Kevin Bishop of IBM spoke with Douglas Simon, D S Simon Productions, about the 100th anniversary of IBM and the six steps for a successful initiative. Recorded at the IABC Measurement Event discussing the 100th anniversary.
Some of Kevin’s VlogViews:
On the 100th anniversary, “ We wanted to make sure we drew on the history of the past to be relevant to the future as a strategic objective. How can we demonstrate that from our past history, we will be able to make a difference with things that matter to people in the world now.”
“You put your media plan in a way that’s relevant to all of the constituents, then you really got to work each element of the media for what it’s good for. So films can be a very powerful thing, quick delivery of information with a powerful emotional content. If you are going to use the web, make sure you produce things that deserve to be shared, because that’s what people do on the web, it’s to share content. You have to work every media really hard for what it’s uniquely good at.”
“The tree is the real thing, and the shadow is just the image, and if you want to manage a brand you have to work on the health of the tree. If you have a healthy tree, it will always look beautiful in photographs, it will have a great reputation, people will come and look. If all you do is take clever photographs one afternoon, then the tree is going to wither and die. So managing a brand is like managing the health of a tree, and then the shadow looks after itself.”
Matt Broder, Vice President, Pitney Bowes, discusses how social media is the driving force in communication.
Some of Matt’s VlogViews:
“Because the number of journalists is going down you really don’t need as many people to speak to the journalists, but the number of people consuming information over the internet has exploded, and so you need a lot more people in that realm.”
“At Pitney Bowes we’ve gone from 4 or 5 authorized spokespeople five years ago to over 40 today, and we’re on our way to hopefully a lot more…Companies need to adapt, companies need to become more flexible and nimble, and they really need to expand the ways in which they communicate with their constituents.”
“I think social media has really smashed all of the walls. It is the oxygen that we breathe now. And all media whether their print, earned, whatever it’s all brought together now in one kind of big conglomeration of messaging.”
Doug Simon, President and CEO of D S Simon Productions, spoke with Jennifer Campana, Communications Manager for Munchkin, at Editor Showcase: Modern Moms in New York City on April 6th. Lauren talks about how just one social media initiative, “That Stinks”, doubled their audience.
Some of Jennifer’s VlogViews:
“We’re doing a lot of social media lately and we’ve found it really takes a lot of different types of partnerships to grow it. We use our PR agency a lot and partner with other clients of theirs and have them post about us on their social media and we post about them on ours and kind of co-op.”
“We’re doing a lot of creative things in social media as well. We do giveaways weekly and we come up with very cute promotions. We did one for our diaper pail called ‘That Stinks’ where people submitted their story of something that stinks. It didn’t have to be literally, it could be figuratively, like a parking ticket. Then every Friday we had ‘Fresh Fridays’ where we would give away a diaper pail and also fix their problem, like pay their parking ticket.”
“These are extremely important for our strategy. We’ve doubled our audience through the ‘That Stinks’ campaign alone and I don’t think we could have done it without the giveaway component. I think that’s critical to building the audience because people spread the word; when they get stuff for free, they’ll tell their friends.”
Doug Simon, President and CEO of D S Simon Productions, shares his 2011 predictions for the economy, politics, entertainment, sports, and the PR industry. This is his third year doing so and even we have to admit, he’s been pretty spot on. To view Doug’s 2010 predictions, go to http://bit.ly/dExdZz. To view his 2009 predictions, go to http://bit.ly/gGWWhH.
Doug’s Predictions:
“Let’s get started on the economy: I think we’re going to see a continued slow improvement in the economy during the course of 2011. Unemployment is also going to be dropping but at a slower level than would be hoped for given the state of the recession that we just experienced. One little bump in the road, gas prices are going to increase. I think the stock market, after correctly predicting it’s rise two consecutive years, is going to stay relatively flat, probably up a little bit but still remain in the 11,000’s. I think toward the end of the year, we’re going to see corporate profits, which had an awesome 2010, take a slight hit as they begin to have to expand their employee to meet with the increasing demand.”
