Barnum knew promotion. He used the social media of his day, the word-of-mouth of a thousand excited kids triggered by a couple advance men and a few handbills, to build anticipation for events featuring the “Fiji mermaid,” General Tom Thumb and Jumbo the Elephant. Our young democracy ate it up.

Today, we’re quick to laugh at the “gullibility” of P. T. Barnum’s customers, rubes suckered in by “obvious” hoaxes like the Cardiff Giant. But history records few cases of customers complaining or demanding their money back. Why? Because the ostensible product – a quick peek at something exotic – represented only a small fraction of the value Barnum delivered. People didn’t demand their money back because, by the time they filed past the case or cage holding Barnum’s latest “find,” they’d already received their money’s worth.

Barnum knew ballyhoo drove traffic. But he also knew something else: ballyhoo added value. The promotion of an event was a big part of the product.

Now, through the twentieth century (what we mistakenly call “the golden age of advertising”), ballyhoo was cast as low class and cheap and all but squeezed out of existence. Thanks to J. Walter Thompson, Edward L. Bernays and all their kin, marketing and public relations became one-way and distinctly “un-fun;” an abattoir that attempted to march consumers cattle-like up a ramp toward buyer’s remorse. We got sucker punched so many times by the bait and switch of “scientific marketing” that we began to recoil, protect ourselves in a cloak of irony.

After a century, we almost forgot the joy and the value of ballyhoo. With the passing of “Crazy Eddie,” we professionals almost forgot how to do it. And so, when social media popped on the scene, with its viral videos, its trending topics, its comments, likes and shares, we barely knew what to make of it.

P. T. Barnum would have known what to make of it.

The social media geek in me has to wonder: How much of those banked bucks were thanks to Facebook and its social-platform counterparts? I ask because these days, all of my money-saving or freebie-amassing has to do with logging on somewhere. With that, I give you my top five ways to save moolah using social media, both from a consumer perspective and “insider” view. Got others? Comment below!

Follow coupons, freebies, sales and sweepstakes aggregators.
Here’s a great list to start: The Top 40 Twitter Feeds to Help You Save Money. I never would’ve won all my Starbucks gifts cards if it weren’t for these trusty aggregators, who constantly spread the word about deals and ‘RT to win’ contests. Also search for relevant hashtags–#coupon, #sale, #deal, #giveaway to name a few.

Amend your Twitter profile to rack up freebies:
I’m not saying I do this, but I have on good authority that many Twitter contest hosts only “randomly” choose winners who, in their profiles, list their hometown. They don’t want to risk selecting a winner with no location listed, only to find out they live in Wales—and since most Twitter contests don’t come with official rules, it’s difficult to take back a congrats. So if you don’t already, consider at least citing the U.S. as your homeland to up your chances of getting that coveted “You win!” tweet.

Get the 411 on gasoline.
Before I hit the nearest pump, I check GasBuddy.com online or on my iPhone to find the lowest rate nearby. The incentive for users to post rates and help others: prizes! (And the desire to help out a fellow consumer, of course).

Check-in on @foursquare wherever you go.
Free appetizers, 30% off, buy one get one…Check-in specials are on the rise; always check to see if the venue you’re at has one. But don’t stop there—look at the tips, too. For one of our clients, we left a tip at a specific venue saying “show us your screen and you’ll jump to the front of the line.” No money saved there, but you never know. Perhaps a customer will leave a tip a la: “They take expired coupons!” Ch-ching.

Swap your stuff with someone else’s.
From bookmooch.com and paperbackswap.com to freecycle.com and Craigslist, there’s usually someone somewhere who will trade items with you—or just give you something for zilch.

Like and follow your favorite brands. (Probably the most obvious one…)
Start at the brand’s website to find out which social media platforms they’re active on. If they’re on Facebook, ‘like’ ‘em and constantly check their tabs for new coupons or sales. If they’re on Twitter, follow them—but be proactive, too. Tweet to them if you have a problem (maybe you’ll get a freebie?) or compliment their merchandise (perhaps a ‘thank you’ reward will come your way?). Or straight-up ask if they have a coupon code you can use.

But when Tara cautions, “Buying fans is a waste of money and probably a threat to your brand,” I am reminded about a social media (and universal) rule – few things are true absolutely.

After all, there is “buying likers,” and then there is “buying likers.”

Brands can (and unfortunately sometimes do) goose their social numbers by paying fees to third parties who in turn pay strangers (individuals with low potential brand affinity) to like pages and posts, comment and follow streams. This is the equivalent of paying shills. It is a practice that is not only unethical but potentially brand damaging. Its only “benefit” is to boost the apparent popularity of a social stream. This may attract a few legitimate likers but will do nothing to generate a true critical social mass.

