Kristi Vandenbosch video showcasing the best of the US Presidential election online activity

The US Presidential primaries have now finished and Kristi Vandenbosch has put together a great video that highlights some of the most popular viral videos and online activity from the US primary campaigns. The video features the Jack Nicholson endorsement, Obama Girl, John McCain as the Fresh prince, Hillary vs Cookies and many many others!

You can watch it here:

Kristi Vandenbosch's US presidential election online showreel from the Advertising 2.0 US conference

This showreel demonstrates how dramatically the political campaigning landscape has changed in the US, with digital (especially user generated content) now playing a major role in US elections. It also shows how far ahead online political campaigning in America is versus the UK.

I wrote a number of pieces recently about the London Mayor election and the candidates' use of online. Whilst there were a wide range of new initiatives and some commendable activity through social networks and digital channels, when you see the US Presidential campaign highlights in the video, it shows how much more potential there is for UK politicians to use online channels to capture the public imagination – though I’m not sure we'll see ‘Gordon Brown girl’ any time soon!

UPDATE - Google have also published a review of the Presidential primary elections online on the official Google blog. Titled 'Elections in the internet era' it pulls together links to a number of YouTube reviews like 'Pop Culture politics' and 'Running the 21st century campaign.' Read more here:

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/06/elections-in-internet-era.html

Related articles on this blog:

London Mayor election review of online developments -

http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/05/london-mayor-election-online-web.html

London Mayor candidates online vs US Presidential candidates online -

http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/04/london-mayor-candidates-v-us.html

Nokia and Spike Lee to produce a collaborative UGC film about music!

Spike Lee has been signed by Nokia to encourage people to “express mobile creativity in a massively collaborative film about music”. All details can be found on the website at http://www.nokiaproductions.com

The final film will be made up from content that Nokia users have created with their mobile phones and will be put together by Spike Lee.

"Here’s the assignment:

Humanity is our central theme. Think about its meaning and how music tells our story. Over the course of production, there will be three Acts for you to interpret.

Shoot a photo or video that reflects the Act.

Produce a soundtrack to enhance someone’s Act.

Text in ideas for others to go out and film.

Upload your work and if you want, edit in other people’s submissions to create a full Act.

Vote for your favorite Acts. The winners will appear in the next Spike Lee Joint."

Nokia's partnership with Spike Lee is a nice way of demonstrating how a mobile phone can be used for far more than just calls. Another example is a recent campaign where Nokia sent bloggers on a trip that would see them mobile blog around the world using an N82 (see here for more: http://neilperkin.typepad.com)

However, whilst I like the Nokia Spike Lee partnership, my favourite example of this user generated / music video collaboration idea is actually from the Beastie Boys way back in 2004! The concert documentary that they made "Awesome; I F**kin' Shot That!" looks even more impressive when viewed in the context of how media and music has developed in recent years.

In October 2004 the Beastie Boys gave video cameras to 50 members of their concert audience in different parts of Madison Square Garden and encouraged them to film as much footage as they could. The end result was a 6,372 cuts which band member Nathaniel Hornblower (Adam Yauch) then painstakingly edited and spliced together to create a highly innovative Beastie Boys concert film - way before User Generated Content entered the mainstream (more here).

This is a good indicator of how quickly technology has changed in a short space of time. The Beastie Boys had to distribute Hi8 cameras, whereas Nokia's collaborative Spike Lee project can have a far wider range of contributors as users can now produce high quality video via their mobile phones!

London mayor election will see a new style of British political campaigning online

The power of crowds has been evident with a number of collaborative initiatives that have brought together likeminded online users. For example 30,000 people paid for a stake in www.myfootballclub.com which led to the group purchase of Ebbsfleet United football club and www.tribewanted.com created a combination of online community and real world sustainable tourism project on the Fijian island of Vorovoro.

To date the UK political establishment have not tapped into this trend though. In 'Politics, Policy and the Internet' (a recent publication for the Centre For Policy Studies) Telegraph journalist, Robert Colville, argues that British political parties have failed to embrace the new opportunities online (see here where you can download the pdf of his full study). Indeed the British National Party website has the same market share as all of the other UK major parties combined. He argues that the major UK political parties could reverse this by altering their mindset from “send” to “receive”, by learning the lessons of unofficial organisations such as bloggers, activists and campaign groups which have exploited the potential of the internet.

