Final Four Madness and Social Media

The pinnacle of March Madness 2011 has be invaded by the madness of Social Media. There is tweeting, streaming and blogging taking place about the Final Four than ever before. According to a survey done by Research Now on the use of social media among those over 18 years of age, 69% use social media to follow the tournament, 82% used social media to pick brackets, and 47%  followed more than one media. Social Media such as: Tweeter, Facebook, Youtube, and Bracket Town by Foursquare all contributed to the madness. The largest contributor was Facebook then Youtube. Of those that filled out the ESPN Bracket Challenge, 51% filled their brackets out through social media.
Coke even got into the act by launching their Coke Zero Social Arena during March Madness. According to SatelliteNews. com, "visiting the Coke Zero NCAA March Madness Social Arena online or via the new iPad app, fans can monitor and contribute to the social chatter around each match up from their own Facebook posts and Twitter feeds. Fan comments and social media posts related to March Madness will appear in “Tourney Buzz” on the site. Joining in on the conversation will be CBS Sports and Turner Sports online and on-air basketball analysts who will be regularly commenting on live game action, sharing tournament observations and connecting with fans". When you see companies as large as ESPN, CBS and Coke become involve seriously in
Social Media, competitors best take notice, take the plunge or find themselves swimming with the gold fish.

Sources: http;//marketwire.com/press-release/Research-Now-Poll-Reveals-Social-Media-a-Fan-Favorite-2011- NCAA-Tournament-14189.htm
http://www.satellitetv-news.com/turner-sports-and-cbs-sports-partner-to-launch-coke-zero-ncaa-march-madness-social-arena/

Pepsi gambles on Social Media

I was looking at companies that decided to take a serious look at social media and found that one of the biggest risk takers was Pepsi Cola. ABC News stated that in Super Bowl ads from 1999 to 2009, Pepsi spent over $142 million to encourage consumers to drink the Pepsi brand. Pepsi's decision to pull its advertising from the Super Bowl telecast and concentrate on its Social Media strategy to try and create a movement will be the largest and most visible showdown between broadcast media and the Internet to date.This is a huge amount of resources that are spent every year on 30 second ads. Pepsi decided to give away $20 million dollars through Social Media to make communities better through suggestions from consumers. This campaign is called the The Pepsi Refresh Project. With the loss of visibility due to viewers watching less and less television, Pepsi decided to gamble on a project that would show them in a more positive light as a proactive corporate citizen. This was a huge risk on Pepsi's part because Coke had already committed to the Super Bowl ad campaign. While the ROI remains to be seen, Pepsi will never look at marketing in the same light ever again.

Source: http://abcnews.go.com/Business/pepsi-big-gamble-ditches-super-bowl-social-media/Story?

Foursquare, Numbers can be decieving.

Foursquare is one of the new and most popular social media platforms today. The concept is to gain more traffic for business that advertise through Foursquare. By advertising discounts and free deals for patronizing businesses like McDonalds, customers "check-in" through applications on  I-Phones, Droids, or other phones. Check-ins are the latest craze among the younger generation, who are constantly surfing for free deals thru the internet. Do these check-ins result in increased sales for someone as large as McDonalds. According to Oliver Blanchard@brandbuilder.com, a small scale campaign on Foursquare, McDonalds claimed to receive a 33% increase in check-in traffic, not actual foot traffic for one day. The actual bump in foot traffic was only 0.011% from the day before, and returned to normal levels within three days.. Therefore, the conclusion must be that check-ins do not always translate into increased sales. Many people just want to find free giveaways on the internet, and have no intention of making purchases. So companies like McDonalds that have such a large customer base already, must consider if the Return on Investment is really worth the investment.

Social Media Comes Home

     Although I have said publicly that I am not a big fan of social media, a do have a personal interest in its success. My daughter is the art director for a small company in the Cleveland, Ohio area called BooJee Beads. BooJee Beads is a small company that was started in the garage of Lisa Harrington, a pediatric nurse from Ohio. As BooJee began to grow, there was a need to expand their business vision. My daughter was hired to not only be the creative director of the company, but also to expand their business through social media. This business that started out of garage, now has sales in excess of five million dollars a year. Those sales have increased due  social media. In a period of a down economy, 2010 was BooJee Beads second best sales year since their founding in 2003. That success was in part, due to a social media designed to get customer feedback on product lines and sales orders. The importance of social media comes home with this example of a small business success because of its use. Take a look, you might find something you like: www.boojeebeads.com.