IT/Web Developer’s Chance to Break Into the Music Business @ Merge Records
A friend just sent me this posting from Merge Records in Durham. If you’re into music and the Internet check it out.
SPARKcon Releases Google Calendar of Events for this Weekend’s Conference.
We’ll be there starting tomorrow night with ideaSPARK. Learn more at www.sparkcon.com. Click on image to go to event calendar.
Obama ‘Jackass’ Tweet Heard Round the World as Social Media Curmudgeons say ‘I Told You So’
Earlier tonight ABC reporter Terry Moran tweeted that POTUS called out Kanye for his jackassery at Sunday night’s MTV Video Music Awards. The fact this was an off the record portion of the interview makes things a bit dicy for Moran who’s update was quickly taken down but with over 1 million followers had been too quickly retweeted. In short, it’s out there. Forever.
By Tuesday morning the damage won’t be to Obama except his pride when he sees Biden who’ll quickly chid, “Everybody thought I was the one with the big mouth!” Moran’s seat at the White House Press Corp dinner will be a bit further back – like in the kitchen – but he’ll still be there at least. And Kanye will write a song about the incident that might become a number one hit.
Most damage will be felt by the reputation of social media. All those long-time corporate communication and marketing managers who’ve been too timid to join the conversation will grab the microphone and like Kanye proclaim “This is what we were talking about. You can’t always control it!”
No you can’t always control it but you can have:
- Corporate policies that address social media usage by employees
- A Plan of Action in place when the inevitable inappropriate comment is made. It doesn’t have to be pages long, just make sure it’s transparent . The honest reaction was to delete the post (maybe none of my MILLION followers saw it). But it only compounds the “social media authority” of the news item. As Red Bull would say – it gives the story wings.
- ADD helps. With “blink and you missed it” news cycles whatever damage, real or perceived, won’t last long if you keep putting out other relevant content.
- A sense of humor – after all Obama was right wasn’t he?
iTunes 9 – My Genius Mixes
Just as I was feeling that my music library was getting a bit stale iTunes 9 arrives with a great new feature, Genius Mixes. A step of from the introduction of Genius in iTunes 8 this new version now takes your music and “mixes” it with other music in similar genres. Essentially creating a radio station based on music you like. Here’s a screen grab of my Genius Mixes. What do you think it says about me?
The Cobbler’s Kids Don’t Have Shoes or a Facebook Fan Page…Anymore.
Throughout my career in media and advertising I’ve never worked for an agency or corporation where keeping up with self-promotion (websites, printed collateral, themes, strategies, etc…) didn’t take second, third (and on and on) place to the immediate needs of paying clients. Even today as I visit their URLs I see that the same perpetual non-motion is prevalent. Irony at it’s best and worst.
But how do you justify such inaction when you’re hanging your hat on your own door? I won’t. Agency 140 is a newbie agency with talented people whose expertise more than offsets the new paint smell that still permeates the office. We hit the ground HARD. Running very quickly to meet and exceed the demands of very excited clients. Among other things we’ve counseled our clients on what, if any, social media channels they should use to connect with their customers – emphatically demanding they not create a social media presence where they don’t have the time to create relevant content. 
Which makes the fact that we created a quick-to-be orphaned Facebook Fan Page all the more embarrassing. Like some of our clients, it was created Blog feeds just aren’t enough. What do we tell our clients about this? Creating a conversation channel that is ultimately ignored is a distraction to your brand that ultimately creates a negative impression – quite the opposite from the original goal!
Apparently our advice is spot on as it was brought to my attention recently that our Fan Page’s lack of fans was used as ammunition by a marketing manager who felt threatened when his boss suggested bringing in Agency 140 to help create a strategy for his company’s social media efforts. OUCH!
Why share this? Social Media is also about transparency and I won’t make us hypocritical by ignoring this ultimate meta-media case study. Essentially this takes the ammunition away from the fearful and gives it to the hopeful. What we say about social media really is true – when done correctly it’s a powerful mechanism to connect with customers. It’s not to be feared because even when we have missteps we can quickly learn from them, adjust our strategy and move on, much better than we were before.
So we’re saying good-bye (for now) to our Fan Page to focus more time on the Blog and Twitter. We’ll bring it back when it makes good strategic sense for us. And we’ll add this case study to our pitch presentation 
I pre-ordered Apple’s Snow Leopard or Social Media Works on the Marketers Too
I’m an early adopter. I’m not an early early adopter. When Apple announced on Monday it’s latest OS X will be made available earlier than September’s planned launch I did what I’ve always done – made a mental note to look into it later. After all it’s not an iPhone! People won’t be lining up days in advance to be among the first to experience true 64-bit support or an updated iChat experience on their Macbooks.
Then I started checking my Twitter feeds and followed a couple of links to Snow Leopard related blog posts. Faster time machine backups and start up times? Better Finder? Smaller memory footprint? My curiosity was peaked enough to go to Apple.com and see what they have to say. Satisfied with what I saw, and since I was already there anyway, I did what I’ve never done before. I pre-ordered the software. In other words, I followed the social media breadcrumbs, from Twitter to Blog posts to corporate site and completed a purchase . Exactly what I tell my clients can happen and I wasn’t even trying to become a case study.
-Information was available through the channels I’ve programmed from people I trust (have influence)
-Links in blog posts direct me to details on corporate home page – not landing page.
-Pre-order button and purchase integration (saved credit card info) means I can cross this off my list before it was even on it
Truth be told I would have upgraded to Snow Leopard anyway. Maybe this weekend or maybe in a week. Now Apple’s got my money and adds one more purchase to their pre-order total. And they’ve got one more blog post on their new product too.
Win-Win.
Laundrymen Announces Agency 140 as Social Media agency of record
Triangle Social Media Agency Chosen to Help Keep College Students Clean
Agency 140, LLC named agency of record for Durham, North Carolina’s Laundrymen,
a specialized laundry services company providing pick-up/drop-off services to area college campuses.
DURHAM, N.C. August 4, 2009 – Laundrymen, a laundry services company based in Durham, N.C. today names Agency 140 as Social Media agency of record. The Durham-based Social Media firm will handle all social media implementation, including strategy, platform integration, content development and email marketing.
The firm will launch the “Keep it Clean” campaign targeting students at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Duke University, North Carolina State University, Meredith College, and St. Mary’s School. Keep it Clean is designed to increase brand affinity through college student engagement around various ways today’s modern students get dirty and tips for cleaning up.
“Laundrymen has created a uniquely fun brand for campuses in North Carolina – one that Agency 140 is excited to help create conversations around.” said, Tom Greene, Co-Founder, Agency 140. “It’s really the perfect brand with a choice target for social media in college students. When we’re underway “Keep it Clean” will make an excellent case study in local business-to-consumer social media marketing”
About Agency 140, LLC
Located in Durham, NC, Agency 140, provides social media and email marketing services to companies and institutions in a range of industries. Founded in 2009, Agency 140 focuses on creating content for conversational marketing and cross-channel integration. For more information, please visit www.agency140.com
About Laundrymen
Laundrymen is the leading provider of affordable door-to-door laundry and dry cleaning services in the Triangle with a focus on students, businesses, and residents. For more information, please visit www.laundrymen.com or call 919.215.8575.
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Ignite Raleigh, tonight
We are going, are you?
According to the website:
“Ignite events were originally conceived as technology variety shows, but they have grown into much more than that. Ignite is about ideas. Ideas can change the world. And it takes less than five minutes to spread one.
Each presenter gets five minutes on stage with 20 slides that rotate automatically after 15 seconds Around the world communities have been coming together to share their ideas.”
We are looking forward to Ignite Raleigh tonight as we watch all the presentations and are ready to be inspired and enlightened.
I’m an expert!!! Really?
Anyone can claim to be an expert on any one topic, subject, art, craft, or field of study, especially, with the use of social media platforms. People can claim a title or expertise as an essential label in their profile, and yet you may or may not have evidence to the contrary. For example, many people are claiming to be social media marketing experts, but how does a company or business owner know otherwise? Well, here are a few questions the expert should be able to answer and some guidance if their answers don’t match-up with a true expert’s:
“1. How do you determine which channels and platforms we should be playing on?
If you’re producing quality content, you need it to reach and engage the right audience. Just tossing it onto the “it” channel du jour doesn’t mean you’re maximizing its potential.
2. How do you determine where we should have a presence in the future?
The logical follow-up to question one. Things change quickly and frequently in the online world. MySpace yesterday is Facebook today. What’s the plan for tomorrow and the next day?
3. How will you apportion our budget across these channels?
Different channels, different needs. Each channel or platform requires more or less spend, financial and human. What’s their budgetary plan for you?
4. What’s your approach to distributing content to a variety of audiences?
If all they know is Facebook and Twitter, they’re not doing their homework or exploring new channels; nor are they addressing your unique needs or the value of niche audiences.
5. How frequently should we publish?
If the answer is anything less than very frequently, move on. The life span of content, no matter how engaging, is brief. To stay relevant, content should be perpetually produced.
The takeaway
Ask these questions and you may get some surprising answers — or blank stares. But the answers will give you the necessary insight to judge any social media strategy. You’ll learn whether your local neighborhood ‘expert’ recognizes the long-term strategic goals your company should be developing in 2010.”
Also, check out question #6 provided by the comments at the bottom of the blog post, where in our opinion it is a perfect additional question from Andrew Davis.
“How have you used your strategy to execute successful, long term relationships with a well-defined audience?”
Friend Request DENIED! Marines sending mixed messages about social media
The Associated Press is reporting today that The Pentagon is clamping down on access to social media sites through their computers. We’re all for national security but it does strike us as odd when there are dozens of official social media sites related to the armed forces. 
Story below.
The Pentagon is reviewing the use of Facebook and other social networking sites on its computers with an eye toward setting rules on how to protect against possible security risks.
The Marine Corps on Monday issued an administrative directive saying it was banning the use of Marine network for accessing such sites as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace. The order doesn’t affect Marines’ private use of such networks on personal computers outside of their jobs.
However, the service’s computer network already effectively blocks users from reaching social networks, officials said. Marine officials said part of the reason for the new ban was to set up a special waiver system that govern access for Marines who need to reach the sites as part of their duties.
Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn, meanwhile, ordered a review of both the threats and benefits of using emerging Internet capabilities, which the military has widely used for recruiting, public relations and sharing information with allies and military families, officials said Tuesday.
Lynn noted that the sites and other Web 2.0 capabilities “have rapidly emerged as integral tools in day-to-day operations across” the department. (more…)