Whilst there are political blogs and sites like Webcameron, no party has truly engaged online communities in policy development. Downing St e-petitions have seen specific groups mobilised around particular issues (1 million people against roadpricing), but the UK has not seen anything similar to Estonia's 'today I decide' initiative that offered the Estonian public the chance to influence national policy and feedback on proposed new laws.

In the US Presidential elections Ron Paul and Barack Obama particularly have shown how effective the internet can be as a vehicle for raising funds and engaging supporters. Ron Paul is an interesting case because his campaign has used the internet to generate support far exceeding the original predictions for his campaign. The US electoral system means that he was always going to struggle against the more established candidates and campaign machines, however his online strategy has set the bar for online campaigning (see my previous post here: http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/02/no-other-presidential-candidate-can.html). Ron Paul and Barack Obama's online tactics could be particularly effective in a democracy with a more focussed electoral timeframe (weeks rather than months / years) and some of these strategies could be well suited to the forthcoming election for London's mayor.

The London mayoral election is the first really significant British election in a Web 2.0 world and over the next few weeks London is set to see some online political campaigning that has not been previously seen in the UK. Whilst things like Ken Livingstone's Search campaign are already running, the really interesting moves are around some of the independent candidates.

The socially progressive website www.londonelectsyou.co.uk is offering to award £50,000 to the campaign of an independent candidate. This will be awarded to the winner of a sort of online primary that www.londonelectsyou.co.uk are running, with the candidate gaining the most online votes by 18 March qualifying for the financial support.

Time Out magazine have entered their own independent candidate (Michael Hodges) into this competition and have flagged it, under the strapline of 'Vote Hodges', on the front cover of their magazine this week.

Michael Hodges is offering readers the chance to participate in the collaborative production of his London manifesto. More details can be found here: http://www.helphodges2008.com

Using public domain, online voter suggestions and feedback to influence an election manifesto is a clever idea and I'm sure the main UK political parties will start seriously investigating this sort of model for testing their own policy ideas. It is also a useful mechanism for bringing MPs closer to their constituents.

Alternatively if the UK political parties do not adopt practices of this nature, it may not be long before www.mypoliticalparty.co.uk actually becomes a reality?

FOOTNOTE:

I have also written about the Google strategies of the respective candidates here: http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/04/are-london-mayor-candidates-making-most.html

User generated Machinima videos - a trend to be embraced or a trend to be discouraged?

Machinima videos are great examples of user generated content. Gamers mashup / re-edit footage from popular games like Halo, the Sims and World of Warcraft to create their own short films and videos. Video sharing sites like YouTube are being used as Machinima distribution networks and are allowing videos to be shared with both peer groups and a wider audience.

Machinima music videos are popular and a selection based on Halo and World Of Warcraft are below:

Dance All Night Machinima music video


McDonald's Rap Machinima music video


Its All Coming Back To Me Now Machinima music video
Established publishers are working out how to address this trend, though the standard response has been that Machinima music videos breach artist copyright. WindUp records' response to UGC machinima videos is documented in the book 'Wikinomics'. Fans of WindUp records artists created over 3000 hours of Machinima music videos and spent over a quarter of a million hours creating them. This level of engagement offered a fantastic opportunity for WindUp records, however instead of embracing these Machinima creators, WindUp records served 'cease and desist' notices and asked for these videos to be removed as they breached copyright.

Despite this Machinima videos and user created remixes and mashups persist. Some mashup artists like Danger Mouse have since been officially signed to labels and some in the music industry seem to be changing their approach - seeing these areas as vibrant pools of creative talent rather than just viewing them as copyright infringers.

Should machinima and mashup user generated creativity be encouraged or should it just been seen as another form of copyright infringement?

Metro launch series of features on 'Change' and give readers the chance to redesign the Metro masthead!

Today's Metro newspaper launched a series of features on change and started a competition to allow readers to design a new Metro masthead!

The newspaper contains a 4 page feature in association with Zurich and it looks at how our lives have changed over the last 10 years. Looking to the future, the feature also references the 'Living Britain' report that Zurich commissioned from the Future Laboratory.

