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By Vegasbab, May 4, 2011 10:06 am

I’ve watched this video about 20 times in the last two days and yes, I tear up every time… I’m such a sap It’s a brilliant commercial by Google. But, the underlying message is even cooler – technology has the ability to make your real world experiences not only better but it allows you to share them with whomever, whenever. In essence, it fundamentally changes how people think of the Internet. While, Chrome/Google isn’t the Internet, I’m sure they won’t mind people thinking they’re synonymous with it.

The web really is what you make it.

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By Vegasbab, November 15, 2010 8:13 pm

Thanks to a friend, I stumbled on this post. I liked it so much, I’m reposting it here:

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By Vegasbab, September 4, 2010 7:34 pm

Groupon has been sweeping the nation. In addition to Groupon, many other sites with the same business model have popped up – Deal of the Day, Living Social, Screamin’ Coupons, the list goes on. The idea behind the sites are one great deal a day delivered to your EMAIL inbox (side note: gee, seems like email isn’t dead ), heavily discounted and it can’t be bought until x amount of people have purchased the deal so it “tips”. This caveat, along with the great price point, makes it a prime candidate for sharing.

Forbes claims Groupon is the fastest growing company ever. When Gap advertised with them, they sold 441,000 and $11 million worth of coupons (or Groupons) in a single 24 hour period. Although, while $11 million seems like a lot, I have to wonder if it’s a lot to a national brand like Gap?

While Gap was a national deal, even the local ones are selling like hot cakes – the recent Vegas deal for Nothing Bundt Cakes sold over 2,500. I have to wonder how many sales they do in a day, but I imagine 2,500 in sales is a good day for them… then again since it was 50% off and then Groupon took at least 40%, they made $15,324 vs. the $51,080 they would have made if they didn’t participate in Groupon and sold the same amount.

I have to wonder. For businesses, is participating in Groupon worth it? Sure, there are pros – no upfront advertising dollars. The Groupon model is a revenue split, so advertisers aren’t on the hook upfront. With this model, in theory, the publisher promotes the deal harder and better since the more sold, the more money they make. The other pro is that it drives exposure and consumers into a place where they otherwise might not have gone. And finally, I have to think there’s bound to be some breakage and/or people spending more once they’re there.

But, do the cons outweigh the pros? When you’re discounting your product by at least 50% and then giving Groupon a cut, how much money are you really making? In addition, there’s the psych thing- if you’re discounting your product by 50% was it really worth the full price to begin with?

What do you think? Is Groupon worth it for businesses?

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By Vegasbab, August 1, 2010 2:41 pm

I won’t deny it, I’m a sucker for most alcohol campaigns. I don’t know why, but to me, they are so well done, so sharp and put together.

The latest, is True Originals. It’s an interesting campaign. One with a url, trueoriginals.com, that redirects to Facebook, not a website. To me, the strangest thing is not a single video nor the Facebook page is branded Bacardi. I looked hard, the bottles in the back of the bar aren’t all Bacardi. The bottle that the bartender pours from has its label hidden. Strange, no? The other odd piece is that the main Bacardi Facebook page and site make little mention of the campaign, as if it’s just one of many, which I suppose it is Nevertheless, it’s one I fell in love with.

Here’s one of the four. Enjoy!

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By Vegasbab, May 25, 2010 5:27 am

Just like the White House and Pope are kicking butt and taking names in the interactive space, so is Coca-Cola. When such a large brand can think about social media in these four, simple and real ways, it makes me wonder, “Why can’t we all?”

At a Blogger Outreach presentation, Coke talked about four “truths”:

• They don’t own their brands – people do
• Every day is election day – woo the audience constantly
• Fish where the fish are – be where you should be
• Success revolves around genuine and compelling content

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By Vegasbab, May 18, 2010 11:59 pm

I had the pleasure of sitting in a “special” presentation today. It was one where the presenters had intimate knowledge of some key audience members and yet, structured their deck to go above every one’s head. They talked social and search. They threw in “scary” graphs with steep trends both up and down. And, they threw out names of people that no one in the room understood the connotations of. Except me. The wild card of the presentation. My favorite part was when their Executive VP of Social Strategy said, “I live and breathe Mashable.” Clearly, it was true. Everything he spewed out in the presentation was a direct thought or idea from Mashable.

The comments got me thinking… the easy way to tell if someone’s full of social BS? They mention Mashable in a bow-down-to-the-all-seeing-all-knowing-god. Yes, I read Mashable. But, I sure as hell don’t live and breath by the thoughts in that BLOG. In fact, I take most of the articles with a grain of salt.

Think about it.

