National Business Review (NBR) chose to leverage social media to promote its 40th Birthday via a competition of sorts. Entrants were asked to submit a brief story on how they would celebrate winning their own weight in Veuve Clicquot Champagne. The entry implied a popular vote process, and entrants jumped on board via their social networks to solicit support for their entry. A brilliant move by NBR and by Veuve Clicquot – to motivate its audience to leverage their social networks to promote the 40th Birthday. Cheers from here for the idea!

But the story does not end so well for National Business Review (or Veuve Clicquot). After one particular entrant appeared to run away with the popular vote, NBR indicated it would take the top ten voted entries and have a judging panel choose a winner. Fair enough except… NBR did not make this clear to the entrants in advance.

What is one of the most important elements of a social media strategy? TRANSPARENCY. And this is where NBR failed.

The fallout is beginning to reach a fevered pitch in New Zealand as bloggers and mainstream media are now berating NBR for its lack of transparency. True to the nature of social media, the court of public opinion is speaking out and it’s not pretty. A few comments from blogging community:

“My message to the National Business Review is that you have lost something infinitely more valuable than my subscription. You have lost both my respect and my trust. That is hard to do, and even harder to undo.”

“I cannot put up with a tawdry run competition which had the entire blogging and related Facebook communities, engaging and participating. The amping up of the competition to boost their online stats for advertisers. Then the invoking of the most pitiful of terms and conditions…”

“Quite sim­ply NBR and Veuve Clic­quot can no longer be trusted as either a source for news or as a decent lux­ury brand when they bla­tantly make up rules as they go along…”

“Who can trust the National Business Review? …it seemed that while the NBR were happy enough to lead people on with it, they were only doing so to milk as much attention and traffic to their website as possible.”

The postings continue and now a dedicated Facebook page has been created as a result of the situation, with further comments propogating throughout.

Do you suppose this was the result that NBR anticipated when it launched the campaign? NO. Could this have been avoided? YES.

NBR failed the transparency test when it built the campaign. If there is one thing we learned from the TGI Friday’s “Woody” campaign of 2009, it’s that you must set clear expectations and be able to deliver upon those expectations. It took TGI Friday’s 10 days to fix their redemption mistake, but they made good on EVERY promise… even though it cost them a few extra $$ along the way.

NBR and Veuve Clicquot opened the social media door when they created the campaign. The best move they can make now is to create extra space on the podium, include the popular vote winner and celebrate. Maybe next time they will plan their social media strategy more thoroughly, and make sure that the rule of TRANSPARENCY is heeded.

What failed social media campaigns have you experienced? How did they fail you?

EDIT - Five days after the social media eruption occurred, NBR posted this apology and awarded the popular vote winner a grand prize as well. A graceful apology with a bit of humor, it is interesting that NBR states it did not intend to “compromise transparency.” No doubt a lesson learned by NBR in how to properly engage in the social media environment. 

Dr. Colin N. Clarke is a senior strategist for The Flint Group who studies how and why people choose to consume information. Follow him on Twitter @colinnclarke or on Facebook at Facebook.com/cnclarke.

Simon Sinek has developed an inspirational leadership philosophy called the “Golden Circle.” The video below is from a conference he spoke at in 2009 where he explains the Golden Circle in depth. The basic premise is that in today’s world, people tend to come at problems or develop products with a tactical approach, or just telling us “what” they are selling. Simon shows us some relevant examples from throughout history, from The Wright Brothers to TiVo. I highly encourage you to watch the 18-minute video and then think about the why in everything that you are involved in.

I would love to hear your thoughts on the video.

I’d like to lie and tell you that this is the first time I haven’t been able to think up something great to write, and that I’m some kind of playboy millionaire jetting off to Spain this weekend, but it would be all lies. Since the best advertising is grounded in the truth, I’ll readily admit that I’m engaged in three completely different cases of writer’s block as we speak. Fortunately, this has become such a regular occurrence that I’ve developed some confidence in working around it—emphasis on the “work” part because getting to any great idea takes time.

When I’m stuck, I tend to go into Jack Kerouac writing mode where I type and type nonstop until I get somewhere I like. Other people I know get out of their funk by hanging all their work up on a corkboard, then coming back to it a couple of hours later with a fresh perspective. While I wish I could give you the definitive answer as to what to do when you’re stuck, the reality is what works for one person may not work for somebody else.

In the end, coming up with an idea is a lot like a giant game of hide and seek. There are infinite ideas out there somewhere. You’ve just got to keep pushing yourself to find them. Sometimes they’re right in front of your face. Sometimes they’re camouflaged and hiding right in front of your face.  The key when you get frustrated in looking for one is to not get frustrated. If you put in the time, you’ll find dozens of ideas, and one of them is bound to be good.

