Trent Reznor’s Doing a Little Social Media Marketing of His Own

Last October, Radiohead shook up the music industry by allowing potential buyers to download their newest “In Rainbows” album for free.

This time Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails is even taking it further with their new album, “The Slip”. After you provide your email address, they give you the opportunity to send the invitation to up to three friends via email.

I wound up getting two emails before 9:00am from friends who filled out these forms.

This isn’t too much more than what Radiohead has done, but here’s a nice social media suggestion made by Nine Inch Nails.

Here’s another one, right on the nin.com home page.

That’s quite a few Diggs.

Throw in a little user-generated media with their new single, more of a picture with audio, but that’s fine.

…and you have some great social media marketing coverage.

In slightly different news, it’s rumored that both Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead are are on headlining this year’s Lollapolooza, which is very strange since both Radiohead and NIN are known for dissing these types of events.

Naymz Doing AdWords on Your Name?

Maybe I’m the last kid on the block to see this but it strikes me as a bit strange.

I am in the naymz network I guess, but was surprised to see this. It can give the assumption that I would actually pay for a PPC ad for users to see my Naymz profile that I’ve never really done much with.

For those unfamiliar with Naymz, it’s an online reputation management and networking tool where members can say nice things about each other and get a good rep score because of it.

I don’t know if it’s clever or annoying. Any thoughts? In Naymz? Google your name and there’s a good chance they’ll have an ad in your name.

Update - Thanks for the comment Tom. That explains it. I should check out my Naymz email more often

Social Networking in the Presidential Debate

About an hour ago, I was flicking through channels and caught an interesting CNN segment regarding social networking in the 2008 presidential debate. It featured the new Rolling Stone magazine cover story that helps explain Senator Obama’s popular Internet campaign that has surpassed any other by far.

They’ve married the incredibly powerful online community they built with real on-the-ground field operations. We’ve never seen anything like this before in American political history.

The whole article is five pages. I’ve read it twice, but plan to read it more.

Note - the following Facebook links require a Facebook account before viewing.

A main premise of the article points to Obama’s own social networking site, plus how he’s using similar opportunities such as his Facebook page.

Senator Obama isn’t the first politician to use social networking. In fact, both Senators McCain and Clinton have their own Facebook pages.

The same goes with “Yahoo Answers”. All three remaining candidates have official profiles, although none of them have utilized it very much. The first I saw it was over a year ago while viewing an inquiry from Senator Clinton regarding health care.

Another note - This is from a social networking point of view and not an elephant/donkey/indie point of view.

One thing I really like is how the Obama team has integrated social networking with their ground campaigns. This hasn’t been done before and I can see the push vs. pull marketing aspect.

We all see the TV ads where politicians of all parties try to push their opinions on us. These social networking pull campaigns allow us to view and be solicited from whom we choose.

The above example could also be useful for marketers whether they are focused on traditional or online search efforts. It’s one thing for consumers to see you, but it’s another for consumers to react.

Entering a Zvents Event

Last night I posted a random question on Facebook and noticed that Paul O’Brien from Zvents joined the “Local Search Central” group. I haven’t had a chance to use Zvents yet, but then thought of a quick trip coming up.

I’ll be in Houston and Dallas for a few reasons during the first week of November. In Houston, there’s an inline skating event that piqued my interest. My old, slowpoke self is all signed up, but it looks like this race is pretty “pro” heavy, meaning that I’ll be one of only a few not wearing a lycra skinsuit (this is a good thing, folks).

So, why not at least enter my own Zvents event to try to encourage local, Houston recreational skaters to sign up? Some thoughts on the user experience while entering the event…

It is that user friendly and a useful tool I can see suggesting for clients. It provides Google Maps, user reviews, other Houston events, and even nearby suggestions on where I can enjoy some food and drink during my short visit.

Uploading an image is initially tricky. It could be the user (me), although I wouldn’t mind seeing some spec requirements prior to the upload.

It provides tagging opportunities for keywords. I’d suggest using (and not abusing) it.

A very cool thing is they have partnerships with local online news outlets from the Denver Post, Boston.com, and the San Jose Mercury news that display Zvents. I was hoping that the Houston Chronicle would be a partner, and maybe they will some day. Hopefully the dailies in the Twin Cities area will partner up, too.

Anyone have some Zvents experiences? I’d like to hear. If the Houston Zvent helps registrations, I’ll make a quick post here, too.

Post also up at Search Engine Guide.

Houston, We Have Some Social Sites

There’s a really good article in the Houston Chronicle labeled Internet Startups Going Social. Normally, mainstream articles like this can be pretty vague, but I thought this one really hit the spot. Plus, I’ve always liked the Chron.com format.

The article gives some cool information regarding the sites themselves, their overheads, word-of-mouth marketing, and attracting ad dollars.

It winds up that Houston (also home to the Search Engine Guide and the updated social-based Small Business Brief) has a number of cool social networking sites. Based on the success of sites like MySpace and Facebook, these Houston-based sites are similar, but built more toward a particular niche from wannabe stars, social networking for moms, illnesses and injuries, and even a user-recommended search engine – algorithm free (sort of).

OpMom.com is built for moms gaining advice, giving wisdom, finding great ideas, and meeting other moms.

IRazoo.com touts itself as a true “social search engine”. The sites that come up on top are determined by user votes. It looks like it’s at least partially algo-based, but it gives users the chance to recommend the site or not. It probably has a long way to go, but it does have promise.

My favorite is CareFlash.com. It lets users keep up to date with friends and relatives of those who are ill with requests down to picking up mail to informational videos regarding their illness or injury. The videos themselves are really slick and informative.

The only things I really know about Houston is that it’s big, my cousin Jerry lives there, and I’m going to make my first visit there in a couple weeks (I’m still working on that shirt, Robert!). It’s cool to know that there seems to be quite the social media scene there as well.

Post also up at Search Engine Guide. If you like it, feel free to “fetch” it.

A few thoughts:

I’m not the biggest fan of the big social sites like Digg (and others) as the topics are so broad. I could get into these niche sites and now finally find Sphinn somewhat useful for information.

How hot is Houston in early November? And where in Houston do you find jumbo Gulf shrimp?

I’m thinking of hitting a Houston Aeros hockey game during my visit. Hey, you gotta’ support the MN Wild affiliates!

SXSW Festival - Music, Interactive, and Hyperlocal

My dream geek vacation is to hit the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in Austin TX, particularly the interactive and music festivals in adjacent weeks. It didn’t happen this year, it won’t in 2008, and am crossing my fingers for 2009.

Both Erica and Greg from Metroblogging Twin Cities are looking to present at the interactive festival for 2008. I’m particularly interested in Erica’s pitch on Building Hyperlocal Web sites for the Future. I gave my vote and comment, you can too.

Yeah, I know. I’m kinda’ passionate on the whole “local” thing. The above hyperlocal pitch is more community over business-based, but the concept remains the same. Engage and communicate with local visitors, and build trust with them. Kinda’ cool.

Greg from Weber Shandwick is pitching a cool social media presentation too on Marketing for Monkeys. I’ve been a marketing monkey before. Eeep eeep.

Minnesota Businesses - Check Your Yahoo Local Listings

As mentioned in the last post, Search Engine Land has made local search marketing a major focus for this week, and I wanted to give input on how select articles can help out local Minnesota businesses.

In the above series, Mike Blumenthal writes a great piece regarding Yahoo local and User Denigrated Content. It’s really worth the read. Users can affect how people view your online business results, good or not-so-good.

Yahoo Local (not the only victim) has definitely had its problems in their listings with bogus addresses and fake user reviews. In March 2007, I posted about local florist results and noted that the Yahoo Local listings were pretty relevant in Minneapolis. It didn’t take long for Cathy to point out that I was wrong. Oops.

