I’m a big fan of Erik Qualman and his Social Media Blog Socialnomics.

He’s helped me and my clients a ton. He’s a smart guy – so smart that being a James Bond fan, I think I’ll call him “Q.”

Q’s Socialnomics the book is a great read too.

And, his outstanding Social Media Revolution video which hit YouTube last year generated about 2 million views.

If you haven’t seen SMR 1 don’t worry, check out Q’s new Social Media Revolution 2 video below which launched a few weeks ago and has been updated with more fascinating facts.

Next time someone tells you that Social Media is a fad, send them a link to Q’s video!

P.S.: The facts blaze by, so if you’re interested in Q’s key facts in text, click here.

NERD ALERT!

This chart shows that nearly 30% of U.S. consumers use their cell phones and/or computers at the same time they watch TV.

And, I have to say that I’m guilty on all three counts and possibly four, because I can hold a conversation at the same time – at least I think so – but, don’t ask my wife!

The integration of marketing messages across platforms is becoming more critical by the minute – as well as the ability for Brand’s to create clear, easy to understand and remarkably meaningful communications.

Keep this chart in mind the next time you try to pack 60 seconds of vanilla milkshake copy into a 30 second television commercial!

Source: Experian Simmons DataStream 4.13.10

Forrester says that by 2014 (see Advertising Age article), you and most of your customers are going to get over 9,000 email marketing messages a year which is about 25 messages per person per day or two times what you both got last year!

And, email marketing spending will increase to $2 billion in 2004 – about 2X what was spent last year!

So, what’s all this mean for marketers like you and how can you overcome your customer’s email irritation and overload?

Here are three ways to immediately improve your email marketing:

1. Integrate email marketing with social media communications since most young adults (18-24 year-olds) prefer it over email; over 20% of adults prefer it too
2. Segment email databases into smaller/tighter unique groups and send relevant, timely messages
3. Be religious about testing your email campaigns and work to improve your creative executions and copy writing

Good luck!

I don’t have many favorite politicians – check that – I don’t have a one! And, I’d bet most of you don’t have one.

Until maybe now.

Republican candidate for Congress and former U.S. Army lieutenant colonel Allen West is someone I’ve been following throughout his race in the Sunshine State!

And you should too.

Allen West, is a former U.S. Army lieutenant colonel and is running this November as a Republican candidate for the United States Congress in Florida’s District 22.

Watch this video of West in action. No notes – pure passion and conviction – clear message coming from experience – a complete mastery of the power of video and the mastery of the public speech!

When the Republicans and McCain and Co., got outgunned and derailed by the Obama campaign in the last presidential election, there’s no question that one of big contributing factors was that they were far behind in mastering the New World Order of interactive and social media marketing tools.

In the next election/s, you’ll see that everyone will be on the SMM bus. And, it will be somewhat of a level playing field in terms of marketing execution since most everyone will be wearing a pretty nice SMM tool belt and carrying a well equipped toolbox.

Check out West’s Web site and you’ll see its complete with all the appropriate SMM tools however, his talent, integrity, character and clear brand message and performance rules.

Certainly money helps, but in this online, always on world we live in, citizen journalists can help West even out the playing field for his underfunded brand.

Watch out for the Allen West’s of the world (performance based brands with character, integrity and trustworthiness) and remember that tools are cool, but tools don’t rule because anybody can buy them and learn how to use them.

To excel these days, recognize that for today’s informed consumer, what truly matters is a clearly communicated and meaningful brand promise delivered from a trustworthy, proven brand. Guaranteed.

P.S.: I call Lt. Col. Allen West a Marketer’s dream because it’s so easy to promote a brand you believe in. I’ll bet West wins in November – this American Patriot prays and hopes that he does – we need more good people like him in government.

If you’re feeling confused about the benefits of social media marketing,  uninterested or if you lack subject matter knowledge that’s OK. A lot of your peers feel the same way. Research on the effectiveness of social media marketing is mixed. Check out this recent chart by eMarketer and Ad-ology.

Again, it’s OK. Anything relatively new is bound to have mixed results.

For me, I’ve learned a long time ago that a few marketing best practices are to pay attention to new trends, don’t always follow the crowd, be an early adopter of new technology and to “fast fail” in my efforts.

I fall in the 16% of those who find that social media marketing helps me drive leads, stay up to date with industry shifts and competitive intelligence. And, like any form of exercise, the more you do it, the better you become.

For me, lead generation has been my biggest benefit of social networking driven by the thought leadership of my  Blog and showcasing our good works.

Small businesses rated Facebook the most beneficial social networking site, but I’ve found LinkedIn to be as effective and I’m surprised YouTube isn’t ranked higher.

We use YouTube a ton for Web site storytelling, email marketing, product demos, and customer testimonials and find it incredibly effective. You get out of things, what you put into them.

My recommendation with new technologies to clients is to set up a small team (or you take the reins by yourself) responsible for executing a plan and challenge them to understand the subject matter better, jump into it, experiment and lead.

Don’t believe your customers aren’t into social networking, because all research points to the fact they are and your next new round of younger customers are already fully immersed in it.  Or, aren’t you interested in surviving and thriving in the next decade?

Everyone’s busy and no one has the time for anything new that’s a fact – but, another fact is that you need to find the time, because these technologies aren’t going away and consumer use will continue to grow via new technologies that make it easier to understand, access, and use on a daily basis.

Can you say, “IPod, IPad and Smart Phone?” I Thought so!

Get on the bus and enjoy the ride!

Sources: eMarketer, Ad-ology, Citibank

Here’s the very best site for all things Twitter from oneforty.

They list nearly 2,500 Twitter Tools and Apps.

Thanks a million oneforty!

Typically, in times of crisis, most brands fail in their communications before the crisis explodes not during or after it happens. Then, long after the explosive facts are out, whatever a brand does to quell the unfortunate act never seems to be quite enough.

And today, in this ever changing and rapidly growing Social Media Marketing environment we all live in you can get yourself into a whole bunch of trouble.

Two cases in point…Tiger Woods and Toyota.

On Tiger Woods’ Web site, you’d think nothing’s wrong with his brand.

You can read all about Brand Tiger’s accomplishments and of course buy a ton of stuff. On Facebook, you can also buy Tiger’s Stuff, but 1.3 million fans can’t communicate via Facebook anymore. Well they can (sort of) to posts back in November, but Tiger has not responded. Plus all I can see are positive notes of support.  Is Brand Tiger jsut keeping the good and editing out the bad?

Tiger’s been “off the Facebook air” since November 6, 2009. In fact, when you click through to Facebook at times there are no comments since. Tiger is supposedly hiding out in a sex rehab bunker..I mean clinic…so why no more news? An apology? A simple update?

Now Toyota is underway with its largest recall ever and has looked foolish and disorganized in its scrambled up mess of communications. Sure they’ve been “backpeddling” (no pun inteneded) off and online and its certainly not easy while battling legal, economic and staff issues, but tough, they’re a big boy company.

But, you’d think Toyota like Tiger would know better.

Toyota only has about 77,000 Facebook fans and you’d think they’d have a ton more than Ford (79,000), Chevrolet (65,000) and Subaru (31,000 – would have thought they’d have a lot more) and other but they don’t. Heck, Harley-Davidson Motor Company has an amazing 467,000 Facebook fans.

Both Brand Tiger and Brand Toyota Web sites all talk about how great their brands are with no or little regard to their misgivings and what they’re doing to fix things.

Why was it so hard for both brands to fess up early and often – not to mention…don’t do bad things in the first place!

So much about crisis management is learned by all of us at a young age – well, hopefully its taught to us by good, caring parents – such as:

• Be good
• Don’t lie
• If you do something bad (we all do), own up to it immediately in person, apologize and say you’re sorry and promise to make things (and do them) better and promise to not repeat your behavior

When you were a kid, wasn’t your punishment greater and more harsh when you put off owing up to it?

In these ever changing times of social media marketing, it’s more important than ever to have a crisis management plan, because something bad will happen to your Brand – it’s not a matter of if, it’s when.

