Emanate PR

TwitterMoms @ EmanatePR

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 17:36:00 +0000

The New York 'Nation got a special visit from the TwitterMoms team—Megan, Jim, Sally and Bridget. Check out this article from Brandweek about their innovative offering, the TwitterMoms Seal of Approval. It's like the Good Housekeeping Seal for the social media age!

Things We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 19:21:00 +0000

Emanate was abuzz with love as the New York office continued to welcome our new hires as well as some visitors from across the country and the pond. There was even a little intercontinental gift exchange between the New York ‘Nation and our new colleagues in Munich. How sweet!

Speaking of presents, earlier this week Mark Zuckerberg donated $100 million of his Facebook fortune to Newark, NJ public schools. Some are critical of the move, calling it a PR stunt conveniently timed with the release of The Social Network, which could potentially paint the “billionaire, punk, genius” in an unflattering light. We tend to agree with Mashable, however, that “the gesture should be taken at face value.”

Our hearts were all atwitter over this PR move: the man behind @BPGlobalPR has finally revealed himself. In an interview with The Awl, Josh Simpson unveiled both his identity and some of the strategy behind the parody.

We were enamored with this brilliant idea from the world of digital marketing: CAPTCHAs as advertising.

We love Vitrue, an Atlanta-based social media company, for helping us get smarter about leveraging the power of Facebook for our clients. Its suggestions? Post brand updates early in the day and late in the week, use more images and photos than videos and text to engage consumers, and offer up coupons—they work!

Finally, there was plenty of birthday love in the air this week as both our Global CEO, Kim Sample, and the world’s oldest man, Walter Breuning, toasted to another fantastic year. While celebrating his 114th in Montanta, Breuning said to his friends and family, “In this good world, let us be kind to one another.” How’s that for love?

Do something kind this weekend!

Jade Faugno

Coffee Cake To Start The Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 14:03:00 +0000

Happy Monday Everyone!

Things We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 18:56:00 +0000

We love Mashable and their article on the Future of Journalism got our brains whirring.

We thought Hasbro was pretty smart in the way they are using Youtube to pump life back into good old Trivial Pursuit.

As a mix of public service and gutsy PR, KFC is emblazoning Fiery Gilled Wings ads over fire hydrants in Buffalo in return for a $2500 grant. Hot idea (pun-intended) but wonder what the local dogs will think.

We love football but we also love chocolate. We thought Dove chocolate nailed it with their chocolate football party in Times Square.

We take our hats off to Dentsu London for the way they are bringing their brand proposition to life: Inventing Future Magic. This video is amazing.

We loved this eye-popping iPhone app by tryvertising that lets you try on watches for real.

And last but not least, one of our agency cousins, Interbrand, released their annual list of top brands. Well worth reading.

Things We Loved This week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 19:48:00 +0000

How about this for a smart use of Twitter? Uniglo has been asking its UK customers to tweet the price down. The more tweets an item gets, the lower the price goes. Check out the counter and tweet your way to a big discount!

Because it's Fashion Week, we loved what Desigual's been up to with a clever little stunt in Spain. A few hundred folks showed up outside one of their stores in Barcelona in their underwear and then go in to help themselves.

Enjoy!

So einfach kann es sein eine Twitter-Promotion umzusetzen. Uniglo hat seine UK Kunden aufgerufen dein Preis „runter zutwittern“. Je mehr Tweets ein Gegenstand bekommt desto weiter geht der Preis runter. Twitter dir dein Schnäppchen!

Es ist Fashion Week in New York und dazu passend, stellen wir diese sehr witzige Idee von Desigual vor. Mehrere hundert Fashion-Begeisterte warteten halb-nackt vor den Länden in Barcelona und hüllten sich in neue coole Klamotten.

Viele Spaß

Lukas Adda (German Version) and Adam Turinas (English Version)

Farewell from our Munich Colleage

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 16:59:00 +0000

We have been lucky enough to have our new Munich colleague, Lukas Adda, Digital Guide, with us for 3 weeks in NY. He has encapsulated his memories of the last three weeks with this photo montage, including a very cool slideshow.

Adam Turinas

Things We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 19:51:00 +0000

With all the excitement about Earl, it would be easy to forget that there was a whole lot other stuff happening this week.

We are in awe of Sharon Murray who has been chosen as the face of Debenhams, the UK department store chain's autumn/winter collection and features in the new window displays that went up in stores across the UK.

We loved the clever way McDonald's helped hot Torontonians cool off, as part of the Dollar Drink Days promotion.

And on the subject of major global brands using their mega-power, we loved that P&G is leveraging the power of the Tide brand and launching a national chain of dry-cleaners. "Each unit has a double-lane drive-through, lockers for after-hours pickup, lollipops for kids and Iams biscuits for the pooch." Sign me, the dog will love it!

We were chastened by this article on things you should not reveal on Facebook. We're sure no one is doing anything like this. Just saying s'all.

Lastly, we suggest that you end the week with a power nap before the long weekend (here in the US). Zzzzzzzzz

Adam Turinas

Things We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 17:45:00 +0000

While we continued to help our Office Depot client get ready for back-to-school season this week, social networking went back to college. GoodCrush and RandomDorm founder Josh Weinstein launched a new site exclusively for those still hitting the books. CollegeOnly is being hailed as a safe haven for college kids who want to post photos, events and the latest campus buzz away from the prying eyes of parents and employers. Study up on the hottest thing since Facebook on the New York Times Bits Blog, Mashable and Business Insider.

Twitter, Twitter, Facebook wall...who's the most social media savvy of them all? None other than Lady Gaga. The pop culture icon, who has already taken over the airwaves and is the first and only living person with over 10 million Facebook fans, posted a YouTube video this week to declare her eminence as Tween [Twitter + Queen] Gaga.

And Gaga isn't the online presence we went gaga over this week. Check out 25 brilliant examples of Facebook pages from some of America's favorite brands.

We love visitors, so we love having Lukas Adda—an import from our Munich office—in New York for the next couple of weeks to share his wisdom about all things digital and all things deutsch. Check out this amazing example of a German augmented reality magazine that he brought to our attention:

We also welcomed organizational development expert Daniel Pitlik to the 'Nation as he helped the New York team brush up on our presentation skills.

Have a "love"ly weekend, and thanks for indulging us and our pun-loving ways!

Jade Faugno

Social Media Strategy - US vs Europe

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 14:29:00 +0000

Very interesting article today care of PFSK regarding why Social Media campaigns fail. According to a study by Brand Science Institute, a German think tank, 81% of European companies lack a clear social media strategy. The expectations on social media are unrealistic with demands that campaign prove out an ROI in 12 months and the confusion that social media=viral.

The US is head in many respects but the situation isn't great here either. According to a study reported in Mediapost, 78% of firms are using social media but only 41% have a strategy. So better but not great.

As a digital veteran, this feels so much like the first wave of digital - the growth of online advertising. Initial excitement, lots of trial and error, followed by confusion and tons of questioning. The difference between US and Europe is a temporal one. The report from Europe feels like the discussions around social media in the US a year ago, with many experimenting in a highly questioning climate. Out of this a few a believers emerge, e.g. Starbucks and Dell, who use social media in a disciplined way and turn it into a highly competitive weapon.

It will be interesting to see if in a year the climate around social media in Europe mirrors the current climate in the US and who will emerge as the social media champions.

Adam Turinas

Things We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 21:04:00 +0000

At Emanate, we all like to think of ourselves as young at heart. It’s no surprise that we enjoyed this week’s New York Times piece, What Is It About 20-Somethings?. The story analyzes life for those coming of age in today’s complex society – how chic!

Speaking of getting to where we want to be, social networking giant Facebook just launched its new location service, Places, which allows users to “check in” wherever they are and share that info with their friends. Because Facebook is well known for its “network effect,” it is hoping to open the opportunity for wider distribution to more established location services like Foursquare, Gowalla, Loopt and Booyah. We’ll start sending status updates from the kitchen, copy room and elevators next week so you can keep tabs on us.

We loved JetBlue’s response to the dramatic exit of one of its flight attendants, an incident that has gone viral over the past couple of weeks. Harnessing the power of social media, the airline chimed in with a clever blog post invoking Office Space, the pop culture classic that brought disgruntled employees into the mainstream.