Sadly, even today, an easy gauge on how much someone knows about interactive can be based on whether they use the term “hits” or “visits”. While the terms seem to mean the same thing, they are in fact drastically different.

I’ve long said I don’t trust anyone who uses the term “hits” in the wrong context. Today, I’ve added to that philosophy. Today, I still wouldn’t hire an interactive person who uses the term “hits” when really meaning “visitors”. But, I also have no intention of turning my social media strategy over to someone who “lives and breaths Mashable.”

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By Vegasbab, February 6, 2010 7:44 am

It always irks me a bit when posts talk about social media not delivering on “promises”, that it “disappointingly” hasn’t grown up yet and it’s not an “enterprise” function of a business because it resides in marketing. All three statements point the blame to social media and some non-existent enterprise department. All three statements are baloney. Social media hasn’t delivered nor grown up because as marketers it’s YOUR fault. Social media hasn’t been seen as more than a marketing function because marketers don’t see it as more than that.

Let’s tackle the easy one first – social media not delivering on promises. Bullshit. Total and complete bullshit. It hasn’t delivered because (a) YOU (aka the marketer) didn’t set campaign objectives and (b) YOU didn’t come up with a measurement. If you launch a campaign with no goal and then tell your executives, “Well… it did great! We got lots of positive mentions.” Ummmm… I’d think social media failed too. But, in reality, YOU failed. You failed to set expectations and you failed to sell how successful the campaign was.

Now, onto the one that requires a little more thinking. Why does social media often sit with marketing? Well, not only do marketing departments market, but they also hold the keys to the brand and ultimately what an entire company embraces, or doesn’t. As the head of marketing, not only are you responsible for external marketing, but you’re also responsible for INTERNAL marketing. Think about it. What’s your company culture? Who came up with the tagline? Who designed the materials to internally promote that tagline? (Side note: Yes, I’m well aware that simply having a tagline does not equal company culture.) Aside from the President, which Executive is in charge of crafting that message? Oh yes, no company-wide initiative would work without the support of ALL Executives, but, who’s in charge of selling them on say, social media as a company-wide business plan? YOU. The Marketer. If ALL your employees aren’t on board – and I’m not saying they have to “get it” like “we” do – then YOU have failed, not social media.

It’s tough. Back in the day, marketers only had to market. Or, as agencies like to believe, marketers sat back and drank while the agency did the heavy lifting. But, not today. Today, the role of a marketing department has evolved into so much more. Today, it’s time for marketers to grow up. Today, it’s time for more marketers to start leading and stop “just” marketing. If marketers can’t do that, then social media is never going to “grow up”.

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By Vegasbab, January 31, 2010 11:03 pm

In the last few months, I’ve been amazed at some of the innovative ways companies are aggregating and using information from social networks. From Bravo’s use of Foursquare to We’re All Fans, wow. It seems like the economy has slowed the innovation of “new” and allowed marketers to really harness what’s out there. And, harness it quicker than ever before.

Surprisingly, tonight’s Grammy’s was the first event that twitter both spoiled and enhanced for me. Everything online, from the MSN homepage to twitter was reporting and commenting on the Grammy’s in real time. The comments made me excited and frustrated. I wanted to see the outfits and performances my “friends” were commenting on. But alas, being on the West Coast, I was three hours behind. For me, it was an interesting and new experience. And yes, it made me wish I was living on the East Coast that much more

One of the coolest parts of the Grammy’s was their use of social media. An institution that’s been around for 52 years continues to innovate and stay relevant. From an iPhone app to We’re All Fans, kudos to the marketers behind the show… We’re All Fans was one wicked cool and beautifully done aggregater of what fans we’re saying.

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By Vegasbab, January 13, 2010 10:00 pm

I love this. I’ve watched several videos lately about how powerful, refreshing  and transformative personal projects can be. Time is just an idea… enjoy the video!

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By Vegasbab, December 18, 2009 2:03 pm

If you’re an internet marketing geek, you were excited, intrigued and took notice when Google went live with their real time search feature. Alas, after seeing it in action for about a week, I’m sorely disappointed. I hope they fix it soon, otherwise we all might Bing instead of Google things

The buzz of course is that real time search will (a) change the SEO game and (b) bring your “social brand” front and center. Yep, all great (and scary) in theory. But the reality? Real time search is NOT relevant (yet). Unfortunately, the non-relevancy is sure to put a bad taste in savvy searchers’ mouths and confuse the rest of the population. Take a look at the below screenshot about a search for “Twitter Grader”. The top two (real time) results have nothing to do with twitter or a grading tool.

Google seems to see the issues and has removed real time search for larger queries (i.e. “Las Vegas”), but until they fix the algorithm, real time search won’t impress or help anyone.