SoMe Awards » 2009 Winners

Winner 2009 – Bloviater – Edelman

John Anthony Hartman — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 05:42:24 +0000

Challenge: Autodesk, a 2D and 3D design software provider, was preparing to launch the latest release of its flagship product, AutoCAD 2010. Many of the company’s beta testers are also bloggers, and in the past they had blogged about product launches; however, often times they critiqued the company for bugs not fixed and features not included. Autodesk wanted to open the line of communication with a small group of influential bloggers who had been beta testing AutoCAD 2010, and provide opportunity for bloggers to ask and get answers to critical questions. Key Insight: Bloggers had limited visibility of the research and development behind AutoCAD product releases. Lack of knowledge resulted in an assumed lack of activity. Strategic Approach: Host a one-day blogger summit at Autodesk for a small group of influential bloggers who had been beta testing AutoCAD 2010, and provide a backstage pass to the product launch, including a unique opportunity to get a behind the scenes look at the AutoCAD launch Webcast. Address difficult questions, listen to feedback in an open format, and provide insight into the development process. Provide accessibility to the engineers and product team behind development, as well as well-known Autodesk bloggers. Provide product demonstrations and a hands-on, interactive tour of Autodesk Labs to demonstrate innovative thinking from Autodesk. Results: The event created excitement with ten bloggers who flew in from around the world. When NDAs lifted mid-day, attendees were posting pre-prepared entries on AutoCAD 2010. In the first couple of weeks, attendees posted 27 entries, and have continued to post additional entries since, drawing on their visit to Autodesk and key insights gleaned, with an overwhelmingly positive tone. Core to the event’s success was a shift in opinion: One blogger noted, and several others observed, didn’t realize how much research was going on behind the scenes. Another blogger, who had long been a critic (often posting negative entries), began defending Autodesk in many cases to critics, sharing insight into how Autodesk is listening to its customers. Overall, bloggers came away with a positive impression of Autodesk as an accessible company that puts a lot of research and customer focus behind product innovation. And they shared that insight with their readers.

http://cadman-do.blogspot.com/2009/02/autocad-2010-rollout-behind-scenes.html

http://rcd.typepad.com/rcd/2009/02/autodesk-gallery—design-on-show.html

http://www.thecadgeek.com/blog/2009/02/06/autocad-2010-first-look-at-parametric-constraints/

http://lazydrafter.blogspot.com/2009/02/whats-future-of-autocad.html http://cadablog.blogspot.com/2009/02/behind-scenes-at-autocad-2010-webcast.html

Winner 2009 – Wildcard – GoSeeTell Network

John Anthony Hartman — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 05:27:24 +0000

Travel products are a high risk purchase – there is no way to test-drive, refund or resell a vacation. Where to stay, where to eat, what to see and what to do – personal tastes and travel preferences are different. GoSeeTell Network developed a concept for Travel Portland that allows visitors to get recommendations from peers using micro-blogging site Twitter.com the Portland Twisitor Center. The concept is very simple: visitors can ask questions about Portland on Twitter and just add the hashtag #inpdx to their tweet. Travel Portland (@travelportland) answers these tagged questions do Portland locals and other visitors. Every day between 5 and 25 questions are asked and answered this way, many within minutes of being posted on Twitter. This crowd-sourcing of visitor information allows Travel Portland to highlight the diversity of the city and benefit from the Twitter buzz by using Twitter in a unique way. As part of managing the entire social media strategy for Travel Portland, GoSeeTell staff handles the @travelportland Twitter account and answers questions from visitors. Prior to the launch of the Twisitor Center GoSeeTell tested several hastags before selecting #inpdx (distinct yet simple), identified Twitter users in Portland who know the city and are passionate about it, reached out to these users and asked them to support the concept. For the launch several other social media sties were used, e.g. photos on Flickr and a YouTube video explaining the concept. The buzz created and the service provided by the Twisitor Center have made the @travelportland account the most popular destination Twitter account in the world with more than 5,000 followers. Since the launch other cities have started using hashtags on Twitter to help visitors. GoSeeTell developed http://www.twisitorcenter.com that lists all destinations that have an official Twitter presence.

http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23inpdx

http://www.travelportland.com/visitors/twitter.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-uLPX3NPkY

http://www.flickr.com/photos/35211583@N02/

http://venturebeat.com/2009/02/10/twitter-travel-tips-arrive-in-portland/

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/04/10/TRG416ROJH.DTL

http://www.katu.com/news/39398597.html?video=YHI&t=a

Winner 2009 – House Party – Conkling, Fiskum & McCormick

John Anthony Hartman — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 05:17:12 +0000

Project Overview In April 2008 Tillamook County Creamery Association asked its Agency of Record, Conkling, Fiskum & McCormick (CFM) to come up with “big ideas." CFM recognized the opportunity to engage Tillamook’s best customers online and encourage brand advocacy to grow new customers. A social networking strategy was developed to accelerate existing online conversations among those that had an affinity for the brand and take the company into its second century. Fortunately, Tillamook® Cheese has a large base of passionate fans. They had begun sharing their affection for the brand on the Web, posting videos of their trips to the Tillamook Cheese Factory on YouTube, adding photos of their favorite recipes on Flickr, or blogging about their love of Tillamook. By early 2008, 400 Facebook members had joined fan-started Tillamook Cheese groups. Social networks offered the opportunity for those who share this common passion to come together in a central location. CFM set to create a space for Tillamook’s fans to connect in a community in an effort to supercharge the brand’s enthusiasts. While consumers trust other consumers most, they also want the companies they are talking to or about to listen. CFM wanted to engage Tillamook’s best customers to deepen the connection they had with the brand and encourage advocacy. For a full overview of the project, visit http://www.tillamooksocialmedia.com/

Blog Post Praising Tillamook Twitter: http://weiwardgirl.wordpress.com/2009/03/09/follow-me-for-a-prize/

2009 Winner – Sugar Daddy – StepChange Group

John Anthony Hartman — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 07:35:06 +0000

Working closely with the Tostitos & Facebook teams, we created an Amazing Race-style competition campaign for two $100,000 scholarships around the 2008 Fiesta Bowl. This was a national, integrated campaign program that included: – Set of custom Facebook Pages & Applications to manage contest & user-generated content – YouTube Channel for daily videos during the “race” – Integrated blog for each race team, with highlights and hooks to FB/YouTube content – Coordination with production team going across the country with the competitors – Culminated in national TV event during half-time at the Fiesta Bowl The concept was simple. Get the most rabid, dyed-in-the-wool fans to compete against each other for the chance to win a $100,000 scholarship for their school. We created Facebook applications to collect fans & contest info, a short paragraph about why they should be selected, and a photo showing their school spirit. We also created apps for the contest administration and a gallery to allow supporters and friends to view and comment on the teams. Two teams were selected a few weeks later, and they began a cross-country challenge that started in NYC and ended at the Tostito’s Fiesta Bowl on game day. Throughout the challenge, they were filmed and wrote updates about their experience on the Facebook fan page. Tostitos and Facebook were thrilled with the results of the largely grassroots marketing effort: Here are the raw numbers. * 17,779 people became fans of the Facebook page in only 3 weeks * 56,531 page views * 39,477 unique visitors * 597 wall posts * 1098 entries with photos for the contest * 1925 entries to the contest were shared with a friends …and more than 13,000,000 "Social Impressions" were generated through the Facebook applications.

Event Marketer Coverage (print & online): http://www.eventmarketer.com/viewmedia.asp?prmMID=2378&prmID=1

Our blog posts about it: http://blog.stepchangegroup.com/?p=7

http://blog.stepchangegroup.com/?p=9

FanSection.com Coverage: http://blog.fansection.com/2009/01/update-on-tostitos-fiesta-bowl-promotion-on-facebook/

ClickZ Coverage: http://www.clickz.com/3632238

2009 Winner – Scrappy – Anvil Media

John Anthony Hartman — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 06:36:50 +0000

The travel industry has suffered during this recession, so in order to increase sales during a down economy we had to get creative with how we attracted businesses. It was time to get extremely proactive and start reaching out to customers, versus them seeking us out. We wanted to connect with people who just started thinking about travel, and get in early. Our goals were to utilize Twitter & Facebook to start conversations and engage potential customers, increase brand awareness and ultimately, to influence online bookings. We utilized Twitter to reach out to folks traveling to any of our markets in order to get on their radar. The ultimate prospect was someone searching for a hotel where we could give a 140 character pitch that didn’t sound desperate. Additional ways to engage folks have been to use trivia questions. We give away free room nights, gift certificates, t-shirts, etc to those that answer questions properly. This has helped show off the brand’s personality, gain more followers and garner attention on blogs/sites. Anvil used Facebook as more of an aggregator for blog posts, tweets, photos, video and hotel information. The combined Twitter/Facebook social media campaign has proven very successful as we’ve begun booking rooms directly from Twitter by reaching out. A success story: A follower contacted me and mentioned his parents were staying at a competitor hotel a few blocks down the street. This particular follower was impressed with our social media efforts on Twitter (and Facebook). He was able to get his parents to switch their reservations to stay at my client’s hotel. This is the power of Twitter in action. Establishing your brand, being respected for the work/effort you put into it and seeing the payoff at the end through a conversion/sale.

http://www.twitter.com/hotel_deluxe

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Portland-OR/Hotel-deLuxe/52472127121?ref=ts

http://www.twitter.com/hotel_lucia

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Portland-OR/Hotel-Lucia/11150774207?ref=ts

http://www.twitter.com/hotel_max

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Seattle-WA/Hotel-Max/36187032046?ref=ts

http://www.twitter.com/hotel_murano

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Tacoma-WA/Hotel-Murano/16709223235?ref=ts

http://www.twitter.com/hotel_preston

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nashville-TN/Hotel-Preston/36251942283?ref=ts

2009 Winner – Next Big Thing – Web Analytics Demystified

John Anthony Hartman — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 06:27:23 +0000

The Twitalyzer is an analytics application built by Web Analytics Demystified that sits on top of Twitter. There are a variety of uses for the Twitalyzer, but most people use it to track their use of Twitter over time, benchmarking themselves against other Twitter users, and helping to determine which social media strategies are working (and which are not.) A byproduct of the Twitalyzer is our list of the 100 most influential people in Twitter—an evolving list of Twitter users ranked by average influence as calculated using Web Analytics Demystified’s definition of influence. We have provided a screen-shot showing the 100 most influential Twitter users in Portland, Oregon. If you Twitalyze yourself you will get a variety of scores including influence, your signal-to-noise ratio, your generosity, velocity, and clout. You will also get to see how these scores and a dozen others (followers, friends, updates, retweets, references, retweeting, etc.) change over time. You can even use the Twitalyzer to explore the URLs and hashtags you and other people are using. Currently Twitalyzer is tracking nearly 50,000 individual Twitter users. Twitalyzer is also used to power Twitalyzer SEARCH (http://search.twitalyzer.com) and Twitalyzer BRAND (http://brand.twitalyzer.com). The Search application adds influence scores to Twitter Search and the Brand application provides Twitalyzer-type data for companies, brands, and products. Twitalyze yourself at http://twitalyzer.com or your brand at http://brand.twitalyzer.com

http://blog.twitalyzer.com/2009/03/reviews-of-twitalyzer/