On my part, after reading about the campaign on Joe Pulizzi’s blog, I eagerly sought out the videos, rewatched both commercials, and scoured the blogosphere for more coverage. By the end of the day I had not only further publicized the campaign via facebook and twitter; I had physically told at least three people about it. That’s right, actual word of mouth!

But while the blogosphere, twitterverse, and facebookalaxy (too much?) were all buzzing about Old Spice, one burning question plagued every marketer. Will this actually translate to sales? Well, ladies and gentleman, the numbers are in.

Since the campaign launched in February, Old Spice sales have been on the rise. Brandweek reported that Old Spice sales rose 55% over the past three months, and 107% in the last month alone (stats published by Nielsen). Though it can only officially be called a correlation, I think it’s safe to consider this campaign a triumph in social media marketing. Mashable’s Stan Schroeder went as far as calling it “the archetype of a successful social media campaign,” and that was before any sales figures were released.

Will anyone be able to replicate this lightning-in-a-bottle campaign? Probably not.  There is a huge novelty element to this strategy that can’t be undervalued.  Old Spice was the first brand to tap into its social network in such a direct and, let’s face it, hilarious way. How then, can Old Spice’s success apply to you and your company? How can you translate it into your own content marketing efforts? First of all: don’t copy it. A lot of people are going to try and copy this campaign, and the public will know exactly what you’re up to.

Old Spice Guy is just one man, albeit an incredibly handsome one. He couldn’t possibly address more than a small fraction of Old Spice’s ever-increasing followers on twitter. But the mere possibility that he might led thousands of web users to jump on board and tweet their little hearts out.  In the same vein as the Creators Project, which continues to draw in hundreds of facebook fans daily, Old Spice offered the mere possibility of something great. In this case, being personally addressed before millions of online viewers… by an incredibly handsome man in a bath towel.

That is a tactic you can use. Provide the possibility of something incredible, but keep it limited. Make a demand for it. If you don’t know where to start in terms of devising that inspired must-have reward, why not ask your customers? What do THEY want? Tap into them as a resource, and then implement their ideas so they know they’re being listened to. Whatever plan of action you take, it should single out customers/readers/etc as individuals that are uniquely valued. It can be done at random, or maybe as a reward for loyal followers.

And if you can think of an angle that is really appropriate for your customers, why not create something that they will actually enjoy? Your marketing content should provide useful information for your clients, but you can also have a bit of fun with it. If you’re not sure you can pull it off,  consider hiring writers to create the kind of smart, punchy content that just might get your social network buzzing. After all, who doesn’t need a bit of light, funny, engaging fluff now and again?

Nicola Fairhead is an ideaLaunch editorial intern with a ferocious appetite for writing, editing, and consuming content.  She has quickly become a content marketing evangelist.

Image courtesy of http://www.shoppingblog.com/blog/3291015

Last weekend, I witnessed an astonishing thing. Concrete personal benefit as a direct result of my social networking efforts.  The Creator’s Project, “a new network dedicated to the celebration of creativity and culture across media,” held a competition on its facebook page. Whoever could accrue the most “likes” on a single post would win two tickets to the Creator’s Project official launch in New York, featuring musical performances, films, and art exhibits.  Simple.  A friend of mine dutifully wrote a post, then sent a facebook message to a limited circle of friends with an emotive and humorous back story, a link, and a simple request.

Not a bad start, but not a great one either.  And definitely not enough to secure a win. Your main base of friends/readers/customers/what have you can be your greatest promotional asset. Don’t be afraid to appeal to them, albeit sparingly. Luckily I didn’t need to be asked—the content marketing deviant in me immediately came to life. Surely this was the perfect opportunity to use social networking as a marketing tool? After a solid hour’s effort, I solicited a large fraction of my friends list, with five separate drafts tailored to different audiences within my network.

Making a demand of the network you’ve spent so long cultivating can be a delicate process. Keep these key points in mind when you start drafting:

• Make it personal. No one wants to be bullied by a robot.
• Provide some back story so your readers know what they are supporting. But don’t drag it out.
• Acknowledge that you are asking something of them.
• State your gratitude along with any benefits they could receive.
• Humor helps, but make sure to be sincere.

While my recruitment rate was less than 50%, that in addition to my friend’s previous efforts was enough to secure two tickets to the Creators Project’s New York event.  And there you have it! Concrete results.