The feature includes top news stories from 1997, a quiz and various interesting facts including:

- Dave Winer started the first online diary in 1997 (the word blog was first used 2 years later)
- The 'Google' domain name was first registered in 1997
- 1997 saw the launch of BBC News 24 and Sky Digital

The feature also contains discussions about change in music, fashion, celebrity, books, transport, technology and community.

Activity appears online at http://www.metro.co.uk/zurich and there are links to the stories about how the world has changed, the Living Britain report, a quiz on changes in the last decade and the competition to redesign the masthead (with a gallery showing submissions so far.) Readers also have the chance to contribute their thoughts on change or submit their favourite quotes about change.

Blendtec (will it blend?), Lonelygirl15 and French Maid TV - 3 great examples of different You Tube business models

Many people (including Google) have been trying to work out how to use You Tube as a revenue generator. I have found 3 unconventional examples:

1) Blendtec and Will It Blend? Blendtec make industrial strength blenders and the CEO was confident that these qualities could be shown off on film. However whilst Blendtec CEO Tom Dickson did not have the budget for a slick TV campaign, he did have $50 and the technical expertise to make his own videos.

A series of videos were made where Mr. Dickson showed Blendtec equipment blending every day technological items. Once uploaded to You Tube the films became hits - especially the film where an iPhone gets blended!

Blendtec claims to have seen an online sales uplift of 650% since this approach was adopted and this is a great example of how it's not what you say, but where and how you say it.

2) Lonelygirl15

Running on Bebo and through You Tube, Lonelygirl15 was a massive success. Bitesized soap episodes engaged youth audiences and developed a cult following with over 3 milllion episode views.

As well as selling more ad inventory from higher site traffic, the producers were able to monetise the content by selling product placement opportunities which were taken up by companies like P&G and Orange.

This concept has been continued through new series like 'Sofias Diary' and Endemol produced 'Gap Year.'

Watch the latest videos on YouTube.com

3) FrenchmaidTV

A series of how-to-videos with a twist! Instead of traditional product demonstrations, FrenchMaidTV has (as the name would suggest) a number of French maids showing how to do things. Films are again bitesize (3 to 5 minutes) and are based around the French Maids having a bit of an adventure whilst the vocieover gives practical tips.

FrenchmaidTV are offering the chance for companies to get specific products featured as well as offering members of the public the chance to star as French maids in future FrenchmaidTV episodes - again monetising their traffic through things like

FrenchmaidTV is not particularly PC and may not be to everyones taste, but it does seem to work - over 3.6 million YouTube views for the 'How To Share photos' video alone!

Watch the latest videos on YouTube.com

None of the above examples employ cutting edge video production. These are great examples of how YouTube is changing the rules. Overproduced corporate advertising is a big turn off in this space (see my post on P Diddy and Burger King here) and whilst successful online video can often look amateurish, there is no doubting its ability to engage the You Tube audience!

Molson pulls 'Canadian Nation' student Facebook Group competition after accusations of promoting excess drinking

Canadian lager brand Molson have recently been running a 'Molson Canadian Nation' campaign, but this has become the latest big name social media campaign to run into difficulties. The campaign ran as a Facebook Group under the banner of 'Molson Canadian Nation', but has been cancelled after accusations that it promoted irresponsible drinking.

'Canadian Nation' university and college students were encouraged to post pictures of themselves partying on their campus, with the best photo winning an $8000 trip for 5 to Cancun. Various 'university administators' condemned Molson for promoting excess drinking and irresponsible behaviour. People have also pointed out the danger to future career prospects of posting drunken party photos to the internet.

The Canadian Nation campaign did not run outside Canada, but has been pulled in the face of the criticism it received. Molson still view social media as an important media channel though and say they will continue to experiment with blogs and user generated content.

Nick Burcher writes: "Molson's Canadian Nation Facebook campaign is an good example of how social media campaigns can engage the target audience but upset the wider population. This is a difficult area for brands, but the rewards from getting it right will (in most cases) offset the risks of getting it wrong."

Batman Dark Knight with Heath Ledger - viral seeding and online activity starts over 18 months before the film is due for cinema release!

