Chris Abraham » Globalism

De Beers’ False Scarcity is a Woman’s Best Friend

Chris Abraham — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 01:57:50 +0000

Even though I know that diamonds are common and that the value of diamonds is based on false-scarcity and multi-billion-dollar global marketing campaigns, I still want to buy my future wife a big-ass Tiffany solitaire. However, diamonds are losing value like a lead brick, so even the biggest profit center on the planet, De Beers, is doing some borrowing (via Luxist):

De Beers, has announced plans borrow $500 million from Anglo American Plc and other shareholders to bulwark itself against a falling gem market. The loan is a preventative measure in response to the fact that jewelry sales are plunging around the world. Diamond prices have already dropped, some say by as much as 50 percent and exports are down across the globe. De Beers has already cut the amount of rough stones it is offering to clients by half until April and has enacted production slowdowns at several of its mines. It is being predicted that diamond demand might not rise until the end of 2010 and even that may be optimistic.

Why Social Media Marketing Makes Brands Nervous

Chris Abraham — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 19:13:29 +0000

Tom Smith wrote a smashing article that really gets why big brands are having such a big problem with social media. The article is over at Mashable and deserves a read because I am only excerpting the list here, Why Big Brands Struggle With Social Media. Number one, “social Media is often viewed as just another marketing channel,” deserves number one because the biggest mistake that brands and their agencies of record constantly make is they forge that these social media “marketing channels” are real people with real lives and real friendships and a real voice.

1. Social Media is often viewed as just another marketing channel: It is of course so much more; it is a completely different approach to interacting with consumers and customers. Of course, you can advertise in a social media environment, but the true return on investment comes from developing communities, creating content to be shared, and talking and listening directly with consumers.
2. It does not fit into current structures: True social media falls somewhere between marketing, PR, communications, content production and web development. No one is quite sure whose responsibility it is and who should ultimately deliver their organisation’s social media strategy.
3. Communities and content are global: Users of social media connect, consume, and share content globally with little care for international borders. Marketing and PR departments and objectives are set up nationally or regionally. Very few organisations have a truly international structure and perspective.
4. Social media needs a long term approach: To build community, distribute content, or get people actively involved in an application takes time. Marketing and PR work on short time frames and are wedded to sets of individual campaigns or short term objectives. Social media is not a campaign, it’s a permanent approach.
5. No guaranteed results: You book advertising and it’s guaranteed to work. For, example you book a web campaign on page views and you keep going until you reach your goal. This is what advertisers call a push medium, i.e. you choose when people see it. Social media is a pull medium; usage and interaction is totally dependent on the user choosing to do so. If it’s not relevant or lacks creative brilliance it will not work. This makes it hard.
6. The metrics are new: Companies are used to the big numbers of advertising, but these numbers are different. Advertising is measured in booked exposures, i.e. page views, while social media is measured in direct interactions, i.e. number of friends, number of views or number of users. These numbers will always be smaller, but not necessarily any less measure of success.

Now We’re All Poor People Who Shop at Wal-Mart

Chris Abraham — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 16:23:45 +0000

The reason why Wal-Mart has taken over America and most of the world is because most Americans are a lot lower on the class totem pole than they think (middle class my ass), thanks to Wal-Mart and the dollar menu (read I Love What Wal-Mart Means to the US).

Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, beat expectations after its US discount stores accounted for about 50 per cent of all US retail growth during 2008 – while its full-year global sales passed $400bn for the first time, and profits hit $13.4bn.

