The damning evidence against Sherrod surfaced on July 19, when conservative blogger and activist Andrew Breitbart posted a  2-minute video snippet of a speech Sherrod gave in 2009.  In the clip Sherrod, who is African American, recounts an incident in which Roger Spooner, a poor white farmer, approached her for help in saving his farm from foreclosure.  She says she handed him off to a white lawyer rather than devote the necessary time and resources to his case.   Of course we now know the clip was edited and posted out of context:  in the full version of the speech, Ms. Sherrod goes on to say she later helped save the Mr. Spooner’s farm after she saw the lawyer had been mishandling the farmer’s case.  Sherrod was using this episode to illustrate how it changed her views on race and poverty.

In today’s 24 hour newscycle, social media sourcing has become commonplace for reporters, bloggers and general consumers.  Social media has truly leveled the playing field, empowering the public to determine what is newsworthy.  However, just becuase it’s on the internet does not make it true.  More than ever, both the media and consumers need to check the facts to prevent the spread of misinformation.  Anyone can launch a blog or post a video that distorts information, trashes a competing company or spreads false rumors about a brand, product or individual.  Many companies have been burned by rumors started online, and the impact can be devasting to personal and corporate repulations alike. 

In this case, Breitbart’s post had further consequences than even he intended.  His real target was the NAACP, who just a week earlier had accused elements of the socially conservative tea party group of racism.  Sherrod was simply collateral damage, but the implications of his post extend far beyond one woman’s damaged reputation.  It’s a wake up call to ensure that all of us check our facts and do the research needed to make informed decisions. 

Robert Gibbs Apologizes to Former USDA employee Shirley Sherrod

In the June 7th issue of Newsweek, Daniel Lyons writes a column titled “Facebook’s False Contrition,” in which he proclaims that he is deactivating his Facebook account because of the recent privacy fiasco. I have to admit, the article got a little under my skin. His reasoning for deactivation was a culmination of his anger at the company for sharing information with advertisers. He’s not alone. Thousands joined a Facebook group (how ironic) threatening to quit the site if the privacy issue wasn’t taken care of. Modifications were made and the uproar died down – for now at least.

What annoyed me about Mr. Lyon’s reasoning is that he is angry that Facebook considers its advertisers customers and not the site’s users. Well, duh. As a member of Facebook, I’m not paying for the service, and considering the company is expected to bring in $1 billion this year, they’re getting that dough somewhere. And why not? There are 500 million members on Facebook. As an advertiser, if you’re not on Facebook you’re missing a great opportunity to get in front of your target audience (because they’re ALL there). Why then is it so surprising that member’s information is being shared with advertisers?

And this is only the beginning. Information sharing via social networking sites is only getting more sophisticated. I recently connected with an old friend who works for a company called Media 6 Degrees. The company helps clients to connect with customers through “social targeting.” In other words, they help companies reach potential customers by tracking the movement of their “friends” on social networks. For example, I interact with my friend Sarah frequently on social networking sites. I also recently purchased a pair of Adidas shoes online. The likelihood that Sarah might also prefer Adidas shoes is pretty high. Media 6 Degrees lets Adidas know that Sarah is probably someone they should be targeting with an ad on one of her social networking sites. Pretty clever.

Dare I say – I actually appreciate the sophistication of it. I encounter hundreds of ads every day (you do too). Wouldn’t it be nice to see ads that might interest me? Unfortunately many people don’t feel the same way. I agree that my privacy is important, but I’m also not naive to the fact that I can have a presence on social media sites and still keep my anonymity. That’s just not how they work. If you’re uncomfortable with it then you may want to consider (gasp) disappearing from social media sites all together. Well, let’s not get crazy.

At Maven, we are always looking to promote our clients in new and creative ways.  And when there is no “breaking” news to announce on behalf of your clients, a good PR firm will find ways to create their own.