While we’re on the topic of “jetting,” the Emanators are sad we missed out on this year’s All You Can Jet Pass – it was a busy, busy week and now they’re sold out! Congrats, JetBlue. Maybe next year…

As was foreseen, the debate over regulating Internet traffic has caused quite a stir. Internet giants Google, Facebook and Verizon, as well as the FCC, have simultaneously contributed to and tried to deflect a whirlwind of conversation involving conspiracy theories, rumors and accusations on the topic of net neutrality. But as Mashable puts it, wait until the proposal is brought to Congress, because “that’s where you’ll find the real fireworks.”

Have a great weekend!

Diana Rostkowski

Things We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 21:40:00 +0000

The wait is over… the official “Tweet Button” hath arrived. This week Twitter announced the button’s launch as an official option for web publishers to count retweets and let their readers share content. Now, we can share stories in the blink of an eye and follow relevant users, such as the websites that posted them. Social networking just got a little bit easier.

Attempting to build out the social media strategy for an upcoming program and coming up short? Try this—a site that will suggest just about any social media strategy under the sun. If you have already used the strategy on the screen, simply click “I’ve already f****** used that one” and a new one will pop up. You can keep clicking for hours (and pardon our language!)

Carl Richards, a financial planner and writer for the Bucks blog, has taken doodling to a whole new level. In a continuing series of napkin drawings and posts on the Bucks blog, he has been explaining the basics of money and finance via simple graphs and diagrams. Thanks for breaking it down for us, Carl!

We’ve all heard the age-old saying “money won’t buy you happiness.” According to an article from the New York Times, spending less = increased happiness—which means the fact that consumers have quelled spending habits during the recent economic crisis might actually make them happier. We are fans of this glass-is-half-full way of thinking.

As always, have a fantastic weekend. See y’all on Monday.

Anna Boisvert

Things We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 19:26:00 +0000

With plenty of money to spare, some notable U.S. billionaires have decided to band together for a business deal that will go down in history—and one that we particularly love. Prominent Americans like David Rockefeller and Bill Gates have united under “The Giving Pledge” to donate more than 50% of their fortunes to charity.

Enjoy the thrill of solving puzzles like those you’ve seen on The Amazing Race and Dexter? There’s an app for that! SCVNGR is a game about doing challenges at places and earning points, played via your iPhone or Android. You can also add challenges at your favorite places—and never be bored while on-the-go again!

Bill Cosby realized the importance of social media this week, using it to inform us that—contrary to popular belief or urban legend or something—he’s not dead. This week, he confirmed his existence via Twitter while simultaneously promoting his new app.

In fashion, it’s now possible for a girl to find that perfect pair of jeans! Before trying on multiple pairs to find the best fit, just submit a picture of your backside to Old Navy’s Madame Eva. Her Booty Reader will reveal which pair is in the cards for you.

Not to brag (OK, maybe to brag a little), but Emanate is very proud to call Katherine Ducker our own, as this week she was named one of PR Week’s 40 Under 40! At age 31, Ducker is Emanate’s youngest Director and VP. She has a solid reputation among her clients and the PR world at large. Needless to say, we love her!

Also this week, per Emanate tradition, the majority of us gathered in the NYC office while Global CEO Kim Sample, European CEO Nick Propper and Managing Director Kim Friedman gave their “State of the ‘Nation” address, highlighting the company’s recent successes.

And in the typical “work hard, play hard” spirit, the week concluded with a company celebration, as there was certainly much to toast!

Have a great week! We sure did!

Diana Rostkowski

Social Media Training Needs - Survey Results

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 12:56:00 +0000

Like many PR firms, at Emanate the transformation to digital is one of our highest priorities. Training is a critical pillar of the transformation. We recently polled the Emanation about their digital training needs, asking them about their use of social media and what they most wanted to learn about.

Usage: Almost everyone at the Emanation uses social media personally and most use it professionally in some capacity.

Learning: We asked the Emanation what they most wanted to learn about. They prioritzed:
1. Measurement and ROI
2. Law, guidelines and best practice
3. Influencer mapping
4. Socia Media Trends
5. Deep Dive on Facebook
6. Deep Dive on Twitter
7. How to use SM to pitch

It was good to see that the entire Emanation is engaged in social media in some way and interested in learning more about how to make it a more integral part of what we do.

What We Are Doing About It
Our goal is to make digital a seamless part of what we do. To that end we are "skiling-up" the entire Emanation. The aim is for everyone to have at least basic digital skills and many will have deep skills in specialized areas to complement their traditional skills. Very few will be exclusively digital (I am one of them and most of my job is to be a digital coach). This way we avoid creating a digital silo and ensure that we have digital skills that can be deployed seamlessly across the firm where they are needed.

We have three key initiatives to accelerate our digital education.

1. Team Digi: This is an informal team of Emanators from across the whole firm who care passionately about digital. This team are catalysts in accelerating our movement to digital and they are leading the charge in training. They meet every week developing training, sharing learning and working on our digital offering.

2 Training Program: We have an on-going training program and we are adding specific digital modules based on the survey. There is a basic Social Media 101 that is a grounding in the topic. Additionally there are modules around specific strategic areas like best practice and influencer mapping. We will also have deeper skills training for Facebook, Twitter, etc. Anyone can participate in the training. We will be making the materials available publicly so that others can benefit outside the Emanation. Here are the modules we are working on:

Social Media 101
Law, Guidelines and Best Practice
Influencer Mapping
Measurement & ROI
Facebook Deep Dive
Twitter Deep Dive
Blogger Relations

3. Checkits: As way to share ideas we have created an internal email alias called "checkits". If someone sees a cool digital thing (The Old Spice campaign was one) the email to the "checkit" distribution list. This way we are always sharing ideas and the latest trends. Our weekly Things We Loved posts are a summary of sum of h best of the week's "Checkits"

You can follow our progress on Twitter @EmanatePR. How is your firm is tackling social media training? Let us know and we promise to share.

Adam Turinas

Things We Loved This week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 16:24:00 +0000

If there’s one thing we love, it’s food. If there’s another, it’s a really smart online campaign. So we definitely loved Jamba Juice’s response to a certain fast food chain that recently decided to break into the smoothie business. How would you like to try a Cheeseburger Chill Smoothie? OK, we wouldn’t either, but the commercial is definitely worth watching.

Speaking of food, we loved the Pizza Proverbs contest from Domino’s. Plenty of Emanators got in on the fun, spouting off pizza-related wisdom that was sometimes saucy, sometimes cheesy. Some of our favorites? “A pizza a day keeps the women away” (Sean Carney) and “Don't put off until tomorrow the pizza you can eat today” (Shauna Wreschner).

Mark Zuckerberg, the face behind Facebook, showed up on our or newsfe—I mean—radar a couple of times this week. First, we caught the trailer for The Social Network , a film based on his rise to social networking superstardom, which features Justin Timberlake as part of the cast (love him!).

Next, we watched as Zuckerberg got the Gawker stalker treatment . The popular tech blog followed him around paparazzi-style, capturing every mundane detail of his life to show just how much of a bore the whole Facebook privacy debate has become.

Still think you’re kind of a big deal? Check out PeerIndex , a new tool designed to measure one’s social influence on the Web, and find out if anyone actually reads your tweets. Fast Company calls it the “the 140-character version of the Google vanity search.” We say it’s totally cool to love yourself.

Go grab a smoothie and a slice of pizza, and have a splendid weekend!

Jade Faugno

Things We Loved This week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 18:44:00 +0000

We loved Comic-Con and our Hilton Garden Inn team was there in force with their clients spreading comfort and good cheer to the crowds staying in line overnight. Just watch this video to get the full Comic-Con vibe. Words don't do it justice.

Watching the Tour de France? If you have been following this annual bike race round La Belle France you might have noticed that at the end of each stage there's a guy dressed up as a water bottle running along with the racers. There's a great backstory on this simple innovative ("Why didn't I think of that") product.

Who you calling an apphole? I am feeling a little ecochondriac. I just charitexted. Wondering what the snood I'm talking about, check out the urban dictionary.

Are newspapers dead? We loved NPR's in-depth analysis of this issue with great interviews from experts like Jeff Jarvis. By the way, although they are far from dead, we think flipboard is going to shake things up (despite how unbearably hip the demo is)

Have a gagalicious weekend!

Adam Turinas

Things We Loved Last Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 13:25:00 +0000

We're a little late with last week's "Things We Loved".

We have a bit of a Wold Cup hangover and this got our attention: The Vuvuzela Exchange Program…very smart idea of taking advantage of a current theme and extending the story for the benefit of the KFC brand.

