The film is about product placement, marketing and advertising, and also fully funded by product placement, marketing and advertising (Screenrant).

Spurlock managed to convince 17 willing companies, such as Hyatt, jetBlue and Old Navy, to participate in his latest ‘docbuster.’ In exchange for sponsorship funds, each of these brands received some sort of placement or promotion within the film.

Hyatt, for instance, is the film’s feature hotel partner. Everywhere Spurlock travels throughout taping, he stays in a Hyatt hotel. He not only shows off Hyatt’s services, but he raves about his stay in various Hyatt franchises.

In the video below, Stacey Snyder, marketing director at Hyatt, tells us about the decision her team made to participate in Spurlock’s project. Because Hyatt “is all about authentic hospitality” it made sense to jump at the opportunity to work with Spurlock, says Snyder — despite that it was a journey that they had “no idea where it was going to take us.”

Since the premiere of his latest ‘docbuster’ Spurlock has been spreading his take on brand transparency everywhere. He even presented a TED Talk (video below) entitled “Embrace Transparency” — brought to you by EMC. EMC actually purchased the naming rights to his talk on eBay for $7,100, which Spurlock has donated to the TED Conference to “go towards his attendance for next year,” he jokes.

More importantly than receiving any sort of product placement, the film’s corporate sponsors gained some brand humility and transparency by participating in the movie. Working with Spurlock meant literally handing over their brand assets, stories and select employees to expose on camera. These organizations allowed Spurlock to take complete control of the marketing message. But in doing so, they just might gain a little respect from Spurlock’s cynical, sophisticated audience members.

A New York-based spa deals site, @SpaSally, gained 60 new followers and increased sales by a third when it offered a $25 spa deal to the @bronxzooscobra on Twitter. 

@HiltonNewYork received a retweet and response from the Egyptian cobra after tweeting: “@bronxzooscobra Do you have a place to stay in NYC tonight? We can offer you the Penthouse ssssuite #snakeonthetown.” 

After Charlie Sheen created his own hotdog concoction at Infield Hot Dog Stand in California, tweeting a photo of it, Infield sales tripled, says stand owner Robert Davition (FOX Small Business). 

Recently, businesses have made quite a push to tack their brands onto trending Twitter accounts and hashtags. It’s not only a great way to gain millions of brand impressions and grow Twitter followers, but if brands can jump on a trending Twitter topic in an authentic way, it may even increase credibility and sales.

So how do brands align with pop culture phenomena like Charlie Sheen, Rebecca Black and the assortment of animals taking over Twitter (see @RoyalPony @BronxZoosCobra @BronxZooKeeper)? The same way consumers do. Simply tag the trending account in a retweet, reply or hashtagged post. If the tweet is clever enough, it could get picked up by the intended Twitter handle, retweeted, and seen by millions in just minutes.

It’s not surprising that smaller, localized businesses have successfully tied themselves to trending accounts. Notice Spa Sally, Hilton New York and Infield Hot Dog Stand are all small-scale, local businesses or franchises. The Hilton New York account most likely needs far fewer post approvals than the Hilton Worldwide account does. With the ability to tweet more freely, smaller brands can write quick, clever, authentic posts that are more likely to be retweeted by the current ‘it’ Twitter account.

 In a few short words, the key to tying a brand to Twitter trends: keep posts simple, funny and organic.

Video blogs and webcasts can potentially cost between $5,000 and $7,000, not to mention the cost of production hours. Are video blogs really worth the time, money and effort that companies pour into them to enhance the relationships with their key publics? Do these videos make the company more transparent to consumers, employees and shareholders? Or are they just a form of entertainment to add to the hype of the corporate website, blog or newsroom?

Southwest Airlines hosts a video blog on its corporate blog, Nuts about Southwest. Video blog posts range anywhere from new Southwest TV commercials and scripted humor videos to footage from promotional events. While these videos meet the fun cultural standards at Southwest, they may not add to the overall transparency of the organization—they just function as entertainment for the Southwest online audience. However, these videos do exemplify Southwest’s ability to break down the corporate marketing voice and use down-to-earth, humorous authenticity.

Check out this video posted on Nuts about Southwest around St. Patrick’s Day. Two Southwest employees give viewers a glimpse into their exciting day. Could they be showing hints of authenticity and transparency?

Accenture also has a video blog. Though the videos are less entertaining than Southwest, Accenture uses them to build transparency.

In the video below, for instance, an Accenture employee describes how she balances her life at work and life outside of the office. The folks at Accenture have given her the freedom to talk about recent vacations complete with personal anecdotes. This employee can be completely transparent and authentic, even in as serious an environment as an IT consulting firm.

Check out the video post on Accenture’s video blog site.

]]> http://lindseymmonroe.com/2009/04/06/video-blogs-additional-transparency-and-authenticity/feed/ 0 Lindsey http://lindseymmonroe.com/2009/03/29/twitter-authentic-or-aloof/ http://lindseymmonroe.com/2009/03/29/twitter-authentic-or-aloof/#comments Sun, 29 Mar 2009 07:16:52 +0000 Lindsey Monroe http://lindseymmonroe.com/?p=104 ]]>  With constant updates and 140-character messages, Twitter is the environment to create the authentic voice of an organization.

Twitter has received a lot of popularity lately, with “tweets” from mega-corporations such as Comcast, Zappos, and Jetblue. Even President Barack Obama twitters.  

Twitter is a great way to reach a mobile audience. Followers might receive tweets on their cell phones and comment back in seconds. No matter where the audience is, followers can find out what’s going on at the company.

With only 140 characters to update followers on corporate news, links or events, many corporate twitterers have adopted an authentic, short-hand tone of voice. 

Southwest, for example, tweets about weather, flight delays, and most recently, live updates aboard the new wi-fi equipped aircraft. SouthwestAir uses a light-hearted tone to chat with followers on Twitter. Employees post tweets using phrases such as “super cool” and “bummer.” Followers also exchange jokes with employees frequently. With its high customer satisfaction ratings, Southwest can interact with customers in a casual manner, similar to how Southwest flight attendants talk with travelers on-board.

Comcast twitterer, Comcastcares, answers customer service questions and concerns. Comcast doesn’t have as high customer satisfaction marks as Southwest, and therefore utilizes Twitter to gain customer trust.

Comcastcares, maintained by Frank Eliason, director of digital care at Comcast, has done a remarkable job revamping the frustrated relationship between Comcast and its customers. Comcastcares has a slightly serious tone because customers need their questions answered quickly and accurately.Wachovia uses a very formal tone to interact with customers on Twitter. Twittering Wachovia employees don’t introduce themselves with photos and professional information like those at Comcast. In fact, Wachovia doesn’t provide as much corporate information or links to other corporate social media as Southwest does either. 

 Wachovia sends out tweets with a formal, marketing tone. Check out the tweet from @greenbanking on March 27^th. Greenbanking promotes paperless billpay, in a commercial voice, which is much less authentic than the voice of SouthwestAir.

But is a casual, joking tone too aloof? Or is a marketing voice too distant? Jokes may decrease credibility, but formalities may take away from the authentic relationships built on Twitter.

 Tone of voice on Twitter depends on corporate culture. Southwest uses an authentic, jovial voice because employees are encouraged to act that way in real-time. Wachovia employees naturally use a formal tone because of the rigid structure of the banking industry.

Courtesy of Life 123 Alpha

After beginning a discussion on authenticity in the previous post, I decided to delve deeper into the subject. A major issue in regards to authentic social media is ghostwriting.

A study published in the Public Relations Journal found that readers prefer to read a corporate blog written by the CEO or another executive with equal star appeal in the organization. Most readers prefer a CEO blog that covers personal as well as business-related topics.

However, CEO blogs can pose problems for the CEO as well as the organization. For instance, blogging takes time, research, and effort. Can a CEO or another top exec cram another task onto his or her plate? If blogs are too personal, they may become inappropriate or boring. Blogging CEOs must have the communication skills necessary to interact online with organizational publics. Finally, CEOs who blog about the internal logistics of the company may become too transparent and (as discussed in previous posts) may disclose too much information, resulting in legal issues.

Therefore, ghostwriting has entered the blogosphere just as CEOs and organizations have. Simply defined, a “ghostwriter” writes a corporate blog and acts as if he or she is the CEO or top executive who is the supposed author.

Dave Fleet, a marketing and communications consultant from Ontario, believes ghostwriting is unethical. Whether the writer acts as another individual on a blog or a microblog, such as Twitter, he believes readers have a right to know whose personal ideas and words they are reading. If the actual author or the blog is not a CEO, but rather a communications department employee for example, that knowledge should be shared with readers, says Fleet. Without this vital information, readers won’t know who they’re interacting with and his or her trust in the organization may be compromised.

However, a reader of Fleet’s blog on social media and marketing communication begs to differ. “Ghost Blogger,” a reader of Davefleet.com, spends so much time studying how the CEO whom [he] writes for reacts to situations, reading the CEO’s emails, and editing blog post drafts with the CEO face-to-face that [he] believes [his] ghostwriting duties are completely ethical.

The issue still remains undecided. But will ghostwriting become more or less ethical as more people and organizations adapt to blogging and microblogging in the near future?

To develop an authentic voice, the producer needs to follow a few simple rules:

1.    Don’t just read from a script. Though it’s important to stick to a script so that you don’t get off topic and bore your audience, reading directly from a script can be equally as boring to audience members.

2.    Don’t use a corporate tone, but rather a fun, casual tone. A number of producers use a voice similar to radio talk show hosts’. A casual voice will engage the audience and won’t compromise credibility. After all, you’ve created a podcast to build a personality for your message or organization—don’t make the message sound like a corporate advertisement.

3.    Don’t read press releases! If audience members are really concerned about news updates, they can visit the organization’s online newsroom.

4.    Remain professional. Casual doesn’t mean sloppy. No inappropriate personal stories. Make sure there is no distracting background noise in a podcast or video. Make sure the lighting is good and there are no distractions in the background of your online video.

Below are two examples of online videos. Both exemplify the do’s and don’ts listed above. Listen to the speaker’s voice to critique the podcast voice. Pay attention to the ways in which the speaker tries to engage the audience visually through the use of video production.

This video was written and produced by the folks at Marketwire, an organization that assists companies in press release distribution through new social media tools. Watch a few seconds of it and look for the do’s and don’ts.

Now, watch a little of this video by Christopher Penn, producer of the Financial Aid Podcast. You can watch the video below, but it might be more beneficial to watch it on the Financial Aid Podcast site to understand his interactive navigation. “His what?” you’re asking. Check it out—you’ll see!

Between the two, who do you think has a better grasp on authenticity?