Salon Vanity by Edmondo Blando on the 10! Show

Excel Physical Therapy and Fitness and Salon Vanity by Edmondo Blando, are two consumer clients whose clients include many brides-to-be looking to gear up for their big day.  Since June is the most popular month of the year to get married, we thought why not pitch a targeted broadcast segment focusing specifically on weddings? With broadcast coverage in mind, we approached the NBC 10! Show with the idea of launching a “wedding special” featuring both clients. The producers loved the idea of putting together a show about the hottest trends in weddings in the hottest month to get married. With a tight time line of three weeks, wedding special feature grew from two segments into an entire hour-long program dedicated to the hottest wedding trends – everything from flowers, dresses, dances, hair & makeup, wedding planners, fitness, food and more with an audience consisting entirely of brides-to-be. Maven and the NBC 10! team divided and conquered the show and all of its various components.

Excel Physical Therapy and Fitness on the 10! Show

In addition to our two clients, Maven secured fabulous wedding consultant Vinnie D’Adamo of Kaleidoscope Solutions to cover wedding planning trends, and high end bridal boutique Bridals by Danielle to showcase the hottest wedding dress trends for the season. We outlined the segments, developed key messages for guests, media trained the spokesperson and practiced run-throughs with all our segment guests to ensure the show was flawless.

As well as conducting the orchestra of semi-live television (the 10! Show is taped at 10am as if live but then plays as is at 11am), Maven was charged with filling the 50-seat audience entirely with brides-to-be and assemble a gift bag for each. We ended the bride search with a waiting list 15 brides deep and a very excited studio audience. In addition, gift bags for the audience turned out wonderfully with a value of more than $500 each.

The icing on the wedding cake was a special giveaway to one lucky bride in the audience. Maven was able to secure:

A three-day/2-night Luxury Included® Honeymoon to any of the twelve Sandals Resorts with locations in Jamaica, Antigua, St. Lucia and the Bahamas. The lucky couple’s Luxury Included® stay includes lavish accommodations, all meals, including gourmet dining and anytime snacks, premium brand beverages, daily & nightly entertainment, an array of land and water-sports including snorkeling and scuba, gratuities, and transfers to and from the resort designated airport.

The excited Sandals Resorts' winner!

The brides had no idea about their chance to win this special getaway when signing up for the show, but they were thrilled to find out! The winner was thrilled and Maven basked in its once in a lifetime Oprah-inspired moment.

Watch our clients’ segments below as seen by the estimated 27,000 daily viewers of the 10! Show. Maven placed the videos of their segments on their respective websites and facebook pages and made sure people saw how great they were and are! We owe the 10! Show team and everyone who helped out a HUGE thank you! Please visit the websites of those who donated to the gift bags at the end of this post. In addition, you can find more behind the scenes photos on Maven’s facebook page.

Everyone was elated with how the wedding special turned out, especially and most importantly, our clients, who were thrilled with the exposure the segment provided.

Gift Bag Contributors:

Sandals Resorts

Beke Beau

Bellezza Veils

Brandywine Valley Talent

Bridals by Danielle

Byers’ Choice, LTD.

Carl Alan Floral Designs

Carolina Pad

Chic Gems

dressy.com

Elegant Events

Excel Physical Therapy and Fitness

It’s in the Stars

Kaleidoscope Solutions

Larmon Studios

Marriott Philadelphia West

Philadelphia Marriott Downtown

Pictures by Todd,

Priscilla of Boston

Proud to Plan

Queen of Hearts Weddings

Ritz-Carlton, Philadelphia

Sabrina Ann

Sagets Formal Wear

Salon Vanity by Edmondo Blando

Silver Image Photography

Spell it Out

Stella & Dot

But what about the more serious, and sometimes violent, effects of the immediate connectivity of social networking? 140 characters or a viral Facebook invitation allows for little information and organization, but  excitement translates very well.

Recently, a couple of blocks from the Maven offices, a ‘flash mob‘ (which isn’t as risque as it sounds) assembled in The Gallery, a small Center City mall. The group of 150 high school aged kids didn’t dance or pillow fight, which would have been adorable. They instead ended up ransacking Macy’s department store and running ammuck. Supposedly the mob was organized in the spirit of the massive snowball fight that also occurred. But in true Philly fashion, the friendly fire turned into a wildfire.

Like any new technology or fad, it can be used for good or evil, mostly depending on the intentions of its participants. With so many on social networks and its potential growth, I just hope no one take it too far and ruins it for the rest of us, especially when my commute and day could be unexpectedly brightened by a dancing flash mob! I am also eagerly awaiting day when a criminal’s defense is “twitter made me do it.”