In this case I made a request based on my confidence in existing relationships.  And that is why you’ve spent so much time cultivating your company’s online persona. You too are developing relationships that you can one day call upon. Provide support for your target market.  Return their comments. Show that you care about their input. If you have really taken the time to invest in solid content marketing that actually provides a service for your readers, you may find that they’ll be willing to champion your cause when the time comes. Then when you really need them, go ahead and make the ask.

But the real winner in this story, of course, is the Creators’ Project. I can pat myself on the back all I want, but by offering even the mere chance of something truly phenomenal, they got me to do their work for them. The Creator’s Project facebook page is gaining fans daily by transforming existing followers into active recruiters.  Have you offered your readers something spectacular lately?

Nicola Fairhead is an ideaLaunch editorial intern with a ferocious appetite for writing, editing, and consuming content.  She has quickly become a content marketing evangelist.

Image courtesy of http://andpluckyourstrings.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/man_loudspeaker.jpg

Facebook Fan Pages

Even if your company’s fan page is mostly employees, customers, or old friends you are still getting your content out and reminding people of exactly what your company does. You never know when that guy you sat next to in algebra will wind up working for a major buyer in your industry.

Twitter

Twitter has become very popular. Many businesses that are not yet on twitter are wondering how they should do it. However, having a strategy is essential in successful marketing on Twitter. Have reasonable expectations and set the boundaries with the person or people who will be handling the company account or accounts.

Geographic Search

From Google Maps to Gowalla, there are many websites or mobile applications that offer businesses a chance to market themselves for free. Google maps local listings allow many features including keywords that you can use to align the listing with your website content SEO strategy. GPS based applications like Gowalla and Foursquare allow businesses to be listed and for users to give tips. Be sure to create the location, check-in and write a tip that targets the keywords your home page is focusing on.

Jennifer Gniadecki loves to write. You can find her on any given day writing lists, blog posts, articles, assignments, outlines or fleshing out story ideas on her laptop.

Image from thenewjew.files.wordpress.com

Image from TheHubCompany.com

When it comes to marketing a business, there are several tools you can use in your swiss army knife of promotion. At ideaLaunch, our primary focus is content marketing – strategizing, writing and creating online content that appeals to your audience, builds your reputation and increases the chances of someone coming across your business on a search engine results page. We do this through blogs, articles, tip centers, videos, podcasts and public relations.

Public relations? But isn’t that a whole separate field?

Because of the nature of information on the web, content marketing and public relations are well partnered together (in fact, some would correctly argue that PR and content marketing are sometimes one in the same). Just like a blog post or an article, a news release that is placed on an online wire like PRWeb (who happens to be an ideaLaunch client), has the capacity to attract potential customers and media, drive visits to your main website and influence your SEO. To be as effective as possible, a modern press release needs to utilize the same skills and tools we implement in every content marketing venture. For example, an online news release should:

• Be well-written with a target audience in mind
• Incorporate researched keywords that will perform well in an online search
• Use SEO-minded links of keywords or business names to an appropriate website (also known as anchor text)
• Include optimized content pieces like pictures, videos or podcasts that particularly appeal to those who use social media

Along with classic PR techniques on writing a news release, these content marketing aspects can simultaneously put your company’s news on the radar of media and potential customers. The next time you have a new product or service to announce, have hired a top executive, or are hosting a big event, considering putting PR into your promotional mix. If you need experienced professionals to assist, a certain content marketing agency is happy to help.

The ad agency of Forsman & Bodenfors in Gothenburg, Sweden put together a genius Facebook campaign, although it may technically have been in violation of Facebook’s Terms of Use.

You can watch a video of how they went about creating Facebook content here.

Basically, the ad agency set up a profile for the store manager at one of IKEA’s new locations. They then uploaded photos into a Facebook photo album in the store manager’s profile. Next, they created a contest where you could win an item pictured by tagging an item in the picture with your name.

Why was this genius?

When someone tags themselves in a picture, the profile of the person whose photo album was tagged shows up in the tagger’s profile page. It also shows up in that person’s friends’ news feeds. Very quickly, thousands of Facebook users were promoting the profile page of the new IKEA’s store manager. Their friends weren’t looking at a banner for a furniture store, they were looking at individuals who were specifically talking about individual items that they were excited about. The campaign was interactive, viral and – most importantly – social.