But, in the past, Wal-Mart was other people’s store. Welcome to Wal-Mark 3.0, the store for the rest of us who don’t want to feel as low on the socio-economic ladder as we are — and Wal-Mart’s share holders and bottom line will laugh giddily as a direct restult (via Financial Times & Business Pundit)

Social Media and Blogging Ethics and a Code of Conduct

Chris Abraham — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 02:55:07 +0000

Bloody great, best-in-breed, article about online PR and marketing ethics by my buddy David Gelles of the Financial Times — he is surely a golden child and new media journalist rock star… be sure to put this article in front of your boss, whether you are a PR flack or are a corporate stooge — I think this article is actually going to be printed into the pink pages of the FT on Thursday, February 12 — go pick it up and hand it to the members of the C-suite, Blogs that spin a web of deception:

A web of deception By David Gelles
An overenthusiastic employee from the computer supplies maker Belkin posted an offer online last month – $0.65 for anyone willing to write a positive review of Belkin products on Amazon.com. Several people took up the offer, producing gushing appraisals of Belkin products they had never used.
After a blogger exposed the scam, news organisations jumped on the story. The offer was removed and Belkin’s president weighed in with an apology.
The incident was a public relations disaster for Belkin. It was also a prime example of “Astroturfing”, the unsavoury marketing practice of generating fake grassroots enthusiasm for a product.
Given the anonymity afforded by the internet, it is hardly surprising that deceptive marketing is on the rise. Consumers are spending more time online and companies are seeking new ways to reach them.
But now, in an effort to regulate how employees behave on the web, companies and industry groups are developing their own online codes of ethics. They want to ensure that when staff do engage with social media, they act ethically.
Last year, Coca-Cola established its own set of social media guidelines and distributed them in a memo to all employees. The policy emphasises the need for transparency and encourages employees to use common sense when discussing the brand online. “We’ve always had very diverse channels to reach consumers,” says Adam Brown (pictured), digital communications director. “Wherever they are, that’s where we go. That’s now evolved into the need for a social media policy.”
So when Mr Brown went online to promote Coca-Cola’s Super Bowl advertisements, he followed the guidelines. On Facebook, Mr Brown announced that he was a Coke employee and pointed other users to the Coke ads on YouTube. On Pittsburgh Steelers fan forums, Mr Brown, who is from Pittsburgh, named his employer and then directed fans to the Coke blog, which had an interview with Steelers’ defensive star Troy Polamalu.
Mr Brown said more deliberate engagement with online conversations was a necessity for a global company such as Coca-Cola. “We’re mentioned several thousand times a day on blogs, and there are several hundred tweets about us on Twitter,” he says. “There is a lot of conversation taking place about our brand without us. Where appropriate, we wanted to start getting involved.”
Companies began interacting with social media years ago. But only recently have those involved with the industry perceived a need to develop ethical standards. Among the first to do so was The Word of Mouth Marketing Association, an organisation for the viral and buzz marketing industry. Womma published an ethics code in 2005, emphasising honesty of relationship, opinion and identity.
Since then, many companies have used the Womma code as a blueprint for their own guidelines. “Companies are learning every day that there is a right way and a wrong way to engage with social media,” says Paul Rand, vice-president of Womma’s board and head of its ethics project. “Some companies are learning by touching the burning pot; some companies are learning from the mistakes of others.”
One company that “touched the burning pot” is Shelfari, a social networking site for book lovers, owned by Amazon. As it battled for market share in late 2007, it came under fire for its poor design and clunky user interface. Soon, comments appeared on more than 50 blogs attesting to Shelfari’s greatness. “I have been on Shelfari for a couple of months now and absolutely love it,” read one. “Shelfari is such a great site. I joined a couple of months ago and I have been hooked on it ever since,” read another.
But all the comments were posted by the same user, “schaufferwaffer”, who was soon exposed as a Shelfari employee. Shelfari’s chief executive admitted to the Astroturfing (he blamed it on an intern who knew no better), and promised it would never happen again.
Such behaviour is declared out of line in the “disclosure best practices toolkit”, an ethics code drawn up by the Blog Council, an organisation for heads of social media at big companies. The document advises employees and agencies to announce whom they work for when communicating with blogs or bloggers. It also encourages employees to provide a means for contacting them directly, if someone they interact with via social media wants to follow up with a two-way conversation. The toolkit also warns against using pseudonyms.
IBM was one of the first companies to develop its own social media policy. In 2005, it published its “social computing guidelines”, which insist that employees write under their own names, using the first person, and make it clear they are speaking for themselves and not on behalf of IBM. It also prohibits employees from referencing clients, partners or suppliers without their approval.
UPS is developing its own online ethics policy after recognising how damaging Astroturfing and other online misbehaviour can be for a company’s reputation. “If one of our airplanes goes down, we have a very clear plan for getting information to the media,” says Norman Black, director of global media services. “We realised we did not have a good plan for responding to a crisis on the internet.”
In some countries, deceptive marketing practices are not only frowned upon but also illegal. In the UK, the law identifies “falsely representing oneself as a consumer” as a punishable offence. And in 2006, the US Federal Trade Commission issued regulations stating that word-of-mouth marketers must disclose their relationships. But in spite of these new rules there has been little enforcement of the measures.
Even without prosecution, Belkin seems to have learnt its lesson. Melody Chalaban, speaking for the company, says Belkin will soon be holding seminars to teach employees how to interact ethically with social media, and is also considering joining Womma. “We want to stress that this is an isolated incident,” says Ms Chalaban. “We don’t endorse or condone unethical practices like this.”
Side Bar: The last post: underhand tactics can end in a PR disaster
* Flogging. Fake blogs can help companies get a personal voice behind a marketing campaign – but they risk a PR disaster if they are uncovered. When Sony tried to boost sales of its PSP portable gaming unit, it started a blog supposedly by two boys who wanted PSPs for Christmas. When it was revealed as a fake, Sony apologised and took it down.
* Astroturfing. A technique that gets its name from the practice of generating fake grassroots enthusiasm. One Florida company, PayPerPost, serves as a matchmaker between companies willing to pay for good press and bloggers willing to plug products that they have never used. After receiving criticism, PayPerPost now requires bloggers to disclose that their posts are sponsored.
* Comment spamming. Flooding the comment fields of blogs with enthusiastic notes about a company, even with full disclosure, is not welcomed by web users. When a Motorola employee commented on dozens of posts on a technology blog – each comment a plug for the new Motorola Krave – bloggers responded with snide criticisms of his spamming, which duly ceased.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2009

Abraham Harrison, LLC: an expert global PR team of travelers and expats

Chris Abraham — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 02:21:28 +0000

Abraham Harrison, LLC is an online PR and Brand Promotion firm that not only knows the online social media lifestyle like no other PR shop worldwide but lives the traveler and expat experience every day.

Abraham Harrison is a 18-person shop with team members spread across the world – the United States, Germany, Holland, South Africa, India, Nepal, and Mauritius. Our CEO, Mark Harrison, who has been an expat for half his life and a traveler for far more, splits his year between Mauritius, and Berlin, Germany. Our President and COO, Chris Abraham, splits his year between Germany and Washington, DC.

Our head of technology is an expat in Nepal, our Director of Operations lives between San Francisco and Capetown, and one of our project managers is currently spending two years in Holland, another works from Brazil when she is there volunteering. Together, the members of our team have lived in or visited 52 countries. We speak not only English, but German, French, Spanish, Afrikaans, Swahili, and Hindi.

Mosnar Communications Blogged Its Way to Global Brand

Chris Abraham — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 18:06:10 +0000

I just got off the phone with fellow AdAge Power 150 blogger CR Ransom and we had quite an amazing chat. CR runs Mosnar Communications, Inc. Public Relations, an Atlanta-based firm focused on the African American luxury market, “folks who have over $250,000 a year to spend on lifestyle.”

During our conversation, I realized that it is a very exclusive market and hard for outsiders to infiltrate because the Black luxury market is guarded and takes care of its own. I am told that this is a community that doesn’t really even need much of a web presence or a social media strategy because the market is closed and people are very loyal to one-another and to their Churches. These are very traditional, conservative, communities that require someone like CR and the gang at Mosnar to act as ambassador.

