This post first appeared on O&M’s page on Fast Company

Brands are not media companies–they are ill-suited to that role. But they can become great content marketers.

As brands become more and more attracted to content marketing and its benefits, they’re going to hear 1,000 consultants whispering in their ear, “Yessss, my precious, you must become a media company.”

With so much turmoil in the media universe–from Time Inc. spinning off to Yahoo doing, well, who can say what–it seems odd that the forward-looking prescription for brands would be to move into that space. Very few brands that started their business selling one type of product but evolved into a media company even come to mind. Red Bull is the one major exception—the poster child for those who think all companies should become media outlets. Red Bull captured the attention of a valuable audience, created remarkable content, and then monetized it by selling their consumers’ eyeballs to other brands.

But is Red Bull the end of the rainbow for all brands?

No. Brands are not media companies. Nor are most well suited to it.

But they can become great content marketers.

When most people say “become a media company,” they mean adopt editorial ways, organize and invest around developing content that engages customers and drives them to some type of action. They mean that brands should start valuing content marketing as much as any other discipline (like advertising) and then operationalizing the hell out of it.

The best place for most brands on the content-marketing continuum is what I call the Social Content Marketer (see above diagram). It’s like a new and improved version of the everyday-content marketer, who must master the basics of building a content-delivery system:

• Mining social and customer data for content insights and ideas–after all, people are telling us what content they want in social media and Google
• Designing content for many screens and contexts–for when mom’s standing in the aisle at Target as opposed to on her tablet in front of the TV
• Getting facile with all sorts of multimedia–from low-fi videos to the ubiquitous infographic, you need a virtual content factory today
• Delivering content across a wide network–not just posting on owned and social sites but delivering content through partners and even ad channels
• Evaluating and optimizing all of the time–real-time adjustments to content delivery are the name of the game today

Social Content Marketers come at all of this with one fundamental difference: They do everything possible to get people to share that content. Every day they answer the question, “Why would my customers and their influencers care about this content enough to spend some time with it and pass it along to a friend or social connection?”

Tencent remodeled its QQ chat app to resemble WeChat, its sister mobile chat app. Before, a light beside each contact’s name indicated who is online which clearly separated QQ as an IM service for fast-pasted conversations and WeChat as an SMS service for casual messaging. The QQ makeover deletes this function and changes the chat window to a new-style messaging app, questioning the difference between the two. Mockingly dubbed “second hand WeChat” by angry QQ users, the negative backlash has users demanding to downgrade. Read More

KakaoTalk Takes on Facebook Home With KakaoHome Android Launcher

Eager to take over the homescreens of Android users, popular Korean messaging app KakaoTalk, launches KakaoHome. Similar to Facebook Home, it is a customized mobile home screen for a more integrated social experience. By pulling out KakaoHome from the left side of the screen, it displays notifications from KakaoTalk, KakaoStory, social games and more. Boosting 90 million users, this is big news for South Korea. Read More

Is Yahoo! Acquired Tumblr More Attractive to Brands?

Yahoo! is looking to grab foothold among a younger demographic through acquiring Tumblr, a popular micro-blogging site that captures the “18-to-24 sweet spot.” The tech giant has plans to ramp up Tumblr’s ad revenue. But the acquisition may lose credibility for the site, as an aggressive ad-driven model could disrupt user experience. Read More

BBM No Longer Shackled to Blackberry Platform: Will Indonesians Rejoice?

Blackberry is bringing its infamous real-time messenger service (BBM) onto multiple operating platforms like Android and IOS, rivaling cross-platform chat apps (WeChat, Whatsapp. Viber, etc). Although Blackberry is confident with its latest move, their core customer base in Indonesia speaks otherwise – many are relieved to be free of their Blackberry shackles: “It’s BBM news, but the trending topic [in Indonesia] is iOS and Android.” Read More

Source: NYTimes.com

I recently read Peggy’s Orenstein’s thought-provoking New York Times article, “Our Feel-Good War on Breast Cancer,” and I’m hoping every social marketer will read it too. It has sparked widespread dialogue within the social marketing community, and left me feeling unsettled and with many questions about the meaning behind my work.

The article suggests that the spectacularly successful pink-ribbon campaign has ultimately made women less conscious of the facts surrounding breast cancer, “obscuring the limits of screening, conflating risk with disease, compromising our decisions about health care, celebrating ‘cancer survivors’ who may have never required treating”. Orenstein — a breast cancer survivor who benefited from early detection — suggests that the very notion of early detection contributing to a cure is actually a mis-truth or oversimplification.

Orenstein did a thorough job of sharing facts and statistics that were very surprising (to me at least). For example, I didn’t realize that since mammograms/screenings have been introduced there haven’t been corresponding decreases in incidence of metastic cancer. And, that while there has been a 25% drop in breast-cancer death rates since 1990’s, many researchers attribute those declines to treatments, not screenings. Apparently mammograms are not as good at detecting the most lethal forms of breast cancer at a treatable phase. There was much more in the article, and I learned a lot about the history of breast cancer science, treatment, and prevention.

Still, the article was not just about the science behind breast cancer – it analyzed the marketing of the awareness of this disease and definitely took the stance that awareness initiatives like Komen’s pink-ribbon contribute toward overselling “both the fear of cancer and effectiveness of our prevention and treatment”. It posits that being over-aware of our risks for breast cancer can lead to unnecessary screening and preventive treatments. Orenstein goes on to suggest that while fear of cancer itself is legitimate, how we manage that fear, responses to it and emotions around it, can be ‘manipulated, packaged, marketed and sold’. The suggestion is also made that many social marketing/public health initiatives (prostate cancer’s Movember, testicular cancer’s yellow bracelet, heart disease’s red dress) all share a similar superficiality in terms of the response they require from the public.

Paul Holmes recently made a similar argument in an article for The Holmes Report, in which he references the New York Times article and indicates that social marketing interventions may have “ taken a huge step backwards in recent years.”

I bristle at this perspective. I’ve worked on social marketing initiatives for more than a decade, and know the rigor of behavioral theory and planning that is at the heart of much of this work. By applying behavioral science, we drive actual changes in behaviors, beyond simply creating awareness of an issue. Maybe the issues I work on are different by their very nature, where there is no one screening to detect, etc. Still, Orenstein makes a very strong argument for how, in the case of the pink ribbon and breast cancer, the level of awareness does seem to contribute to heightened levels of screenings and diagnoses that may not in fact require treatment.

So, I am left with questions. Are the initiatives we intend to be preventive actually doing harm? How do we protect against that and ensure they are not having a backlash that is unintended or expected? Is raising awareness as a first step toward behavior change justified, as long as the ultimate goal is an actual behavior change? What implications does this analysis hold for our work?

This post first appeared on Fast Company

Between the endless Euro drama and the Bitcoin brouhaha, currency has been much in the news of late. Most people would probably name the US Dollar as the dominant currency in this day and age. While that may be true in one sense, is today’s preeminent currency even still money? Does money allow for a brand to buy trust? Or is it one’s digital footprint? What about social media profiles or properties? Perhaps the dominant currency today is, as smartly noted by Hugh MacLeod, social objects—or as many of us all call it, social content.

The dominance of the web and the human behavior spawned from it as a result has turned social content into a new, increasingly important, currency. Think about it for a second: the web allows for informational exchange—transactions, if you will. In the past, these transactions took place when you went directly to a destination. However in 2013, most of us live in the here and now of the “feed”—our home for content discovery.

We are now entrenched fully in the era of the sharing economy. This sharing is on two fronts. One is the sharing of things or services courtesy of an array of technologies or facilities. The other front is the information packaged and presented as content: thought leadership, entertainment, utility, or whatever else allows us to begin and continue conversation among a group of people with whom wish to engage.

The era of “Like/Follow/Fan” is fading into twilight. Brands will continue to accumulate likes because bigger is always perceived as better, but social acquisition campaigns are doing business and customers a major disservice. Technology is breaking down barriers between brands and customers faster than when social first operated as engines for connection.

