Brains on Fire

• 

  Has your Starbucks experience been watered down?

  Posted on February 28th, 2007 by Virginia and currently 4 commenting.

  If you’ve been feeling that way recently, jump on over to conversation on the Brand Autopsy blog. John Moore, who spent 8 years as a marketer inside Starbucks, is requesting your thoughts on what Starbucks needs to do to get back on track. This is all in response to a leaked memo from Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz admitting that they need to “get back to the core” of who they are.

  Since almost all of us have had the Starbucks experience in one version or another, we’re all qualified & encouraged to jump on in and share our thoughts. John is compiling them for a free e-Book on What Starbucks Must Do.

  Tags: Brand Autopsy, CEO, e-book, Howard Schultz, john moore, Starbucks, What Starbucks Must Do
• 

  Every Six Months

  Posted on February 27th, 2007 by Jennifer and currently 0 commenting.

  That’s right. You may recognize this post as one that came up here and here. Well… it’s that time again. Yes, we are extending Fred Reichheld’s Ultimate Question to everyone we touch; everyone who is or could be in a position to recommend us. So, if you – our faithful blog readers – would like to join in the conversation, please take our quick, anonymous Net Promoter Survey by clicking on this convenient link.

  Thank you for taking the time to help us strive to improve ourselves.

  Tags: Fred Reichheld, Net Promoter Survey, Recommendation, Ultimate Question
• 

  Open Aura Arms

  Posted on February 26th, 2007 by Jennifer and currently 2 commenting.

  Okay… who watched the Oscars last night? I know several of the BOF crew did. In fact, Megan and I still have to sit down to see who won our Oscar Ballot Showdown!

  But more to the point… did anyone notice the Saturn Aura commercial? We chatted about it this morning in our Monday Morning Meeting… and it really was something special. The Saturn Aura is another one of those compact cars that no one really pays much attention to. But, lo and behold, they were voted North American Car of the Year. So what did they do? They sent a duplicate of the award to the people who had bought an Aura BEFORE it won anything, asked them to hang onto it for a while, and then pass it on to the next person on the list (postage paid by Saturn, of course). What a great way to reward the early adopters – the people who came to you before there was a bandwagon to hop on. What a great way to engage your customers and make them feel like they’re a part of your success. And it’s just so much better than just tossing the award on a lovely shelf with track lighting.

  Tags: Aura, Compact Car of the Year, Megan Byrd, Monday Morning Meeting, Oscar Ballot Showdown, Oscars, Saturn, Saturn Aura
• 

  Even if it’s made to be viral, it’s not viral until it goes viral.

  Posted on February 23rd, 2007 by Spike and currently 8 commenting.

  It will never cease to amaze me what videos get picked up and go viral and what doesn’t. I’m not a viral expert, but I don’t think that there is any magic bullet for creating a viral video. For example, VeeDub’s post last Friday. It’s been picked up and is doing the worldwide blog tour. Did I think it would? Not really. But it’s getting a lot of attention.

  And then I received an email from a PR firm last week about Nokia’s new effort, which they already called a ‘viral video’ in the email. (Side note, the boys and girls at the PR firm did a nice job of communicating their objectives for contacting us in a very transparent way ” kudos.)

  But even if it’s made to be viral, it’s not viral until it goes viral. Got it?
  I’m sure the guys at CoBrandit can weigh in on this one. They know more about this kind of thing than I do.

  Tags: CoBrandit, Magic Bullet, Nokia, PR firm, VeeDub, Viral, Viral Video
• 

  SXSWi from Me to Ze

  Posted on February 22nd, 2007 by Virginia and currently 1 commenting.

  Friend of BoF and Community Guy extraordinaire Jake McKee has been kind enough to include me in a panel he is hosting at the upcoming SXSWInteractive conference in Austin, TX. I will be discussing my experience with the Fiskateers and joining managers from communities as varied as Discovery Education and SuicideGirls.com to discuss how to work with fans to create a thriving community ecology.

  I lived in Austin for 8 years and never experienced SXSWi so I am, as you can imagine, very excited to participate. I started going through the myriad of panels in detail, carefully planning my time there to make sure I get the most out of the speakers. I stopped dead in my tracks when I got to one speaker name: Ze Frank.

  Last summer, BoFer Joe Dannelly told me about this wacky guy Ze Frank who blew the doors off a design conference keynote. He also told me that he posts a 3-5 minute podcast daily on his site. “The Show with Ze Frank” contains the wittiness of a 22 minute Daily Show distilled into 4. His fans, self-identified as “Sports Racers” support his show by composing music, sending story ideas, creating a new intro for each day’s show, and using Ze’s signature rubber ducky in their sites to signal that they are part of the clan. Ze also features a host of other interactive projects that you may have seen including the birthday invitation that started being passed around virally and kicked of Ze-mania: “How to Dance Properly“. As you can tell, I’m a fan.

  The professional side of me is very pleased to be presenting at SXSWi because of the credibility it gives to our community, the crowd, content, etc. The rest of my brain stopped at “I could be in the same room with Ze Frank”. If you haven’t “met” Ze before, do yourself a favor, check out his site, and get a sense of why this man has such a devoted following that has given him interactive celebrity status. Hopefully you’ll see a follow up post from me in a few weeks of my brush with interweb greatness.

  Tags: Austin Texas, communities, Community Guy, Daily Show, Discovery Education, Fiskateers, How to Dance Properly, interweb, Jake McKee, Joe Dannelly, Podcast, Sports Racers, SuicideGirls.com, SXSW Interactive, The Show with Ze Frank, Thriving Community Ecology, Ze Frank