Brown-Forman's Southern Comfort has launched a social content hub as the latest extension of its marketing campaign for Southern Comfort Lime, launched last fall. The Lime-themed hub resides on Southern Comfort's main Facebook page and Web and mobile sites. The hub has taken over the sites for the summer months. The concept: Helping SoCo fans to plan and interact throughout their nights out by consolidating a variety of digital activities in one convenient, cross-platform area -- while building awareness of the new Lime product through the hub's features and design. "If you look at a night out with friends, there's a cyclical flow," says Lena DerOhannessian, U.S. marketing director, Southern Comfort. "It starts with planning and maybe a smaller party at someone's home, moves into partying at one location, usually moving onto other locations during the night, and ends with rehashing all of the night's memorable moments." The hub is being supported by Lime television spots. Fifteen-second versions ran last October through December during Lime's introduction, and those and extended, 30-second versions will now run through the summer. Three Southern Comfort agencies, Arnold Worldwide (creative agency), Universal McCann (media) and The Marketing Store (promotions), collaborated on the activities for the hub, then worked with the brand's marketing team to finalize concepts, reports DerOhannessian. The activities include:
Nielsen takes look at today's American teen, raised in an age dominated by media choices like never before, from the Internet to cable channels to web connected devices galore. Kids Today...
In the 25 years I've lived here, I've never had to say this -- indeed, I never believed I would ever say this -- but last Wednesday, I was ashamed to say I live in British Columbia. I wasn't the only one. I'm guessing the vast majority of the other 4.5 million people that call this Canadian province home felt the same way. In fact, the only people not feeling that way were the idiotic jerks that caused our collective shame. They were the ones using the Canuck's loss to Boston in the Stanley Cup final as an excuse to wreak havoc on downtown Vancouver. "You can't cure stupid." We went into the night holding our collective breathe, hoping the sad scenario of the 1994 riot, after a similar Game 7 loss to the New York Rangers, would not repeat itself. The Olympics had given us hope that we could be placed on a world stage without burning it to the ground. But, as one police spokesperson said, "You can't cure stupid!" Sadly, it proved to be true. B.C. is a breathtakingly beautiful corner of the world, but we definitely have our quota of stupid people, and last Wednesday, they all came onto the streets of Vancouver. You've probably seen news footage of the riot and, if you were disgusted, I get it. I was too. But there's another part of the story that also has to be told. To be honest, I'm not sure if it's a happy ending or an even sadder one. I'd like to hear what you think, but bear with me for another minute or so. Throw the Face"Book" at them Even though it appeared that we had learned nothing in the 17 years since the last riot, there was one significant difference between 1994 and last week's debacle. This year, it went viral. Much of the mayhem was captured by photo or video. Soon, it was posted online. And that's when something surprising happened. For most of our history as social animals, there is not much we can do when some of our herd runs amok. There are reams of research on the psychology of mobs, but one of the common themes is a feeling of invincibility that comes from being part of a faceless, mindless crowd bent on destruction. Most times, there is no response or retribution for individual perpetrators of mob violence. They get off scot free. But not this time. The mob that trashed Vancouver may have been mindless, but they certainly weren't faceless. The next morning, a Facebook page was started by the Vancouver police. They asked anyone with photos or videos of criminals to post them for identification. Within a few hours, the page had captured over 50,000 "likes." Within a few days, the police had over a million pictures and 1000 hours of video uploaded. As people were recognized, they were tagged so police could follow up with charges. The Insurance Corporation of BC offered police use of their facial detection software and crooner Michael Buble, who also hails from Vancouver, even launched a newspaper campaign asking for people to turn the guilty in through social media. Social Justice or Virtual Vigilantes? On hearing that, I felt that finally, justice was being served. We, the often-voiceless majority of law-abiding citizens, could do our part to right the wrongs. But, were we really interested in justice, or did we just want revenge? Is there any difference between the two? One blogger, Dave.ca, said "report the rioters out of civic duty..or revenge..either is fine." Is it? If we are holding onto moral high ground, should we rally and become a virtual "lynch" mob? It's brand-new territory to chart, and I'm personally unsure about which is the right path to take. Let me give you one example. One of the rioters is a provincial water polo athlete and he was soon identified online. His name was made public. His father is a doctor. Since his son's crime was made public, the father has had to suspend his practice and the family has had to move out of their home. Other exposed rioters have been subjected to violent threats and the comment strings are riddled with utterings that are in contention with the riot itself for sheer stupidity. When I started this column, I was convinced it was going to be a bad news, good news story, where social media would play the role of the redeemer. As I did further research on the aftermath, it seems that it's a bad news, good news, possibly worse news story. Much as I'd like to think differently, I'm not sure mob rule, whether it's pursuing mindless violence, or mindless revenge, can ever be a good thing. Social media has a way of exposing all that is human, at scale, and at velocity -- warts and all. How do we handle this new accountability, this new immediate transparency into the dark things we've always kept tucked away?
Since the 2011 SEMPO State of the Market Survey was released back in March, I keep revisiting this one nagging data point, one that may be a sign for the reality of future marketing endeavors across social networks, and yes, social channels ("Social PPC is Giving Google Adwords A Run For Its Money"). The survey found that social PPC has emerged as a sort of third search channel for paid media buyers, meaning that they go to Adwords, Binghoo, and also a multitude of PPC channels like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter to round out their media spend. This data point leaves out all debate on the efficacy of these channels, but rather underscores the point that marketers and advertisers are in fact buying media with a PPC mindset towards these channels. The problem is that we, as marketers, may be unknowingly reinforcing social as a PPC channel, while the greater opportunity lies in participation and content publishing strategies. But as search marketers, we've seen this movie before, and we know how it ends. So today I want to go over a loose history of the "ppc-ification" of the search channel as a much larger strategy, and how the same path may be happening to the balance of social participation vs. advertising marketing activities. But first let's go back to the basis of the 90-20 conundrum in search marketing, to better understand if we in fact may be headed down a similar path for "social" as a marketing "channel." The problem is this:90% of spend goes toward paid search media channels, yet it only provides 20% of the return from the search channel as a whole. For at least 10 years now, I have at various times dragged out my own slides and data points in making the case for proper budget alignment in the search marketing channel. Over and over again, using a client's actual spend and conversion data from both channels, I revealed an unbalanced approach to budget allocation versus actual opportunity in the search channel. In almost every single historical case for my own clients, the spend is lopsided in terms of investment versus the potential for short- and long-term benefits from the channel. I've since taken the liberty and rounded it off to the 90:20, meaning that for most marketers, 90% of their search marketing spend goes towards paid search, yet it may only represent 20% of the opportunity and return they are currently getting from the channel. Paid search may only represent 20% of the clicks. It may only represent 20% of the conversions, and 20% contribution to the bottom line. Conversely, only 10% of search budget may be going towards natural, yet it is generating 80% of the revenue or desired actions. This is true for marketers who may be getting anywhere from thousands to billions of dollars in return out of the search channel as a whole. Sure there are exceptions, but this remains the case for most enterprise and SMB marketers. The purpose of my argument here is not to debate what the actual %ages are - it varies too much from marketer to marketer, anyway - but to shed further light on a fact that many of us know all too well, that paid search media is already maxed out for many marketers, while natural allocation has achieved only the tip of its true potential. Again, 90:20 is not a set ratio for every situation, but I rounded it off for this article to illustrate a greater point. So why does this problem exist? If most searchers are clicking on the natural results, why don't marketers shift more spend into natural search, or earned marketing approaches? The answer is simple: Paid search makes it too easy for lopsided budget allocation. (Stay with me here -- I'm getting to the point about social budget allocation). Paid search is quick, and relatively easy to get started with. Most marketers don't understand natural search and earned media, and they have organizational challenges with implementation. They do not measure the benefits of an earned media program in months or years, but rather as "what have you done for me lately," meaning today, this week, and this month for paid search. Marketers have numbers to report, and they want to see the results right now to justify the channel upstream. So for all of the evangelization and education, for all of the search conferences, for all of the columns and blogs read, all of the forums frequented, marketers still find themselves in this short history of the search marketing channel in an upside-down, disproportionate position of throwing 90% of search budgets at paid media. Make no mistake about it - I am not an SEO apologist, but rather an advocate for balanced allocation in the search channel as a whole, especially when the benefits are to the client, and also the consumer and searcher. Which brings us back to the 90:20 "social" allocation conundrum. My question for marketers is this: Has frustration with the difficulty of "social media optimization" as an earned effort (and its parallel to SEO) driven them to social PPC and advertising as a quick way to get involved in the channel and be "social," even if it is paid media? Again, my concern here is that the greater opportunity of social is participatory and earned, but with the rise of Social PPC and advertising, the trend seems to be that marketers are focusing on it as yet another paid channel. Are marketers somewhat unknowingly reinforcing this view, simply because social engagement is harder? Is it the "advertising" mindset that somewhat disintegrates all media efforts away from "earned," and into "bought"? I don't have the answer right now, but I would say that this is one to watch. Based on my long experience in search marketing, I would say that a 90:20 ratio for paid versus participatory/earned spend appears to be where social media marketing is indeed headed.
Brown-Forman's Southern Comfort has launched a social content hub as the latest extension of its marketing campaign for Southern Comfort Lime, launched last fall. The Lime-themed hub resides on Southern Comfort's main Facebook page and Web and mobile sites. The hub has taken over the sites for the summer months. The concept: Helping SoCo fans to plan and interact throughout their nights out by consolidating a variety of digital activities in one convenient, cross-platform area -- while building awareness of the new Lime product through the hub's features and design. "If you look at a night out with friends, there's a cyclical flow," says Lena DerOhannessian, U.S. marketing director, Southern Comfort. "It starts with planning and maybe a smaller party at someone's home, moves into partying at one location, usually moving onto other locations during the night, and ends with rehashing all of the night's memorable moments." The hub is being supported by Lime television spots. Fifteen-second versions ran last October through December during Lime's introduction, and those and extended, 30-second versions will now run through the summer. Three Southern Comfort agencies, Arnold Worldwide (creative agency), Universal McCann (media) and The Marketing Store (promotions), collaborated on the activities for the hub, then worked with the brand's marketing team to finalize concepts, reports DerOhannessian. The activities include: