Digital Marketing Specialist, Social Media Consultant,
and Tech Geek at Heart

Home >

From the monthly archives:

February 2008

Is Social Media the Final Frontier of Marketing?

February 22, 2008

This is a guest post from Pierre Far, who recently launched a very cool program called Social Alerter which notifies you as soon as your website has a solid chance of hitting the Digg or del.icio.us frontpage.

We have all engaged in debates over the past few years about social media. Is it new? If so, how? Even a recent thread on Cre8asite Forums discussed this, kicking off by someone stating they find social media very intimidating.

Then and Now

In the good old days, say from the 1850s onwards, marketing was mostly a one way “communication”: companies advertized their wares via local media like newspapers, magazines, and traveling salespeople. We certainly we had word of mouth back then, but it was geographically limited to a large degree due to travel and communication constraints. Ideas and product use spread slowly: what was a very popular product in one town was not necessarily popular in another nearby town.

This is a preview of Is Social Media the Final Frontier of Marketing?. Read the full post (996 words, 5 images, estimated 3:59 mins reading time)
Continue Reading29 comments
Read the full article →

Zicam and the Reputation Management Fiasco

February 6, 2008

Zicam Oral MistAwhile ago, I used Twitter to talk about one of my favorite cold remedy vitamins, Airborne. It was then that two friends suggested Zicam to me. When stocking up on medication for the winter months, the high recommendations of Zicam had me buying the oral mist.

On Sunday night, after a rather interesting Superbowl XLII, I felt the onset of a cold. As most of these cold medicines suggest, you should take the medicine at the first sign of illness. I immediately thought of my Zicam and was eager to try it out to kill the cold before it really gets bad.

Monday morning, to continue to fight off whatever this may be, I took the recommended dosage of Zicam a second time. I went on my day realizing that I had lost the sense of taste. I ate leftover nosh from the game: really spicy salsa and chips. The spiciness did not impact me. I had some Hershey Kisses. The chocolate taste was dull, as if almost not there.

This is a preview of Zicam and the Reputation Management Fiasco. Read the full post (870 words, 1 image, estimated 3:29 mins reading time)
Continue Reading71 comments
Read the full article →

The Unfortunate Investment of Social Media (and its Consequences)

February 1, 2008

A week ago, I gave a relatively unbiased account of the “Digg revolt,” a response to Kevin Rose’s post that there were to be algorithmic changes to Digg that likely will impact only the top submitters. After seeing how it panned out, I have to say that I’m not impressed.

Here’s a screenshot of a story that became popular with a whopping 235 Diggs. It was taken the night of January 28, 2008 (approximately 11PM EST):

Digg hits Front Page with 235 Votes

While Digg typically allowed stories to hit the front page within 80-120 votes (the latter being more rare than normal), it’s now requiring almost double the number.

In comparison, here’s another anomaly (for its time). This is a Digg submission from August 17th:

Digg hits Front Page with 142 Votes

The problem is quite evident that the most dedicated and seasoned users are feeling the brunt of the impact. And so, it’s time that I acknowledge what people have been saying for a long time: I think Digg has jumped the shark.

Here’s why:

This is a preview of The Unfortunate Investment of Social Media (and its Consequences). Read the full post (1183 words, 2 images, estimated 4:44 mins reading time)
Continue Reading29 comments
Read the full article →