This is some great information from Dan Zarella. In the post he looks through some of the science of Facebook, things like Readability of Facebook sharing and days of week for posts. Worth taking a look at
(Source: SEOMOZ)
Following on from the 2008 conference in Brighton this conference will bring together those interested in applying strategic communications, marketing and behaviour change methodology to solve key social challenges. Speakers will be from areas such as social marketing, the behavioural sciences, strategic communications, health promotion, community engagement, policy development and advocacy, and more.
Themes that will be used to structure the conference key notes, parallel programme and workshops will be:
Taking place in Citywest Dublin on April 11 & 12, you can book tickets here
Really worth a read
Last year I posted about how we can sometimes operate within a bubble of the importance of the projects we are working on, they are all consuming to us, but it is important to step outside of them and challenge how effective they are for people who are outside of this bubble.
At the time I said
I certainly think that we need to make our communications clearer so they stand out……. stuff I did see seemed to be quite wordy and cluttered. Whereas the best outdoor ad I saw was for Coopers Beer (I cant seem to find it on line) and it simply had a bottle of beer and the text underneath simply said …. “If its not in your local……move house”. Genius.
Well a year later I have managed to track down the ad, and even though I was one word out on the copy, it still resonates with me as a really strong ad.
Over two years ago I posted on this blog about the need for organisations to appoint Directors of Appreciation. At the time I said:
I don’t know. But, outside of its mission, what is the most important thing a non-profit does? In my book it’s…..Appreciate.
As soon as we start to take our donations for granted, we are in trouble. As soon as we don’t treat each donation as a personal gift to us, we are in trouble. As soon as we start to send out mail merged receipts that don’t talk personally about why that person donated, we are in trouble.
I know it is difficult to wade through all the donations we get and treat each one personally, but we need to. We need to invest in this and that is why I believe non-profits need to consider appointing a Director of Appreciation. Their job description is simple:
Make sure that everyone who connects with your cause feels appreciated and ensure that every contact every single staff member has results in the donor feeling special
I think it is time for non-profits to consider such a role in their organisation
I still think this would be one of the most important posts a non profit could fill (I also think lots of companies could benefit from taking on this kind of thinking!)
So has anyone appointed a Director of Appreciation yet?
Bid for a Wii Fit and 2 Free Tickets to Fundraising Irelands Direct Marketing: Maximising the Impact seminar next Friday. The amount you bid gets donated to a charity of your choice!
Its simple all you have to do is tweet your bid and the charity you want to donate to. Use this tweet as your template
I Bid €XXX to win a Wii Fit & 2 tickets to @Fundraising_Ire seminar http://bit.ly/gOp5Mk. I will donate to @YourCharityName #MaxTheImpact
First United Canada wanted to show the positive impact of their work and so together with DDB they worked on a campaign that placed statues of homeless people in Vancouver. The statues actually represented real people who once were homeless and had been helped by First United.
The body sculptures were placed at three spots in the city of Vancouver t from 8:30 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. Wednesday, December 8th 2010.
During the full 90 minutes, slightly more than a 1500 people walked past the 3 empty shapes of homelessness. About 80 persons actually stopped to look more closely – or at least showed signs they had noticed there was no actual person present. Six people took photos, and 7 took a slip available at the sculpture that provided the link to a facebook profile (like this). Most people were focused on getting to where they were going and took little notice of the very visible familiar yet extraordinary shape.
When i first saw it I thought it ran for longer and in more locations, but perhaps this was just a test? Its a creative way to play on some of the typical imagery of homelessness, that many homeless organisations are afraid to use, but to use those images/stereotypes to talk about impact. I would be very interested to know when they went into this campaign what they were hoping to achieve and how they measured it?
The link below shows a short video of the campaign, which is worth watching.
Outdoor ad: First United: Sculptures
I came across this on the BestAdsonTV site
(Article Source: New Media Age, Jan 12th, 2010. By Gina Lovett)
Some good news for Digital…as reported in New Media Age, Cadbury have made between 2-3 pounds on every 1 they are spending on digital advertising. Certainly one of the challenges digital faces is how to attribute sales, especially of FMCG products, to digital activity. This article shows how digital is effective and how Cadbury’s measured results.
Juliet Du Vivier, digital strategist at Cadbury’s media agency PHD Media, who worked with Consumer Connect to track sales of Creme Egg, says that the “GfK MEP and Consumer Connect show real sales, helping the market move and increase investment.”
According to PHD Media group manager and Cadbury account manager Katrin Schlenzka, this is the first time that a brand has been able to attribute uplift in sales to specific channels, as well as indicating the relationship between channels.
“While Cadbury has had its own econometric model for a while, it hasn’t been consistent and hasn’t looked at the role between each media,” she said. “What the Google study did was drill down by media to see the relationship between TV and digital, as well as breaking down the channels themselves.”
