Viral...Marketing!

Upon reading this as our last Keyword Search :( , I thought about what viral marketing really was before I even Googled it.

Viral is associated with virus, so I automatically picture people getting viruses on their computers and completely shutting down the system...

According to Wikipedia, viral marketing is just really using the social media that is already out there (like the popular Facebook and Twitter) to increase "brand awareness".

They put certain viral marketing advertisements on certain websites that marketers believe would be passed along by those visitors of the site.


Forms of Viral Marketing.

This type of marketing can come in the forms of: flash games, ebooks, images, text messages, and even more than that.
They can be as creative as being a mini interactive game to promote their product or as simple as just a pop-up dancing ad in the corner of the site you're visiting at the time.
Any way as long as it grabs your attention.

• When I looked for examples of viral marketing, this website came up and shows different campaigns that companies have used. I never even thought of how much of this I was exposed to until I saw this list.

I've definitely done the Simpsonize Yourself tool before. Which makes me think some companies much either be A. Complete geniuses for thinking about marketing in this perspective or B. Completely desperate to promote their product.
*As a side note, I used one of my pictures to Simpsonize Me just now...and it looks nothing like me....how disappointing.

Another viral marketing promotion I've done is the Subserviant Chicken. I'm sure you've all seen this as well, it's the ad where you can make the Burger King chicken dance!!..or do other weird stuff.

Effective?

Burger King has made both of these viral marketing promos happen...but I can't say they've been really effective to myself.

I don't ever really remember using a viral marketing tool and thinking to myself, "Gee, Simpsonizing myself was fun, let's go to BK now!"
...But then again maybe it works so well that I don't even know it.

This website though discusses how it's said to be one of the best marketing tools we have to date. Maybe so.

How ridiculous.lol.

Glad I Don't Have To Be A Secretary...

While I have never taken a class yet with Mr. Rift Fournier, I feel like I already have.
My first encounter with him was on Sibley Day when I went to the Emerson Black Box to hear Mr. Chris Cluess speak about being a writer for MADtv, and all of his life experiences.

I have to admit the first time I met Rift, he slightly took me by surprise. The way he talked...he just didn't give a damn almost and I really enjoyed that.
So, when he came into class I had an idea of what to expect.

As he was talking, he started telling us where he had traveled and what he had done. He's traveled and worked all over the world and written for Orson Welles. I'm sure there's plenty of other things he's accomplished as well.
The only thing it made me think about was, "Wow, THAT'S what I want". To travel and experience life, while doing something I "give a damn about," according to Rift.
(I also find it interesting that a lot of successful people say that getting their dream jobs were almost by accident, it makes me really wonder if I'll ever get my own "accident").

It also kind of freaked me out when he asked us how far along in college we were and if we were positive about our majors. After a few head nods, he says confidently, "You'll change your minds". (Or a variation of that). It scared me to think I may actually change my mind, because I LOVE doing this.

I've come to realize that it's people like him, Penelope Trunk, and Gary Vaynerchuck that inspire me to keep doing what I want to do, despite what anyone else says.

Rift had the passion for writing, he said ever since he was little he had a desire to be a writer.
He's from a small town, so am I.
Hearing things about people's lives like Rift's gives me hope that I can be just like that, and that being from a small town doesn't mean anything.

The whole guest speaker topic usually really kind of bums me out when we're assigned to write about them because I feel like we're just paying attention to what they say formally about the media.
Rift took a different perspective. He still talked about the media, but applied to his life and added stories to tell us exactly everything he's been through.

I really appreciated Rift coming in to guest speak, and I feel like he'll be a good teacher and great mentor for the future.

Wow, Gary...wow.

A Man After My Own Heart, Gary Vaynerchuck!
Googling Gary Vanerchuck's name led me straight to his website.
I watched his vlog addressing Dominoes and how other chains are going to be afraid to put things online and use social media. After watching it, all I could think was 'this guy is an absolute genius'.
I didn't even have to watch or look at the rest of his website to know it! The way he was saying that it's fine if they don't get it, the people that do can use it to their advantage is exactly the way everyone should be viewing it! Finally, a man who says exactly what's on his mind!
Working on building his family's local business into a "national industry leader", he uses things like Twitter, Tumblr, and Cork'd to spread his business.
He's made guest appearances on Conan O'Brian, The Today Show, Ellen Degeneres, and others. So this guy obviously knows how to market himself out there in the televsion market and not just the internet.

Everyone is using the internet more to find sources and businesses and better, more efficient ways of living and he's one of the best examples of a gate jumper that we have. Seeing the way he uses social media to his advantage makes me believe that GenY will maybe eliminate gatekeepers altogether because we're the ones creating the new technology and making new things popular...but we'll see though.

'Ze Brazen Careerist!...(I would really enjoy knowing how this came to be the title for the website...)