We are constantly inundated with advertising that annoys us, as it is obviously trying to separate us from our wallets. You don’t have to be on Times Square or the Vegas Strip to be suffocated by it. Radio ads seem to turn up the volume on their own. The surprise flyer on your windshield stops your heart for a second because you think it may be a parking ticket. Credit card offers appear like they are actually important. SPAM mail. Door-to-door sales. It comes at us from every direction.

However, why is it that people watch the Super Bowl in anticipation of the TV spots? Even water cooler talk sometimes starts with, “Did you see the ad about the …”

When advertising entertains and feels relevant, it piques our attention. Good advertising flows with our daily lives to the point we don’t realize we are being sold to. It almost feels natural.

Now that I have made my point, perhaps it is appropriate to change the title of this posting. Because, the truth is this: PEOPLE HATE BAD ADVERTISING.

I work with clients to create communication plans and digital strategies that usually include some form of social media. I often get an objection when the social elements of the program are introduced. Something along the line of “we tried a blog but it wasn’t a success” or “we have a Facebook page, but it isn’t doing anything for our business.”

Who’s Doing What?

Digging deeper into the failure, many times it is because the business did not understand who is doing what. The blog was a failure because posts were not written on a regular basis. The Facebook page was a failure because they were not engaging their audience, they were just collecting names. As my colleague Jay Baer preaches, social media is not about collecting names, it is about activating your fans. That can only happen if you know who is doing what.

It can get complex depending on the size of your social media program, but here are some tips to help make sure you’re managing social operations appropriately:

• If you are blogging, create an editorial calendar. You don’t need to know the what, just the who and when.
• Again with the blogging, make sure your blogger or bloggers want to do it, if they are forced into it, you won’t get your posts on time.
• If you have a Twitter account, set up a CoTweet account to help manage interactions, and define who is responsible for interaction.
• If someone asks a question in a social space, make sure you have an expert on hand that can answer the question if it gets too technical for the day-to-day social listener.
• If you are being badgered by someone that continues to post off-topic or negative comments in your space, what is the plan to engage them, and who is going to do it?
• If you have a Facebook page, know who is responsible for engagement. Who is responsible for adding content? Photos? Videos? It might be different people for each task.
• Who is monitoring social spaces where you don’t currently have outpost? There are tons of free and paid tools out there that help you to monitor the conversations taking place.

Take a look at the Social Media Responsibilities Worksheet we use at the Flint Group. Hopefully it will help you figure out who is doing what.

Social Media Responsibilities Worksheet

Photo by hotmayo on Flickr

To print or not to print? That is the question.

I had an interesting conversation with a client last week regarding a very successful digital campaign. Successful and measurable. Bonus.

We started talking ROI, future campaign budgeting, and the hazards of completely moving away from traditional media. This particular client has seen solid success and increased sales by largely focusing on digital media with a strong emphasis on social media. But, the audience for the product is very niche, easy to segment, and prone to online, super-savvy digital consumers.

We’re hearing it loud and clear. The temptation is to shift traditional media budgets from broad-based awareness activity, to very targeted, segmented and measurable non-traditional media. So what’s the answer? It depends on the objectives of the campaign.

I like digital media. I like the fact that I can see exactly how a campaign is performing in real time. I like that prospects and customers can interact with a brand. However, there are many things that impact that interaction. Typically there is a certain level of awareness and trust that precedes an interaction. That is where traditional media continues to make a powerful difference. Basically, you have to look at the entire scope of the campaign, consider the integration and determine the points of interaction. We want to lead consumers down a path to purchase by using an impartial media mix.

It is smart to always consider print, television, radio, billboard to possibly play a part in a campaign. Think about how you personally look at brands and receive messages. What are you subconsciously picking up as you drive by a billboard? What magazines do you browse through? How often do you read the newspaper? And at what point do you go online when considering a purchase? When you do go online, what are you looking for? Is it product information? Product reviews? Specs? Options? Pricing?

That experience and the timing involved vary by what you are purchasing, how large of a purchase it is, how long the sales cycle is, etc.  In order to reach you, different mediums need to be leveraged at different stages and tie back into the objectives.  It’s the same with every product or service we promote. It’s the blend of outreach that gleans the best results.

With every channel, measure, evaluate and adjust as you go. Because we have more opportunities to look at campaigns in real-time, we want to use that information to our advantage.  We shouldn’t be thinking of digital at the expense of traditional media. Instead, think of how the two work in tandem.

