Kansas City Car Dealer Frank Ancona Honda Launches 2nd Facebook Contest via Jennings Social Media Marketing
By Valerie Jennings, CEO of Jennings Social Media Marketing
Enter Here
Frank Ancona Honda, a Kansas City Honda dealer, which Jennings Social Media Marketing (JSMM) has been working with for more than a year, has launched a second Facebook contest this week. The contest is a chance to win a four-course dinner for two and wine pairing at Trezo Vino and a night at the Aloft Hotel at Park Place in Leawood, Kan.
Jennings Social Media Marketing has been utilizing the NorthSocial Facebook contest application for the past five months and has been impressed by the easy-to-use functionality, results, viral sharing opportunities and ability to load original creative work. Check out the contest on the Frank Ancona Honda Facebook page.
JSMM designed the contest, worked with Frank Ancona Honda on the creative, loaded the application via their Facebook page, developed the email opt-in opportunities and hopes to see 500 or more entries. The contests typically generate hundreds of new “likes” and email addresses for future prospective marketing.
Check out the NorthSocial applications on their website to understand what they are capable of providing, but have a social media professional design the campaign to reach your audience, engage with fans, design the NorthSocial landing pages, set up targeted Facebook ads, distribute viral press releases and send email marketing to prospects and customers to enter the contest.
How to use QR Codes with your Marketing
By Sarah Newman, client services manager
Little black boxes seem to be appearing everywhere. These black boxes are popping up at your grocery stores, restaurants and even in your mail. The boxes are referred to as QR codes. QR codes are the newest tool that is assisting marketing companies in reaching smartphone users.
QR codes contain advertisements and even videos for people to view on their smartphone. In order to access this media, smartphone users need only download the QR code application to their phone. Due to the ease of access, the QR codes have gained popularity. In fact, according to the social media source, Mashable, “Fifty percent of smartphone users use QR codes on a regular basis.”
Additionally, QR codes are helping businesses create new marketing plans for their clients. Let me provide a personal example, while sitting at a neighborhood restaurant with a girlfriend, I noticed a QR code on an advertisement at the far end of the table. We scanned the QR code with our smartphones while we waited and the QR code showed a video about the desserts the restaurant provided. Viewing the advertisement helped our time pass by more quickly and also aided in turning our conversation towards the restaurant.
At the end of the video, it gave us the option to share the advertisement on our Facebook or Twitter. How convenient is that? The ability to share this video in any social media forum will help increase the restaurants online visibility. This is also a great idea for restaurants or even waiting rooms to use for the sake of parents with children. If the children were able to watch videos while they wait, they would be distracted, making both the parents and the children happy.
Here at Jennings Social Media Marketing we recently used QR codes for a race sponsored by Frank Ancona Honda. The Frank Ancona Honda cars all had QR codes on them and the runners that took part in the race received a goody bag that had the QR codes on them as well. This allowed Frank Ancona Honda to continue to market to the runners after the event was over. Jason Heard, sales manager at Frank Ancona Honda, added that the mobile initiative is a step towards engaging their customers via social media channels and into mobile. “We are excited to be the first of Jennings’ clients to incorporate SMS and QR codes into our social media marketing. Valerie has been a key advisor throughout the social media integration at Frank Ancona Honda, and we know this will be the right move for our dealership,” said Heard. We were just as excited to help Jason have a great race and continue to market his brand.
It’s exciting to see where QR codes will lead to in the future. They serve as useful tools for planning marketing campaigns with all of our clients!
Yahoo!Finance.com & MSNBC.com Post Jennings Social Media Marketing Press Release: Jennings Social Media Marketing Earns Top Notch Ratings from Frank Ancona Honda
Posted by: Jamie Sutera, VP of R&D
Yahoo!Finance.com & MSNBC.com recently posted Jennings Social Media Marketing press release: Jennings Social Media Marketing Earns Top Notch Ratings From Frank Ancona Honda.
KANSAS CITY, MO — Frank Ancona Honda, an Olathe Honda dealership, hired Jennings Social Media Marketing (JSMM) to target online car buyers, increase organic search engine optimization (SEO) via social media, enhance branding on all social networking platforms, increase website traffic and generate results (www.jenningssocialmedia.com).
