Sports Aren’t A Beauty Pageant

Dove, a brand known for their positive portrayal of women, is calling out media outlets for criticizing female athlete’s looks—just in time for the 2016 summer Olympics. The “My Beauty, My Say” campaign hopes to change the media’s focus from appearance to performance arguing, “When they [the media] only see an athlete’s looks, they don’t see her at all.” Dove shares real-time quotes on social media, sportscasts, and magazines by popular media entities like TMZ and Bleacher Report, and offers viewers a chance to respond to these quotes. They range from discussing a female athlete’s “frizzy hair” to saying a female athlete is “built like a fire hydrant.”

 

Some may believe critiquing athlete’s looks or attire is just part of being in the public eye, but where do we draw the line? Since April 1, 2016 there have been 86.5 million comments about female athlete’s appearance according to http://www.dovehaveyoursay.com. Instead of focusing on their athletic performance, here’s the breakdown of what’s being discussed:

• Clothes: 11%
• Body: 26%
• Age: 6%
• Beauty: 50%
• Hair: 7%

When 50% of the discussion surrounding female athletes is solely focused on their appearance, it’s time for a change. A woman’s level of attractiveness or appearance has no bearing on her abilities as an athlete. By focusing on her beauty or body, the media takes away from her hard work and abilities as a professional athlete. Dove put the ball in our court (pun intended), bringing attention to the current offensive approach to women’s athletic coverage, to drive change. It’s time to take the shot: http://www.dovehaveyoursay.com

Forget Waverly Place, She’s the Wizard of Social Media

Selena Gomez is 24 years old and a single post from this former Disney star is worth more than most people make in a year, two years, three years… A single promoted post from her is worth $550,000, which tops the list of all celebrities – including the Kardashian/Jenner clan. This value is based off D’Marie Group’s algorithm that takes into consideration 56 metrics. These include: followers, post frequency, engagement, post quality, click through and potential to create sales. So although Gomez is not guaranteed to make half a million dollars on every sponsored post, she essentially could use that as a starting point for negotiations.

You’re probably asking yourself, how can a social media post be worth so much money? (Or if you’re me, how can MY posts be worth even 1/100^th of that?) There are several factors to Selena Gomez’s monetary value. First, she has 200 million followers on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook who are actively engaging on her accounts. (Not to mention on average, 200,000 more join them every day, increasing the total number of her followers daily.) Brands will pay big bucks to have their product placed in front of that many people – especially if they’re conditioned to engage with the content that typically is pushed out from the page. According to AdWeek, users trust influencers as much as their friends, and around 40% say they have purchased something because they saw an influencer using it. These influencers are seen as real people, and their fans trust them, even if they’re being paid to promote a product. The relationship social media creates between influencers and their followers makes every suggestion feel personal, so if Selena Gomez says to buy a product, her fanbase is likely to do so.

Gomez isn’t involved in many brand partnerships. She’s (or at least her management is) selective about what brands she endorses. Right now that includes Coca-Cola, Pantene, and Kmart. Her feed isn’t diluted with promoted posts. According to D’Marie Group a post by Selena Gomez, or supermodel (and Kardashian) Kendall Jenner, will produce 12x the return on investment compared to standard digital marketing efforts.

Here are a few other top celebrity endorsers on social media:

Kendall Jenner: $125,000 – $300,000 per post

Cara Delevigne: $125,000 – $300,000 per post

Taylor Swift: $125,000 – $300,000 per post

Gigi Hadid: $125,000 – $300,000 per post

Scott Disick: $15,000 – $20,000 per post

Kim Kardashian: $20,000 per tweet

Khloe Kardashian: $13,000 per tweet

Ashley Benson: $5,200 per tweet

Did anyone else die a little inside after that? If you need me, I’ll be working on my Instagram.

Snapchat’s New Groove

The people have spoken and Snapchat has listened. If you’re on social media, you’ve seen the conversation—Snapchat users wishing to rewatch stories and see images past their current disposable nature. The popular messaging app’s newest update will allow for just that. Users can save photos and videos to a newly launched “Memories” page on their app. They can choose to keep images to view later, resend an image or video, and even edit captions.

