Trying before Buying

With virtual reality usage and advertisement expanding at an unprecedented rate, companies are now developing technology that allows users to "experience" their products and services before clicking the purchase button.  The travel giant Expedia is working with and developing VR products to help users examine their hotel room, cruise, or other travel booking in closer detail than ever before.  This technology will change the booking game as users can even interact with the experience in ways like sliding doors and stepping onto balconies.  Through this technology, Expedia is flexing its muscles in innovation with >$1 billion in technology investments last year alone.  It will be intriguing going forward to see how much of an effect that VR will have on our travel booking decisions.

The Future of Job Applications?

Recently, McDonald's in Australia launched "Snaplications", a Snapchat filter showing the user wearing an employee uniform.  After the user sends the snap to the McDonald's account, they are redirected to a link to fill out a more complete application.  Since attitude and enthusiasm are crucial for a first-time employment opportunity like McDonald's, this quick snapshot allows the stores to gather a first impression from a fun photo versus a dry resume.

I think that this technology has an opportunity to revolutionize the entry-level employment process but certainly has its limits.  An entire application shouldn't be based off of a simple photo but it also offers the candidate a chance to put a face to their resume and highlight the personality that they can bring to the job.

How Social Media Is Helping Somalia

After French social media star Jerome Jarre watched a video of a young Somalian girl die from dehydration, he felt compelled to use his popularity as a way to grow awareness about the issue of malnourished and dehydrated people in Somalia.  Learning that Turkish Airlines is the only commercial airline that flies to Somalia, he quickly created a campaign centered around sending an entire cargo plane donated by Turkish Airlines full of donated items to the Somalian people.  He launched the campaign with the hashtag: #TurkishAirlinesHelpSomalia and the campaign started to attract the help and support of other celebrities.

Ben Stiller and Colin Kaepernick offered their support for the campaign and donated their own money to help the cause.  They formed a crowd-funding campaign on GoFundMe called "Love Army for Somalia" and it's managed to raise nearly $2.2 million in just 5 days.  On 3/17, Turkish Airlines committed to the flight donation and to allow the group to ship food on all Somalian flights until the end of the famine.

This campaign shows the power of social media and its ability to bring awareness to a cause that was previously unheard of.  What started as a few people looking to make a difference turned into a multi-million dollar relief effort in order to bring aid to a struggling nation.

Snapchat Spectacles

With a successful IPO, Snapchat is lighting up the Internet in more ways than one with its recent widespread release of "Snapchat Spectacles", a pair of sunglasses that can take snapchat photos and videos.  The sunglasses were actually released in late 2016 in extremely limited availability, appealing to first adopter consumers.  Retailing at $130, the spectacles were found in Snapbots, special vending machines.  However, the Snapbots constantly changed location and it became a challenge to find the product.

On February 20, Snapchat began selling the spectacles online in order to make the product more available to consumers.  They are fairly customizable, and the length and prescription can carefully be adjusted by an optician.  Snapchat is looking to make a larger footprint in a increasingly digital world, and bringing their technology outside of the cell phone realm is a great step in that direction.

Stock Photos Put a Damper on Lithuania's Tourism Campaign

Recently, Lithuania's Tourism Department launched the "Real is Beautiful" campaign in order to showcase the beauty of the country to prospective tourists.  Unfortunately, some of the photos of scenery used in the campaign were stock images taken in other countries like Norway, Finland, and Slovakia.

This controversy has caused the head of the Tourism Department, Jurgita Kazlauskiene, to resign from her position.  After the nearly $150,000 bid for the project of two agencies was accepted, a competing company soon noticed that more than half of the 700 photos needed for the campaign were not unique photos.  These photos turned out to have been bought inexpensively from sources such as Shutterstock.