Online activity for the Cadbury Dairy Milk campaign, evaluated through GfK NOP’s 7,800-strong Media Efficiency Panel, used TV, Facebook, YouTube Promoted Videos, YouTube home-page takeovers and display banner advertising. Such activity delivered more than £2 of short-term sales for every £1 spent.
GfK NOP divisional director Babita Earle said, “Cadbury got it right because of the complementary fashion it planned it. There was less reach through TV, so the online ads could make more of an impact.”
Piers North, Yahoo UK head of strategy said that the industry still has a way to go, however, before such studies have a wider impact
“The money will often come from other traditional media so it’s seen as a risk,” he said. “There’s always the concern that the investment won’t pay off. The nature of online is instant – we’re so used to implementing a search campaign or doing DR in real time – but a sense of longer-term vision and co-operation between media agencies and clients that allows you to plan across platforms is needed if this is to really take off.”
(Article Source: New Media Age, Jan 12th, 2010. By Gina Lovett)
Concern Worldwide are a very
progressive organisation when it comes to embracing new ways to
communicate and ultimately fundraise. Yesterday to mark the first
anniversary of the Haiti disaster they went all out on Facebook,
running an awareness campaign. Neil Rooney, their e-marketing
leader, explained to me that they
… used a
Facebook specific advertising solution called a ’24 hour reach
block’. The reach block delivers the first 4-5 ad placements
someone sees when they log into Facebook and allows ad placements
in users homepage.
Here is what that looked like
when I logged in to my account 
Not only did they
do this but they made sure that when you got to their page on
Facebook it was all about the work they have done in Haiti,
To create awareness of the work that
Concern have been doing in Haiti we have added a ‘Haiti
update’ tab to our profile. The tab acts as the landing page for
visitors that have not previously ‘liked’ concern and outlines the
key areas that Concern and
ECHO have been working on. In addition, within the tab we
have embedded a campaign specific video that we stream from our
YouTube channel, an interactive Google map that details what has
been achieved in each location Concern is working in and twitter
feeds from @concern as well as staff we have in the field at the
moment.
Here is what the page looks like (click here to go to the actual page on
facebook) 
This is great
stuff by Concern, really getting to grips with the technology that
is available to them to do something really important….Talk about
the Impact. While I’m at it, kudos to Concern for the
homepage of their website, one of the first things that
my eye was drawn to was the How Money was Spent pie on the right
hand side, and they have rightly won an award for their
transparency.
You may have seen this if you follow AdFreak on
twitter. Very well done and funny take on how the John St
agency planned an 8 year olds birthday party! As someone
who talks about movements alot, I loved the ending!
(Source: AdFreak)
This is a nice round up from E-consultancy of the Christmas e-commerce stats in the UK and US.
(source: Graham Charlton, E-Consultancy, Jan 7th, 2011)
Online Christmas shopping in the UK (Tealeaf)
- 44% of Britain’s online adult population upped their online spending this Christmas compared to 2009, pushing the total amount spent online to £2.8bn.
- 45% of those who shopped online encountered website problems while doing their Christmas shopping, and 32% abandoned purchases as a result.
Internet usage over Christmas (eDigital Research)
- 86% of UK consumers logged onto the internet over Christmas Day and Boxing Day this year, an increase of over 10% when compared with figures from 2009.
- 22% of online users accessed the internet on their phones, confirming the importance of mobile commerce for retailers.
- 30% of online consumers used the internet to shop online on Boxing Day, while 62% of online consumers shopped for sale items and discounted products across the two days.
John Lewis (via IMRG)
- Online sales at John Lewis reached £500m this year, and sales in the five weeks to January 1 were up 42% on the same period last year.
Most popular UK online shopping destinations (Hitwise)
- On Boxing Day, eBay and Amazon were the most visited e-commerce sites, with 9.96% and 7.02% of visits respectively.
- After the two pureplay giants, Argos, Next, and M&S were the most popular online retail sites.
US Holiday season(comScore)
- Online retail spending for the entire November to December 2010 holiday season reached $32.6bn, a 12% increase on 2009, and an all time record. US holiday shopping 2005 – 2010 (Volusion)
- This infographic charts the amount spend online in the US on Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and the busiest day of the year since 2005.
Redwind Software used iPod Nanos as name tags when they attended the Appy Awards.
check their site out to see how to do it
I came across this on AdFreak and really like how they capture the toddlers trail of destruction…which of course has been made easier because of the Huggies Little Movers nappies (diapers!)
Exciting news!
I have a FREE ticket to the Ask Direct Kick start 2011 event to giveaway. And there are two easy ways to win a ticket
For those on twitter: All you have to do is re- tweet this:
I’d like to attend #kickstart2o11 @conorbyrne @ask_direct http://wp.me/pe4k0-Js (RT to win Free Ticket)
For those who arent on twitter: All you have to do is post a comment here and in less than 140 characters say why you would like to attend
I will give the ticket away on Monday when I will randomly pick someone from all the entries. The event is on next Friday, more details here
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