Author Archives: Amy

Fashion and social media – G-Star Raw Reporters

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Posted by Amy on January 28, 2010 – 3:52 pm
Filed under Consumer Social Media

Gstar

I stumbled across this site for G-Star, a Dutch clothing company, today and loved their new campaign.

The G-Star Raw Reporters campaign is using social media to recruit fashion reporters to attend their catwalk show during New York Fashion Week. People can demonstrate their creativity and passion for fashion via four different channels, Twitter, Facebook, You Tube and Flickr.

Utilising all four tools not only broadens the scope, but also allows consumers to communicate in a way they feel comfortable and confident.

The Raw Reporters will get front row tickets to the show, go back stage at the event and attend the after-show party. There will be winners from each category, so the Facebook winner will be updating via the social networking site, the Flickr winner will be taking loads of photos, the Twitter winner will be Tweeting live updates and the You Tube winner will be making short video clips for their channel.

Not only does this campaign create buzz in the run up to the event, but also during the show as people will be following (in one way or another) live. Plus, once the show is over G-Star has loads of user-generated content for their site. This is shareable and also much more accessible to consumers.

They’re much more likely to read something, and then buy something, from someone like them rather than a corporate website.

I think this is a great campaign and a great use of social media. I’ll be entering now to try and bag my place in New York!

PEPSI ‘CAN’ ADVERTISING AT THE SUPERBOWL IN FAVOUR OF SOCIAL MEDIA COMMUNITY CAMPAIGN

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Posted by Amy on January 8, 2010 – 10:29 am
Filed under Consumer Social Media, Word of Mouth

Reuters recently reported that PepsiCo had unexpectedly decided not to advertise at the Super Bowl in February for the first time in 23 years.

Pepsi has changed the focus of their communications strategy and will be focusing around a more social and cause related strategy. Pepsi has just launched their “Pepsi Refresh” campaign, featuring a new, interactive microsite where people can submit suggestions about refreshing their local communities to make the world a better place.

There will be a vote taken on 1st February, and the top rated ideas will be funded by Pepsi. The company report has over $20 million in the pot for such activity.

It works on the same basis as My Starbucks Idea, but is much more community focused. Asking for suggestions to improve communities rather than the Pepsi product seems much more genuine and I think it will be very successful.

The blog section is very informative and features environmental, health and charity news from across the world. This is an interesting way to run the blog, as opposed to posting about Pepsi and the drinks industry; it will broaden the appeal and make the whole campaign seem much more genuine.

The microsite is being backed up with other social tools such as a Facebook group with almost 300,000 fans and a Twitter account with 20,000 followers. Not only are these tools available, but consumers are being actively encouraged to use them

When someone registers a project they are prompted to enable voting on their personal blogs, Facebook or Myspace page, or Twitter accounts. The site also generates a specific URL which people can forward onto friends and family to increase their votes.

This is a fantastic example of using social media to spread online word of mouth and I’m sure it will generate lots of offline buzz too. In my opinion, this is so much more innovative, creative and effective than a 30 second ad that most people will fast forward though via the power of recordable TV.

Super Bowl ad prices have been running close to $3 million for a 30 second slot, so it’s no wonder brands are looking for an alternative. Doritos and Anheuser-Busch InBev are still advertising at the sporting event, but it will be interesting to see how this pans out in 2011.

Dolce & Gabbana create beautiful film for new Sony Ericsson Jalou

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Posted by Amy on October 23, 2009 – 8:58 am
Filed under Consumer Social Media, Public Relations

This is a bit of a work-related post as Sony Ericsson is a client of Wolfstar, but I felt I had to post about it here too. Dolce & Gabbana has teamed up with Sony Ericsson so create a new phone called Jalou.

To promote this new device, Mr Dolce and Mr Gabbana have come up with a creative concept and produced an exclusive online video. Shot in Paris, this beautiful video features jealousy, glamour and desire to showcase the new Jalou.

Burberry to launch online community

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Posted by Amy on September 17, 2009 – 10:14 am
Filed under Consumer Social Media

Classic fashion brand, Burberry, has announced it will soon be launching an online community for consumers. artofthetrench.com will be live from October and will ask consumers to send in photographs of themselves wearing the iconic Burberry mac.

