There are a few iPad games for pets, but Friskies has taken the production up a notch with three free cat games released today on gamesforcats.com. The games were built with HTML5, enabling your cat to attack your iPad or any Android device. The Friskies scientists claim that their cats haven’t scratched the glass of an iPad, but could damage a plastic cover. The boss’s cat here is a heavyweight in the ring (pictured here), so I’m still sceptical on letting him take a swing at it. So I figured I’d test it out first before I mention it to second in command. The three games are Cat Fishing, Tasty Treasures and Party Mix-Up. All are pretty addicting from my end, the cat equivalent of Nintendo’s classic Duck Hunt, letting the cat swipe the targets instead shooting with a light gun. Now that I think of it, they should remake Duck Hunt for cats, catching the nostalgia market for cats that grew up in the 80s on 8-bit NES. Check out the video below:
I did a little Googling on it and found the game developer, Mondo Studios, which has already released two games for Friskies called Wonderland Quest and Wonderland Quest II. Both designed for humans, the popularity of the first demanding a sequel. I gave the sequel a go, which followed the original by letting you uncover cat treats in a fantasy setting, which was oddly hypnotic. The weirdest part is the developer’s press release, which sites a research study, funded by Friskies, which discovered these key findings:
Wonderland Quest positively influenced the purchase intent of Friskies dry cat food among buyers and non‐buyers of Friskies
Among Friskies buyers, the game had a positive impact on brand loyalty and influenced the purchase intent of specific varieties of Friskies cat foods
Among most groups the game also enhanced the Friskies brand perceptions of taste, variety and mealtime experience
So what I gather is they reverse-engineered the new games for cats from their success with cat food-based games for humans. This leads me to the only conclusion that the Friskies scientists are, in fact, cats.
Luxury hotels and resorts seem to be a little slow and pokey to embrace social, and sometimes it’s hard to get them in a groove as a client. I wanted to showcase a luxury resort we are not affiliate with, and hopefully inspire your team to get caught up. What I liked about the Miramonte, besides its location and amenities, was it’s social media efforts on a plethora of social platforms. I also wanted to get across that not everything needs to be viral or link bait, but just solid content that gets your message across. Hopefully the folks who run the Miramonte don’t mind me using them as an example, but I couldn’t resist as they’re doing a damn fine job.
When you’re a luxury resort of sorts, you’re already a sought after experience that hopefully alone is enough to get a viral effect going. Strutting your stuff across a few of the top social media platforms should be a kick start to an easy social marketing campaign. Your pictures, HD video, deals and celebrity visits are all bases you should have covered. The Miramonte has a great thing going on with their social media efforts, and while it may not be of rock star status yet, they’re heading down the right path. Let’s take a look at just some of the efforts that are driving them businesses through social interaction.
The Blog:
Of course a good blog is in order and the Miramonte is doing an ok job on their blog. While I think a good dosing of images and video could be added to make it more vibrant, they’re getting in solid content for the search spiders. It seems their Facebook Page is getting all the pictures, videos and social interaction and that’s a trend we’ll see more of down the road. We all know more people spend their time on Facebook than any other site, so this may be a sign of the times for blogs (in certain industries).
What they do different than almost all other resorts we’ve seen or worked on is offer people to guest blog. This was a nifty feature to have found and I think it’s a brilliant step to better selling their service. Just imagine your blog getting free great content from the people who pay to stay…just awesome!
Youtube:
Just about any luxury resort is worthy of video marketing mainly because each place is usually stunning. The Miramonte has a crazy nice location just two hours outside of LA, and they took advantage of this with a great mini video. You’ll see below that it’s nothing crazy, just shows off what they’re all about and even some summer deals. This kind of video marketing should lead to a lot of sales if they keep it up! This one was done by Point 7 West.
Twitter:
A lot of people struggle with Twitter, especially if they don’t have a dedicated marketing team. I can see how people don’t get involved, but in the hotel world that can be a huge mistake. The more social you can be the better off your business will be as well. The folks at the Miramonte have definitely been active here and what I liked especially about their Twitter stream was the direct interaction. Most companies just stick to tweeting their latest blog post or a deal, both of which there is nothing wrong with, just don’t make this your bread and Twitter butter.
Twitter is a great way to bridge the gap with your customers, both potential and past. It’s also a great way to get people to return by constantly being in their brain. We’ve even had a lot of success by firing off special deals and coupons to individual Twitter users…and it bloody works!
