Tag Archives: Facebook

A Look Into Facebook Deals

24th March 2011

Facebook deals made a quiet launch a few weeks ago with a lot of buzz surrounding how the largest social network would break into the group coupon model.

While the actual tool has not launched, we have uncovered a few more details around how it will work. The program will launch first in Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, San Diego and San Francisco, you can sign up for deals today and Facebook will alert you once they go live.

Deals will go beyond the mobile phone. Currently Facebook users can claim a deal through Facebook Places. With the different options for check-in deals, it will be interesting to see how Facebook expands upon this feature.

Deals will work with friends. Given the social nature of Facebook, this definitely doesn’t come as a surprise, but it does come as an added extra. Other deal sites like livingsocial allow users to forward a deal to friends in order to receive perks of their own. Since this can be tough, it will be interesting to see how Facebook taps into the social networking nature to create meaningful rewards.

Facebook deals will aslo be activated through a tab on a brand’s Facebook page. Apart from check-in deals alone, Facebook has created a dedicated tab to all deals so that a user can easily see offers for local businesses. Although the future enhancements of this are not clear, it is clear Facebook is ready to make this action easy and functional for users.

What are you thoughts on Facebook deals? Have you signed up? What will you expect to see when they finally go live?

Chick-fil-A’s Approach to a Multifaceted Campaign

23rd March 2011

Yesterday I had the opportunity to speak on a panel for AiMA’s monthly social SIG luncheon about one of our clients at Engauge, Chick-fil-A, and their recent Spicy Chicken Biscuit launch. Rather than speak directly about a social media case study, our team decided it would be interesting to present how Engauge, along with our agency partners at Chick-fil-A, BrightWave Marketing and Foundry approached the campaign from social media, email marketing and website design respectively.

When tackling the prospect of a campaign or in this case a product launch, it’s important to take a holistic view of the goals, objectives and desired outcomes, rather than just see the project through our eyes as the social component.

The success of this particular product for Chick-fil-A did not lie in awareness across many mediums, but cohesive engagement throughout many mediums.

As an agency partner it can sometimes be difficult to separate your work from another’s, but integrating aspects of social across channels is crucial to campaign success.  For example, a call to action to participate in a poll on Facebook within an email gave our fans a reason to react and a directive to react to, not just multiple visuals to consume from each medium.

As marketers continue to build multiple communities across the web, it’s important to not only think about the success of an individual channel, but also how each channel can build upon and create an unforgettable experience for each and every subscriber, fan and future customer as well.

Disclaimer: I serve as the social strategist on the Chick-fil-A account at Engauge and helped to develop and execute this particular campaign. However, it is also true that I love the Spicy Chicken Biscuit just as much as the next raving fan, even when I’m away from my desk.

SXSW Day 2: Everything is Only 1% Finished

13th March 2011

Today I had the opportunity to visit the new Facebook Austin offices. The space largely unfinished with an industrial feel. Digging deeper, the team explained the reasoning behind the design, everything we do should always be only 1% finished.

There is always a problem to be solved, and a problem still exists not because its solution is impossible, but that someone hasn’t been impatient enough to do something about it.

A professor of mine at UGA, Dr. Scott Shamp, always challenged his students to make something work, then make it work better. These same mentalities can be applied to everything SXSW is about. Innovating, pushing the envelope and changing the way people interact.

Social moves beyond a singular tweet or Facebook post and in-between your TV, mobile phone, a screen at an event and beyond. It’s always 99% new, 1% familiar. The platforms, devices and apps will change, it’s our job to learn how, why and when people will interact with technology in their daily lives and hopefully learn to be a little more impatient while getting there.