Okay, so I didn't really know anything about Brazen Careerist so I checked out the "About" section of the website. And this is what I found:
*It's a place for GenY people to get together and talk about everything about jobs and future careers. Not just the three piece suit people telling us what to do for jobs or how to it.
Brazen Careerist has company profiles and corporate bloggers, making it easier for everyone to have access to companies and what they're looking for.
There's a job board that shows: the job's title, the location for the job, the company that's posting it, and when the job was last posted. This website literally has everything for anyone looking for a potential career. The other extremely nice thing about having this job board is the hyperlinks they have that can take you straight to the full description of what they're looking for.
Blogs are posted on the website also, discussing all different topics, some called "What I Want vs. What I Want," and "Big Kids Do Cry and Sometimes It's at Work".
This place even has coaches in order to help every individual figure out what steps they should take in their career.
I can see vlogs being posted now for live webchat Q&A. Maybe evolving into more than that.

The only thing that I can see Gary Vaynerchuck and Brazen Careerist have in common is that they are using social media to their full advantage. They're aware of how beneficial the internet is to help and inform someone.

Here's an interview about what it's like with Brazen Careerist and being a GenY entrepranuer.
(I like how the first related link is a Gary Vaynerchuck video...)

Twitter: Jill's Favorite Past-time is a Social Media!

That's right...Twitter. After we've all figured out how to work the infamous micro-blogging, I googled "Social Media"...and it was pretty much everything I thought it was.

"So what EXACTLY is Social Media?" You might be asking? Well, it's basically when a regular person starts up a social, interacting, data and information sharing place on the web.
Things like Facebook, Myspace, YouTube, Linkedin, Twitter (..oh joy), and even our Blogger accounts are all classified under the social media category.

The list goes on and on considering picture and music sharing, like Photobucket and LimeWire.

The Craze
This new industry has gotten to be so popular that I actually found a website, that I'm sure many other people will have on their blogs, that helps people figure out how to use the new social medias to their advantage...SocialMedia.biz. This website has helpul videos and strategies that discuss bringing a specific company a new online community to draw in a diferent kind of business to them. The website even discusses setting up a customized Web 2.0

Social media, in essence, can really help or hurt a company that's promoting itself within the internet.
A perfect example would be from this website, discussing how Dominoes had their business hurting after a video put on YouTube about a Dominoes employee sneezing and farting on a sandwich. The video recieved over 500,000 views. It's no longer avalianble on YouTube, but is accessible for visiting that website.

The Negative to Social Media
Now, don't get me wrong, I love social media as much as the next person. I have a Facebook, Myspace, and even a Twitter now (thanks to this class). But part of using social media is knowing when to stop using it, and come back to the "real world". Places like Twitter and Facebook and even instant messaging (yup, it's social media) are seen as almost sources of evil by parents with young teenagers. According to this other website, news reports linked Facebook to the main cause of poor grades and Twitter is "accused of putting morality itself at risk".
Which leads me to wonder...

Is Social Media ever going to really stop? No. It's pretty safe to say that.
Is it going to start dictating our lives though? Isn't it already dictating most of our lives?
It seems so strange to me that something so fun and recreational can also be used for business, but I suppose that's just a characteristic for Gen Y to have developed.

Now, it might seem like this whole blog I've written so far has been about the negative affects about our growing social media, but in reality, it's just the scary truth that could possibly happen.
But Social Media overall has been a positive experience for everyone. It's connecting us all in ways I'm sure people before us never thought to imagine...or at least didn't think it was coming so fast. Social Media has a power all it's own and is now a force to be reckoned with.

Jill asked us to post our favorite YouTube videos. Here's two:


If you don't know, I work at a Renaissance Faire. I took this video :)


This is one of my favorite shows, Man and Wife!

Ew, I'm Growing Up...Gross.

So I found a job from the free career search website we were given in class, and as I found it's actually right in Illinois!

Decatur, Illinois actually. About right smack dab in the middle of it. Or as Jill referred to it, "the armpit of Illinois".
That's not very attractive, Jill.



The Job

WAND-TV is looking for an Internet content producer who has about a 1-2 year experience. I instantly thought that the job description could be something I would be happy with.
The main idea of the job is to hire someone with experience in using PhotoShop and Fireworks, and a basic program language (working with HTML codes).

Ew...I'm Growing Up

The idea of growing up and getting a job is honestly, kind of depressing to me. One of my favorite movies is Peter Pan, and the whole "growing up" concept always seems like the gray cloud that's following shortly behind me; catching up more than I would like it to.

BUT! This job seems more like a career I would like to do, since I have to eventually grow up.
I love playing with PhotoShop and I know that I could learn more. Honestly, I didn't even know there was a program called Fireworks before last night at a business meeting for APO. I'm excited at the idea of learning this, though.

The second that Jill mentioned there were careers out there that are developing for social networking and blogs, I really instantly thought "Where can I sign up?", so I really believe I could excell at something like this.

What Can I Do Now?

I could definitely use my knowledge from my previous classes such as this one and Media Literacy. I also am taking Writing for Electronic Media next year (I'm only a Sophomore) and Fundamentals of the Internet.
Working in the TV Station could also benefit me because then I could have a general idea about what the news staff represents and what they're looking for in an Internet content producer.
Keeping my grades up couldn't hurt either, I suppose.

I hope everyone else in class found something they are just as equally excited about!

The Best Way to Market to Gen Y is to STOP Marketing.

