August 16, 2012 in Marketing, Social Media Marketing by Clay Zeigler
ADVICE: Olympic-Sized Lessons About Social Sharing from NBC

The London 2012 Olympic Games are history and the biggest surprise winner may have been NBC. The television network paid more than $1 billion for the rights to broadcast an event that would take place in the early mornings in the US, would be heavily discussed all day long on social media, and would still have to be interesting enough hours later to attract prime-time audiences in sufficient numbers to pay that billion-dollar bill.

How’d it go? The just-released television ratings show that in the last week of the Olympics NBC had the eight top-rated broadcasts. A quarter of all the televisions watched in prime time were tuned to NBC. The Games drew nearly 220 million viewers, and NBC sold about $1.25 billion in advertising, a gold-medal-winning performance.

How’d they pull that off in a media world dominated by status updates, competitive cooking shows and mindless reality TV? NBC was smart, and did some things that both media and marketers should think about when they strategize about social sharing.

The Bronze Medal Lesson: Ask for Something

This Olympics featured live video streams like never before — every sport, all-day coverage. What a great way to draw viewers who favor some of the less-popular events. My own athletic addiction is rowing, so I was right there on the first morning of the regatta eager to watch online. But wait: Gotta sign up. Give us your information. And, here’s a new one: Prove you pay us something through your cable provider. My reward after all that was to watch a commercial.

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May 24, 2012 in Media Orchard, Picks by Scott Baradell
HEADS UP: Pick of the Orchard

We’re just trying to be social with this week’s Pick:

 
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April 2, 2007 in Media Orchard, Social Media Marketing by Scott Baradell
Anyone Seen My Blog Post?

Someone named Eric on MySpace, who goes by the handle “Anyone seen my bottle of Jack??” and says he is a college professor (and a swinger), apparently likes to pick up chicks with the witty writing on his blog.

For example, check out this brilliant entry entitled, “Sexy Jobs for the Ladies: Are stereotypes hurting the profession?” An excerpt:

OK, now before you go past these words and straight to the pictures, let us explain that this is a serious exercise.

Last night was another one of our poker nights. One of the guys (JD) brought up this article that he had read in Playboy. Of course, he had to preface it with the whole “I was looking at Playboy for the articles” bullshit. Come on JD, we are all men. Who cares!! Anyway, back to the story. He happened upon a reader survey that asked which of several fantasy-inducing women’s professions was the sexiest. The results:

1. Cheerleader (42 percent)
2. Nurse (20)
3. French maid (15)
4. Stewardess (12)
5. Woman cop (10)

It occurred to us that this stereotyping is a form of branding: it affects what men — and women — think of the profession. In fact, it almost certainly impacts who enters these careers, the pay scale, job satisfaction, and on and on.

An interesting concept — and yet oddly familiar! For some reason, we are reminded of our June 2006 post entitled “Sexy Professions for Women: Do the Stereotypes Damage the Brand?”, which begins:

OK, now before you go past these words and straight to the pictures, let us explain that this is a serious exercise.

Recently, as we were looking at Playboy for the articles, we happened upon a reader survey that asked which of several fantasy-inducing women’s professions was the sexiest. The results:

1. Cheerleader (42 percent)
2. Nurse (20)
3. French maid (15)
4. Stewardess (12)
5. Woman cop (10)

It occurred to us that this stereotyping is a form of branding: it affects what men — and women — think of the profession. In fact, it almost certainly impacts who enters these careers, the pay scale, job satisfaction, and on and on.

Weird! Maybe it was some sort of deja vu thing. We decided to read on.

Eric’s next paragraph:

So, being as we were getting tired of cards and more interested in downing the brewskis, we contemplated the positives and negatives of these five stereotypes and whether, on balance, they were a plus or minus for their respective professions. A couple of us did a little research and here is what we came up with. It really is fascinating.

Our next paragraph:

So, being one to have random thoughts after lunch as we scarf down a giant pistachio ice cream cone, we contemplated the positives and negatives of these five stereotypes and whether, on balance, they were a plus or minus for their respective professions.

The rest of Eric’s piece is pretty much a word-for-word lifting of our post.

College professor? I hope not.

Ladies, here’s a courting tip from Media Orchard: If a dude is willing to plagiarize someone else’s content to impress you with his wit and intelligence, what else will he be willing to do to get you in the sack?

We’re just saying.

 
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