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Fallon Planning

Share ideas that inspire. FALLON PLANNERS (and co-conspirators) are freely invited to post trends, commentary, obscure ephemera and insightful rants regarding the experience of branding.

Target WomenDecember 12 2008

Sarah Haskins critiques the targeted ad messages to women on Current TV's weekly Infomania. Here's a sample of them
Target Women: Family Dinner

Target Women: Number 2

Target Women: Cleaning

Target Women: Jewelry

Community 2.0: Juicy CampusDecember 8 2008

Is user anonymity the key threat to brands on the social web?

I missed this Juicy Campus furor (+, +, +) in recent months yet found this intriguing story on Current TV.

The predicament detailed here reminds me of what many of our clients fear - anonymous social terrorists undermining brands on the social web by unfairly calling the brand a slut - with no recourse available to the maligned brand! Is user anonymity a threat to brands on the social web?

Obviously there is no easy answer as the social web can hardly be "controlled". But brands seeking to conduct social web ideas may learn from the success of other social web communities (think eBay and Amazon). These communities foster user privacy and protection yet users can't just say and do any ol' thing and not be held accountable to the community. Maybe this makes an argument for why brands must initiatiate where they want to participate and on what terms - jump in first before you're forced to defend yourself in forums you don't want to be.

For example, Starbucks, a brand that everybody has "2-cents" comme

Election Day GenerosityNovember 25 2008

Generous brands provide people with something of value. Increasingly, we’re seeing brands offering up more than just ads, messaging, and ‘fuzzy background noise’. We’ve begun to witness brands giving us ideas – things to get behind and care about. Today’s brands that give in such a way have the power to become bigger role players in their audiences’ lives because they offer value beyond plain old messaging. Branding becomes more than just the ad that gets put out in space for all or anyone to glaze over.

When this happens, generosity emerges and helps create more meaningful brand experiences.

One example of Generosity is Starbucks’ free coffee giveaway on Election Day.

To help bolster sales but also to encourage the ideal of good citizenship, Starbucks promised they’d give a free tall coffee to anyone who came in and said they voted.

Their spot that aired during Saturday Night Live asks: “What if we all cared enough to vote? Not just 54% of us, but 100% of us? What if we cared as much on Nov. 5 as we care on Nov. 4?....You and Starbucks. It’s bigger than coffee.”

Fallon Brainfood: @_S_A_R_A_H_ Case Study at SMBMSPNovember 19 2008

How Fallon and SciFi Network are using Twitter to turn TV audiences into social web advocates.
Listen to testimony from a real fan's podcast describing his experience

Fallon strategic planner Aki Spicer and producer Marty Wetherall presented some of their recent learnings from @_S_A_R_A_H_ at Social Media Breakfast/Twin Cities. @_S_A_R_A_H_ is a character from SCIFI Network's Eureka who Twitters to over 3600+ loyal followers. Aki and Marty revealed some of the rewards and pitfalls of maintaining a live, ongoing, public conversation with fans as well as thoughts on how the modern television series is evolving, extending and enhancing their characters and stories using the social web to engage and inspire fans.

FALLON Case Study for @_S_A_R_A_H_

Politics 2.0: Millennial MakeoverNovember 19 2008

Current TV's Mariana van Zeller looks at the impact of the youth involvement in the 2008 presidential election, with some intriguing interviews with the authors of Millenial Makeover