Consumers Lash Out at American Girl on Facebook After Diverse Dolls are Discontinued

By Montrie Rucker AdamsJune 13, 2014 Blog American Girl, American Girl doll, Cecile, diversity, facebook, Ivy, Marie-Grace, Ruthie, twitter

Recently, the American Girl doll maker and retailer announced that it is dropping four dolls from its historical doll line. That wouldn’t be news except that one of the dolls is one of two black dolls and one is their only Asian doll.

Angry Facebook fans saw the move as reducing the line’s diversity and lashed out. American Girl responded to some commenters in the more than 1,200 in the thread, stating that they remain committed to offering diverse cultures and races in their dolls. Commenters responded about the disconnect in the statement, since it would no longer have any Asian dolls for sale. Reaction on Twitter was similar.

American Girl contends that the reason for the dolls discontinuation was that it was moving away from its “friend” dolls, ones that are sold in pairs but not separately.

The company sent a statement to ABC News after its news story on the discontinuation and fan outrage:

“At nearly one million strong, we’re proud of the relationships we’ve built with our dedicated Facebook community. Our fans are very passionate and many of our posts generate a high level of engagement, including comments, likes and shares. Certainly we know that whenever we announce that a character is archiving, it will cause some level of disappointment, especially among our most ardent fans… While demand for characters certainly plays a part in our overall decision making, the main reason for this year’s approach is based on the decision to move away from our friend-character strategy within the historical line. This decision affected Marie-Grace, Ruthie, as well as Ivy and Cecile—the first two racially diverse characters to be archived by American Girl. In comparison, American Girl will be archiving a total of nine Caucasian characters since 2008.”

Our daughter is an American Girl fan and loves her American Girl doll. I understand the company’s move. As long as dolls are represented for girls of all ethnicities, the fans should be happy “American Girls.”

Pinterest Told to “Get Green” by its Users and Greenpeace

By Montrie Rucker AdamsJune 5, 2014 Blog facebook, green, Greenpeace, pins, pinterest, twitter

It seems that no one has an excuse for not going “green.”

At a demonstration outside Pinterest’s headquarters in San Francisco, influential Pinterest users and Greenpeace activists asked the social network to use renewable energy to power its platform.

Mimicking Pinterest’s interface, the demonstrators set up two 15-foot by 13-foot “boards” with “pins” that stated, “Make Our Pins Green.” The featured “pins” were designed by Pinterest users who have almost five million combined followers.

The activists also set up a solar-powered café in a trailer with functioning solar panels, keeping the coffee hot with solar-powered burners.

Pinterest has 70 million users with 750 million boards and 30 billion pins but has yet to commit to a sustainable energy program. Other tech companies have committed to using renewable energy including Apple, Google and Facebook.

Pinterest is powered by Amazon Web Services, whose data centers are only powered by 15 percent renewable energy. Greenpeace is pushing all major Internet companies to shift to renewable energy sources. It is inviting Pinterest users to join the campaign and share content from pinterest.com/greenpeaceusa/clickclean.

Why NASA Landed on Instagram

By Montrie Rucker AdamsNovember 21, 2013 Blog facebook, Flickr, Foursquare, google+, Instagram, NASA, Reddit, twitter, youtube

In order to expand its audience, The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) recently landed on the photo sharing site Instagram.

NASA’s image content will include Earth science, aeronautics, spaceflight, astrophysics, and historic photos as well as video.

The first day on Instagram, NASA featured the launch of its Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer, a robotic research mission that will orbit the moon. Instagram is a good fit for the space agency with its rich visuals of space and the Earth. Their followers grew rapidly, to 32,000 within minutes of its first post.

NASA also uses social platforms Google+, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Foursquare, Reddit and Flickr to tell their story. When Instagram tweeted to welcome NASA to its site, within one day it had been retweeted 1,000 times and 500 had given it a “favorite.” NASA had over 4.7 million Twitter followers, more than any other federal agency.