However, “buying likers” by offering on-brand discounts and sweepstakes is a perfectly legitimate, necessary and even welcomed practice. Promotions are a time honored way to get potential customers (not strangers) to sample a brand’s wares. Good ones offer a sweetened version of the steady stream of “delights” that a brand promises will follow a “like.” Of course, long-term success depends on the brand’s willingness to follow through. In the social world, that means making sure the ongoing social stream is “delightful” and offers value.

P.T. Barnum, who knew a few things about big promises and following through, said, “Without promotion something terrible happens: Nothing!” When done well, social promotions enrich the brand experience. Here are a few simple suggestions:

• Make sure your promotions align with your brand. It would be wrong for a fitness brand to give away “cake of the week” subscriptions, for example, or for a muscle car model to host a Hello Kitty sweepstakes.

• Empower the people on the social front lines to have fun with fans/followers. Create promotions you’d like to engage with yourself, and manage the conversation as thoughtfully as you would any business effort you put forth.

• Mix big sweepstakes and contests with social stream promotions, fun and games. Big promotions get lots of attention, but what will you do to entertain, inform or interact with fans when the bells and whistles aren’t going off? Have a plan for sustaining enthusiasm!

Social promotions are critical for creating excitement about a brand, building genuine relationships and demonstrating honest brand good will.

Well … maybe not. See, the way I look at it, the controversy surrounding the legalization of MMA in New York is directly related to one thing: its reputation. Or, more specifically: the misinformation that has formed its reputation. And, boys and girls, what do we know about misinformation? It often occurs due to a lack of communication, a lack of awareness. It’s no surprise to me that many people who oppose MMA admittedly don’t actually know that much about it.

Dana White – president of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), the largest MMA promotion company in the world – knows this all too well. That’s why he spends who-knows-how-many thousands of dollars trying to educate the public on the sport. In his fight to win over New York lawmakers, he’s written opinion pieces in city newspapers, commissioned studies to show how much revenue MMA fights would bring to the state, and done countless interviews with news channels and radio shows. And while he’s educating lawmakers and the public about MMA, he’s doing something else, as a result: a heck of a lot of marketing and promotion for both the sport and his company. Pretty smooth.

But White’s smartest move in this “fan base acquisition” endeavor, without question, was his decision to take UFC social.

White knows where his fans are – the current ones, like me, and the potential ones, who are my socially connected friends. For me, the best part of his effort is that he has recognized that the “if you build it, they will come” mentality is a big, fat lie.

He understands, for example, that just using the UFC Facebook page as a news feed wasn’t going to cut it. Instead, he created a legitimate destination for UFC events that fans can’t see or experience anywhere else. On fight nights, as long as I’m a “liker” of the page, I can watch the preliminary bouts right from the customized tab. For an audience at the mercy of Pay-Per-View fees, this gives a huge and very welcome level of access.

And, just announced, White’s trying something new on Twitter. Whereas his fighters are accustomed to battling it out for Fight of the Night, Knockout of the Night and Submission of the Night – awards that come with hefty monetary bonuses – they can now vie for “Tweet of the Night.” Well, sort of. Fighters who increase their Twitter followers by the largest percentage or Tweet the most creatively will be compensated for their efforts. This rewards the fighters who are already there, and encourages those who aren’t to start engaging. As far as I am concerned, this means I’ll have a greater opportunity to chat with my favorite mixed martial artists. (My older brother used to tease me that I only had “friends” because he paid people to talk to me. So be it if it means I get to converse with a world-class athlete!)

There’s no doubt that mixed martial arts is growing in popularity at an exponential rate. Fingers crossed, I’ll soon be able to take in a fight at the Times Union Center instead of trekking up to Canada to see favorite fighter and Quebec native @GeorgesStPierre or over to Mohegan Sun Arena to watch the fighters of @BellatorMMA (another promotion company) try to make names for themselves in the world of MMA.

It’s going to take a lot more engagement, promotion and audience building, but I think Dana White and the UFC are on the right track.

We work hard at Media Logic to remain neutral in our reporting on the state of marketing for a social world. There is a lot of good news and a lot of great ideas to spread around. We don’t need to be hogs. And honestly, we think “rising Likers lifts all boats.”

But we have to admit that it does feel pretty good to tell you that at 21 percent, the fastest-growing major brand on Facebook for the week ending June 5 was none other than our founding retail account FYE. It also feels pretty good to report that the third fastest-growing brand, Cabela’s, is a Media Logic client, too.

Against some pretty mighty odds, FYE has been growing its FYEGUY social persona at a prodigious rate as of late. In our recent webinar, FYE Naked, we boldly predicted that growth wouldn’t stop – that it would spike. That prediction came true when back-to-back Facebook-based social promotions, Angry Birds and Tech N9ne, drove the big percent increase in Likers and our Zeitgeist & Coffee^sm-managed social effort earned FYE the highest Facebook engagement score among 100 tracked brands.

Cabela’s (our newest retail account) landed at #3 with 65K new Likers and a solid one-week increase of 6.1 percent. Competitors Gander Mountain and Bass Pro Shops took the #2 and #4 spots, with 6.4 percent and 4.1 percent gains, respectively.

PacSun and Walmart repeated their top 10 performances, landing in the #5 and #6 slots. Sears, after falling off the list the previous week, climbed to #7 on the strength of a Facebook Father’s Day sweepstakes. Gymboree, Tommy Hilfiger and Fashion Bug rounded out the list at #8, #9 and #10.

Curiously, Kirkland’s, which set the standard for Liker growth with its recent “Cha-Ching!” sweepstakes, fell this week all the way to the bottom of the Media Logic Facebook Retailers list.

On the heels of one recent exchange, it occurred to me that an invitation to make social media alliances/associations had become a gesture grounded in normalcy – no different than adding contact info to a rolodex or data-base in the old days. Online life and offline life have aligned: tool in some cases, skill in others.

It also occurs to me that although this mode of relationship-building requires little lift, it shares far deeper insight into folks who are all but strangers initially. For me, it has the makings of an unspoken trust initiator. Without much effort, you have some credibility with one other.

That is not to say the natural soul connection or skill of building bonds and relationships is replaced, or for that matter lessened (indeed the opposite), but it does allow a more instant comfort with each other. You can see other comments and recommendations and understand in a snapshot the basics of their expertise.

For example, reading that one of my new vendor contacts was the owner of a very well-established and respected “Print Solutions Innovator,” along with several other key phrases, instantly added to the impression that we likely had similar work ethic and were dead-on for product fit. It was also very interesting to see what groups and associations he valued enough to join. Subsequently, this vendor (and his team) has become a highly valued partner, not just a vendor.

It reminds me of a video I ran across recently (which, by the way, I ran into by browsing beyond the LinkedIn page I was invited to and onto the Facebook wall of another potential freelance partner). It compares everything you need to know about social media to online dating. In the description of TEDxAtlanta – Sally Hogshead – How to Fascinate it says, “In today’s world of 9-second attention spans, our introductions mean more-than-ever before. Sally Hogshead reveals the seven triggers of fascination and how to get others to fall in love with your ideas, instantly.” In reality, when we are forging any vendor relationship, we are inviting each other at first to fascinate with the knowledge or expertise we are seeking in each other and must ultimately share to achieve excellent products for clients.

Of course, the “real” life vs. online/online vs. “real” life notion has not just occurred to me. The Washington Times recently ran an article, DE BORCHGRAVE: Embracing Web 3.0, by Arnaud de Borchgrave. He suggests that social networks are tapped out, since we have all reached that moment in time when everything we do online is just part of everyday life – something we no longer plan or think about, but simply do. I don’t think that proves social networks are tapped out (just simply become a staple vehicle used as part of everyday life) but the rest of his statement about us having reached Web 3.0 makes perfect sense to me: “Web 3.0 is that moment when you forget you’re doing any of this stuff. It’s when using the Internet becomes so casual, so much a part of your natural life, that you don’t think about it anymore. … You no longer have the conscious sense of a dividing line between the real and the online world.”

For those of us who cut our teeth on pre-internet production values, adapted to the advent of “The World Wide Web” and embraced “Web 2.0” as a pretty cool tool that we all played a part in creating, the motto of being a jack of all trades and a master of many still fits. This new online comfort and normalcy is just another facet. Experience is, after all, a culmination of what comes naturally over time.

Facebook has been the story of the Media Logic Retail Marketing Report since our research began last July. Brand after brand has ticked past a million Likers, with a full one-third of our tracked retailers now north of that magic mark. New members of this no-longer-exclusive club include Tommy Hilfinger, Foot Locker, Build-a-Bear Workshop, Walgreens and Bass Pro Shops (with Party City and Cabela’s crossing the line after this survey’s close).

And for many brands, the pace of growth is only accelerating.

Gain access to the full article to discover what retail sectors and social marketing strategies are yielding the greatest growth on Facebook and Twitter. Plus, view the complete growth chart for the 100 surveyed retail brands.

Get the Full Article »

An increasingly popular aspect of Twitter is the velvet rope-less access it provides to celebrities: A- and D-listers alike. With an “@” symbol and verified (this is important!) account name, anyone with a keyboard can tweet to their favorite actor, artist or athlete.

