove in! Over the past eight months, Whole Foods’ social media presence has grown from corporate accounts to over 120 Twitter profiles and 97 Facebook pages.
Whole Foods is often cited as a social media success, but the details of its amazing tactics are what make them unique – taking a completely decentralized approach to their social media strategy. They have taken the close interaction between Whole Foods employees and consumers, along with team member empowerment and applied it to their social media strategy to create local relationships. This grassroots approach has fueled the explosion of their social media presence while supporting their corporate values system.
Their social media accounts range from umbrella corporate accounts to individual accounts for store locations. There are accounts that cover the many locations for metro-areas (think @WholeFoodsCHI) and topic-specific accounts discussing such topics as wine or cheese. They even created a social media presence around their participation at Bonnaroo.
Some may criticize such a fragmented approach to their social media, but Whole Foods learned from their experiences with their corporate social media accounts and expanded to fit their customer’s needs. They started to see that customers had very specific questions about local stores and quickly adapted, adding social media into the local marketing mix. Liz Bootz, the marketing team leader for Whole Foods Oakland, provides support to customers on Twitter. “One of the things I like best about being on Twitter is if a customer has a question, I can tweet the answer to them and provide that information to 200 other customers at the same time,” she said.
Other companies should follow their lead and apply unique company culture traits to social media, taking a personal and on-brand approach to their online presence. Their responsive, customer-centric method has seemed to work judging by the numbers. Whole Foods Twitter accounts recently reached one million followers.
Nike+ is on Facebook & Twitter
Posted by: brandi111 on: June 25, 2009
If you’ve read my previous post, I’m a big fan of Nike+ and the way Nike is creating a social community with their website. It gets better: I found Nike+ applications for Twitter and Facebook!
I’ve been using the Twitter application for some time now. It’s really easy to set up. Just visit www.twiike.com and follow the instructions. Every time you sync a run, it will automatically generate a Twitter post for you. It also uses the #nikeplus hashtag, so you can find other people who are syncing runs and connect with them.
Nike+ status update on Twitter
I just set up the Facebook application, so I haven’t had as much experience with it. I turned off my status updates, but it still posts my run to my profile. Search for ‘Nike+ Running Monitor’ within facebook, and follow the instruction on adding the application. This process has a few more steps and is a little more confusing that the Twitter app, but it’s still worth the effort.
Nike+ update on Facebook
Since my Twitter and Facebook profiles have pretty different audiences, I’m excited to see the new feedback I’ll be receiving. This adds to the community of runners nicely. Now, not only can Nike+ users see how my running is going on the Nike website, but I constantly have people offering encouragement and kudos. It really adds to my accountability to run, too.
Think of Nike+ social networks like the angel on your shoulder saying “everyone’s going to know if you stop running, keep it up!”
You can find me on Vitamin IMC
Posted by: brandi111 on: June 9, 2009
- In: Grad School
- 1 Comment
The essential nutrient for healthy marketers
A month or so ago, I was approached about possibly doing some student blogging for my graduate program. Well, it’s official, my post Skittles: Bite-Sized Attempt at Social Media is up! I have begun my blogging with Vitamin IMC, the student-run blog from Medill’s Integrated Marketing Communications Program at Northwestern University.
I’m looking forward to covering current business trends and stories from the IMC perspective. I’m also enjoying an intelligent and fun group that I can learn, discuss and explore blogging and social media – and attend all the fun events in the Chicago-area.
You can view the Vitamin IMC Blog at http://vitaminimc.blogspot.com, follow us on Twitter @VitaminIMC, or become a fan on Facebook.
The 80/20 Rule & Social Media
Posted by: brandi111 on: May 27, 2009
The 80/20 rule, or the Pareto Principle, states that 80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes. In Marketing, it’s often applied to your Target Market – focusing 80% of your efforts on cultivating your top 20% of prospects and customers. After all, they’re the ones generating 80% of your revenues.
After reading some interesting articles on this concept, I found the 80/20 rule applies in so many other applications, especially social media. How you may ask?
1) Spend 80% of your time on business and 20% of the time on personal communications: Think of it this way – would you want your current or prospective clients to see it – or your mom? While no one wants to look at robot-like output that’s all business all the time, it’s important to keep a certain level of professionalism in your social media ventures. But be sure to add a little bit of personal flavor into your social media applications so your audience can connect with you, build a relationship, and know you’re human!
2) Spend 80% of your time on 20% of the social media outlets: You can’t be everywhere at once. Just as you know you should focus on the top 20% of your customers, you should apply this rule to the plethora of social media applications out today. Focus your time on the top social media platforms that you can use in your business, building your personal brand, or in social networking. By focusing, you will be able to build quality relationships rather than a whole bunch of useless connections.
3) Focus 80% of your social media presence on the top 20% of your audience: Spend a majority of your time engaging and interacting with your top readers, commentors and fans. Take time to examine what they are reading and writing about, and use this as a guidepost as you plan your future commentary. Focus your blog posts, tweets, comments etc on those top people.
It’s not to say you need to start a tally sheet with your commentary. The 80/20 rule is simply a guideline to allow you to take a step back and examine the way you are engaging with others via social media. Are there time suckers? Don’t be afraid to let them go.
Other interesting articles on this subject:
The 80/20 Rule and Social Media by @larrybrauner
The 80/20 Rule of Effort
LinkedIn for Non Job Seekers
Posted by: brandi111 on: May 16, 2009
LinkedIn can be a great tool for job seekers. Articles and job-seeking strategies that leverage LinkedIn are constantly popping up. But what about those who are generally happy with their job? What’s in it for them?
I’ve been on LinkedIn for a few years, yet I’ve never used it to find a job. I have a decent network of people from and have fully filled out my profile. So now what? What’s in it for me?
The other day, I made an update to my status letting everyone know what I’m working on (a campaign about the federal stimulus funding). Out of the blue, I received a message from a previous manager, along with a recommendation. How cool is that? It got me to thinking about what LinkedIn is all about.
It’s about building your personal brand: This is all about you, but professionally. Sure you may be on Twitter or Facebook, but this page is all about your professional life. It’s you resume that goes along with the personality and insights you provide through all of your other mediums.
It’s about staying networked with people you’ve come in contact with: I just got back from a conference with a pile of business cards. I debated what to do with them – should I write descriptive notes on the back of the cards with what they do, what they look like, what we talked about? Seemed like a lot of work – then I got the bright idea of adding them on LinkedIn! Problem solved. All but one of the contacts were on LinkedIn.
It’s about joining groups: Keep the conversation going. You can get a lot of information from being a part of the LinkedIn groups, and provide a lot of information too! By responding to requests for advice and weighing in on subjects, you’re building your network even further. Even if you aren’t directly connected, you are getting in front of people with the same interests as you. Plus, when you need advice you’ll have a group of people who will return the favor.
It gives you an excuse to ASK for recommendations: Who thought asking for recommendations was ever going to be easy? And once you received one, be it for admission to college or for a new job, you never got use out of it again. With the LinkedIn recommendations, they’re there for the long haul. Next time someone thanks you and says they owe you one, simply ask for a LinkedIn recommendation to go with that beer!
It gives you a chance to give kudos to those that deserve it: If you work with someone great, tell everyone about it. Wouldn’t you want them to do it for you?
It gives you a network, ‘just in case’: You never know when you will need to tap into your networking resources on LinkedIn. With the economy down and the unemployment rate up, LinkedIn and other social media networking strategies are critical.
The Best & Worst of Twitter Auto-DMs
Posted by: brandi111 on: May 1, 2009
Twitter messages with ’secret’ ways to ‘make money fast’ and get ‘thousands of followers’ make me want to unfollow… What’s worse than those spammy messages? Getting an automated ‘Thank you for following me’ message with the same content. What a horrible first impression!
I’m on the fence on automated direct messages on Twitter. As a marketer, I understand the importance of welcoming your new follower, and how these welcome messages can help drive traffic to your website, blog, offer, etc. So I set out (with help from some awesome Tweeps) to find the best and worst of the auto-DMs we’ve received with hopes to shed some light on how to do DMs ‘right’. Author’s identities have been protested to save them from public Twitter humiliation.
Auto-DM Don’ts:
- DON’T cover up a good cause or message with a SPAM-like offer: Here’s a message I got that I completely ignored:
Save approx. $1000/yr and save earth at the same time, learn better energy source-http://websiteaddress.com
This is a great cause – saving the earth! Starting with money-savings instantly makes you glaze over in anti-spam mode. - DON’T be too good to be true: Sure, maybe it’s possible. You always hear the stories.
But if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is! - DON’T send duplicate welcome messages: Hmm… Spam?
- DON’T send messages that alienate your audience: An email industry expert sent me this DM he received: Thanks for the Follow! Let me know if you have any questions about email marketing. Ironic, right? He got a kick out of it. Think about your audience, and don’t alienate other ‘experts’ in your field – you’ll want to make connections with them!
Lessons learned: Proofread your message before you post it. Ask someone’s opinion. Then ask someone else. Don’t offer something that seems too good to be true. Would you want to receive that message? Would you click through? TEST your Auto-DMs to ensure it isn’t broken.
Auto-DM Do’s:
- DO make it about your follower: It’s all about them. Make your message be follower-centric.
- DO ask a question DO ask people to Tweet you: Start the conversation right away. That’s what Twitter is all about! @SloanInnovation Hey Thanks for the follow! How did you get such a great list of followers?
- DO show some personality: Let them know something about you through showing your humor, friendliness, or that you like to have FUN! @carvideoguy Hi there, Twitter Is Designed To Be A Big Party, Lets Have Fun, Enjoy My Quotations
- DO tell people what they are clicking on: Do you really want to click on a condensed URL if you don’t know what’s behind it? It only takes one dirty link from someone else to teach your followers NOT to click on your undescribed link. Let them know what they get when they click through. @CustomerMgmt IQ Thanks for the follow! Check out http://tinyurl.com/dcmqsg for more info on Customer Service, Mgmt, Call Centers & more
Lessons learned: Just as in business, it’s all about the customer! No one really wants to hear about you. They want to hear what’s in it for them. What is following YOU going to help THEM with? Don’t worry about having a URL or link in the auto-DM – if your message is done right, they will click on your profile to find out more about you and click on your website link on there.
So, I still haven’t set up my auto-DM – have you? Let me know what it is! I am open to suggestions.
Special thanks to @danpereira!