This seems like a great idea and Burberry is obviously becoming savvy to the power of e-commerce and social media. I’m looking forward to seeing how they utilise this online community once it has launched. Community is all about adding something extra, adding value and being genuinely engaging. Burberry is leading the way with this community, but I wonder how it will work in practice? They already have the critical mass of over 600,000 fans on their Facebook page – but how will this translate into a community?

As a brand, Burberry have gone from classic to chav then reinvented themselves as cutting edge British fashion. I think if anyone can pull it off, then they can.

Burberry Advert

CIPR Awards 2009

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Posted by Amy on September 3, 2009 – 12:47 pm
Filed under General, Public Relations

Well it’s award time again and here at Wolfstar we’ve just heard we’ve been nominated in three categories in the CIPR PRide Awards; Outstanding Consultancy, Best use of social media and Outstanding Young Communicator of the Year – that’s me! I’m so flattered to have been shortlisted, I’m not sure who else is up but sure they’ll be tough competition. It’s exciting to be nominated and I can’t wait for the awards!

We went to the awards last year and had a really good time, good excuse for the team to get together, have a few drinks and let our hair down (although we don’t really need that good an excuse.. see the evidence of Jed Hallam last year. Still my favourite photo of 2008.)

So, good luck to all the other shortlisted agencies and people – look forward to seeing you all there.

Ricky Gervais, blogging legend!

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Posted by Amy on August 14, 2009 – 11:07 am
Filed under Consumer Social Media, General

I’m a huge fan of Ricky Gervais, I was slightly addicted to the Office, loved Extras and am actually obsessed with the podcasts – Karl Pilkington is my hero!

I’ve been reading his blog for a while and thought I’d flag it up as a great example of using social media well, and of how to tailor your approach to your audience.

Ricky’s humour transcends through his posts and you can tell they’re genuinely from him. He’s currently filming his new movie in America, so uses the blog to diary his progress. There are loads of photographs from on set and sneaky previews of what’s to come. In addition, the blog links to all recent coverage about Ricky and Steve, and any of their ventures into TV or film.

It’s a great blog and genuinely makes me laugh out loud sometimes – especially the screensaver he’s produced, nice!

Just gutted I missed tickets for Science, so if anyone has two spare get in touch!

Ricky Gervais screensaver

Bruno’s LA PR girls are giving the rest of us a bad name

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Posted by Amy on July 14, 2009 – 9:00 am
Filed under Consumer Social Media

On Friday night my boyfriend and I went to see Bruno. We’re both massive Sacha Baron Cohen fans and were really excited about seeing the film.

There was really no escaping Bruno, over the past few weeks I’ve seen him absolutely everywhere. I love how SBC only does interviews in character, and there were some ingenious tactics used to promote the film, such as Bruno taking a front page of Marie Claire magazine as a guest stylist. Using his alter-ego meant he had access into a completely different section of the media and was able to dominate the press running up to the film’s launch.

The social media tactics used were also really innovative and impactful. Bruno created a personal URL at www.meinspace.com where you could see the trailer, biog and links to other social networks. His Twitter account and facebook pages were both active and in character with over 48,000 followers. In addition to the online campaign and the assault on the traditional media, Bruno also created a number of stunts such as falling onto Eminem’s lap at the MTV Awards (attracting over 600,000 views on You Tube so far), creating a truly integrated and exciting campaign.

The film was amazing. Albeit at some parts I was watching from behind my boyfriend’s shoulder because I was cringing so much! SBC is a real comedy genius and has to be one of the bravest men out there!

However, one scene compelled me to write this blog post. Half way through the film, Bruno goes to an LA PR firm to get advice about how charitable work can help raise your profile in Hollywood. He’s met by two sisters, Nicole and Suzie, who are quite possibly the most stupid cretins I’ve ever seen. That’s not an exaggeration, they can barely speak – if you’ve seen it you’ll know what I mean, they struggle to form sentences.

Bruno asks about Darfur. The sisters reply by saying “that’s a hot charity right now”. This is despite not knowing where Darfur is. When Bruno suggests Darfur is old hat, and that Dar-five might be better, they simply nod and agree.

