Indianapolis Social Media Marketing | Indianapolis Internet Marketing | Digitalia

SECONDLIFE HELPING TO IMPROVE REAL LIVES

Check out this article on CNN.com that discusses a SecondLife area created specifically for individuals with Autism. Autism is a disorder that impairs individuals’ social interactions and communication. The space, called Naughty Auties, encourages visitors to communicate with others in a relaxed, stress-free environment. Although I’m not for virtual worlds and lifestyles taking over what’s real, I think anything that can help people with this isolating condition is a positive thing. Check it out and let me know what you think.

-Margaret Henney

2007 YOUTUBE VIDEO AWARD WINNERS ANNOUNCED

Today YouTube announced its 2007 Video Award winners. Winners from 12 different categories will receive “bragging rights, a trophy, and a special invitation to an event later this year.”

Many of these videos went viral in 2007 and most were already familiar to me. Chocolate Rain by Tay Zonday, winner in the Music category, never gets old however.

All 72 nominated videos are available for your viewing pleasure here.

- Chad

LINKEDIN - IT'S NOT IN

LinkedIn - It does nothing for the web brand called you!

First of all – it's not free. Second - it's not that easy to use. Third – almost no one really uses it. With 70 contacts over the last few months – I’ve received 3 or 4 messages versus several hundred times that amount on Facebook and MySpace. The only slightly useful feature - which seems to be driven partly by the "um I don't want to diss this person in public" approach - is the recommendations. But let's be honest - who cares about an online recommendation from some random person that was asked to give it. It's inherently biased.

Our collective "internet marketing agency" opinion of LinkedIn – its NOT IN! Who wants to pay for something that is offered free and in a significantly cooler manner by other tools? It seems to be particularly useful for recruiters (and not the kind you want to know) and people who see their connections as some sort of capital that can be cashed in on. It has a dated connectivity and clearly hasn’t evolved its business model to monetize its traffic.

Open message to Linkdin from small people like me that do matter: freeconomics. The business of free. Adopt it or face loss of traffic as people shift away from paying for what is free elsewhere. Remember when Yahoo charged for mail storage? Google then came along with 2 gigs. Now Yahoo has unlimited storage for free. More examples in the LinkedIn industry? Facebook, MySpace, Eons, and many many more.

- Duncan

YOUTUBE SHOULD BE PART OF INTERNET MARKETING STRATEGY

comScore released January 2008 data on Friday, March 14th that shows that YouTube accounted for one-third of the 9.8 billion videos viewed online in the U.S. for the month. Some worthwhile points to ponder:

• 2-3% decline in viewing between December 2007 and January 2008.
• Google sites continue to dominate U.S. video properties.
• YouTube accounted for more than 96% of all video viewed at Google properties.
• 78.5 million viewers watched 3.25 billion video (that’s 41 videos per viewer)
• The average online video duration was 2.9 minutes.
• The average online video viewer consumed 70 videos.

As your company devises its internet marketing strategy, building emotional connections and ongoing online relationships will become an increasingly important component in both online web marketing and online web branding. Why? People commit to watching video online. Every video is worth thousands of words. It is immersive and experiential. It offers basic feedback and depending on the analytics set up can offer more sophisticated feedback. So whether you’re internet marketing strategy is focused on awareness or lead generation, video is an important tactic to consider.

- Duncan

CYBER SPACE THEATRE?

Before we can get to the good stuff I need to give you a short theatre lesson: Site specific theatre is just that…site specific. Instead of taking place in a traditional theatre setting (like on a stage or in a black box), the performance is held in an ordinary setting. I found this definition, which explains it relatively clearly: “Site-specific theatre is a performance which overtly uses the properties, qualities, and meanings found at/on a given site, be it a landscape, a city, a building or a room.” This form of theatre primarily seeks to explore the relationship between individuals and their environment.

ANYWAY…

The theatre department at Butler University (of which I am an alum!) offers a site specific class where students develop a performance based on discussions, exercises and journaling. These have taken place anywhere from the Starbucks on campus to a mental hospital (Butler theatre is known for being quite progressive and, let’s face it, a little weird). 

What’s so unique about this year’s site specific performance is that it will be taking place virtually. Although the audience will go, like normal, to the black box theatre to watch the performance, it will be broadcast live over the Internet, and will be projected on a screen. Adding yet another twist to this experiment, is the fact that students who are studying abroad will also take part in the performance. So, theoretically, an actor in London can act in a love scene with an actress who is right here in Indianapolis. 

I geeked out when I heard this because the concept opens up a whole new realm of performance possibilities and challenges the traditional ideas of what makes something a piece of theatre.

