The aforementioned movie that we saw was “The Social Network”, the tale of how Facebook was conceived and developed. It chronicles Mark Zuckerberg during his days at Harvard, portraying him as a socially awkward computer prodigy. Through a recipe of 1 part idea-borrowing and 200 parts genius, he launches Facebook as a service available only to his classmates. As the movie progresses, the site grows, in members and value, and the number of lawsuits increase. It follows Zuckerberg through the whole process and then abruptly ends just after Facebook’s 1 millionth member acquisition. The filmmakers cite real-life facts and settlements just before the credits roll. All in all, it’s fantastic and I think it’s one of the best movies I’ve seen in a long time.

Some of the moviegoers left the theater remarking about how they didn’t know that Zuckerberg was such a scumbag or that he stole the idea for Facebook. Some were listing ridiculous things they’d buy with Zuckerberg’s $6 billion fortune: “I’d hire the drumline from a marching band to follow me around all day” and “I’d buy the giraffe from that Opulence commercial” were 2 of my favorites. It’s safe to say that I was the only person that left the movie with the dead-serious intention of starting a multi-billion dollar platform before work the next morning. It’s not so much that I’m motivated by the money that Facebook has made for its founder. In all honesty, the thing that excited me most was that an idea sparked in a dorm room and nurtured by someone with no expertise changed the world as we know it.

As soon as I saw the trailer for “The Social Network”, I was pumped to see it. It’s only natural; I work at a company that shows personal and consumer brands how to kick ass on this platform. So yeah, you could say I had an interest. However, I never thought that the movie would actually evoke inspiration. I thought impact like that would come from a Disney film or a touching biography or something. But it didn’t; it came from a movie about a website I use daily, starring a CEO I was intimately familiar with and telling a story that I had already heard before. I’m well aware of the controversy surrounding Facebook’s inception and I’ve always believed that Zuckerberg is the victim of his own success. You can’t build a $25 billion company without attracting a few credit-seekers. I’m sure several people helped shape the idea that Zuckerberg eventually exploded into a visionary concept that became Facebook, but that doesn’t mean that they invented anything. Anyway, the reason that I was so inspired by this movie was because it really shined a spotlight on the world that we live in today. We’re living in a time where our ideas are not hindered by anything, where gatekeepers can’t extinguish an entrepreneurial mission. If you have an idea, whether or not you can reach your target audience is no longer even a question, so the success or failure or your idea rests solely in its functionality and validity.

Now, obviously I’m not saying that a good business idea is going to flourish 100% of the time. What I am saying is that there’s a great lesson that we can all take from Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook, and that lesson is that the world is becoming more and more entrepreneur-friendly every day. I guess what I’m saying is that if you have a great idea but aren’t launching because you don’t think you can make it really take off, think again. In this day and age, smart ideas backed by passionate people can make it on their own merit. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes it just doesn’t work; but sometimes, a $25 billion company springs from a crappy college dorm room.

I’d love to hear your opinion on this. What did you think of the movie? Do you agree that smart ideas can grow easier nowadays?

If you’re already familiar with this situation, feel free to skip the next 2 paragraphs.

The article tells the story of Posie’s Cafe in Portland, OR and their experience with the daily deal site Groupon. Apparently, the proprietor of Posie’s, Jessie Burke, was intrigued by the number of potential new customers and exposure that her business could receive by offering an enticing deal to the site’s users. And understandably so; Groupon and it’s user base have grown at a staggering rate since its inception in November of 2008. After mulling it over for a while,  Jessie decided to take the plunge and spoke with a sales-rep to discuss the particulars. Together, they decided on a “$6 for $13″ deal; the customer pays $6 for $13 worth of product. Jessie said that she “assumed Groupon would take a percentage, but that it wouldn’t be that huge… maybe 5-10%” and that the rest would belong to the cafe. As she found out, when the site does a deal for less than $10, they usually keep 100% of the profits (their compensation for the exposure they provide); the sales rep explained that with a deal this small, most of the people would likely order additional items upon redemption. This situation was unacceptable to Jessie and she told the rep that she would need some time to think it over. Eventually, she called back and agreed to a 50/50 split with the company and the Groupon was released several weeks later.

Over 1,000 users took part and Posie’s experienced a huge influx of patrons, many of them first-timers. Initially, it seemed like the partnership was paying off. However, after a few months, the cafe began to slip deeper and deeper into debt due to their Groupon deal. This was due to several problems, according to Jessie. Firstly, people were using several coupons at a time to pay for their meals, which was against the terms of use. Secondly, customers were tipping for what they paid, not for the value of their meal and as Jessie pointed out “10% of $0 is zero dollars, so tossing in a dime was them being generous”. Thirdly, Jessie did not set a cap on how many people could take part in the deal. By the end of the ordeal, Jessie says that she lost nearly $8,000 and had to dip into her own savings to cover payroll and rent. She claims she is completely jaded by the experience, regrets it fully and will not even “buy Groupons because I know how it could hurt a business”.

This is an immensely interesting topic to us, especially given our familiarity with the platform and passion for branding. Everyone had an opinion on this and two very heated company-wide debates ensued; one via email and one in the office the next day. The proverbial “line in the sand” was drawn and we split up into two sides.

The following summarizes the main points of both sides as VaynerMedia debated internally:

In Support of Jessie Burke and Posie’s Cafe

-Yes, this was probably a poor business decision as the proprietor of a business, but in some way, it may be Groupon’s fault for taking advantage of naive small business owners with the promise of a huge influx of business. This is supported by Jessie’s claim that the Groupon sales-rep told her that they “would never have to advertise again after taking advantage of their network”.

-If Groupon truly created a good overall deal for their business users, they would take a percentage of the revenue they help generate instead of keeping a percentage of the coupon price.

-As the service provider, Groupon understands the intricacies of their business plan better than anyone. Therefore, it is their ethical responsibility to inform the small businesses who use them of the risks they may incur.

-Groupon itself is a corporation, and as a corporation, it’s number one priority is to maximize profits for it’s investors, which it has been doing incredibly well. However, the execution team, those who run the corporation, have a moral obligation to take responsibility for their actions, especially when working with small businesses that may not be able to take a financial hit and stay afloat. If Groupon sees a link between types or sizes of their clients and certain negative results, then it is imperative and morally responsible for them to warn those who may be at risk, especially if the negative consequences are difficult for the businesses to predict without the massive amount of information Groupon has on its own practices.

Bottom Line: while Jessie may have made a poor decision, Groupon should have taken the responsibility to advise her on all risks involved with this sort of endeavor; at the very least, don’t be misleading about the value of the deal’s exposure.

In Support of Groupon

-If $3 did not correlate to a smart decision against the cost of $13, then she should not have embarked on a Groupon feature. If you do think that this may be a financial risk, but you feel the exposure may be worth it, it is best to err on the side of caution and set a cap on the amount of deals available for purchase.

-As a business owner you are in a position where people and companies are going to pitch you ideas. It is completely your responsibility to be discerning when making these decisions and look out for your business’ bottom-line first. Jessie actually proves the point that she did not diligently research the risk/reward of Groupon when she says “I don’t know why I thought even 50% would be a good deal for us. Maybe because I thought since we were covering our food costs. What I didn’t think clearly enough about was that that margin we mark up is what covers all of our other costs… like staff, rent, utilities, etc. Our overhead is roughly $25,000/month, and this decision was about to make it so that we didn’t cover any of those other costs.” Just like Groupon is intimately familiar with the risks of their service, Jessie should be equally as aware of her overhead cost and factor them into every decision she makes pertaining to the business.

-Groupon agreeing to a 50/50 split with a small business is absurd; if they are giving exposure to a client, they should be compensated accordingly. The site should get a vast majority of the initial revenue, if not 100% of it, due to the immense publicity that they are providing.

-As a corporation, Groupon’s responsibility is to make money for their investors and expand. However, that doesn’t mean that they are excused from business ethics. It also doesn’t mean that they are required to make sure that every client has done their homework on various potentially risky scenarios. Groupon is a business and should function as such.

Bottom Line: while the situation with Posie’s Cafe is regrettable, it is not Groupon’s fault. They did not force Jessie into any sort of agreement and it was solely her responsibility to understand the ramifications of every possible scenario.

Personally, I can understand both sides of the argument. On one hand, I believe very strongly that this was not Groupon’s fault in any way. I think that the company has a great product that has continuously proven to yield “win-win” scenarios for their users, their clients and themselves. Their main focus should be on the success and expansion of their own business. Any possible negative effects that their service can cause to a potential client should be researched and identified by said client.

On the other hand, it’s really regrettable that in an effort to be ambitious and grow her business, Jessie’s cafe took a financial hit; she is guilty of taking a risk without knowing all the facts, but she did it with the best of intentions. As Groupon continues to expand and garner notoriety, more clients of varying size will emerge. As such, they should think about customizing their service by offering different packages that will allow the client to adjust their risk factor, an option that fragile small businesses require to feel more comfortable with something like this.

It should be noted that this is a rare scenario; CEO Andrew Mason (who has done a phenomenal job answering critics and showing his overall attentiveness to this issue) stated in a response post on Groupon’s blog that “97% of the businesses we feature ask to be featured again” and included several ways his service can best be utilized. Be that as it may, if they want to be trusted in the future by other small businesses in similar financial situations, they need to evolve, to a certain degree, to try to ensure that something like this won’t happen again.

As a company, we would love to hear your thoughts on this. Was Groupon at fault here? Should they keep their service the same or make it more customizable?

Incidents like this seem to be a dime-a-dozen these days, even with local and state police doling out hefty fines for cell phone related offenses; a friend of mine recently got a $100 fine because he was holding his cell phone and it looked like he was texting. The bottom line is that we are living in a world where people are accustomed to being constantly connected and are totally fine with sacrificing some degree of focus while driving to stay “up to speed”.

So when the brains over at GM sat down to develop the next round of features to be applied to their vehicles, they apparently focused heavily on two statistics: 1- the number of car accidents caused by texting or mobile social media. 2- the staggering number of people who join social platforms, specifically Facebook, on a daily basis. Understanding that people are not likely to stop using their smartphones while driving, GM set out to find a solution that would allow people to consume their content while keeping their hands and eyes focused on the road. The solution came in the form of the newest feature for OnStar.

Since 1997, OnStar has been available to drivers who used the service for anything from directions to phone calls to road-side assistance all at the touch of a button. My Chevy Tahoe has OnStar in it; when I first got the car in 2002, my friends and I were fascinated by the fact that we could hit a button on my dashboard and a pleasant customer-service representative’s voice would materialize through my speakers and give us directions to the closest diner at 3 am. But with the onslaught of smartphones that can do everything OnStar can do and more, GM was constantly struggling with ways to justify the $200-$300 yearly fee. Recently, they arguably came up with their best idea yet.

OnStar announced that they will upgrade both the hardware that goes into new cars and the telematics that connects that hardware to the Internet. The service in general will be beefed up and modernized, but the biggest development comes in a addition called “ATOMS”. ATOMS, short for Advanced Telematics Operations Management System, will allow OnStar to greatly enhance a driver’s ability to stay focused on the road while still staying connected. It does this by integrating two revolutionary features: the first will allow a driver to listen as a new text message is read to them by the car and select from a list of preset responses (creating a new message may violate some texting-while-driving laws). Once a response is selected, ATOMS will send the message. The second feature connects OnStar to a user’s Facebook account. Once connected, ATOMS will read the Facebook News Feed to the driver in real time.

Timothy Nixon, GM’s Executive Director for Infotainment and OnStar Engineering, said last night in San Fransisco that the services won’t be readily available for some time, but he made it clear that this is not merely a concept; the technology currently exists and they are actively fine-tuning it. I have no doubt that within 2011, we will see this technology and various spinoffs debut in select car models. Personally, I think this is a revolutionary idea that will greatly reduce the number of tech-related car accidents. It goes without saying that this is certainly something that I would love to have integrated into my car. Until then, for the safety of all the police cruisers in the Holland Tunnel, I promise to keep my iPhone in the glovebox.

What do you think? Is this going to make our roadways safer or is this still too much of a distraction? Do you want the OnStar/ATOMS software in your car?

If you’ve used some of the popular geolocation apps that have been picking up steam over the past year or so, then you’re going to find that the user experience of Places is very similar. Just like with other services, users can check-in to different locations through the app and tack on an update detailing what’s on their mind. Where Facebook’s service differs slightly is that it allows you to tag friends who are with you at your check-in just like you would tag a photo or video. Once tagged and posted, it’s published in the News Feed for everyone to see.

Normally, when new platforms come onto the horizon, it takes me a while to really jump on board and start using them at full steam. Case in point: VaynerMedia is invested in Venmo, a service that allows you to pay debts to those around you via text message. It’s an absolutely genius platform that is going to revolutionize the way money is exchanged and it is used by literally everyone in our office on the regular. However, when someone owes me money and says “cool if I Venmo you?”, I have to say I don’t really use Venmo and then deal with a look of shock, generally followed by the impending judgment. I’m sure I’ll be Venmo-ing my face off sooner or later, and judging my landlord for not using it, but as of right now, I’m still getting my feet wet. And that’s how it goes for me; I use new platforms enough to understand it so that I don’t fall behind, but I don’t really use it voraciously right away.

Why do I bring up my irrational fear of change? Because it doesn’t apply to Places at all and that is why it has the ability to take over the geolocation game. While other people do not share my specific apprehension, they most certainly enjoy staying within their comfort zones to some degree. So when it comes to a super-young space like geolocation, Facebook has positioned itself to become the industry leader seemingly overnight. Did they put in the work to determine the public’s wants, dislikes, etc like Gowalla and Foursquare? No. Did they produce a service that is revolutionary and different? No. What they did do is they allowed the space to develop to the point where the public’s familiarity with geolocation services was substantial  but not yet mature enough that the majority has “brand loyalty” with any one service. For instance, most of VaynerMedia uses Gowalla. My interest started when Gary invested in the service; they retained that interest through the platform’s phenomenal features and user experience. However, many people can’t say that yet; they can’t explain what their favorite geolocation service is because most of them simply don’t have one. And at this pivotal point in the growth of this space, in comes Facebook, the 800lb gorilla with half a billion users, and they throw their hat in the geolocation ring.

Honestly, after playing around with Places for a while, I wasn’t blown away by any of its features or graphics; the layout is fairly similar to everything else out there that I’ve used. However, the one enormous, gigantic, ridiculous (bust out the thesaurus) advantage that Facebook has is that for any service or feature they launch, their infrastructure is already in place. As a user, you never have the feeling that no one is paying attention to your activity or that you’re building relevancy because your network is already built and waiting for you. A buddy of mine from Boston College had a good analogy: “getting people to use Places versus any other similar service is the difference between laying a cornerstone on a piece of land and building an addition onto your house.” Well put. It’s simply easier to build the addition, and most people will do what’s easier. Personally, I think there is a lot to be said for starting from the ground-up on a new platform; I remember at one point I thought that I could challenge Gary on DailyBooth because we both started on it around the same time. I quickly abandoned that hope, but you get what I’m saying. The truth is, a vast majority of social media users don’t agree with me and they stick to what they know, and EVERYONE knows Facebook.

What do you think? Is Facebook going to take over the geolocation game or can these other companies move quicker and evolve faster? Is Facebook “adopting” popular social media trends the beginning of a pattern?

If you’re like many of us at VaynerMedia, you thought this had a chance to be a big win and that it could possibly take off in a big way. I remember listening to folks at the office talk about how this might be a total game-changer and agreeing with them 100%. Wave had the potential to make extended conversation and interaction exponentially easier. A wave (or ongoing conversation) had the ability to show what people were saying in real time. More specifically, users could weigh in on different parts of the conversation chain and extend it in a different direction. Each contributor’s actions were distinctly marked and recorded so that every Wave participant could see exactly who was contributing what. It really seemed as if this was a tool that was going to be widely used once everyone became comfortable with it. Unfortunately, the platform never caught on and the anticipated popularity never materialized.

I got my invitation to try Google Wave on November 29th. I played around with the features and, honestly, I really liked it. I think that the UI was great and that the platform did exactly what it set out to do: visualize conversation in an easily digestible way. In my opinion, and I think that a lot of people will agree with me, the main problem is that the features of Wave, are just that, features. It’s just not enough to support an entire platform. I think that as time goes on, Google will chop up the different pieces of Wave and distribute them to already-thriving platforms. Example: I don’t think that the “visualization of conversations” feature is enough to warrant a dedicated platform. However, I do think it can compliment the hell out of GMail.

I should note that Google has already said that they plan on using some of these aspects on current and future projects. Furthermore, they are going to release most of the source code of Wave so that users (both commercial and private) can customize it to their own specifications.

I’m really curious to hear your thoughts on this. What about Wave was useful? What about it wasn’t? What aspects of Wave would you like see integrated into your everyday Google experience? Was it a failed product or was it just ahead of its time?

And in conclusion, I want to point out that, in my opinion, this is not a loss for Google. Yes, Lars and Jens Rasmussen’s, co-founders of Wave and Google Maps (thanks for the latter, by the way) project didn’t pan out the way they intended, but it will end up vastly improving the future user experience of Google as a whole. So, you could say that Wave didn’t rock the boat like it was supposed to, but its ripples will be felt for a long time to come (finished strong).

But as the tournament progressed, it seemed that interest in the World Cup was waning. Focus shifted more and more to the wrong things: “why do they flop when you barely touch them?”, “the vuvuzella is so annoying”, etc. It all came to a head when the United States lost to Ghana. As quickly as the enthusiasm had started, it dissipated, and the majority went back to being disinterested in soccer completely; “The New York Post” led the way with the following headline:

Shortly after that, Nike came out with a sequel to their wildly popular “Write the Future” ad. The sequel depicted young players thanking the US soccer team for various actions during their games. The video is full of comments like “thank you for playing with style, with class, for having confidence.” 24 seconds into the ad, one of the players channels most of our nations thoughts when he says “thank you for not diving.” This aspect of the game seemed to outrage and disgust many first-time viewers. While I partially agree with this, I can also see the other side of the story. Diving is part of soccer. A player has the chance to outsmart his opponent by accentuating a mistake; it’s simply part of the game.

It occurred to me that during this month-long soccer spotlight, two very important points were identified:

1) The World Cup showed that Americans are more than willing to embrace the game if their own players are on the field.

2) As a whole, our country isn’t ready to accept a “rest-of-the-world style” of play. Nike showed that conclusively.

The organization that should have been paying VERY close attention to the American response to the World Cup (and I mean taking copious notes 24/7) is the MLS. They have been struggling for years to get professional soccer to same level as the MLB, NBA, NFL and NHL. To date, they’ve had very little success. However, since it’s inception in 1993, they have been modeling their league after foreign soccer clubs (a very logical decision), going so far as to bring international sensations like David Beckham, Cuauhtémoc Blanco and Juan Pablo Ángel into the league in an effort to create some credibility. While this helped, the league’s popularity never truly took off like anticipated. I think one glaring reason is because Americans won’t respond to an imitation of a foreign club. If the 2010 World Cup and Nike have shown us anything, it’s this: Americans want their own style of play with their own players on the field. It’s the epitome of “easier said than done”, but it seems to be the current reality.

So with the sport still fresh in everyone’s minds, Major League Soccer is at a crossroads. Should they embark on a new American style of the game, one devoid of primadonnas, diving and vuvuzellas? Or should they continue to follow the proven model and wait for the rest of us to come around? It’s an interesting question that I personally can’t answer with 100% certainty. Obviously, there are very valid points on both sides. But if you were in charge of branding for Major League Soccer, in what direction would you take the league?

Can you imagine the PR staff in charge of BP’s public image? I think it’s safe to say that these people have been in a room since April 20th trying in vain to think up ways to make ruining an ecosystem, putting thousands of people out of work and killing cute marine animal after cute marine animal seem “not that bad”. To date, they have been unsuccessful (shocker, I know). The truth is there is no PR strategy in existence that a company in BP’s position could unleash to effectively fix an issue of this magnitude.

However, before this ever happened, BP should have (among many, many other things) stepped back and taken stock of how the public views them and grabbed the proverbial reigns of their own image. I don’t know about you, but when I think of a giant oil juggernaut like BP, I get a picture of corporate greed, usually followed by a clip from the movie “Wall Street”. Now, it’s fair to assume that before this disaster happened, the people in charge of BP’s branding understood that:

A) the majority of the public thinks of them as greedy oil pimps.

B) there is a chance that some catastrophy might unfold and BP will have to explain themselves to the public.

Knowing that, it’s also fair to assume that BP would have gone to work crafting their image as an environmentally conscious and lovable oil giant long before anything bad happened. Among other benefits, this would ensure that most of the public would perceive an accident as just that, an accident. Instead, everyone perceives this as a company being careless in the interest of boosting their profits. This positive public persona that BP currently wishes they possessed could have been achieved through a consistent and transparent social media campaign. What makes this even more frustrating, especially for an employee of a brand consulting firm that specializes in social media, is that they could have done this for, to quote Gary Vaynerchuk, “sweat equity”. No billboards, no commercials, just social media; Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

BP has an online presence, but they waited until the disaster was in full swing to become truly active. Furthermore, now that they’ve been forced into action, the space is so new to them that they are making some very rookie mistakes. A couple things that I noticed:

Twitter

-While their Twitter account @BP_America is super-active now, it wasn’t even close before the spill; they averaged a tweet every 10 days or so. Their lack of engagement showed in their follower numbers; on April 20, the day of the spill, BP had 2,299 followers. 17 days after that, they had 2,846 followers. Today they have 14,897 followers, all of them with a hugely negative image of the brand and undoubtedly following purely out of desire for answers. Wouldn’t now be a nice time to have a loyal follower base that interacted with you before you were a pariah?

-They have neglected to take swift action against the Twitter account @BPGlobalPR. This account is fake and has systematically made a mockery of BP. The account was created 28 days ago, and they’ve spent all their time putting out tweets like “If we have to pay $20 billion, we’re paying each claim with sweaty wads of ones and/or penny hills”. While it is funny, it is detrimental to a brand that is currently at its weakest. And the worst part: they have just under 170,000 followers.

-They never @reply anyone. I understand that there are millions of people griping about the oil spill on Twitter, but as little as 10-20 replies per day would show that BP cares about what people are saying and that they are listening.

Facebook

-Lot of the same on this platform. BP’s interaction with their Facebook fan base was embarrassingly low before the spill. For example, they had a post on November 10th, December 10th and February 18th and then nothing until May 2nd. Again, another platform that could have been populated with genuine fans of the brand.

Youtube

-As far as I can tell, BP didn’t even have a presence here until the spill. In my opinion, this is the most crucial platform for them as a company, because it allows them to show the public what they’re doing and why it’s relevant. This interaction can range from videos displaying charitable efforts to environmental conservation to safety measures and beyond. Instead, BP is hastily attempting to populate their new channel after the fact. With all of the talk surrounding BP’s lack of safety measures and disregard for the environment, it’d be quite beneficial to be able to reference a video addressing those topics published before April 20th to show that it truly was a priority for them. Furthermore, they are encouraging people to “friend BP on YouTube”, a function that doesn’t exist on the site (they meant to say “subscribe”).

Please understand that I am not suggesting that if BP had properly developed their social media presence before this happened, the public outcry would have been suppressed. There is literally no way that BP can heal their image for years to come. However, their charge into social media after a crisis has happened is akin to putting your seat-belt on after you’ve been in a car accident. Effective use of social media enables you to build relationships with people in a way that no other medium can. It’s an important lesson for all brands, both personal and consumer, to learn. Don’t wait until you need the loyalty to earn it; do it during the good times, because no one knows what tomorrow will bring.

While in a meeting yesterday, designer Adam Kopec pointed out that Dominos “Pizza Turnaround” campaign is continuing to pick up steam. This was not a total news flash to me, as I was aware that they were still incorporating the home-grown tactics that had worked well thus far. However, when he showed me their Facebook campaign, something I was not familiar with, it became very evident that Dominos was taking things to another level.

In their current television ad campaign, Dominos harps heavily on what they call “Holdouts”. These are people that have not tried the new Dominos pizza and they make a show of putting up billboards, ads, commercials, etc. targeting them by name; the ads are actually quite brilliant. Seeing the great response they got from turning the footage of their “Holdout” stalk-fest into prime-time commercials, Dominos went a step further and made PizzaHoldouts.com, a Facebook-driven campaign where people can suggest that their friends try the new pizza. After connecting your Facebook profile to the page, you are prompted to “Place a Bounty” where you supply the “Fugitive’s” (your friend’s) name and email. The company then sends that person a “buy one pizza, get one free” coupon and you get a small side-order for free (for example, I recieved a coupon for free chocolate lava crunch cakes, a coupon I will battle not to use). Once the pizza coupon is redeemed, the company considers the bounty “fulfilled” and you are able to acquire more rewards and climb the ranks of the leaderboard. All of your statistics are viewable within your profile, including “Taste Bud Bounty Rank”, “Unfulfilled Bounties” and “Captured Taste Buds”. The person with most captures by June 27, 2010 will win free pizza for a year.

Even before I was shown this, it was my opinion that Dominos was crushing it; the new television ads served as a great follow-up to an already powerful initial website. In Pizza Holdouts, they capitalized on the competitive aspect of Facebook and they did it in the most effective way possible: they combined the competition of a game and tangible rewards in a contest where someone redeeming a coupon is a prerequisite to your success. It’s a fantastic idea that, along with the rest of their turnaround campaign, is really working for them. Don’t believe me? As I mentioned, when I released the initial article about Dominos on February 3, their stock was at $11.20 per share. In late April, it exceeded $16 per share; that’s a 30% increase in under 3 months.

As I said in my first article, I am ecstatic that a company embraced transparency and honesty and is seeing fantastic results. The money is nice, but I’m sure what is really making Dominos’ Board of Directors do backflips is the fact that they were able to reverse a rock-solid stereotype in just a few months. It’s a great lesson that keeps getting better. I hope Part III is just as good.

Then it hit me: is Calipari doing this so that he can have an unimpeded stream of communication to blue-chip recruits? I began to investigate how he was using his Twitter account and if his feed was full of recruiting tweets. I thought that 99% of it would consist of tweets like:

UKCoachCalipari: Hey @BlueChip, UK is the place for you. Coach Cal loves you!

But it wasn’t. His 300,000+ followers enjoyed tweets about his schedule, post-game thoughts, insights about his family and even the occasional “guest tweeter” (he had University President, Dr. Lee T. Todd, fill in for a while). It seemed that this “behind the scenes” look, which I was certain would affirm my premonitions that Calipari was a diva, exposed him as a completely normal and likeable guy who never used social media for recruiting. I felt jipped. What’s more is that in an interview with ESPN.com, he said: “The one thing I like is that it’s a little bit of an unobstructed view. They get to know what you are and how you are and how you think without someone telling them who you are, what you are and how you think. There’s something there, and Twitter doesn’t even know what it is. No one knows what it is. You know what I’m doing? I’m having fun with it.” I had my preconceived notions about this guy and he goes and uses Twitter, a platform that my job relies heavily on, to make me look like an jerk who jumps to conclusions. Great.

Even after reading that, I couldn’t understand how a guy like Calipari, who would do anything to win games, wouldn’t utilize this relatively unregulated platform to win over recruits. Having gone through the recruiting process when I was graduating from high school, I realize how rabid college coaches can be when competing for your signature. I also realize how much of an upper hand Boston College had when my whole family connected with the coaching staff. That connection was a direct result of the quality and sincere interaction I had with them, and it led to me signing there. When interacting with a recruit, coaches have an immense amount of pressure to make a lasting impression because the regulations around how much time they have and how they communicate are strictly enforced by the NCAA; violation of these rules can lead to anything from a small fine to being withheld from post-season play and beyond. What social media engagement does is alleviate some of that pressure by giving coaches more time to make an impression. It wasn’t until I read the “NCAA Social Media Rules” that I began to understand that coaches aren’t even allowed to @reply a player or mention his/her name; however, they can DM or Facebook message them, an activity that is governed under the same rules as email contact.

While social media recruiting is not quite the “Wild West” that I initially thought it was, it’s still a very fulfilling form of communication for coaches, especially since most of their recruits probably have smartphones with Facebook and Twitter right on them. This means that any message coaches send are read almost instantaneously by their addressees, making this one of the new paramount tools when trying to build your team.

And it seems the only valid way to verify anything regarding John Calipari’s social media recruiting tactics is to look at his Twitter DM’s and Facebook Messages. Until then, you’ll have to rely on your own unsubstantiated, preconceived notions.

Epilogue- Matt Sitomer (Chief of Staff) and Sam Taggart (fellow Project Manager) made a bet that NCAA coaches on Twitter will be banned by 2012; Matt thinks it will be banned while Sam thinks it will be embraced. Stay tuned to see who wins this multi-year bet.

This stat got me thinking; how can this be? How is it that Lady Gaga achieved in 2 years what other “more revered” artists haven’t? Before anyone gets up-in-arms, I like Lady Gaga and I think that she is a great (read “weird”) artist that has some phenomenal songs. I have “Telephone” on my iPod and frequently whistle it in the office. That being said, I do not think that she’s up there with the Michael Jacksons, Beatles and Rolling Stones of the world. The reason I mention those artists in particular is because when I read this, I wondered how they weren’t at the top of the list, especially due to their huge bodies of work and massive cross-generational fan bases. Furthermore, I thought that Baby Boomers who had become comfortable with the Internet would have been all over the vast number of videos on YouTube starring their favorite bands. I remember how my uncle reacted when he realized there were videos on YouTube about The Doors that he had not previously seen; he lost his mind. As a result, Jim Morrison incessantly roared through his office door until he emerged several weeks later with a beard.

As I read more articles about Lady Gaga’s milestone, I noticed that many mentioned Soulja Boy’s “Crank Dat” as the most watched online video ever. TechCrunch in particular mentioned that the 2007 viral hit topped the “100 Million Views List” run by Visible Measures. Intrigued, I perused this list and was shocked by some of the stats. As the page was loading, I made peace with the fact that my “worthy music” theory may not be fully valid and that there would be several, if not many, homemade viral videos on there. But after looking through the complete list, some of the stats were shocking. Some of my favorite examples:

-Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”, arguably the most important and influential music video of all time, was topped by the trailer for the “Twilight Saga: New Moon”. MJ garnered 443,535,722 total views, but it was almost 200 million short of catching “New Moon”, who weighed in with 639,966,996 views. I guess being the highest selling artist of all-time doesn’t count for much when you’re going up against sexy vampires and werewolves.

-A preview for the video game “Modern Warfare 2″, ventriloquist Jeff Dunham’s “Achmed the Dead Terrorist” and “Charlie Bit My Finger” accounted for nearly 1 billion total views (956,637,311).

-Remember the annoying “I’m a Gummy Bear” ad that Jamster put out as a downloadable ringtone? Yeah, that ridiculous bear is the fifth most-watched video of all time.

-“The Dramatic Gopher”, the “Peanut Butter Jelly Time” Banana and “Sneezing Baby Panda” all have spots in the 100 Million Club.

-The list’s undisputed #1, Soulja Boy’s “Crank Dat”, got 722,438,268 total views. That means that (conceivably) all of America, all 307 million of us, nursing home residents and small children included, decided to “Superman that ho” at least twice.

My goal in making these points is not to tear down the accomplishments that the members of this club have achieved, and that includes the Jamster bear. My goal was to show how exponentially further an artist or brand can extend their reach if they harness social tools correctly. However, the whole gist of my point centers on the fact that quality content is key, whether that content is a movie trailer, a music video or an overly dramatic gopher. Congratulations to Lady Gaga for understanding this and making it happen in a huge way.

WordPress
Price: Free
Stars: 3.5/5
Description: A great app, specifically because of the vast number of bloggers who use WordPress for their blogs. It has all the features of WordPress for no cost. Perfect for an impromptu post on a time sensitive topic or approving/disapproving comments. The only bad thing is that it doesn’t include the traffic stats for your blog; you have to pay $3 for a separate app.

Awesome Note (+todo)
Price: $3.99
Stars: 4/5
Description: Especially for disorganized, spontaneous people, this app is great. Not only does it allow you to organize your to-do list, but it also supports notes for quick ideas whenever they may pop up. The main folder page comes with tabs titled “Hello”, “My Idea”, “Study”, “Shopping”, “To-Do List”, “Work” and “Travel Diary;” however, the user can add any folder they think is appropriate.  I personally love this app, as it has effectively “un-chaosed” my life.

Tweetie 2
Price: $2.99
Stars: 4/5
Description: If you have an iPhone and a Twitter account, odds are you are well aware of all the Twitter apps on the market. In my opinion, Tweetie 2 is the best out there because it is phenomenally user-friendly and can easily support multiple Twitter accounts. Don’t be fooled by its more expensive competitors.

WorldCard Mobile
Price: $5.99
Stars: 3.5/5
Description: If you’re chatty with your fellow train-riders during your commute like I am, this app is a must. Not only does it allow you to effectively manage your contacts but it prevents you from losing their info (which has happened to me before – it’s a huge bummer). Just open the app, take a picture of the card and hit “recognize.” All the info on the card is automatically classified as a contact in your phonebook.

Tips and Tricks- iPhone Secrets
Price: $0.99
Stars: 3/5
Description: A cool app, especially for the new user; even if you’ve had your iPhone for a while, this app can help you learn tricks and shortcuts to make sure you’re as efficient as possible. It includes advice that most people can figure out on their own, but when going through the content, most people are bound to have that “oh, that’s how you do that” moment. I had mine regarding the best way to use my voice-control function, and it helped make sure that it was a feature I could depend on.

Mashable
Price: Free
Stars: 3.5/5
Description: A great way to stay up to date with all the stories on Mashable. Their app enables the user to not only view stories that are breaking on the website, but also by categories, tags and authors. Specifically for those working in this industry, it’s a must, especially since it’s free.

JotNot
Price: $4.99
Stars: 3.5/5
Description: Basically, JotNot allows you to use your iPhone camera to take a pic of a document, specify the size of the page and then convert into a email attachment. This not only takes scanning items mobile, but it makes it way less of a hassle. “Scanned” items are surprisingly clear. I really like this app, though it’s not one that I use on a daily basis. However, when I have to use it, it’s irreplaceable.

9,000 Awesome Facts
Price: $0.99
Stars: 4/5
Description: This app is very different than the rest on this list, but I put it in here because it does enhance the user. Instead of zoning out, you can peruse 9,000 random facts. These may not make you that much more productive, but you’ll certainly be more knowledgeable.

Dropbox
Price: Free
Stars: 4/5
Description: Dropbox is a fantastic tool for sharing various files on your internal network. With this app, you can easily access, download or edit those files from your iPhone.  Especially with time sensitive situations, you can rely on this app to get what you need ASAP without having to use your laptop or desktop. Considering the price (or lack thereof), this is a must-have for anyone with a DropBox account.

I was not alone in my perception of Domino’s, and the company apparently knew it. Tired of hearing the same complaints, they launched an enormous “focus group” exercise, not just relying on interviews with random candidates, but also using Social Media platforms like Twitter to listen in on what people were saying about their brand. Comments like “pizza was cardboard”, “mass produced, boring, bland pizza”, “processed cheese” and “microwave pizza is far superior” poured in from Twitter. Interviewed candidates added “Domino’s pizza crust to me is like cardboard”, “worst excuse for pizza I’ve ever had”, and on, and on, and on. It became abundantly clear to the management of the company that these were not trivial phrases that some were using to describe their product; over time, it had become a fact and the widely accepted image of their brand.

However, Domino’s decided to make a move that most of their peers would be very averse to making: they went completely transparent. They understood that their flagship product, somehow, had become completely unacceptable and no amount of “special offers” or “discounts” were going to fix it. Instead, they embraced Social Media, honesty and most importantly, overall customer care to bring them back to life. They bought in to something that we believe very highly in; to quote Gary Vaynerchuk, “The days of being able to con the customer without repercussions are pretty much over, so however how you shape and color your personal brand, honesty has to be at your core.”

“You can either use negative comments to get you down, or you can use them to excite you and energize your process of making a better pizza. We did the latter” says Domino’s President Patrick Doyle on their site, PizzaTurnAround.com. The site features a video that completely chronicles Domino’s journey from A to Z throughout their rebuilding experience; it shows the displeasure of the customers, the initial reaction of the company (complete with a clip depicting a boardroom full of executives watching a focus group, all the while wearing pained facial expressions), the overall response of the company and clips of Domino’s chefs bringing their new pizzas to formerly dissatisfied customers who testified in the focus groups. The video Domino’s put together is great because it not only shows that they care about what is said about them, but also that they are willing to seek out those comments no matter what medium they happen to be in. What is equally compelling is the live Twitter feed on the side of the page; named “Live new pizza Twitter feed”, it displays tweets made about, you guessed it, the new pizza, displaying an honest mix of good and bad comments. It allows curious, and probably jaded, customers who haven’t tried the new version an opportunity to browse unbiased and generally unfiltered reviews.

The result is that Domino’s is back on track. They essentially talked directly to the public in an honest and organic way, apologized for their transgressions and vowed to make it right. But in this day of verbose, written apologies flatly read by CEO’s, a simple “we’re sorry and it won’t happen again”, even if it’s wrapped in a pretty website like the one Domino’s built, usually gets shrugged off as corporate crisis-management protocol. To avert this from happening, Domino’s followed through with their commitment to change, going so far as to hand deliver pizzas to people that had previously voiced their displeasure, all the while filming their responses and posting it on the “Turnaround” site. They also have maintained their very active Social Media presence, most notably interacting with Twitter users who have questions and comments about anything related to their brand, specifically customer service (side note: as I was writing this, I @replied Domino’s to see if they’d respond and they wrote back within 4 minutes. Check the screen-shot below).

From an ROI perspective, Domino’s stock has risen substantially amidst the enthusiasm surrounding their new recipe, commitment to customer satisfaction and their ongoing story-telling website. In fact, the stock turned around at such a rate that “Mad Money” host Jim Cramer, who had previously bashed Domino’s stock and product, raved about them on Jan. 13 saying “It looks like everyone used to hate Domino’s. On this show we slammed the company a couple years ago…but now things are changing”, adding “Domino’s Pizza is beginning to deliver with a new recipe, a great ad campaign, fabulous international business that dominates India thanks to its great vegetarian offerings and a competitor that’s falling apart. Don’t believe me? Go look at the Domino’s presentation on its terrific, robust website.” Cramer goes on to say that he is reversing his “negative opinion on the stock and going positive.”

Domino’s completely buying in to transparency, honesty and Social Media obviously make us at VaynerMedia very happy, as it’s something we try to instill into every brand that we work with. It makes us even happier that a corporate powerhouse like Domino’s put in the work, trusted the process, followed through and is now reaping tremendous rewards that are positively impacting their brand image, customer relationships and overall value as a company. It’s probably safe to say that we’ll be having an office pizza party in the near future.