The client should make their own updates when building credibility is the main objective of the campaign.  One of the biggest benefits of social networking is to connect with a large number of people and ideally to eventually translate that relationship offline. If this is one of the goals of the Twitter account then the page should be set up as a personal page of someone within a company, rather than a company Twitter page.  This allows for a more personal connection that provides insights that don’t appear to be churned from the company’s PR team (even if they are). Even if the Twitter updater is an official spokesperson of the company, followers tend to take the information as more credible because they “know” the person from whom the information is coming. Like blogging, information posted to a Twitter page should be transparent. If the bio on the page is of an individual, then that individual should be the one making the updates. The instant that it’s discovered that someone is tweeting for them, especially when it’s the spokesperson for the company, all credibility is lost and it will be very hard, if not impossible, to regain. 

The key thing to remember here is that although tweets need to be fairly frequent, ideally multiple times per day, they’re only 140 characters (including the all essential link).  Tweets can be made while standing in line, sitting on the train, waiting for a meeting to start or in an elevator.  Although it’s a real commitment, it’s not a real time sucker, which helps when selling the “client update” option.  

On the other hand, it’s okay for an agency to make updates when the account has been created for a specific project or event with a definitive end date.  We’ve found that creating a Twitter account is particularly useful when planning an event and hoping to build some buzz around it beforehand.  Because these types of tweets aren’t necessarily company insight, but more facts about the event, it’s more accepted that someone other than a company insider might be making them.  However, make sure the profile for the account is more general, with the name of the event rather than of an individual person. 

Another example of when it’s okay for a Twitter page to be updated by an agency is when the page is that of the company’s and not a particular individual within the company.  The key here is that the agency will need access to company information so that the tweets are relevant and insightful, rather than an obvious attempt to distribute key messages.   

So, when you’re ready to build a Twitter account into a strategic marketing plan, make sure you define the objectives first, and the answer as to “who will tweet” will become more obvious.

Players, coaches and football operations personnel can use Twitter, Facebook and other social media up to 90 minutes before kickoff, and after the game following traditional media interviews. The use of social media by NFL game officials and officiating department personnel will be prohibited at all times. The league, which has always barred play-by-play descriptions of games in progress, also extended that ban to social media platforms.

While fantasy football to some may seem like a stupid game that takes up way too much time, it’s a $1.5 billion industry with close to 30 million active players. Additionally, leagues have been formed on Facebook, and there are even social networking sites just for fantasy football. For those of you who do play, here are several ways to use twitter to help your team win your league’s super bowl.

Many of your players have twitter accounts and following them may be actually like coaching your team. To find if any of your players are on twitter go to: twitter-athletes.

If you have a twitter account, do a search for fantasy football or #fantasyfootball to see what people are saying about fantasy football.  What’s pretty cool is that there are so many tweets that you can do the same search a little later and get completely different results.

Many broadcasters and fantasy football websites have accounts on Twitter, and they’re all posting their thoughts, opinions, and articles.  A good list of people and websites in fantasy football is on the WeFollow directory.

You can also pose questions to your followers who may also have teams and have “insiders knowledge” about who start or sit each week. Just think about the millions of people whose thoughts you can read in real time-on how players are performing, any recent injuries or other game time updates. It really adds an interesting element to the game. Also polling your followers may just help you make your decision an easy one. Just don’t blame them, when they get knocked out on the first play or throw 5 interceptions. This game isn’t science, which is why it’s fun!

So as I enter Week 3, I’m 1-1, but hope to complete a big trade this week, which should put me in place to win this year’s championship. Good luck to all!