There has been some amazing digital hype activity running to support the new Batman film, Dark Knight.

Kicking off over 18 months before release, there have been a series of viral initiatives that have gained widespread coverage and seen significant consumer interaction. Most of the activity has been tease and reveal and has offered reward for user interaction - accreditation, photos and set shots, sneak previews etc. In a lot of cases activity hasn't been promoted and this has led to internet users searching around, trying to find the latest viral and searching out tips on how things work. Little of the plot has been given away, but a very high level of engagement has been created.

A particularly clever example was a 'treasure hunt' (at http://www.whysoserious.com) where users had to solve clues, find certain locations, photograph them and then upload the images. Each image represented a letter and once the full sentence was visible, a previously unseen still from the film was revealed. Anyone who uploaded an image also got a name check on the site.

More recent activity has involved a Halloween site where users were encouraged to make a Joker mask (www.rorysdeathkiss.com) and upload photos that showed them wearing it:

A fake clown site has been created at www.rent-a-clown.com and all the clown photos are of people with make up like the Joker:

www.ibelieveinharveydent.com shows a political poster for one of the films characters, Harvey Dent:

A version of this website is rumoured to be running at www.ibelieveinharveydenttoo.com , however when you get there all you see is a message saying 'Page Not Found.'

There is a secret message on this page though. If you go to the 'Edit' menu at the top of the browser page and then 'Select All' a secret message from the Joker is revealed!

The trailers have obviously been 'leaked' onto You Tube too:

Nick Burcher writes: "Viral activity has been all over the internet for the Dark Knight film. Starting hype activity over 18 months before release is unprecedented and it seems to have created significant audience engagement. Somehow I feel there is more to come - let's hope the film warrants the hype!!"

Primark reject the opportunity to create a Facebook fan page because unofficial Primark Appreciation Society Facebook Group is so successful!

I have previously written about retailers on Facebook with a post entitled '5 Great Examples of retailers using Facebook' One of the best examples I could find was the PRIMARK APPRECIATION SOCIETY and this has gained more prominence in recent months.

The Primark Appreciation Society Facebook group now has 98,375 members! More remarkable is the fact that this group was not created by Primark, but by a student from Oxford Brookes University called Sophie Bellchambers. According to Marketing magazine (14 Nov 2007) the group now features 335 photos uploaded by users and more than 340 discussion threads with topics such as products, staff and paper bags.



The latest issue of Marketing (21 Nov 2007) includes a review of Primark.co.uk, authored by Sophie Bellchambers, the founder of the Primark Appreciation Society on Facebook. (link) She argues that Primark's website is not up to scratch and that this has been a major contributory factor to the growth of the Primark Appreciation Society. Furthermore she argues that the volume of people on her Facebook group indicates a genuine desire for an 'online shop, or at least a forum showing what's new in store.' She also takes the opportunity to plug the idea of an Express queue for Christmas!

Primark are not designing a fan page / advertiser page on Facebook though - there will be no opportunity for Facebook users to publicly declare 'I am a fan of Primark.' The justification is that the Primark Appreciation Society is already well-supported and according to a Primark spokesman 'an independent Facebook group launched by our customers is of far more value than anything we could do.' (Marketing 14 Nov 2007).

A Facebook page offers more to an advertiser than a Facebook Group though. A Facebook Ad page is publicly searchable through a Search Engine and provides a useful (SEO friendly) linkback to the main website. It is also possible to track popularity by using the Insight tools and advertisers can promote it through targeted ads to a users Feeds. Many Facebook users are slightly suspicious of the new ad mechanisms on the site, but Primark seem to be in a position where they can test these new models, however it doesn't look like they are going to at the moment.

Nick Burcher writes: "The popularity of the Primark Appreciation Society on Facebook shows how keen Primark customers are to interact with the brand. Many advertisers are unsure of the response they would get if they created a fan page, but Primark are in an unique position where their customers are crying out for more online / Facebook interaction with them. Consumers are actively seeking out Primark online and creating a Facebook fan page, coupled with a redesign of Primark.co.uk, would create a great opportunity to show off product , give sneak previews and offer discount vouchers to their loyal customers. The new Facebook ad platform is based on word of mouth / trusted referrals and with 98,375 members in an unofficial group, Primark could get some great results from this new advertising model."

