Who knew that reviewing the responsibilities of a Grip could be so cool. 10 minutes of the insider workings of making movies as a Grip makes you want to PAY to see a movie one of these guys worked on.
By the transitive property if I were to do a long-form video about a designer, or tool and die person, that helped build a Tesla or the new Corvette and it sounded cool then I’d be more inclined to buy their product, correct?
Someday, hopefully soon, marketers will figure out the value of well-done long-form and use it to inspire customers and prospects.
Love this story about the beauty, utility, demise and resurrection (sort of) of The Blackwing 602.
If you ever wondered if a story could help sell a product then I defy you to not want to pick up a box of these rare pencils after reading about Hollywood’s obsession and history of creation with The Blackwing 602.
We’ve been on a rant the last few years pressing clients and prospects on producing long form video. Call Of Duty has produced a really nice new 2 1/2 minute piece with actor Peter Stormare (Fargo and Seinfeld) as The Replacer.
In a nice shift in tone Call Of Duty goes with funny as opposed to hyper-violent.
Again, we just don’t know why more aren’t building long-form when they seem to work so well.
The Internet Underground Music Archive was launched in 1993. It was created to democratize the music distribution business and give thousands of unknown bands a direct path to fans. The concepts of: social or peer to peer influence, long-tail marketing and direct to consumer distribution were all a part of the original model.
The site was salvaged by Jason Scott (textfiles.com) and he has a nice write-up about the project.
Glad to see IUMA alive and hopefully kicking.
It’s difficult to describe all the ways in which this sandwich board is brilliant. Let’s try three:
1) It’s brutally honest. We expect marketers to mostly hide from the truth but here’s someone being quite frank.
2) It’s funny. We like things and people that are funny. Putting this message on the sandwich board makes us want to hang around with the people who run this shop. Regardless of the quality of the food.
3) The guy who wrote the review must be a bit of a douche and it probably wasn’t the sandwich that drove the review. Somehow their willingness to put this message on the board makes us think that they must actually think their food is pretty good and that actually the jag-off who wrote it just had another issue that ticked him off.
Since these people are so funny and we’re all so clever and appreciative of their humor we’re sure we wouldn’t be like the jerk and would actually have a great time here. Can’t imagine there are any brands out there that wouldn’t learn a lesson in customer communication from these guys.
John Stewart recently skewered the Obama team for overly friendly, overly “social-media”-voice emails. Not only do we agree with the sentiment expressed here about these emails but want to echo that point about voice and content for all kinds of other brands in the social space.
In the first phase of social it was ok to treat all your communication with that same community-manager “up with people” voice. Asking people their opinions on every single thing you post because you believe it will jack up the engagement numbers, or talking to communities in overly personal language and tone. Why not. Heck, people were downright thrilled to hear from a company so you could get away with just about anything. But come on enough, please.
Let’s get those social voices aligned a bit more with the brand. That community manager voice is as grating as the Obama “Hey” subject line or our personal favorite (or least favorite): “Let’s have dinner”
Interesting Stat number 1: three times more people search for “How-To” videos than “Music Videos”.
Of course most people just search for the artist or song over the generic “music video” expression but the same is true for a search for what you’re trying to do over the generic expression “How-To” so the point holds.
Interesting Stat number 2: Cellume, a company that produces ceiling tile videos, has seen over a million views. Over a million views of ceiling tile videos.
Note to client and agency looking for a viral video concept. Are all the basic, instructional, relevant videos produced and in place on YouTube? If they aren’t then do not bring up the V word until they are. Now go and do likewise.
Bob Lefsetz, an influential music industry blogger, wrote a great post recently about music marketing for the rest of us. He notes that while the Simon Cowell world of X Factor and Idol can power a a few artists down our throats, they don’t stick, and for real staying power you have to get your hands dirty a thousand different ways. He calls it the DIY world.
This notion of the DIY world feels right for the rest of us marketers. What we refer to as the Conspiracy of the Masses is just too strong to simply spend your way to success. Not stunning news for all who’ve been slugging it out in the digital and social world for several years now but worth hearing again.
Over the last several months several of the multinational holding companies that I follow on Facebook have wished me a great weekend and even asked me what my plans are. This includes General Motors as seen here:
Now I don’t want to pick on GM too much since my father, sister, and several generations of family have all worked for GM and I worked with Chevy a couple of times but please stop wishing me a good weekend.
There are a number of things I would like to exchange information about with my M.N.H.C. (multi-national holding company) friends and weekend plans aren’t among them. I did a quick audit of GM’s posts and for the most part they’re great: info about fuel efficiency across the GM brands and employee contributions within and outside the company all seem to fall within a sensible voice for the company on Facebook.
Hoping they and the rest of the M.N.H.C.’s ditch the faux friendlies and stick to the content we find valuable. If you have a quota of posts you’re supposed to make and you find yourself on Friday without something to say then consider silence the better part of noisy valor.
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