In June, I posted about a Yahoo Local result that makes the Interweb cry. An attorney (not local to MN) basically spammed Yahoo Local (and Google Maps, and CitySearch) with fake, self-generated five-star ratings and keyword-rich user reviews every month, almost to the date. They’re still all there today.

So, Minnesota businesses… it’s a good idea to check your online reputation anyway, but you can watch out for manipulation as well. Maybe you’ll see a fake business and/or bogus address listed above you, competing business owners that love themselves and write fake reviews about them, or in rare cases, write some fake BS about you. Un…cool. The silver lining is that you can usually report these results as crap abuse.

Here are a few places you can probably find your business (and add relevant information, too).
Yahoo Local
Google Maps
CitySearch (Twin Cities)

A Look at the New Yahoo Local

It was just earlier this week when Yahoo came out with blended search, similar to what Google and Ask have recently done. Now they’ve gone a step further by updating Yahoo Local. Yahoo can arguably be considered the better local engine already, although this looks like another step in the right direction.

It’s taking a bit to get used to, but I noticed one thing right away. It’s stepping further away from the search engine look to more of a community-building look. For what Yahoo considers metro areas, right up top you see visual tabs for different “guides”. These prominently include ratings and user reviews, maps and buzz tabs, and even an event tab to see what band, sporting event, or art scene is going on in your neighborhood this coming weekend.

I do like the community-building feel. Outside of pizza, music, and maps however, you do have to search around for other local services such as attorneys, lodging, or even piano lessons. Luckily, these local results still often show up in Yahoo Web searches, their local search box, and even from Google searches.

Not everyone likes this new look. Yahoo does provide a suggestion board for those who want to share their thoughts.

Post also up at Search Engine Guide.

Discount Tire, Co. Wishes my Sis & Bro-in-Law a Happy 10-Year Wedding Anniversary

Well, indirectly anyway.

Many know that I’m a fan of real online user reviews, both as a marketer and as a consumer. Bear with me. There’s a point. Really!

Late this morning I took off to Rochester to take pictures and help my sis & bro-in-law celebrate their 10-year wedding anniversary, but wound up running over something on I94 in St. Paul that ruined my right-rear tire. I got off the freeway and slapped the spare donut on, but there was no way I was driving to Rochester with that thing.

I wasn’t far from a Discount Tire location, and drove there since I bought new tires from them a few months ago. Great news, they had a replacement! Bad news, it’s a sale weekend and there was a 2+ hour wait. Judging from the “oh, f%$&” look I had on my face, they asked me what was up and I explained my situation. They basically said they’d see what they could do.

I’m guessing customers often come into these places and artificially embellish reasons why they neeeeed their work done right away. Since I was dressed in scrubs and literally brought my dress clothes in to change in their restroom, they probably realized I was actually in a hurry and wasn’t hoping for a rush just because I was some snob making up a story who didn’t want to wait.

Under a half hour later they called my name saying it was finished! Thanks Ben (I’m guessing that’s the name, it was on his uniform)! I literally made it to Rochester just in time to put my bad photo taking skills to work. Winds up my bro-in-law Bob likes to prepare in style.

Ok, the user review part. Because of Discount Tire taking care of me, I was luckily able to get there in the knick of time. I appreciate that and posted a user review on Yahoo Local. Hopefully others will see it and view that as a potential positive user experience for themselves.

…and we had a great time at the Hubbell House in Mantorville, MN, and I uploaded a small Flickr set. There are a bunch more pictures, but they’re reserved for the fam.

Brand New Legal Search Site Gets Sued

Well, this didn’t take long. Avvo didn’t even get to make it out of beta (they launched June 5) before a class action was slapped on them (PDF).

It was only nine days ago when I was wondering if Avvo would make a good fit with the “Super Lawyers” model.

I’m hoping the case gets tossed, mostly because it reminds me of businesses suing Google because their Web site doesn’t “rank” high in the free listings.

There’s quite the discussion about the lawsuit at the Avvo Blog.