Author: Donna

My two daughters are back at home for a few days. Both are out of college now.  Kelsey is visiting because her sister, Alex, is home on a semester break from Ross University Veterinary School of Medicine. She’s got two weeks off before she has to head back down to St. Kitts, an island in the Caribbean. It probably sounds like a great place to go to school, but she was never so happy to be back in “America” as she posted on her Facebook page along with a photo of her meal at the airport of a burger, fries and a Bud Lite! She also brought home a huge empty suitcase so she can bring more stuff back to St. Kitts with her.

So I will include Alex in the “Back to College” crowd that adds quite a bit to the U.S. economy. The National Retail Federation says that college students and their parents will average $916.48 this year on back-to-school spending compared with $836.83 last year. And it predicts total college spending to hit $48.4 billion. By comparison, it forecasts that parents of kids K through 12 will spend $669.28 this year. This Back-to-College crowd is a key market for many retailers who have come up with some unique promotions this year to connect with them. Macy’s has launched a $50,000 video contest, inviting schools to submit a remix of the classic “Be True to Your School.”

The Macy’s Back to School Lip Dub Contest is giving schools and colleges the opportunity to win up to $25,000. They have created this video posted on the Contest You Tube page that provides many of the details that are listed in the Official Rules.

Contest submissions will begin being accepted on September 4 and run till October 10. The contest is open not only to colleges and universities but also to elementary, middle, and high schools that are located in the United States. Students are invited to upload a Lip Dub video of the school’s students lip-syncing in one continuous take to the song provided by the Sponsor (Macy’s) which is on the Contest Site. They must also include the following information: name of school, name of School Representative, email address, telephone, school identification number, and a statement (maximum of 500 characters) on how Entrant would use the prize.

Three winners will be selected based on the following judging criteria as weighted: school spirit and participation (50%), creativity (30%), and execution (20%).  First Prize school $25,000,  Second Prize school $15,000 and a Third Prize school $10,000. Winners will be announced on or around October 31.

Besides the video contest, Macy’s is sponsoring events such as campus bus shuttle services. transporting students to shopping parties at Macy’s that include DJs, mini-manicures, makeovers and apparel, as well as 25% discounts. Macy’s is using the #MacyBTS hashtag to also promote back to school selections on their Pinterest page.

Macy’s has here some very unique and well thought-out promotional marketing campaigns. However, what’s the first thing my daughter purchased since she’s been home? A new Apple MacBook Air since she spilled water and fried her last laptop two weeks before finals! I’m sure she’ll be hitting some other stores soon.

 

It seems that every time I leave for vacation Facebook decides to make a change to their Promotional Guidelines. This has happened several times to me and this time I read about it upon just returning from an amazing two-week trip around Europe.

On August 7 this post was published on the Facebook Developer’s Page that announced this change to their Platform Policies:

“You must not incentivize people to use social plugins or to like a Page. This includes offering rewards, or gating apps or app content based on whether or not a person has liked a Page. It remains acceptable to incentivize people to login to your app, checkin at a place or enter a promotion on your app’s Page. To ensure quality connections and help businesses reach the people who matter to them, we want people to like Pages because they want to connect and hear from the business, not because of artificial incentives. We believe this update will benefit people and advertisers alike.”

So yes, this does means that now you can’t make it mandatory to have someone Like your page first in order to open the app to enter the promotion. From some of the comments that I read on this post there appears to be a few people that are again not very happy with Facebook. Facebook is however giving people up to Nov. 5 (90 days) to make the changes to their apps to comply with this new policy.

When brands first started out building their Facebook pages their main objective was to acquire fans. They wanted a way to drive people to their page and Like it to become a fan. I would tell clients that if they wanted to just grow their fans, along with their database, sweepstakes were the way to go. You could create a simple sweepstakes offer with a Like-gate attached to it so that visitors to your page would have to Like it first in order to access the entry form. So this was a great way to build up a fan base.

That is now a thing of the past. Facebook has evolved into more of an advertising platform for brands which means that businesses can’t reach their “fans” as easy or “free” as they used to. Consumers who “like” a Facebook page will most likely not see the content that this page posts anymore in their News Feed. So this recent policy change does not surprise me.

This year we have been steering our clients away from using the Like-gate approach.  I’ve been telling clients that it may not be a good idea to use a Like-Gate anymore is mostly because now more people are accessing their Facebook account from a mobile device vs a computer. When you require someone to Like the page to enter, they must first sign into Facebook from their mobile device so that the application knows if they are or are not a fan already. This added an extra step and was not a user-friendly entry process.

So do sweepstakes and contest promotions still work on Facebook? Yes, they do, but you clearly have to define what you want to get out of them. No longer is the number of Likes you have on your Facebook page a good measurement of success. Instead marketers need to look at quality in their social media, not quantity. Which means more engagement such as shares, comments, etc. I think Facebook made the right move here which was an obvious change that most marketers were moving towards anyhow.

Next month I’m going to me heading back down to New York City to attend the 3rd Annual Social Media, Sweepstakes and Promotions Digital Compliance Conference put on by the American Conference Institute.  I’m looking forward to again hearing Allison Hendrix, Platform Operations Attorney from Facebook speak. Allison has been a keynote speaker each year at this conference and always has provided some great insights into why Facebook does what it does. There are many other great speakers and colleagues who will also be attending the conference. So please stay tuned for my posts that I’ll share regarding the conference which is Sept. 9 and 10.

 

 

Consumers who live in the state of Texas have a chance to win a couple of grills and a lot of charcoal from the National Pork Board. We recently launched their Grill and Charcoal Giveaway Sweepstakes on July 11 which goes to October 4. They are utilizing text messaging as a method of entry into this sweepstakes.

Text messaging is the most popular mobile behavior across user demographics. In fact, 96% of people aged 18-50 years old send text messages, making it an excellent way to opt-in participants to a sweepstakes campaign. It requires very little effort from participants to enter and can be done from where ever they are on their devices. So this year we are finding that more and more of our clients are considering text messaging when running their sweepstakes.

For this Grill and Charcoal Giveaway Sweepstakes we are again utilizing the Signal Engage Platform. This allows us to create a sweepstakes promotion with multiple methods of entry that get collected into one database. In this case consumers are instructed to text the world “Pork” to the shortcode 50101. They then receive a response message that provides a link to the mobile Sweepstakes entry form. The entry form enables the National Pork Board to collect additional information from them other then just their mobile phone number such as their name, mailing address, phone number and e-mail address. This way they we confirm that the entrant came from the state of Texas.

However, you can still collect additional data about the participate just using text messaging. I wrote earlier about the Summer Souvenir Sweepstakes series tied into Live Nation concerts.  We’re also using the Signal Engage Platform for this promotion and in this case the sponsor wanted to collect the Entrants’ full name. So after the participant sends their initial message they receive a message back that asks them to provide their first and last name to complete their entry. We have other sweepstakes running which ask the participants to provide their date of birth before they can enter which is a great feature for alcohol beverage brands.

Utilizing text messaging in a sweepstakes promotion can also provide a connection to a more long lasting relationship with customers after the sweepstakes has ended. When utilizing text messages sweepstakes entrants can be opted in to the sponsor’s list by agreeing to receive a set number of text messages per month from the Sponsor. All entrants can unsubscribe at any time. This allows the sponsor to communicate with them on their mobile devices throughout the year.

In the Grill and Charcoal Giveaway sweepstakes we will conduct two random drawings; one halfway through the promotion on or about August 7 and another at the conclusion of the sweeps. Each drawing will pull one grand prize winner who will receive an All Seasons Charcoal Grill worth $700. We will also draw 30 first prize winners for a total of 60 who will each receive six bags of charcoal.

Sweepstakes today still remain a powerful and simple way to achieve high participation, excitement and buzz for your brand and company. Mobile opportunities now expand this promotional tactic as a way to further the communication touch points with customers and gain a higher return on the investment. If you would like more information on how you can integrate mobile into your marketing plans please feel free to contact us.

Summer is a time for vacations, holidays and travel throughout the world. Many Americans flock to Europe during this time to join the Europeans and experience the beauty and cultures of this part of the world. Our client, Rail Europe, just launched this week the first round of their Scenic Train Trivia Contest which aims to share with people the attractiveness and benefits of European train travel.

Each round of the contest will focus on a different scenic train route in Europe. The plan is to have 8 rounds to start off.  Here’s how it works. Rail Europe will publish a post in their Scenic Train Blog Series on their blog. Each post will include information on the featured train route along with quotes from people that run the route and birds-eye views of the stunning vistas you can see while traveling on the route.

Once you read the post then you are invited to hop on over to the Rail Europe Facebook page and click on the contest tab to enter and answer the trivia question relative to that round.  Each round will be open for entries for a week once the post is published. A random drawing will be held at the end of each round from all those that entered and answered the question correctly. One lucky winner of each round will receive an iPod Touch. The contest is scheduled to launch a new round approximately every two weeks.

The first round features the Swiss beauty of the Bernina Express which makes its way through the valley of Albulatal. The blog post includes an interview with Hans Amacker, Director of Rhaetian Railways’ Bernina Express. Rail Europe asked him to provide a description of his train route which he answered “The line links extremes of climate, along with various cultures and languages and never fails to impress. It includes winding switchback tunnels, the towering viaducts of the valley of Albulatal and, as you cross the Alps via the Bernina Pass, glaciers that look almost close enough to touch”.

You can read more here to find the answer to this round’s trivia question which is ‘How many meters above sea level is the train station of Ospizio Bernina?” It looks like most of our entrants have correctly answered the question so far. It’s not too difficult.

I personally am very excited about this contest because I will be experiencing train travel in Europe in a couple of weeks. My husband and I are taking a two-week vacation and will be using a Rail Europe pass to travel around to various destinations. The Eurail Select Pass we purchased gives us 8 days of rail travel throughout the countries that we will be visiting.

We are starting in Munich, Germany, and then will be traveling on some very scenic routes to Geneva, Switzerland. France is once again included in the pass after pulling out about a year ago, so our next train route will take us to Paris. From there we are flying to Dublin and will be using the Ireland train routes to take us across the county to the west side and flying home from Shannon. I invite you to come back and read my post once I return and see some of my photos. And don’t forget to try your luck at this contest!

Reading is a great summer pastime for both adults and kids. So our clients at Reading Is Fundamental have teamed up with Macy’s to kick off the 11th Annual Be Book Smart campaign to help spark kids’ imaginations this summer with books.

A survey of more than 1,000 parents was conducted by Harris Poll back in April and found that children ages 5-11 spend nearly three times as many hours weekly watching TV or playing video games as they do reading in the summer. Only 17% of these parents say reading is a top summer priority.

This year’s Be Book Smart campaign started on June 18 and runs till the end of this week, July 13. Part of the campaign includes the “Book Smart Summer Photo” Sweepstakes which invites people to submit their #BookSmartSummer photos for a chance to win a $500 Macy’s gift card each week. The photo must includes these three components: 1) The cover of the book 2) A favorite summer spot to read the book, 3) A summer style. The photo can be expressed through a composite image or a single photo with all components.

Participants can submit as many photos as they wish during the sweepstakes period and use these three different methods of entry. First is via Facebook from a Sweepstakes promotion tab off the Reading is Fundamental  Facebook page.  Participants must first “Like” the page in order to access the submission form. Or they have the option of submitting their photos on Twitter and Instagram and including the hashtag, #BookSmartSummer. Upon posting the photo, the participant will receive a notification with a link to the Sweepstakes submission form.

One winner has been randomly selected each week to receive the $500 Macy’s gift card. Only one more weekly drawing is left in the campaign. Here is a photo that was submitted by week #2 winner, Lynn S., from Morristown, NJ. All the entries can be viewed here on the RIF Facebook Sweepstakes page. Currently it looks like over a hundred great photos have been submitted.