Sharing content helps us connect. Connection helps us engage. Engagement leads to a relationship. Relationships lead to friendship and possibly endearment. In the industrial economy, we congregated in front of the TV, read newspapers and magazines, gathered around the radio and saw signage that told what to believe. In the sharing economy, technology has allowed us to connect, engage, question, critique, criticize or concur. Humans are social animals, and we still need something to spur connection. Content acts as that stimulant. Content is our true currency.

Five Reasons Content Is the New Currency:

Here’s David Karp, Founder of Tumblr, speaking at Ogilvy just a few months ago.

Yahoo! to Acquire Tumblr

Promises not to screw it up

Yahoo! Inc. and Tumblr announced today that they have reached a definitive agreement for Yahoo! to acquire Tumblr.
Per the agreement, Yahoo! promised not to screw it up, Tumblr will be independently operated as a separate business. David Karp will remain CEO.

Stats to know from Yahoo!’s press release about Tumblr:

- Tumblr has more than 300 million monthly unique visitors.

- 120,000 signups every day.

- Earns 900 posts per second and 24 billion minutes spent on site each month.

- On mobile, more than half of Tumblr’s users are using the mobile app and do an average of 7 sessions per day.

- 50 billion blog posts (and 75 million more arriving each day).

Total consideration is approximately $1.1 billion, substantially all of which is payable in cash. “Tumblr is redefining creative expression online,” said Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer. “On many levels, Tumblr and Yahoo! couldn’t be more different, but, at the same time, they couldn’t be more complementary. Yahoo is the Internet’s original media network. Tumblr is the Internet’s fastest-growing media frenzy.

“I’ve long held the view that in all things art and design, you can feel the spirit and demeanor of the creator. That’s why it was no surprise to me that David Karp is one of the nicest, most empathetic people I’ve ever met. He’s also one of the most perceptive, capable entrepreneurs I’ve ever worked with,” continued Mayer. “David’s respect for Tumblr’s community of creators is awesome. I’m absolutely delighted to have him join our team.”

David Karp, CEO of Tumblr, addressed the Tumblr community, “Before touching on how awesome this is, let me try to allay any concerns: We’re not turning purple. Our headquarters isn’t moving. Our team isn’t changing. Our roadmap isn’t changing. And our mission – to empower creators to make their best work and get it in front of the audience they deserve – certainly isn’t changing.”

Click here to read the full press release

Here’s a quote from WordPress Founder, Matt Mullenweg, who posted a blog post when this was all speculation. He said “imports have actually spiked on the rumors even though it’s Sunday: normally we import 400-600 posts an hour from Tumblr, last hour it was over 72,000.” (All Things D)

We are proud to be an A-List Partner of Tumblr.

What exactly does it mean to be a “social” brand? You’ve probably heard the term being bandied about by people wearing suits; in this webinar we really dive into what a “social” brand is, and how to be it.

Here’s a taste of what all brands should avoid on social media… at all costs.

Owners, Amy and Samy, of Amy’s Baking Company Bakery Boutique & Bistro, based in Scottsdale Arizona took their fury to social media recently. After seeing Amy’s bakery being featured in an episode of Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen nightmares, Amy and Samy of the bakery received worldwide criticisms on Reddit and Yelp, and they did not like the criticisms that amassed one bit.

The battle then moved onto the restaurants Facebook page, with the owners attacking Reddit, Yelp, and Facebook users for posting what they thought was misleading and negative comments about their restaurant. The owners fought back with numerous offensive comments and updates, calling users ‘stupid’, ‘weak’, ‘trash’ and ‘punks’. With the story gaining momentum, more and more Facebook users flocked to the restaurants Facebook page giving their two cents on the now infamous bakery. To top it off, the following night, the owners claimed that their Facebook page was hacked and they did not post the offensive comments. It was like adding fuel to a fire, and it spread very quickly. Click here if you want to read the full story.

So we gave you an example of what not to do. But what can you do to positively maximize your brand presence on social media?

This Friday (May 24) we will be hosting a webinar to discuss what makes a brand a part of the conversation that people have on social networks, it will cover:

•  The difference between a traditional and social marketing model
•  Case studies of brands who get social right
•  6 steps to becoming a social brand

Register for the webinar now and find out more!
https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/801633689

Have we forgotten the basic purpose and promise of content as we have rushed to make it a system?

The following excerpt first appeared on O&M’s page on Fast Company by Jared Gruner is Director of Integrated Strategy and Planning for Ogilvy & Mather.

It’s been said that we’re in the midst of a content revolution. Revolutions are exciting but chaotic. We try to make sense of them, pumping out organizational charts, updated vocabulary, and new systems with every paradigm shift. Maybe it’s just my newsfeed, but for this revolution, the system seems to be the story, not the ideas. The content conversation I’m exposed to daily is skewed to the engineering and distribution of content. It’s all ecosystems, newsrooms, and real-time marketing.

Make no mistake, all of this is important. Agencies desperately need to reorganize themselves to consume and create content at the ever-quickening pace of culture. All this restructuring is pointless if we use it to crank out a stream of unnecessary infographics, five blandly optimistic tweets per day, and GIFs that ineffectively crowbar a branded message into the meme of the moment.

Click here to read the full article on Fast Company 

[Word Of Mouth: Lavitrei via Shutterstock]

How about an innovation instead?

The following excerpt  first appeared on O&M’s page on Fast Company

David Ogilvy, the most quotable man in advertising, once said: “Make sure you have a Vice President in charge of Revolution, to engender ferment among your more conventional colleagues.”

And while I most certainly agree with the sentiment, as a guy at an agency (with Ogilvy’s name on the door no less) whose job it is to help colleagues and clients innovate, it gives me pause.

What are the simple and digestible ways anyone at an agency can affect innovation starting today? Here are five things to get you started:

1. Creative injection. Nothing strangles innovation like having the same people in the room every time you’re trying to solve a problem. Invite outsiders—those within the agency who don’t work on that business, folks from other disciplines, or even a local startup who might have a fresh, unencumbered perspective on things.

2. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Oscar Wilde took it a step further: “Talent borrows, genius steals.” The lineage of some of the most innovative ideas out there can be traced to something that already existed. Heard of the Rio PMP300? Probably not. But I know you’ve heard of the iPod. The point is that starting with aspirational examples can sometimes be a catalyst for the next new thing.

3. Art of the pitch. Agency floors are littered with incredible ideas that never come to life because they aren’t sold with the same gusto and ingenuity as it took to create them in the first place. For a client to buy innovation they likely have to be shown, not told. Which leads to #4 …

4. Make > tell. One of my big takeaways from this year’s South by Southwest Interactive conference was the growing prevalence of the maker culture. Next time you’re faced with a client or new business challenge, ask your teams to produce a physical artifact as part of the pitch or presentation. It can be anything from a 3D cardboard model to a tweet powered gumball machine. It doesn’t matter, really, what it is. The act of making anything can be a strong catalyst for innovation.

5. Get out! Just a few weeks ago I tagged along with colleagues on a tour of Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood. The purpose was to get out of our comfort zones and experience things that could inspire different thinking in our approach to client and new business work. Without going into detail, a Flamenco dancer named Wendy Clinard has me reconsidering how to run important client meetings.

Click here to read the full article on Fast Company

[Red Flag: Diego Cervo via Shutterstock]

Content and brand strategy are inextricable–and both depend on fulfilling the promises you make to consumers.

The following excerpt first appeared on O&M’s page on Fast Company

Two-thirds of the conversation about any brand in existence today is generated from outside the company that creates and markets that brand. Brands are being defined, in many cases, by customers, consumers, influencers, prospects, policymakers, and other sources instead of through owned and paid content a brand distributes about itself. And that content earned through conversation is even more crucial to brand strategy than what the company develops. Brands have had to upend the way they communicate to grapple with that conversational content. This world is instantaneous and ubiquitous, and as a result, brand strategy and experience must be considered every ten seconds, not every ten years. Brands are continuously kneaded, rolled and shaped–by both devotees and detractors–and content about the brand often takes on a life of its own. The kids have the car keys. Pandora’s box is open. There’s no going back.

This can work tremendously well for a brand that has an authentic position and stays true to its brand strategy. Consider Dove and The Campaign for Real Beauty. Several years old now, The Campaign for Real Beauty has rocked the world and made Dove’s brand strategy of real, natural beauty profoundly relevant to women, men and children everywhere through a combination of user-generated and brand-owned content.

Click here to read more on Fast Company

[Clock Hands: ra3rn via Shutterstock]

According to their stats, Kickstarter projects have enjoyed a 43.95% success rate, raising over $520 million for projects (most individual asks are $10,000 or less). They have been responsible for funding more than 41,000 creative projects.

This year, Kickstarter has received more press–not about helping aspiring artists achieve their goals, but for their controversial support of helping the “rich get richer.”

On March 13, 2013, Rob Thomas (creator of Veronica Mars) launched his Kickstarter campaign to bring his TV show to the big screen. Within 12 hours, he raised $2 million, becoming the fastest Kickstarter campaign to reach its goal. By the end of his campaign, Thomas had raised more than $5.7 million.

In what some have called a bothersome and abusive trend, other celebrities have successfully used Kickstarter as way to launch their own projects—actor Zach Braff received more than $2 million to produce a sequel to his film, Garden State; Ren & Stimpy creator John Kricfalusi raised $137,000 to produce a cartoon; and Whoopi Goldberg raised $74,000 to film a movie on comedian Moms Mabley. There are even rumors of a Friday Night Lights movie Kickstarter.

But not all celebrity projects have been successful. Recently, actress Melissa Joan Hart cancelled her Kickstarter project after it fell woefully short of its $2 million fundraising goal—collecting just more than $51,000, proving that patrons don’t find all celebrity projects worthy of funding.

Still, critics argue that celebrity-initiated projects make it harder for lesser known artists (Kickstarter’s original muses) to meet their fundraising goals. For those individuals, crowdsourcing is the only way they can collect funding for their projects. Critics say it’s unfair to use Kickstarter as a means to fund something that you either 1) already have the money for or 2) have the professional connections to make happen. Celebrities, they argue, meet both of those.

Kickstarter founders, Perry Chen, Yancey Strickler, and Charles Adler, took to their blog to defend celebrities’ projects:

But seeing how Kickstarter makes 5% of the total funds from a successful project, it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which they wouldn’t support a multi-million dollar celebrity project as a way to boost their revenue potential.

Yet, there is something to be said for a person’s ability to choose which projects to back—they can elect to help fund an A-list actor’s movie or an aspiring singer’s new album. Isn’t that the democratic way? Still, I wouldn’t want my creative masterpiece stationed on the Website beside the Veronica Mars project. The long term effects of celebrities on Kickstarter has yet to be seen. But their presence does beg the question—is it fair?

This post first appeared on Fast Company

By now, hopefully, we can all agree that we have collectively debunked the myth of manufactured “virality.” Most brands understand they cannot create the magical piece of content that actually helps their business and sparks an avalanche of sharing like Harlem Shake, Justin Bieber, and the latest contraption choreography from OK-Go. If you want to create the most shareable content that remains relevant to your brand–kittens, dance routines, and kicking someone in the junk isn’t really for every business–then there are some clear principles to follow. These are born from behavioral economics, persuasion science, and plain old trial and error.

IT’S ALL WORD OF MOUTH
When a person tweets a link to Ford’s hilarious response on EW.com to Jeremy Irons’ inadvertent slight of the Ford Fiesta (he was actually dissing Downtown Abbey as the Ford Fiesta of Shakespeare), or when someone emails a link to the cool IBM infographic predicting via social data the rise of Steampunk posted in IBMblr, their Tumblr site, they are sharing by word of mouth. We look at stuff our friends send us. We pay attention when they recommend something. In a world where randomly relevant marketing constantly floods past us, this is often the only way to decide what to pay attention to.

Brand content that comes to us via a friend, a colleague at work, or someone we know online matters more. The question for us marketers is not just how do we create great content, but also how do we get people to share it across their social graph.

The answer lies more in psychology and behavior than in finding the magical recipe for a breakout video. The books and work of Robert Cialdini, Dan Ariely and, now, Jonah Berger all tell us why we do the things we do. The field of behavioral economics has blossomed over the past few years as researchers and geeks have found a willing audience amongst marketers hungry to put their results to work. The biggest problem applying these proven principles is that there are just so damn many of them. Many of them, like ”loss aversion”–the tendency for people to move more quickly to avoid losing something rather than to gain something of value–are more like a bolt of fine, durable cloth than a ready-made suit of clothes. You need to know which ones to stitch together to tackle a particular problem.

Here is a set of word-of-mouth drivers that, when applied routinely, help make any content or experience more shareworthy. While many are adopted from the body of behavioral economics–and all of them have been validated by experience.

VALUE EXCHANGE
Is the content valuable to the end user in some way? Entertainment has value, but so does utility. In either case, you need to understand what your audience values rather than just assuming they have an innate fascination in your brand talking about itself.

DISRUPTIVE IDEAS
We stop to notice ideas or concepts that challenge our understanding of the way the world works. The Museum of Memory and Tolerance in Mexico asked the question “what if tweets that discriminated against races and genders were bullets aimed at the heart of Mexico?” A social media fueled paint gun stained the word “Mexico” every time someone posted a discriminatory tweet. This social data-driven demo shocked citizens around the hate speech going on around them.

GREAT STORY
So many of our decisions are based upon emotional drivers, not the rational features and benefits of the latest widget. Great stories are not only dramatic, they are also emotional. Our team in Amsterdam created a deeply emotional story—for funeral insurance, of all things—when they asked people to share what they would want to tell a loved one before they died. These stories are so emotionally touching, we want to pass them along and reach out to our own parents, favorite aunt, or close friend to tell them how important they are to us.

FRESH INTEREST
What is new or interesting about a topic? Finding that fresh area of interest when you are launching a product that’s not as sexy as the next Tesla Roadster is every marketer’s job. People want news they can share around the vending machine at work or via their Twitter handle.

SOCIAL PROOF
When we see others doing something, we are often more apt to make that same choice ourselves. Why else do we have counters next to Tweet icons or Facebook tallies that tell us how many others have already thought that content valuable enough to share? The beauty of Facebook advertising is that the ads tell me which of my friends find a product interesting enough to “like” it.

CREATIVE PARTICIPATION
I wrote a chapter in the ebook Social@Scale. Since I participated and was able to be highly creative–those were my words and thoughts–I am now far more likely to pass that content along. Nutella has applied that principle to its product label as content. In Belgium and other countries, users can customize the iconic product label with their name in place of the logo and have that product delivered. Customers are invited to participate, and creatively so.

SIMPLE ADVOCACY
When we make it simple and then actually ask people to share, they aremore likely to do so. Reducing the number of button clicks it takes to share a white paper is worth sweating bullets over. And don’t forget the ask.

Like most good suits, shareable content doesn’t come off the rack ready-made. But if you start weaving the fabrics of these principles together, trimming a little length here, broadening the shoulders over there, you can wind up looking like a million bucks.

This post first appeared on Creativity-Online.

For full disclosure, this work has been done by O&M Frankfurt.

In Germany, business to business photocopier machine producer Triumph Adler managed to boost its sales 500% with a Twitter-based campaign through Ogilvy & Mather Frankfurt that boosted awareness of its fast copying speeds. It created a Twitter account, and then copied the tweets of its clients immediately as they appeared, with the message “Copies Faster.” It copied more than 50,000 tweets over three months and got a 10% click through rate from prospective clients, while 20 per cent became followers of the brand on Twitter.

This post first appeared on O&M’s page on Fast Company and is by Steve Phelps, CMO, NASCAR

NASCAR’s product is the unpredictable excitement found at and around the track. At Innovation Uncensored New York, Steve Phelps, Chief Marketing Officer of NASCAR, discussed how this unique sport uses content to engage its passionate fans while attracting a whole new audience to the track, television, computer, mobile device, and beyond.

