Thanksgiving is almost upon us, which, for many, means a day to give thanks, eat, watch football, and finalize Black Friday shopping strategies.
Online buzz about Black Friday has been in full force, as you can see from this real time twitter search and the abundance of ad aggregators online. Many retailers, at least the smart ones, no longer view these online resources as a threat. They realize the benefit of playing along and providing their ads to these sites in advance, in order to get people buzzing early, and planning their day around their deals.
We, here at MGH WOM, prefer to sleep in the day after Thanksgiving and hold out until Cyber Monday to do our bargain shopping. However, we’ve compiled a few helpful online resources for those of you who are planning to brave the crowds and battle the stores this season:
>> Black Friday’s Twitter account. Follow Black Friday to get the updates on the latest Black Friday, news, specials tips, and more.
>> GoToDaily: A Black Friday online community in which members can vote to make specials “popular.” It’s kind of like the Digg of deals, with a forum and coupons.
>> A wake up call. Register your mobile number here, choose a time, and JC Penney will send you a friendly wake up call to make sure you get to the stores on time. They will also continue to text you throughout the season with “helpful shopping tips,” according to MSNBC.
Southwest Airlines founder, Herbert D. Kelleher was spot on, when he said “you have to treat your employees like customers.”
We often talk about the importance of creating a positive corporate culture so your employees will go forth and prosper. And by “go forth and prosper” I mean “provide excellent service that will increase positive word of mouth from your customers.” And that’s all very important. However, another important goal that many often lose sight of, is maintaining positive word of mouth from your employees. Not from customers. Directly from your employees. Let me tell you a little story…
In college, I had a friend, who we’ll call “Sarah” who was a server at a local restaurant. She hated the job because of the poor management who overworked and talked down to the staff. As a disgruntled employee, she told us - the entire floor of a dorm - about her experiences as well as all the horror restaurant stories that occurred at that location. Now she would never tell her customers these stories and she still provided excellent customer service, simply because she needed the money. However, the damage was still done. Now I, along with 40 people on our floor and all of our friends will never eat at that chain again.
Like all things WOM, the internet has the potential to spread these negative (or positive) messages to millions in just moments. There are tons of sites, such as Job Vent , where employees can post their rants and raves about their employers. So trust me, you want to take the little extra steps to get your employees on your side.
If you create the right corporate culture, you can accomplish both of the aforementioned goals, obtaining positive WOM directly from your employees and as a result of their work ethic and service. If you need help, just take a few notes from Zappos.
Throughout the course of history, there have been several moments that have helped to shape the face of American sports as we know them today: USA vs. the Soviet Union in ‘80, Lou Gehrig’s farewell speech, Foreman defeating Frazier.
Impressive in their own right, yet these athletic feats could not begin to compare with the major victory scored by the MGH WOM team (the Kings of Pong) on Friday night at the inaugural BPPPA tournament.
Pitted against a fierce competitor - Orange Element - MGH WOM held strong and scored a win in the third round of ping pong play. WOM Intern, Ryan Deal, earned bragging rights as he was crowned the grand winner of the evening.
“This is just the beginning,” said Deal. “First, Orange Element. Next, the world.”
MGH WOM would like to thank Orange Element, their Twitter friends, the Baltimore Business Journal, and everyone else who came out to attend the event. Who’s next?!!
I believe if you look up “fierce competitors” in the dictionary you will see a picture of the MGH WOM team. That love of competition has brought us to our first ever ping pong challenge against a local design shop called Orange Element.
Using our connections on Twitter, we reached out to them with our initial challenge video. Obviously it was a challenge that couldn’t be turned down - they accepted immediately. The next few weeks brought plenty of trash-talkin’ between us. You can track our end of it on the tournament website - The Kings of Pong.
In the meantime, enjoy the blog and join us tomorrow night for the debut of the Kings of Pong!
