Two dance crazes swept the internet in the last year: Psy’s “Gangnam Style,” a highly polished music video with an international flavor; and “The Harlem Shake,” a low-budget nerd-fest that had nothing to do with the titular neighborhood, but was fun to watch. Both were insanely popular and parodied many times over.

This infographic from UK-based agency Face compares the two memes and shows how the videos spread over social media. It gets down to nitty gritty of how many viewers and shares each video had over time, and which countries, social networks, and influencers helped spread the word.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Content marketing for the Internet and content marketing for radio follow the same rules. I know this because before I wore the uniform of a plain black t-shirt and jeans of an Internet marketer, you found me in a Hawaiian shirt as a whacky morning radio shock jock. Every morning for 6 years I got [...]

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Adam Lundquist

Adam Lundquist is the CEO of Nerds Do It Better a Philadelphia based digital marketing company. He has held a variety of positions including the Director of Digital Marketing for Digital Operative. He thinks that he is hilarious, but his mom always tells him that Steve Martin is way funnier.

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The post What Radio Taught Me About Content Creation appeared first on Search Engine Journal.

Asking people to “like,” comment, or share

If you’re constantly asking your social media base to “like” your posts, comment on your photos, or share your product, you’re just coming off as desperate. Here’s why your audience has matured.

Promoting hashtags over conversation

We’ve all seen them in marketing: #(fill-in-the-blank company name, product, or cause). If this marketing tactic takes consumers to an empty conversation, you’re doing something seriously wrong.

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One of the most common mistakes marketers make is that they think their customers and prospects care about them, what they sell and how it works. The human truth is consumers really do think, feel and ask “what’s in it for me?”

They have something they want to accomplish – from getting a cereal that their kids will eat to finding the right de-greaser for their airplane engines. They know the result they’re after and their buying decision is going to be based on satisfying that need.

When it comes to buying decisions, those decisions are always:

• Based on emotion (positive or negative ones)
• Based on meeting our needs and wants (even implicit)

And the truth of it is, consumers usually don’t care about understanding the nitty gritty of how those needs and wants are met.

I’m not suggesting someone would turn a blind eye to dangers, laws or morals. But think of your own buying behaviors. Typically, we don’t care how something works, we just care that it does. Or we care about some very specific aspect of how it works that is tied to us getting the result that we want.

It might be speed, expense, reliability, safety etc. that is tied back to that emotional tug. It’s all about the end result, though. Contrast that “cut to the chase” hunger for a solution with the marketing or sales’ teams attempts to sell.

We often build elaborate cases for how and why our product/service is the absolutely right solution. We list benefits (with bullet points and visuals) that dig into the nuances of every aspect of how we get something accomplished. See the disconnect?

Worried that your marketing might be putting the spotlight on the wrong part of the equation? Here are some common trouble spots.

Headlines: Most headlines are feature headlines. They are about us, not the consumer. “From 0-60 in 5 seconds” is talking about an attribute of our product. “You’ll never be late for another soccer game” is about the buyer’s desires.

Try this instead: Make sure your headline is making a promise or pointing out the consequence of them not using your product. Use the buyer’s emotions to connect them to how your wares can solve their problem.

Tradeshow booths: Because space is at a premium in trades show signage, booth graphics and materials – we tend to use bullet points galore. We want to pack in the facts. Which means we’re telling our story, not the one the buyer wants to hear.

Try this instead: Think about what your prospects ask most. Use your booth to answer those frequently asked questions about end results, rather than talk features.

Sales presentations: If you pull out some old sales presentations, take this simple test. Grade each PowerPoint slide – about us or about them. In most cases, your slides are going to be 75% about you and about 25% about what the customer wants.

Try this instead: Use this recipe for putting together your next presentation. The first 2/3 of the slides should be about the client, client’s business, their challenge and what you can do it fix it. Then, take that final 1/3 of your slides and divide them into 2. The first half – you can give them some information about your company, working with you, etc. The final ½ should be re-focused on the prospect and solving their problem.

If you start looking at all of your marketing materials with this new perspective, you’ll quickly be able to spot which ones need to have their focus re-adjusted to be more about the customer and less about you.

This post originally appeared in our December ’12 issue of “Live Report from the Future of Marketing,” our monthly Post-Advertising newsletter. Subscribe for free here.

My wife has never seen the movie Goonies, released in 1985. That’s a shame. So many classic lines, and one of the most well known yet practically silent characters, Lotney Fratelli, better known to the masses as Sloth. 

The strong, silent type, Sloth had only three audible lines, but anyone who has seen the movie can recite his most famous one, “Sloth love Chunk!” 

For the more than two decades since the movie’s release, the only words Sloth muttered were those in his three lines. That is, until he joined Twitter.

In August 2009, Sloth tweeted “Hey you guys!” His handle: @SlothGoonies. His location: In a basement. His run on Twitter lasted only two months and garnered only 20 followers, but they were a glorious two months for those of us who love Goonies.

Twitter gave a voice to all, in 140 or fewer characters. But what may not have been expected was who (or sometimes what) would manifest themselves/itself on Twitter. Characters from our favorite movies, television shows and commercials came to life on the social platform. Some of these were created by forward-thinking brands or media outlets, but most of them, like @SlothGoonies, were created by superfans, who cared about a character and show. When these characters find success on Twitter, it can create a wealth of earned media for the brand.

Mad Men’s Success 

It’s not surprising that with the success of Mad Men, a drama depicting life in advertising in the 1960s, came a number of fan-based Twitter accounts for the show’s characters. Helen Klein Ross, a social storyteller and advertiser, brought @BettyDraper, Don Draper’s ex-wife, to life. A cursory look at @BettyDraper’s “Rolodex” (a Twitter list) reveals 91 Mad Men–related Twitter accounts, including a half dozen Don Drapers and one for Don’s daughter, @sally_draper, a fainting couch and the copy machine. These accounts, often working together, extend the story line beyond just what’s seen on film, including @sally_draper’s live tweeting of the Beatles’ concert at Shea Stadium, which was briefly mentioned on the show (Don called Sally to tell her the good news that they were going to attend).  

Mad Men is the common case study for character-based Twitter success, but just having a Twitter account doesn’t mean that positive earned media will follow. The endeavor, whether created by the brand or by its fans, has the potential to create more questions and anxiety than social-media momentum. 

Does every brand character, like Tony the Tiger, Toucan Sam and the Green Giant, need a Twitter account? What if a fan creates the account first, as in the case of Mad Men? Should a brand seek out and quell these accounts, particularly if there is no brand oversight, or is it more authentic if the account is fan run? 

When Fans Take the Wheel

While Mad Men is an early success story, one popular fan-driven character is the Twitter manifestation of Kenny Powers, the not politically correct protagonist of the short-lived HBO show Eastbound & Down. His handle, @KFUCKINGP (his language, not mine), boasts nearly half a million followers. As there’s a dedicated author behind the account who’s perfectly in tune with the character’s tone of voice and humor, one would imagine that this is a huge win for HBO. I mean, who doesn’t love earned media and free labor?

While the account does offer classic one-liners that are not safe for work and constantly promotes the show’s upcoming episodes and seasons, a closer look finds the author of the account using the audience for his own benefit. In various tweets, he asks vendors for swag, promotes questionable contests and even gets paid to tweet (or at least appears to be being paid, because he uses the #ad hashtag).  

The popularity of the account implies that HBO’s not creating its own Twitter account based on the Kenny Powers character was a missed opportunity for the network. In an age when brand real estate is claimed on a first-come, first-served basis, however, the larger incentive for HBO to support a character-based account would be to avoid the pitfalls that come with an unpoliced, fan-run account. The popularity and exposure are nice, but credibility is paramount ensuring that an accurate brand story is told. 

When Brands Take the Wheel 

Should a brand decide to extend its character’s persona into the social sphere, a unique world in which fans can actually interact with their beloved character awaits. But unlike standard branded Twitter accounts, it’s not a ticket to one-way self-promotionville.

Progressive found success on TV with its bubbly insurance salesperson, Flo. If you can’t get enough of her enthusiasm in Progressive’s commercials, you can hop over to Twitter and read her daily musings. On a social platform designed for short, witty comments, Flo is primed to succeed. But @ItsFlo follows only 43 people, and of her 1,422 tweets, zero of them are @ replies. The tone of voice is spot-on, and the content is split evenly between self-promotion and witty banter, but the lack of fan interaction limits the brand’s ability to endear itself to fans.

On the flip side, it is a slippery slope when a fictional character tries to engage with the real world. What would the character say? How would they interact? Is that really the point of view that character would take? Six characters from Fox’s Glee are on Twitter (Kurt, Quinn, Rachel, Brittany, Sue and Will), but none of them engage with the audience. Homer Simpson, who has nearly a million followers, doesn’t reply either. It’s a clear attempt to avoid any possible fan interaction snafus. 

Out on a Ledge

There’s no question that Twitter offers a unique opportunity for brands to engage audiences through their characters, but it seems that it’s difficult to protect a character’s authenticity while engaging with a real-world audience. Character accounts started by superfans seem to drive the most engagement and get all the press, as in the cases of Mad Men and Eastbound & Down, but come with risks (what if the fan uses the audience for self-serving purposes? What if the fan simply quits or writes something that’s completely out of character?). Character accounts started by brands maintain the character’s authentic persona and tone of voice and even garner considerable audiences (as measured by number of followers) but rarely create far-reaching earned media, since there’s little to no two-way engagement with the audience.

For a brand, whether it’s a television show or a buttery spread, to find success in this space, it is going to have to extend itself beyond its comfort zone.

Here are a few things to keep in mind: 

1. Keep to a regular content-publishing schedule
It doesn’t have to be every day, but manage the audience’s expectations and adhere to what you promised.

2. Content matters
The character can promote, but most of the content should be shareable and/or engaging.

3. Keep brand and character separate
Don’t mix up roles and responsibilities. In the case of Progressive, @ItsFlo should be engaging but direct all customer complaints to the appropriate Twitter handle.

4. Model best practices
There’s no broadcaster or agency that could create a Twitter handle for every single character and inanimate object on a show. Instead, work together with fan-created accounts to be a best-practice example.

5. Attract audiences with exclusive content
Use Twitter as a place to extend the story, playing out storylines that simply couldn’t be expanded during the show. This can be especially useful for 30-second advertisements as well. 

There’s no clear blueprint for how brands should proceed, and there’s always a risk that fans will taking the wheel when brands hesitate. But there’s enough potential for earned media that brands should take a very serious look at bringing their characters to life.

What characters do you follow? 

Image via IMDB

Four billion people across the globe are expected to watch the Olympics this year. As a brand marketer, this is a massive opportunity. But the Olympics only last for little more than two weeks. How do marketers capture the Olympics spirit, go for the gold (so to speak), and stretch this unique opportunity as far as they can?

P&G seems to have found a formula for success. The CPG giant started its Olympic campaign, “Proud Sponsor of Moms” early, launching it in January of this year, more than seven months before the games began. Since then, it’s added multiple new creatives and has surged with the opening ceremonies in London. The result is a massive campaign that’s driven more than 37 million views to date, with more than 5.1 million views in July alone — enough to give P&G its debut on the Top Brands in Video chart.

Powered by data from Visible Measures, this monthly chart looks at the most-watched brands in online video, across all of their campaigns. (Check out past charts for June, May, and April.)

Like any good campaign, P&G started with its core audience: moms. “Proud Sponsor of Moms” is a celebration of mothers across the globe. It shows the love and support they pour into their kids’ dreams, whether their dream is to become the next Michael Phelps, Gabby Douglas, or simply enjoy competing and playing with other kids.

All of the content centers on this simple idea of celebrating moms. The main creative for the campaign, called “Best Job,” is a relatively straightforward yet poignant execution. It shows moms across the world waking their kids up at the crack of dawn, giving them breakfast, waiting for the bus in the rain, all to make sure they get to practice. It subtly highlights the everyday sacrifices moms make to ensure their kids reach their potential.

Is “Best Job” traditional viral content? No. But it’s solid content that resonates with P&G’s core audience. More than 14.4 million views to date for “Best Job” — that number speaks for itself.

Other creative executions for “Proud Sponsor of Moms” include “Raising an Olympian,” which features interviews with moms of Olympians, a “Momifesto” in which Olympians thank their moms for all they do, and more.

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Recently, I was on an in-house SEO panel at SMX with REI’s Jonathon Colman. Most of the audience’s questions centered around explaining and reporting relevant metrics to upper management. Turns out, while search has come a long way, many execs still use terms like “Google…



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In this video I interview Pat Flynn, founder of Smart Passive Income.

Pat tells the story behind his successful online business and shares the importance of the role podcasting plays in connecting with his blog audience. You’ll also discover why podcasting adds value to your online presence.

Be sure to check out the takeaways below after you watch the video.

