The Vitrue Blog

Well, if you're the state of Missouri, a lot. Next week (September 8th) Missouri kicks off their 2nd annual Tour of Missouri International Cycling Race. This year the tour will include an online social community where fans, tourists, teams and Tour personnel can upload and share content. The social network is called Fanzone and is integrated with the Tour's main site. The social community includes photo and video uploading, commenting, member profiles, and member messaging. Mobile upload is also available and obviously important to an event based social experience like the Tour or Missouri.

"We will be providing video cameras to Tour personnel and each of the 15 teams in the race in order to capture behind-the-scenes footage, which is usually never seen by the public. Team footage could include views from caravan vehicles following the race or team strategy sessions," said Steve Brunner, president of KOM Sports, which markets the event. "The partnership with Vitrue has been trailblazing from the beginning. They have been incredible to work and brainstorm with. They've been able to mold the site to the needs of the race."

Oh yeah, I didn't mention the fact that Tour of Missouri's Fanzone is a Vitrue powered site. Read the press release if you want the details...

I'm personally excited about the Tour's combination of event marketing, social media and mobile upload. I can think of numerous events from my past that could have been significantly enhanced with an online social community. This isn't our first time bridging live events to online social communities, and it surely won't be our last.

Are you attending the Tour of Missouri? Have you engaged an online social community built exclusively for a real world event? Want to participate in a dialog about social media strategies? Sound off in the comments below. We're listening!

At Vitrue we have a long track record of creating successful partnerships with some of the greatest publishers, brand marketers and agencies. How each of these partners taps into social media can differ in approach, needs and expected results. In the latest Adotas article, Reggie Bradford our CEO, discusses how agencies can focus on their core competencies and leverage social media tools for success:

Agencies need tool kits to harness the power of social media. They should concentrate on taking their creative expertise and brand strategy know-how and applying it to the medium, and then focus their efforts on understanding the canvas that social media provides.

Click through to Adotas to read the full article. When you are done, drop us a comment below with your opinion.

The Vitrue powered Ben & Jerry's Imagine campaign has gotten plenty of buzz, and rightfully so. Ben & Jerry's hit the sweet spot with a new flavor, a cool social app, and a cause everyone can appreciate. You have seen Ben & Jerry's Imagine haven't you?

So it was of no surprise when I learned that Vitrue is up for the vote on AdWeek's People's Choice Buzz Awards featuring Ben & Jerry's Imagine. You can see our entry and most importantly vote for us at:

http://www.adweekbuzz.com/

Don't forget to checkout Ben & Jerry's Imagine campaign and leave your message of peace. And, while you're feeling chatty, drop us a note in the comments below.  

Brandweek recently featured Ben & Jerry's social media program (powered by Vitrue) in a case study.  Brandweek found a 42-fold increase in engagement and concluded the program strengthened relationships with loyalists and introduced Ben & Jerry's to younger audiences. Read the full case study at Brandweek.

The Ben& Jerry's program utilizes Vitrue's mosaic application (marketing description here). Personally I think the Mosaic demonstrates a great alternative UGC. The barrier to participate is so much lower than creating a UGC video or even a photo. Check out http://www.benjerry.com/imagine/ and leave your wishes for world peace. Let us know what you think with a comment below. 

This past Friday we launched our new company site. Our goals were to simplify the navigation, present our combined offerings (post acquisition), and highlight some of the client work we have done. Take a look around and let us know what you think. Yeah, that's right, our new blog has comments enabled (don't ask, just comment). We are here to participate in the conversation.

BTW, we know the blog looks a little canned, we plan to turn our attention to it next. Drop us a comment and let us know what you think.

The office is filled with energy and excitement this week with the news of the acquisition. Just in case you haven't heard, we acquired UGENmedia. This acquisition is significant and positions us as the leading social media marketing company for blue chip brands. The official press release as well as UGENmedia's web site has the basic details. As a product director at Vitrue, I'd like to dive into one specific area of our new combined strengths.

Right off the bat, our product strategies overlap significantly, as if we were working from the same product requirements. But the best part is HOW we built success over the past years. Vitrue has invested heavily in building a social media platform with a highly customizable HTML/CSS presentation layer. UGENmedia focused on user experience, style and polish, via a significant investment in Flex/Flash technologies. Both presentation options have their pros and cons, and now we can offer the best option or combination to meet our clients needs.

Vitrue's robust platform has a proven track record of delivering brands the tools and technologies they need to safely manage their social media strategy. UGENmedia's rich application interfaces will make it even better. Vitrue will also begin to offer applications that are integrated within the social networks, taking our current viral distribution to a whole new level.

As a product guy, I look at features, and technologies as a color palette to create solutions from. This week our palette just exploded, the ideas are endless and as you can probably tell, we are thrilled!

In addition to products and technologies, probably the most significant is UGENmedia's team. We're all happy to welcome them to Vitrue.

BizReport's Kristen Knight dives into targeting via social media with our CEO Reggie Bradford. Excerpt below, or click through to the BizReport site for the complete read.

According to Reggie Bradford, CEO of Vitrue, a social media company, there are some proven methods to attracting the right target base through social media. First, social sites need to be monitored. According to Reggie, affluent consumers what to trust a website. Whether that is an ecommerce hub or a social message board, monitoring the site is a good way to show these consumers that you care. Second, marketers should offer video and finally be as authentic as possible on the social platform.

 

Another great article by our CEO Reggie Bradford on Adotas. Reggie dives into 3 excellent tips to help ensure brands safely harness the power of UGC. Excerpt below or click through to the Adotas site  for the full article.

News flash: the much-hyped Web 2.0 is here. When it arrived may still be up for debate but for the savvy company and interactive marketer, the discussion that's really worth having is what to do with it now that it's here. How can companies effectively engage their consumers on a playing field they no longer control, yet maintain the integrity of their brand? Having consumers at the center of the digital universe requires a huge shift in the way marketing is done and, so far, there are far more questions than answers.

Today, we know our customers are no longer happy simply being spoken to - they want to have a voice. If denied, they'll easily find a brand, service or product that is more than happy to engage them in dialogue.

 

Reggie Bradford, our CEO, recently published an article at Adotas about user generated content and the travel industry. Below is an excerpt or click over to the Adotas site to read in it's entirety.

The Travel Industry Association (TIA) of America estimates annual travel expenditures at more than $730 billion. World figures, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council, were valued at $2.97 trillion last year. With the United States leading the world in sheer quantity of travel, it's no wonder that agency, hospitality and hotel marketers are brainstorming ideas on how to attract customers and grow business. The adoption of user-generated content (UGC) has proven to be a significant vehicle to capitalize on this tremendous market opportunity. By bringing their customers into the mix, brands are fueling two-way dialogues that provide dimension and authenticity directly from the consumers about the brand's promise and experience. Over the past several years I've seen firsthand how the power of social media has impacted the tourism industry by working with clients who have been incredibly successful in leveraging this powerful medium to their advantage. With more than 40 percent of all hotel bookings projected to be booked via the Internet this year (according to Milestone Internet Marketing), hoteliers must take a proactive approach to engage their consumers by asking them to participate directly with their brands.  

I read an interesting interview with Founder and CEO of Real Travel Inc., Ken Leeder, in EyeforTravel on March 6, 2008. In this article, Mr. Leeder contended that the idea of "Travel 2.0," or the interlacing of social media with travel companies' consumer outreach, may in the future be linked to social networks like Facebook. He pointed out an alleged disconnect in intentions between people visiting travel sites and those accessing social networks, debating if consumers would be reluctant to have their demographic and psychographic information shared with travel agencies and advertisers for no additional value.