Kevin Rudd and the Kevin07 campaign - Is David Cameron taking notes?

The Australian election campaign is coming to an end with the poll just a few days away. Kevin Rudd is 18 years younger than the incumbent Prime Minister, John Howard, and has used digital extensively (far more than his opponent) under the Kevin07 banner. His efforts have been criticised by some for pushing information at voters rather than engaging them in two way conversations, but there is no doubting the importance that digital has had within the Kevin07 campaign.
The Kevin07 homepage (http://www.kevin07.com.au/) has been used to co-ordinate the various different online activity employed by the Rudd campaign. The homepage links to the Kevin07 Myspace pages, the Kevin07 Facebook Group and the Kevin07 YouTube channel. It also allows supporters to sign up to be distributors of viral email, runs polls / petitions and aggregates associated Kevin 07 blogs. Association with developing media channels (and the 'Kevin07' concept) has arguably allowed Kevin Rudd to appear modern and fresh compared to a long serving incumbent.

There are some interesting comparisons that can be made with UK politics. Like Kevin Rudd, David Cameron is significantly younger than his adversary and is seeking to harness online properties to help reposition the Conservatives as a party for the future. Kevin07.com has a UK equivalent in WebCameron and this is starting to become a well developed entry point to the internet.

A big difference though is that David Cameron is not running a scattergun approach and trying to use every channel he can find. He has (cleverly) resisted the lure of setting up Kevin 07 Facebook / Myspace equivalents and has instead focussed on running online video pieces in strategic areas. Webcameron carries video highlights, the Webcameron YouTube channel is used in a similar way and there is an interesting experiment that is running on Friction TV (though admittedly these all seem to have the same content showing.)

These channels do not necessarily have the visitor numbers of Myspace or Facebook, but they are appropriate for David Cameron's content and will engage people effectively as a result - something that may not have been possible with Myspace or Facebook.

However Webcameron and the other channels are not promoted particularly effectively. Occasional references to Webcameron in speeches (eg the recent Zeitgeist speech) will not drive traffic alone. An effective link generation campaign in conjunction with a targeted Search campaign could boost visitor numbers and engagement significantly. Viral ad messages spread through Facebook's new advertising system (targeted by voting preference / party identification) would also be an interesting way of reaching out to supporters and boosting the Conservatives 'modern' credentials.

Nick Burcher writes: "Kevin Rudd is not the only politician running a heavy digital strategy, but he is the closest to election day. It will be a major coup if he can unseat the incumbent Prime Minister and if it happens, then the Kevin07 digital campaign will be widely credited. Barack Obama and David Cameron will be watching closely!"

Can Social Networks be monetised? Opportunities and issues for Facebook, OpenSocial, Bebo etc

Yesterday Marketing Week published my comments in a feature about Social Networking. My quotes were:

Nick Burcher says: behavioural targeting is either the most highly targeted or most invasive advertising proposition there is, depending on who you talk to. “The debate around advertising in social networks is similar to that of mobile. It’s extremely personal, so there is a question as to whether brands should just muscle in on the space,” says Burcher.

Zed’s Burcher agrees Google’s OpenSocial could prove to be the winner. “It’s very clever,” he says. “Its corporate mission is to organise the world’s information, which it can’t do behind walls. If Google has the data and incorporates this with AdWords platform, it could democratise the networks. It could also give users huge benefits, as they wouldn’t have to input their data into each network every time they registered, while advertisers could run content across the platforms.”

Intrusive: Social networks allow for behavioural targeting, but sites should only use information that is freely given by the user, according to Nick Burcher

Full story is here: http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/item/58607

List of the largest Facebook Groups, and the difference between 'I am a fan of' and 'I am a member of'

I recently tried to write a top 10 of Facebook Groups. In the absence of an official Facebook chart my post tried to list the Facebook groups with the most members. My original post is here: http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/10/biggest-largest-groups-on-facebook.html

Since writing this post I have become aware of a number of other monster groups! So here is my second list of the biggest groups on Facebook!