We're watching GoodCrush pretty closely. It's a college-only dating and social networking site. According to the WSJ it's a cross between Match.com and Facebok. Our very own Jade Faugno helped get it launched. Attagirl Jade!

CNNMoney and Gowalla's collaboration caught our eye. They teamed up to deliver more local information on CNNMoney’s annual best places to live list. They also incorporated housing data from Trulia.

And did we mention how much we loved the Old Spice Guy. It had a lot of us saying "God I wish I'd done that!". The way they executed it is ground-breaking. This article tells it by the numbers. This article is a brilliant analysis of how they pulled it off.

Have a great week everybody!

To the Old Spice Guy: Well-played Sir!

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 13:30:00 +0000

The Emanation would like to say a big to say a giant "Well played sir!" to the Old Spice Guy and all involved in doing something game-changing.

For an in-depth look at how this campaign worked check here.

There are so many reasons this campaign is being talked about. Not least of because it's from Proctor & Gamble. The company that wrote the book of CPG marketing is breaking every rule it's ever written. P&G has been calling for greater innovation from its agencies for a decade. Weiden & Kennedy has just raised the bar for the industry by a big notch. Doing this took guts. Puling it off is amazing.

It changes the expectation of what TV advertising should be delivering. Like WriteThe Future (another W&K piece of genius), the brilliantly engaging TV spot is designed to get interested consumers to take the conversation online. And online is where the action really happens. As of yesterday, the series of Youtube responses to and from the 180+ Old spice Guy videos have been viewed close to 6 million times in a week.

This takes a ton of planning. This behind-the-scenes look at how this was executed check here. The mix of skills to pull this off is a new configuration of an agency team: creative, project management, social listening and seeding, technology and rapid video production.

The thing that is now amazing to watch is the way others are joining in the fun. Check out this voicemail generator and this video response by Alyssa Milano.

Wishing you all a big "Silver fish hand-catch" for the weekend.

A new way to fight childhood obesity...the iPad

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 15:20:00 +0000

I continue to be fascinated by the innovations that keep arising in the digital world, especially so when one has real-life implications. As the national childhood obesity epidemic steadily rises, there is a greater focus on finding unique ways to bring healthy, yet delicious, meals into the kitchen. In a move that wowed consumers and critics alike, yesterday, Kraft attempted to help answer that call by unveiling Big Fork Little Fork, a new iPad app designed to help young parents teach their kids about healthy eating. Supported by the results of a proprietary Google study that showed there were 37 million web searches conducted on family and kids food, but no real relevant resources, Kraft identified an important need and filled it.

Big Fork Little Fork targets a specific population - the tech-savvy 20-30 year old age group with children ages 6-12 - using a clever, kid-and-parent-friendly, interactive platform. Blending games, how-to videos, recipes and more, the new app is an excellent illustration of how well a digital resource can be effectively applied to a very real-life issue. It's also yet another demonstration of the seemingly never-ending uses of the iPad: Co-Founder and CEO of The Hyperfactory, the company, which participated in developing the app, says, “It illustrates the creativity with which this device can change the game for brands wanting to innovate how they interact with consumers.”

As far the success of this branded iPad content goes – we’ll have to wait and see. With no real user data on iPad demographics yet, Kraft took a “leap of faith” in creating the app with this population in mind. For someone who is continually looking for new ways to bring healthcare further into the digital age, I personally think this app is a brilliant example of something I hope to see more brands leaping into.

- Blair Baumwell -

A Bilingual Things We Loved this week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 15:24:00 +0000

Social Media can be soooo beautiful and Mashable presents Social Media at it’s most beautiful: a grand selection of brightly-colored exhibits. The "10 Beautiful Social Media Infographics" depict insight into topics such as: how communication works in Social Media, what the demographics are like on which platform and how changes in Web 2.0 are triggered by increasing mobile internet usage. Fascinating – take a dive – it sure is worth it.

There’s not a day that passes without Twitter in the News. This week the Microblogging provider again made a name for themselves: according to Fastcompany.com, Twitter is now the fastest growing online search engine. What’s interesting, is that the platform is enjoying rapid growth – but moreover, that Twitter now understands itself as a search engine and is stepping in the ring with Google and Bing. The growth figures are impressive.