As NASA uses social media to reach a different demographic, other marketers can learn from their Instagram experience and adopt similar practices.

Can you think of ways you can use this growing social media tool? Whether you’re a construction or utility company an academic institution or health care agency, there are many ways to tell your story through pictures.

Twitter: Three Tips for Better Tweets

By Montrie Rucker AdamsOctober 29, 2013 Blog abbreviations, communications, hashtags, marketing, social media, twitter, twitterverse

Regular Twitter users know that a good tweet contains a good headline, short links, hashtags and less than 140 characters. But there’s always room for improvement. Continue reading Twitter: Three Tips for Better Tweets

Twitter Cards – More than 140 Characters!

By Montrie Rucker AdamsSeptember 11, 2013 Blog twitter, twitter cards

Sometime 140 characters just isn’t enough!

With Twitter cards, it’s possible to attach media experiences to tweets which link to your content. Simply add a few lines of HTML to your web pages, and users who tweet links to your content will have a “card” added to the Tweet that’s visible to all of their followers.

Well… they say it’s done in three easy steps:

Choose a card type! Try them out or read more about them.
Once you find one you like, add the required meta tags to your page.
To apply for the card you want, validate your meta tags.

Sometimes, one man’s “easy” is another man’s “torture.” If you aren’t very web savvy these so-called “three easy steps” could take quite some time to actually implement.

There are seven card types that can be attached to tweets, each of which has a beautiful consumption experience built for Twitter’s web and mobile clients:

Summary Card: Default card, including a title, description, thumbnail, and Twitter account attribution.
Summary Card with Large Image: Similar to a Summary Card, but offers the ability to prominently feature an image.
Photo Card: A tweet sized photo card.
Gallery Card: A tweet card geared toward highlighting a collection of photos.
App Card: A tweet card for providing a profile of an application.
Player Card: A tweet sized video/audio/media player card.
Product Card: A tweet card that better represents product content.

So…what are you waiting for? Hop on over to the Twitter Cards Development page and get started on your cards.

At least you get a chance to share in more than 140 characters.

Why Sharing Blogs Correctly is a Good Idea

By Montrie Rucker AdamsJuly 10, 2013 Blog blogs, facebook, linkedin, traffic, twitter

If you have a business, one of the best free marketing resources you can use is a blog. If your website does not include blogging capabilities, you should consider it. Most people use social media to share blogs written about other businesses, products and services. Sharing your blogs on Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn and other social media platforms are great. It’s never a bad idea to share. That’s what we learned in pre-school, right? However, this will drive web traffic to those companies, not yours.

By setting up your blog and sharing your content – you will drive traffic to your website. There are five key reasons why this is a good idea. You can…

acquire new customers
drive more traffic to your website
build quality relationships with your customers
provide a way to interact with customers and followers through comment boxes
build trust by providing quality and reliable content worth sharing

The more you blog and share, the more traffic you will start to receive. If you have good Search Engine Optimization (SEO) built inside your website and/or blog, you will probably see even more traffic.

Your blog should focus around your business, products, services and most importantly …. your expertise on the subject matter. Write your blog like you own it and write from personal experiences. People like “stories,” so incorporating stories into your blogs that mix with your business will also be very helpful.

Lastly, don’t overdo it! Keep it short, sweet and informative. There is no need to write a blog a day. Your plate is full, so three per week is fine. Schedule your blogs to go out at varying times of the day and different days of the week. Remember… your audience is all over the world… and in different time zones. Don’t miss out on an opportunity to share.

Happy Blogging!

Business Going Stale? It May Be Time to Re-focus, Re-think and Re-brand

By Montrie Rucker AdamsJuly 5, 2013 Blog branding, facebook, linkedin, marketing, rebranding, twitter

If you’ve been in business for a while and sales and service requests have dropped, it may be time to re-focus, re-think and possibly re-brand.

