ROOFTOP banter

Piperlime: Bitchy or Brilliant?

Posted By: 

Brandi Hensler

Date: 

August 31st, 2010 /// Marketing Trends

Piperlime’s “Let’s Get Dressed” campaign is creating a lot of buzz. The campaign encourages women to get dressed up and say “no” to sweats & sneakers & such.

The buzz isn’t surrounding the print portion of the campaign so much as the social media. To be specific, some people are a bit salty about their Status Updates. Not like Piperlime didn’t see this coming, with posts such as, “Every time you wear sweatpants in public, a single guy leaves New York.” Is it worth potentially losing fans who consider this language “snotty?”

I vote yes. Personally, I applaud Piperlime for taking a risk, and Butler, Shine, Stern & Partners for selling in the campaign. It’s edgy and appropriate, and the audience they are targeting appreciates it. The potential for pissing off a few people is offset by the opportunity to gain brand advocacy among many others who identify with their position. Talk about searching out qualified candidates. They gained me, for one. As for the haters… I think this falls under the “no press is bad press”  category. Touché, salesman.

Here’s the AdAge article and Piperlime’s FB page.

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Is Facebook Places Good for Foursquare?

Posted By: 

Brandi Hensler

Date: 

August 25th, 2010 /// Marketing Trends

The talk about town is that Foursquare doesn’t stand a chance against Facebook Places. An interesting article from ClickZ says otherwise.

The short version: The article suggests that the launch of Facebook Places (at least in the short run) actually benefits Foursquare by calling attention to geo-social activity. Foursquare said that they had their biggest day ever the same day Places launched on FB, and that people will be drawn to them because of their offerings on top of check-ins.

Foursquare fans, what do you think?

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Confetti: Party Decor Transforms Into Mystical Marketing Messages

Posted By: 

Tom Keathley

Date: 

November 10th, 2009 /// Marketing Trends

We all know that breaking through clutter is a classic challenge for marketers, particularly with the ever-increasing bombardment of messages hurled at consumers. We believe the key is to offer up unexpected fun to entice engagement.

One of our favorite tactics is a marketing wonder that’s smaller than a business card. Confetti is the word we’ve coined as its name. On the surface, Confetti is a pretty little card with interesting visuals and a website URL. Like traditional confetti, it looks great when it’s spread around an environment as party décor. Unlike its festive counterpart, you can use Confetti to make people believe fate is calling.

Picture this: You sit down at your favorite restaurant and find a pocket-sized message on the table. Suddenly, you have the feeling that it was put there just for you. Almost like fate is talking to you. You put it in your pocket or purse, only to rediscover it later. Yet again, your interest is piqued, and you feel compelled to hop online to unravel the mystery.

That’s the beauty of Confetti. You can spread it around town in small doses or drop it from a helicopter (okay, don’t litter!) – restaurants, the library, and the gym – anywhere that’s appropriate. And it’s a little intriguing treasure that’s impossible to resist.

Proof positive of the power of Confetti.

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…you’re livin’ in the past, it’s a user generation

Posted By: 

Brandi Hensler

Date: 

September 18th, 2009 /// Marketing Trends

We’ve all heard the claims that with social media, the possibilities are endless. Okay, here’s the pickle: I want to make a monster movie, but am sans resources. Can I use social media to get talented writers and filmmakers to give me content for a feature-length film?

Enter our friends from last year’s SXSW awards, the creators of LostZombies.com. These 3 East Bay residents started a zombie-themed social network with the goal of creating the world’s first community generated feature-length zombie documentary. Users submit videos and photos based on loose guidelines, with the best content compiled to complete the film. And with their zombie culture sweeping the nation, the guys are well on their way to success. There’s been close to 1,000 videos, over 100 blog posts, and over 7,000 photos submitted to date. Check out some of the user-generated content on their People’s Choice Award-winning site.

What makes this so successful when Fortune 500s can’t get people to fill out a survey? It’s a two-way street. Hopeful filmmakers get a chance to break into the business with their work featured in the film, and the people get zombies. Zombies, dude.

Lost Zombies in Prague

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Social Media: Creative Content Keeps Them Coming Back

Posted By: 

Tom Keathley

Date: 

September 10th, 2009 /// Marketing Trends

For years, we’ve been talking to clients about building websites that encourage people to come back time and again. Now, the conversation has evolved to discuss how to accomplish this goal via social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.

How do you build a following and keep people tuned-in for the long haul?

For one local company, we developed a citywide scavenger hunt for a new product launch. Scavenger hunt clues have been released exclusively via Facebook and Twitter. By merging guerilla tactics into the social media landscape, we’ve given followers exclusive access to fun. And, everyone wants to feel like they’re “in the know” about something that the general public is not.

This social media campaign began by creating brand-appropriate pages and a content development strategy to keep things fresh. We can’t share all of our secrets, but we also helped this company land hundreds of followers in under a week.

Awesome creative ideas drive the word-of-mouth that will keep more people coming to these pages. Continually posting relevant, intriguing content will keep them coming back for more.

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