P2 is a great new Wordpress theme that masters the micro-blogging art on your blog. It allows you to post on the page itself, comment, up-load photos and videos, and interact the way micro-blogging should be. I see this becoming a standard for the type of interaction we will be seeing on on-line forums; moving away from what we have been seeing since the 90’s. It will change the way communities interact with each other. It is quite familiar if you are use to Facebook – but this is for your blog.

Disqus 3 – the latest commenting system from Disqus, is coming next week.  This is the second real-time commenting system to come out, the other being JS-Kit’s Echo which I am still on the waiting list for… looks like Disqus 3 will be my choice.  I have been really happy with my current version of Disqus and look forward to next week!

Social media is becoming more and more part of the way we interact on line.  It is also becoming a great source for breaking news and communication.  With recent examples like the conflict over the Iranian Election results to YouTube being awarded a Peabody award for promoting democracy.  I have put together the following presentation intended to highlight some of these neat facts on how social media is changing the world.  Enjoy and share:

Vann’s, a Montana based home electronic and appliance store, is looking for someone to manager their on-line community through social media sites. The way they are doing this is forward web 2.0 thinking and part of a good social media marketing plan. I’ll describe just what they are doing:

• They are advertising the position through social media sites.  I came across the job posting on Mashable.
• They have set up a Ning social networking group just for the hunt called, Vann’s Community Manager, at community.vanns.com.  The site is set up for applicants to join, share about themselves (like their qualifications).  This is also where the full job description is and instructions on how to apply.
• As part of the application for the position Vann’s has also asked the applicants to create a 60 second video to, “Show us and tell us why you’re the best candidate for this job. Entertain us.”
• The next part of the application process is for the applicants to use their social media skills to spread the word about their video and get people to watch and vote for their video.
• Later, in September, they will be choosing someone for the position.

If the plan works as they have laid it out, the exposure from the applicants should help spread the word and advertise for Vann’s.  Such as this post.  You see, I have applied for the job.  I think it is a fun social media strategy and one that I think is perfect for such a job.

So in my own shameless self promotion, check out my video and vote – I would love all the votes possible.  Also feel free to share it as much as possible.  Thanks!

Today, while checking out all the fun on Facebook, I noticed an ad on the sidebar, “TJ Boise City Council.”  The use of Facebook for a city election is a great way to get the word out to your constituents.  On Facebook, most people belong to a local network – I am sure this is how TJ’s ad was targeted at me – I belong to the Boise network.

Small targeted ad placement on Facebook could bring your site the traffic you need to get the word out, rally the troops, or get people in your doors.  Social media advertising is all about targeting your audience – the exact demographic you are trying to reach.

Here is a little video I got from TJ’s site – after I followed the link in the ad – it worked on me…

Old Navy has one of the most creative social media business plans I have seen.  I have been intrigued at how they have rallied their customers to their social media sites web page and stores.  They have also incorporated their traditional marketing to blend with their social media campaign.

The reason I am aware of their campaign is mainly due to my wife who is part of Old Navy’s target audience.  They have done such a good job at getting to her that we just bought most of our kids back to school clothes at Old Navy.  You see my wife is an avid couponer; she reads coupon blogs like they are a hot and steamy romance novel – looking for the next best deal and best sale.

Let me describe the main gist of what I see of Old Navy’s marketing plan:

• Their marketing plan is centered around their “Supermodelquins,” a group of Old Navy mannequins.
• The Supermodelquins are then used in all the advertisements; TV commercials, on-line videos, and print and website ads.
• The Supermodelquins also have their own YouTube Channel The Supermodelquins. Here you can see all the ads, in addition to web only ones that tell more of their stories like the ones in this video:
  
  

• Once a week Old Navy also has a special promotion for the latest clothes and specials.  On the day the new promotion starts they reset their weekly promotion website www.oldnavyweekly.com with the latest information along with several embedded on-line printable coupons.  The majority of these coupons are for small savings, but each week there are several $75 off purchases of $100 or more, and similar coupons (this changes though from week to week). There are limited numbers of the big coupons, and they are hidden throughout the site.
• Also on the day OldNavyWeekly.com is reset the fresh TV ads come out, corresponding to the coupon site.  Often this is when my wife is reminded it is time to check their site.  By the time you see the commercial though it is typically to late for the big coupons… I will explain why later.
• Along with these typical advertising methods Old Navy uses Twitter and Facebook – but not the way other companies do.  They have their fan pages and corporate Twitter accounts but they also have personal fan pages and Twitter accounts for each Supermodelquin.  With these accounts the Supermodelquins interact with eachother, creating a type of soap-opera between themselves while also interacing with their fans and followers.
• Beyond this Old Navy also has the Supermodelquins interacting in the blogosphere.  Commenting on coupon sites and more – even personal blogs.  I saw one blog post on a personal blog where someone took a picture of herself with one of the male Supermodelquins – there were comments and tweets from the supermodelquin’s supermodelquin girlfriend.  They seem to be having a lot of fun with it, and it’s working.