It is, however, a bit disappointing to see so many companies jump on board without first doing their homework, and as a result now face a failed (or failing) social media strategy.  Here are a few questions that your company should address before deciding to start any social media strategy, whether it’s a blog, facebook page or twitter: 

Do you have a dedicated person whose job responsibility it is to maintain your blog (or other social media outlet)?
The #1 reason for a failed social media strategy is lack of maintenance.  Most companies go gangbusters in the beginning, posting as much as possible, but after time, sometimes just a few weeks, posts begin to slow, until finally the last update was six months ago.  I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again, not maintaining a blog is worse than never starting one in the first place.  Not only does it show a lack of dedication but it also reflects poorly on the company as a whole.  A sort of black eye.  To prevent this from happening, a person or persons should be assigned to the maintenance of the decided upon social media outlet, posting and updating regularly.  This is a task that needs to be built into a job description, not added as an aside during a meeting. Maintenance of social media takes time, a surprising amount of time, and needs to be taken into consideration from the beginning. 

Do you have a plan in place to promote your chosen social media?
So your company has a blog that’s the most informative in the industry.  The only problem is no one is reading it.  There is more information on the web now than ever before (and will be even more in 30 seconds), so how do you direct target audiences to your information?  A plan should decided on and in place from the beginning.  Maybe your company has a twitter or facebook account and every time a blog post goes up it’s automatically posted and tweeted out.  Creating a dedicated email blast to appropriate audiences giving them a tease of the post and directing them to where they can read more is a great way to increase visibility.  Another tactic to give legs to a blog is to let other, similar blogs know about it, and ask that they link to it. This is especially effective for blogs that already have a high readership.  You can also link back to and refer to older posts in more current posts, which is particularly beneficial for those who are newer to the blog.

Do you have a company policy in place about who can post and what they can and can’t say?
If your company’s social media outlet is updated by more than one person, intended content should be made clear from the beginning as well as what is considered inappropriate.  Although some of the most interesting blogs stir a little controversy, you need to ensure that it’s controversy that you and your company are comfortable with. Some companies go as far as creating a social media handbook.

How will you keep your information relevant?
Your company may have decided to start a blog because someone had a great idea that was relevant at the time. However, that trend/topic, etc. is old news now, and the blog is getting stale. Or, there’s just a lack of ideas or inspiration to keep up weekly or daily posts.  There should be a plan in place to gather new and interesting content.  This may include creating RSS feeds on certain topics that might be relevant for commentary, or setting aside 20-30 minutes a day reading other blogs on similar topics that might spark ideas. Again, time is a necessary component in keeping a blog relevant.   

A comprehensive social media strategy can be a great thing for a company, but answering these questions first is essential for long-term success.

As an avid twitter-er, I can relate to this cartoon. Now that we have Twitter, Facebook and a whole gaggle of applications at our fingertips, thoughts have been reduced to 140 characters and activities summed up by twitpics. Not that I think my followers are hanging on to every character I tweet, but it is fun and somewhat comforting to share in the interconnectivity of social networking.

We all remember the confusion and Armageddon when Twitter was down for a morning (yes JUST a morning and people freaked out- “but how will my followers know what I had for breakfast?”). If you don’t recall, Twitter was attacked (so dramatic) and the site was down- here is a NYT blog post about it. As much as I poke fun, I was one of those people feeling in the dark that morning. I was not wondering what @mikegross144 was doing at the moment though. I was missing my usual stream of RT-ed news articles, odd findings, area events and hilarious commentary. It is a living and personalized daily RSS feed of anything and everything from friends, icons, strangers and the lovable weirdos- and I think it is here to stay.

Oh and by the way- I had a muffin for breakfast.

So you’ve created a facebook page, Twitter account and you’ve started a blog and downloaded the latest i-phone application. But now what? Will the right people see the content you’ve created and if so, can you keep them engaged in your brand?

While designers continue to create tools to compete and keep up with the latest social media craze, marketers struggle to determine how to leverage their brand amongst all the social media clutter. To properly utilize the widgets, pages and other tools that you’ve created, you have to make sure you have a strategy behind it all, and you’re likely to need a little public relations. To truly gain leverage from social media, we’ve identified a game plan to help you gain awareness for your brand. Maven has created a social media 101 presentation as well.

Before your start social networking, create a plan. It’s important to set clear, measurable objectives for your social media plan. Why should your brand create or even take part in an online community? How will that brand be represented in these communities? What is the goal of engaging in social media? Is it to receive feedback from an exclusive group, drive traffic to your web site or raise awareness? No matter what the reason, define the “why” before the “what”.