Jason Heard, sales manager at Frank Ancona Honda, said that one of the ways that JSMM increased website traffic for the dealership was via organic search engine optimized press releases sent to search engines. “JSMM used Marketwire press releases with embedded links, tags, SEO headlines and nationally trending topics that were of interest to our buyers to generate quantifiable results. We were immediately impressed by the website traffic and news websites that the Marketwire press releases appeared on including MSNBC.com, Reuters.com, Yahoo! Finance, Bloomberg.com and more,” said Heard.
Heard added that JSMM completed an overhaul on Frank Ancona Honda’s blog, Facebook, Twitter and video channels. “Facebook is becoming even more important to the automotive industry. We have more than 500 ‘likes’ on our page and lots of engagement which JSMM is attempting to triple over the next few months. Right now, we have incorporated our 50-year anniversary promotions on the page with ads and contests that Jennings is managing. The page has been designed to promote our inventory deals and service and parts specials,” said Heard. “Additionally, JSMM is generating results via Web videos and Twitter for SEO purposes and they have customized two blogs for us on frankanconahond.com and drivegreencarsblog.com.”
Jennings Social Media Marketing is a full service company that utilizes the art of online storytelling with the science of measuring quantifiable results. Jennings creates comprehensive social media marketing and Web advertising strategies from website design and development to viral videos. The company represents publicly traded to medium-sized businesses across the U.S. and overseas including technology, sports, sustainability, entertainment, travel, financial, health care and real estate (www.jenningssocialmedia.com).
Jennings Social Media Marketing Reviews Mashable.com Article: Why do People Follow Brands?
Posted by: Jamie Sutera, VP of R&D
According to mashable.com article, Why Do People Follow Brands? “On Twitter, Facebook, and dozens of other social sites, normal consumers often choose to keep tabs on the brands they love.”
“In fact, many brands have highly optimized their marketing and PR strategies to accommodate that behavior, even going to far as to do one-to-one CRM (that’s customer or consumer relationship management) through avenues such as Facebook and Twitter.”
“As social CRM specialists Get Satisfaction found, many consumers who follow brands online are only in it for the perks. Around 40% of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter users in a recent study said they followed brands to get access to discounts and special deals.”
Mashable.com: How Social Shopping Is Changing Fashion Production
Posted by Valerie Jennings, CEO of Jennings Social Media Marketing
The fashion industry is one of the biggest social media marketing opportunities. I want to share this article by Mashable.com regarding the fashion industry’s growth via social media marketing!
Fashion editors and department store buyers have long had the biggest say in what parts of designer collections make it to market. This pattern is changing, however, thanks to a more social web culture and better tools to facilitate online voting, purchasing and even customization.
How to Reward Your Twitter Followers: 6 Easy Ways Recommended by Mashable
Posted By Valerie Jennings, CEO of Jennings Social Media Marketing
Mashable.com reviewed several ways to excite, reward and support your Twitter followers.
According to the article, consumers follow their favorite businesses on Twitter to get an inside look at the business, to find out about new products, earn discounts and be a part of a community. Businesses have the potential to turn these fans into brand ambassadors by making their followers feel special and appreciated.
Here are a few:
1. Offer them a freebie
2. Give them control
3. Give them a shout-out!
Thank You to David Day from ithinkbigger.com for Featuring Valerie Jennings’ article: Promoting a Green Brand
Posted By: Jamie Sutera, VP of R&D
Thank you to David Day from ithinkbigger.com for featuring Valerie Jennings’, CEO of Jennings Social Media Marketing, article: Promoting a Green Brand.
How to drive a key message without greenwashing.
By Valerie Jennings
Most businesses that are focused on sustainability are doing the right thing for the right reason. These businesses also want to share their efforts with consumers without looking too self-promotional.
In April 2008, a corporate sustainability study sought to determine the greenest eco blogs, websites and other social networks.
The research scored more than 100 green websites for recommendations on which blogs, websites and other communities were the “darkest to lightest” green. This scoring model is not new. In fact, in 2008, Experian announced the greenest (most committed to the environment) to the brownest (very little concern for the planet) consumer markets.
