Tag Archives: social media

Branding lesson from Mr. Sheen: You can bring them to the table, but they’ve still got to eat.

For all the praise heaped upon Charlie Sheen for his social media prowess, I think there’s an element that seems to be forgotten about – when his popularity skyrocketed thanks to social media, Charlie forgot what to do when his invited guests got to the party. Namely, he forgot to put actual work and structure into the main event of his show. Yes, Charlie, people gladly paid to have a ticket. But once they got in the door, they weren’t going to be satisfied to just hear you ramble about “tiger blood” and “winning.” You had to have some organizational resemblance of, well, a show.

After bombing horribly in Detroit, the best reviews coming out of his Chicago show related to the fact that…he didn’t implode?

I guess that’s a big deal considering who we’re talking about, but that’s not exactly saying he brought the house down either (full disclosure – I didn’t attend but certainly got enough of the picture from others who did and news sources).

The lesson we can take away from this is that social media can be intensely powerful in attracting people to your brand but once they get there, you have to give them a reason to stay. The content and communication has to be continuously worthwhile and rewarding.

To that end, are you merely selling on your website or blog? That’s kind of the equivalent of Sheen’s Detroit show – a gigantic disappointment not long after the fans arrived. Or are you sharing information related to your industry that’s helpful so they’ll look forward to receiving it via an RSS feed? If Sheen had done such a wonderful job in Chicago that fans would be raving about it to others and telling their friends in other cities that they couldn’t miss seeing him on stage in their own town…this would be more of the equivalent result.

Which show would you rather put on for your would-be fans?

Put the work into your website. Your blog. Your customer service. The people who could interface with your customers potentially, which is pretty much everybody. Because once the Facebooks, Twitters and LinkedIns of the world help attract people to your doorstep, that’s not the time to proclaim yourself as a guru.

That’s just the beginning.

Meatloaf Bakery gets Cooking Channel’s attention

Chicago’s Meatloaf Bakery is getting its due in a couple days on the Cooking Channel’s new series, “Food(ography)” on Feb 12 at 6:00 pm. As a creative concept, you’ve got to give this destination credit for taking the cupcake craze and putting their own unique spin on it, packaging a variety of meatloaf flavors into the appearance of cupcakes, pastries and smaller “loafies.”

Hopefully you were lucky enough to order the El Loafo Del Fuego meatloaf this past Super Bowl Sunday. Yes, that's mashed potato on top to represent the "frosting."

It may sound a little far out, but obviously the people at The Meatloaf Bakery must be doing something right. Instead of opening one more cupcake store. I checked out their site and they do a good job of keeping up their blog, Facebook and Twitter presence to keep their community of meat lovers loyal. And really, where better to launch a unique concept with meat than a meat-loving town like Chicago? It may not be for everybody, but then, I don’t know too many great brands that appeal to everybody anyway.

Taking a cue from this example, how are you seizing on an existing trend within your industry yet making it your own in terms of product/service development?

Besides tuning into the show, check out The Meatloaf Bakery at 2464 N. Clark and visit the site here.

25 days to go: Chicago Mayoral candidates still have online work to do.

Now that the Rahm Emanuel Question has been officially answered – in case you’re unclear, he’s officially on the ballot to stay – we can take a look at how our selection of candidates are faring in terms of educating voters in the online world. Sure, shaking hands at an El stop is great PR, but if there’s one thing that the Obama era has taught us, it’s that you can’t underestimate the power of social media in terms of spreading the word about your position on the issues. So I decided to judge our primary candidates – Rahm Emanuel, Gery Chico, Carol Moseley Braun and Miguel del Valle – on how well they are leveraging the online universe to accomplish this goal.

Now let’s check out the results.

Easiest to find in a Search Engine: Miguel Del Valle and Gery Chico.
There’s no reason their campaign site shouldn’t be the first result when a search is done for “(name) for Mayor.” Del Valle and Chico passed the test. Moseley Braun and Emanuel did not.

Blog Champion: Rahm Emanuel
This is the most glaring difference I see between Emanuel and his competitors — some will say Emanuel has more resources and a “Machine” behind him but this is a weak excuse. Blogging consistency can be achieved by just one person if motivated enough and you can’t tell me that Del Valle, Moseley Braun and Chico can’t identify one individual to blog on their behalf. Emanuel (OK, his staff) pumps out posts on a daily basis, often multiple times per day. When given the opportunity to educate or take a position in real time on an issue, Emanuel has succeeded by far.

In contrast, take a look at the other candidates on blogging frequency –Del Valle’s last blog post was 12 days ago. Carol Moseley Braun’s last post was wishing Chicago a Happy New Year on January 4th. The worst offender here is Gery Chico – if he has a blog at all, I missed it and a lot of other people certainly have too. If anything, this group should be keeping pace with Emanuel’s blog frequency. Instead, they’re not even close.

The I-Want-To-Be-Like-Obama Award: I can’t resist. From the color scheme to the font selection to the style of video on his home page, everything on Emanuel’s site feels like an homage to his former boss, President Obama. Regardless of your opinion of the President, I downgrade Emanuel on this point for not looking like his own brand. I understand the direction he takes from a positioning angle – where else could he visually get away with playing up his ties to Obama so closely than Chicago – but I think his site goes overboard in this regard.

Catering to the International Community: Gery Chico
All candidates have Spanish versions of their websites, but give Chico credit for remembering the second largest community outside of Warsaw by enabling his site to be read in Polish. Carol Moseley Braun does the same, but I give Chico the international tie-breaker by having his website able to be read in Chinese as well.