Details are below:

1) 'Let’s set and break a Guiness Record!!!! Approved by guinnessworldrecords.com'
2,011,334 members to date and growing very quickly – I guess this will end up breaking some sort of record, just a shame there is so little point to it! http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=7888220844

2) 'They are trying to shut down Facebook – petition to keep it! Invite all! ' This group is based around the action that ConnectU have been trying to take against Facebook over intellectual property rights. I’m not sure how much a Facebook Group would influence a judges decision, but 1,633,702 think that joining this group will help in some way. It has also inspired a whole range of imitation / sub-groups. The group can be seen at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2808848431

3) '1,000,000 strong for Stephen T Colbert' - US TV satirist has his own Facebook group – people are instructed to join this group if they 'love watching the Colbert report.' Not sure what it is exactly for, but 1,483,214 have joined so far.
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=7406420086

4) 'If you remember this you grew up in the 90’s' – featuring a massive list of things that you will remember, 1,258,379 members have signed up to join in!
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2204285338

5) 'Let’s set a Guiness Record!!!!' Same principle as the Guinness group above and the same misspelling of Guinness! Membership seems to have been dropping but still had 737,485 members when I checked tonight! http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2328213900

6) 'I bet I can find 1,000,000 people who dislike George Bush!' Losing the bet at the moment as only 703,756 have signed up! http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5022036305

7)'I Don’t care How Comfortable Crocs Are, You Look Like A Dumbass' – “they’re like shoes, only……well…….repulsive.” 676,483 people agree and have joined up to make their feelings felt! http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2204667614

8) 'Facebook will be forced to shutdown in 20 days! Join and save it!' Believe this was one of the original Facebook petitions. Haven’t been able to find it recently, but the last time I saw it there were 632,374 members who believed that signing up to this would somehow be able to influence a judge if Facebook was sued!

9) 'I secretly want to punch slow walking people in the back of the head' – started in Louisiana by someone called Kaz Kean, this group seems to have struck a chord with people across the world and 612,331 have signed up to date! http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2208419959

10) 'No I don’t care if I die at 12AM, I refuse to pass on your chain letter' – don’t expect the 409,241 members to be passing anything on for you! http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2211022716

There is an interesting contrast between the numbers joining groups and the numbers fanning (is that the correct verb nowadays?) Facebook Ad pages. Certain user generated groups have grown by hundreds of thousands in a matter of days, compared to some of the corporate pages - eg Microsoft still only have a handful of fans.

This is a very good illustration of the difference between traditional media and Web 2.0. The first is about passive consumption ('entertain me'), the latter is about active participation ('I make my own entertainment.') Brands need to think very carefully before charging into the social network space and ensure they are offering something useful / relevant. Users won't go back to a page that just has a big logo and a 'founded in' date. Likewise they don't want brands taking over their personal spaces (unless there is something for them in return.)

There are 'car crash' examples of projects that have gone wrong all over the internet (P Diddy and Burger King, Wall-marting Across America etc) and I'm sure there are others out there.......

Let me know if you find any groups I have missed or examples of advertisers getting it wrong!

Other posts about Facebook:

Facebook usage statistics: http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/03/latest-facebook-usage-statistics.html

Largest groups on Facebook (part one):
http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/10/biggest-largest-groups-on-facebook.html

Largest fan pages on Facebook:
http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/05/list-of-largest-facebook-fan-pages-with.html

Media Week discuss how Google can monetise You Tube and deal with You Tube service issues

Media Week ran an article this week analysing whether Google can get a return on their investment in You Tube. They included some comments from me:

Nick Burcher believes You Tube still rises above the rest and is beginning to endear itself to agencies by making it as easy to book ads on YouTube as it is on Google.

“Regardless of whatever else is out there, YouTube is still ahead in numbers and brand recognition,” says Burcher. “People confident in promoting their brands will become more willing to advertise once there are more examples up there. It helps that it has become really easy to book ads since You Tube was integrated with the Google interface.”

I am a 'fan' of Coca-Cola, Microsoft and Blockbuster - first experiences of Facebook Ad Pages

Facebook launched Facebook Ads on Tuesday. This gave advertisers (amongst other things) the chance to create advertiser pages which users could 'Add' to their Facebook profiles. Once added a message is published in the Feed that declares that you are a 'fan' of X brand.