This is the gerneral structure of the marketing plan – how it works is the beautiful thing.  On the couponing sites, where my wife has seen the effect of this marketing plan, is where the real juice happens.  You see each week there are coupon blogs that wait for the OldNavyWeekly.com site to be reset.  They know exactly when this will happen and sit in the comment section of the latest blog post about the new sale, refreshing the page over and over while they chat where the best coupons are. You can only get one coupon so once someone has the best one they share where it is found (they really need to get the new JS-Kit Echo commenting system on these blogs).  Several of these blogs get thousands of comments from hundreds of women during the first few hours after the new promotion starts.  Some make a party of it and get together with their friends and their laptops as they do it.  Old Navy has caught on to this happening and now the Supermodequins also join in on the fun, dropping hints from time on the blogs as to the location of the different coupons.  What a great way to build loyal customers.

In all, I have been greatly impressed with Old Navy’s use of social media to promote their brand.  It is fun, cute, and viral while at the same time creating a customer driven interaction between Old Navy and their customers.  Great job Old Navy!

Real time comments are here with the new JS-Kit’s newest commenting service Echo.  So what makes Echo different, you might ask.  The answer depends on what you are using for your current blog site.  If you are using the standard commenting system offered with your blog then there is a significant difference.  If you are using JS-Kit’s previous offerings or some of it’s competitors such as Disqus or Backtype then the difference is smaller.

The first big difference is that Echo is real-time – none of the other service offer this.  Real time means that the comments update without the need to refresh the page.  Echo is also different from the other current services because it offers you the ability to comment with multiple social network ID’s and have those comments also pushed to those networks.

Check out this video done by Robert Scoble with Khris Lou, CEO and co-founder of JS-Kit, on Building43.

For those of you out there that want to capitalize off of you blogs or web sites through affiliate links in your posts SkimLinks is a great option. It is a major time saver and gives you a much broader spectrum of companies to use.   It allows you to just use the direct link when disusing products in your posts or on your site, SkimLinks software then looks for matching affiliate links for you and does the linking for you.

The following video is of Alicia Navarro, the founder and CEO of SkimLinks.  She explains how SkimLinks works.  Check it out:

Skimlinks: Revenue through recommendations from JD Lasica on Vimeo.

United Breaks Guitars is a great example of what social media can do to improve customer service.  David Carroll and his band, Sons of Maxwell, illustrate with this song and video just what can be done when social media is used to express grievances.  Today when I first saw this video – having seen it posted by a friend of mine, Jason Crawford, on Facebook, already had over 3 million views and over 15 thousand comments.  News channels and web pages are reporting on in today all over the place so I expect the number to just increase.  United has already responded to David about the incident and has tried to make amends… the damage is done though and perhaps they will make some changes due to the incident.  (Click here for more information from David)

My point in posting this though is to highlight the change that is happening in business due to social media.  Social media makes it so any one’s voice can be heard by millions.  You do not have to be famous or clever, or even a good song writer like Carroll.  All you need is just a little on line presence to make your voice heard through Twitter, Facebook, YouTube or whatever and you can make an impact.  For business this means they can no longer sluff you off and ignore treating you right.  Customer service is key in this world today thanks to social media; some like Zappos.com get it, others like United do not.  It also means that business need to understand this change in dynamic or they could get burned… Just like United.

The last few days the new Seesmic Desktop application has been getting a lot of attention.  When I first saw it late Friday night I installed it after seeing that you can maintain more than one twitter account with it. I have been using Tweet Deck for my Twitter and Facebook streams but with just one of the two twitter accounts I have (I have one for myself personally and one for the Family Nester Blog).  If you could integrate two accounts on Tweet Deck I had not found it.  After the install of Seesmic Desktop I was quickly impressed by what it could do and liked the interface a lot more than Tweet Deck.  As a note, it states on it’s main page that it works for Mac and PC.  I use Ubuntu, a Linux operating system, but Seesmic Desktop is an Adobe AIR program – I have Adobe AIR and it runs great so I figured I would try out Seesmic… and it works great.  Check out this video on it: