So I usually have a pretty lively Superbowl party and this year I decided to evolve it further. One of the highlight of my party 2 years ago was that Mill Street Brewery and a few other companies sponsored their product for the party. I thought this year I would take this to the next level and see how I could expand this, hence my Social Media Influencer Superbowl Party. This year I am actively soliciting sponsors for the party, to put their product in the hands of Toronto social media influencers while watching the game. It is the hope that people at the party, will Tweet, Facebook and share products they like during the party while watching the big game. We have our first sponsor Hollywood Gelato, that will be providing Gelato for the event. Looking for Sponsors We are looking for a variety of sponsors, whether it be food, drink or swag. If you want to share your product with social media savvy people this is your chance. Contact me at joseph@jpuopolo.com Sponsors Hollywood Gelato is a favorite of mine. We have been going to them for years to get amazing Gelato.At Hollywood Gelato we are proud of creating innovative, fun, delicious and authentic gelato. Developing new flavours is a science that takes time, dedication and persistence. We have over 200 recipes in our repertoire and are continuously adding more. Of these recipes you will see 22 of the top selling flavours in our display case. Follow @hollywoodgelato St. Louis Bar and Grill is a Mainstay for wings and BBQ in the city.St. Louis Bar and Grill 528 Yonge St, 595 Bay St and Fairview Mall locations are the best places in the city for Wings, Ribs and Raptors Games. If you are a NBA fan, this is on the only in the city that shows more love for NBA.Follow @stlouiswings I just learned of Black Oak and their great craft beer.Black Oak has been brewing award winning beer since the last millennium! We make slow brewed, all malt, authentic hand crafted beer that’s true to style. Focusing on quality, character and consistency, our Pale Ale and Nut Brown are gold medal winners at the Great Canadian Brewing Awards. We also make seasonal beers in limited quantities, each suited to the season they represent.Follow @BlackOakBrewing Dufflet has been providing me with cakes for years for all my family events.Eat More Cake! Dufflet Pastries’ 3 locations are renown as Toronto’s source for fresh baked desserts that are hand-crafted from scratch using no artificial flavours, colours or preservatives. Along with signature cakes, chocolate confections, and sublime wedding & celebration cakes, Dufflet cafés also offer light lunches and...
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Rules of Customer Service and being a Good Customer I decided to take the week after Christmas off this year, as I usually do. This has become an annual tradition to help me recharge my batteries and get ready for the next year. This year, as usual, I got a raft of gift cards for Christmas and this week I went to brave the horror that is after Christmas shopping to look for some bargains. This year, I have taken a ton of pictures. In fact, nearly 5000 pictures since I got my new camera. Just this Christmas alone, between my camera and video camera I created over 10 gigs of content. I decided to go into a chain of camera stores, Henry’s. This chain has a huge selection and while I got my camera at Vistek, my gift card was for Henrys. Admittedly I am not the world’s greatest photographer (big shocker there) but I still have a lot of pro gear and am getting better with it all the time. I usually keep my camera on auto focus and let it do the work. I went to go look at lenses, and quickly felt belittled by the clerk who wanted to show off how much more he knew about my camera than I did. I was in the shop and probably would have dropped nearly 1000 bucks on a new lens had the clerk not made me feel like I was a 10 year old. There I was, a customer with a 200 dollar gift card to spend in this shop and he couldn’t close the sale. It got me thinking about good customer service. On the flipside, customers can be rude and belligerent themselves. They lie, and manipulate in-store policies to get something that they probably shouldn’t receive. During Christmas shopping I had to tell a fellow customer to stop being a dick when he berated a clerk for something that was clearly not her fault. This is a set of rules I have developed for both customer service and for the customer to follow: Rules of Customer Service Don’t belittle the customer – It is your job to know more than the customer. That said, don’t make them feel like they are 5 years old. You need to be relatable, helpful and human to the customer. Work on behalf of both the customer and company – You need to operate for the best interests of both the customer and your company. You are the liaison between both groups and will earn a lot of loyalty and esteem if you try to find creative solutions to...
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I got to sit down and interview Dana White ahead of UFC 140. The event takes place on December 10th in Toronto, Canada and like every UFC event, heavily hyped via social media. Over the past 3 years, Dana White and the UFC have built a very strong social media presence. I wanted to speak to the head of the UFC himself and get some more detail on what he thinks of Twitter and other social media tools. Dana goes on to outline how he got into Twitter, how he uses it to help his business, what are the pitfalls and benefits. Amy Jo Martin of Digital Royalty, who helps build social media strategies for business such as the UFC had this to say about Dana White and his use of Twitter. “Dana White was the first sports executive to see the power of these new communication channels. From day one, Dana and the UFC have treated social media channels as a dialogue vs. a monologue.” Digital Royalty...
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Ever since game dynamics really took center stage with things like Foursquare, I have become very interested in how people become so quickly enticed in to getting badges and earning points. There are have been other companies who have taken gamification to websites. Two companies, specifically Badgeville and Bigdoor, have caught my attention. I will be writing a detailed article on both. In the interim, I have decided to gamify my website using Big Door’s plug-in. Now by interacting with my site you can earn points. Right now you can’t use these points for anything (I am still figuring that part out). If you want to earn some points you can start by: Checking In using the bar below (10 points) Commenting on any article (15 points) Liking my page (10 points) I am still experimenting with Gamification, but would like your input on how I could either improve the experience and make gamification a worthwhile addition to my site. I would encourage you to to interact with my site and see game dynamics in...
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Over the past year the WWE has continued to push the social media envelope by integrating Twitter and Facebook further into its regular broadcasts. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, now a cross-over star in both the WWE and Hollywood, cut a promo on WWE Raw to hype the upcoming pay-per-view “Survivor Series”. During that promo, the Rock quickly coined a new catchphrase “Boots to Asses” and said it was now trending worldwide. Before he mentioned it there was no mention of it on Twitter. Shortly after he said it, not only did it start a new chant throughout the arena, but it proved that Mr. Johnson was prophetic as minutes later the term “Boots to Asses” was trending worldwide. One might say this is a one off, but for anyone observing what the WWE has been up to this can be seen as only a small part of a much larger social media strategy. In the last year, the WWE has bolstered it’s already strong web presence with a very savvy social media offensive. Now every performer who appears on WWE TV has their own Twitter handle which they use to build a fan following and actually continue storylines started from the show. During the broadcast, whenever a wrestler heads to the ring, their Twitter handle is prominently featured next to their name on the screen graphics. Their strategy is obvious and effective, providing a method to allow their show to be more interactive and leverage casual fans to tune in more regularly especially when something eventful is on the screen. Throughout the show, it is quite common to hear announcers talking about whether something is trending worldwide. Some wrestlers who are trying to increase their standing in the company have actually taken to social media to build an audience. Zack Ryder and his self-styled ”Jersey Shore” persona created a series of YouTube videos to drive interest. To his credit, not only has he been successful driving nearly 100,000 people to become subscribers on Youtube, but he also has 300,000 followers on Twitter. He essentially went out and built a new fanbase for himself and received more airtime and interest as a result. Wrestlemania is by far the biggest event held by the WWE. To hype the main event, they have already launched a separate site to highlight their main fight, John Cena vs. Dwanye “The Rock” Johnson, and to encourage fans to choose whose side they’re on. The site is integrated with both Twitter and Facebook pages. On each side they have attracted huge audiences. Here is the tale of the tape so far, and it is pretty impressive. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson John Cena Twitter Followers 1.6m...
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