LinkedIn: Nobody.
This makes little sense to me. If the President of the United States could make his LinkedIn address available when he was running for office, why can’t any of these candidates? If all are for improving local businesses, large and small, a LinkedIn badge to the candidate’s page would not only be of benefit, but it would also provide credibility from one business owner to another as they were connected to the candidate — endorsements mean a lot, but I think the candidates have forgotten that it’s not just the ones that get coverage on the 10:00 news that matter.

Mayor of Social Media: Rahm Emanuel
Most have the Facebook/Twitter/YouTube trinity covered but his prolific blogging, Flickr channel and RSS Feeds make Emanuel the best choice for providing his prospective voters multiple ways to stay connected to him after visiting his website. If we’re realistic, most people won’t return repeatedly to a site for information but may agree to receive that information on their terms. Emanuel caters well to all avenues in this manner.

We still have 25 days before Election Day — I have Gery Chico’s countdown clock on his website to thank for reminding me. That means there’s still time for the candidates to make the necessary tweeks online as they press the flesh and kiss babies (really, does anybody still do that?). Emanuel is ahead, but everybody has room for improvement. While some of the channels of social media are in place, the fuel for continuous content is not being supplied as consistently as it should. Or the sites are not being found as easily as they should. It’s incumbent on these candidates, particularly those trailing in the polls, to make sure these areas are tightened up as soon as possible if they want to get comfortable at City Hall.

Calling Out Athletes Who Tweet Irresponsibly

“If he was on my team, I’d be looking at him sideways.”
– Asante Samuel

“All I’m saying is that he can finish the game on a hurt knee…I played the whole season on one.”
-Maurice Jones-Drew

“Hey, there is no medicine for a guy with no guts and heart.”
-Derrick Brooks

“If I’m on Chicago, Jay Cutler has to wait ’til me and the team shower, get dressed and leave before he comes in the locker room!”
–Darnell Dockett

Pretty damning stuff from players around the NFL about Jay Cutler after Sunday’s loss. But now I’m calling out players who think they can just tweet and run. I’m sure this will be taken as bitterness from a Bear fan, but this issue didn’t start on Sunday and it won’t end there either. Tweets against other teams and other players can be harmless “trash talk,” but these tweets were not harmless. They were over the line and misinformed. Even before the full extent of Cutler’s injury was known or that doctors had advised him not to return to the field of play, his peers in the NFL were taking shots at him via Twitter.

Which begs the question: When do agents and teams step in to allow a balance of what is and isn’t fair game?

We know this much – if a tweet was about giving away team secrets, such as plays or observations from practice, the athlete in question would be in trouble through an immediate fine. Beyond that, however, there’s a gray area that needs to be better defined. So let’s do that.

Athletes should be allowed to tweet.
It’s a beautiful thing when athletes and celebrities become that much closer and down to Earth to the rest of us through social media tools. For all the flack Twitter gets as a social media tool compared to Facebook, we’re paying plenty of attention to it. We’re listening to Lebron, Shaq and others who are firing off tweets without giving it a second thought. People in the city of Chicago are talking as much about the aftermath of a game as the game itself because of Twitter.

I don’t blame Twitter, I blame the tweeter.
Limiting athlete usage of Twitter won’t solve anything. Just as I say regarding policies in the corporate world on this subject, you can’t ban social media completely. But you can put guidelines in place to be followed so that while your employees should feel free to use social media, they shouldn’t be allowed to embarrass those they represent without consequence. By the same token, athletes need to remember who they represent. They are employees of companies and endorsers of products. Maurice Jones-Drew is an employee of the Jacksonville Jaguars. He did not represent his employer particularly well upon firing off his tweet. But Twitter was not the problem. We know Twitter can be used just as powerfully for good causes. Instead, would it have killed any of these experts like Maurice Jones-Drew to turn to a person near him and say, “I’m going to rip Jay Cutler on Twitter. Do you think I should do it?” I doubt an agent or a coach would approve, so why did you do it, Maurice?

And now guess what? The next time the Bears see some of these tweeters, don’t be surprised if they put a little something extra on those tackles and blocks. Is it that different than the pitcher in baseball who throws a 95mph fastball suspiciously close to a batter and then the opposing team’s pitcher does the same in retaliation? Is it that different than the basketball player who performs a flagrant foul on another player going for a breakaway dunk?

It’s only different because it didn’t occur on the field of play. And that’s what makes it almost worse. The Bears are angry at themselves but they have a right to be angry at those who disrespected their Quarterback while sitting at home or in a studio. It appears semi-calculated, not in the moment. It was spiteful and jealous from players who were sitting at home, not something that developed on the field between opponents who are otherwise friends off the field.

Guidelines, guidelines, guidelines.
Just as we see in the business world among corporations that allow their people to use social media responsibly by outlining do’s and don’t of using it – and I applaud those who take this more realistic approach to guiding without eliminating – teams have to provide their players with guidelines for using social media tools. It’s not as bad as it sounds. If they can follow a playbook, they can follow rules on how to use social media in the right way. Keep the guidelines sensible instead of restrictive so that the players can have a certain degree of freedom. But in the same breath, establish what constitutes a violation, such as openly questioning the manhood of another player to the world.

I’m not asking them to stop tweeting or posting. I’m asking them to have common sense when they do. To treat the people who worked hard to get their same level with an equal amount of respect. Otherwise, I’m worried what starts as a comment taken the wrong way in the online world is going to turn into a consequence that hardly resembles professional sport in the offline world.