As brilliant as this social media campaign was, you might not be able to run out and copy it today for your business.

Facebook’s Terms of Use forbid using any of their native applications in promotions. The tagging system is, in fact, a “native application.”

While you may not be able to copy this idea exactly, it no doubt calls attention to thinking simply when it comes to social media. The IKEA ad agency didn’t hire programmers to develop a new application. They didn’t buy ad space to target users with specific interests. Instead, they found a way to get their brand involved at a grassroots level with the social aspect of one of the most popular social media tools.

Britt Reints is a freelance writer living in Orlando, Florida.  She checks Facebook about five times a day but still has yet to win anything from it.

Avoid Twitter Suicide: Image from Only Connect

By now, you’ve hopefully realized that a misstep in content marketing won’t wreck your bottom line and that there are things you can do immediately and long-term to recover (and even grow) from it – but some companies want to avoid the headache and handle content marketing and social media the right way the first time (imagine that).

Here are some simple tips for avoiding your own Midol Mom Controversy:

• Hire a content marketing agency (you knew we were going to say that, right?)

• Avoid a company of yes-men
  • It’s great when the team is all on the same page – but don’t instantly dismiss a dissenting opinion for the sake of group morale. They might have a point
  • Are you the boss? Passionate about a project? Just be sure you aren’t loving your idea (or yourself) so much that you can’t or won’t hear concerns about it from the underlings
  • Ask people who aren’t involved in the creative process for their thoughts (is your campaign targeting new moms? Ask the office accountant who just returned from mat leave for her honest feedback)

• Don’t be a Presumeavore, be an Informavore!
  • Besides stalking the market you’re after, consider getting a small focus group together and do a test of your campaign
    • If the feedback is negative, consider redoing the project
    • Track the campaign in all phases and see the first signs of trouble right away

• Learn from other flops
  • With your key staff, take some time review situations other companies encountered. Does your upcoming campaign bare any similar earmarks?
  • Role play and pretend your company was in the bad situation other companies have been in. How would you react? Who would do what? When? This is a great way to get a crisis communication plan in place
  • Need some examples? Some of these are web content projects gone bad and other cases are crappy situations that were amplified by the webizens of social media.:
    • The Motrin Moms controversy
    • Amazon’s accidental unranking of gay and lesbian–themed books
    • Pepsi’s Before You Score iPhone app (which received the hashtag #HowToAlientateWomen)
    • JetBlue’s Valentine’s Day “hostages”

• Keep it in perspective
  • Some people are griping about your campaign. Do you shut it down? Probably not. There’s an old marketing tale that says that no matter what you do, 15% of the audience is guaranteed to hate it. That’s your minimum. Humans don’t all like or respond the same way to stuff.
  • The fact is, you were goofing things up and ticking people off with your marketing decisions before – social media is just a more effective platform for people to tell you (and others) about it. So use it. Monitor it. Engage in it. Just don’t overreact over a few haters.

We enjoyed a behind-the-scenes look at their multi-pronged marketing strategy, including content for TV spots, online videos, photo albums, a website, and even a twitter account for P.J. Bland. They took an marketing idea and ran with it. So lets talk about it.

1. P.J. Bland had 1,291 as of 10:18 Friday morning. Ask yourself this, why would anyone want go get updates from a fictitious advertisement character whose entire premise it to be boring? Somehow, Hill Holliday created a celebrity tweeter who makes followers feel cool just by association. Well done.

2. Here is another discovery: Chili’s Restaurant does not have their own twitter account. Their foil character is transparently fake, and lets them have a twitter presence without forcing them to commit time and resources to maintaining a twitter account. Again, well done.

3. Foil characters in literature emphasize better characteristics in the hero. Think Spidey versus Harry Osborn, Hamlet versus Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and Harry Potter versus Draco. They are part of a story- yes, I know you got that. But by creating a foil character for their marketing campaign, they created a story. They created mobile, changing characters who talk and speak and interact with people. That’s interesting, that’s engaging, and that’s good entertainment.

I think Hill Holliday did it right, and am hoping to hear other examples of marketing campaigns like this. How can web content and social media relations about things completely opposite to your products build your brand?