#SMCSEA

The event with Jason Falls was probably a bit hard to take for some of those in the audience – people Falls would lovingly refer to as “hippies” or “social media purists.” Falls focused on how social media can actually be used to move beyond the lovey-dovey feel good and have a true impact on sales and the bottom line.

You could actually hear the gasps from people in the audience during a couple times when Falls would say something that no one expected a “guru” to say, but that’s because he doesn’t see himself as a guru, but part of the larger marketing mix. Falls also showed some great examples of how brands are using social media for real results, even without gimmicks and fancy campaigns (in fact, one was even a drug store that simply gave their users an easier way to access their circular via their Facebook page).

For more info on moving the needle, you can check out http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com/.

gdgt Live

If you’re into shiny gadgets, free drinks and swag, then you should’ve been at the gdgt Live Seattle event last night. Some of the makers of the hottest new gadgets on (and about to enter) the market were on hand to demo their products and let users get a little handsy.

The SCG team made the rounds and were delighted to see Dragon Dictation (from Nuance) there demoing their speech-to-text application for iPhone and iPad. The software makes it fairly easy to dictate and then allows you to send it to text, email, Twitter, and even Facebook.

The team also met the social media players from @virginamerica and got to talk shop with the growing team about what tools and tactics they’re using in their quest to make passengers’ travel just that much better. They recently rolled out a new version of their in-flight entertainment system, Red, and were showing video and talking about some of the new features which include: The Red Store (think SkyMall in digital form, but with a $38,000 diamond encrusted iPhone), the ability to keep a tab in the system, and Google Maps integration that brings terrain views to passengers.

Lastly, we got a chance to get hands-on with the Windows Phone 7 operating system (but sadly not an actual handset) as we stopped by the Windows booth and talked with our friend Brian Seitz (who also works with a great Seattle group called Cold Pavement). Besides the new mobile OS, the Windows area also had some Windows 7 goodness going on as well as an Xbox set up (although I’m not sure what they were doing on that thing other than playing games).

And now for photos…

Ron, Courtney, and Aaron with Microsoft’s Brian Seitz. See the Windows Phone 7 on display?

Aaron with our new friend Jill from Virgin America. She runs the @virginamerica Twitter handle! Sorry for the lack of focus.

I’m fairly sure that most in attendance at last week’s Social Media Conference Northwest 2010 would agree that the event was a hit. Check out this article in the Herald which features our very own Clay McDaniel for a good overview of the content.

Also, check out the Social Media Conference Northwest 2010 site for great video interviews with attendees and presenters.

Here are a few of our favorites:

We’re about to give you the chance to actually follow through on one of our favorite empty threats from childhood.   “I’m going to run away and join the circus” used to just be an unfulfilled promise you made to your parents when you didn’t want to eat your vegetables, but at the upcoming Twestival Seattle on March 25th, we’re giving you the chance to make it a reality.

Since Twestival Seattle is going down at Emerald City Trapeze this time around, Spring Creek Group decided to sponsor a little “Air Time,” where a few lucky attendees will get their chance to fly through the air with the greatest of ease (under the guidance of some trained trapeze professionals, of course).   If hurtling through the air at rapid speeds isn’t your bag, you can still get your trapeze fix as you check out a professional flying show later in the evening.   For all you former circus runaways, there are 60 flying spots available– so if you’re interested, be sure to drop a line to ShaunaCausey@gmail.com. 

One hundred percent of this edition of Twestival Seattle’s proceeds will go directly to Concern Worldwide, an international humanitarian organization that works to make education more accessible for some of the world’s poorest children.  

Bottom line:  Twestival Seattle is benefiting a great cause, and it’s always a good time with some good folks- so we hope to see you there!  For more details, and to register for the event, head here.

For a shop that focuses on three key areas (analytics, engagement and campaigns) dividing and conquering the massive list of available panels at SxSWi becomes a somewhat easier task.  However, even when you attack the festival with a team of eager attendees, you’re left with that nagging question:  “What if I missed the single most-important panel of SxSWi?”

On that note, here are just a few of the things that caught our attention at SxSWi so far:

The Future of Mobile

When you think about the Web, it’s easy to picture a laptop or even a desktop, but the fact of the matter is that more Web traffic comes from handheld mobile devices these days than from any other types of devices. In this talk, Nielsen presented their outlook for the mobile market and predicted that smartphones will dethrone feature phones as the dominating type of mobile device by Q3 2011. Nielsen also talked about the importance applications play in the fast-approaching world of mobile. According to their research it is the teen set that is driving the market for paid applications, but mysteriously, those purchases of applications suddenly drop once those teens reach college age . . . weird.  

From the looks of things, the revolution will not be televised, my friends.  Instead, the revolution, led by teens with their parents’ credit cards, will be live-streamed and simultaneously talked about on social networks – all from mobile devices.

Wall-E and Eve: A Story of Great Content Development

You’ve all heard the phrase “Content is King” more times than anyone would care to admit, but it’s not volume that creates lasting impressions and cohesive campaigns, it’s cautiously-executed content that tells a story. When author and CEO of Brain Traffic, Kristina Halvorson, started off with a story about Wall-E, you immediately knew the presentation following would be a great one.  What Halvorson did, rather eloquently, was equate the eternal search for great content to Wall-E’s daily grind of picking through the garbage left on Earth and sometimes, when he’s extremely lucky, finding a treasure that is so precious he takes it home and essentially catalogs it for later. Even more than that, once Eve comes along with her shiny, Apple-like design, Wall-E shares the treasures he’s picked out of the junk – that’s the great content, people. For more on Halvorson’s content strategy teachings, check out her book Content Strategy for the Web.

Digging Just Got Easier

As Saturday night fell on the anything-but-sleepy Austin, the two guys famous for sitting on a couch and talking about stories that other people brought to their attention took center stage at Stubb’s for a live version of Digg Nation. Besides Alex Albrecht and Kevin Rose’s normal antics and banter, the show also introduced the new and improved Digg.com that will be launching soon. The site boasts an entirely new backend and tech that allows for one-click Digging as well as bringing back leaderboards. You can sign up for the new Digg here: http://digg.com/new.

The event was packed and although we never found two people we were looking for, I did manage to see iJustine and stood in Robert Scoble’s way as he was trying to get up the stairs.

As a bonus cherry on top of the sundae of awesome that actually turned out to be the Digg event, Leo Laporte showed up with his live-streaming backpack and camera rig and crowd-surfed the mob of Digg Nation onlookers.

Finally, as if the show needed anything else before The Walkmen took the stage, Alex brought out Robert Rodriguez to talk about his new film (one that he scripted and originally had turned down), Predators. The flick is a reboot of the original Predator franchise and takes place on the Predators’ home planet.

More to come from deep in the heart of Texas. . .

So come see Clay talk about Measurement and Analytics tools, and come say hi to Grant and I as we walk around soaking up knowledge.  Hope to see you all there tomorrow.

Blogs, the long-suffering workhorses of the Internet, are often thought of as an excellent way to communicate with others online.  However, a “blog post,” when used to convey one’s opinion, comes with one inherent flaw: it requires the use of words, and words alone can simply not be trusted.

Fortunately, in the entire history of the world, numbers have never been used to lie or deceive any one in any way.  That is why, periodically, we like to take a look at “Social Media by the Numbers” in order to cut through the empty rhetoric often present in the busy world of social media and get down to some serious and objective truth. 

• Percentage of journalists in a recent study who say social media is an important tool for producing and reporting the stories they write:  56%
• Number of unique visits to Twitter.com in January:  73.5 million
• Minimum number of Olympic athletes who dislike NBC’s Olympic coverage, according to NBC.com’s own “Olympic Pulse” Twitter feed:  1
• Dollar amount of voucher offered to filmmaker Kevin Smith following his removal from a Southwest Airlines plane for being “too fat” to travel, which prompted a backlash via Twitter:  $100
• Percentage of people, according to a CNN.com poll, who agree with Southwest Airlines’ decision: 58%
• Minimum number of photos of 9/11 hijackers that have been appropriated for Facebook advertisements regarding changes in Michigan’s auto insurance policy:  1
• Number of incarcerated individuals’ Facebook profiles that British Justice Secretary Jack Straw has requested be shut down, due to the fact that these profiles are being used to harass the individuals’ former victims:  More than 30
• Altitude, in feet, which Toshiba UK launched an “ordinary living room chair” for an ad campaign:    98,268
• Number of class action lawsuits filed against Google due to privacy concerns over their new Google Buzz application: 1
• Percentage of social sharing on the web driven by Facebook: 44%
• Number of Facebook’s new environmentally-friendly “green data centers” that will be partially powered by coal:  1
• Breakdown of our emotional reaction to the “new social statement site” pleaserobme.com:  70% amused, 30% terrified

Also, as with most of these events, the great content comes out when the audience starts firing questions, so for that we thank you.

Below is the deck Clay presented during the luncheon for your reference.

We look forward to interacting with and collaborating with you all in the future.

Job Description: Marketing and Research Manager

Spring Creek Group is recruiting a talented individual to assist our Marketing and Business Development activities, specifically focusing on Marketing Communications, Research and Content Development.  This opportunity requires someone who is highly organized and detail oriented, computer and Internet savvy and skilled in Social Media Channel development.  The ideal candidate will have passion and experience publishing across multiple channels, contacts across the industry, and ability to cultivate a community of partners in order to raise Spring Creek Group’s regional and national brand awareness. This position will report to Spring Creek Group’s Marketing and Business Development Department Head.

Overall Role & Responsibilities:

• Support the Marketing and Business Development Department Head and Business Development Director, working closely with other department staff to create and publish relevant, interesting and timely information that can be syndicated in national publications and for individual case studies.

• Manage the Spring Creek Group editorial calendar; working with all of the Spring Creek Group content creators on daily channels such as blogs, as well as developing industry leading reports and analysis for national publication.

• Utilize listening and monitoring technology tools in order to research and collect timely data for reports.

• As a member of the national advertising and Social Media Community, be the company’s first-look into emerging trends in Social Media; identifying ideas, information and opportunities about behaviors in syndicated video sites/applications, mobile, widgets, blogs, social networks, and other social media.

• Speak at, and attend, local and national Panels and Conferences, serving as a representative of Spring Creek Group to relay case studies, strategies, and insights.

• Work with the Community Managers from Spring Creek Group’s Partners to develop shared content, leverage connections, and cultivate new industry contacts.

• Work closely with Spring Creek Group’s creative team to develop video and audio content, including interviews, and animated marketing materials.

• Develop ideas and presentations for pitching SCG attendance on industry panels.

• Work closely with management on the campaign building process, including set-up and participation in brainstorming sessions.

Requirements:

• Strong written and verbal communication skills and a proficiency in Microsoft PowerPoint, Word, Excel, & and other Windows based applications. (Proficiency in Adobe Photoshop, Camtasia Studio and other creative tools a plus.)

• At least 3 years of professional experience in a similar position and/or related field.

• Experience developing presentations and speaking on industry panels.

• Contacts and connections within the national Social Media and Advertising Communities.

• Proven background with a variety of Social Media Channels for personal and/or corporate brand development.

• “Can-do” enthusiastic attitude.

• Ability and willingness to travel for short periods of time if necessary.

If you subscribe to George Santayana’s thought that those who forget history are doomed to repeat it, then rest assured that if any SCG employees go on to become city planners they won’t be building a city in tidal flats or leaving a 15 foot difference in elevation between sidewalks and streets.  No, we didn’t take a field trip to city hall (as evidenced by the fact that we still have our work ethic), but we did take the semi-famous Seattle Underground Tour under our new Pioneer Square home.

While most of us knew about the almost-forgotten Seattle that resides about two stories below our 311 ½ Occidental Ave. S. offices, surprisingly not many in the group had been on the actual tour (Someone must have also given the tour guide a heads-up in regarding our senses of humor, because the tour read more like a standup show than a stuffy tour through history).

We learned about Seattle’s litigious side—a side that was present from the very start— with Henry Yesler suing the city using a loophole in the tax law.  Oh yeah, and he got away with it three times while he was . . . wait for it . . . mayor.

We also learned that the second-largest donor to the Seattle Public School system was a madam by the name of Lou Graham, who owned and operated a brothel on the site of what is now the Union Gospel Mission.  Back in the day, a large number of Seattle women were involved in the “oldest profession” (although they listed their professions as “seamstress” when asked by authorities) as Seattle was a lively port filled with freshly-rich travelers returning from the Yukon and wide-eyed prospectors about to make the journey north.

Proving just exactly how truly geeky I am, I downloaded a Ghost Radar application for my iPhone as we entered what was supposedly a “haunted” vault. The app costs $0.99, and while I’m fairly sure all I did was give nearly a dollar to some college kid sitting in his mom’s basement, I had to try it out – it’s technology.  It basically told me exactly what the guys from Ghost Hunters found out – there’s nothing.

All in all, the tour was great. We learned a bit about the area we work and live in every day and got to spend some time outside the walls of SCG together.  If you’re looking for a bit of history and don’t mind doing something that might be a tad bit cliché, definitely check out the Underground Tour for yourself.