Entries Tagged 'Mike Spataro' ↓

CRMBuyer (of all places) has a interesting article today on brands competing for consumer affection in social networks. Interesting quote in the piece from Richard Feinberg, director of the Center for Customer-Driven Quality at Purdue (great job title), who says, “Businesses that don’t participate are going to be left behind.” Thanks to Jeff Zabin of Aberdeen Group for the kind reference.

Mike Spataro

If you’re interested in learning more about how college admissions officials are stepping up student recruitment efforts with social media campaigns then today’s Boston Globe article, “Colleges Turn to Web Tools in Hunt for ‘08 Freshman” is worth downloading before it goes behind the firewall.

While a number of schools may be starting to implement these new techniques, it’ll be interesting to see if any of them in the future can draw a line between the number of applications and new media spending. There is no question though that perspective students are drawing from each others’ experiences on sites like Facebook rather than fancy college brochures before making a decision on where to go each fall.

Mike Spataro

It took awhile but it’s good to see that Duke University (where my daughter now attends) has taken a bold step in protecting the safety of its students in the aftermath of last year’s tragic events at Virginia Tech. Following what was an exhaustive study of its own emergency response capabilities, Duke has developed what could be the most pro-active emergency preparedness plan for an academic institution in the country.

Covering every type of emergency from hostage situations to biological terrorist attacks, the Duke plan includes a variety of smart alert features, such as an RSS feed for students and parents, email alerts, a specially designed Web site, a dedicated phone number, a public address system and siren on both campuses. They’ve also included text messaging alerts to cell phones, a tactic I have called for in the past that should be deployed by every school and company in the country. The university is also encouraging students to enroll family members in the school’s emergency database.

While no system can guarantee protection for every student on campus, at least Duke is making a major technology investment to do what it can in a crisis. Other colleges are sure to follow.

The Blue Devils may be top 10 in basketball, but every parent who has a child away at a school would rather have a national ranking in student safety. Duke may just get ranked for their new system.

Mike Spataro

Since I live in Boston, getting a chance to witness NFL history was a terrific way to head into the New Year. It was more than fun to be one of the 80,000 on hand to watch the Patriots close out a perfect 16-0 regular season at Giants Stadium last weekend. What a great Christmas present (thanks to my old buddy Frank).

It’s rare you get a chance to be part of sports history and this was as fun a game as I’ve ever attended. (OK, maybe the Red Sox-Yankees 2004 ALCS Game 7 was slightly more fun given the historical circumstances). The Pats still have a long way to go this season, but the Meadowlands was rockin’ Saturday night and the fans were really into the game from start to finish, which was something considering the Giants had virtually nothing to play for but pride.

A real sign of the times we now live in. Every game program was gone two hours prior to kickoff. No doubt most goobled up by sports memorabilia scalpers. Of course, you could find hundreds of them on eBay minutes after the final gun. (I won’t tell you how much I paid for mine).

The playoffs should be even more fun.

Mike Spataro

There are three reports that came out recently worth noting for those a bit behind in their reading like I always seem to find myself.

Forrester analyst Josh Bernoff was generous enough to share his recent report on Keys to Creating a Social Strategy in which he lays out what he calls the POST method for social strategy development. Josh contends that most companies are going about creating social strategies backwards by focusing first on technology rather than audiences and strategy upfront. I couldn’t agree more even though I work for a social media tech firm. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been in meetings where technology and tactics were the topics over strategy and objectives.

The POST method revolves around People, Objectives, Strategy and (then) Technology. Josh’s report lays out a sensible approach for companies to follow. It’s well worth the time even if you’re late to the reading game like me.

The second study was the widely covered and discussed “Digital Footprints: Online Identity Management“ report from Pew Research concerning the number of Americans who Google their own personal information. Research analyst Mary Madden expressed surprise in interviews this week that only about half of the people in the U.S. with Internet access have Googled themselves.

I don’t find that number surprising at all. In fact, I’d bet it’s lower than what Pew found. When you get away from the urban tech centers of our country, the average American isn’t living online, Googling all their friends and relatives, blogging every day or Twittering every five minutes. Some of us have a slanted view of the real world. Only a fraction of people who really need to be concerned about what appears about them in search engines have ever taken the time to check their results. If more of them did, I promise you’d see more people freaking out than you do at the moment.

The third study from USC’s Annenberg Center and Ketchum PR found that many communicators are out of sync with the way consumers now use media. This trend has been underway since the invention of the browser. Findings related to the growth of media usage by emerging markets make this study worth reading too.

Mike Spataro