Snapchat also installed the ability to photo search for simple terms in the images within Memories. If you take a video of your dog, simply type in “dog,” and all those adorable images will pop right up. (If only Apple had that capability…)

Memories will show users data they’ve saved from the past, much like the TimeHop app. Any images users put into their Memories folder will show up on the app on the same date in the future. This “blast from the past” idea has been a well-liked update to Facebook as well. Even better, users can combine their stories to make one long video to share. A lifelong friend’s birthday roast seems like the perfect use for this feature.

Snapchat is consistently improving it’s offerings, giving more incentive for users to stay within their app longer, or for light users like me to get on more often. Snapchat is even growing rapidly among users over age 35. The continued improvements to the application will allow Snapchat to see user growth and soon, Snapchat might be the next Facebook contender. Stay tuned…

A Lesson in Storytelling ft. The Cleveland Cavaliers

This week, history was made in the Land. The Cleveland Cavaliers won the NBA Championship, ending Cleveland’s 52-year drought and bringing happiness, glory, and 1.3 million people to our city on the lake. I was lucky enough to see the excitement of game seven firsthand. When the buzzer went off in the fourth quarter, the city exploded. It was louder and more intense than anything I’ve ever witnessed: screams, tears, drinks flying, hugging, dancing, shirts waving, and high fives all around. As I walked from my viewing spot to Quicken Loans Arena, chants of “Let’s Go Cavs!” echoed across the streets. This was only the beginning.

On Wednesday, Cleveland hosted the championship parade. The scene downtown during game seven was nothing compared to the parade and rally—bringing an estimated 1.3 million people to a city with a population around 300,000. With fans swarming the streets and blocking the parade routes it took more than five hours for the team to make it through a one-mile parade route to the rally zone near the Convention Center. Confetti sprinkled the famous Cleveland skyline and people scaled buildings and sat outside windows stories high just to get a glimpse of our championship team. It was an extreme outpouring of love for them and the city of Cleveland.

You might be wondering what this has to do with advertising. Cleveland fans spend days allowing this team in their living rooms, bars and restaurants. They watched the team evolve with LeBron, without LeBron, and were there with tears and celebrations for “the return.” As a city, they got so close to the championship they could finally taste it. Their faith was tested. And this week, they rejoiced in celebration after emotionally counting down the minutes waiting for them to succeed or fail during sixteen long games. It’s a great story. It’s a Cleveland story.

And storytelling is essential to advertising. There are many forms of storytelling, but the Cleveland Cavaliers perfectly followed the narrative of The Hero’s Journey. Quickly, the Hero’s Journey begins in the ordinary world with a “call to adventure” (enter the NBA, win your hometown that championship.) What follows is the hero’s “refusal of the call” (I’m taking my talents to South Beach) and eventually a “meeting with a mentor” (The Heat) who provides the hero with training and advice to help them on their journey. Then, they “cross the threshold” (welcome home LeBron) and “find allies and enemies” (love and hate in Cleveland fans). They “prepare for the ordeal” (…twice) and finally take possession of the treasure! (2016 Champions!) The “road back” (flight home from California with Cleveland’s most prized-possession) and the “resurrection” (a moment of rebirth, once again the King of CLE.) Finally, “the return” (not that one), where the hero returns home and has the power to transform the world as we know it (1.3 million people waiting to see LeBron, his team and our trophy.)

1.3 million people arrived to celebrate with this team because they’ve been a part of their story; they’ve watched the 2016 NBA Champion Cleveland Cavaliers brand be built—52 years in the making. They care.

We’ve entered the era of consumer empowerment. Brands need to do more than communicate outwardly to their audience. They need to tell stories, entertain, educate, inspire and touch lives.

The Cavaliers team does an exemplary job at delivering what the audience wants. They give us a great product to watch on the court but extend the story off the court as well. By utilizing social media we have an opportunity to be a part of their lives both on the court and at home. They’ve shown us the celebrations, created inside jokes with us (Lil’ Kev), and let us see the world from their perspective. We get to experience this story through the players’ eyes.

Our involvement allows this Hero’s Journey to resonate with us deeper than most. We’ve invested ourselves in this team, and it’s become a part of us. We felt the anguish watching the buzzer slowly count down, we crowded the streets in celebration as the team flooded the court, and we cried with JR as he gave a heartfelt speech about playing for his family. The emotional rollercoaster is what connects us with this team, and motivates us for the future.

The Cavaliers team has told its story. Through them, we’re encouraged empower ourselves and write our own story. It’s our call to action – show that no matter our struggles, Cleveland is a success story. How will you respond?

 

Big thanks to my editor, Kelly Gentile.

 

Shaving Great Branding Since 2012

Dollar Shave Club is one of the best examples of a successful brand identity that is ubiquitous, from its packaging to its digital presence.  I’ve always been a huge fan of a beautiful rebrand.  However, what puts Dollar Shave Club (DSC) in a league of its own is that it was already beautiful, even at its start.

The idea alone was simple: solving an a relatable problem that’s shared by men and women everywhere, getting razors that aren’t ridiculously overpriced.  Quality generic alternatives shipped to your door for as little as $3.00 a month is a perfect example of product-market fit.  The founder and CEO, Michael Dubin recognized an age-old need and found a brilliant answer.

You may remember DSC’s head-turning launch video when it came out
in 2012 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUG9qYTJMsI).  That video (now viewed almost 20 million times) spread across the nation like wildfire on social media and made a boring subject like shaving entertaining enough to share with a friend.  But how did such a young and clever brand become the 615 million dollar mogul it is today? Through a delightfully unique customer experience.

When I subscribed to its service, Dollar Shave Club sent me a friendly “welcome to the club” email and shipped a very well-branded box to my door including the following: the products, a playful “member card,” free samples and (my personal favorite) “The Bathroom Minutes,” a hilarious monthly lifestyle newsletter from the chairman with pun-filled quotes, trivia, club news, member spotlights and more.  I loved how humble the packaging was.  The exposed-cardboard box had very little ink on it and yet it had just enough to keep it tastefully stylish.  This only helped represent the brand’s “No BS” core attitude.

This extraordinarily inexpensive and straightforward method of delivery changed the industry.  It seems more and more brands are now mimicking DSC’s approach, probably because of how pleasurable it is to a consumer to (for once) not have a product trying to blind you in the eyes with hologram-y, foil-stamped, 84-color packaging.  No contracts, no hidden fees, a distinct culture and a lifestyle service that’s worth talking about?  That’s not something you witness everyday.

Over 50,000 people a month refer a friend to the club, according to Dubin in a recent interview with CNBC.  That kind of number gets me giddy for advertising.  To be able to elevate your brand high enough that people do the advertising for you?  That’s more efficient and cost-effective than any other brand / media strategy that I can think of…

Stay true,
Dan

Out of the Brew

Unlike any other outlet, social media helps level the playing field for small companies and large corporations. In 2013 Unmetric did a study where they recorded, analyzed, and ranked the top five beer brands according to their quality of engagement. They recorded the average reply time, amount of posts per day, and even broke down which posts were proactive, replies, and original content.

Above are Unmetric’s top five brands on Twitter according to engagement, and much to my surprise, names like Coors and Busch didn’t make the list. Dogfish Head, New Belgium, Stone Brewing, Sierra Nevada and Brooklyn Brewery are all microbreweries. On Twitter Dogfish and Sierra Nevada aren’t even verified accounts! The Engagement Score allows Unmentric to focus on quality over quantity, so a page with a smaller fan base can still run with the big dogs. So for example, in the study Miller Lite scored the highest average engagement followed by Sierra Nevada, yet Budweiser sent out the most posts within the period analyze. Brands who utilized resources like Twitter and Instagram were better able to spark profound connections with consumers regardless the company size.

Unmetric ranked the breweries by taking the number of Likes, Comments, Shares, and estimated impressions and calculated their overall score. Admittedly, the U.S. craft beer movement has acquired a significant amount of momentum over the past few years, but I think the majority of the credit should go to the quality of engagement these small shops are producing. Good job social! Gold star for you! You’ve shown that sometimes quality over quantity rings true.

-LNB

You are what you Tweet

This Sunday (June 30, 2013) is the fourth annual Social Media Day (#SMDAY). In honor of the upcoming holiday, I thought this week would be a good time to take a break from sharing my brokawesome broternship adventures and give this special day some recognition!

I am a huge advocate of social media and how you can leverage it for your business or utilize it to improve your reputation. Social media is something we need to understand in today’s world to ensure it is one of our allies and not one of our enemies.

One of the reasons I find social media to be so fascinating is the fact that it is constantly changing. The future is all about digital media, and I am proud to be someone who strives to keep up with the always-changing social world.

I have put together some of my favorite social media quotes and thought sharing them might inspire some of you to highlight Social Media Day as well!

1. “You are what you Tweet.”
-Alex Tew, Monkey Inferno

2. “Our head of social media is the customer.”
-McDonald’s

3. “Privacy is dead, and social media holds the smoking gun.”
-Pete Cashmore, Mashable CEO

4. “The qualities that make Twitter seem insane and half-baked are what makes it so powerful.”
-Jonathan Zittrain, Professor of Law at Harvard

5. “When you give everyone a voice and give people power, the system usually ends up in a really good place.”
-Mark Zuckerberg, CEO and founder of Facebook

Please feel free to add some of your favorite social media quotes. And until next time, enjoy the holiday!

Last, But Not Least

Time flies when you’re having fun!

Brokaw proved this to be true this summer with trips to the zoo, Kansas City, and the airport; we even pulled a plane, took a half day to root for the Indians, and traveled across Northeast Ohio to talk about pancakes!

It has been an absolute privilege to have such a hands-on experience this summer working with Brokaw’s truly extraordinary group of people.

Thank you, Brokaw, for the experience of a lifetime!!

The ultimate Dream Team, thanks to Brokaw!

I wish I had more time…well…be careful what you wish for!

Farewell my loyal viewers….you all (2 viewers) have treated me well!

Last week at Brokaw 😦

It is very disheartening to believe that 10 weeks can go this fast. Our (the best interns in the world) first day at Brokaw, a syllabus was put on our desks and the lists of responsibilities seemed to be vast. On top of that our mentors were piling work on us daily! New tasks and responsibilities was the driving force for our work. Now that everything is over we wish we had a little bit more to do and a little bit more time.

This week has been kind of slow but it started to speed up once we realized it was really ending! We have arrived at the end of the Fazoli’s food truck tour and it was a great success! We have participated in feeding people around the nation and providing support to Feed The Children. You can never beat a great idea that’s coupled with a great cause.

I am really happy that I did not publish this before the end of the day because THIS LAST DAY TURNED OUT TO BE THE BEST!

Why do you ask….even if you did not ask, I will tell you anyway!

The Brokaw Bros. offered me a job and they want me to think about it over the weekend…(don’t tell anyone but I am going to say yes)….I thought this moment over a few times in my head already…lol.

There is some type of cubical or desk with my name on it and I am stoked to be a part of a great and creative team. You haven’t heard the last of me yet!

Keep it sexy and saucy…lol!

The Delectables

Happy Root Beer Float Day!

Where else can you attend a meeting and enjoy a root beer float at the same time?! Only at Brokaw, as we had celebrated this delectable unofficial national holiday early last week!

Sodamazing!

This last week wrapped up The Dream Team’s swift tour of Northeast Ohio spreading the word of Bob Evans’ Upside—Down Days.

Say Good morning to Dinner!

To sum up everyone’s reactions: