Pure Thinking

Meh. Snow's not that bad.

Well, I grew up in Minnesota where the two most exciting things in a child’s life were possible Big Foot sightings and snow days. Of course, all of us were outfitted with toboggans in the event our cars couldn’t make it out of the driveway and a keen senses of self defense should we have a run-in with a certain Yeti. So really, both events were rather rare.

After the Spring snow storm last night/this morning, I can’t deny that I thought all night about the potential snowmen I could make or  the forts I could hollow out in the snow mounds left by the plows. I knew I had a shovels somewhere, or at least a baking sheet that could be just as effective. All I needed at this point was to spot an over-sized, caveman-like footprint and it could shape up to be the greatest day of all time.

An e-mail went out to all the Puritans letting them know that working from home would be not only acceptable, but also advised given the forecast. I turned on the news to see canceled school listings dance across the bottom of the TV screen and a notable lack of effort to dig out the cars lining the streets outside. A snow day it was!

But no. No, no. The e-mails started trickling in. Dripping in as tentatively but as surely as the melting snow outside my window. Someone had made it in the office. Then another and another and another. The snow could not deter the Puritans. They were coming in to the office and that was final. No toboggan needed - just a spouse kind enough to dig out their vehicles and a Venti latte to sip on in the traffic. These champions laugh in the face of snow, saying “Hey you white stuff. Make my day.”

That being said, it’s time for me to follow suit, perhaps suit up in my traditional Minnesotan parka and mukluks, and head in as well. Wish me luck – but even more so, wish me a Big Foot sighting. It looks like there are no snow days for the Puritans. 

- Allison

Skype-ticism

Admittedly, I'm not an early adopter of new technology, always a bit skeptical. The new Adobe CS comes out, I'll wait a bit till they work the bugs out… iPhone, can't possibly be all it's cracked up to be, maybe in a year or two…social media, it'll never stick, all right maybe I'll give this Facebook thing a try… So recently, I reluctantly decided to adopt Skype into my digital life and to my surprise, it unveiled a benefit that I hadn't thought of until I gave it a whirl. Now, I've always seen the value of  video conferencing in a professional  scenario, but on a personal level I'd never really thought of it as viable. What can it do that a phone call can't? That was instantly made clear to me during my first video call to my mother. Sunday afternoon, my two-year old son was sitting on my lap when we decided to Skiiiiiipe (that's how he pronounces it) Nana. As soon as the screen appeared, after a moment or two of just hearing voices, the magic happened. Smiles were seen on both Nana's face and my boy's. Every time in the past when my son and I had a "conference call" with her, it always ended with, "God, I wish I could just see him and his smile". Well, voila Nana, here it is. Skype has made it possible to fulfill a grandparents request to see their grandkids more often. I know being there is one thing, but I'm hoping that this helps mitigate the guilt tactics delivered by a Catholic mother (if you come from a Catholic upbringing you'll appreciate this even more) for us to come home more often. Essentially, it is helping to rebuild the bond of family in long distance situations that are more prevalent in our modern society. Thank you Skype, maybe I'll go out and pick up one of those iThingies now.

The Healthcare Debate Via iPhone

A strange thing happened to me over the weekend. No, it has nothing to do with St. Mary's and Northern Iowa completely ruining my March Madness brackets, although something like that seems to happen about this same time each year.

Since my television was stuck on basketball games (March Misery in my case), I found myself watching and, at times, participating in the debate about health-care reform legislation entirely via social media - all on my iPhone no less. Twitter accounts such as @BreakingNews, @nprnews, @WSJ, @CNNbrk, @CNN, @foxnews and @shitmydadsays (kidding) provided blow-by-blow accounts of the debate (aka slaughter/carnage) in Washington, while my Facebook and LinkedIn accounts allowed for insight into my "friends" perspectives.

To think that three years ago I didn't even have an iPhone and had never heard of Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. 

Is all of that a good thing? Or, did I miss something by only being engaged in a very important issue in snip-its of 140 characters or less?

I'm honestly not sure. What I do know is that I watched my kids' swim practice, suffered through several basketball games, and attended a baby shower along with a multitude of other things while feeling like I wasn't missing a beat. 