Here are some of the things you’ll learn in this video:

• How Pat expands his business with passive income streams
• Discover how to combine podcasting with blogging
• How podcasts differ from blogs
• The value of your voice on podcasts
• How to provide intimacy for your audience
• The challenges of getting started with podcasting
• How people discover your blog through your podcasts
• What’s a good strategy to find people to interview for your show
• Why you should interview regular people in addition to well-known experts

Connect with Pat on Twitter @PatFlynn, on Facebook and check out Pat’s blog and the Smart Passive Income podcast.

What do you think? Do you have a following with podcasting? What tips do you have to share about growing your audience with podcasting? Please leave them below.

This guest post is by Christian Arno of Lingo24.

With just 140 characters you can reach a global audience. Hardly a newsflash, I know, but think about it. Followers around the world can give your blog the kind of exposure you could only have dreamed about in the past, everywhere from Tokyo to Buenos Aires. People eagerly await your posts on every continent. Tell me that doesn’t sound good!

Of course, going global on Twitter means embracing other languages. The English language only stretches so far. But building a multilingual presence on Twitter doesn’t have to be difficult.

When it comes down to it, whether you are representing a company or going solo, Twitter is a great way to attract a global audience to your blog. Get it right by following a few guidelines.

Target, aim, tweet

Like most things in life, it helps to have a strategy. Don’t be misled by how easy it is to fire off tweets. Sure, you could machine-translate your next message into umpteen languages and hit the Tweet button. If you want to destroy your reputation, that is.

Instead, think back to your overall marketing plan and where the non-English speaking countries fit your blogging strategy. Which markets are key for you? Your stats for other online content can be revealing here. Where do you need to build a presence, and where should you be improving your reach?

After all, why waste time tweeting in Russian if you are aiming to build your blog readership in South America? When you stop aiming for the whole world, it becomes a whole lot easier to be relevant to the people who matter.

Do your Twitter research

Not all countries and languages are represented equally on Twitter. The impact of your multilingual tweets will in part depend on how actively each language is used. For example, Arabic is the fastest-growing Twitter language, according to a Semiocast study. The same statistics show the rapid rise of Spanish and Dutch. When it comes to the most used languages, Japanese and Portuguese lead the pack. Malay and Korean speakers are also sending their share of the millions of tweets sent each day.

Reach out to these markets and your exposure can skyrocket.

Take care with translations

Unless you are tweeting about what you ate for lunch, resist the lure of instant translation tools. Producing accurate foreign language content can be tricky. You need to strike the right tone (not too stuffy, but avoiding offending anyone) as well as choosing just the right words. Add in the restriction of 140 characters (which gives you even less to play with in some languages than in English) and it becomes an art. Native speaker input is invaluable here.

Follow the right people

Your focus shouldn’t only be on who your followers are, but on who you are following. Stay tuned to the tweets of the big influencers in your overseas markets. These can range from celebrities to the leaders and popular bloggers in your own particular field. Re-tweeting the right people can build your own reputation for having your finger on the pulse.

Stay relevant

Finally, keep your tweets relevant. That means different accounts for each language, so that your followers don’t have to sift through unfamiliar languages. (They will probably just unfollow you instead.) And stay culturally aware. Some topics will offend in particular countries, others will simply be of no interest.

What you stand to gain

Fact: Twitter is a big player on the global social media scene. For over a year now, 70% of Twitter traffic has come from outside the US. If you can tap into the non-English speaking sectors of this international traffic, your exposure will increase dramatically.

Those fast-growing languages mentioned earlier give you a chance to get in early on up and coming markets. On the other hand, countries such as Japan lead the field in terms of posting activity, with more accounts actively posting messages than either the US or the UK.

Actively involved users mean a better chance of re-tweets. If you write something people want to share, you can end up with them doing local marketing for you. For free. It doesn’t get much better than that.

You also have a chance to tap into multiple consumer pools around the globe without leaving your seat. Being part of their conversations lets you monitor what they are saying: about your blog as a whole or your latest post, about other bloggers, about wants, desires and frustrations. Think how valuable that can be.

Twitter brings that information and that potential army of followers to you. But you can’t close the deal without being willing to send those 140 character tweets in other languages. Make the effort, and you’ll probably wonder what took you so long.

Christian Arno is the founder of Lingo24, a top translation service in the USA. Launched in 2001, Lingo24 now has over 170 employees spanning three continents and clients in over sixty countries. In the past twelve months, they have translated over forty million words for businesses in every industry sector, including the likes of MTV, World Bank and American Express. Follow Lingo24 on Twitter: @Lingo24.

Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger

5 Fast Tips for Going Multilingual on Twitter