The Be Book Smart campaign also is inviting customers nationwide to give $3 at any Macy’s register in-store to help provide a book for a child and in return get $10 off a purchase of $30 or more. Macy’s will donate 100 percent of every $3 to RIF.

“We are committed to RIF’s mission of empowering children through literacy and inspiring them to embrace the joy of reading during the summer,” said Martine Reardon, chief marketing officer, Macy’s. “Be Book Smart offers our customers the opportunity to give back to their local community, and thanks to the collective generosity of our customers and associates, we’ve given 10 million books to kids since 2004.”

So only 5 days left! The more people that get involved, the more books that can be given to kids all over the country. So start snapping and shopping!

Here’s a new summertime promotion that we helped kick off  yesterday for Menchie’s Frozen Yogurt who has partnered with Hershey on the Hershey’s Experience Sweepstakes. They are offering a chance to win a family vacation to Hershey’s Chocolate World and Hershey Park Attractions.

Menchie’s is hoping to gain new customers to sign up for their loyalty rewards program, My Smileage. During the Sweepstakes Menchie’s customers will automatically receive an entry into the sweepstakes when they purchase any item at a Menchie’s Frozen Yogurt store and use their registered Menchie’s loyalty card. Participants can also enter online by visiting the Sponsor’s website at www.Menchies.com or by visiting the Menchie’s Facebook page and linking to the Sweepstakes Tab page. Both  are optimized for mobile devices. People are invited to enter once a day by any method of entry.

We set up the Sweepstakes for Menchie’s and again are using the Shortstack Application which we have used for many promotions that we’ve run for clients on their Facebook page. But Shortstack is not just for Facebook anymore. A while ago they introduced a new feature where you can not only install the app on a Facebook tab page, but you can also embed the entry form on any webpage. So in this case we are hosting a separate page online for Menchie’s which they link to from the homepage of their website. Both entry forms are utilizing the same graphics and all entries go into one database, so it allows for only one entry per day per person’s email address regardless of what method they entered from.

Back on June 10, Shortstack announced that they made some huge updates to their platform which they now refer to as their Campaign Builder. ShortStack’s Campaign Builder is platform agnostic which means you can publish Campaigns directly to the web and link to them from anywhere. These campaigns no longer have to be publish on Facebook first. Each Campaign has its own URL, which means that Campaigns can be used as standalone websites, which ShortStack can host. You still have the option to embed them into a website like we are doing with the Menchie’s Sweepstakes and install them to your Facebook Page as well.

Shortstack has stated that these three trends prompted the switch from Facebook-centric apps to web-friendly Campaigns:

1. The continued success of Pinterest, Twitter, Google Plus, etc. Our users’ customers are increasingly using additional social media platforms.

2. A Facebook “Like” isn’t as valuable as it once was. A Cliff Notes version of the old strategy would go something like this: get more Fans because the more you have, the more exposure your brand gets. However, changes to Facebook’s algorithms mean this is no longer the case.

3. The recognition that leads and user data are more valuable than Likes and other similar engagement. The inherent flaw in social media marketing and advertising is that these interactions are, for the most part, anonymous, and provide little to no opportunity for brands to follow up. Leads provide the opportunity to stay in touch with users.

All campaigns are mobile friendly from the start with a “One Campaign for any screen” design philosophy.

So if you want some more details on how to set up a promotion utilizing the Shortstack platform, please feel free to contact me. It’s a great tool and it also includes a great team of support people.

While we have some great summer weather, stop by a Menchie’s Frozen Yogurt store by you and try out their new Chocolate Glazed Toffee Bar flavor!

 

 

Many artists and bands on now on their summer concert tours hitting local venues across the country. One of our clients who is a Boston-based local company has decided to take advantage of this and invest some of their marketing budget towards reaching these fans. They decided to become a sponsor of all the Live Nation concerts taking place in the Boston area this summer season.

