Category

social media

• Internet, social media

  Facebook down for a week!

  03.18.10 | Permalink | 4 Comments

  Got your attention didn’t it?

  This is purely a hypothetical scenario. It’s also an experiment in dual-blogging (think bloggers meet dual-pianists in Vegas). Rodney Payne from Think! and I are going to be hypothesising about the effects of Facebook shutting down for a week. Instead of commenting on each other’s blogs, we’re going to be posting each other’s responses as a blog.

  [WB] Day 1. The Facebook URL stops responding. First thing that happens is an insane amount of activity on Twitter reporting the news. After that all hell breaks loose in the tech blogosphere; Mashable, Inside Facebook, All Facebook, Techcrunch, Techmeme et all just go crazy over the news. Traditional media follows a few hours behind.

  [RP] Day 2. Facebook led last night’s evening news and is splashed across the front page of newspapers worldwide. Twitter traffic has more-than-doubled overnight with almost every tweet referencing #Facebook. Tweets have largely replaced status updates. New account registrations have grown significantly. The ‘Twitter Whale’ is displayed frequently to show that Twitter is slow and overwhelmed with traffic. Cell-phone carriers and email providers see a noticeable increase in messages. Blogs are filled with stories guessing at what’s going on.

  [WB] Day 3. Everybody who threw a party and used Facebook Events to organize the party is ticketed off because nobody showed up. The first “Life without Facebook” t-shirts are starting to appear. ‘Experts’ on the news networks make suggestions about how to deal with Facebook detox. Facebook is scheduling a new conference for the next day.

  [RP] Day 4. People realize that life A.F. (after Facebook) isn’t too scary. Facebook isn’t a matter of life-and-death like internet banking or email. It’s just a convenient social tool. Productivity at offices has surprisingly decreased slightly because many people can’t focus on one task without some distraction. Employees who had learned to collaborate using Facebook messages and Facebook chat are now forced to return to slower methods of communication.

  [WB] Day 5. Facebook promises the network will be back up soon. Some businesses complain drops in sales because of a reliance on Fanpages and Facebook ads. Legal action is discussed. Flickr reports an increase in new accounts and uploaded photos. Some kids fear their Farmville animals will die.

  [RP] Day 6. You would have thought that with 450 million people addicted to social networking and gaming that a rival-site would rise to meteoric success. However, MySpace hasn’t seen too much of a bump in traffic, commentators think its because of the lack of privacy built into people’s social graph. People who log in to their old accounts find a social wasteland with no posts from legitimate friends and just a scattering of links leading to creepy websites. People are beginning to think that Facebook may never come back online. Google Buzz and Orkut are getting an increased trickle of new users but its just not the same, all of our photos and friends were on Facebook.

  [WB] Day 7. Media has nothing left to talk about and tech bloggers are too busy with the latest Apple iSomething. People stop caring about it. Life goes on without Facebook although they wonder what their friends are up to. Facebook announces service will be restored tomorrow and blames a proprietary Microsoft product for causing the crash of it’s service.

  [RP] Day 8. The reckoning is upon us. Zuckerberg flicks the switch and issues a press release to that affect which is picked up by every single news organization in the world. Facebook blows past its previous 30% of web traffic to attract over 50% of internet users. Facebook’s servers overload and go down for another hour or two. When they come back online, people connect again, pay-per-click ads resume, and Farmville animals are revived just in time… Life goes on.

• Marketing, social media, tourism bc, Travel & Tourism, Uncategorized

  Tourism BC 2010 Olympics online activities: #2 Torch Relay Field Reporter videos

  02.13.10 | Permalink | Comment?

  
  Paul Clark, Chris Wheeler and me (photo: Geoff Moore)

  The Torch Relay is a great event to connect people with the games across the country. A perfect vehicle to extend the exposure beyond Vancouver and showcase all of British Columbia around the world.

  But like pretty much anything else related to games, access is tough when you’re not a sponsor or accredited media. About a year ago we worked out a partnership with Coca-Cola to cover every day of the Torch Relay in BC, and key cities across Canada through an extended partnership with the Canadian Tourism Commission. That gave us the access we needed.

  One of our star Field Reporters Chris Wheeler was up for the challenge and on October 30 last year he started the 106 day journey. With the support from Jose and Mike in our Tourism BC office, and Paul Clark and our regional offices on the road, he created 25 videos in BC and 11 in the rest of Canada. The formula was to use the Torch Relay as a continuing plot-line and highlight specific experiences in the area or community the flame visited that day. You follow the flame, and also see what makes the area great.

  The videos are a great success for all partners; awesome stories, tens of thousands of views (almost 300,000 as of Feb 14), great response from the local communities and some great learning for the future. Check out the YouTube channel or our fancy HelloBC Torch Relay page.

• Internet, social media

  Must see presentations #3: Alexis Ohanian: How to make a splash in social media

  12.17.09 | Permalink | Comment?

  In less than five minutes you will understand why social media works best when rallying a community behind a common cause, how trying to control the message is of the past, and accepting the wisdom of the crowd can help you achieve your goals, even if this wisdom might seem ridiculous.

• Internet, Marketing, social media

  Must see presentations: #2 Clay Shirky: How social media can make history

  12.05.09 | Permalink | 2 Comments

  Clay Shirky’s powerful presentation at TED earlier this year will combat any Social Media sceptic you might have to deal with in your organization. Do you have key business decission makers who don’t even have a Facebook account, or marketing teams who think Social Media is just another way to broadcast advertising or something viral? In that case, this presentation will explain in 17 minutes that the future of marketing isn’t broadcast but collaboration with your networks of consumers and stakeholders.

