Tag: bloggers

The Celebrity Endorser: Can It Work For You?
By Categories: Blog Tags: , , , , , , ,

“I’m not a doctor, but I play one on TV,” is one of my favorite, most memorable line from a celebrity endorser. It was the mid-‘80s and Vicks 44 used Peter Bergman, who played Dr. Cliff Warner from my beloved soap opera, All My Children to endorse Vicks 44.

Celebrity faces have  represented products and services for over 100 years.  In the early years, one celebrity would characterize one product. From print material to billboards to television commercials – that one celebrity was the “face” of that brand.

Back in 2002, Oprah Winfrey aired her first “Favorite Things” show where she shared products that she felt were noteworthy to her audience . Plus, they would make great gift items. The show typically aired around the beginning of the holiday season in early November. The best part for the audience was that they were given some of those products to take home. Product categories included food favorites, beauty and body care, books, music and home and high-tech discoveries.

Several years later, the segment began to spotlight specific groups. For example, the 2004 audience members were teachers. In 2005, the audience was volunteers from Hurricane Katrina. In 2008, the show aired in May instead of November due to the nation’s economic hardships. In 2009, instead of a massive audience giveaway, Oprah held a sweepstakes where there was only one favorite things grand prize winner.

Oprah Winfrey’s product endorsement can take a business with virtually no website traffic to crashing its hosting services. It means that those businesses can count on making lots of money – just by her mentioning it – and, especially if that product is listed on her Favorite Things.

Not everyone is fortunate enough to have access to Oprah, but if you look closely around you, in your circle of influence, you are bound to find someone Oprah-like that has a certain amount of clout.

Do your research. Ask family, friends and even other business associates if they know the “who’s who” in your area. As a matter of fact, see if there’s a “Who’s Who” local directory in your business community. These people could be corporate big wigs or they could be well-known bloggers who write product reviews. Find those people and get your product to them. For starters, ask if they would not mind reviewing your product and writing a testimonial. If you are creating an ad or commercial, ask if they would endorse your product or service.

Check out some of the products that made it to Oprah’s 2012 Favorite Things List. Who knows, one day you may be one of them (wink wink).

Are Bloggers Journalists
By Categories: Blog Tags: , , , , , , ,

Journalists enjoy certain legal protections. One is the Shield Law.  The Shield Law protects journalists from forced disclosure of confidential sources of information.

Many bloggers consider themselves journalists  – individuals who report, write, edit, photograph or broadcasts news.  Are they protected by the Shield Law or, is the law extended only to accredited reporters from news organizations?

Forty states and the District of Columbia uphold the Shield Law which varies from state to state.

In August 2011, TechnoBuffalo.com, an Irvine, California-based website published from an anonymous source, a report that contained photos of Motorola’s new Droid Bionic phone. Legal action was then taken against TechnoBuffalo.com by JohnsByrne, a printing company located in Niles, Illinois. Hired by Motorola, JohnsBryne asked that TechnoBuffalo be ordered to disclose the name of the source that provided the image.

In January 2012, the judge ruled that TechnoBuffalo.com did not meet the standards in the state media privilege law, which protects journalists who refuse to disclose their confidential sources.  TechnoBuffalo.com was ordered to turn over the information.

TechnoBuffalo.com then filed a motion asking the judge to reconsider and in a surprising development, the judge reversed his initial decision.

As social media begins to evolve, there will be more cases similar to that of TechnoBuffalo.com’s.  The courts will continue to receive new media cases.

We are treading on new territory. With it will come opportunities to re-write the law books.

 

Just for Your Safty
By Categories: Blog, Hey.. Try This Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

That’s just what I saw in an ad in big, bold letters, sprawled across my computer. “Just for Your Safty…” I could not read beyond the word “safty.”   My first thought was, “Hmmm, that typo is huge! How did it get past the editors?”

Most bloggers, Facebook enthusiasts, marketers and people who love to write, don’t have editors. Editors check your words before you put it out there. They make sure that your audience will understand what you say and that your message  makes sense. They are the ones that, if you’re writing about our nation’s safty, what the audience reads is information about their safety.

No one is perfect. That’s a given. But when you’re putting your stuff out there for all the world to see, make sure that it’s tight and it’s right. Have someone look it over. Ask them to proofread it for errors – typos, sentence structure, dotted i’s and crossed t’s. After that person reads it, give it to someone else.

I once worked at a major newspaper. In our department we wrote classified ads. The nature of our job was to type as fast as we could what the person on the other line dictated. One of our biggest fears was to leave the “l” out of the word “public.”  Guess what? Our fears were often realized.

One way to proofread spelling is to read the words from right to left instead of left to right. Most people miss words because they know what they wrote, so they skim over the words without truly reading them. But when someone else reads it, they see, “all there money was lost,”  and “the dogs were baking all at once.”  Spellcheck can’t check this.

The best of the best make mistakes. The challenge is to make sure that you at least do all that you can to not make them. If you do, at least you can say that you covered all the bases. It’s for your own writing safety.