Facebook:
I really really liked what they’re doing with their Facebook Page. It goes beyond the normal wall posts and they seem to be really embracing a lot of features. You’ll see from my amazing Photoshop skills on all the features they’re taking advantage of(such as Reviews, Book a room, Youtube, Photos, Blog, Active Wall). This is all really good stuff and this is an area I want our hotel clients to take note of, as well all you hoteliers reading this post.
Since I’ve never been in contact with them I have no idea how that Book A Room feature is working for them from the Facebook Page. I can safely say that not including this feature will leave you at a loss, even if you only make one sale a month. From what we’ve seen on our end with other clients, the direct social contact through Facebook leads to a way higher conversion rate.
Foursquare:
Last but not least on the list to mention is Foursquare, and I honestly didn’t expect to see the Miramonte so active on here. Bravo! Their hip clients are checking in at a very good rate here and that’s all you can really hope for. If I were to offer any advice here it would be to jump on the mayor deal marketing opportunity. Besides that you can get a link from your venue page so why not utilize that and add a little more diversity to that link profile?
Foursquare doesn’t take much effort and if your mayor deal is attractive enough, you can pretty much set it and forget it. Make sure you befriend people who check in as well which goes to show you’re a company with real people behind it, and that you actually care.
Well I hope this inspires, helps and encourages a lot of you folks out there. As always, I’d love to hear comments, suggestions and tips regarding anything talked about here. If anyone from Miramonte wants to pipe in then we’d be more than thrilled! For the rest of you folks who are near LA and need a pampering, then check out their spring specials and deals.
I’m a sucker for good/bad/rare ads and usually you’ll find Heineken in the mix. Obviously with my recent post on their latest advertising wonder, I just had to drum up one more for you folks this week. This one features Jennifer Aniston and while nothing too special, she provides enough star power to build enough brand buzz for the delicious beer company. I promise this will be the last Heineken commercial for a while!
I’m a sucker for good/bad/rare ads and usually you’ll find Heineken in the mix. Obviously with my recent post on their latest advertising wonder, I just had to drum up one more for you folks this week. This one features Jennifer Aniston and while nothing too special, she provides enough star power to build enough brand buzz for the delicious beer company. I promise this will be the last Heineken commercial for a while!
I recently saw the Miracle Whip ads coming out since I was home over the Easter Weekend. I don’t have cable at home, so I sometimes miss these unique ads that hit the cable networks. While Pauly D is only a fraction of the commercial, it’s how he was involved that got me interested enough to write about it. Instead of a boring run of the mill ad, Miracle Whip did something very different. The commercial you see below showcases both lovers and haters of Miracle Whip. This was a smart idea, and kudos to the marketing department who came up with it. They didn’t stop there either, the company has encouraged Youtube users to make their own love/hate response which is crucial to brand buzz. Instead of being forgotten in a couple of weeks, they’ll have built up long lasting hype with their fans. Just for the record, I’m a Miracle Whip lover!
If you’re going to attempt to ride the wave of success Old Spice had with their viral commercials, at least do it right. Dairy Queen recently launched an ad with rainbows on fire and bunnies shaving some weirdo who likes like he should be doing the Brawny commercial. While I imagine this commercial will neither increase nor decrease sales, it does however make me question big brand marketing departments heavily. I know I’m forced to talk about it, and that will make some claim that it’s working…but someone had to bitch about it. Back to the drawing board DQ! Get back the team who did the flamethrower burger commercial!
Big brands have a huge opportunity to have a little fun with their fans. and perhaps give your viral marketing team a breather. We’re all consumers, and some of your loyalists may be armed with an HD video camera, editing skills and the creativity to pull off something amazing. You may find it worth you companies while to dabble in the more socially interactive forms of video marketing. I’ve seen dozens of big brands do commercial contests, and from that I’ve seen videos that rivaled the big firms. Throw in a prize, let the winner receive their 15 minutes of fame and everybody wins.
Every moderate to popular product out there has some sort of consumer base, right? There’s always a good reason why your product has worked its way into the lives of all those people. Youtube is a great platform to let them showcase their own talents, for example let’s take a look at a current trend. Tea is undoubtedly making a come back, especially out here on the west coast. If we can dive deeper into the niche, outside the obvious health tea, let’s take a look at Blooming Tea (aka Flowering Tea). I saw this out there, and while it’s no big budget Hollywood showcase, it’s well done and makes me want the tea pretty bad.