• Marketing, social media

  Is a Twitter follower or Facebook fan better than an email address in a consumer database?

  11.25.09 | Permalink | 2 Comments

  Interesting to see a lot of campaigns specifically targetted at growing Twitter Followers or Facebook Fans.
  

  • Las Vegas is giving away a 5 day trip over New Years. To apply, you need to follow @vegas and tweet your excuse to be there. So far, @vegas has 3600 followers.
  • Sidney ran a contest where you had to become a Facebook fan and write something on the fanpage wall. The SeeSidney fanpage has 7700 fans.
  • Air New Zealand first gave away 30 trips to New Zealand. To enter, you had to follow @kitweets and answer a trivia question. Result: 3500 followers.
  • Air Zealand is now running a trivia contest on a Facebook app. So far, 3200 people have played.

  Traditionally these campaigns would be used to grow a consumer database. Is a Twitter follower or a Facebook fan more valuable than an email address? Or is it Shiny Object Syndrome? Or isn’t about the aquisition but about the engagement; the process of entering into the contest. Asking somebody to give an excuse to visit Vegas will at least make somebody think about visiting.

  I think a Facebook friend or Twitter follower can be much more valuable because there’s an opportunity for two-way conversation and interaction between community members. Something typically not part of database marketing. But if the objective is to broadcast on somebody’s wall or feed, it will probably lead to predictible failure.

• Internet, Marketing, social media, tourism bc, Travel & Tourism

  The DMO site as a social platform; moving closer

  11.05.09 | Permalink | 1 Comment

  The future of DMO websites needs real time and social content. Yesterday, our Torch Relay Field Reporter program is a good example of a step towards real time content. And I use social in a broad sense. It means collaboration with people who have a personal or commercial interest in assisting potential travelers to visit a destination.

  In our case, our province is a collection of regions, cities and communities; most with their own DMO. Last year our regions took a bold step and decided to use their region on HelloBC as their website. Instead of both spending time and money on development, content, SEO, SEM, etc, we’re now collaborating and HelloBC is better for it.

  Most DMO’s are also using Twitter now. Twitter is a great way to connect our website visitors with local experts and give them real time information about regions and communities. So we’re starting to add the local DMO twitter feeds to the relevant pages of HelloBC.

  

  Parksville Twitter feed on HelloBC

  Another step towards a more social and real time website.

• Marketing, social media, tourism bc, Travel & Tourism

  Leveraging the 2010 Games with our Torch Relay Field Reporter

  11.04.09 | Permalink | 4 Comments

  Chris Wheeler is our Torch Relay Field Reporter. He will travel with the torch throughout BC and Canada and document the relay, the celebrations while showing off the amazing places the torch passes.

  One of our objectives for leveraging the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games is maximizing exposure surrounding the games for all of British Columbia and Canada. And the Torch Relay is a perfect way to do so.

  Big kudos to Chris, the Tourism BC team (Paul, Jose and Mike in particular) and our regional staff for doing an amazing job and bringing the vision to life.

  Chris will product a video for every day the Torch is in British Columbia and key places throughout Canada.

  Follow Chris on Twitter and around the country by subscribing to his YouTube channel.

• Internet, Marketing, social media, tourism bc, Travel & Tourism

  Tourism BC and Field Reporter videos as an example of industry collaboration

  09.03.09 | Permalink | Comment?

  Last year, I posted about our online video strategy. It’s been one exciting year. Ten field reporters have created more than 120 videos. With an average time of 3 minutes per video, it’s the equivalent of 4 feature films! Videos are posted on YouTube, our blogs, and they’re incorporated into the appropriate places of the website. In less than a year, our field reporters are approaching 200,000 views.

  That alone is enough reason to call these videos a success. But I think the most interesting piece is the way we’re extending our Field Reporter program and leveraging the long tail. Tourism BC can never create videos for every place, event and activity in British Columbia.

  Our Field Reporter videos are cost-effective. It’s a one person operation. The host also operates the camera and does the editing. Producing videos is no longer a big budget operation.
  That means they’re affordable for smaller destinations and tourism businesses. So we’ve made our Field Reporters available for our industry. We’ve taken care of the process and format of the video. All the industry has to do is pay the Field Reporter and the videos can be used as any other on YouTube and HelloBC, but also on the DMO or operator website.
  This concept is working well and a good example of using a collaberative approach to online marketing between a DMO and it’s industry.
  
  The video above was created by Chris on behalf ot Tourism Nanaimo.

  
  This video is created by Ivan on behalf of Canadian Mountain Holidays.
  More about our Field Report program soon…

• Internet, Marketing, social media

  Why businesses should use Twitter – by Japadog

  03.14.09 | Permalink | Comment?

  Japadog is taking Vancouver by storm. The Japanese style hot dogs are weird but delicious. Japadog is also active on Twitter and here’s why:
  
  Awesome. Couldn’t have said it better in less than 140 characters myself.

• Internet, Marketing, personal, social media, tourism bc, Travel & Tourism

  My interview for Online Revealed Caribbean

  10.14.08 | Permalink | 2 Comments

  I was supposed to present with Richard Kunz from T4G, our technology solutions provider, at Online Revealed Caribbean. I couldn’t go unfortunately but Richard interviewed me and incorporated some of the footage in his presentation. I received some good feedback so I decided to put the whole interview online.
  We discussed Web 2.0, user generated content, social networks and one-to-one marketing for Destination Marketing Organizations and the tourism industry. I shared some of the things we’re working with T4G on to provide more relevancy to individual consumers on a mass scale.
  
  Richard and I will hopefully be at the next Online Revealed Canada in Niagara Falls on April 13-15.

William Bakker's Destination Marketing blog