Did you know that the producers of Mystery Science Theater 3000 “encouraged the show’s viewers to videotape their copyrighted shows, and pass them along to friends — creating that sought after word-of-mouth buzz”?
Interesting article at Wired Magazine called Organized Chaos: Viral Marketing, Meet Social Media.
Literally! Well, almost.
Charmin, the toilet paper company, has come up with a social media campaign that lacks ingenuity. They’ll be paying five bloggers $10,000 each to spend five weeks working as Charmin brand ambassadors at a pop-up bathroom in New York’s Times Square (does that mean it’s a real bathroom with real toilets?)
The brand ambassadors will be expected to keep social media and Charmin blogs updated with content and to interact “with hundreds of thousands of bathroom guests”.
The campaign slogan is “Enjoy The Go”. Fantastic!
Original story at Business Courier of Cincinnati, found via CNet News.
“Having a website will no longer be enough for driving schools to survive in a highly competitive market and must embrace the opportunity to grow their business using the internet. Whilst many driving instructors don’t even have a Facebook account, those that are well acquainted with the user interfaces on social networking sites have the advantage over their competitors.”
The impending strike by Royal Mail could be a disaster for small businesses that rely on the postal service to deliver goods or cheques.
Many Ebay sellers will be affected if the strike goes ahead. Demand is said to be high for alternative courier services and especially for guaranteed Royal Mail services like Special Delivery.
Small businesses must face the fact that they will be impacted by the postal strike and those that depend on the Royal Mail must communicate with their customers in advance to ensure that espectations are realistic.
Most customers will be entirely reasonable so long as they are not led to believe something which could never happen, i.e. a prompt delivery of documents, cheques or goods.
With a little planning, the postal strike could be a marketing success, or if events are left to take their natural course then some companies may face serious problems when their mail doesn’t arrive.
A new Facebook application offers ordinary users the opportunity to build their own applications.
App Bank has a simple and intuitive interface which means that non-programmers now have the tools build a Facebook app themselves without engaging the services of a professional.
AppBank is free to use and even pays people to create applications with it. According to AppBank their top-earner makes $769 a month. At the moment only users in the USA and Canada can take advantage of the revenue stream from Facebook advertising but that is sure to change in the future.
Whilst AppBank provides the tools to build a facebook app, there will be many businesses where they will still want to hire someone to do this for them. This will enable new companies to provide these development services where ideas people don’t need costly programmers to build their envisioned application.
If you want a Facebook application created for your company, get in touch with Simon Says Media.
With a hat tip to MomGadget.
History was made last week when a high court injunction was served on the user of a Twitter account using the tweeting service’s own platform.
The Guardian reports:
The legal tradition of serving court papers to a defendant could be consigned to history, after the high court ordered an injunction to be served via social messaging service Twitter for the first time.
In a ruling on Thursday, a judge in London said that an anonymous Twitter user accused of impersonating a right-wing blogger should cease their activities and reveal their identity to the court. Without any other way of contacting the individual in question, however, the judge agreed that the best way to serve the injunction was through a message on the popular web service.”
According to their own website:
“As students across the country return to university for freshers week, the University of Central Lancashire has become the first UK university to launch its own featured iPhone application.”
The story continues:
“The app was developed during the summer recess and makes use of many existing UCLan services. These include fast webmail access, a comprehensive library catalogue, staff directory, a list of campus facilities and the option for students to top up their printing accounts. Students can also book a meeting room in any of the university libraries by using the iPhone application.
Further plans to enhance the app include making use of the iPhone’s location functionality to improve the search of services across campus and the development of an innovative news service. The app can be downloaded free from the Apple App Store and is compatible with both the iPhone and iPod touch.”
The university is using existing systems to add value to its “users”. Could you build an iPhone app around parts of your business to add value to customers?
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