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Can the NHL Leverage the Olympics?

Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010

No denying that in recent weeks more people have paid attention to hockey then ever before; The Olympics have a tendency to make folks wax patriotic about things they may otherwise not pay attention to. Curling, skating….hockey.

What I am interested in watching is the ability of the N.H.L. (National Hockey League) to leverage the Olympic-fueled interest in hockey. Without recounting last Sunday’s game, it goes without saying that hockey is on the minds of more (Americans) than ever before. The Olympic hockey Gold Medal game match-up could not have been planned any better.

Last weekend people were watching, and caring about hockey that had no prior interest in the sport. I come from a family of sports-fans, however none of us closely watch hockey. Last Sunday, that changed.

My wife, my children, my father, my friends all sent me text messages akin to “are you watching this?!”. Hockey has an opportunity to gain fans.

Low Hanging Fruit
I visited the NHL website, and a number of team sites, as I wrote this post. I have to say, I was disappointed.

Not because the websites were bad, they are very well designed. However, they precluded me, a non-hockey knowledgeable person, from better understanding their sport.

It is easier for me to find an “official” bar to watch a Chicago Blackhawks game, than it is for me to learn what icing is, or for that matter just general rules.

Un-Solicited Advice for the NHL
Leverage the Olympic experience. (duh). Opportunities for “welcome to hockey” packages exist. Introduce people to a sport in a friendly, non-elitist way, and you could gain fans for life.

Player videos (Olympic participants if possible) explaining the basics (icing, power plays)
Create a “Newbie” section on your team websites that has simple Q & A’s for newbies like me. I went to several websites and found nothing about understanding the game. The NHL is not alone in missing this, however, they have the greatest barrier to entry, so far as becoming a spectator sport.

It is great to see the NHL making use of some social media channels like Twitter, and responding to people. The more interaction, and introduction, the greater chance of creating life-long fans, and enthusiasts for the game.

Tags: Marketing, Social Media, sports marketing
Posted in Marketing, Social Media | No Comments »

What You Can Learn From Jerry Garcia

Wednesday, February 24th, 2010

Around here we listen to and enjoy all types of music, you are as likely to hear AC/DC as you are Miles Davis, and everything in between. Bluegrass, rock, funk, jazz (my personal favorite) and jam bands all stream from Pandora and iPod alike. While musicians inspire and stir our emotions with their creations, everything from sports teams to weddings, indulge me for a moment as I explain how I think musicians can also inspire your marketing.

Live music is something that many people enjoy, from large stadiums packed with superstar performers to classical concerts in small theatres. For many, experiencing music live takes it to a new level. Jam bands, those that seem to have the ability to recreate a song every time they play it, set the bar, when it comes to live performances.

The Grateful Dead, Widespread Panic, Leftover Salmon, Yonder Mountain String Band, Phish and Govt Mule are just some of the jam bands that have created strong brands by leveraging their content and their communities. Jerry Garcia was an incredible guitarist; Is it possible that he and the Grateful Dead were pioneers of content and viral marketing? You decide.

Why are jam bands so successful at content marketing?

Jam bands take a story and present it in a unique and captivating way.

Of all the jam bands I have had the opportunity to see live, I never once walked away from a show thinking it seemed contrived. Can you say the same thing about your content? Tell your story in a personable way. Corporate speak sucks, ditch it and roll with the story the way you would speak it, not how you think your 8th grade English teacher would want it.

Jam bands keep things interesting.

They accomplish this by always changing play sets, arrangements and sometimes they will really surprise you with a guest appearance. How can you mix your content to produce something new? Know someone you can reach out to for a guest blog post? Never hurts to ask, and you give your audience something new, something fresh…they will thank you.

Jam bands spread their music virally

Most jam bands allow, and even encourage, the recording and trading of their live music. Some will even allow “tapers” to plug into their sound boards for maximum quality. The “taper” community then trades and shares the recorded concerts, which allow the band’s music to spread virally. The bands allow this trading of their music to take place free of charge. You are creating content and sharing it with your audience, but are you giving them the access, the permission and the tools to share it? Sharing of content and music helps spread your content and helps build a stronger community.

People enjoy “discovering” new bands.

Many years ago I had the opportunity to see The (then unknown) Dave Mathews Band play at a fraternity party. They were damn good, but hadn’t hit the big time yet. Think we all didn’t tell our friends about this new band we saw? Of course we did, we all wanted to feel like we had “discovered” something great. Things are no different online. A great video, a really good blog post all are things that people love to discover and share. Create things that people will want to tell their friends about, don’t just create to complete a milestone.

Jam bands create community.

These communities are tight-knit, many having their own norms, nomenclature, and even nicknames – the “Dead Heads”, “Spread Heads” and other countless communities are fiercely loyal. Each member of the community consumes the content in their own way, and react to it differently. Some spin, some sway and some simply shake it. Your audience is no different. They consumer your content in different ways and react differently – some share a blog post through their RSS reader, some post a video to their Facebook page. Do you know your audience and their nuances?

So crank up some music, play a little hacky-sack, start thinking like a jam band and you will see improvements in your content, your engagement and your rankings.

Tags: Digital Marketing
Posted in Content Creation, Digital Marketing, Inspiration, Marketing, SEO, Social Media | 2 Comments »

How To Introduce Yourself With Social Media

Wednesday, January 20th, 2010

We talk a lot about the conversation.

But one question a lot of business owners have is, “How do I join?” That makes sense. Business owners usually sell things to the people they’re talking to.

Or at least, they did. Now, it’s not up to the business owners to sell as much as it’s up to the consumer who to buy from. I can buy a $200 import guitar from anywhere. Everyone has a sale, everyone can ship to my door. What makes you so special?

What makes you special is I know you. You came to where I was and introduced yourself.

There are more than a few good ways to find conversations about what you do. But once you find them, it’s best to spend some time reading up on what people are talking about there.

If it’s a message board, read the notes from the moderators. Check out the people who post a lot. If it’s a comments section on a blog, read past entries. Try to get an idea of the audience. Take some time to hear what people are saying.

Why? Because it’s possible you’ll be stepping all over the conversation if you don’t.

You’ve been listening, so you should get an idea of how to best introduce yourself. It doesn’t have to be a formal “Hello”. And this isn’t a post about etiquette, necessarily. But there should be a few cues you can take from the people already taking part in the conversation.

And if you can’t, it might not be somewhere that’s worth your time. In general, places online where the conversation is “noisy” isn’t a good place to make a suggestion, say hi, offer something, etc.

It’s a rule that the more anonymous a conversation is, the less helpful it tends to be. In other words, stick to conversations where people are who they say they are.

That’s who you want as a customer.

Also, be humble. Acknowledge that people have been contributing to the conversation for a while before you showed up.

Along that same line, be honest. Tell people who you are, and what interest you have in being there. One caveat: Don’t sell. Ever. Almost. We hammer this point here pretty regularly, so I won’t go over the finer points in this post. But instead of selling, just be helpful. Okay? Great.

That’s what you showed up to do in the first place, right?

Tags: Ben Curnett, getting started in social media, relatonships, Social Media
Posted in Social Media | No Comments »

What Does “Internet Famous” Really Mean?

Monday, January 18th, 2010

It means there are a lot of people out there willing to help you, because you’re being yourself.

That’s my take away from my brush with the internet famous. It’s strange. Personal meetings back up exactly what I had gotten from my online interaction with the internet famous.

What does that mean?

First, the story…

We had grabbed a cab from the Austin airport to head to Pubcon, where Pat was speaking on a panel. This was going to be one of the first internet marketing conferences for me. I was a web writer, going to find out what all these developers were doing with the content I made.

That part? Fascinating. Edifying. A different story altogether.

But back to the internet famous. I was already interested and a little nervous about the conference. When the cab pulled into the hotel, I jumped out, grabbed my bag, and prepared to check in as fast as I could so I could try to bone up on the conversations I could expect in the following days.

Which is exactly when I turned to see Chris Brogan walking into the hotel. I did my best to quickly match a 30×30 jpeg to a real human, figured out who it was, and said, “Hey, Chris!”

Chris stops walking into the hotel and proceeds to have a really nice short conversation with me about what it is Matterhorn does and what I’m hoping to learn from the conference.

Now, his was one of the first social media blogs I read, and it was interesting to find that he was exactly as he came across in his blog. One minute in, and I’ve talked to the person I consider to be the goto guy for learning about social media. And he’s not in a rush, or condescending, or anything other than interested and helpful.

Next day, on my way to the conference, we share a cab with Guy Kawasaki. Now, how many entrepreneurs would kill for that opportunity? And sure enough, we talk pretty much the whole way about what businesses that are new to social media (there was a self-admitted newbie also sharing the cab with us). And Guy was full of ideas, even when our cab got lost.

Two days, two brushes with the internet famous.

Here’s what it means: People who are internet famous are very much like who they are online.

That tells me that I need to be online very much like who I am in real life. And businesses, partners we work with, should be very much who they are (not just what they’re selling). Transparency isn’t just a BS marketing term that the get-rich-quick-on-the-net folks throw around.

And it’s not even “transparency”, necessarily. The internet famous don’t have anything to gain by conning you into helping them. It’s a genuine case of things being better when you give than receive. Internet fame is best leveraged when it’s not leveraged at all.

But I would trust Chris or Guy if they told me something, or asked me for something. Especially if it lined up with my goals. And I can make a reasonable expectation that the same is true for them. And I’m not talking necessarily about just making money. I’m talking about goals.

And those entities that are just regular, plain old famous, like McDonald’s or NBC? I’m way, way more skeptical.

At least, that’s how I’ll interpret it. What about you?

Tags: Ben Curnett, business relationships, motivation, online reputation management, Social Media
Posted in Social Media | No Comments »

If Twitter Had A Fairy Godmother…

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010

It would be nice if there was a Twitter intervention service.

I’m thinking of something like a fairy godmother that would step in and gently correct those misguided businesses that are out there shouting.

Alright, cue bad sitcom dream sequence…

—–

@newtosocialmedia: Right Now! 50% off every single thing from our summer stock! Check it out http://snip.li/026a07 #michaeljackson

@therealfairygodmother: @newtosocialmedia you’re doing it wrong, dear.

@newtosocialmedia: @therealfairgodmother Thanks for the RT love! 50% off every single thing from our summer stock! Check it out #britney

@therealfairygodmother: @newtosocialmedia I’ve cut you off. ur tweets aren’t going anywhere right now.

@newtosocialmedia: @therealfairygodmother what? #haiti #google

@therealfairygodmother: ur tweets aren’t going anywhere. except to me. and stop using those hashtags.

@therealfairygodmother: that’s the first lesson : – )

@newtosocialmedia: I don’t understand #tcot

@therealfairgodmother: exactly.

@newtosocialmedia: ?

@therealfairygodmother: You ran in and started shouting before you had a chance to understand what it is ur doing.

@newtosocialmedia: I’m marketing my business.

@therealfairygodmother: You’re making an ass of yourself. And your business.

@newtosocialmedia: But how do I sell things to people using Twitter if I don’t, you know, sell things to people. Using Twitter. ?

@therealfairygodmother: That’s just it. You don’t.

@newtosocialmedia: Then why the hell am I doing this?

@therealfairygodmother: Good ?

@therealfairygodmother: Social media isn’t for direct sales. Or, it is if u want to spam. r u a spammer?

@newtosocialmedia: No. I just want people to know about my business.

@therealfairygodmother: Awesome. That’s a great place to start. What’s the best way to talk about your business?

@newtosocialmedia:
Radio?

@therealfairygodmother: lol no. If you went to a party, and someone asked you what you did, would you tell them everything they could get for 50% off?

@newtosocialmedia:
No. I’d tell them what I did.

@therealfairygodmother: Right. And what if they asked you where the best coffee was near you?

@newtosocialmedia:
I’d tell them.

@therealfairygodmother: Right again. And what if they told you about the bad day they were having? Would you give them your specials?

@newtosocialmedia:
No, I’d probably tell them that joke about the mother-in-law who dies and she’s talking to St. Peter and he asks her to name her sins.

@therealfairygodmother: Okaaaaaay.

@therealfairygodmother: What I mean is, you’d have a conversation, right?

@newtosocialmedia:
Right.

@therealfairygodmother: Well, that’s what Twitter is. A way to have conversations. Some of those conversations will be about what you do. Some won’t.

@therealfairygodmother: But you can’t choose all the time. That’s selling. And selling isn’t having a conversation. It’s selling.

@newtosocialmedia:
And Twitter isn’t about selling. It’s about having conversations, meeting people who have some interest in me, and vice-versa.

@therealfairygodmother: Now you’re getting it! Nice job. I’m going to put you back in the stream now. Go use what you’ve leaned.

@newtosocialmedia:
Cool. #superbowl

@therealfairygodmother: : – ( alright, let’s talk about hashtags first…

Tags: Ben Curnett, Digital Marketing, Social Media, twitter
Posted in Social Media | No Comments »

Social Media Stragglers Get Skewered

Tuesday, January 12th, 2010

It’s January. 2010. Time to step things up.

If you’re a small business, a destination, an event, you’ve got to get on the ball. You need a social media plan.

Because you can’t be one of those people that says, “We need to be on Facebook,” or, “Better start Twittering,” or, “We need to ‘do’ social media.”

You really can’t. It wasn’t okay before, either. But now it’s totally out of the question. You must change.

There are more reasons why than I could even go into. But I will say that everything about digital marketing has changed, and it will never go back. Keep up or get left behind.

And before you start, you have to plan.

Here are four quick ways to start planning for digital marketing today, pokey…

-Learn Jumping into social media without learning about how to use it it is a lot like every single item here. You can do some pretty serious damage to your brand just screwing around. So learn a little about the parts and pieces before you run in shouting about your company.

-Plan Here’s how you end up with an online billboard instead of a communication engine: don’t plan. Can you imagine going through the whole process of building your online marketing, only to have something completely useless at the end of it? Wait. A lot of you don’t have to imagine it.

-Prepare Not the same as planning. Preparation comes when your plans are in the works. What will you do when your plan for digital marketing is launched? That’s what you’re preparing for. One big preparation tip: Put one person in charge. Nothing suffers as much from committee creep as social media.

-Listen So you’re ready to jump in and start friending and poking and tweeting the crap out of the place. Great. The best way to start is to shut up and listen. Social media is a big cocktail party. Get a feel for the conversation. Hell, find the conversation. It’s worth taking the time to listen before you go around shouting; it might encourage you to actually use social media in a way people appreciate.

Which is to say, being social.

Tags: Ben Curnett, Digital Marketing, marketing strategy, Social Media
Posted in Social Media | No Comments »

Are You A Twitter Ninja, A Guru, Or A Jedi?

Thursday, December 31st, 2009

These references are done. Played out. Finished.

It’s a new decade, so let’s put them away forever. Please.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you probably don’t need to read any further. But just in case, here’s the deal: Guru, et. al. were terms used throughout the 00’s to lend a little tech savvy speak to your bio in an informal (zany?) way. These idioms were little one word cues that branded their designees as in-the-know. Geek marketer code.

(Guru is a little older. Still, though… ugh.)

Okay, I’m going to give you the fact that I am a self admitted word geek. I’m hypersensitive to language. When people start using words that are fashionable, I’m the first to ignore them. To each their own.

But these words are too egregious to be ignored anymore. I’m calling for an immediate boycott. This is a cease and disist order from saying anyone is a “blogging ninja”, a “Wordpress jedi” or (gasp) a “social media guru”.

It’s over.

But far be it from me to be a critic without proposing a solution. For the 10s, here are the words that will be quirky designations for expert:

General, Wrangler, and Matador.

Go ahead. Try them out. That guy who gave the keynote on Twitter is a General. Four Stars.

See? It works great.

Jill is a total wrangler when it comes to Facebook.

I guess what I’m trying to point out is that, no matter what catchphrase people are using, information and the folks that wield it are either useful or not. They either help or they don’t. They either use their powers for good, or… hey, now I’m doing it!

You get the point. It’s probably best to just let your actions do the talking, rather than calling yourself something or other that, let’s face it, 10 years from now will sound like a catchphrase from a bad sitcom.

But if you’re dead set on trying, I hope you’ll use the ones I put out there. If you start using them now, your vocabulary will be way ahead of the pack when the rest of the Twitter-verse comes around.

You’ll be a language matador.

Tags: Ben Curnett, business trust, marketing strategy, Social Media, twitter
Posted in Digital Marketing, Social Media | No Comments »

Best Ideas Of The Week

Friday, December 18th, 2009

Friday seems like a good time to reflect.

That’s what this new feature on the Matterhorn blog is about. Pat and I are online a lot, of course. And we stumble on some pretty cool stuff throughout the course of a week.

There’s a lot of things that we see that we’d like to write whole posts about. So we do. But other things don’t fit for one reason or another (usually a time shortage). That’s what the Best Ideas Of The Week is for.

Enjoy…

“This I Believe” is an amazing series of short radio essays from people across the spectrum of American life, many famous, some not. Here’s one by movie and TV producer Brian Grazer about leaving your comfort zone. And surfing.

One of our favorite thinkers and marketers, Seth Godin released an ebook called “What Matters Now”. It’s available for free download, and is the kind of thing you really want to share with as many people as you can.

We’re big believers in quality content, partly because of Joe Pulizzi (@JuntaJoe on Twitter). He’s been writing about how to use content strategically for a long time on his blog. This week, he posted a list of 100 predictions for 2010 on content marketing and social media. These are thoughts from some of the best and brightest; it’s well worth a look.

If you’re an iphone user, you probably need the type-’n-walk app. Amazing that this didn’t come out earlier.

18 minutes well spent is a big deal in the age of the internet two-point-whatever. Robert Ballard, an oceanic explorer with too many discoveries to name, gives a fascinating talk about the new age of ocean exploration, and how much left there is to know about 3/4 of the planet. It’s the kind of thinking that gets you thinking.

Finally, if you’ve never heard John Henry Faulks’ Christmas story, you owe it to yourself to gather up your loved ones and have a listen.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays from Matterhorn.

Tags: Ben Curnett, business relationships, dec_14, Digital Marketing, marketing strategy, Pat Strader, Social Media
Posted in Digital Marketing, Partnership, Social Media | No Comments »

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