The Tourism Department defended their actions, noting that they didn't object to the use of generalized photos and that they had allowed the contractors the use of stock photos to complete the campaign.  One contractor additionally stated that the location of the photos plays no role and identification is nearly impossible.  This fiasco shows the importance of honesty in social media marketing.  While using stock photos is much easier and cheaper than unique photos, it is more important to uphold the values of the campaign (ironically, "real is beautiful") and avoid a PR nightmare that the agencies, Tourism Department, and Lithuania are currently experiencing.

NBA and Social Media Conduct

Recently, the NBA sent a memo about social media usage to every team in its league.  Among other things, the league wants to put an end to teams mocking or making fun of each other on social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.  This surprisingly authentic memo was openly mocked and ridiculed by the media, teams in the NBA, and even teams in other leagues like the NHL.

While the NBA has every right to encourage the use of positive social media for the teams in the league, competition and passion are two of the many factors that draw viewers and fans to the sport. I follow a variety of team accounts (even for teams I don't cheer for) on social media because their posts are engaging and even humorous.  Light-hearted trash talking between social media coordinators is far from the most pressing issue facing the sport of professional basketball in this country, and the silliness of the NBA's memo is being seen through sarcastic tweets like the messages above.

Super Bowl Success with Avocados from Mexico (AFM)

With dozens of brands competing in the Super Bowl each year with short, multi-million dollar advertisements designed to outshine the rest, one of the newest entrants to the Super Bowl advertising space managed to blow away the competition.  Avocados from Mexico ranked 2nd in digital engagement among all brands based on impressions from the first two years of campaigns, and last year's Super Bowl campaign obtained 133,000 social mentions with a staggering 828,000,000 impressions.  However, this year's Super Bowl digital campaign has already delivered over two billion impressions and has many wondering how a smaller brand and budget has managed to maneuver into the social media conversation.\

One of the biggest keys to their success is the focus on their KPIs (key performance indicators). AFM's biggest KPIs are views of the Super Bowl commercial across all platforms (online, mobile, and live) and dominating the social conversation.  With all the clutter that occurs on social media during premiere events, AFM works to focus on the KPIs and help users participate in the conversation.  Another important factor for their success is overthinking.  The digital team constantly held sessions where the user's journey is analyzed and they worked to make interaction and participation as simple as possible, through the use of tools like an app interface.  Finally, AFM worked to humanize the experience as much as possible.  They relied on influencer marketing, including 100,000 brand ambassadors, to provide numerous avenues of engagement in the days leading up to the Super Bowl and the day of the game itself.  AFM proves that low budgets aren't a roadblock in creating and participating in a global conversation about the brand.

Nintendo Switch

Nintendo has recently developed a handheld and console gaming device called the Nintendo Switch. This product offers users the ability to play their favorite games on the go, and just as easily play them from home using the same device.  The following video shows some of the many features that the Nintendo Switch will be bringing to the marketplace in March 2017.

So far, Nintendo has done an excellent job of branding and marketing the Nintendo switch, primarily through their choice in name.  The "Switch" manages to describe the intended use and capability of the device in just one word and leaves little confusion about its purpose, especially after advertisements, videos, or other material from the campaign is viewed.  Another thing that Nintendo has done to build and increase brand recall is through the use of the snapping sound that appears in all of the videos, typically before a transition to another scene.  After hearing it a couple of times, it is easy to identify an upcoming Switch ad before it even comes on.  Nintendo does a great job of showing through numerous situations just how versatile its device can be and successfully markets it to consumers with active and less active lifestyles, or for those that are somewhere in between.  With a strong marketing campaign, I believe that the Nintendo Switch has the opportunity to make noise in the marketplace.

Friday Night Lights - A Social Media Perspective

Inspired by a best-selling book and popular movie, Friday Night Lights was a little-known television show that aired on NBC from 2006-2011.  Featuring relatable characters, rich story-lines, and endless emotional scenes, the show quickly became a favorite for a small but passionate audience. Set in the fictional town of Dillon, Texas, the story-line centers around a high school football team and the small rural community in which they live.  For a television show that was filmed in a real Texas community, featured local residents as extras, and tackled many of the difficult issues we face in life, it surprises many people that have discovered and fallen in love with the show through Netflix in recent years that it had a small viewership in the years it aired.

