What Were They Thinking?
Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on November 30th, 2009
I have to admit, when I heard about the accident over U.S. Thanksgiving weekend involving Tiger Woods, I thought “hmmmm.” There seemed to be something missing from the story when I first heard it – what was Tiger doing leaving his house at 2:30 am on Thanksgiving, distracted enough to hit a fire hydrant and a tree?
There are lots of rumours out there right now. The thing is, Tiger isn’t talking, so the rumour mill is growing. During an issue, if you don’t give people solid information, they will speculate, discuss and even gossip.
Twitter, Facebook, blogs and mainstream media are…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on April 23rd, 2009
In the “what were they thinking” category…apparently a promotional ad for Alberta’s new $25-million branding campaign actually depicts two children on a famous English beach near Bamburgh Castle, the legendary home of Sir Lancelot.
I heard about this issue on Twitter. It will be interesting to follow this via social media and see how big it becomes.
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on April 16th, 2009
Domino’s has created a YouTube response to the issue that they recently faced regarding what we have now heard was supposed to be a “hoax” video on YouTube. There were several videos made by the two young people who worked (past tense) at a Domino’s franchise in North Carolina. (See our previous post on this.)
Domino’s takes a very interesting approach to this issue – and in my opinion, it’s a little over the top. Depending on what kind of policy Domino’s has, maybe these young employees didn’t realize how wrong this was. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a stupid, stupid thing to do,…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on April 15th, 2009
There seems to be a new issue online every day. Over the weekend, there was the Amazon issue where it seemed the online bookseller had removed thousands of gay and lesbian themed books from their listings and search results. Social media guru B.L. Ochman has a very good post about this issue.
And then there is the Domino’s video that showed up on YouTube yesterday. The company quickly took it down. But you know that sneaky Internet…there is always another copy somewhere that gets put back up.
According to this piece in Advertising Age, Domino’s corporate headquarters was reacting cautiously to the kerfuffle about this disgusting…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on March 18th, 2009
There is a very interesting article in The Vancouver Sun today that cites a survey done by 6S Marketing. According to the survey, 61% of companies using social media are tracking what is being said about them while 39% don’t pay attention.
Social media is hitting critical mass – and as I mentioned in previous posts, one of the underlying themes at the Ragan Social Media Conference in Vegas last week was that social media is now a part of everyday life for the majority of people. My question is to that 39% not paying attention – why aren’t you? There may be…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on January 30th, 2009
The Ketchum/FedEx issue on Twitter is being discussed online quite extensively. In my opinion, blogger David Henderson is covering this story very well. (David is a newly discovered online voice for me – and he has quickly become one of my favourites. His blog is definitely worth reading.)
This story has legs. And it has created some valuable discussion online about freedom of speech, the right to your own personal opinion, what’s reasonable to say out loud, how to handle a crisis online and much, much more.
For those that might not know, the basic overview of this issue is that a week or two…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on December 10th, 2008
Well, the blog post below “The Big Three Don’t Get Social Media” certainly got some attention. Creating respectful, authentic discussion is what social media is all about and, with a couple of exceptions, it seems that this is what is happening here.
Not everyone posted what they do for a living, but it is interesting to note that most of the comments here come from those involved in online/social media and/or the auto industry. Scott Monty of Ford posted and he also mentioned this post on Twitter, which sent several more people over. I did find it interesting that, at times,…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on December 09th, 2008
I have been reading a great deal about the “Big Three” automakers and the controversy surrounding their proposed bailout. I have seen a lot of mainstream media coverage on this issue and wanted to know what was being discussed online. More specifically, I wanted to know what Ford, GM and Chrysler were doing online to open the conversation with consumers and the average person.
There has been a lot written online about how these companies were using social media to reach out “to promote the bailout.” Notice the choice of words: “to promote the bailout,” not to open a conversation with…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on November 19th, 2008
Motrin and their ad agency Taxi have had their hands smacked pretty hard online recently over an online ad about Motrin and moms. There is some discussion online how the anti-ad campaign spread so quickly – and Twitter is getting some of the credit. Someone has also put up a video on YouTube that shows how mad the mommies are.
Ad Age has a good article on the issue and so does A-list blogger and social media guru Shel Holtz. They both have a bit of a different take on it. Ad Age talks about the power of Twitter and Shel looks more into…
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Posted by Ruth Atherley of AHA Creative Strategies on April 21st, 2008
The online world really has changed things. Now PR people that send irrelevant, useless and/or irritating pitches and news releases to journalists are being called on it –in public, on blogs. The bad pitch blog is definitely worth a read. Chris Anderson, author of The Long Tail and editor in chief of Wired magazine also published a long list of media relations types that are now blocked from his email. And most recently Lifehacker’s Gina Trapani did the same.
I was a journalist for years and can’t tell you how frustrating it is to receive pitches from PR people who don’t get…
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