-Margaret Henney

FIND YOUR INNER LEPRECHAUN THIS ST. PATTY'S DAY

In the spirit of St. Patrick's day I recommend that everyone spend some time on the Bennigan’s Grill & Tavern's microsite (www.InnerLeprechaun.com) - complete with countdown widgets and dancing leprechauns as well as a MySpace page all designed to help fans of the casual dining chain find their “inner leprechaun.” It's a clever way to build an emotional connection with consumers, in addition to creating an ongoing relationship and top of mind awareness.

The sites introduce leprechaun "Fergus Dargle," and offer an array of ways to engage viewers with tools, resources, videos, viral emails, mobile texts and interactive games such as the Lepregram.

The Lepregram allows users to download their photos onto the body of a leprechaun. Each Lepregram can be customized with its own backdrop, music and message. Lepregram senders then receive email incentives (in the form of coupons) intended to drive guests into the restaurant.

- Chad

SPEED TO MARKET: ESTABLISH LEADERSHIP POSITION IN INTERNET MARKETING

From time to time, I enjoy Tim Bray’s writing. This latest post is really interesting and focuses on the advantage of time to market. Specifically attributing the proliferation of PHP and Rails to this capability of getting things done faster and into market. I’ve been saying this to companies we work with for some time – get into the game before your competitors and do it well – become a leader with making new communications techniques work for your company. Your customers and prospects will gather around you and you will have the center stage. At the end of the day, savvy business people crave authenticity.

Over polished, coolness mavens will face an uphill battle gathering a following based on unproved technologies. The Firebelly Digital recommended strategy for internet marketing includes speed to market, a trans media experience, and an authentic approach.

- Duncan

THE CORPORATE MULLET

We were in one of our favorite restaurants, Yats, today discussing the merits of a diversified web branding and marketing strategy. Here's how it went down. Think of the approach like a corporate mullet - business in the front and community party in the back. Specifically the main website has to cater to diverse stakeholders, internal and external customers, and so on. It needs a certain look and voice - all based around the central nuggets of the brand including the key messages. However, if one of the key customer groups within this brand is young, educated women 25 - 34, then building a strategy that emphasizes community - while emphasizing the key brands in a media-appropriate manner makes perfect sense. If you're familiar with Dr. Henry Jenkins and his book Convergence Culture, then you know that trans media experiences are part of deeply pervasive brand cults such as Mini Cooper, Apple, The Matrix, and even back as far as Casablanca.

If you're taking a deeper look at your brand - think of it this way. Would you act the same way in a boardroom as you would in a bar? Your core values will remain the same but your message will be situation specific. It’s the same thing for your brand!

- Duncan

HULU OPENS TO THE MASSES TOMORROW

Hulu.com, the joint venture between NBC Universal and Fox, will begin offering most of the two network’s popular shows online tomorrow, in addition to free, ad-supported shows from more than 50 additional media companies – including Sony, Warner Brothers, Lionsgate, and MGM.

Sports fans will be able to view highlights from N.B.A. and N.H.L. games, and full-length N.C.A.A. men’s basketball games from the last 25 years.

Hulu will also distribute videos on Myspace, AOL and Yahoo - among others. Users will be able to embed shows into their own websites, blogs and social networking pages.

Hulu’s high-quality video and professional content is expected to be more attractive to advertisers than sites like Youtube.

- Chad

SHARE YOUR FAVORITE MUSIC MEMORIES ON FACEBOOK

Just read an interesting piece on Wired. So Paramount Pictures will be the first major studio to make thousands of clips from its movies available for use on the web. They've teamed up with FanRocket to launch an application on Facebook on Monday. So you can send your friends short clips that you and they have probably experienced before. And you can experience it again. So what's the point? Well its a new way of attracting attention for existing and new titles (the clips have various buttons - I added a clip from Top Gun and once you watched it - there is a button that allows you to add it to your profile, send it to your friends and buy the title).

- Duncan Alney

IPHONE RISING!

Just been reading Charles Starrett's latest article on iLounge. Basically, the iPhone has become the world’s fourth-largest online browsing platform, according to the latest operating system numbers from Net Applications. Okay so before you jump all over me. That puts the iPhone ahead of competitors such as Windows Mobile, Symbian Mobile, Symbian Series 60, and Hiptop, better known as the T-Mobile Sidekick. Net Applications’ data comes from the browsers of “site visitors to its on-demand network of live stats customers,” and is compiled from “approximately 160 million visitors per month.”

Here's the rest of the breakdown.

- Duncan