Sounds confusing, doesn't it? The title, I mean.

But when I searched the phrase "Marketing to Gen Y" the first website I came across was all about telling companies to STOP marketing to us.

How do they go about ceasing marketing you might ask? Well, they don't actually stop making advertisements or give up trying to make us loyal customers to their products, but they do one thing before they start trying to pull us into their product.

They have to ask us 'What do YOU want?'. They need to listen to us first.

This website I first read made me come to a very strong realization about Gen Y and myself. According to the article, Tough Customers: How to Reach Gen Y, they say that people born in between approximately the late 70s to late 90s, possibly 2000 are considered main Gen Y.
That puts me smack dab in the middle just about, being a child born at the beginning of 1989.

In our first class discussion about being a part of Gen Y, I almost felt ashamed to be considered one born and classified with a group that is seen to the older generations as selfish, self-centered, and lazy.

The more I've read and written about Gen Y, the more I'm proud to be a part of this generation that is making marketers see that they need to listen to us. That we've been told from a young age to do what makes us happy first and that we can be anything we want to be.
This is becoming a challenge for marketers, because they can't tell us what we SHOULD like anymore.

And here's a list of Gen Y Charicteristics I've found. I rather enjoy knowing I'm part of this list:



Another thing that the first website I visited discussed was about how we need four things from a product.

1. Cheap cost
2. Good quality
3. Fast service
4. "An experience"

I couldn't agree more with all of this. I can't help but think that these are things generations before us wish they could've had at their time of controlling the workforce and finances.
Oh, and there's one other thing we need to see in a product...

Authenticity. I think this word scares a lot of companies because it means they need to stand out from every other group.
But it's true.
Our generation craves things to be real for us, we need reality. We can't be bullshitted, to say it very bluntly.

I think our parents and grandparents have shown us how much companies and the government has pulled the wool over their eyes that we're so determined now to get nothing but the truth and the reality of everything.

And it needs to be original on top of it.

But we've established what we need out of companies.
They should just think of this as a challenge for them.
Rise to the occasion. Apple has. 99 cent downloads?! Ha. Okay so I don't download songs legally, but maybe I should start. And Apple would of course be the first place I'd go to for it. Not just because they have good prices for songs and I can get the songs out of the comfort of my home, but because I have an Ipod and it only seems right.

The first website also mentioned that marketing tattoo parlors would be good because 36 percent of "Gen Yers" have at least one tattoo. Piercings should count too! I found this picture and thought it was pretty hilarious.

That's It! No More Classes Starting After 9 A.M. From Now On!

I'm sure we've all done things we're not proud of. When we were little our mothers or grandparents or teachers taught us that lying wasn't good and stealing was even worse.

But we were also taught that "sharing is caring".

So, when it comes to pirating movies and music...should we feel that guilty?
I guess it's not a matter of feeling guilty, because it's against the law.

I Know Pirating Is Bad, But I Do It Anyway
I think a lot of people are guilty of at some point either downloading songs illegally or downloading a movie and watching from the comfort of their own computer.

But it's easily accessible. We have programs such as LimeWire, BitTorrent, BearShare, and many more that we can find to download for FREE.
It costs nothing from the start. Granted, these programs come with certain features that you can't get with the free version, but I tend to stick with the free download.

I know that I'm a broke college student and paying for my music is far from my mind.


For about four years, I have never thought downloading music to be so bad. I thought 'people are sharing music, I don't have to pay for the cd, and it's all okay'.

Apparently not, after reading this article I really see that the government is really starting to have a lock down on finding people who illegally download music.
Fines of up to 150,000 dollars?!
I don't even have 200 dollars in my account.

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is not kidding when they mean to catch people illegally downloading music.
College kids seem to be the top stories for when I searched Google.

Movies Get A Different Look When Being Downloaded.
There are many places where you can download movies legally. It's the file sharing websites everyone should be wary of.
As far as downloading movies legally though, there's a cost to it and piracy might eventually lead to a raise in prices of downloading movies legally.

I found it rather annoying in my search as well when I type in "downloading music/movies illegally", and there are websites dedicated to telling someone how to not get caught when commiting piracy.

GenY Wants Everything NOW.
This is exactly WHY I believe illegal downloads are becoming so popular...besides not having to even pay for the media entertainment.

We are so used now to the Internet giving us exactly what we're searching for and music and movies shouldn't be any different...right?

Here's an article I found written by a man who believes there's a different way to address our pirating issue.
I fully agree with Robert's ideas on pirating and how the government can try to hunt down all the people who are downloading illegally, but it can be pretty much guarunteed that they will not be able to find EVERYONE.
He also has some terrific insight on possible different ways to fix the pirating issue.

This is a man who should be helping the RIAA figure out solutions, instead of trying to tackle a problem that doesn't look like it's going away anytime soon.

I mean, c'mon, I've downloaded music illegally for years.

But I am grateful that Lindenwood has their internet system set up to where we have to make sure all of our illegal downloading programs are gone before we can have the internet on our laptops. It definitely takes away from temptation and I find myself doing more valuable things with my time than downloading music that probably can't even all fit on my iPod.
After all, it's only 4 gigs.