- Larry

Twitter: @lholdren

Email: [email protected]

Link Building And Digital Marketing Basics

Social Media marketing continues to grow from experimental to must have, that increases the importance of including social media as part of your overall digital marketing strategy, not to be your only digital marketing strategy. As an example here are 6 ways to increase "link building" to drive traffic to your web site and help improve your organic search results.

1. Email Newsletter and blog campaigns: Email newsletter and blog campaigns with links back to your web site will increase your ranking as people click to learn more. Keep your newsletters and articles pertinent to your audience so they look forward to getting new info from you. Include industry specific best practices, white papers, webinars and include some humorous stories about your business community. And don't forget simple things like a link in your regular email's auto-signature.

2. Social Media: Social media with links back to your web site will increase your traffic and ranking as people click on the links on your Facebook fan page. Doing a good job with Facebook and having ongoing communication between you and your customers will keep it interesting and "real". Start a discussion about industry topics on LinkedIn groups (like I will do with this post), upgrade your business listing on LinkedIn, and tweet about your company's activities on twitter.

3. PPC: Pay Per Click will also increase organic search results as people are clicking on those ads back to your web site. PPC should be done well; perhaps you have multiple campaigns, multiple ads, all leading back to your web site which again will help with your organic search listing. 

4. Link Building Campaign (one of my favorites) for SEO: Many companies will have some kind of community area on their web site where they list companies they partner with, customers, non profits they work with, industry associations, trade publications, etc. Do this and ask them to include your web site link on their pages as well.

5. Web site optimization for SEO: be sure your web site is optimized for search engine optimization. Is the information there for the search engine spiders to crawl on and keep you ranked high on search results?

6. Traditional Media: Even traditional media marketing will help your search results if you have "calls to action" to visit your web site. Magazine ads, direct mailings, trade show handouts, business cards, etc.

The idea is to dramatically increase the traffic to your web site, and do it continually. Once there make sure your web site is interesting for your customers to learn more and optimized for conversion. That's a topic for another post.

- John

@johndmeyer

How do you define social media?

Have you ever searched for a concise, easy-to-understand definition of social media? If you haven't tried already, don't bother. You won't find any common definition. What you will find is a collection of random explanations that contradict each other, such as:

Social media is media designed to be disseminated through social interaction, created using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques - Wikipedia

Social media is a set of technologies and channels targeted at forming and enabling a potentially massive community of participants to productively collaborate.- Anthony Bradley, Gartner

A term used to describe tools and platforms people use to produce, publish and share online content and to interact with one another. Social media tools include blogs, podcasts, videos, microblogs, wikis, etc. - The Buzz Bin

If there was a conversation cloud that monitored what I was talking about, social media would be the biggest, brightest phrase. I talk about it A LOT. Can I provide the Merriam-Webster's official definition for it? No, but neither can you because there is no entry for it.

So, what is social media, really? Is it a platform such as Twitter or YouTube? Is it the experience of sharing your opinion via a blog post or commenting on a video on YouTube? Is it a concept such as a way to engage in an open dialogue with your customers using online technologies? Is it a combination of all three?

For me, social media is a combination of all three. Social media is an innovative way of socializing where we engage in an open dialogue, tell our stories and interact with one another using online platforms. There's no big complicated words or phrases in my definition but for now, it works. I'm sure that it will change tomorrow, but that's the beauty of not having an official definition for social media. It can continue to evolve as social media changes. Once we have an official definition for social media, it means that innovation has stopped happening and that in itself will mean that social media is probably dying since innovation is what truly defines social media

What's your definition of social media?

- Shannon

@stdanitz

What’s the #1 way to make your friends jealous?

Get an internship at Pure, of course!

The Pure Internship Program is designed to give juniors, seniors or recent graduates an opportunity to learn alongside respected (heck yeah we're respected) members of the public relations community. At Pure, we invest in people and technology to create a place where people are challenged to rise to any and every task – showing us that their capabilities go beyond their job title. In fact, there are no job titles at Pure. Sure it makes it confusing, but also significantly less intimidating.

At Pure, interns are an integral part of our busy team, working on several accounts and applying a range of vital PR skills. Interns gain the industry knowledge and real-world agency experience that will prepare them for the PR industry while they hang out with us (the respectable people at Pure). The deal really keeps getting better, doesn’t it?

