From the monthly archives:

April 2008

Approaching 10 Years After Cluetrain, Most Still Don’t Get It

by Jason Falls · April 30, 2008

Is it really the 10th anniversary of The Cluetrain Manifesto? Actually, it isn’t. The book was written in 1999 by Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searls and David Weinberger. It was published in 2000. I suppose then that John Cass’s meme inspired by the upcoming 10th anniversary of the book is meant to borrow the quality of being ahead of its time.

The Cluetrain ManifestoNevertheless, Valeria Maltoni nominated me as someone who should participate in the meme and chime in on the five questions Cass poses about where we are today with respect to the 95 theses that begat social media. Before I respond to the specific questions, though, a raw perspective:

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19 comments

How Do I Get Placement On Blogs?

by Jason Falls · April 28, 2008

A fellow public relations professional posed the question: “How do I get placement on blogs?” The answer I gave was honest and to the point, but it didn’t address the a hidden problem in his approach.

[flickr style="float: left"]photo:126354515[/flickr]My answer was something along the lines of, “Pitch bloggers the way you would primary targets within traditional media. Do your homework. Personalize your pitch. Reach out in a manner that suggests (hopefully honestly) that you’re trying to build a relationship and provide something valuable to his or her audience. If you truly are, the blogger will respond just like the Wall Street Journal editor or nightly news correspondent would.” And while that is absolutely the way I would approach trying to “get placement” on blogs, his question beckons a tad more discussion.

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42 comments

The Writer’s Block Guide To Producing Compelling Content

by Jason Falls · April 25, 2008

It’s hard not to hear the phrase, “content is king,” when having a conversation with a social media thinker these days. Any brand, business or company asking questions about how to improve their website or better engage with their online communities should be hearing it over and over. Still, the vast majority of company and corporate websites out there remain static billboard-like online presences with a monthly front page rearrange or other minor addition the company misunderstands as producing fresh content.

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11 comments

How To Tell When You’re Doing It Wrong

by Jason Falls · April 24, 2008

Social media marketing is all about businesses having conversations with their customers. In many industries this era is the first in which brands have actually listened rather than trumpeted their hype from the tallest billboards and loudest channels. That listening is opening the eyes of brand managers, CMOs and CEOs everywhere.

Dairy Queen -- Remember The BurgerUnfortunately, brands sometimes forget to listen internally, though. A recent and very strange personal experience illustrates this point.

On Wednesday of this week, my family stopped at our local Dairy Queen for lunch. We grabbed it to go since our house is less than a mile from the store. When we got home, my wife opened her bacon cheeseburger to add ketchup and exclaimed, “You’ve GOT to be kidding me?!”

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14 comments

Do You Want A Social Media Job? I’m Hiring.

by Jason Falls · April 23, 2008

Help Wanted

NOTE: This position has now be filled. Thank you for reading and for your interest. If we hire in social media again, we’ll post another entry. Just in case, subscribe to our feed!

Early in 2007, a singular client came to Doe-Anderson asking for guidance in the social web. Since that time, almost all of our clients have either expressed interest, or expressly ordered up social media thinking. Not to mention we’ve added a few new clients to the fold based primarily on our social media capabilities.

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30 comments

How Personal Is Too Much?

by Jason Falls · April 21, 2008

My daughter Katie was born late Saturday night. She was six pounds, two ounces and 17 inches long. Mother and baby are exceptionally well. My son Grant and I are good, too.

[flickr style="float: left"]photo:2426616395[/flickr]Katie came early – three weeks to be exact – and we didn’t know she was coming until late Friday afternoon when a 24-hour hospital stay for what the doctor’s termed, “precautionary monitoring.” The precaution turned out to be preventative and labor was induced Friday afternoon.

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29 comments

So You Want To Run An Online Forum?

by Jason Falls · April 18, 2008

It’s a fair point to say the online tool most responsible for the advent of social media is the forum or message board. Descendants of early bulletin board systems and USENET groups, the forum introduced the concepts of conversation and community to the Internet. As technology blossomed and more sophisticated methods of communications usurped forums as the primary place people played online, the forum seemed to take a back seat.

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18 comments

The Next Generation Of Social Media Experts

by Jason Falls · April 16, 2008

[flickr style="float: left"]photo:250236754[/flickr]All good technology ideas are hatched in garages, right? Or basements. Perhaps that’s why it didn’t surprise or concern me Wednesday when Nick Huhn and I ventured to the basement of a technology building at the University of Louisville to serve as reactionaries to student presentations in a U of L-Murray State collaborative marketing class entitled, “Marketing in the Era of Consumer Generated Media.” The class was a first of its kind at Louisville and Murray State and was co-presented by professors David Faulds (U of L) and Glynn Mangold (Murray State). There were eight Louisville students and seven Murray State students represented in the four groups of presentations we saw. Each one looked at CGM, how brands are using it (both well and not so) and identified some ethical misdeeds by some.

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24 comments

Web Video Editing And Production For Dummies

by Jason Falls · April 14, 2008

[flickr style="float: right"]photo:177117996[/flickr]Ask most social media experts and a common prediction for the future of the web bubbles to the top. The next big thing is commonly thought to be video podcasting, v-logging or Web-TV. Call it whatever you want, but web video is on the rise, and for a variety of reasons. First, the medium of video offers a level of engagement far more compelling that just audio or text. Aside from stimulating more of our senses, the barrier to entry for web video is at an all-time low.

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