“Here are my predictions for U.S. politics in 2011. President Obama will maintain a stronger approval rating then he had last year before the election, in part because he’ll now have the Republican led House of Representatives to use as a counterpoint. I think because of that, no major Democratic liberal candidate will oppose him in the Democratic primary. Healthcare will continue to be talked about and focused on resolutions, potential legislation, etc. but not a lot is going to change to the law that was passed last year, in 2010. Now I have two predictions that are related to Sarah Palin. One is that a second office holder who is on Sarah Palin’s “hit list” on her website will be targeted for assassination this year. Second, and I think this is because Sarah Palin is a lot smarter than a lot of people think she is, is that she’ll decide not to run for the Presidency in 2012 despite the fact that she could easily win the Republican nomination. She’s going to hold off for 2016 when her chances will be better.”
“Media and Entertainment: We’ll continue to see the trend where an increased number of folks get their news information online compared to TV stations as that gap will be closed even further. However, most of that information online will be coming from traditional news sources. We’ll also see what I call the media bias gap, and an example after the recent assassination attempt on Representative Gabrielle Giffords, the New York Times said many cite extremism on both sides for the uptick in violence. It would be like saying that it was the right that was responsible for the anti-government violence in the 60’s, not true, it was the left. Right now, it’s the right that’s generating this violence not the left, period. In the entertainment world, I think The Social Network is going to win the Oscar for Best Picture and Natalie Portman’s going to take it for Best Actress (for Black Swan). This prediction comes from my two teenage sons who say that Idol’s (American Idol) going to see a drop in ratings and relevance and that this will be it’s second to last year.”
“In the world of sports, the big story is going to be labor problems in both the NBA and the NFL. I think they’re going to play out a bit differently. I think for the NBA there is going to be a lockout and the big reason for that is many of the players have enough money not to take a hit if they sit out, even for an entire season. The NFL, with far more money at stake and more players who don’t make huge salaries and have shorter careers, I think that’s going to get settled more quickly. It will be moving eventually to an 18 game season but not necessarily next year. I also, unfortunately as a Knicks fan, do think that the Heat is going to win the NBA championship. The Mets I’m not holding out any hopes for buying playoff tickets this year.”
“I’m going to wrap up my predictions for 2011 with a look at the Public Relations and communications industry. Here I see five things that I’m pretty confident will be happening. One is a move of senior executives from the Advertising world to the Public Relations world as authentic content has become more important, you can’t just buy your way on anymore. It’s got to be relevant to consumers. That’s something that PR has excelled at and that’s where there is going to be the action. News for agencies will be okay, they’ll continue to grow but increasingly corporate communicators are going to be looking to hire people for project assignments and those assignments increasingly are going to be about creating content and also distributing them via social media. Two services that will grow in popularity in the broadcast PR industry are Internet Media Tours as well as Internet Interview Tours. Finally, for D S Simon Productions specifically, I predict that we’ll be celebrating our 25th anniversary this year and to do that we’re going to be moving to larger headquarter offices as well.”
Kevin Bishop, Global Head of Brands, For IBM
To Link To Post: http://bit.ly/swdiEF
Kevin Bishop of IBM spoke with Douglas Simon, D S Simon Productions, about the 100th anniversary of IBM and the six steps for a successful initiative. Recorded at the IABC Measurement Event discussing the 100th anniversary.
Some of Kevin’s VlogViews:
On the 100th anniversary, “ We wanted to make sure we drew on the history of the past to be relevant to the future as a strategic objective. How can we demonstrate that from our past history, we will be able to make a difference with things that matter to people in the world now.”
“You put your media plan in a way that’s relevant to all of the constituents, then you really got to work each element of the media for what it’s good for. So films can be a very powerful thing, quick delivery of information with a powerful emotional content. If you are going to use the web, make sure you produce things that deserve to be shared, because that’s what people do on the web, it’s to share content. You have to work every media really hard for what it’s uniquely good at.”
“The tree is the real thing, and the shadow is just the image, and if you want to manage a brand you have to work on the health of the tree. If you have a healthy tree, it will always look beautiful in photographs, it will have a great reputation, people will come and look. If all you do is take clever photographs one afternoon, then the tree is going to wither and die. So managing a brand is like managing the health of a tree, and then the shadow looks after itself.”
Check out IBM’s Centennial Website and video!
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