As much as I would have loved to blog live from the WOMMA conference this past week, my overheating laptop wasn’t as keen on the idea as I was. But I did take copious notes (ref: doodled), and have developed a list of the following top 5 list of things I learned from the 3-day event:
1) There’s no one right way to measure word of mouth. As much as I would like to claim that MGH WOM has the single best solution for measuring any word of mouth or social media campaign, I just can’t. The fact is that there’s endless ways to skin the proverbial WOM measurement cat, and different metrics may be more appealing to different clients. You may have 50,000 views on a YouTube video, but if the goal was conversion, you’ve likely done little to nothing to drive those sales. 150 new mentions on blogs mean nothing if you can’t sell in why such numbers were significant to meeting that client’s goals. The key to WOM measurement rest in communicating with one’s client (prior to the start of a campaign) to identify specific objectives, and setting metrics and benchmarks against those goals.
Who doesn’t want free SWAG? Why not charge people to send it to you? Earlier this week, the web saw the launch of GirlinYourShirt.com. The premise behind the site is quite simple. You send in your company’s shirts and information and the girl will expose your brand to her social networks all day.
What seems like such a simple idea has already created over 15,000 views for her introduction video in its first three days.
Check it out and leave your thoughts on the concept.
Google is rolling out its version of video chat via its Gmail chat server today. The service allows g-chat users to connect with other who have installed the free plugin. Gmail video chat works very similar to iChat, with a small camera icon situation next to user-names of those with web-cam enabled computers. Currently, Google is in the process of rolling their new feature out to all Gmail users, so if you do not see if its not available yet, no fear, its coming soon.
What affect will this have on other similar services like Skype and iChat?
To me it seems like Apple and Google seem to be colliding more and more with their technology. I am looking forward to seeing even more competitiveness between these two companies.
Check out the Google video introducing Gmail Video Chat.
Every once in a while something comes along on the internet that draws massive attention, something that everyone is talking about. Usually it is something that someone creates with the intention to get as many viewers as possible, much like Fred Figglehorn. This time around though, a viral sensation has taken over the World Wide Web, with seemingly non-viral motives.
Enter Puppy-Cam. Originally launched as a way for the owners of 6 Shiba Inu puppies to keep an eye on them when they were not home, the puppy-cam was discovered by the general public and has created hysteria among dog-lovers everywhere.
Most incredibly, the puppies have developed somewhat of a cult following. They consistently have more than 10,000 people viewing at any given time, and have maxed out at over 15,000 viewers. In just the 5 weeks that the puppies have been on air, they have received nearly 2 million views to their cam. Continue reading ‘THE AWWW FACTOR: UNVEILING THE PUPPY-CAM’
Are you friends with your mom or dad on Facebook? Chances are if you aren’t already you will be soon! The face of social network users is changing and it includes a few more wrinkles.One particular group of adults tapping into Facebook, and other social media tools, are moms. A study done by MarketingVox, illustrates that moms are most interested in sites that connect them to other moms online. The study also shows that Generation Y moms are high involved in reading blogs, participating in online communities for moms, and creating and sharing videos.
New sites, created exclusively for moms, and parents in general, are popping up on a daily basis. These sites provide parents with a way to trade tips, swap family photos, and even create online journals. Below you will find the top new ways this audience is connecting online.
Twittermoms - a group of 3,900 moms who tweet. This site offers several sections includine a message boardogs.
Totpsot - comprised of over 15,000 members, Totspot pegs itself as a site for parents to scrapbook, write journals and connect with other parents online.
Clubmom - provides parents with a way to share photos and journal entries. Moms are also able to participate in their rewards program and online polls and blogs.
MeetUp - with over 130,000 members nationwide, this site allows moms to connect online and off with other moms based on location.
Family.com - a social network created by Disney that engages parents in conversations surrounding entertainment, food, coupons etc.
With their incredibly busy schedules, social networking sites give parents an easy way to connect with family and friends online. Moms and dads are hitting the social networks hard and everyone from advertisers to tech start-ups are taking notice.
Here we are, less than a day away from the opening of the polls. I am sure everyone is excited to cast their votes, but even more excited to see the end of the incessant smear campaigns coming from all over. I am sure most of you have received more than one e-mail declaring that Barack Obama is a terrorist, or calling into questions John McCain’s military service record.
Of course attacks like these will put the candidates on the defensive. With a large portion of both campaigns relying on social media and word-of-mouth, it only makes sense to target the online community and directly stand up to these smears. After all, you can’t get stabbed in the back if you are standing face-to-face.
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