Here are a few crisis management rules to follow:

1. You never make friends in crisis, so build your friendship databases and trust bank deposits NOW
2. Create and continue to work on extensive, ongoing social media outreach efforts
3. If/when something happens bad to Brand You (Company), come clean, be visible and approachable and meet things head-on.
4. Tough times never last, but tough people do. To that point, when times get tough you need to reach out to you loyal fans, customers, employees, vendors etc., but you need to create that fan base and it doesn’t happen overnight
5. The best PR campaign and highest paid strategists can’t prevent all of the mudslinging and brand damage – preventive maintenance is key

Take a lesson from David Letterman’s confession here. Brilliant!

As a wise man once said to me, “That fish wouldn’t be on the wall, if it didn’t open it’s mouth!”

Looking forward to great game and loving Pepsi’s decision to pass on Super Bowl ads (waste) and lead with its “Refresh Everything” online marketing project.

Two things I’m sure of about the Super Bowl.

One – someone named Peyton/Payton – will win!

Two – Pepsi’s campaign will be successful for them and similar types of brand initiatives that focus their marketing with a meaning (great book here – Marketing with Meaning) will create more long term brand success than over-priced, short-lived and joke-filled ads.

Pepsi’s “Refresh Everything” offers them a lot of extra ‘arms and legs’ such as adding folks to their database, promoting goodwill inside and outside of their company, community connections, generating great PR, making the US a better place etc.,

Check out the success of PR machine already!

Any brand – big and small – can learn a great deal from Pepsi’s Refresh!

I’m proud to announce that two BrandMill clients, John Graf of the Priory Hospitality Group and Kevin Joyce of The Carlton Restaurant both won two of the three most distinguished awards from the Pennsylvania Restaurant Association.

John won the Wilmer S. Lapp Keystone Award and Kevin won Restaurateur of the Year!

Our Winter White Wedding Campaign for the Pittsburgh’s Grand Hall at the Priory lifted sales an amazing 433% and our new Web site, Blog and email marketing campaigns for The Carlton have driven Web site views nearly 1000% – yes, not a typo – that’s driving one thousand percent Web site page views!

All of us at BrandMill are proud to be partners with these two super brands and gentlemen.

Pancakes in a can? I’m all in!

What a simple brand promise – so easy and clear to understand.

Think Reddi-Whip aerosol can, but think Pancakes – maybe think both at the same time (hint – writing this during dinnertime – and, I’m a little hungry)!

Anyway, I plan to try NEW Batter Blaster this weekend, after eating up it’s marvelous marketing and unique story for some time now. You can learn a ton about how to effectively create and launch a new product by studying the good folks at Batter Blaster. For example, here are just a few reasons why they’re achieving amazing success:

1. They created a truly new product that solves a need. Make pancakes easy and quick to make with little waste and mess.  Everyone knows that it’s a pain to make pancakes for one or two people – especially in the morning if you work.  Most people blow off breakfast – the most important meal of the day – because of a lack of time – so, Batter Blaster to the rescue! Plus, BB cakes must taste pretty good to be able to quickly earn nearly $20 million in 2009 sales when it just got up and running in 2005. Certainly it might not be the best tasting pancake you ever had – taste is a subjective attribute – but balanced on the whole against speed and convenience, it must taste OK and certainly worth a try.
2. Clear Positioning – Easy, Quick, Better…Fun. Shake, point and shoot! It’s so easy to talk about it – so easy to explain. People get the core value proposition spot on and it’s easy to spread the buzz. Everything about Batter Blaster is easy – their web site, lists recipes, places to find product,  product information and it’s a cinch to find contact information too. And, it’s fun – love the 50′s-style jingle when you hit the home page – “Make a better breakfast faster, Batter Blaster! It’s a spot on benefit rich positioning statement that’s easy to remember.
3. Show and Tell and Proof of Performance. Great use of demos, testimonials too – love the Guinness Record Book move – brilliant!
4. Great use of Public Relations and Social Media – How about 9,000 Facebook fans of Pancakes-in-a-Can! Let’s face it though – it’s a much easier to get coverage and viral buzz when you deliver on your promise!

In this age of iPod, iPhone and now iPad…iWant, INeed, iGotta have me some iPancakes from Batter Blaster because I’m thinking I’m going to love them! At least one time!