WeltKompakt – the biggest German tabloid daily newspaper, dared an experiment: for an entire day, they ceded their offices to the most influencial national and international Bloggers and Social Medialists (amongst them Jeff Jarvis). Declared goal was to bring online content to paper or rather the newspaper. The WeltKompakt Scroll-Editon bears the specific view of Bloggers on day-to-day news. Unfortunately, and that’s not a shocker – most topics strongly referred to (one might even say revolve around) – the internet (including facebook, twitter, flickr, Blogs etc.). In the long run, this centered one-way view on the world is too tiering. Still the question lingers if this might not well be the future of the print medialandscape? …for what it’s worth – it was definitely interesting! (click here to read the newspaper… though online)

Haut rein,
Lukas

Social Media kann sooooo schön sein. Mashable hat eine Auswahl an den buntesten und prachtvollsten Exponaten vorgestellt. Die "10 Beautiful Social Media Infographics" geben einen anschaulichen Einblick auf die Themen: wie im Social Web beispielsweise kommuniziert wird, wie auf welcher Plattform die Demografie der User aussieht und welche Veränderungen hinsichtlich Web 2.0 auf dem mobilen Markt stattfinden. Sehr spannend – einfach mal eintauchen – es lohnt sich.

Kein Tag vergeht ohne das Twitter in den Medien erscheint. Auch diese Woche machte der Microbloganbieter von sich reden: Fastcompany.com berichtet und verkündet das Twitter nun also auch die am schnellsten wachsende Suchmaschine im Netz ist. Interessant an dieser Tatsache ist nicht, dass die Plattformen rasend schnell wächst – viel interessanter ist es, dass Twitter als Suchmaschine definiert und mit Google und Bing verglichen wird. Die Kennzahlen zur Entwicklung sind überaus bemerkenswert.

WeltKompakt – die größte deutsche Tageszeitung im Tabloid-Format hat ein Expermiment gewagt. Sie überliesen für einen Tag den wichtigsten nationalen und internationalen Blogger und Social Medialisten (u.a. Jeff Jarvis) die heiligen Hallen und haben ihnen die Redaktion überlassen. Ziel war es: das Internet von innen heraus auf das Blatt Papier bzw in die Zeitung zu bringen. In der WeltKompakt Scroll-Editon berichteten Blogger über die alltäglichen News aus ihrer Sichtweise heraus. Dann überrascht es nicht weiter, dass leider alle Themen einen sehr starken – zu starken – Bezug zum Internet (inkl. Facebook, twitter, flickr, Blogs, etc.) hatten – diese einseitige Sichtweise war auf Dauer anstrengend. Ist das die Zukunft der Print-Medienlandschaft? … interessant war das Expermiment alle mal! (hier die Zeitung in „echt“ – wenn auch im Internet)

Have a great weekend.
Lukas

Things We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 13:06:00 +0000

In the UK, everyone is eagerly awaiting the hottest contest since England’s World Cup bid, Andy Murray vs. Rafael Nadal at Wimbledon today!

Another battle about to be fought, if rumor are to be believed, Google is working on a social service to rival Facebook called ‘Google Me’. While all previous attempts have been major flops, Orkut, Google Friend Connect, Google Buzz to name but a few, this attempt seems to have more optimism but I guess only time will tell.

Other highlights this week include:

On Thursday, Finland become the first country in the world to make broadband internet access a legal right for all citizens. The legislation forces telecom operators to provide a reasonably priced broadband connection with a downstream rate of at least one megabit per second. Let’s hope every country is soon to follow suit!

While the sun shined at Glastonbury last weekend, Orange also came up with a bright idea – super tagging! A super high resolution picture taken at the festival allows you to tag yourself or your friends in the photo. Zoom in and pan around to look at all the people who have tagged themselves in the picture.

Have a lovely weekend.

Lucy Dee

Sony smells like vanilla and bourbon

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 15:01:00 +0000

Most of us are aware of the link between scent and memory/behavior, as well as how this connection has been harnessed to influence consumer behavior. What you may not be aware of is the range of industries invested in creating particular scent experiences to, let’s say, prolong customers’ stays in their stores, make mailings more memorable, or project images of trustworthiness or sexiness. Interesting story from ABC News.

Jade Faugno

Stuff We Loved This Week

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 17:04:00 +0000

There’s been a lot of buzz around the office this week! A few of the highlights:

Digital license plates in California. When stopped, the plates would turn into a screen and could be used for advertising. As long as it’s safe, we’re fans of it. Our LA offices will have to be on the lookout for the newest California fad before it comes East.