Plus, all interns meet with a mentor throughout the internship to discuss goals and expectations that make the experience ideal for them and for Pure. If they really knock our socks off at Pure, there might even be conversations about post-internship possibilities.

This is what we’re looking for:

• Juniors, seniors or recent graduates with background studies in communications, public relations,      journalism, marketing or a related area
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Strong willingness to learn and be an active member of the team
• Ability to multi-task and work independently
• Minimum commitment of 25 hours a week for 12-14 weeks; full-time a definite plus

If you know someone who might fit the bill or if you think you have what it takes, send your resume to [email protected]. She also accepts cards, flowers and singing telegrams.
 


   

The new Twitter? Tweeting vs. Bubbling

Home to the magnificent Taj Mahal, the majestic Himalayas and the birth of Bollywood, India offers culture, art, history and…Bubbly. No, not the champagne, but a hot new voice-based, social-networking application that is the next best thing for India’s ample mobile users.

Ad Age reports that Bubbly has garnered more than 500,000 users – before its official launch – and ‘is growing virally and with virtually zero marketing spend.’

Similar to Twitter, people can send short messages and follow family, friends, brands and celebrities. Yet, instead of a typed message, users record an easy and personal voice message. Messages are usually around 30 seconds and have a cap of one minute. Once a message is sent, receivers get an alert and must pay for mobile airtime if they select to listen to the bubble.

Bubbly is the vision of Bubble Motion, a global provider of mobile messaging and social media applications. According to Bubble Motion CEO and President Tom Clayton, Bubbly will be zeroing in on markets with fast-growing cell phone users like India, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia and Brazil, as opposed to the high volume web users in North America and Europe. Even Indian media networks are paying attention, with BBC being the first major brand to jump on the Bubbly board, testing ways to dish out breaking news. So, what are you waiting for? Start bubbling!

Derk Robson Rocks the House

It's not often that I pimp a competing agency on our blog, but in this case it seems pretty darn justified.

Goodby Silverstein & Partners has been a traditional agency that I have revered for years.  They have been named "Agency of the Year" more times than I care to count.

A few years back, they pulled a massive transformation and, seemingly overnight, became one of the most innovative and respected players on the digital stage.  They still hold that torch high.  I always wondered how they pulled it off so seamlessly. 

Next Thursday, I have the opportunity to find out, as their managing partner, Derek Robson, speaks to the New Denver Ad Club during their "Outside Voices" speaker series.  Members and non-members can attend.  If you're not a member yet, join and get a discount that ends today.  All the details here.

Gregg

Expand your network... and your waistline

Like we really need a reason to eat pineapple upside down pancakes.

Maybe some of you crazier individuals do. We're hosting the annual PRSA Colorado networking breakfast next Wednesday, March 24 at 7:30 a.m. Spots are limited and filling up fast, so sign up now, scarf some 'cakes and meet some new people. Just keep one hand on the fork and the other for shaking hands. Otherwise, this could get a little sticky.

2-D Barcodes, For Real!

They’re happening. They’re really, really happening. Forget fuzzies, puffies and oilies (the stickers I collected growing up), now kids on the playground will be trading barcodes with much more than just a picture. When scanned, these barcodes will lead you to a photo, text, video or voice note when using Stickybits. Needless to say, these kids on the playground would need an iPhone or Android, but its 2010 and, sadly, they probably do.

You need to download the application on your smart phone and then you can activate any barcode, or buy barcode stickers of your own. A pack of 20 vinyl barcode stickers is $10. This sounds like one of those awesome forms of technology that you see when you go on a trip to Japan and you tell all your friends in the US about. In case I got you wondering, Japan was doing this in '08.

Gregg mentioned 2-D barcodes in a post back in January and everyone here at Pure has been infatuated with the idea of having the option of sharing websites and media through one picture but now with SXSW just around the corner, this product will officially be launching as a consumer product, available for anyone. You can use it for personal messages like attaching the code to a birthday card, food boxes, and posters. What will I be using Stickybits for? A new era, tech-savvy scavenger hunt….

 

Even their graphics are really, ridiculously cute.

-Gillian