Technology Convergence Makes All Media Work Better

Yesterday my associate Frank Isca wrote about a not-so-new technology from Microsoft that's finally starting to get some traction because of the dramatic growth in smart phone penetration. In his post "What Are Microsoft Tags?" he explained that these tags can appear on any printable surface (print ads, transit signs, clothing labels) and are hyperlinks recognized by smart phone cameras using a Microsoft app. With smart phones approaching 30% of cellphone users, Microsoft must have decided the time was right to start getting more aggressive.

In a world that's gone increasingly bonkers over our mobile devices, here's something that allows those devices to use a physical world cue and deliver something more relevant and meaningful than ever before possible. Think about it: you're shopping for wine, and the shelf tag for a certain vintage links you with a click of your Blackberry camera to Kyle Meyer on the Winery Channel telling you what's so special about that bottle.

So now you can take anything with a printable surface and transform it into a hyperlink that can instantly engage your customer, patron, political supporter, you name it, to the content of your choice. Talk about a connected world! I'm starting to have flashbacks to Minority Report, the futuristic Tom Cruise movie that used corneal scanning to customize ad messages to passing shoppers. But instead of your eyes it's your iphone that gives you away.

Expect to see print publishers jump fast to offer this capability, since it will make their medium work harder. Better yet, use your imagination about how you might use it. What's the next big idea that MS tags makes possible?

What Are Microsoft Tags?

Although it’s technically not a new technology, the use of Microsoft Tags is starting to become more wide spread in the print world and it seems the possibilities are endless. So what are Tags?

According to a recent article on CNET News, Tags are essentially the hyperlink in the physical world to expanded content in the digital world. Printed as a square 2D image bar code, Tags can be placed in printed materials such as newspapers and magazines or on product packaging and outdoor signage. Then, with the use of a smart phone camera equipped with the proper software/app, Tags can be scanned to link directly to online content such as videos or a specific Web page. This results in a more media rich and interactive experience, especially when used within a static magazine or newspaper article.

Intrigued and want to know more? The CNET video below provides a nice demonstration of how Tags work and shows some examples of companies and outlets that are currently using them.

Facebook at work? Tips to ensure you’re not putting your company at risk

While on Facebook at work this morning, I came across an interesting article from Inc. Magazine discussing how Facebooking at work could put your company at risk of spam, phishing and malware. The article releases a statistic from a survey done by British research firm Sophos revealing that 72% of companies believe their employees' activities on social networking sites could endanger their business's security. In addition, 60% of businesses saying they believe Facebook presents the biggest security risk due to the social network company forcing users opening up profiles, significantly ahead of MySpace at 18% and Twitter at 17%.

Although our company understands the risks Facebook presents, we also understand that the benefits of being connected on Facebook far exceed those risks. I was on the social network this morning checking up on a few fan pages that we’ve helped clients develop in the past few years. For many companies, Facebook fan pages are becoming an important tactic to keep connected and become more engaged with employees, clients, customers and prospects. In order to do so, many employees are asked to engage in social networks while on the clock.

So, how can employees help avoid endangering their business’ online security? Here are 5 simple things you can do:

1. Use a personal e-mail account instead of the corporate address to avoid spam from entering your corporate e-mail program.

2. Don’t click on any Facebook ads while accessing your account from a corporate computer.

3. Only connect with people you know well. Your company’s fan page connects you to customers and prospects, so don’t feel obligated to accept if they send a personal friend request to you.

4. Use caution when authorizing applications. You can keep an eye on which applications you have authorized by going to “Settings” and clicking “Application Settings“. Then, on the “Show” dropdown menu select “Authorized” and you’ll see the applications that can access your data and are allowed to post and view information from your contacts.

5. Don’t download files from other people’s profiles while in the office. Links from people you don’t know could contain viruses that can corrupt your company’s computer.


Facebook can be an incredibly important tool for companies to market themselves. Stay smart about security and you’ll only experience the benefits.

How To Make A Video Go Viral

Ever wonder what it takes for a video to get viewed hundreds of thousands of times? Millions, maybe?

urlesque.com has just published its "100 Most Iconic Internet Videos," the most popular videos on the web since the inception of the web. Based on that list, it seems cute kids, pratfalls, stupid tricks and other low-brow stuff gets the most attention. In large part, what they have in common is humor. There's a lesson there, to be sure.

Make it Go Viral

This is one of my favorite cartoons released from Hub Spot. There have been so many times we’ve received similar instructions. “Make it funny,” “Make it different,” and “I love the cute sleepy things videos, can we do something like that?” And my personal favorite “We really want this to go viral and have everybody see it!”

I’m all for making videos and marketing materials memorable – they have to be! But there’s no rational reason to want everybody to see your video other than pure vanity. Even in the world of YouTube, only your target audience needs to see your video.

Companies that understand who their audience is and target their message specifically to that audience will fare much better than companies that blast an irrelevant message to the masses. If 80% of your ideal prospects get and react to your message, isn’t that better than 2% of the entire world that will probably never interact with you? The same tried and true marketing principles apply today as they did 10 years ago when there was no social media, only the means of distributing those messages has changed.

So yes, please make your videos and messages interesting, just make them interesting to people who actually mean something to you.

How long has it been since you updated your crisis communication plan?

As PR professionals today, we have a few areas we MUST pay attention to on a daily basis: monitoring what is being said about your company, handling media relations, engaging in online conversations about your brand, executing marketing plans and keeping your head above water in the new PR 2.0 world. Often times, we allow responsibilities with less immediacy to fall to the wayside when putting out day-to-day fires, like long-term planning of events, internal communications and crisis communication.

Yesterday I attended a local PRSA event that focused on crisis communication and it got me thinking about what our clients' crisis plans look like right now. Since handling crises is not something we deal with everyday, it’s also not something we think about everyday until it happens. However, even if you don’t have to execute it, continuously updating a crisis plan is most likely one of the most important things you’ll do as a PR professional.

So, once I got back to the office I began thinking about different scenarios our clients might face and how I can reach out as their PR advisor to help create updated crisis plans. During the process, I uncovered great online resources about crisis communication planning.

Here are some of the best:
Bulletproof blog - The blog on crisis communications
7 must-have elements in every crisis communications kit
Crisis Communication Planning: Organizing and Completing A Plan That Works
Will your crisis communication plan make you or break you? (okay, this is mine...)

To answer the title of my own blog post - TOO LONG! I'm contacting our clients this week to discuss updating their crisis communication plans. Any suggestions on how to make this a smooth and effective process?

Toward A More Meaningful Tweet

The Ad Contrarian today wrote about the complete worthlessness of some Twitter posts – most, in fact. He has a good idea for putting followers out of that particular misery. It's a good post - you'll enjoy it.

And it reminded me of a post I did last year about a another idea for improving content on Twitter, titled TwitterStarters. So for those of you who haven't yet read it (or read it and couldn't wait to read it again), here it is.