Over the Labor Day weekend I caught up on the TivoCast items I downloaded from Rocketboom, and saw this clip that featured an interview with Susan Crawford about OneWebDay (OWD). OWD is a yearly celebration of the Internet that takes place on September 22^nd. What a great idea! As I listened to Crawford’s passionate statements about the yearly global event, I decided to go ahead and check out OWD’s website.

As I perused the blog, I came across one post (“Have you thanked the web lately?”) that noted “OneWebDay gives us a chance to reflect about the ways in which the internet has changed the world, and to shed light on information-flow blockades around the globe.” and provided a list of suggested activities one could take part in to participate in the global celebration. Since there’s not an event in Atlanta this year, I thought I’d share the online activities for OneWebDay to help spread the word and maybe gain interest in a local event for next year.

Their main goal this year is to encourage people to make their own short videos and post them on blip.tv or YouTube tagged “onewebday2007″. Some of the suggested topics for user generated videos include:

• how the web has changed your life
• how you’d like the web to change the world in the future
• highlights of what you’ve seen online the day you make the video
• your favorite online event ever
• something you’ve done online with other people in other countries

I think these are great topics, and if I didn’t have this thing about posting video of myself on YouTube – I’d definitely submit one. I don’t mind writing though, so I thought I’d take a minute to talk about how the web has changed my life.

Through the years I’ve had access to the Internet, I have used it as a tool to meet other people and connect in a fashion that wouldn’t be possible without the use of the web. Growing up, many of my friends were people that I met online in IRC chat rooms. I wasn’t the coolest kid in school (which I know is hard for many of you to imagine now), so I didn’t have many friends and I had a hard time confiding in others. With the anonymity of the internet, I was able to discuss issues and obtain viewpoints from others. Along the way, I found ways to express myself and build confidence in the person I was. Since those awkward years, I’ve managed to make real life friends, but I’m still in contact with a few of my IRC buddies, which makes me very happy; they were a key part in my formative years and I won’t ever forget them.

Since then, the Internet has played an even bigger role in my life. Without the Internet I:

• Wouldn’t have my awesome job
• Wouldn’t have found my awesome apartment (yay for Craigslist!)
• Wouldn’t have an efficient way to communicate with a large group of people all at once (where would we be without email or social networking sites?)
• Wouldn’t have met one of my very best friends

But enough about me…I want to hear how the Internet has changed the lives of our blog readers. For those of you without a YouTube-phobia, I encourage you to submit video for OneWebDay and share the link on this blog post. If you’d rather not create a video, at least share your thoughts and feelings on the Internet in the comments below. I’m fascinated by the different stories I’ve heard so far, I’d really like to hear yours!

Are you too good for Facebook? With your multi-million dollar homes, your Bugatti Veyron, and your fully-booked schedule of social gatherings … you can’t be expected to stay in touch with friends on Facebook, or - gasp - MySpace. That’s for “commoners.”

FINALLY, a social networking site for the rich and fabulous … aSmallWorld.com is a “private online community, which is designed for those who already have strong connections with one another.”

Before you get too excited, this is invitation-only from a “trusted member.” I mean, they can’t let just anyone in.

I’m sorry, I can’t help it. I try to give new technology a chance, I really do. And I usually credit companies for trying things, for sticking their necks out there, for attempting to innovate. But when I saw that Playboy was launching their own social networking site…well lets just say I can’t hold my tongue on this one.

On the Playboy U website, they describe the site as “an exclusive college-only non-nude social network. Here is where you can show your school pride, connect with other students and celebrate the social side of college.”

Finally, its here! A website where college kids can network with each other. It’s going to be a Golden Age! Why didn’t I think of that? Oh wait, I did think of that, a few minutes ago when I updated my Facebook status. You know Facebook, one of the most visited sites on the web. The one that was started in early 2004, and according to Wikipedia, has “the largest number of registered users among college-focused sites with over 34 million active members worldwide”.

And I’ve been thinking about all the reasons this won’t work but the biggest reason is very simple: females largely detest Playboy. At least the females I know. Heck, most females can’t stand Hooters, let alone Playboy. So getting females to sign up for this will probably be impossible. So then there are just the guys. Why do guys use social networks? Especially college guys? It’s not to chit-chat with their buddies. It’s to meet girls. College guys pretty much have three things on their minds, and they’re all called, “meet girls”.

What’s funny is, when I read this I assumed the the Playboy headquarters must be in some place like Big Piney, Wyoming (no offense to all of our Big Pineyian readership - we’re huge there). But no, Playboy HQ is in Chicago. So they should know better.

Yeah, this is going to be a big winner.

We all know MySpace and Facebook … LinkedIn. We’re now learning about sites like Twitter, Dandelife and many more.

Well, I was reading the Adfreak blog and it seems the folks from Adweek, Brandweek, Mediaweek, and Marketing y Medios recently launched a social networking site of their own, At The Roundtable. And, it’s pretty good. It’ll be interesting to watch this grow - and I’ll definitely be signing up. (ok, I already did.)

