Every day, brands keep an eye out for real-time marketing opportunities while simultaneously rolling out innovative campaigns to reach audiences in creative ways. We too are keeping an eye on what’s happening in the industry and staying updated on the latest news, trends and viral content of the week. Here’s what we’re hooked on!
Potato Salad
Zack Danger Brown posted a simple Kickstarter campaign to make potato salad. Is goal? $10. This week, Brown was pleasantly surprised to see he met his goal — and exceeded it by $60,900. The campaign reached more than $70,000 in contributions, although due to unverified funds it backed down to about $46,000 by the end of this week. With 21 days to go, the campaign has been updated with new donor levels and rewards (ie; pledge of $20 or more gets backers a potato-salad themed haiku, their names carved into a potato that will be used in the potato salad, a signed jar of mayonnaise, the potato salad recipe and more.).
Why we’re hooked:
The Internet is a great place. When has anyone ever raised $70,000 to make potato salad before? It also just shows the power of the Internet and viral content. An idea can be simple – it just has to be the right one.
Facebook Mood Manipulator
You may remember Facebook’s psychological experiment that was recently revealed, uncovering manipulation of almost 700,000 users’ emotions based on positive or negative content. Brooklyn artist and programmer Lauren McCarthy developed a Google Chrome extension that lets users manually set how they’re feeling, taking Facebook’s little experiment into their own hands.
Why we’re hooked:
The beauty of technology and taking control of data to impact the type of content you see, and therefore, how you feel. Why should Facebook get to decide your mood?
Privatize
If you’ve ever wanted to tweet private links to multiple people before, your wish has been granted with Privatize, a tool that enables private links tweeted publicly. It only allows people who are mentioned in a tweet to open a link, so if someone else tries to click on the link, they’ll be directed to the Privatize homepage.
Why we’re hooked:
First is the obvious opportunity for anybody looking for some privacy functionality on Twitter. This service also opens up doors for selective content sharing – think social media contests, targeted engagement and the like. Pretty cool.
LeBron James Returns to Cleveland
Chances are, if you were online in general at any point today you saw updates about LeBron James’ return to the Cleveland Cavaliers. He announced the move via an essay on Sports Illustrated, and the Internet went crazy, with references to burning (and unburning) jerseys, bandwagon fans and homecomings.
Why we’re hooked:
LeBron James is one of the (the?) best basketball players in the world, and this news is something that everyone seems to be talking about. With that said, this is a great example of brands trying to hop on major events with real-time marketing…and some are just in it without thinking through their messaging, goals or purpose. Check out some of the contenders.
LinkedIn Connected for iPhone
LinkedIn added to its apps with LinkedIn Connected for iPhone, which is focused on strengthening relationship with existing contacts. It will send reminders about birthdays, anniversaries and job changes, and will also push out notifications with pre-meeting content and information. This is an updated version of LinkedIn Contacts, which is now redesigned and refocused on keeping tabs on their professional networks.
Why we’re hooked:
LinkedIn may not be Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or Snapchat, but it’s still a strong social network with a big user base – more than 300 million registered users. The company is turning to mobile and contextual content to make networking and communicating easier.