Basement Technologies is that company. They have been providing basement waterproofing and foundation repairs for over 45 years. They go by the name of 1-800-Busy-Dog and promote their toll free number at all the events that they attend. You could find them in the past at Red Sox Games at Fenway Park or Celtic Games at the TD Garden. This summer music season you can find at the the Xfinity Center (formerly Comcast Center) in Mansfield, MA and the Blue Hills Bank Pavilion in Boston, MA at various concerts happening up till early September.

They wanted to make their Live Nation sponsorship really pay off, so we are assisting them with running a mobile marketing campaign. The 1-800-Busy-Dog Summer Souvenir Sweepstakes invites attendees of these events to text the keyword, BusyDog, to a shortcode for a chance to win a prize package consisting of merchandise item(s) related to that Event’s performing artist(s) or venue. There is also a mobile optimized entry form that they can enter instead if they choose not to use the text entry method.

We are working again with our mobile partner, Signal Engage,  and utilizing their platform to run each of these sweepstakes promotions. The platform is scheduled to start a new sweepstakes on each day of an Event and end it by 8:30 pm that evening. It automatically draws a winner at that time and notifies the winner by sending them a text message back to the mobile phone number they used to enter. The winner at that event then needs to visit the 1-800-Busy-Dog tent in the venue by 9 pm, show their winner message on their phone, and receive their prize.

All of the people that enter each of the sweepstakes are also being opted in to a 1-800 Busy Dog SMS list in which they agree to receive up to 2 text messages maximum per month from Busy Dog. All entrants can unsubscribe at any time. Busy Dog would like to send out messages to them during times of heavy rain to remind people of the services they offer.

The platform we are using from Signal Engage not only allows for text and online entry, but also may include a Sponsor’s Facebook page as well. We’ve run some other promotions for clients with this platform that have included all three methods of entry. The company Signal recently was acquired by another Chicago-based firm call BrightTag. They just recently announced that BrightTag is adopting the Signal name and the Signal product is now called Signal Engage.

We’re glad to have been one of the early customers of Signal and have helped them get their business to this stage. I look forward to our continued business relationship and introducing many more of our clients to their products. So far the folks at 1-800-Busy Dog have been happy with the results of the program and by the end of the summer they should be able to communicate via text message with a good number of local homeowners.

Everywhere you look right now it seems you see and read something related to the 2014 World Cup. I recently came across some stats that compared the number of people worldwide that watched the 2014 Super Bowl vs. the final match of the last World Cup in 2010 and it was 111.5 million vs. 909.6 million. This did surprise me on how big a difference there really is. So since I normally dedicate quite a few weeks of blog posts to the Super Bowl, I thought I should at least write one on the World Cup.

It’s not just TV viewers that are bigger either. According to Adobe Social they came up with this interesting infographic and claim that the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil will be the most social sporting event ever. It will most likey tally more social media mentions than the 2014 Winter Olympic Games or Super Bowl XLVIII. Adobe Social studied more than 69 million social mentions from Facebook, Google Plus, Reddit, Twitter, Dailymotion, Flickr, Instagram, Tumblr, vKontakte, Disqus, Foursquare, Metacafe, WordPress, YouTube, and blogs to determine this.

Twitter has published an entire article explaining how to follow the #WorldCup action online. It also created this short video posted on YouTube called #WorldCup on Twitter: Love every second.

eMarketer just released these stats in which Facebook tied with SMS for the top way US smartphone users following the FIFA World Cup planned to communicate with others about the games while watching.

The major World Cup Sponsors appear to all be big into hashtags this year. Visa is a worldwide partner or the World Cup Brazil. They have launched a huge integrated campaign which includes television, print, digital, social, mobile and local tournament elements. Kevin Burke, global chief marketing officer for Visa says. “It underscores our brand platform of ‘Everywhere you want to be. We know people want to be at the World Cup, and we want to help them get there.”