Mosnar Communications may well be based in Atlanta but its reach and influence carries far past the borders of Georgia. CR is very grateful for what Google and blogging has done for their practice as both platforms have given Mosnar a clientelle well beyond even the boarders of the United States.

In fact, CR told me that her firm competes — and wins — on Google in searches that anyone would die for about luxury brands, luxury branding, and the like – even outside her core, which is aspirational, upper-middle-class, affluent, and wealthy Black Americans.

Because of the Internet, blogging, CR’s commitment, and Google, Mosnar Communications has gone from being a niche vertical geo-targeted regional Atlanta player to a firm that fields calls from major global brands and media from around the world.

CR Ransom told me that, to her, the key is Google and how Google’s algorithms don’t segregate based on her location, race, gender, company size, number of employees, the people she knows, or anything else, and that allows her offerings, content, experience, and insights to show up, in a search, right next to agencies and firms a thousand times bigger (and probably less likely to really understand her market like she does).

In Response to My Whopper Virgins Response

Chris Abraham — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 01:38:25 +0000

When I wrote my scathing response to the Whopper Virgins campaign as perpetrated by Burger King over on Ad Age’s Global Idea Network, Ian Lurie responded with Whopper Virgins: Not Appalling. Not Brilliant, Either.

Whopper Virgins: Not Appalling. Not Brilliant, Either
Chris Abraham over at Marketing Conversations wrote an thoughtful critique of Burger King’s new Whopper Virgins campaign.
I appreciate Chris’s opinion: The video is at times jingoistic and, frankly, a little embarrassing if you’re an American. Burger King went out of their way to find people in local clothing minutes from major urban centers in Europe. How exactly did they do that? Much of the video is just more ugly Americans pointing and giggling at the rest of the world.
I also see Burger King’s thinking: This is a great viral piece. The effort alone – flying a broiler all around the world to cook burgers, for gosh sakes – is worthy of a documentary.
So, is the Whopper Virgins campaign ‘good’ marketing? Marketing should:
Help the target audience make informed decisions about products. Nothing about this video does that. Nothing tells me why I’d want a Whopper.
It should not make the target brand look foolish. Burger King ends up looking (in my opinion) a tad silly. They spent who-knows-how-much money to shoot this. Could they have better spent the money on other aspects of marketing? Or on their product? Also, “Whopper Virgins? Are you kidding me?
Make me want the product. This video utterly fails to do that. Granted, I’m a classic middle-class liberal. So I have no sense of humor. But I’m also an avid fast food consumer. This video makes me want Wendy’s.
Take risks. Good marketers take chances now and then. Nothing wrong with that. And this video clearly takes a gamble.
It should generate buzz. It’s certainly done that, with headlines like “Socially Awkward” and “Just Bad Taste?”.
I don’t think this video deserves the controversy it’s generated. You could interpret it as offensive. But would you consider it as offensive if the video had been done by National Geographic? Probably not.
But it’s not good marketing, either. It’s an art project: A huge investment of dollars in something that probably won’t pay off, in spite of the kerfuffle right now.
How many burgers do you have to sell to pay for that rental helicopter, I wonder?

My Top 91 Social Media Blog Posts

Chris Abraham — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 03:30:11 +0000

I am not willing or able to say that the following 91 blog posts about social media, blogging, new media, social networking, etc, are the definite top-91 posts because I didn’t have the time or attention to go through all of my 5,437 blog posts:

Reverend Joseph Lowery Inauguration Benediction Transcript

Chris Abraham — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 20:31:28 +0000

I was amazed and impressed by Reverend Joseph Lowery’s Inauguration Benediction from yesterday, the2009 inauguration of Barack Obama, so I asked the Twitterverse for a link to a transcript of the speech and@raygunner came back with a link to the Chicago Sun-Times with the goods. Thanks, man!

