my 2 cents

Paying for Twitter followers

I'm far from an expert on Twitter, but I have been playing with it and watching it for a few months.  If you want to increase the number of followers, which is important for some people, there seem to be a few ways to do so.

Unlike blogging, it doesn't always seem to be about quality of content, but more about frequency -- just being out there.  That seems to lead to a lot of inane chatter about what you just had for breakfast or what song or TV show you happen to have on while you're tweeting.

While I've complained about that inane chatter, I do understand that Twitter can and should be different things for different people.  For some, it's like having a bunch of friends a few keyboard (or phone touchpad) strokes away, to chat about a film or news event.  For others, it's about sharing information and pointing others to articles that they think might be of interest.  And for others, it's about discussing professional issues in whatever business they're in.

All well and good.  I'm learning to filter out the chatter from my "follow" list, so I can focus on getting what I really want from Twitter.

As I'm sure happens with many others who use Twitter, I get messages telling me so & so is now following me.  I take a look to see who that person is and what they tweet about, so I can decide if I want to follow them.  When I see someone is following hundreds or thousands of people and they have relatively few updates, I've learned that's often someone looking to sell something. 

The latest thing I've been seeing is sites that promise to instantly gain you thousands of followers.  Spend $85 and you'll quickly get 1,000 new followers, a recent one from across the Pacific promised me.

Why would I want to pay for followers?  I'm not trying to impress anyone with numbers.  But I suppose some people are.  Paying for followers, though, is like gaming the system.  Or like a politician buying votes.  Not fair, not right.

Check out an interesting post from an advertising guy in Las Vegas, Rich Becker, which I happened across via a tweet from my friend Valeria Maltoni at Conversation Agent.

Is it news or show biz?

I'm afraid I already know the answer to the question above, but it's frustrating when you tune into the local morning news on TV and you get so much fluff.

The Daily News today called out two local morning TV reporters for less than professional moves.  Good Day New York's Ann Craig, on FOX 5 here, was doing a red carpet interview with Cameron Diaz for her new film "My Sister's Keeper" and she asked the actress how she manages to keep her "Heinie" so tight.  Diaz started to walk away and then told her, "I guess I'm just lucky."

Diaz may have a nice "heinie," but is this information relevant to the film?

And then WPIX entertainment reporter Emily Frances, who I know and like, slipped with a curse on air.  That's not the issue for me; it's that it happened while she was playing a game with a C-list celeb, running an obstacle course in the studio hallways.  Maybe the celeb had nothing of substance to talk about, so the producers thought a stunt would be a better use of precious morning news airtime.

I know the morning shows need to have some entertainment value, but...  Maybe this is why more people are going to the web for their news updates.

Baby, Don't Take My Kodachrome Away

Paul Simon titled a song after it in 1973.  Millions of new parents in the 70's and 80's reiied on it to document our growing families.  Professional photographers swore by it for the rich tones it brought to their pictures.

Kodachrome -- one of the best-known products of its time, in its distinctive Kodak-yellow packaging.

But it's no surprise that, as reported in today's New York Times, Kodak is ending production of the once ubiquitous film, which was introduced in 1935.  The company reports the once-mighty Kodachrome now accounts for less than 1% of its traditional film sales.

For many of us boomers, who led the charge into digital cameras 15 years ago, the Kodachrome name will stick with us even after you can't find the film in camera stores anymore. The refrain from the Paul Simon hit is one reason.  And many of us have, tucked away in closets or attics, thousands of Kodachrome slides of our early married years, our kids growing up, and shots of our parents when they were (OMG!) the age we now find ourselves at.  I bet many, like me, haven't looked at those Kodachromes for years because their Kodak Carousel slide projectors are long gone or, if we still have them, the bulbs have burned out and we can't get replacements. 

But those boxes and Carousel trays filled with Kodachrome memories are still there.

Sadly, however, the time has come for Kodak to take my Kodachrome away.

AP Heading in a New Direction

The Associated Press is adapting to the times to stay alive and healthy in the face of threatened defections over membership fees by several major newspapers earlier this year. 

Last week, the 162-year old news cooperative said it would lower fees for member newspapers and broadcasters by a total of $45 million in the coming year.  That will help cash-strapped newspapers especially.

The AP also began a push to sell advertising and sponsorships for its online services, especially its mobile products that go directly to consumers.  In a presentation to ad agencies and advertisers, the AP challenged agencies to be creative about how they look to advertise on digital news content platforms.

It's much too soon to know how this will be received, but I hope this effort succeeds for the AP.  It's too important a newsgathering organization to have it be forced to cut back seriously on its reporting nationally and internationally. 

CNN and Twitter aside, we need the Associated Press.

A bright spot -- online -- for newspapers?

Perhaps there's a bright spot for newspapers after all.  Ironically, it's an "old" digital tool -- e-mail.

Major dailies including The New York Times, The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times have been using opt-in e-mail to distribute newsletters and other editorial content that's available only online.  Some magazines, like Forbes, are doing this as well.

E-mail distribution gives newspapers and potential advertisers something they may not get from their print editions -- reaching highly targeted audiences at a lower cost, along with expanded readership beyond their normal local or regional marketplace.  And the distribution cost is practically nothing -- no printing, no shipping, no sharing revenue with distributors and dealers.

According to a story in DM News, e-mail is proven as a medium that can be monetized, while other digital media like RSS, mobile and blogs haven't yet been proven as real advertising money-makers.

The New York Times, which has about 20 e-mail products (like Stuart Elliott's online ad column), reports e-mail columns are responsible for nearly 10% of The Times' digital revenue.

So maybe there's hope for newspapers, from one of the venues that's been contributing so heavily to their financial woes.

The greatest birthday present

Today's post has nothing to do with "marketing, media or public relations," but it's all about "life."

I usually don't make a fuss about my birthday, especially as the number gets bigger.  I had a great day today, starting with a bunch of birthday messages by email, Facebook and Twitter, including from blogging friends around the country and the globe.  Some nice calls from family and friends, and a birthday lunch with CK, who brought a helium balloon and made me walk around my Manhattan neighborhood with it tied to my belt.  It brought smiles to some normally jaded New Yorkers.

Then I got the call that my daughter, Jen, who is pregnant and due with her second later this month, broke her water.  I rushed out of the office, caught the next train home and jumped in the car for the trip up to Maine.  Made it in a record 5 - 1/2 hours.

Our grandson Jack, who is now 3-1/2, greeted us at the door and said Momma has a birthday surprise for me.  I went in to see Jen and she said Happy Birthday Dad.  My little grandson, Gabriel Kai Reich Janczuk, was at her breast, sucking and making little cooing sounds.

I'll never forget this birthday... never.

.

Twitter: A potential problem for some marketers?

Since I'm fairly new on Twitter and still trying to sort it out, an article in the current issue of Advertising Age caught my eye.  "Michelob joins keg party at Twitter, but will its tweets draw heat?" asks the headline, while the subhead makes reference to the age-verification problems that added to Anheuser-Busch's decision to pull the plug on its Bud.tv experiment.

The article mentioned six brands with Twitter feeds, with followings ranging from a few hundred to nearly 4,700.  Nothing like the followings that Ashton Kutcher and Oprah pulled, but still a fair audience.

As I read the article, I wondered how tight the liquor marketers are with trying to keep underage teens from being exposed to what are, essentially, marketing messages.  Just for fun, I opened a Twitter account that has the word "teen" in the name.  And the profile says he's "a curious teen."  I wondered if that might raise any sort of red flag.

As my teenage alter ego, I was quickly able to begin following five of the six twitter feeds.  (The sixth one mentioned in the Ad Age story didn't work when I tried it.)  But without any hassle or even a screen asking me to verify my age, I became a teenage follower of Michelob, New Belgium Beer, Sauza Tres Generaciones tequila from Don Cenobio, and King Estate vineyards from Oregon.  I saw a welcome message from Michelob reminding that curious teen that "we're here for you and for the beer."  And Don Cenobio tells me "Tequila pairs nicely w/an aged Gruyère or sharp Cheddar."  A hint for my "teenager" to raid the parents' refrigerator for some good cheese to go with the tequila in the liquor cabinet.

Just as an aside, my new Twitter account also had four followers within minutes of opening it -- a punk rock band with a link to their MySpace page, and three explicit porn sites.  I'm sure of real interest to a curious teen.

The profile pages for two of the liquor companies had wording indicating the site is intended for those 21 or over.  One said you had to be 21 to engage in chat, however when my "teenager put" up a question, it went through with no problem. (No reply yet, but it's only been up for a few hours.)

And -- get this -- at least one of the liquor companies doesn't seem to be taking this too seriously. One of the companies mentioned in the Advertising Age article retweeted it, sending it publicly to the other companies mentioned.  And King Estate vineyards actually posted a message back, visible to anyone following, seemingly making light of it by saying..."No problem, we figured we were in pretty good company." 

Some joke, eh?  Ask a parent of one of the 8,000 teens (conservatively estimated by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) who die in alcohol-related car crashes every year  if they see humor in that cavalier attitude.

Clearly, control over who sees content online is a challenge.  Tobacco companies, as far as I can see, have wisely stayed away.  I know it's early in the game for marketing use of Twitter and other social media.  But a simple sentence saying "21 and over only" doesn't do a thing other than, perhaps, satisfy the lawyers. 

Let's take some responsibility here.  Or is that asking too much?  (Remember what happened to the tobacco companies' ability to freely advertise?)  

Note:  A few minutes after I initially posted this, I received this emai from Michelob...  "thanks for the follow. Since we brew beer, we need to confirm you're >21. Please DM your Date of Birth, thanks! @michelob"    Fair enough, but what's to stop a teen from lying?  To give A-B's Twitter-master credit, they obviously did check the profile and sent the following direct message:  " Based on your personal bio, I am going to block you. We don't want followers who are underage."  Good for them.