Matt Singley | Social Media Optimization

**UPDATE AT BOTTOM OF STORY**

Something that is making the rounds in social media right now is a link to an article on The Chive called “Girl quits her job on dry erase board, emails entire office (33 Photos)“.  The article is, as described, a series of photos that tell a story of a girl that got fed up with the behavior of her boss and quit by emailing a series of pics of her and a white board around her office.

Great story, but for some reason I just don’t buy it.  I can’t help but feel that this is a contrived marketing campaign, although I’m not sure for what.  The pictures and set seem a little too polished, and the timing it just a little too close to the story of the flight attendant that quit by yelling at a customer, grabbing a beer then inflating the evacuation slide and heading off into the sunset (well…handcuffs, actually).

So what could this be shilling? My best guess is TheChive.com, but there’s a strong play for Farmville, the “little office snitch” (network monitoring tool?) or even a job site like Monster or CareerBuilder.

If it is a campaign for something, it’s already succeeded in getting press as it is being talked about on Twitter, and Mashable just wrote it up. In this case, we should see another installment come out in the next day or two, maybe an update to how “Jenny” is doing, and what a wonderful new job she landed.

If it isn’t, well, I’m sure at the very least Jenny will be getting a lot of attention for just long enough to get another job! We’ll also see a wave of photos, videos and blogs about people publicly quitting theirs…

**UPDATE #1**

Valleywag picked up the story and is calling it a “near-certain hoax” that “sucked the whole internet”.  I agree, as I called it earlier.  They say they will reveal the identity of “Jenny” tomorrow.  My money is on [name removed because it wasn't her], which savvy commenter Stacy called out earlier today.  What do you think?

**UPDATE #2**

I hate to tell you “I told you so”, but…I told you so.  Totally fake.  TechCrunch has the write-up here.

So what can we learn from this? People (and “news” outlets) really do believe everything they read on the internet…

This morning I watched the new spot from Nike that features Tiger Woods, just in time for his return to golf at The Masters. When I first viewed it, the page had already been viewed 600k+ times on YouTube. As of this writing, it’s over 1.1MM; it’s obviously getting a lot of attention. I’ve been thinking about this video all day, going back and forth about how I feel about it.  The video is embedded below, and it’s worth watching.  Let me summarize what you see:

It’s a :30 spot in black and white, with Tiger Woods standing still.  He says nothing.  He blinks.  The voice over is of his father, Earl Woods, who passed away in 2006. He is talking to his son, and says, “Tiger…I am more prone to be inquisitive; to promote discussion.  I want to find out what your thinking was, I want to find out what your feelings are, and…did you learn anything?” It flashes to a black background and the simple, iconic Nike swoosh. (more…)

Usually for viral Friday I post up something funny or bizarre.  Today it’s something that is touching.  I saw this over at 1TimStreet and agree with him that it will go viral. It’s not always the humorous or strange that spreads like wildfire on the internet, very often it’s something as human as two sisters giving advice to two others.  This is worth 3:30 of your day no matter what you feel about the recent election.

Letter Between Presidential Daughters

I couldn’t get the video to embed for some reason, but you can click on the image to be taken to it. I would love to know what you think about this.

Since @brooksbayne has convinced half of Twitter (including me) to change our avatars to ’80s pics for the day, I thought the video for the day should stay with that theme.  This made me laugh, it’s A Ha’s “Take One Me” only with a catch…what if the lyrics matched what was actually happening in the music video?  My favorite line, “I’m gonna kick some ass with my own pipe wrench”. :)

Okay, this isn’t new, and it’s really not all that viral, but just made laugh! :59 of Aunt Mildred playing Halo in her mind.

A lot of people play Guitar Hero, the uber popular video game.  So what do you do if you love it so much it hurts, and you have too much time and chalk on your hands?  You create Bike Hero.  Apparently this took several days. 

Below is the video for “Prisoner of Society” by The Living End.  It’s done on expert mode, but not exactly the way you are used to seeing it. It gets really good at the end, so make sure you watch the whole 3:36. I really want these guys to do this with Freebird next.

RSS Subscribers: Video Embeded, go to original post to see it.

I’m listening to Viva La Hova while I write this. It’s a mashup mix of Coldplay, one of the greatest rock bands in the world, and Jay-Z, one of the greatest hip hop artist in the world. “A Spy’s Prayer” is playing much louder than I should probably play things while I’m trying to work, butI just can’t help it.  What a great song.  What a great mashup album! I started hearing some buzz about it a week ago, and I finally downloaded it today.  I’m pretty sure I will do the digital equivilent of wearing this album out (remember that with cassette tape? ha ha!).  Haven’t heard of it yet?  You will.  I think that in the next few days it will trend on Twitscoop, I think it’s picking up some momentum.  Why?

It’s Free.

Yes, the great minds that put this together, Mick Boogie and Terry Urban, are giving their music away.  You can go download it right now, DRM free, no strings attached…all 20 tracks. I wonder how hours they put into this project? I wonder if they were tempted to try to sell it? What kind of buzz would they have if there was any cost involved to the consumer?

I have lost track of how many business owners and managers have asked me to create “something viral” that makes money for them right away.  They want visible, tangible results that they can track on Excel, sort of the equivelent of a coupon that tracks sales of a product.  Here’s the thing…you won’t always see immediate results, but if you can break free of the traditional business model of cashing in on the first step, you will probably do better in the long run.  I don’t know what the future holds for Boogie and Urban, but I think they are going to do well. Buzz about this project will continue, people will download their work for free, and they won’t make a nickel off of it at first glance.  But…they will make money.  Publicity, offers, promos…

In your next team strategy meeting, will you try to figure out something that you can give to your customers and fans free of charge? Don’t add conditions and hoops to jump through, just give it away. The loyalty and buzz you create will likely produce more long term gain than anything you can gather in the short term.

I should probably note that before you download the album, the language is, well…hip hop.  If you are not familiar with Jay-Z and are easily offended, you may want to proceed with caution.  Consider yourself warned.

I tweeted about this earlier today, but I think it deserves its own post.  I love fresh and creative ways of spreading content around the web, and AC/DC has put out one bizarre and intriguing product: a music video down in Low Definition Excel!  Yes, that Excel, the spreadsheet program from Microsoft.

I downloaded the .xls file just to see if it work…and it does!  I think this has viral written all over it.  If you don’t have Excel or don’t want to download the file you can watch it on YouTube as well. I’ve embedded it here for your viewing pleasure.

It’s nice to see a band that has been around for a while coming up with really new and creative ways to get some buzz going about their music!

I’ve had more than one head of company ask me if I could “make something viral” to promote their service.  I wish it was just that easy.  The buzz of “viral” is one of the most abused terms around, and although many people strive to make a viral video or email or sound clip, very few succeed.  Why?  Because it’s not a company that makes something viral, it’s the community.

Case in point: I love this video from The Natural Confectionary Company!  My friend James Whatley from Spinvox pointed this out to a group of us at Blogworld Expo 2008 and we just couldn’t stop laughing.  Why?  I don’t know…it’s a ridiculous script with gummy animals making no sense.  It’s brilliant.  It’s too bad their website isn’t equally brilliant, unfortunately it’s as far to the other end of the spectrum as you can go.  TNCC: if you ever want a redesign let me know!

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