Click here to read the full article on Fast Company

[Checkered Flag: Hxdbzxy via Shutterstock]

When you think of a job search, your mind will automatically direct you towards a few online sites known to many as job search staples, like LinkedIn, Monster, Careerbuilder; and if you’re creative, you might be hunting on Facebook or Twitter. But if you want to impress a potential employer, use a pin and a board. Pinterest’s traffic has increased tenfold in the last six months to 10 million visitors a month, according to Forbes—but don’t expect employers to discover you on a Pinterest; instead, lead them to you and your personal brand, by directing them to your secret Pinterest board. This will give you a competitive edge and make you stand out.

1. Create, Pin and then Search and Pin Some More

To kick off your job search, you’ll want to create a public board on the industry/career you’re curious about. Use the search box to enter key words and phrases to pull up relevant pins. Having a board solely dedicated on a new career or industry will increase your job search motivation, because having direct access to job “eye candy” will super-charge your visual cortex.

2. Shh, and Keep a Secret

Discover and maximize the use of the three secret pin boards Pinterest gives you access to. Log in, go to your boards’ section, and scroll to the bottom and activate your imagination. You’ll want to dedicate one board to the specific company you’re targeting. (Three boards = three different companies.) And don’t worry, it’s called a secret board because only people you give the link to will have access—just make sure you don’t give the wrong link to the wrong employer, as you will not be deemed a creative super star, but instead be seen as confused.

3. What to Pin?

You want the focus to be on you, your personal brand and your experience. Pin your resume, and make sure it links to your LinkedIn profile, but that’s just the beginning; you’ll want to dissect your background in order to inspire the “ooh” factor in potential employers and recruiters. Pick your resume apart and pin your past employers, your educational institution and past volunteer experiences. For each item, use the description box to add a little spice and flavor to your pin, describe your experience at each company, a memorable project, or the reason you left.

Don’t forget to pin certifications or awards you’ve received. And to inspire the “aah” factor, pin projects you worked on that reflect your leadership style or contribution. Make your descriptions count, instead of pinning a picture of your last company and inserting text like, “I worked here for five years and I was promoted twice,” make your description accomplishment-based, “In the five years I worked at company X, I increased sales by 20%, had a close-out rate of 18% on new business, and was recognized by senior leadership with two separate promotions.”

4. What to Pin, Part II

Once you’ve defined your experience through the appropriate pins, it’s time to show off your social media acumen by pinning information about the company, to prove you’ve done your research. Pin some of the company’s greatest accomplishments that have inspired you—and in the description, add text that reflects your reasons why you’d like to work for that company. You’ll also want to pin social causes the company participates and/or believes in—this will show alignment all around.

5. Don’t Keep Your Secret Board a Secret (well, sort of)

Once your have created your board, work the link into your cover letter (if you’re still in 1955), job application, or even in a follow-up to an interview that you didn’t have the opportunity to showcase any earlier.

If you follow all five steps, not only will you be showcasing your brand, experience, and value, you will be as tasty as a deep-fried Twinkie.

Taobao announced the launch of its Hong Kong official site last Friday. The e-marketing platform is expanding rapidly in Chinese-speaking regions including Hong Kong and Taiwan. The official Hong Kong Taobao website offers functions tailored specifically for Hong Kong users. Outside of its native country, Taobao now has more than 1.2 million registered users worldwide. (Read More)

Indonesian Telco Enters the Battleground of Chat Apps

Indonesian Telco Indosat is building a chat app that bridges the gap between smartphone and feature phone. Unlike its competitors – WeChat (China), LINE (Japan) or Kakao (Korea) – Indosat’s chat app allows chats to go out from a smart device to a feature phone (in SMS format). The app is set to launch in the third quarter of 2013 at the earliest. (Read More)

Facebook Helps You With Their New Security Feature

Facebook has introduced a new security feature for when users lose access to both their email and Facebook accounts. Three separate codes are sent to three assigned contacts and users need to acquire all three codes to regain access into their Facebook account. The trusted contacts account recovery feature is another option for Facebook users if they encounter a virus on their computer. (Read More)