A friend found that her original business slowed tremendously. She started thinking about re-branding – starting with a new name. Her immediate concern was if people would know her by the new name. What if current clients couldn’t identify with her? After careful consideration, she decided to start a different company – with a new name – but providing the same services and adding on a few new ones.

After a few months of sharing this new identify on the Internet, specifically Twitter, LinkedIn groups and other group forums, she began receiving random inquiries. As time went by, her business has picked up even more.

Sometimes, you have to leave your comfort zone in order to focus. Sometimes, in order to be successful, you have to seek out other relationships besides friends and family members. One mutual friend, I’ll call her Dana, was able to experience a rise in new business – merely by changing her identify, re-branding and marketing herself to a different audience. Below are six tips she shares about the process:

Get out a piece of paper and write (yes, I said write) down your current business name on one side, draw a line vertically down the paper and put your new business name on the other side.
Under the current business – write down your products and services and other offerings. Then duplicate that under the new business. If there are any aspects of the current business that won’t be included in the new one, don’t write it. Under the new business, if there are new services/products you want to offer – include them.
Under the new business – write down Twitter and Pinterest. (Dana didn’t include Facebook or LinkedIn, but you may want to consider those as well).
Also under new business – write down several domain names. Keep them short and sweet so prospects can find you. It also makes your email address shorter and easier to remember.
Now, register for a new Federal Tax ID number and register with the state in which you do business. You can also revisit the SBA for opportunities you may have missed the first time.
Lastly, purchase your new domain name and hosting. Find a reputable web developer to design your new site.

If you’re in a business slump, it may be time to do what Dana did…look beyond your comfort zone – your hometown, friends, family and former clients. The World Wide Web is open 24/7. If your business is one that can take advantage of something new (and most are), then think about re-focusing, re-thinking and re-branding. You may be surprised at your results.

64 Google+ Content Strategies [Infographic]

By Montrie Rucker AdamsJune 24, 2013 Blog facebook, google hangout, google+, infographics, linkedin, twitter, yourtube.com

As I was reviewing some of my bookmarks, I came across a blog written by Maria Peagler, founder of SocialMediaOnlineClasses.com and an award-winning publisher and author, who had written this article for Copyblogger back in February. I don’t know how I missed sharing this, but it’s never too late to share.

In this article she expands her discussion on a few of her favorites from this list. You can read them here – http://www.copyblogger.com/google-plus-content-strategies/. Below is an Infographic that breaks down Google+ into areas you can use to create your own branding strategies.

Like this infographic? Grab a proven framework for content marketing that works from Copyblogger.

I hope you will find this useful. If you have a chance, please let me know how it works for you.

Does Your Social Media End at 5pm?

By Montrie Rucker AdamsJune 19, 2013 Blog facebook, hootsuite, inbound marketing, linkedin, sharing, social media, twitter

Occasionally I receive emails from my web developer who also assists VMI with our blogging and social media activities. She often reminds me that social media doesn’t stop when I shut down. “Your business is open 24/7 and is seen all over the world…. and in different time zones… so why don’t you tweet after 5pm?,” she asks.

Back on May 3, 2013, she sent the following email out to her clients – Subject: “Does Social Media Stop on the Weekends.”

To my social media clients,

A client recently contacted me to see if I would also do their social media on the weekends. I said sure because social media is ongoing – it’s going on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. To be honest, why share only during your regular business hours. Your website and business technically is open for business all over the world. Are you missing an opportunity to reach out and touch one of your customers in a different city, state, country? Time Zone matters!

This intrigued my client because I told him that I now have clients in Alaska (4 hours behind me), California (3 hours behind me), Texas (1 hour behind me) and one in London, England which is 5 hours ahead of me. So what about the people in those areas? Are they even seeing what you tweet/share? Probably not if you are doing it only in YOUR time zone.

Donald Trump says, “Your Fired!”… My Client says, “Girl, you are HIRED.” Made me laugh.

As I was reading a few news items and blogs today, I came across a blog from Inbound Marketing Agents entitled, “Social Media 101: Your Perfect Posting Schedule.” There is a great infographic found in the blog stating the best time to post to Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+ and Pinterest. For instance, the best time to post to LinkedIn is from 7am to 9am and 5pm to 6pm but not between 10pm and 6am. It says avoid posting in the evening because traffic fades. I am also assuming that in most places, many people may be asleep.

If you’re working in different time zones, you can always adjust your post times. If you’re using Twitter, there’s HootSuite, an online tool that helps you schedule when your tweets will go out. I’ve talked about HootSuite before in my blogs.

Take a look at their blog. They have useful tips for creating a posting schedule that will meet your posting needs.

Montrie here’s the link to the blog – http://www.inboundmarketingagents.com/inbound-marketing-agents-blog/bid/294669/Social-Media-101-Your-Perfect-Posting-Schedule

Google+: What’s New and Why You Should Use It

By Montrie Rucker AdamsJune 17, 2013 Blog facebook, google hangout, google+, infographics, linkedin, twitter, yourtube.com

It seems that the mediums for sharing information will never end. There is, and probably always will be, a way for you to connect to anyone, anytime and anywhere.

Are you familiar with Google+?

Google+ has a fresh new look. Looking at it – it reminds me a little bit of Facebook, Pinterest and Twitter all rolled into one. PR Daily wrote an excellent breakdown of some of the changes to the Google+ platform. A few of the items noted that I particularly find interesting include:

#3 – Infographics will display in a nearly useful size at full length in the new layout. The estimated dimensions are 503 × 930 for desktop viewing. An influx of infographic posts is likely. Keep an eye on ensuring readability.

#7 – A Hangout is now any form of group communication. This can include Video Call, Group Chat or Group Calling. This new feature means many messaging and calling products can now merge.

#8 – Google has released a standalone Hangout app that replaces Google Chat and allows for text and video chat across Android, iOS, and Chrome.

#12 – YouTube expands its live-streaming feature to all channels with more than 1,000 subscribers.

Some of these can prove very useful when communicating with business colleagues, family and friends. No need to set up multiple accounts with different service providers – you have one-stop shopping right inside Google+.

To view the entire lis , go here (http://www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/19_things_you_need_to_know_about_the_NewGooglePlus_14559.aspx. You may find you have more favorites that I did!

Use These Clever Tools to get Likes, Followers and Shares

By Montrie Rucker AdamsJune 12, 2013 Blog content lockers, facebook, lead generation, sharing, twitter

When you make the decision to use social media, you are making a decision to share what you know. You’re being “social.” You want people to read what you have to say. If they don’t, the outcome is like standing at the podium before an empty auditorium.

There are a few clever little tools out there to get your web visitors to share your content and to generate leads. My website is built on the WordPress platform. I’ll share a few WP tools, but there are other non-Wordpress tools you can research that work the same way.

Pay with a Tweet – This allows your visitors to download files after publishing a tweet on his/her twitter account. For example, you have a free eBook you’d like to give away. Once the visitor clicks the download button, a Tweet screen will appear for them to Tweet your message. Once the Tweet is sent, they are returned to your website where they can then download your eBook.

Content Lockers – There are several branded content lockers available to lock down content. You place a small code in between content and when a visitor comes to your website – they must either “follow” you on Twitter or “like” you on Facebook. A few free content lockers are:

Easy WordPress Content Locker – Easy WordPress Content Locker allows easy implementation of content lock gateway widget code to monetize your content. It works with code from CPALead, Leadbolt, BlamAds, Adscendmedia, Adgatemedia, MGCash, Dollarade and many other CPA Networks.
Facebook Like – Content Locker – With this powerful Content Locker you can lock your entire blog for a user, until he hits the Facebook “like” button.
Twitter Content Locker – The plugin allows the user to lock part of a post or page. The user must share it on Twitter to view the content.

If you aren’t a WordPress user, you can use Google to search for these keywords to find codes that will be suitable for your website. You may find that there is an increase in “likes” and “followers” by using one of these tools.