Both of these projects required reviewing corporate green behaviors, attitudes and other forms of promotion to get the word out that green was important to companies. The lessons learned through these types of studies by national brands and large corporations can be applied by small businesses in promoting their own green efforts.
Key Lessons in Marketing Your Greenness
-Be truthful, and you don’t have to worry about greenwashing (i.e., making misleading claims or promoting superficial environmental efforts). Use disclaimers, be honest and use your brand to advance education, awareness, media exposure and promotions. -Use social media to promote green messages, connect with green bloggers, tweeples, social networks and press.
-Reach out to the Earth Day Network.
-Marketwire, a PR distribution platform, works. Green reporters research subject matter experts online for article sources. Use this tool to connect.
-Measure success via Google search results, media coverage, Twitter followers, blog traffic, contests, Web video views, Facebook likes, e-mail opt-ins and leads.
-Reach out to green bloggers who are appropriate for your brand. The most green or most liberal environmentalists may not want to hear about a medium-green product, company, service or expert.
-Stay focused on where the key listeners are around the product. Use blog or PR research to speak with the appropriate reporters and engage the right community.
Learn from the ‘Big Guys’
Proctor & Gamble has made a continuing commitment to greening its corporation. Its website has a long list of eco goals, but the reporting is still lax, difficult to read and challenging to evaluate.
The best online green results from a major brand, on the other hand, are from Coke. At a green conference several years ago, a presentation by Coke’s VP of marketing was packed with data, published timelines to make an impact on cutting back on Coke’s water usage in developing countries, information on their execution plan and ways they were working to get the plan moving. Coke’s website still has the goals published, and the results from the past few years are available. Go Coke! It appears Coke has decreased its water usage every year since it launched its sustainability plan.
Follow Coke’s example and share your green goals, timelines and progress with consumers by posting on your website. Promoting your green efforts is another way to differentiate your company from the competition.
Valerie Jennings is CEO and founder of Jennings Social Media Marketing, a full service company that utilizes the art of online storytelling with the science of measuring quantifiable results. Valerie@jenningssocialmedia.com // Twitter: @valeriejennings //www.facebook.com/jenningssocialmedia //www.linkedin.com/in/jenningspr
Facebook Tests Deals Program in Austin, Atlanta, Dallas, San Diego & San Francisco
Posted by: Jamie Sutera, VP of R&D
According to an article from http://news.cnet.com, Facebook launched its social-buying program today. Facebook Deals offers members local deals they can buy and also share with their friends on the network. The test launched in Austin, Atlanta, Dallas, San Diego and San Francisco, but may be expanded to include other cities.
Facebook Begins Testing Social-Buying Program
Facebook announced this evening it is ready to begin testing its new local deals offering–the social-networking giant’s effort to cash in on the feverish interest in social buying.
Users in the five test cities will be able to learn about offerings through e-mail and notifications, by clicking on the Deals tab on their Facebook home page, and through their News Feed when friends like or buy a deal.
Facebook is working with a passel of other deals sites in the venture, including Opentable, Gilt City, Tippr, PopSugar City, Plum District, ReachLocal, Zozi, Home Run, KGB Deals, aDealio, and ViaGoGo.
With 500 million members, Facebook brings a sizable user base in its challenge for dominance in the deals market, which brought in $873 million in revenue last year and could bring in $3.93 billion by 2015, according to a projection from consulting firm BIA/Kelsey.
Chief among those competitors is Groupon, which has been riding meteoric growth with half-price massages, discounted restaurant meals, and travel bargains. Chicago-based Groupon, with 60 million users and more than 39 million deals sold in its two years in business, is expected to beef up its muscle with an initial public offering later this year.
Jennings Social Media Marketing Celebrates Earth Day With a Billion Acts of Green Pledge & Provides Tips to Promote Green Brands
Posted By: Jamie Sutera, VP of R&D
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Jennings Social Media Marketing is celebrating Earth Day by making a pledge to the Earth Day Network (EDN) campaign: A Billion Acts of Green and providing tips to promote green brands.