Visa has created a portal, www.worldcup.visa.com, where fans can engage in various content. The site shows off 90-second sharable films (which employ the same format and soundtrack) created by 32 filmmakers showing off how their country celebrates the World Cup. It also includes a “tele-transporter” through which fans can insert their faces into a series of World Cup-themed videos that can then be shared across social networks.

Mondelez, maker of snacks including Oreo cookies and Ritz crackers, set up a the #PassTheLove website. It includes an instant win game for chances for fans to win 1,500 prizes that consist of “Soccer in Box” kits containing commemorative soccer balls, goals, and Mondelēz Snacks. After a fan plays the Instant Win Game, they can follow the links and instructions to participate in the Pass the Love Contest. Fans were invited to submit a photo and an essay (not to exceed 140 characters) that describe what they love about soccer. The photo could be uploaded from Facebook, Flickr, Instagram or directly from a computer desktop, or submitted through Instagram or Twitter with the hashtag #passthelove.

The contest submission period has ended and the judges are now determining the top 10 finalists. Once determined, those finalists will be contacted and each will be sent a camcorder Finalist prize. Each Finalist will then be required to use the camcorder to create a short video that describes how he/she experiences the sport of soccer.

Beginning on July 16 through July 31, the public will be invited to vote for their favorite video. The Finalist whose video receives the most votes will be deemed the Grand Prize winner and receive a soccer game experience hosted in their community. The Grand Prize winner will be the MVP at that event which includes transportation, an autographed jersey, $10,00 in spending cash and $5,500 to cover taxes. Total value of the prize is $24,000. The nine other Finalists will each receive a $10,000 cash prize.

Now that team USA has won it’s first match against Guana, the US fans appear to be very excited about the games. This should help to make sure this is the most social sporting event ever. John Brooks has become a star overnight and his #daretodream has become a reality. Go U-S-A!

June is the month known as the time for “Dads, Grads, and Brides”.  I do love this month. The days are long, the gardens are all in bloom and we still have the whole summer to look forward to. However, this June I am not invited to any weddings (went to one in early April that was really fun). I also am not attending any high school graduation parties…most of the kids we know are now college grads. But I can still celebrate dads!

I was born in the Bronx and lived there the first five years on my life. My dad would take me to ball games at Yankee Stadium as I was his first child. My dad loves the sport of baseball, but he never was a Yankee fan. In fact he hates the Yankees and instead has always been a Boston Red Sox fan. So like father like daughter, I was raised as a Red Sox fan from the Bronx!

Now the guys I work with are both Yankee fans which causes some banter in the office about the games. So when one of our clients, Brookstone, came to us with this Father’s Day promotion they wanted our assistance with, my colleague Matt said that I just had to write about this on the blog. So here it is.

In case you weren’t aware, Brookstone is the “Official Father’s Day Store of the Boston Red Sox”. They are currently running a Father’s Day Sweepstakes offering a chance to win the ultimate Father’s Day gift: A Brookstone massage chair and four Green Monster seats at the Red Sox June 15th Father’s Day game.  Unfortunately for me though the sweepstakes is only open to fans in New England! They can enter at www.redsox.com/Brookstone up until June 11. Brookstone is also promoting it on their Facebook page. The online entry form has an optional field to enter your mobile phone number to receive text messages & updates from redsox.com and MLB.com.

I have been lucky enough to sit in Green Monster seats at Fenway Park a couple of seasons back. Another client of our was a sponsor of the games that year and gave me a couple of tickets. Sitting up there I said to my husband, Do they really hit the ball up here? Of course as soon as I said that David Ortiz hit one just a couple of seats to our right.

My dad now lives down south in the Myrtle Beach area, so we haven’t been to a game together in awhile. I keep trying to get him to visit “Up North” by offering to get us a couple of tickets, but he hasn’t taken me up the offer yet. Instead we talk on the phone each weekend and we discuss how good or how bad those Red Sox are doing. Last year they came from last place to end up in first place. This year is looking like they may end up back in last place again. But we’ll see. The season is still young.

Happy Father’s day to my dad, my husband and to all the dads out there this year. Don’t forget to wish them a special day on June 15th!