The statement, “For all your [insert term here] needs” is overused, ignored, and irrelevant yet multitudes of businesses continue to use it. To prove a point, out of curiosity I ran a Google search for the term, “For all your needs.” 1.15 BILLION results! So by using the term, you essentially are saying you are just like 1.15 BILLION other businesses out there… no big deal.

Think your business is unique enough to get away with it? Think again. You can search for pretty much ANYTHING with the, “For all your needs” statement and find millions of results and other businesses just like yours using it to generalize their services… and scoring no points with customers along the way.

How about, For all your fertilizer needs (10.4 million results). Or, For all your filtration needs (7.8 million). Or Logistics (19.8 million), or Catering (10.5 million), or Zoology (7.5 million), or Votive candles (What are votive candles anyway? Seriously, 1.3 million results for all your votive candle needs!).

I once worked with an esteemed copywriter who would bristle whenever he saw or heard the term, “For all your needs.” He would flat out refuse to include it in anything he wrote. He would say, “How do they know what I need? It’s impossible for them to have everything I need!” He had a book where he kept examples of ads that used the term and as you would turn page-after-page the statement would become more and more irrelevant. A wasted opportunity to share a meaningful message with a customer.

Every business is built on some point of differentiation, be it price or quality, service or product line, convenience or style. Every brand stands for something, so let your communications be about your differentiation. In most cases you have likely invested significant time and money to cultivate a point of differentiation for your business, so let it show. Communicate it clearly in everything you do. In your service, your marketing, your direct communications and your advertising.

Make your message meaningful and memorable. Your customers will appreciate knowing what makes you unique.

Colin is a senior strategist for The Flint Group. Follow him on Twitter @colinnclarke or on Facebook at Facebook.com/cnclarke.

This happens when we get excited about the work we’re doing. Sometimes it’s easy: you get a job that’s right up your alley and immerse yourself in it. Other times, projects can be challenging. It seems like what makes a creative professional really shine is the ability to make incredible things happen from the very constraints that seemed daunting at the outset.

I guess for this to happen you need to embrace the challenge and, somewhere along the way, wait for inspiration to strike. It may come to you in your sleep, it may come from a long intense brainstorm session, or it may be sparked by some existing work you’ve seen. However it comes, I think we all have our go-to places for quick inspiration. 

Here are a few I use regularly:

The Web: This one’s obvious, but the Internet is our direct line to what’s going on every day in the creative universe. These are some sites that I’m on almost daily: Behance, Abduzeedo, CardObserver, and Motionographer.

Books: I love books. In my opinion it’s impossible to replace the tactile experience of a good book with a digital screen. Here’s a couple I like:

How to Be a Graphic Designer Without Losing Your Soul by Adrian Shaughnessy

Green Graphic Design by Brian Dougherty

The Record Store: We’re lucky to be located right across the street from the only existing record store in town, the Electric Fetus. I go there on my lunch break from time to time just to look at album covers. It’s not the type of work I typically get to do, but it gets me jazzed nonetheless.

Music: Music and creativity go hand in hand. Sometimes it’s good to block out distractions and just get into a rhythm with your iTunes library.

Inspiration is a personal thing and it’s different for everyone. For some people it may be a good cup o’ joe and that perfect yacht-rock song, while for others it’s peaceful silence and a favorite quote. Whatever it may be, that inspiring thing plays a crucial role in the creative process.

What gets you motivated to do your best work? My perspective is that of a designer, but it would be interesting to hear what works for you.

If you attended the 2009 Hatling & Flint Circus party, you may have heard the horrible news that Barbie was launched from the cannon and got trapped in a tree.

Original footage has been lost. This is not the actual Barbie.

Despite our efforts, she could not be rescued. We tried and tried with no avail — we had to count our losses. We watched autumn turn into winter, winter to spring, and now, spring to summer.

She has been through turbulent wind, pelting rain, bitter cold temps, freezing blizzards, blinding snow and scorching heat. She survived plagues of bugs, threats from squirrels and cuttings from territorial birds.

We’re still not sure how she got out of the tree. With thoughts of another winter on the horizon, she may have been a jumper. The birds may have grown tired of her purple tutu and big smile. Maybe the tree grew tired of her constantly perfect posture. Either way, she was back on solid ground. Once on the ground, she had the ants and a riding lawn mower to contend with. Luckily, Bill saw a purple ballet costume and stopped the mower just in the nick of time. We don’t know the events of that Thursday in July, but we do know that she landed on the padded lawn with that expression and pose that only Barbie could hold.

An excited Barbie. Once on the ground, she had a hard time leaving her tree.

Through all of this, she hasn’t lost that sparkle in her eyes or that big, genuine smile. Her clothes may be a little tattered and sun bleached, but by golly, her hair is still perfectly coiffed.