So, picking up where I left off in my last post about not paying for social media profile services.  This is where you pay someone, or a company, to set-up your shiny new Twitter page, Facebook profile or YouTube channel for you.  

Next, look to avoid blindly creating “chit chat” or continuous “self-promotion” as the core of your new content development strategy.  

Here’s the question you should ask “before” you agree to work with any individual or company on your social media presence. 

First, you want to converse with others in the world, digital or otherwise.  Having said that, ask your new “social media guru” what their content plan is for you.  If they answer by saying, “we’re just going to start talking and engaging” put your cheque book away. What they’ve just told you is that not only do they not understand social media strategy deployment, they also don’t understand you, your customers, your culture or your business objectives.  Yet, they intend to announce your brand to the online world and you’ve just paid them to do that.  

Why would you cut corners on your digital strategy?  

The web is filled with case studies of companies who leverage social media in unique ways to grow their businesses, brands, influence and presence.  Yet, for everyone one of those success stories there’s another thousand who hired the lowest quote, and just started babbling on Twitter.  Worse yet, the plan is to beg for followers.

Gaming social media to pump up numbers, pump up perceived influence isn’t valuable, it detracts from your brand, reputation and real world influence.

Has your organization been down the following path?

1.) Start twitter account

2.) Start tweeting about yourself

3.) Not much initial response, so you follow 1000 accounts thinking everyone will automatically follow you back.

4.) You deem your 100 new followers as twitter success

5.) Reality sets in that you’re not gaining any new business from the first 2 weeks on Twitter and abandon the effort.  

Thank goodness you didn’t spend much money on this plan in the first place…but…

6.) You buy twitter followers thinking that somehow this is a win for your organization.

Instead, think of context, think relevancy and think of how you can provide value to your community.  You’ll build a reputation in the right way and for the right reasons.  A reputation built on pure values rather than fake numbers.  This is a marathon not a sprint, lay a strong foundation and be committed to the long-term.      

Ultimately, you have a choice.  

Hire someone who’s adding social media to their list of other services or hire a dedicated digital agency.  Of course, I have an opinion on which way you should go, but it’s your brand, your company and your budget…

Was this post helpful? 

I vowed that when I was ready I would do something to give back in his name.  My dad was the most giving person in the world, if you were stranded, needed help and he was physically able to help, he didn’t hesitate, not for a second.

Here’s what we at fusedlogic would like to do.  We’re going to dedicate one hour of video production at fusedlogicTV per month FREE to non-profit and charitable organizations in Alberta.

What does FREE video production at fusedlogicTV mean?

Simple, we’ll be setting aside (4) 15 minute show slots for non-profits.  As a non-profit or charitable organization, you would “like” the fusedlogic Facebook Fanpage and then tell us what you’d do with the free 15 minutes of recorded talk show format video produced in the fusedlogicTV studio.

The top (4) ideas with the most Facebook likes at the end of the available voting time on our fanpage will win the available production slots for that month.  You will have to host your own show, prepare your own simple script, and promote your own show as you see fit.  As part of the provided free production service, fusedlogicTV will supply you with the ability to Skype in up to (2) people, and you’d also be able to invite up to (2) in studio guests.

Once completed, fusedlogicTV will supply you with your digital file, you’ll own the content.  However, you will have agree to allow us to include production credits but your branding will be front and centre.

We’ll be starting this program formally in September, and just thought we’d give you an advanced  heads up.  I’m very excited about this, and hope that you’ll take us up on the offer once it’s officially launched.

Stay tuned…and get your creative juices going…if you’d like to see what these shows can look like, visit and subscribe to the fusedlogic YouTube channel.

Who’s talking?  Many who spend time following the #pcldr hashtag seems to be a small grouping.  This is partial speculation, however, with as explosive as politics can be, this is really low engagement overall.  People just don’t seem to care about what’s being said, at least enough to spur on discussion and content generation online outside of the current observers.  The group actively participating in this Twitter discussion, predominately led by candidate supporters is even smaller.

Taking samples such as the one below over a week or more, the players on the list move up and down but generally stay the same. You’d think that the best time to see the most activity would be during or right after a live debate.  That is generally true, although policy announcements help, yet the amount of people being reached on Twitter, is in my opinion, very small considering the importance of this.  I do expect this to heat up as we get closer to the first ballot in mid-September.  Here’s a screen shot from tweetreach.