For the star-struck, a tweet back is like a digital autograph, the next best thing to rubbing elbows in person. (Hello, bragging rights!) For retail marketing, it’s a terrific tactic to gain the attention of millions of followers.

But with stars’ @mention feeds flying faster than a G4, it takes a little bit of social media savvy to get noticed by the twitterati. Here are a few tips and tricks to get you started:

Go behind the scenes
Through Media Logic’s work with national entertainment retailer FYE and their contacts, @fyeguy has secured RTs, S/Os and responses from a variety of heavy hitters—including Nicki Minaj, Lupe Fiasco, Cody Simpson and MC Magic—by going straight to the artists’ “people” (publicists and managers). If they know you’ll be tweeting about their brand, they’ll often try to return the favor.

Time it right
Contacts not an option? Try it the organic way. Here, it’s all about timing. On my personal account, I once noticed Bethenny Frankel of Bravo TV fame had just tweeted. I sent her a question and within seconds got an answer (and a lot of, “Hey, look at you!” tweets from envious pals). The next day, Giada de Laurentiis shared her go-to healthy snack with me—again, because I asked at the right time. If you see that a certain star hasn’t tweeted in days, your chances of hearing back are slim.

Be creative
What you say is just as important as when you say it. Pose a thoughtful question or funny comment to make your tweet stand out. A friend of mine tweeted out a little rhyme to get Modern Family’s Eric Stonestreet to wish her a Happy Birthday. Did it work? Yes!

Tweet about them
If you manage a brand’s account, always include official account names when talking about a relevant product. (For FYE, if we’re tweeting about Jennifer Lopez’s new album, using @JLo is a must—just in case she wants to RT). Think about it: if someone tweeted about you, wouldn’t you pause to read it? And for those celebs who have ghostwriters, it’s the same deal.

Pay up
Got money to spend? Ad.ly works as a liaison between brands and big-time tweeters (Kim Kardashian, 50cent, Charlie Sheen and Mariah Carey, to name a few). But with their follower bases—Kim’s pulling in over 7 million—it comes at a steep price. Think upwards of $20,000 per tweet. (You can watch Kim talk about getting paid to tweet.) However you reach Hollywood, it’s undoubtedly a promising experience—and Ad.ly provides metrics to back it up.

So, who have you tweeted with?

While reading news from RSS feeds recently on my Dell flat-screen monitor and listening to the Lynyrd Skynyrd channel via the Pandora radio app on my iPhone, I found a brandchannel article on product placement in a children’s show. Product placement. It can be blatant, like a logo plastered across a character’s costume in the cartoon referenced in that article. It can be slightly sneaky, like the first sentence of this paragraph. Or it can be ingenious and well-received, as it is in the popular TV show “Mad Men” (also mentioned in the brandchannel article).

I spend a lot of time reading about social media and how brands struggle with when and how to make sales pitches. Those without conscience (and those bound to get voted off the island) bombard fans and followers with advertisements. The only thing they know how to say is “Buy this now!” Most companies understand how inappropriate that is in the social space and genuinely want to mix the sales pitch with the right amount of engaging content.

[Enter The Metaphor. Cue camera.]

Why not think of your presence in social networks as a creative endeavor? A movie, perhaps. Or a novel. Now think of your subject matter (content) and your audience and decide how often you can showcase your brand without being intrusive. Think about clever ways to incorporate your products into your story.

Product placement in social media. It’s tricky, but not impossible. Take this Moleskine video which uses a story to introduce new, strategically placed, products:

And remember, the stealth approach is only one way to be clever in product placement. Entertainment and humor make even blatant product placement forgivable.

[Enter the handsome orange hand puppet Doug of Ford Focus fame.]

Ford’s series of YouTube videos featuring a puppet, his sidekick and his car has attracted more than a long line of poets with crushes on Doug. It has enhanced product awareness among consumers and created a buzz.

VIEW THE RECORDING

It’s not every day you get to see a brand in the buff. Media Logic pulls back the curtain back on FYEGUY, its ongoing social media marketing effort on behalf of FYE, the largest specialty digital entertainment retailer in the United States.

The webinar, hosted by Media Logic’s EVP/ECD Ron Ladouceur (recorded 5/10/11), traces the history of FYE’s social marketing strategy – where it started, where it has gone – and reveals the results – even the embarrassing stuff. We share everything that has been learned about Facebook, Twitter, FourSquare, website integration and the in-store experience.

Whether it’s the economy, blossoming competition or emergence of other game-changing factors, every retailer faces challenges today. FYE, for instance, needed to reclaim sales it had lost to digital downloads and department stores, and it needed to tap the energy of its loyal customers to breathe new life into the brand. It turned to social promotions with very specific goals: increase site traffic and store sales, grow fan/follower bases and enliven the brand personality.