There was a rush to launch Facebook advertiser pages and 100,000 were published in the first 24 hours!

I am now a fan of Coca-Cola, Microsoft and Blockbuster. Updates have been published in my feed and I will look to see if this prompts any of my Facebook friends to follow suit - if the viral / trusted referral model works then at least some of them should.

So was my experience rewarding?

I am the only fan of Microsoft! I don't know if this is a reflection on their brand or if it is because there is nothing there, other than a Microsoft logo and a 'founded in 1975' note. Randomly there are 2 Microsoft Ad pages and neither seem to have progressed further than just adding a logo and a date! Assume this is the equivalent of buying a domain name before knowing what to do with it? Watch this space! http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=7232030949

Coca-Cola have a bit more going on but there is still not much more than a big logo, a bit of company history and 3 discussion groups (one of which is about alleged issues in Colombian bottling plants.) Assume they will do more with it, but I think it highlights an interesting dilemma for the companies using these pages – pursuit of authenticity vs brand protection through moderating / censoring comments? http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=8336965364



The Blockbuster page looks significantly more established – even the page address has been customised. Various images and info on latest releases, details of current offers, links to other information and a ‘Blockbuster driven’ movie rating application called ‘MovieClique.’ Only 52 fans so far but this is the best looking page that I have found. Good work, especially as there is no media cost involved! http://www.facebook.com/blockbuster

Nick Burcher writes: "Facebook ad pages look like they will be very popular and I'm surprised that there is no media cost attached to them. Social ads will be a harder sell as they are more difficult to explain, but these unique targeting opportunities have the potential to revolutionise online planning and buying."

P Diddy, Burger King and LisaNova on YouTube - Social Media campaigns don't always work out as planned.....

Burger King and P Diddy got together on the DiddyTV on YouTube to announce that they were entering into a partnership. The first episode features Diddy walking through a Burger King, chatting to the camera and ordering a Whopper.

Not everyone on YouTube enjoyed this though. LisaNova became something of a YouTube celebrity after posting her own version of this clip as a video response:



The LisaNova clip has twice as many views as the P Diddy clip! Think this is a good example of how brands now need to engage consumers, rather than just preach at them. The key thing is to operate within the 'rules of the universe' and give consumers something useful - two things that the Diddy clip didn't do.

Bo Hellberg from Ogilvy summed this up nicely at IAB Engage 2007. He says "if brands are going to gatecrash the party, they can at least turn up with some booze."

Josh Spear from Undercurrent talks about the 'born digital generation' at IAB Engage in London

Nick Burcher saw Josh Spear speak at the IAB Engage event in London:

Josh Spear of Undercurrent / www.joshspear.com told marketers and agencies that the youth generations of today were 'born digital' and they think that all media is social, digital media. This audience will 'issue passports' to advertisers, but only if brands engage with them respectfully.

In his opinion beng born digital is a mindset and gave various examples. iJustine has over 5000 followers on Twitter, Loopt.com is 'Twitter on crack' (combining Twitter type technology with GPS) and I'minlikewithyou combines dating and gaming.

The mobile phone is the centre of gravity for this generation and there are some interesting developments. However, Josh Spear does not believe that 16-24 year olds will embrace Blyk (the new service that gives 217 texts and 43 minutes of free mobile phone usage in exchange for allowing advertisers to serve them ads.) He believes that they will 'put up' with Blyk because
it gives something free, but saying they will embrace it is going to far.

The success of the Radiohead 'Rainbows' album was used to demonstrate how brands will benefit if they are brave.

He went on to argue that advertisers need to redefine their approach. The aim should be to get 'born digital' generations to reach out for them - basically create something that they want to find / use.

The presentation finished by offering 3 golden rules for advertisers targeting youth markets online:

- Think of how you could turn an interruption like a banner into a service or something useful
- Think of how your brand can make each place you advertise a better place for users to be
- Ask yourself, are you following the rules of the universe?

He left us with this final thought:

'If it's hard to advertise products to this born digital now, imagine how hard it will be to sell them things like healthcare or insurance in 10 years time........'

Citizen Criticism - the rise of celebrity commenters like DaShiv and a nice touch from Technorati founder David Sifry!

People like Lily Allen and Tila Tequila became famous after promoting themselves online. Both of them used Myspace and created personal networks of hundreds of thousands of ‘friends.’ They were then able to promote their products (CDs, TV shows etc) to this captive audience and take advantage of the opportunities this offered.

The notion of becoming famous through personally publishing music / video / blogs online is an appealing one for many - though only a small percentage of people have the capacity / time / inclination to follow this through.

Nowadays though it is not just about people breaking through after publishing original content online. A new cultural phenomenon can be seen in the US - the rise of the 'celebrity commenter!' Rather than running their own blog / Myspace profile etc these people are spending their time leaving comments on other peoples blogs and pages. These people are gaining cult status just through having an opinion on somebody elses work!

The most well known commenter is probably ‘DaShiv’ - over 13,000 comments! He mainly comments through MetaFilter (http://www.metafilter.com/user/3502) and also posts photos to Flickr here (http://www.flickr.com/photos/dashiv). Great work and a man in demand at the moment after his recent appearance in the New York Times!

Various other people have gained attention through widespread commenting and a nice example is David Sifry, founder of blog tracker Technorati. Mr Sifry practices what he preaches and tries to post as many blog comments as he can especially if they mention him or Technorati - I would feel honoured if he commented here!

Nick Burcher writes: “This is another example of how the internet empowers people in the Web 2.0 world. People are gaining fame not through producing original work, but through having opinions on what other people have done. Citizen Criticism is here!"

Brand Republic report: Saga have launched Sagazone, a UK social network for the over-50's

Saga have launched a social network site for the over-50's called SagaZone (http://www.saga.co.uk/sagazone)

Brand Republic featured this on their Digital bulletin today and included comments from me:

Nick Burcher, board member at Zed Media, said Saga's entry into the UK social networking arena was an effective way of connecting with its audience, which was increasingly willing to interact and form communities online, as evidenced by the popularity of Friends Reunited with older users.

Burcher said: "Over the last year there have been a number of moves into this area to tap into the older market online. Saga Zone is part of the company’s overall engagement and interaction with its customers, rather than a standalone social networking site for over 50s."

Burcher said that it was unlikely that older users of social network sites would devote the amount of time typical among younger users: "We are not seeing massive usage in these demographics in social networking. However, older users tend to be more loyal and less likely to jump on the next bandwagon, so they are more likely to be sticky and develop loyalty to one site over time.

"Social networking has been dominated by youth-oriented sites such as MySpace, Facebook and Bebo. MySpace is almost deliberately designed to alienate older users and preserve its exclusively young user base."

Making money from social networking was still a challenge faced by even popular sites, Burcher said: "Facebook is still wrestling with how to monetise their traffic, despite their massive user base."

http://www.brandrepublic.com/Digital/News/763810/Saga-launches-social-networking-site-attract-over-50s/

You Tube hero Chad Vader to star with Glenn Rubenstein (Lonelygirl15 writer) and Gary Brolsma in Canon sponsored "Battle of the Internet Superstars!"

Another example of the internet making celebrities out of 'normal people' - the Chad Vader phenomenon. Bored shop staff started making tongue in cheek short films featuring a character who is the supposed younger brother of Darth Vader from the Star Wars films.

"Chad Vader: Day Shift Manager" was filmed in a grocery store and shows Chad Vader unable to get a date, despite his powers. With the exception of the Darth Vader suit everything was very low budget, however 8 films have now been made and the series has become extremely successful on Youtube - over 19 million views according to the New York Times!

The makers of the films, Matt Sloan and Aaron Yonda, have become celebrities in their own right and this month Canon are flying them to New York to participate in the making of a film that will feature other You Tube celebrities - notably the writers of LonelyGirl15 and Romanian lip sync star Gary Brolsma (the "numa numa" guy.)

Nick Burcher writes: "it will be interesting to see how this turns out for Canon. Rather than jump onto the user generated / create your own ads fad, Canon are seeking to enhance their digital credentials by using established cult internet figures. This sounds like a hit to me - I'm looking forward to seeing the results!"