Reverend Joseph Lowery Inauguration Benediction Transcript
God of our weary years, God of our silent tears, thou who has brought us thus far along the way, thou who has by thy might led us into the light, keep us forever in the path, we pray, lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met thee, lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget thee. Shadowed beneath thy hand may we forever stand — true to thee, O God, and true to our native land.
We truly give thanks for the glorious experience we’ve shared this day. We pray now, O Lord, for your blessing upon thy servant, Barack Obama, the 44th president of these United States, his family and his administration. He has come to this high office at a low moment in the national and, indeed, the global fiscal climate. But because we know you got the whole world in your hand, we pray for not only our nation, but for the community of nations. Our faith does not shrink, though pressed by the flood of mortal ills.
For we know that, Lord, you’re able and you’re willing to work through faithful leadership to restore stability, mend our brokenness, heal our wounds and deliver us from the exploitation of the poor or the least of these and from favoritism toward the rich, the elite of these.
We thank you for the empowering of thy servant, our 44th president, to inspire our nation to believe that, yes, we can work together to achieve a more perfect union. And while we have sown the seeds of greed — the wind of greed and corruption, and even as we reap the whirlwind of social and economic disruption, we seek forgiveness and we come in a spirit of unity and solidarity to commit our support to our president by our willingness to make sacrifices, to respect your creation, to turn to each other and not on each other.
And now, Lord, in the complex arena of human relations, help us to make choices on the side of love, not hate; on the side of inclusion, not exclusion; tolerance, not intolerance.
And as we leave this mountaintop, help us to hold on to the spirit of fellowship and the oneness of our family. Let us take that power back to our homes, our workplaces, our churches, our temples, our mosques, or wherever we seek your will.
Bless President Barack, First Lady Michelle. Look over our little, angelic Sasha and Malia.
We go now to walk together, children, pledging that we won’t get weary in the difficult days ahead. We know you will not leave us alone, with your hands of power and your heart of love.
Help us then, now, Lord, to work for that day when nation shall not lift up sword against nation, when tanks will be beaten into tractors, when every man and every woman shall sit under his or her own vine and fig tree, and none shall be afraid; when justice will roll down like waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.
Lord, in the memory of all the saints who from their labors rest, and in the joy of a new beginning, we ask you to help us work for that day when black will not be asked to get back, when brown can stick around — (laughter) — when yellow will be mellow — (laughter) — when the red man can get ahead, man — (laughter) — and when white will embrace what is right.
Let all those who do justice and love mercy say amen.
AUDIENCE: Amen!
REV. LOWERY: Say amen –
AUDIENCE: Amen!
REV. LOWERY: — and amen.
AUDIENCE: Amen! (Cheers, applause.)
END.

Reporting on the Inauguration from DC by a Non-Participant

Chris Abraham — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 13:19:56 +0000

I am in Washington, DC, for the inauguration, but aside from the excitement of seeing all of my global friends as they converge on DC for the inauguration, I am not participating to any great extent. Why? There are two reasons . . .

First, I have attended inaugurations, inaugural parades, and inauguration balls for the last 20-years, starting with the election of George H. W. Bush, Bush senior, into the White House all the way through to the second inauguration of George W. Bush back in 2005, which was held on a very cold January 20th, if I remember correctly. While I had my plans set for Berlin, I didn’t have my plans set up in Washington, so I am just going to enjoy the pleasures on the fringe.

Second, while I am blissed out that Senator Barack Obama will be inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, I am allergic to two-million historical well-wishers crowding the National Mall.

I have to be honest, I am still dazzled that the United States elected an African American from Hawaii by the name of Barack Hussein Obama, especially in such jingoistic times. And I am proud and impressed and looking forward to not just the first one-hundred days but also to the second term.

The Obama White House really needs to be an eight-year presidency — two terms — because there is a lot of work to both do and undo.

What I do plan to do, however, is open up Naval Lodge 4 on Capitol Hill at 8 AM. I will be serving hot coffee and donuts from the 4th floor of 330 Pennsylvania Avenue, SE. So, if you’re in the neighborhood and want some warm coffee, some company, and maybe a donut or two, please drop by for a cuppa.