Now lets take a look at the Wildrose Alliance Party and their hashtag #wrp, who are not currently in an internal leadership race.

By comparison, the Downtown Arena District hashtag #yegarena discussion as of late has heated up but in the last 24 hours is on a bit of decline.

Go beyond this one small view, and take into consideration the amount of main stream media coverage this issue has generated in the last 6 days or so surrounding the Enoch and MLA PR issues have reached well over a million people.

The reasons for the low digital engagement regarding the PC leadership race in part would include accounts with small follower counts engaging.  A small cross-section of account variety engaging in the discussion.  That said, I’m not including the #ableg or #pcaa hashtags in this post, and that would normally need to be sifted through and considered for a more accurate reading of issue reach.  Also, the various campaign camps might want to consider the activity of their own teams in particular.

When building a better understanding of a digital footprint, one should consider several factors.  To measure more accurately, say as part of a formal project report, I would consider all primary elements that make up a digital footprint.  From the content created, the attention given to that content, the influence of those engaging, the sentiment of the comments, and the reach of that content across all relevant digital channels, such as Facebook, YouTube, Linkedin, political blogs and mainstream media websites, then compare that with conversions.  This is a lot of work.  Some may be fooled into thinking that a single piece of software might handle all of this, and they’d be wrong.

To interpret what’s happening within that PC tweetreach stat above we need to ask some key questions.  Sure hired guns can create white noise to look busy but is this translating into increased interest in their candidate?  I’m seeing more impact based on direct comments made by a particular candidate.  As it should be.  How about the volunteers?  A small group of 5-7 or so per candidate quick to defend their candidates is evident, but are they convincing voters to join the discussion, donate to their candidate, buy a membership and become advocates?  I’m seeing a bit more positive evidence of this lately based on some of my own real-time analysis, that said, I wouldn’t suggest evidence of a “landslide” victory for any one candidate.  Pretty safe to assume this is going to a second ballot.

Curious as to who is getting the most traffic to their website?  I consulted Alexa.com which provides a global ranking for all websites. The higher the number, the more websites with better traffic than your website.  You want a low number.

In order of Alexa ranking worst to best:

 
When asking why these rankings are the way they are, there are several reasons.  From a commitment or lack thereof to digital content generation, and existence of an actual digital strategy versus those who haven’t focused on it.  In the case of Rick Orman, a concerted use of traditional advertising driving awareness.  He is also an outlier and less of a known entity as compared to the other candidates, plus he throws all other candidates under the bus every chance he gets.  Having said that, the proof is in the conversions pudding.  Each campaign will know whether this traffic is translating into meaningful membership conversion.  I would hope they’re modifying web content based on their internal web analytics AND what they’re hearing at events.  However, the above evidence supports that this work is beyond some of these campaigns. In at least a couple of the campaigns, this is likely a lack of knowledge and understanding.  In others, I would add a lack of prioritizing resources to focus on this.
Just for fun I also looked up the various Party websites.

 
Clearly, this is only a fraction of the information that one should consider before making any serious judgements, recommendations or moves.  However, if one or more campaigns takes a critical look at what they’re doing, and can figure out the flash points that drive membership conversions for them in particular among voters, and then repeat it, some late gains can be made.  I will say though, there is little help for those without any strategy.  The numbers above separate those who are simply going through the motions from those making a concerted effort.

Also, one final little tid-bit, currently with respect to “sentiment,” Doug Griffiths and Alison Redford are reaping more positive comments related to their efforts in the last couple of debates, Doug Horner, Gary Mar and Rick Orman are not inspiring noticeable jumps in positive sentiment, the majority is “neutral,” and Ted Morton is leading with respect to negative sentiment.

One other key thing to monitor is the low “attack” factor.  Generally the Wildrose is leading the political attacks with one NDP supporter being vocal.  That said, the PC candidates are generally not being challenged as much as I would have expected.

For me, as far as personal voting goes, demonstrating an understanding of technology is important to me regardless of Party. Technology permeates our lives, whether you’re 9 or 90 years old.  This isn’t the only consideration to be sure, but it’s important, and it drives me nuts that in this day and age, we still have to explain to business and political leaders that there’s this little thing called the “Internet,” an environment that should definitely be respected and mastered.  For me, the above numbers suggest there’s a fair amount of work yet to do.

All of this data from comScore is coming from their Video Metrix service designed to focus on the online video landscape.  Below is a graph that outlines viewership for June.  Pretty insane numbers overall, which continues to suggest that you should definitely have video as part of your overall digital marketing plan.  This trend is why we launched fusedlogicTV, with live, plus recorded, plus digital marketing included in our packages, they are incredibly powerful and affordable.  Have a look below, I was actually surprised to see Yahoo ahead of Microsoft.  Another interested item is that Facebook is generating viewership, people love to watch video and look at pictures on Facebook.  It will be interesting to see in 6 months if Google plus will start to erode this as the migration of something new continues to take over.  That said, Facebook has over 600 million users and I don’t see them being crush tomorrow, but it’s nice to see some more competition.

 This information provided by comScore goes on to cover ad networks as well:

Other notable findings from June 2011 include:

• The top video ad networks in terms of their potential reach of the total U.S. population were: Tremor Media at 44.3 percent, BrightRoll Video Network at 38.5 percent and Break Media at 37.6 percent.
• 85.6 percent of the U.S. Internet audience viewed online video.
• The duration of the average online content video was 5.4 minutes, while the average online video ad was 0.4 minutes.
• Video ads accounted for 13.6 percent of all videos viewed and 1.3 percent of all minutes spent viewing video online.

There are a couple of other interesting stories brewing and I’m wondering if they’re making a difference in the hearts and minds of the youth vote.

First, take a look at “vote mobs” being organized across the country at Leadnow.ca.  Students on campuses across Canada are using social media, including YouTube, Facebook and Twitter to self-organize and hold rallies in support of getting out the youth vote. This is very cool and there is certainly lots of main stream media evidence to suggest this is catching some steam, just search “vote mob.”

Now here’s an interesting twist on things.  What if this momentum regarding vote mobs suddenly shifted towards the Elections Canada and their recent citing of Section 329 as a reminder to all tweeting Canadians that it’s still on the books as it were.  The Edmonton Journal’s Paula Simons, has written an excellent piece on this a few days ago.

FYI, I’m not advocating civil disobedience and here’s why this scenario is interesting.  We already have significant evidence of self-organization online on the “vote mob” front.  A faction of this movement could ignite civil disobedience online and Elections Canada should at the very least be monitoring the situation online already.  Although I suspect they’re ill equipped to do this effectively.   Also, not a single Canadian needs to tweet any result for Elections Canada to be in a pickle.  US based twitter accounts could of course communicate the results and Elections Canada would be at a loss.  This is why this is so difficult for regulatory agencies. This is the world wide web with a hyper-connected society leveraging technology to it’s potential.  While analog agencies like Elections Canada still try to remain relevant with some of their old legislation.

Frankly, for Elections Canada to prove their point of enforcement of S329, and I’m not a lawyer, but I suspect they’d simply need one person, who has correctly self identified themselves on Twitter, to violate the law as they see it, and bingo they have a case.  I wouldn’t want the hassle or expense of being that person, would you?  This is why in part I believe many will not violate the twitter ban on May 2nd.  Further, I have found evidence of those online who have stated they want to respect the law which is another reason that I believe the majority of twitter users/voters in Canada will not overtly violate this rule.

This should be interesting to watch.  What about you, do you believe people will violate S329 on May 2nd via Twitter or Facebook, vote mob or otherwise?

Watch this video collage of some of the most viral moments online and see if there’s anything there that you’ve spent money on in the content.  I recognize in advance that much of this content is simply private citizen calamity, misfortune and rudeness, so it’s good for a laugh.  The point is, a laugh, and very little else (unless you’re the head of the Diet Coke division).  Just having the numbers, (this video is well over 7 million views) doesn’t always equate to a whole lot unless in this case you attach advertising to this YouTube channel.

As part of this discussion we should remember that most on the Internet still like to “watch” versus “create” content as stated in this recent GIGAOM post.  So then, one could say that viral may still reach and create buzz among this large group of the online community and that may depending on the campaign trickle into financial gain.  For the men out there, when did you last buy an Old Spice product?  The better question might be, have you received an Old Spice product from your wife or girlfriend lately as inspired by over 110 million Old Spice brand views and that of Old Spice Guy, Isaiah Mustafa?  All indications from Neilsen are the numbers are up.  Also, Old Spice didn’t get these numbers from listening to bloggers and “specialists” whose main piece of advice is “just go play and have fun” with social media.  Watch out for that.

I believe that viral is more fleeting than social engagement.  Viral drives the “fad culture” of the net, whereas social engagement strategies look to influence through more meaningful discussion, sway opinion and inspire action as an end result.  Can an organization connect the two?  Absolutely, that’s precisely what Old Spice did.  They provided a balanced approach through multiple channels, including traditional media coverage.

Consider the much talked about “InspiredbyIceland” tourism campaign.  Certainly their iconic dance video went viral and here we are talking about it, and yet, my bags aren’t packed to catch a plane.  So is there value in viral?  Yes on a buzz awareness level there is no doubt, this campaign is getting Iceland talked about months after it launched.  In fact, before this campaign I don’t think I’ve ever spent this much of my time even considering this country.  Still to date, none of my hard earned cash is flowing into the Iceland tourism industry but that’s not to say there hasn’t been some impact.

Visitor numbers jumped 12% last year to around 1.23m people, or about four times Iceland’s population, with German, French and British visitors topping the list, and the trend is set to continue this year.

This research isn’t directly tied to the video campaign but I feel confident in saying that there is a segment of those tourism results that were influenced by the Iceland Tourism Board’s efforts.

There is continued response provided by some of the over 43,000 Facebook fans of the Inspired By Iceland Facebook fan page.  In order to find out the real impact however, one would have to do an analysis of how many of those fans actually hopped a Icelandair jet this year or inspired others to take a volcanic tour.

We should also ask ourselves if this viral campaign has served to increase “trust” in Iceland.  Iceland used to be one of the wealthiest countries in the world based on it’s financial industry.  That was all but erased with the global economic meltdown of 2009.  I’m not sure if dancing icelanders suggests that their banking industry is on the road to recovery but it certainly highlighted that there were deals to be had to visit this beautiful northern landscape.

There’s a business adage that says, “it’s always easier to sell an existing client than try to find a new one.”  Increased tourism equates to increased opportunities for a business relationship in other ways.  Visit on a holiday and possibly meet new people you may end up doing business with later.  That scenario happens every day around the world.  The money doesn’t flow overnight but it flows nonetheless.  Rarely do we see public evidence of this phenomenon at the granular level, rather it’s the stories over lunch that get told of how that deal was done, or this lead was generated.  Still it is possible to draw a correlation from viral video to tourism “krónur” to sustainable economic development but you have to dig and it’s much more than touting simple online traffic numbers.

Viral needs to cross the “fad chasm” and enter engagement before social media can claim victory and as suggested in a post written by Liana Evans on Clickz.com which inspired me to write this one, I believe viral and social media are very different, and should be connected.  Building a campaign with that in mind has a much greater chance of success than simply trying to do the goofiest thing in front of a camera you can think of to garner viewership and drive numbers.

First up is Starbucks:

Here’s a post from Econsultancy.com that outlines what Starbucks is up to.  Below is an excerpt. According to Starbucks VP Chris Bruzzo, Holiday 2009 is all about scaling up Starbucks’ Holiday 2008:

It’s like we’ve taken the version 1.0 of last year and now we’re really doing it at scale and going to a lot more places where our customers already are. People are saying this is going to be a big year for social media and we’re a microcosm of that. Whereas last year it was a curiosity, this year it’s a core part of the program.

Some of Starbucks’ specific online efforts worth noting include:

• Facebook holiday photo uploads and branded virtual goods.
• A Flickr page encouraging consumers to upload holiday pictures of themselves.
• A branded playlist on Pandora, additional integration in Pandora’s iPhone app and traditional ad placements on the Pandora website.

Starbucks Love Project

Adage Article on Starbucks

MyStarbucksidea.com

Coca Cola:

In an article by Mediabiznet, an explanation is given as to what the beverage company is describing as their “largest social media campaign ever.” 206 countries, 365 days, 1 mission

Expedition 206, as it will be called, will send three 20-somethings to 206 countries and territories where Coca-Cola is sold. The trio set off on their 275,000 mile tour from Madrid on 1st January 2010, stocked with laptops, video cameras, smartphones and other gadgetry, in order to document their search for happiness to the masses.

 

Their journey will be tracked online via www.expedition206.com as well as Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Twitter. Fans following the trio will be able to weigh in on what the trio should do and who they should see at each destination.

BestBuy:

It’s no secret that BestBuy has been pushing further into the social web than probably any other electronics retailer to date with their Blue Shirt Nation experiment at the core.

They’ve decked out their Facebook page with a Christmas theme as a start, offering gift advice, a “hint helper” to let friends and family know what you want for Christmas, a Secret Santa area, and a smattering of “Christmas carol videos.”

The New York Times reports that BestBuy is building a large TV commercial campaign around their “Twelpforce” Twitter account, said to be manned by 2500 BestBuy blue shirts with the claim that “no knows more about electronics than BestBuy employees.”

When was the last time the number of “impressions” your ad campaign generated also told you how many conversations about your brand were happening in real-time?

When was the last time “frequency” explained how many times a customer mentioned your brand, product or service to others and the sentiment of that comment?

When was the last time the above information actually told you “why” people were buying your stuff?  Or why they didn’t buy?

The truth is, most organizations despite the decline are still spending large dollars in the traditional advertising space and are justifying these expenditures on metrics that are estimates in many cases.  Then those same executives look at social media investments with risk in their eyes, a lack of understanding and claiming there’s no way to measure.

Top executives claim there’s no budget for social media.

What they’re really saying is “we don’t understand.”  Then they provide a media buyer with $250,000.00 or more to go fire away at the big three, print, television, radio for a 90 day campaign.  Why?  Not because it’s necessarily the right answer but because it’s what they understand and the safe move.  Now in this recovering economy there are shifts in these patterns to be sure.  Much of the traditional ad industry is feeling the effects.

Every once and a while, I come across an executive who has thought the above questions through and has realized that the ability to hold conversations, build rapport, inspire action directly on a mass scale or one on one and track all of those activities is definitely appealing. “Welcome to the social web.”

Social media metrics do exist, they’re just different.

Social media is word-of-mouth advertising ON FIRE!  You have to change how you look at measuring things.  Measuring conversations is a hands on job.  You can’t just tally up the traffic numbers and say we won.  You have to dig deeper than that and it is possible to do so.

A strong online campaign will demonstrate “engagement” levels that will include a number of things.

My definition of social media “impressions” would constitute the number of times elements of your campaign get mentioned across blogs, articles, comments, video, images, mass-media, micro-sharing platforms, social networks.  This information would also include, “sentiment and influence within micro-tribes.”

Beyond just eyes seeing the message, many other things can be identified.  Did your message move or inspire further actions or discussion publicly online?  If it did, this can almost certainly be tracked.

What was the sentiment of action taken?  Are citizens blogging about your message, brand, product or service positively or negatively?  If they explain their position and why they feel the way they do that can be identified.  Did they spoof your television ad on Youtube?  Did they create a twitter hashtag and engage others on Twitter?

The interaction and what can learned within the social dynamics identified can help your organization understand your customer and their relationships or “social networks” better.  That understanding can lead to emotional engagements, emotional engagements can lead to influence and influence leads to action.  The social web is where you need to commit your resources long-term and you need to do it, yesterday.

Where’s the value?

The value is in the human connections and relationships generated between your brand and your customer.  Those connections properly nurtured will build loyalty and loyalty means repeat business and influencing new business.  The social web is the perfect environment for this.  That’s where the value is.  This doesn’t happen overnight and it isn’t easy.  However, the ability to amplify a message is immense and shouldn’t be ignored.  The problem isn’t with the social web, the problem is with current organizational mind-sets and it’s time for a change.  If you truly understood the social web, you’d never call it a fad.

• The Social Web Isn’t Just for the Young Anymore (gigaom.com)
• Forrester: Social networking grows up (infoworld.com)

Still think Social Media is a fad? WATCH THIS: http://bit.ly/4DLpNK #socialmedia #revolution

Now I certainly don’t think social media is a fad, however, curious I still clicked to read or in this case “watch” the content on the other end of the link.

Below is what I found and I loved it.  Love the information, pace, structure and delivery of the work by Erik Qualman of socialnomics fame…enjoy!  Qualman has put a lot of work into this video and I just felt compelled to share it with everyone.

Of course, the social media numbers in the video are in a constant state of flux.  However, this fast paced piece of work captures the key points that people and businesses who don’t believe social media is a serious opportunity should come to grips with.  One of the wonderful things about social media is the ability to share and Erik Qualman has put considerable effort into this video.  We all get to observe, learn and participate in the social web and this is evidence of that.  Any business that doesn’t see value here is crazy, plain and simple.  ”Keep learning my friends.”

This Edmonton social media project is designed to generate awareness.

Awareness for Edmonton and our Fringe festival in other parts of the world.  We’re doing a number of things to accomplish this goal, one such activity is the live streaming video.  Tonight we finished broadcasting our 3rd Fringe related show.  First was the Edmonton Fringe VIP reception, second was last night’s live webcast of a show out of Seoul, South Korea – Choon-Hyang: True Love.  Tonight the excitement continued as we worked with actor Eric Davis from New York City who plays the entertaining and engaging Red Bastard, once again watch for these clips to be uploaded.

Broadcasting a live theatre act is a unique experience for all sorts of reasons.

You’re not really sure of the challenges associated with the venue until you get there and assess the situation, which in this case, has to be done in-between productions and with next to no time before going live.  Tonight we were really packed into Venue #3 or ACACIA Hall for example.  Heat was a problem and caused a brief shut down right at the beginning of our live broadcast, fortunately not much longer than a 5 minute outage was experienced as we switched computers.  Not something that’s ever happened to us before but once again going live on-location means anything can happen.  Thankfully we have an experienced crew.

Other things that we have to address on the fly are the nuances with the show itself, doing one off broadcasts means we rarely have any prep time.  So for example, we have little to no idea where to position the camera in anticipation of the next shot, that unpredictability can be troublesome, dark venues, no space, lighting apparatus in the way, you name it.  In order to do this well the fusedlogic team just needs to be really good at their craft.

With that in mind, I’m proud of our team, they’ve done a tremendous job of dealing with these little details and I believe with the exception of the one unexpected heat related shut-down which could have been far worse, everyone and everything has performed really well.  Certainly, this social media work has been great for Edmonton’s Fringe festival, giving it the recognition it deserves as a leader in many ways and no I’m not just saying that because they’re our client or because I live in the region.  If you like the fact that Edmonton is known for great festivals and you attend the Fringe, then this benefits you.  If you’ve participated directly in these social media efforts in some way then it has hopefully enriched your Fringe experience this year.  If not, I’d like to hear about it so that we can make it better.  Post a comment, send us an email or a DM, let the Fringe know directly if that’s better.  We are constantly looking to learn and gain experience, we never stop looking to innovate.

By the way, I simply cannot bear it any longer, I’ve got to let the cat peak its head out of the bag.  Just for fun and because we have absolutely nothing else to do (dripping with sarcasm), we’re going to be launching an iPhone application “very” soon, as well as, a Twitter app.  This will be under our custom application division fusedlogic Labs.  Just thought I’d throw that out there…

Also, for those staying in touch on Facebook regarding Edmonton Fringe shows, food, street performers and reviews.  You should be aware of the main Fringe related Facebook group.

We are excited to have performers and Fringers blogging about their experiences at Edmonton’s Fringe Festival.  Much of the daily action regarding social media and specifically blogging activity is happening on ShowYouOurBlog.com.

Many on Twitter are following the Twitter account @EdmontonFringe which notifies everyone of a new blog post on the aforementioned blog, as well as, other interesting Edmonton Fringe tidbits that come along.

Many like watching video and we don’t disappoint.  Here is the ShowYouOurs Youtube channel.   You’ll also be interested to know that we’ll be live streaming a couple of shows from the Edmonton International Fringe Festival this year.  This first of which is tonight at 8:45pm from Venue #1 – Choon-Hyang: True Love The live feed will be broadcast from the ShowYouOurBlog site listed above and the archived content will be posted on this Youtube channel.  The Edmonton International Fringe Festival continues towards breaking new social media ground as this will be our 2nd of 3 live webcasts from the festival.

We have been working with the production staff from Seoul, South Korea and we expect a good turnout online from that Internet savvy country, despite the time zone difference being 16 hours ahead, which in this case works in our favor as it should be early Tuesday afternoon in Seoul.

If our challenge helps one more person, child, family eat- it was WELL WORTH the effort.

Many may have thought that we forgot about this charitable social media project, the Facebook group and flickr groups have seemingly been ignored and it’s all over before it really got started…WRONG!  Our work has been to inspire and organize and then inspire and organize some more. Starting with keeping Edmonton’s Food Bank in the loop, which has led to a discussion at the provincial level with the Alberta Food Bank Network Association, we hope to involve the national and international organizations shortly.

Achieving a “happy mind.”

The fragmented photo group approach wasn’t going to work.  So we found some great and very giving people for the construction of a centralized website to house all the photos.  This is being donated by Victor Rubba and his Crazed Coders of Edmonton.  Victor assures us that the site which is to be located at www.happymind.ca will be fully operational on August 15th, 2009.  We chose “happymind” by the way because it represents two things:  One, the state of mind after donating.  Two, D-DAY or donation day for this challenge will be in support of and coordination with the central message from His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, who is scheduled to speak in Calgary, Alberta on October 1st, 2009.

We want to get his attention by scheduling this on September 30th, 2009.

SIDEBAR:  I was invited to meet with and speak to the University of Calgary steering committee on the topic of social media at one of their meetings this summer.  This great group of people responsible for inviting the Dalai Lama to speak inspired me to align this challenge with their efforts around actNOW and what we’re doing perfectly supports the message from the Dalai Lama of achieving a “happy mind.”

Trying to collect 1 million photographs representing 1 million donations from people around the world predominantly via social media is a daunting task and one I know we’re all up for.  There have been many social media initiatives for the purposes of charity that have done very well in the past.  Twestival comes to mind, I attended the Edmonton event and that model is brilliant and we’d love to inspire a similar effect in cities around the world.  The 12 for 12K gang continues to do great work each and every day as well.  The real challenge here is to get folks not only to donate food but then take a picture and upload it.  We hope you’ll agree, that in this day and age of uber connected citizens, donating a picture is not too much to ask in order to achieve a “happymind.”

Our plan remains simple.

Go out to the universe and ask for your help.  To support you, we’re working through Rotary International and still need to reach higher within that organization.  Anyone know John Kenny President of Rotary International?  By the way, Rotary has 1.2 million members and great communication channels within their organization, Rotarians are very special people and their help would be spectacular.  We’re also approaching other organizations with considerable size such as the Lutheran Church of Canada and Edmonton’s World Trade Centre organization.  We’ve had numerous discussions with Share Our Strength on their ability to help promote and support this initiative.  They have agreed to promote this to their 40 thousand newsletter subscribers and we are very grateful for that.  Wouldn’t it be fantastic if President Obama, Prime Minister Harper made a donation and posted a twitpic?  They both have twitter accounts, so does Premier Stelmach for that matter.  What about other world leaders?  How about the United Nations?  There are people out there with connections to get folks like this involved.  Please reach out and touch them…

Does anyone know somebody at Feeding America or having anything to do with the Pound for Pound Challenge?  Please contact me at walter[at]fusedlogic.com your help is greatly appreciated.

What about brands?  How can your corporation benefit?  Simple, own this event, put your brand behind it, your marketing message of inspiration.  We want to share this experience with you, it’s about feeding the hungry for us and we know we cannot do it alone.

How can you help?

1.) Donate, take a picture and upload it to www.happymind.ca once it goes live or the facebook, flickr groups already in place today.

2.) Inspire everyone in your personal network to donate food and a picture at work, home, friends and family and the world at large via all means possible on or before September 30th, 2009.

3.) Be creative, persistent and inspirational in your communications regarding this world changing challenge, we won’t stop after September 30th and we must surpass the 1 million photos.  Hold tweetup food drives in your city on September 30th and post the pictures.  Write a song, make a video to inspire others and post it on Youtube, (our channel).

4.) Be an Ambassador!  Get your local organizations like the food bank, Second Harvest, Rotary Club, chamber of commerce, church, mass media, politicians, schools etc involved.  Send them the link to this blog post or others that explain the goal and what to do.

5.) Use Social Media: On Twitter (@fusedlogic) please use the hashtag #happymind, on your blogs please consider posting a “happymind” badge.  Spread the word through Facebook, with well over 200 million people, we can do it folks, take minute to inspire others.

VERY IMPORTANT: Please tag your photo with “HAPPYMIND.”

Or does the fact that during CBC’s Canada Votes! election broadcast, Susan Ormiston attempted to look like she actually “gets” Twitter while trying to pull off her best “I-wanna-be-hip-like-John King on CNN” impression by informing the future leader of the Liberal party – the ever unbiased Peter Mansbridge-that there’s this thing called the Internet (Peter, see Bill Curtis ref below) and something called Twitter while finger-scribbling on a SMART board.

I would have almost believed Ormiston if she hadn’t delivered her segment with all the micro-blogging savvy of someone who was briefed about Twitter while getting her make-up done just before going in front of the camera that night.

Thankfully much of her audience not on Twitter were probably blissfully unaware.  That’s partly for the reason Twitter is not yet “mainstream,” at least from the Canadian perspective.

Does the fact that the mainstream broadcast media is grappling with micro-blogging and Twitter on television broadcasts mean we can all exclaim Twitter as “mainstream?” No, not yet.

How about if the Wall Street Journal writes an article about Twitter as it did today?  A helpful explanation of Twitter (and how some are using it) for the beginner and the more savvy Twitterati to be sure.  Does the fact that WSJ (just another “broadcaster” on Twitter) in terms of it’s use as a tool like many pro-journalists mean that Twitter is finally becoming “mainstream” when WSJ starts conversing with others rather than simply pushing updates?

Well maybe. . .

In fact, WSJ only needs to follow and learn from Tannette Johnson-Elie (@telie) of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel who uses Twitter very effectively as an unpaid crowd-sourcing tool for stories and sources -myself being one of those sources.  She not only updates us on what she’s writing about, but she actually talks with us as if we were…well…”human beings,” just like she is.  I suspect many other journalists/broadcasters such as Sanchez and Lemon on Twitter do the same but that still doesn’t mean Twitter is “mainstream.”

Having said all of that, there are certainly signs that we’re at the “tipping-point” for the label to be more realistic.  Why?  Well for one, many high-profile users are “tweeting.”  Barack Obama’s campaign for President of the United States is using Twitter very effectively for their purposes (107K+ followers); Joe Biden has 2600+ followers; McCain, of course, needs Bill Curtis to find the Internet for him, and because of that, McCain has 4174 followers.  Sarah Palin has just over 1000.

Actually, the “tipping-point” is fast approaching really because of the collective combination of all of the above.  With these high-profile users comes a large communal following. Obviously that certainly helps to spread the word about Twitter into the “mainstream” of society.  So, we’re getting there, but we’re not there yet.

No, for me, the litmus test for when I’ll start calling Twitter “mainstream” is when the Republican party and McCain campaign shows a Youtube video of McCain himself using Twitter remotely (a laptop is fine) which is then followed up by a Ross Perot-like SMART board explanation of the micro-blogging technology and culture-at-large that makes John King red with envy.

When that happens “my friends,” then I think it’ll be safe to say Twitter is not only “mainstream,” but more likely just about to be “mothballed.”  Not to mention that by that time, Biz Stone and crew will have figured out how to make a buck on Twitter without it caving and everyone jumping ship to Identi for good…

Actually come to think of it, Twitter is perfect for the McCain/Palin ticket.  McCain can sum up his entire campaign platform like this “My friends, Maverick, Iraq war, Barracuda, drill baby drill,” and still have 81 characters left of the 140 to talk about his economic plan or “pork-barrel spending.”