Valerie Jennings, CEO and founder of Jennings Social Media Marketing, said that Earth Day is a great way to review sustainability practices. “Jennings Social Media Marketing committed to replacing its hazardous cleaning products with more eco-friendly cleaning supplies this year. Next year, we hope to have everything toxic removed from our office,” said Jennings.
Jennings added that the office is always trying to improve, however, it is a constant challenge. “We have been providing eco-friendly social media marketing advice to businesses since 2008 and are currently working with many companies that are making green commitments.”
Here are a few tips-
1. Be transparent and use the brand to advance education, awareness, media exposure and promotions.
2. Do use social media to promote green messages, connect with green bloggers, tweeples, social networks and press.
3. Reach out to the Earth Day Network.
4. Marketwire, a PR distribution platform, works. Green reporters are researching subject matter experts online. Use this tool to connect.
5. Monitor success via Google search results, media coverage, Twitter followers, blog traffic, contests, Web video views, Facebook likes, email opt-ins and leads.
6. Reach out to green bloggers who are appropriate for the brand. The greenest environmentalists may not want to hear about a medium-green product, company or expert. Stay focused on where the key listeners are around the product.
Jennings Social Media Marketing is a full service company that utilizes the art of online storytelling with the science of measuring quantifiable results. Jennings creates comprehensive social media marketing and Web advertising strategies from website design and development to viral videos. The company represents publicly traded to medium-sized businesses across the U.S. and overseas including technology, sports, sustainability, entertainment, travel, financial, health care and real estate (www.jenningssocialmedia.com).
Jennings Social Media Marketing Commits to Replacing Toxic Cleaning Products: A Billion Acts of Green
Posted by: Valerie Jennings, CEO & Founder of Jennings Social Media Marketing
Each year companies, consumers and media organizations promote green awareness for Earth Day. This year, the Earth Day Network (EDN) is promoting A Billion Acts of Green to secure a billion commitments to the planet by 2012. The campaign is known to be the largest environmental campaign service in the world; striving to build commitments by individuals, corporations and governments in honor of Earth Day. This is an easy way of anyone to participate in the environmental project. Please make a commitment to the earth. Thank you to the Earth Day Network for its hard work!
Go to http://act.earthday.org/leaderboard to join the project.
Jennings Social Media Reviews Video Interview: Guy Kawasaki Talks With Mashable at SXSW
Posted By: Jamie Sutera, VP of R&D
I would like to share this video regarding well-known author, venture capitalist and former Apple luminary Guy Kawasaki.
At SXSW 2011, Guy Kawasaki sits down for an interview with Mashable’s Christina Warren. In the wide-ranging discussion, he talks about his new book,Enchantment: The Art of Changing Hearts, Minds and Actions, and points out useful tools he’s discovered at SXSW this year. Along the way, he talks about his two different stints working with Apple, musing about what might have happened if he had stayed with the company (http://on.mash.to/eILzqG).
Thank You to Angle Bush, Radio Host of Your15Minutes Radio, For Interviewing Valerie Jennings, CEO & Founder of Jennings Social Media Marketing, in Celebration of Women’s History Month & International Women’s Day!
Thank You to Angle Bush, radio host of Your15Minutes Radio, for including Valerie Jennings, CEO & founder of Jennings Social Media, during a panel discussion: “Blueprint for Success” with Diane Hansen and Pam Brossman on International Women’s Day in celebration of Women’s History Month (http://www.blogtalkradio.com/your15minutes).
Listen to show:
Here is a partial transcript from the radio interview –
Angle: Valerie, tell us about the beginning of your journey.
Valerie: I started my company when I was 24 and will have had the business eight years this June. It has definitely been difficult starting at such a young age because there were some things that I had to learn and overcome, from being a female business owner to starting at age 24. I will say I had a ton of support from the community and Johnson County, Kan. There were a lot of people who invested time in working with me and it really helped me advance my career as a business owner. To both the men and women who really supported and talked about the success that we had with our clients early on, I just want to say thank you for being so supportive in those early stages and now to all of the wonderful companies we work with today, almost eight years later. It has been a lot of dedication and commitment not only on my part but everybody that works here, which is a pretty small social media marketing and pr firm. There is so much to be learned no matter what age you start your business at. There are some unique challenges when you launch that early in the game.
Angle: So you have gone through some things being 24 with people probably misjudging you like ‘she is only 24’
Valerie: Yes, that is probably fair.
Angle: One of the buzz words that many business owners are hearing at this moment is branding. We had a show on branding, discussing the book by Mr. Damon John, “The Brand Within.” I want to know from each of you, how important is branding and what does branding look like for each of you. When a client comes in and says, ‘I have a business but I don’t have a brand. Right now I’m an item. I haven’t gotten into the branding stage just yet. What do you do to assist that client that has not built their brand and is just starting out?
Valerie: It is incredibly important because without a brand you don’t have a message. There is not a story to share with your audience. There are all kinds of aspects that you need to review when building a brand and one of them is search engine optimization. What I mean by that is somebody jumps on Google and researches either the owner of the company, the product, the service they better find information or that organization immediately. It shows people in about 30 to 60 seconds if you have a brand presence and that you are dominating the search engines on either your company name or the owner of your company.
We spend a lot of time looking at the brand and most of the companies we work with do have a brand that’s been created and in existence for a while. Every now and again there is a startup that comes through here and we talk about how they are going to build up their brand. One of the first steps is to make sure you reserve all of the social networking sites for your organization on YouTube, Twitter Facebook to make sure that nobody else takes it down the road, or that a competitor takes it. That does happen and we see the brand hijacking going on. So once you have your brand going, protect the brand and cherish the brand. You can shift throughout the course of your company and change directions with branding and reinvent the brand. There are a lot of things you can look at overall it is such an incredible component. From a story telling standpoint and a marketing standpoint that brand has to be solid so you can understand how to advance your company farther down the road.
Angle: What in starting your business overall do you wish you knew then that you know now.
Valerie: I think overall it’s a resources concern. It’s one of things that you have to look into multiple components to building the business. I started when I moved into the Kansas City market and I really didn’t know anybody. I wish I would have a little bit better database of connections of people I trusted. I wish I would have been able to call on people who had established businesses that could have been trusted advisors. I felt like I was fumbling a little bit in the beginning because I just didn’t have those resources to call upon people and lean on them. I feel completely blessed to have those types of relationships now and there are so many people that I can call up anytime and I feel super supported. I think that is such a hard thing for many business owners who feel like they are going through this alone and if they don’t have those relationships or resources it can be really scary.
Angle: Last thing I want to know, tell me Valerie, what is your blue print for success. We want to know, how do you become successful when you are pursuing your passion.
Valerie: It’s commitment overall. It’s so hard to stay focused on everything that you want to accomplish. You have to look at the bottom line. If this is what you want then you have to be committed to it and that sounds like a generic response but I just have to tell you that it’s the most important thing to any business owner. If you don’t like what you are doing then you have to change it.
Listen to the Interview: with Valerie Jennings, Diane Hansen and Pam Brossman on International Women’s Day!
Thank You to Maureen Kedes, Radio Host of PR Insider, For Interviewing Valerie Jennings, CEO & Founder of Jennings Social Media
Posted By: Kerry Phouthavong
Thank you to Maureen Kedes for interviewing Valerie Jennings Friday on PR Insider. During the interview, Valerie discussed how she started Jennings Social Media Marketing by transforming it to a more non-traditional way of approaching PR. Although she still incorporates the standard components that make up for a typical public relations company, Valerie embraces her work more through social media and the art of online storytelling. Here’s a brief transcription of the interview.
Maureen: Today I have an expert on the show in social media storytelling. Her name is Valerie Jennings, Founder and CEO of Jennings Social Media Marketing.
Maureen: Tell us how you started before the birth of social media?
Valerie: My background is as a journalist. I was a print reporter and I did some on-camera work. I worked on the government side; I did some public affairs, media outreach. I got more training on the traditional side. Even though I’m not a senior entrepreneur, I started my business at the age of 24. I did give us a huge boost from competitor’s standpoint. When I first started the business, it was traditional PR–pitching, press releases, media coaching, prepping for interviews, and looking at what’s going to sell.
Valerie: We experimented with a PR Web and we used a a lot of search engine optimization to capture the story; what was interesting and what was going to drive traffic.
We’ve continued to expand what we do, and we still do a lot of traditional. But we’ve maintained the social networking side as a way to penetrate some of the traditional aspect. For example, we have a great blog post; we’re a great video to produce for a client. We’re going to maximize that on the client’s Twitter site on a social media press release on Facebook, whatever it is. So we talk about success in an exclusive client list, and we’re really looking for companies that have amazing stories. We try to figure out what is a possibility and we figure out what is trending. As a journalist, if people aren’t looking for it, why would they be paying attention?
Jennings Social Media Marketing CEO Valerie Jennings To Be Interviewed Live on PR Insider by Maureen Kedes Friday, February 25, 2011
Thank you Maureen Kedes for booking Valerie Jennings, CEO and founder of Jennings Social Media Marketing, on PR Insider to review social media storytelling: How To Be The Best Social Media Storyteller
Jennings Social Media Marketing Press Release: Social Media Marketing Entrepreneur Valerie Jennings Named Friday Girl TV’s 2011 Woman 2 Watch Posted on Yahoo!Finance.com, MSNBC.com & Businessweek.com
Posted by: Jamie Sutera, VP of R&D
Jennings Social Media Marketing press release regarding Valerie Jennings’ recognition as one of Friday Girl TV’s 2011 Women 2 Watch was recently posted on Yahoo!Finance.com , MSNBC.com and Businessweek.com. The article reviews Jennings as a change agent, entrepreneur, community activist and an all around phenomenal woman.
Read Valerie’s interview with Friday Girl TV: http://fridaygirltv.com/blog/2011/02/02/woman-2-watch-valerie-jennings/
Social Media Marketing Entrepreneur Valerie Jennings Named Friday Girl T.V.’s 2011 Woman 2 Watch
Posted By: Kerry Phouthavong
Valerie Jennings, CEO and entrepreneur of Jennings Social Media Marketing, was recently featured as one of Friday Girl T.V.’s 2011 Women 2 Watch.
The feature was released today and reviews Jennings as a change agent, entrepreneur, community activist and an all around phenomenal woman. In addition to being featured on Friday Girl T.V.’s Women 2 Watch page, Jennings will appear in the monthly Friday Girl Newsletter: The Friday Files: The Girl’s Guide to Chic.
About Valerie Jennings:
http://www.jenningssocialmedia.com/about/
Friday Girl T.V. features interviews with progressive women of all ages who are influential in shaping their community through the arts, business, philanthropy, fashion, health and fitness, with additional segments on fashion, sex, love, relationships, lifestyle and culture (http://fridaygirltv.com/woman-2-watch-4/).
Jennings Social Media Marketing is a full service company that utilizes the art of online storytelling with the science of measuring quantifiable results. Jennings creates comprehensive social media marketing and Web advertising strategies from website design and development to viral videos. The company represents publicly traded to medium-sized businesses across the U.S. and overseas including technology, sports, sustainability, entertainment, travel, financial, health care and real estate (www.jenningssocialmedia.com).
Twitter Launches @Anywhere Platform
By: Jared Cook
I would like to share an interesting article by Jennifer Van Grove, Associate Editor for Mashable.com, about Twitter’s newly launched @Anywhere Platform.
Twitter’s @Anywhere Platform Is Now Live
@Anywhere supports auto-linkification of usernames, hovercards (similar to ones we see on Twitter.com), follow buttons, tweet boxes and user login/signup options (a.k.a. Twitter Connect). All of these tools are meant to keep visitors Twitter-happy while on third party sites.
Jennings Social Media Marketing Releases Case Study Video with 180° Urban Design & Architecture
By Jared Cook
Jennings Social Media Marketing in Kansas City, Mo. recently released its second case study video within a series of social media videos focused on measurable results. The second video, with 180° Urban Design & Architecture in Kansas City, features the evolution of 180°’s blog into an online news community.
Click image to view video.
