Starbucks Spelling #Fails

Yesterday, TIME magazine named “Starbucks Spellings” the Tumblr of the week. The blog was not created by Starbucks, but rather by Jenna Livingston, a freelance copywriter. It highlights an eccentricity unique to Starbucks and every one of its chain establishments:failed name spellings.

No matter what you order to drink, Starbucks asks for your name and writes it on your cup in an aim to A. give you the correct drink later down the production line and B. appear to be your hometown coffee shop who cares who you are. However, more often than not, the employees at Starbucks misinterpret customers’ names leaving consumers with comical cups filled with caffeine. From Hei-Wei to Highway, Christian to Kris Chin, Lacey to Lazy, Katy to Heini, the Tumblr is packed with daily uploads. Even Buzzfeed found the collection hysterical and created their own piece about it which has already collected over 12 thousand views since yesterday.

The takeaway for brands? Sometimes earned publicity and content creation come in the form of owning a quality that is unique to your brand and can be identified by the majority of your customer base… even when it’s slightly embarrassing.

Originally posted here:http://fwd.mbooth.com/post/7312686905/yesterday-time-magazine-named-starbucks

Child Like Wonder

This year, Nokia hosted a competition to promote their pocket-size Nokia8 mobile HD film technology. Consumers submitted short films shot only with a cell phone for the chance to premiere at the Edingburgh International Film Festival (as well as receive $10K).

The winner, called SplitScreen, shows the journey of a couple in love who travel from New York and Paris to meet in London.

One of the runner ups, hosted here, is my personal favorite: The Adventures of a Cardboard Box." This short shows just how inspiring childlike wonder can be. It also reminds us adults not to get caught up in the definition and functionality of what something is supposed to be, and to rather see the world as we want to see it:

The Adventures of a Cardboard Box from Studiocanoe on Vimeo.

Today's Mantra

I love this...

Consumers Give CPGs Stars

Watch out “like,” there’s a new social currency in town and it’s name is “star.”

Today, Advertising Age broke a story about the new Yelp! for consumer packaged goods (CPG) that launched today in beta: Consmr. Want to know which detergent is best for you? Which brand of microwave popcorn you’ll enjoy the most? What type of glue will hold your art project together best? Other consumers will answer all of your grocery/drug store questions.

Packaged goods account for $12 billion in e-commerce, which is why Zagat’s former head of mobile Ryan Charles and entrepreneur Noah Zitsman put together Consmr.com.

“Product discovery hasn’t really changed yet because of the social web,” said Mr. Charles.

Apart from hastags, twitter followers and facebook fans, it can be argued that this is the first information source of it’s kind in the social world to organize brand affinity in a way that translates to consumer reccomendation and behavior changes in the consumer packaged goods category.

The site provides benefits for brands and journalists: brand profile pages, allows magazine sites like Men and Women’s Health to provide brand reviews, incentivizes bloggers to cross promote their reviews wtih them. And the site provides benefits to fans/consumers: it borrows from the old Facebook idea of “flair” and allows brands to distribute badges of sorts and reward consumers for checking into products. Consumers can also share their purchases, reviews on twitter and Facebook — in case you REALLY want people to know how much you love your brand of toothpaste.

Consmr provides the soapbox — that didn’t exist in the social world — for people who like to voice their opinion and share their brand experiences, in one place. It’s like the Google of consumer packaged goods (currently with a catalog of 50,000 products) with Bing’s feature of telling you what your friends like.

They plan to open their API in the future so developers and third parties can tap into Consmr’s data. And, with Charles’ past in mobile, brands can expect to be a part of a mobile app soon.

The makers are counting on self-population and consumer reviews to get off the ground, so get to starring.

Originally posted on http://fwd.mbooth.com/. Can also be seen: http://theli.st/post/6527010824/consumers-give-cpgs-stars.

This is Going to Be Awkward

Let's face it... we all talk behind people's backs. (Yes, yes you do.) Now, there's an online site that attempts to erase passive aggressiveness and helps you say what's on your mind... anonymously. Tell them they're smelly, you slept with their boyfriend back in the day, you have a crush on their mom, or that you could care less that it's their birthday.

Choose from a variety of (laughable) messages including:

I may or may not have sent that last one to someone near and dear to my heart... anonymously.

The site asks for their email, let's you sign the card with "anonymous," "someone who cares," "secret admirer," "rumplestiltskin," or "a friend." You NEVER enter your information -- get those issues out without being traced.

Check out http://thisisgoingtobeawkward.com/ for some of the less PG cards you can send and save money on your shrink.

This site will truly be a game changer when they release the less extreme cards about annoying everyday habits... chomping on gum, hanging up without saying goodbye, not cleaning up after yourself... the list goes on.

Bye Bye My "Friend"

Today, my work twin posted this on our company's daily trend newsletter "word.":

Who Dat Who Dat Who Dat?: To encourage people to download and use Windows Live Messenger again, Microsoft created Facebook App “Who is Who?” where you have a minute to guess the first name of your “friends” based on their profile pics. Microsoft wants to prove being “friends” with someone of FB, doesn’t mean you have a real connection. To my disbelief, the best I got was 4 out of 10.

This app got me thinking -- not about Microsoft but about my Facebook "friends" (Sorry, Microsoft, you're going to get attention and traffic, but I don't think you'll be getting Messenger converts)...

Facebook came out right as I was exiting high school and entering college -- at a time when a college email address granted you admission to the social network (pre grandmas and children joining in on the world's largest contact book). Since that time, 7 years ago, I've met a LOT of people -- understandable since I went from a high school with 3000 students to a college in another state with 30,000 students, to New York City, and onto my second job.

Call me lame, but I can assure you that I do not stay in regular touch with the 787 friends I claim to have on Facebook. I've always had a strict "accept friend request" personal policy: no "grown-ups" (I am from the college-only Facebook generation after all), no people I've never met, only night-out/drunk friends if there's a possibility of staying in touch/close mutual connection, etc. Basically, I have always "known" the people that are my current Facebook friends at the time of acceptance.

Then, Microsoft came along and challenged me to "know" my own "friends." My pal above knew 4; I knew zero and then racked in a mere 2 when I challenged myself to a rematch. That's when I set to blogging -- I challenge myself to delete one "Facebook friend" per day from here on out that shows up in my home-feed and makes me go "huh?" Mean? Doubtful. Chances are Joe Shmoe from freshman year English doesn't have a clue who I am either. You're welcome Joe, I'm cleaning out your friend-box too.

I'm feeling lighter already...

Thanks Microsoft for reminding me that social media isn't for information overload, it's for authentic interactions.

What Twitter Said About the “End of the World”

As you’ve probably gathered by now, the world did NOT end last Saturday at 6PM as 89-year old Bible scholar Harold Camping predicted it would. Unlike Y2K, where multiple new stations covered the moments leading up to the supposed crash of society, we sat back waiting, laughing at this prediction. In fact, 67% of the tweets about Saturday’s “rapture” fall into the “jokes/humor/sarcasm” category. Regardless of your beliefs, it’s interesting to see the majority social reaction to this moment in news; take a look at this infographic, fromCrimson Hexagon, on twitter activity regarding the “end of the world”:

People on twitter weren’t the only ones poking fun at the event. Buzzfeed put out a photo blogcalled “32 Pictures You Need to See Before You Die” that attracted 82,003 Facebook likes. (Pictures included serious images such as a baby penguin meeting a baby dolphin and a dog at a bar.”) Also, Aol started a live blog (on their “Weird News” channel) called “Rapture 2011: Apocalypse Now,” which aggregated news from across the internet — almost entirely humor based.

If you missed out on tweeting with the 3rd most popular trending topic hashtag #iftheworldendsonsaturday, you can start planning your social comments for your #judgementday party on the next predicted date of Oct. 21, 2011.