This is a freshly done video so it will be interesting to see where it goes. I think this video is a great example of letting the fans do a little work. This isn’t done for BloomingTea.com by any means, but I certainly would have got in touch with the producer on this one. I would personally be thrilled if I saw something of this quality come from the social web. Hopefully these videos will spread the passion the producer has for you product, and the end goal is to make others feel and understand that same ka-pow!
Force The Creativity Out: Contests
Contests are always a great way to drive social media buzz, snag some links and spread brand awareness. This should almost surely bring out the talented video editors and bring forth a lot of great content. Large brands should have no problem getting a lot of interest and participation, which is why I’m surprised at the lack of social contests. A few good prizes and recognition will go a long way so talk to your marketing department to get the ball rolling!
I always recommend to clients thinking about it to head on over to Youtube, and just have a look at the other brands that have ran a video contest. From there, you can sniff out all sorts of interesting data such as how much social media interaction was achieved, how many links were acquired and other tid bits such as video views and perhaps even an impact of traffic (via Alexa or other sites).
Youtube offers a promoted video feature which should *never* be ignored by any big brand and their typical marketing budget. A good example of a current contest via Youtube is by L’Oreal Canada, and there opening video has nearly half a million views. Those views are nothing to shake a stick at, and you can get the ROI is going to be well worth the time and effort. For the sake if this post, here’s the video with the views;
The last tip we’ll give out here is make sure you identify influential Youtube “stars” within your vertical. L’Oreal has done this and we’ve always done the same for our clients. While your company may not need the help, it is such a fresh approach that won’t cost that much at all. You’d be surprised by how many of these “Youtube Stars” jumped at the chance for the exposure, and of course some free product! Regardless, it won’t cost much and it just builds deeper roots with your fans.
I’m sure most cosmetics companies by now have noticed the sheer amount of makeup tutorials on Youtube, so congrats to them for running yet another contest. I’d recommend to companies interested in all this to keep a close eye on how it all plays out for L’Oreal. If you happen to be a cosmetics company, check out all the things this company is doing online because it’s nothing short of awesome!
Let’s Hear From You
If you’re running a contest or have in the past of this nature, we want to hear from you and I can imagine so do our readers. I wish we here at Linkbuildr have actually done one for our own company, but you know how it is…too much work going on for other people to get anything done for ourselves.
While some people would be offended to hear the F-word, most of us hear it on a daily basis so it’s no big deal really. When it comes to branding and watching what you say on behalf of your company, then that’s a different story. While it looked like the social media team for Chrysler may have accidentally dropped the F-bomb via their Twitter profile, it now is a case of being hacked…or at least that’s what they say. Regardless I’m all for it! While a few people will scoff at what has happened, the rest of the web is quick to talk about it on Twitter, Facebook and of course blogs. This means the links are pouring in and it’s a nice little bit of exposure for Chrysler.
So far I haven’t heard much of a negative response, but I’m sure Chrysler is doing all it can to make sure their image isn’t tarnished. If anything is learned here, and you have a slip up via social media like this then you can instantly claim you were hacked and begin an easy clean up process. Either way, the auto company will enjoy a couple days of buzz before the entire world forgets all about it…kinda like when they a launch a new car(zing!).
Find out the results of a year of high volume content marketing on guests blogs taught us money still talks. Read the results!
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Check out the anatomy of a "negative SEO" attack on our own site in our latest post. There's too much worry about these attacks happening, but I wouldn't worry too much about it. Come read what I think and just what to do if anything like this happens to your brand.
The Friskies scientists claim that their cats haven’t scratched the glass of an iPad, but could damage a plastic cover. The boss’s cat here is a heavyweight in the ring (pictured here), so I’m still sceptical on letting him take a swing at it. So I figured I’d test it out first before I mention it to second in command. The three games are Cat Fishing, Tasty Treasures and Party Mix-Up. All are pretty addicting from my end, the cat equivalent of Nintendo’s classic Duck Hunt, letting the cat swipe the targets instead shooting with a light gun. Now that I think of it, they should remake Duck Hunt for cats, catching the nostalgia market for cats that grew up in the 80s on 8-bit NES. Check out the video below:
