Brands & Bloggers Summit, Things I learned

Jul 18, 2011 by Sami

Last weekend I attended Brands and Bloggers Summit in Chicago. I tend to visit few conferences a year but this was a truly an educational AND a fun conference. I can’t wait to go again next year and learn even more! The summit had an amazing collection of brands and bloggers coming together to learn, as the incredibly smart @xiaolinmama from @CleverGirlsColl puts it, “dance together”.  As a blogger it’s important to know how to best maximize the potential of building a relationship with brands. That wasn’t all, we also received tips on how to build relationships with the media and even got best practices on vlogging!  Below are some of the things I’ve learned that I hope will benefit you as well!

Passion for a brand is contagious and that’s what captures a brand’s attention. @ConnieBurke from GMC.

The blogsphere has changed (…) bloggers should be paid. We are doing their (brands) work now, and it’s about your influence. Clever Girls Collective is like Match for bloggers, putting those relationships together and making sure they’re good relationships. When I know what you write about, your personality, and your metrics, it’s easier for me to know that you’re a good fit for a particular campaign. The overall page views doesn’t matter as much as it sometimes appears. When there’s a campaign, a lot of times brands are looking for aggregate numbers or they’re looking for a very specific demographic.@xiaolinmama from @CleverGirlsColl.

Sometimes, it’ll take a long time for a brand to respond to you so have patience and don’t give up. @meaganfrancis

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I have a crush on UNIQLO’s Social Media Team

Jul 12, 2011 by Sami

NOTE:  This post is NOT as long as it seems. You have my word!

I love UNIQLO’s clothes. That’s old news. I’m at a different phase with my relationship with the brand and it’s the hugest crush on their social media team. Just like any social media marketing enthusiast, when someone comes up with a brilliant way to use social media, my heart flutters and my cheeks get rosy. I promise, it’s a completely platonic crush and more of an admiration than anything so UNIQLOers, please don’t worry about your inbox flooding with love letters…at least not yet! Read what happened below and you’ll understand why they really are telling the truth when they say that their fan page is by fans, for fans. And no, it’s not just about fans being able to leave comments on their page.

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Tired of getting caught up in mass Facebook messages? I have a solution for you!

Jul 6, 2011 by Sami

Let’s face it, we love how easily you can chose “reply” versus “reply all”  when replying to an email. So why did Facebook make it so hard for us to chose one of the two? Countless times I get caught up in the spiderwebs of mass Facebook messages that I know I’m not interested in reading. I even ended up with 10 new phone numbers at some point in time!  Most times, I send a friendly reply to all to remind them that they’re replying to everyone in the thread and maybe they should not share that information with others. So every time you want to be left out of the mass messages, you have to do the same thing you’re complaining about and “reply all”? Not anymore! I’m sure Facebook officially told us at some point but I missed the memo!

Here’s how you do it. On the top right corner of the message, there should be an “Actions” button. Click that and drop-down menu will appear. From there you can select “Leave Conversation”. Viola! You are free from the curse of the mass Facebook messages. This option is only available on the web version of Facebook and not sure how it works on a mobile app.

Now go experiment!

 

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On the Kindness of Strangers and Why Social Media Kicks Butt!

Mar 23, 2011 by Sami

It’s not very often a time comes that defines your beliefs on humanity.  A teenager from a small country travels to the States ten years ago. Doesn’t know any English, left parents and siblings back home and barely knew anyone. I stand today and couldn’t have been more proud to call myself an American. Even more, a Chicago resident. Why wouldn’t I want to be proud? In a city that helped me so much. Where kind strangers on the internet united to help a great cause. Because they wouldn’t think of doing anything else.

I’ve hosted many Tweetups in Chicago. It all started when I came to the realization of how great it would be to be able to meet, in person, the great people I talk to on Twitter every day. Turned out that I had a knack for it and hundreds of IRL (in real life) meetings later, I was given the name “Mr. Tweetup“. Thanks to Twitter I have had a very fulfilling and not uneventful past few years.

To call it a tragedy  might be an understatement, but when I heard about what’s going on in Japan I went on auto-pilot and had to help in any way I could. That’s how Chicago Helps Japan was born and with the help of amazing Chicago tweets, Facebook links and LinkedIn messages we were able to lend a hand to those in need.

Special thanks needs to be given to the Hunt Club and Eventbrite Chicago who both stepped up in minutes’ notice, to help the cause. Another big thanks to all the businesses that donated services and products for our silent auction.

Now, I know you must have guesses on how much we were able to raise. Well, my friends, with the power of Social Media we were able to raise…*drum roll*…$6050! Yes!

Just like I told @VeronicaLudwig, every second that I worked so hard to get this event going paid off and beyond. Honestly. SO PROUD of the amazing Chicago Social Media community. Especially for those who helped get the word out!

The money we raised will be donated to the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Chicago. They will double donation making it $12,100.

So, if anyone tells you that Social Media doesn’t work then you send them my way. I’ll teach them a thing or ten about why Social Media kicks butt! Especially all the tweets that everyone sent so tirelessly to spread the word. Who knew that 140 characters can affect the lives of so many souls. Twitter played a huge part on bringing awareness to our fundraising efforts. Twitter, how do I love thee…let me count the ways!

Check out below video from NBC! Thanks @Nduhoski for sending the video my way! If anyone recorded the FOX or CBS clips please share them with us!

Chicago Helps Japan Fundraiser Tweetup

Please take a moment to support businesses donating to silent auction by following/liking them!

Dupreeblue, Bike and Roll Chicago, Floriole Cafe, Hoosier Mama Pie Company, Foiled Cupcakes, SKo-Fit, Lynfred Winery, Beard Papas, WOW BAO, Sunday Dinner, Best Vacuum, Lincoln Hall, Schubas, Redhead Piano Bar, Bull and Bear/Public House, Indira Salon, Rick Lundy, Murasaki Sake Lounge, Shui Tea, Chevy, Wildfire Restaurant, House On a Hill, Target Stars and You Swoop!

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You Are Not Your Customer’s Best Friend

Sep 13, 2010 by Sami

Amongst many other things, I am an observer. I spend a great deal of time observing at how businesses use social media to benefit their bottom line.  I am a huge advocate of using social media tools to advance any organization’s reach. In fact, online community moderation is what I love to do more than anything else.

That said, as of late, I have noticed a disturbing trend amongst brands trying to connect with their audience on Twitter and Facebook. I am not going to sit here and tell you about how important it is to connect with your audience online, god knows we’ve all read enough about that and we all realize that it’s a much needed aspect of doing business. What I’m here for is to point out an observation I have. It seems that certain brands are making the mistake of being overly friendly to their customers.

Working towards humanizing a brand does wonders to brand’s visibility. After all, we all want to connect with our clients and extend our reach. However, going over board with trying to connect with your audience leads to disaster. It’s a fine line between the two and brands need to be careful in distinguishing where that line exists.

I’ve already mentioned in a prior post but I was at complete admiration of Calvin Klein’s Facebook campaign to help launch their new line of underwear. It was clever, it was engaging and they managed to connect to so many of their customers without being the clingy-over-sharing friend that you don’t want to have. Another brilliant strategy was delivered by Burberry under the name of Art of the Trench. Fans got to upload their photos wearing their favorite Burberry trench coat and share it with equally in love-with-Burberry fans. Those two might be a little less known compared to the ingenious work of W+K with Old Spice.

On the other hand, there’s a hotel in Chicago. This hotel is popular for its great location, great service and wonderful amenities. They have a Facebook fan page that is, for a lack of a better word, miserable. Just the other day I caught a status talking about a certain White Sox player doing something unexpected during a game. Yes, it got some people talking but how many people did it turn off? People who do not care for the White Sox, people who do not care for baseball, people who do not care for sports. The community manager might think that mentioning such a specific topic might get fans (clients) to engage by voicing a strong opinion but this community manager forgot that by doing so they are alienating everyone else who is unfamiliar with such topic. Please do not take this as an invitation to become boring and sterile. It’s more of an art than science. If done in tasteful tact it will help you reach, as Buzz Lightyear might say, infinity… and beyond!

The trick in  any successful community moderation is to create and strengthen the sense of community between your target audience and not becoming their long lost best friend. Think about a leader, not a follower. I can’t help but think about it the same way I think of a symphony orchestra. The conductor is a man much like everyone else he leads but he is the one that makes sure everyone is in unity without the need to play a musical instrument himself.

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