During this scene my boyfriend was looking at me and smiling, making a sarcastic dig about my job in PR. Girls like Suzie and Nicole give PR girls a bad name. It’s obvious there is still a stereotype surrounding women in PR – perhaps even stemming back to the Ab Fab days. I did a degree in PR and have lots of friends working in the industry. All of them are intelligent, focused, articulate and funny. It’s a shame we’re sometimes still portrayed as fluffy party organisers.

I began to wonder if any women working in PR still feel this stereotype exists, or whether things have moved on since the days of Patsy and Edina?

Suzie and Nicole need not respond.

Bruno with baby OJ

Spotify set to change the Top 40 countdown

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Posted by Amy on June 24, 2009 – 4:48 pm
Filed under Consumer Social Media, General

I have very fond memories of the Top 40 show on Radio One. I’m afraid it’s a very Peter Kay style story about me in my bedroom with an old fashioned tape recorder, trying to press pause when the presenters spoke so I had my very own Now That’s What I Call Music top 40 style medley.

I don’t listen to the Top 40 much anymore, but I was interested to hear they may have to change their system again. Only recently they started to include downloaded songs too, as the ipod took off and digital music downloads soared.

Now, with the introduction of Spotify, they may need to change it again. The Official UK Charts Company have said that music played on Spotify could start to be taken into account when compiling the Top 40. It’s going to take at last another year to develop this,. but it’s great they’re paying attention and noticing how music consumption is constantly changing. I suppose this will lead to other things like You Tube too - I know lots of my friends use You Tube to listen to music generally and as a karaoke tool on a drunken night as you can get videos with the words – it will be interesting to see how they incorporate these tools into the charts.

spotify_logo

My day out with the mummy bloggers

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Posted by Amy on June 16, 2009 – 4:26 pm
Filed under Consumer Social Media, Public Relations

As part of my work for Wolfstar, we handle the social media for buggy manufacturer, Silver Cross. I really enjoy working on this account. Silver Cross is a great brand, that has proven it can retain its traditional and heritage roots, but update its product range and bring itself bang up to date - without compromising its identity.

Last week, we organised a special blogger meet-up for a selection of mummy bloggers at the Rainforest Cafe in London.

It was a little stressful trying to organise about 27 adults and 18 children in quite a small space with intermittent thunderstorms, but once we were all in it was really enjoyable.

It was lovely to meet all of the mums I’ve been working with so closely over the past few weeks - and obviously their adorable children!

To name just a few, I had chance to chat to and get to know Alpha Mummy, Wahm-Bam,NixdMinx, Noble Savage, Potty Mummy, Maternal Tales, And One More Means Four,Boozlebox, Home Office Mum, Diary of a Surprised Mum, Being a Mummy, Daddacool, Notes From Inside My Head, Thames Valley Mums, Part Mummy Part Me, Metropolitan Mum,Perfectly Happy Mum, London-Baby and the lovely Susanna who I’ve met a couple of times before too.

Thanks for a great day and I hope we can do it again soon!

Email.. it’s not quite like the post

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Posted by Amy on June 16, 2009 – 4:11 pm
Filed under General

It was recently my mum’s birthday and she was a bit surprised when she didn’t get a card from her mum and dad (my nana and grandad). Nana is usually really organised and wouldn’t forget a card.

When we went round for a drink the next week, my grandad asked her if she’d got their card. Mum said no and it transpired they’d sent her an e-card! My nana and grandad are both online, but their knowledge generally spans booking flights on Jet 2 and checking the cinema times. However, they’d done their bit for the environment and and sent an e-card.

Mum said no, she hadn’t received it and asked which email address he’d sent it to. He said, “I tried to send it to your work email address but it kept bouncing back. So I took your surname off and it worked fine!”

Mum and I tried to explain every letter had to be right in an email address and you can’t just make it up or delete bits. They didn’t really get it.

I think their ideas about email are based on the old Royal Mail system that if you get even half the address right, the letter will EVENTUALLY get there.

Nevertheless, I thought it was a cute story worth sharing. At 72 and 69, I think they’re doing pretty well when it comes to technology (my nana knows more text speak than me) and I’ll be sure to keep an eye on my inbox for my very own e-card coming soon

Technorati Tags: Royal Mail,email,ecard