It’s simple, really: smile, and you get ice cream. Why didn’t we think of that?

Thirsty for new office décor? We’re loving on Gatorade’s social media Mission Control – a very interesting way of how social media is driving their marketing efforts in a centralized way. Can we get this look for our cubicles?!

We’re fans of competition and social media, so when we heard about the Democratic and Republican parties’ battle for online popularity (mainly Facebook friends and Twitter followers), we were curious. Do we see tweelections in the near future?

It wouldn’t be a week of buzz without mention of the World Cup and the USA team. Whether it’s Miley on ESPN, Guy Ritchie’s duet with Nike or the universal love for Landon Donovan, we’ve been tuned in all week. Go USA!

And of course, the new iPhone 4. We may not have been waiting outside the Fifth Avenue store, but we are certainly coveting the new buzz-worthy device. Rumor has it that a couple Emanators are receiving their shipments soon? Maybe the next Check-It! post will come from the newest Apple toy…

Have a great weekend, everyone!

-Emily Favret

Power Outage or PR Stunt

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 16:22:00 +0000

It was lights, action, but no camera for late night TV host Jimmy Kimmel earlier this week. Kimmel, claiming that he’d lost power to his cameras and control room, busted out his handy MacBook and filmed an entire program, which aired last night, with the device’s built-in webcam.

Though Kimmel told the New York Times that this wasn’t a stealthy promotion, others wonder whether it was truly quick MacGyvering (pun intended) on Kimmel’s part, or just an attempt at garnering some publicity for Apple and himself. Either way, he succeeded in generating a bit of buzz for both.

Read more at Engadget.com.

Jade Faugno

Embargo Horror Story - Beware Twitter

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 13:07:00 +0000

At a recent conference I heard a real horror story on the danger of not being explicit that a release sent out under an embargo must also cover social media.

The victim in this case was the PR director of a major research firm that covers a highly regulated industry. To protect the innocent, lets call him him Josh and his company Research Co. Every quarter, this firm publishes a report on the industry it covers that is hugely influential.

As normal, on the Friday before the report was published by Research Co, Josh sent the report under embargo o reporters he has worked with for a long while.

Some time late on Friday afternoon, Josh got a call from Kevin, a reporter at a major newspaper with some bad news. Kevin said that one of the reporters who had received the report, Jenny, had tweeted that the report was coming out on Monday and there was big news about the industry. The tweet had a link to the embargoed release!!!

This was bad enough. To make matters worse, Kevin told Josh that his editor has said that as the embargo had been broken, it was fair game and they would be running an article the next day, 2 days before the news hit the market.

Josh managed to get hold of the editor in question and persuaded him not to run the article before Monday. He then called, Jenny to find out what she was thinking. Jenny responded that there was nothing in the embargo, covering social media. Despite this Josh persuaded Jenny to pull the article down.

Two lessons:

1. Relationships Matter - No news here but had Josh not had a good relationship with all those involved he would have not been as persuasive. Relationships are two way street. It was equally in the reporters interest not to alienate Josh given who he represented.

2. Explicitly Include Social Media in Your Embargo: This is the key point. Now Josh spells out clearly that the embargo covers online and specifically, Facebook, Twitter, etc.

Adam Turinas

Things We Loved This Week: The World Cup Version

noreply@blogger.com (Emanate PR) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 21:26:00 +0000

Some might say this is guerilla marketing at its finest. South Africa says it’s illegal. We think sending half-naked women to cause a scene in front of a world-wide craze is fantastic publicity.

Sticking with the “naked-is-good-publicity” theme – Pepsi takes a unified stance with Argentina when it declares “If the coach goes naked, we will, too!” Some brands just know how to capitalize on a good thing.

It’s a bird! It’s a plane! No, it’s a vuvuzela! A what?!
Two weeks ago, you may not have ever heard of a vuvuzela. This week, you can’t not hear it. The ~~annoying~~ loud horn has become the symbol of fans cheering on their team at all World Cup games. The plastic instruments are selling out faster than they can be produced – but leave it to the Apple Store to provide a way to support your team by pushing a button on the iPhone. Is there anything you can’t get on the Apple Store?

Blair Baumwell