What are you looking forward to most about Super Bowl XLVI? The game? The parties? The halftime show? As the most watched TV broadcast of the year, the Super Bowl brings much hype. Although the football game is the most obvious reason why people tune into the broadcast, many people tune in for other reasons, specifically the commercials.

Companies spend months strategizing, preparing, creating, and producing innovative and engaging commercials that will grab the viewer’s attention in hopes of promoting their product. In years past, the commercials were kept secret up until the moment they aired and were shown once during the live taping of the game, but last year some marketing officers went against the traditional approach and implemented a new plan of attack. As our society has become more and more engrossed into the world of social media, companies have discovered that combining their commercials with a social media overlay increases not only the awareness of their product, but also “gets the ball rolling” before the commercial airs live on TV.

We launched a new action for media page for Mikey Wax‘s new release Constant Motion.

To get a free download you can either Like on Facebook, tweet a predefined tweet, or join the mailing list.  Check it out for yourself and download at mikeywax.com/constantmotion!

Google+, Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter and LinkedIn are competing for the social network spotlight— making it hard for users to decide which sites are best for them. Pointing out the strengths and weakness of each platform, this infographic can help users decided which is the most appropriate site for them to use!

Thanks Mashable.com for highlighting this!

Infographic design by Emily Caufield.

We were sought after by Andrea Bocelli’s camp to assist in the promotion of Andrea Bocelli, Live in Central Park - Sept. 15, 2011. This is a FREE concert for the lucky 60,000 fans who were able to snatch up tickets before they sold out quickly.

Late last month, the unveiling of Google+ prompted the world over reconsider the future of social media and online networking, and many began to wonder if The Goog’s latest product would boast enough innovative features to dethrone Facebook, king of the social networking realm. Speculation has run rampant as the search giant’s latest foray into new media gains momentum, much of which attempts to size up Google+ against Facebook. Many in the tech world are projecting whether or not + will be successful both in stealing existing social network users and attracting new ones. But here at Oniracom, my compadres and I have been interested in how Google+ will integrate into the larger scheme of social media marketing and brand growth strategies. While wishful thinking would allow Google+, Facebook and others to harmoniously coincide with each other in the virtual world, it is becoming ever-more clear (as is obvious with Facebook’s Skype contract retaliation) that there really may only be room for one. It’s impossible to know which network, if any, will prevail, but Google+ is making a strong attempt by promising features and upgrades not available on Facebook or other social networking sites.

Likester is “the global popularity engine,” here to help you understand what people like on Facebook. This includes anyone from your best friends to people you have never met that live across the world. The site is broken up into five major sections: My Likes, Friends, Everyone, Trending and Like List. With these tabs, you are able to sort through popular likes on Facebook in comparison to your own personal likes. Likester is potentially a great tool for social marketing; it can help any Facebook page increase their fan base!

“My Likes” provides an interface to easily view the items you personally like. Here you can sort you likes as entertainment, people, places and things. Likester displays how many of your friends like the same things as you, and how many total Facebook users like the same pages. When comparing your likes to others, you have the option of browsing according to the location of users. Additionally, you can manage your likes through Likester.

We are proud to announce the launch of an awesome website for the very talented (and only 15 years old!) Scott James! Check it out here.

We implemented Topspin for Scott’s mailing list collection and e-commerce, Soundcloud for Scott’s audio content, YouTube for Scott’s video content and Facebook to feed Scott’s photos.

The switch from the old profile to the new profile that Facebook pulled on its users in late December/early January anticipated some other alterations to occur. Alas, the new Pages on Facebook is here! The new Pages redesign resembles and operates like a user’s regular profile. However, there are multiple differences in regards to the Page’s and their admins.

The new Pages consists of all the features of the new profile more or less. For example, the menu bar is on the left-hand column with links to the wall, photo albums, videos, tour dates, etc., which also eliminates the information box that was a component of the old profile and old pages of Facebook. The edit tab option has therefore also switched to the very top of the page. Admins can now click up top to edit their pages, which directs them to editing the info, apps, profile picture, marketing, etc.

Now here’s a brilliant album release campaign. UK songstress Adele, grammy winning “Chasing Pavements” singer, is releasing 21 (XL, Columbia) the much anticipated follow up to her debut album, 19. To generate buzz and increase fan engagement with the record in the weeks leading up the it’s US release, team Adele has set up quite a creative splash page:

Facebook introduced the new profile to its users this past December, and hoped to upgrade all users from the old profile to the new profile early during the new year. Gradually reeling its users towards the new profile allowed users to sample the new profile before it officially became mandatory, which stirred up different types of discussions between almost all Facebook users. Not only did the new layout get users talking, but the new features such as exposing all users to individual friendships and connecting interests between them, caused much debate between whether the old profile or the new profile was viewed as “better.”

My favorite time of the year is here, it’s Festival Season!!  The Santa Barbara International Film Festival is taking place from January 27th to February 6th.

This years festival promises to be a little bit different with the addition of New Media.  They plan to update festival goers via Twitter and Facebook and even have a give-away or two.  Here is what they have to say:

SOCIAL MEDIA

This year SBIFF will undertake a massive social media campaign throughout the course of the festival. SBIFF will utilize both Facebook and Twitter in order to enhance the festival experience for festival attendees, filmmakers, and press.

• Both Facebook and Twitter will serve as valuable resources, providing up to the minute information on program changes and announcements. With these tools, festival attendees will be given many new ways to actively participate in events and activities. Throughout the 11 days, there will be many exciting opportunities to win film tickets, party passes, tribute tickets, and festival memorabilia. SBIFF also encourages everyone to share their favorite moments, films, and photos as the festival progresses, many of which may be reposted or tweeted.
• For filmmakers, these tools will be utilized to both promote their film at the festival, and also to network with other filmmakers and industry insiders in attendance.
• Members of the press should also take note as these tools will be used to make valuable announcements and highlight published coverage.

Now as much as this sounds like a great idea, it has been my experience from other festivals and conferences that the promise is never delivered.  Festival goers are promised to be given cutting edge to the minute updates but it is usually the main person running the festival who is in charge of updating, and he/she obviously gets too busy and does not have time to make any updates.  Or the responsibility gets handed down to a new intern who is way too excited to be there and also does no updating but is instead throwing up in some green room.

I hope that the film festival has taken this new role seriously and will be updating frequently, although im not sure since their Facebook page does not have a custom URL (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Santa-Barbara-International-Film-Festival/141996919640), the bio is from 2010, and they haven’t even created any events for their panels and award ceremonies.

For more information on the festival where I plan to spend a lot of time check out the links bellow

SBIFF Website
Twitter
Facebook

We all know the web was infiltrated by Facebook and Twitter last year.  Understanding WHY and HOW they were successful goes beyond examining their respective business models.  So let’s see WHO made the most impact on the web for Facebook and Twitter.

The infographic is from Digital Surgeons.

The obvious growing trend in 2011 for millions of TV viewers is to go online to see the shows (or clips) they want, when they want them.

Clicker makes finding shows and clips online quick and easy.  If you are looking for a past season of “The Simpsons,” want to stream a full length movie or want to discover a brand new web series, Clicker may be for you.

The Facebook integration for recommendations, trending and connecting with friends and staff is already in place and growing.  Decide which shows should be cancelled and have your voice heard!

At Oniracom we do a lot of news/blog post for our clients.  Whether it’s a cool interview, a new music video, tour announcement, etc - we need to make sure our artists’ audience is receiving the info we’re giving them. 

Over time (and millions of blog posts) we have learned that certain days and times in the day are better to post news than others.  It makes total sense and is more often than not overlooked.  A new study by Social media management company Virtrue further proves this.  Virtrue conducted a study to determine when facebook users are most active. 

Some of the highlights of this study include:

• The three biggest usage spikes tend to occur on weekdays at 11:00 a.m., 3:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. ET.
• The biggest spike occurs at 3:00 p.m. ET on weekdays.
• Weekday usage is pretty steady, however Wednesday at 3:00 pm ET is consistently the busiest period.
• Fans are less active on Sunday compared to all other days of the week.

Oniracom created a fun little campaign to promote Jack Johnson’s new music video “At Or With Me”.  In the music video, Jack Johnson and Andy Samberg get into a minor slugfest. 

Oniracom created a splash page that featured a teaser for the music video and also the ability for fans to “place bets” on who they think will win.  In order to place the bet, you simply click on the like button.  The like appears in the Facebook news feed - creating BUZZ. 

This is only Phase 1 of the campaign.  Stay tuned for Phase 2!

Peter Tanham of Amp Music Marketing writes, “When we start working with any musician, two of the most important goals we start with are:

1.) Build a strong mailing list

2.) Build a popular Facebook page

Fans are going to be more comfortable interacting with the artist through these mediums, and they are also the ones that drive the most sales.”

Highlights from this article include:

The importance of Facebook Ads

Implementing effective Facebook Ads

1.) If You Like Those Guys…  it’s called a “power play,” pick musicians that are similar to your style and pay to be played to their fans.

2.) Building A Good Landing Page: make sure your Facebook ad redirects them to a customized landing page which will encourage them to click the “like” button with some incentive to hear or get your music. Make sure it is the most similar sounding music to the artist you referred to in the “power play.”

3.) Target Your Ads… and run multiple campaigns!

4.) Ask Questions. Encourage Clicks and Likes - (reference pseudo ad image on the left).

Facebook event pages have been under construction for quite a while,  forcing our events to go everywhere that they are not supposed to be which has become rather frustrating for many people in the social media department. But, it appears that the Facebook gods have worked out the kinks and have successfuly launced a new version of Facebook events.

“At the MobileBeat 2010 conference in San Francisco, Eric Tseng said that Facebook “really sees mobile as the future,” and that we can expect to see Facebook’s “Like” buttons in mobile applications soon.

Tseng used geolocation as an example to illustrate the power of the mobile Open Graph. If you were to walk near a coffee shop and get a location-aware notification that there’s a happy hour going on there, you’ll probably be even more inclined to visit it if the notification comes bundled with recommendations from your Facebook friends.”

Thanks to Facebook who recently released their “Best Practices” guide for musicians.  Facebook attempts to teach musicians how best to connect music fans on their social network.

On page 3 of the PDF, they reference some tips on how to connect, and under point 2 “Create Content Worth Sharing” they show an example of Oniracom’s Lenny Kravitz photo-tagging campaign!

Oniracom is honored to be part of this official Best Practices Facebook guide.

There are rumors flying around like crazy that Google is planning to launch a social network that will rival Facebook in the very near future.  It all started when Digg founder Kevin Rose tweeted the message below:

At the moment both Google and Facebook are not commenting on this speculation.  It is worth noting though that Facebook is rumored to be dabbling in the search engine market for their own.  This is a clear move into Google’s territory.  Perhaps Google finds that fighting offense with offense is the way to go here. 

Also, a new social network launch from Google could not come at a better time given the recent user dissatisfaction with Facebook’s privacy settings. 

Other rumors are stating that Google Me would combine Google’s Buzz, Wave and Orkut social networking features into one social network to rule them all.  Not to mention - an instant user base of about 200 million people too. 

Of course, at the moment this is all hearsay.  However, this doesn’t stop us from wondering and asking the questions - will it succeed or will it fail? 

What do you guys think?

The socializing of media and tech is a bid by the human heart to transform the cold, hard, and un-feeling processes of “bottom-line, quantitative” thought INTO a tool for saving all that is beautiful about this planet, the human spirit and our beautiful flora/fauna. The season of the heart has arrived AND, because our tech was born from the imagination, it MUST serve that same SOURCE. Here are some steps you can take to HUMANIZE your entrance into the social fabric of the internet:

1. Discover communities closest to your heart through the use of free monitoring tools. To do this make a list of 40 keywords/keyphrases that match your heart/passion/goals. Then go to this page and find the FASTEST climbing Facebook pages associated with those keyphrases: http://bit.ly/facebook_leaderboard.  “Like” these.

2. Observe the choices, challenges, impressions, and wants of the people within these Facebook pages AND other networks Most of the monitoring tools available to do this observing are listed at this wiki: http://bit.ly/social_monitoring_master_list

Read More

InsideFacebook.com published an article “How Top Musicians Are Utilizing Their Facebook Pages” showing how bands now leverage Facebook more heavily as they turn from artists into brands.  With many of Facebook’s tools (old and new), artists are able to form lasting relationships with their fans, rather than selling them the occasional album, EP or single.  Oniracom shares this philosophy—in fact all of our websites, microsites, widgets and social media destinations facilitate direct to fan marketing, fan-oriented growth tactics and lasting relationship building.

By collecting additional contact information from their fans through a sign-up form, musicians can augment their Facebook campaigns with mass e-mails and mobile promotions. Mozes, a leading service providing mobile engagement tools such as mass promotional text messaging, powers the mobile sign-up of many leading musician pages such as Rihanna and Kings of Leon. Email sign-ups are predominantly handled through an integration of a widget, often developed by an artist’s record label. Jack Johnson, in a tab powered by Oniracom, baits users with a free mp3 but then requires an email address to which to send the file.

Tabs which offer downloads, especially of rare b-sides or live recordings, in exchange for contact information are a great choice for musicians because they entice both hardcore and new listeners with something exclusive, and help establish the artist on the fan’s hard drive, not just their web browser.

Read the Article Here

Motorola recently released their new Smartphone the Motorola DEVOUR on Verizon Wireless. The phone looks essentially like a shrunk-down and better-engineered version of their holiday marketing success the Motorola DROID. However the new Android powered Smartphone has not only received a firmware update, but also an innovative integrated social widget called MOTOBLUR (Motorola really takes to YELLING in their brand marketing, for the sake of your eyes I’ll refrain from emulating their extravagant use of text size).

Read more.

Fifteen years ago, the only hope for a band was to play locally, generate a dedicated fan base and pray to be discovered by a major record label. There was little to no money to be had in the realm of independent music, and the odds of your band getting national recognition were little to none. Nowadays however, through social networks like myspace, twitter and facebook, bands of all levels of popularity have been able to gain recognition within their own social circles and beyond.

In the digital age, it is becoming increasingly simple and affordable to create, record, produce and distribute your own music. And the good folks over at ReverbNation (RN) are revolutionizing the band merchandising business as well. RN recently introduced a store application to their already popular music industry website. Through their service, any band is now able to create, design and distribute their own quality merch with absolutely zero overhead costs. The merch is not made until it is bought by fans, and on top of that, the bands are able to price their merch at their own discretion at any price above production. RN also developed facebook applications to work along with the store, allowing fans to purchase merch directly from a bands facebook page. Check out the RN Store.

Check out more in a recent article on wired.com.

Best discovery o’ me life.  You can set your language on Facebook to Pirate.

That’s right, just a few clicks and facebook becomes a whole lot more piratey.  No more of this you have an event invitation.  NO!  Now you can have “grog fests sighted from the crow’s nest”  And no facebook won’t ask you “what are you doing?”  It’ll ask, “what Arrrr you doing?”  or “what be troubling ye?”  So there ye go. It’s awesome.  If you want to enjoy the awesomeness, just go ahead and log into facebook, head to the bottom of the page click language and switch it to “English (Pirate).”  Ye won’t be disappointed.

MySpace has launched their sync service to many of their users world wide.  Right now you can sync your MySpace status update with your Twitter. 

The beta service was originally only available to celebrities and musicians like Oniracom clients Lenny Kravitz, John Legend, and Matisyahu.

The service is another great way for musicians to be able to update once and publish to several sites much like several third party Facebook apps that publish your Twitter updates to your profile wall.

We have been able to keep fans updated about new tours, album launches, and special opportunities through Myspace Sync. (Sizlocore)

Over 8 million users become fans of Facebook Pages every day to connect with their favorite public figures and organizations and get updates directly in their streams. Now, users can connect with brands, musicians, celebrities, businesses, and more, whether they’re on or off Facebook.

Today, we’re excited to launch the Fan Box, a Facebook Connect-enabled social widget that Page owners can add to their websites to allow users to fan and view the accompanying Facebook Page stream. With the Fan Box, brands can bring content from their Facebook Page into their website and help convert website visitors into Facebook fans. Users can view the most recent posts from the Page, see a list of other fans (including their friends), and, most importantly, become a fan without leaving the site. Additionally, if a user visits the site and isn’t logged in to Facebook, the user can log in and become a fan directly inline as well.

How does this relate to Oniracom?

Others implementing the Fan Box on their websites today include ABC News, NPR, World Wildlife Fund, (RED), BlackBerry, Lance Armstrong/Livestrong, Roger Federer, Lenny Kravitz, Kings of Leon, Tide, and Herbal Essences.

Yes, we implemented this on Lenny Kravitz website and social network destinations.  Thank you to the Facebook development team who are incredibly easy to work with.

Read More Here…