Archive for November, 2009
Best Browser Notice Ever
Posted by Damian Damjanovski | Filed under Uncategorized
Big thanks to @pixelette who posted this on her Tumblr.
Probably one of the funniest and most straight-talking Browser Compliance notices I’ve ever seen.
It reads:
Hi, if you are coming to this site via Internet Explorer 6, you might not be getting the best experience possible. Honestly, I can’t even begin to think about what your entire experience on the internet must be like? (…probably like riding a bike on the highway while cars blow by you on their way to Costco to get gallons of mayonnaise and 60-inch plasma TV’s). How will you ever be able to use this website?????? You wont. You’re an asshole and your browser is an asshole. So look, I’m going to be honest: I kind of hate you. BUT we c-a-n make this work. Here is what I am going to need you to do: fire up your Toshiba ShitBook© that weighs about 45 pounds, wipe the Cheeto dust off the screen, download Safari, delete Internet Explorer from your computer, punch yourself in the face, and get me a pulled pork sandwich.
See it for yourself at the bottom of Tyler Thompson’s site (Creative Director – Squarespace)
On Westfield’s Gift Card
Posted by Damian Damjanovski | Filed under Advertising, Marketing & Strategy, Web2.0 & Social Media
Okay, so first off, I have to admit, I was actually quite peeved about how all this panned out, so yes, this post will be slightly biased due to my anger towards Westfield about how they conducted this campaign.
There’s been a lot of back and forthing on the internets about whether this campaign was total spam, or whether it was just so awesomely virally successful, that none of us want to admit it.
I’ll try and cover this off as logically as I can in my furore.
1. Is the idea bad?
No. Hell no. The idea is great, I mean, who wouldn’t want to win a $10,000 shopping spree at the expense of Westfield! To enter all I need to do is click a button?!?! EVEN BETTER. I have to admit, I was tempted to click on the button to, you gotta be in it to win it and all that jazz. The campaign idea is a great one, it’s using a widely accessible platform, at the right timing, with some good media spend behind it.
2. Is the execution bad?
No. Well, ‘no’ except for one thing. You see, the execution on a whole is fantastic. The app is built well, the competition mechanism seems pretty solid, it all fits together quite nicely and everyone involved should pat themselves on the back for a job well done.
Except for one thing.
Why, oh why on god’s earth did you have to make the entry requirement a pro-forma status update? Yes, it does contravene the Facebook policy, but the real question is why is it against the Facebook policy.
Here’s my thoughts (Facebook hasn’t commented on any of this, so this is all my assumptions based on my knowledge of Facebook functions).
Most competitions of this nature (the ones that convene to the Terms of Service that have been put in place for a reason) require you as the user, to become a Fan of their Page. Becoming a fan of a page puts you within the FacebookDM reach of the brand’s page (i.e. they can message you through Facebook whenever they like) and allows the brand to go through the demographics of their fans, as well as specifically target Facebook ads to not only fans, but friends of fans.
So there’s heaps of benefits to the brand involved, yeah?
From the user perspective, if a hundred of your mates decide to all become fans of a particular page, then Facebook does you a solid and aggregates that information into a single Newsfeed line item.
The same happens for Events (so if 10 of your friends are going to a party, it’ll say “Damian, and 10 other friends are attending blah blah”).
Same happens if y’all join a group.
You know when it doesn’t happen. When you update your status, Making a Wall Post, or Uploading Photos. Unsurprisingly, these are all activities which are specifically sighted in the Facebook Terms of Service for competition mechanisms.
In the rules of the promotion, or otherwise, you will not condition entry to the promotion upon taking any action on Facebook, for example, updating a status, posting on a profile or Page, or uploading a photo.
View the full guidelines on Promotions here
http://www.facebook.com/promotions_guidelines.php
The point I’m getting to here, is that there is NO reason that Westfield and M&C Saatchi/Mark couldn’t have run the same campaign, with all elements the same, but made the condition of entry not a status update, but rather becoming a Fan on the Page.
If Westfield have (as they’ve stated) “worked closely with Facebook” on this Application, then Facebook needs to be much clearer to users (who helped guide much of the new Terms of Service) about when Facebook will happily break the rules for advertisers. And if they haven’t, then Westfield needs to fess up that it may have made a mistake, and may need to revisit how the entry mechanism works.
For what it’s worth, I think the campaign is a great idea, and was executed well, with a very good promotional incentive. I just think it would have succeeded just as much (if not perhaps more) if it didn’t use Status Updates to enter, and didn’t piss off so many people by doing so.
Cheers.
Note: Yes, I realise I am a marketer, and that much of this may seem “ironic” coming from somebody working in this industry, but I definitely think we as marketers needs to understand that there are lines that we’re not supposed to cross. Social media is still developing, and doesn’t have the legislative framework that surrounds SMS or email marketing, but we do have a very clear set of Terms by which we’re asked to adhere. We should try not to cross those lines.
Reading news pages, made easier
Posted by Damian Damjanovski | Filed under Uncategorized
One of my pet peeves is trying to read articles from news sites such as news.com.au or smh.com.au using their site.
Most of the news I read on a daily basis, is delivered to me through RSS feeds that I keep on top of using the wonderful Mac application NetNewsWire. It syncs with Google Reader, and makes it really easy to flag articles, post them to my delicious, and in general keep on top of everything.
But sometimes, I do have to read SMH or News.com.au – and it really frustrates me to have to attempt to read a thousand word article (including all it’s errors) when it’s been jammed in-between hundreds of links, photo galleries, ads, ads, and more ads.
A few days ago, I discovered Readability, which I have to say is quite possibly one of my favourite tools at the moment.
The premise is simple, you drag the bookmarklet to your toolbar, you go to an article, click the bookmarklet, and suddenly, everything but the relevant text is gone. Couldn’t be easier.
I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.