There are numerous reasons why Friday Night Lights failed to garner the audience it truly deserved. One of the biggest reasons is the time slot placement.  When it first aired, it was placed in prime-time competition against Dancing with the Stars and American Idol, two of the most popular shows on television at the time.  Due to scheduling conflicts, it was also unable to air on Friday nights, which would've further helped build the audience because of easy date recall.  Another issue that Friday Night Lights faced was their initial failure to market the show to an audience outside of young males drawn to football.  The promos in the beginning season highlighted gritty football action instead of focusing on the intense character relationships that appeal to a wider audience.  As I like to say, Friday Night Lights isn't a football show - it's a show that happens to have football.  To their credit, NBC began working hard to help expand and market the show to a wider audience. They aired episodes on Bravo, created a new tagline "It's About Life", featured character profiles, and played short promos in movie theaters across the USA.  If the show aired in present day, there are many things I would do to successfully market the show.

From a social media perspective, it is important for Friday Night Lights to be engaging with fans across social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram.  With a comprehensive, integrated marketing campaign, the show can work to tell a story and help create conversations about both the show and life.  One way to achieve this is through the use of a summary video series.  This series can highlight the key moments in each episode after it has aired and use the actors and writers to discuss the episode.  Providing engagement and further authenticity for fans, many shows in present day have experienced success with this concept, including Bates Motel and Game of Thrones.  Another way to effectively use social media is through the use of Q+A sessions. Whether it's the lead actor taking questions for a specified amount of time on Twitter, or the producer using Facebook Live to answer questions in real time, these fan interactions help provide insight into the show and makes the experience even more realistic.

While Friday Night Lights never received a sizable audience, it ran for five successful seasons and provided a wonderful experience to the viewers it did receive.  They are a prime example of the importance of correctly identifying the target audience and marketing the product in the most accurate format possible.

Social Media's Influence in the 2024 Olympic Games

With a long and rich history dating back to ancient Greece, the Olympic Games has been the elite international sporting competition that allows men and women from all over the world to compete against each other every four years in an attempt to claim glory for their respective countries.  The result of the media exposure on the athletes and the host nation provides ample opportunities to highlight the best of the best on an international platform in addition to .  Understandably, it is extremely difficult to obtain the Olympic Games and many cities and countries begin lobbying and collecting funds years in advance for preparation.  The 2024 Olympic Games will be awarded later this fall and LA 2024, a bid committee designed to bring the Games to Los Angeles, is using a unique social media marketing campaign in order to achieve its goal.

Since LA 2024 is a non-profit committee, a social marketing technique is ideal to reach their target audience (Los Angeles residents) in the most cost-efficient way possible.  With the close geographic proximity to tech giants like Facebook, Snapchat, and Twitter, social media is an obvious choice.  The use of Facebook Live and storytelling in particular have already helped grow the official Facebook page to more than 200,000 followers as LA 2024 hopes to supply captivating content in order to continue increasing fan support.

Facebook Live offers users the opportunity to share live and unique content from anywhere in the world, and offer this content to their followers in real time.  LA 2024 has successfully utilized this social media tool so far by using live-streams of events like Q&A sessions with committee leaders and even a live-stream from their float in the Rose Bowl parade.  These opportunities to connect with the committee allow fans to feel even more involved and willing to help with the ongoing process to bring the Olympic Games to Los Angeles.

LA 2024 has also produced a video series featuring United States athletes that participated in the Olympic Games held in Rio.  They share the stories of warm greetings that they received from their hometowns upon arriving back from the Olympics.  The series also showcases their desire to compete in Los Angeles if the Games would return to the United States.  Intelligently, the series is displayed across all LA 2024's social media channels (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube) for full social integration.  Athletes are an integral part of the Olympic Games and enthralling content like this video series helps resonate with the Los Angeles market and strengthens the movement to bring the Olympics to LA.