Certainly this was going to happen - social sites geared toward a specific industry. We already knew sites like Facebook that catered to the school set (even though the site is now for everyone), so industry social sites were only a matter of time.

So, I did a little “googling” and discovered there’s actually quite a few community-specific sites brewing right now:

• Shelfari - an online community for book lovers.
• Sermo - for physicians.
• Travbuddy - to find people traveling where you are, see reviews of places you want to go, and read experiences of users.
• MyChurch - a site for, well, Christian church-goers.
• Respectance - a social site for mourning the loss of loved ones.
• Flirtomatic - A dating site. Ok, I’ll be honest … the name just tickled me, so I had to include it.

Does anyone else know of social networking sites that are specific to an industry?

Nalini sent me this email the other day and rather than encouraging her to create a blog post about it (which is probably my first response to just about anything people at Spun tell me these days…Hey Jeff, check out this new Facebook app…Great, blog about it!…Hey Jeff, where are you going for lunch today?…Great, blog about it!), I figured I’d just throw up a quick post so people could hear about this pretty unique campaign and if you have any thoughts about it…Great, blog about it!

Enjoy:
I saw Katie checking out the site: http://www.1-18-08.com/ and thought it was really cool so I asked her to send me the link.

She also sent me the blog that had the article related to the site, which I think is even more interesting: “How do you advertise a movie with no name” because it talks about how you can generate user interest by leaving clues on websites; using emails; even phone calls.

Seen Ice Rocket yet? Yeah, its yet another search engine. It’s hard to turn around these days without running into a new search engine. I posted a while back about the newly designed Ask.com which I think is actually a great spin on search. Interestingly, I haven’t used it much since then. For some reason Google has some kind of hold on me that I can’t shake. It’s like that old group of friends from back in the day that you just can’t get away from, even though you know they’re no good and you should move on with your life but instead you set them up in your pad in Virginia so they can run illegal dog-fighting rings and then you’re not allowed to show up at training camp because you’re being indicted and…

Focus, Jeff, focus…ok, back on track. I’m not advocating that Ice Rocket is the new place you need to start your search (I haven’t really used it more than a few times so far), but they have started to make me realize how easy it is to take almost anything online and tie it into social networking/Web 2.0/etc. Check this out, when I search for “spunlogic” in their blog category, I get the following:

Notice the tabs they have which I’ve shown in their drop-down state. The first one I show is the “Subscribe” tab which allows you to create an RSS feed based on that search. Amazingly simple but who else is doing that? I quickly added this search to my Google homepage which looks like this:

Now I’ll be able to see the latest mentions of Spunlogic in blogs without having to go and run a new search. The second tab I highlighted is the “Share” tab, which allows me to share this search with other people. I added it to my Facebook page (which by the way, feel free to add me as a friend in Facebook), and it looks like this:

Now people that visit my Facebook page can see the same search results.
There are two points here that I think are important. First, the Web 2.0 phenomenon can seem very confusing to marketers but if you really think about it, there are very simple ways to take advantage of these things. Don’t over complicate it, just give people the ability to consume/share your content in the ways they are comfortable.

Which leads me to my second point - please stop trying to create your own social networks! People don’t want or need yet another place to create a profile and invest in another place to keep up with their friends and contacts. Instead, go where the user is. Allow them to add your content to the places they are already familiar with.

Not since David Hasselhoff joined reality TV have two of my favorite things come together like this. R.E.M. has embraced Web 2.0 with their recent R.E.M. in Dublin website. In a recent concert there they actually encouraged people to bring video cameras to record the concert and put it on Youtube and other social networking sites. They’ve got Flickr photos, a blog, tags and even RSS feeds. Might Athens, GA be the next Silicon Valley???

PS - for those of you that don’t know me, I was kidding about “the Hoff” being one of my favorite things. He’s barely in my top 10. Again, kidding.

Has SEM arrived? Well, search engine marketing, absolutely.

What I’m referring to here is what Accenture - in the elegant codex of consultant speak - is calling Social Ecosystem Marketing. Basically, applying Gladwellian effect principals to advocates and peer groups, and amplifying your message to the most active and influential segment authorities. A blend of eCRM and oCRM (organic).

While I enthusiastically agree with moving from a mass, single segment approach to marketing in advocacy layers, especially for consumer package and household technology goods, what concerned me was a recent article in Adweek attempting – poorly – to demonstrate the power of this methodology (oh, and the impressively convoluted designation: Social Ecosystem Marketing – these people slay me).

The article cites a program Sprint and Unilever coauthored to target moms and, seemingly, their extended network of peers. Users were asked to log in and write shorts scripts about their days, with the crowd pleasing-est to be recorded by a cast that includes Leah Remini.

However, the piece cites as success 3,000 entries and 50,000 votes. So this is what constitutes the validation of Social Ecosystem Marketing? The story goes on to report that the program, “by definition” hit extroverted mothers who would invariably talk about Suave (the brand in play) to their girlfriends. But, in no way does the piece dig deeper into how the marketers know that the participants were extroverts, or if they extended the message at all to their net promoter sphere. Less an ecosystem, more like a bowl full of guppies.

Hilariously, the article goes on to tout the program as a way to gather consumer insights and ethnographic data through what users submitted. A new research paradigm: from declared behavior, to observed behavior, to self selected fictional  manners. Excellent.

Finally, about the name (if it sounds sorta like social science, it must be social science - but let’s play along): Two things an ecosystem relies on for sustainability are biodiversity – the more diverse a population, the more the system can absorb negative or high impact events; and stochastic phenomenon (basically, chance happenings). We hope that our marketing efforts don’t rely on chance, and marketing to Moms more likely means you’re hitting a far less diverse pocket of population than more (have you ever been to the local Outback Steaks during margarita night?).

Maybe I’m nitpicking. But if I think about the cost of just hiring Leah Remini for this program, forgetting everything else, don’t you think it would have been more cost effective to send 1 bottle of Suave to 5,000 local PTA presidents along with a packet of coupons for peer distribution?

Sampling…great. What’s elegant about that?

Can you develop Frito-Lay’s brand and produce their “Mockumentory” ad campaign? Of course you can! With the power of social-media and a bold “hot dog” flavor, you can not only do these things, you also have the chance to be one of the lucky winners to have a year’s supply of Doritos . . .

So why my sarcasm? Other than the fact that social media is by far the tastiest spice currently being traded in the marketing world, I believe that social should be social. Can you still taste that “social” football-flavor left over from the Doritos’ SuperBowl campaign? Do you think that engagement with your community/customers betters your brand online?

The one great thing that Frito-Lay has done is understanding that the online channel is a viable one, and that consumers have no problem going from offline to online. Now let’s see if they will really ever get social.

Check out the Dorito’s X-13D Website.

Ken Bernhardt is the Regents’ Professor of Marketing and Assistant Dean for Corporate Relations for Robinson College of Business, Georgia State University. Ken is a personal friend, sits on our advisory board and is overall one of the smartest people I know. He is also a frequent contributer to the Atlanta Business Chronicle and you can find some of his most recent articles here. I spent some time with him recently and asked him to share his thoughts on a few subjects.

What role do you see interactive marketing playing in the overall marketing mix over the next few years?

As the traditional marketing media continue to slowly lose impact, interactive media will become much more important. A number of major consumer marketing companies are already reallocating their media budgets away from traditional media, and many others are exploring alternatives to the way they have been advertising. Interactive marketing should be the big winner in this reallocation due to its many advantages over current mass media vehicles.

What do you make of the recent acquisitions by Microsoft and Google to get deeper into the online media/advertising space?

These are two companies that everyone pays attention to as industry leaders. They have both been positioning themselves to take advantage of the trend away from traditional media vehicles and toward interactive media. As my old track coach used to say, “the speed of the leader is the speed of the pack.” Thus their activity should accelerate the trends already happening.

What are your thoughts on the ability of large corporations to embrace social media?

Large companies are often the least able to respond to trends in the market place. They tend to be conservative, with many layers of approval for major shifts in strategy. Thus, I expect them to be followers rather than leaders in responding to the increase in usage of social media. There are always exceptions to this observation, and companies who have target markets that are younger and more innovative will be the early adopters of this new medium.

Let’s talk about the “green” movement that many companies are embracing. Why do you think this is such a hot topic for corporations?

Companies tend to respond to those things their target market customers are interested in, and there is no doubt that consumers are more interested in being seen as green. The surprise hit of the Al Gore movie is just one example illustrating consumers’ interest in environmental issues. The increase in availability of hybrid cars has enabled consumers to make a statement about their concern for the environment. We have seen an increase in environmental concern, not only attitudinally, but behaviorally as well. The key is to make the products without negatives for the consumer. For example, many consumers are concerned with healthy eating, but they are not willing to trade off taste. The same is true for environmentally favorable products - - they can’t have disadvantages vs. less environmentally friendly alternatives. that’s the biggest reason why people didn’t buy phosphate free detergent a few years ago - - it didn’t get the clothes as clean as the brands they had been using. The hybrid car market has demonstrated that consumers will pay a little more to help the environment but won’t give up comfort, style, etc. I think a lot of research is being conducted today by companies trying to determine how to appeal to environmentally concerned consumers.

Have you seen any companies that are doing a really good job of marketing their green efforts?

UPS has invested big dollars in making their fleet more environmentally friendly. Home Depot has added many products to the offerings that are green and have put up signage informing consumers of these alternatives. Some of the fast food companies are reevaluating their packaging, especially with respect to things like foam cups. And certainly Toyota has been on top of this trend, recently stating that they plan to produce 1 million hybrid cars a year in the very near future.