readings in social media and pr for february 4 2011

our Social Media class at the University of Tennessee

Here are a few great readings for today!:

• why social media hasn’t and will not kill the super bowl

“Fox television executives celebrated with high fives when this year’s Super Bowl sold out in October, commanding ad rates that seemed to defy gravity. (Commercial slots in the Feb. 6 game sold for $3 million apiece.) But wait a minute: Wasn’t the 30-second television spot meant to be dead and buried? This is 2011 after all, a time when Google, smartphones and social media sites are making big-brand TV ads seem as dated as Duran Duran and shoulder pads in women’s suits.”

• the Kenneth Cole Brand suicide?

“Watching the morning news with my five-year-olds today, it was more than a little unsettling to see what’s happening in Cairo. Even my children were wide-eyed at the footage of the riots, street fires and destruction. Journalists were reportedly beaten with sticks and detained by pro-government security forces. Even the intrepid Katie Couric was swarmed as she tried to report from the scene and her cameraman maced as they filmed.Serious stuff? You bet.”

• when national and global businesses go social

“When national and global businesses go social, they often bring with them a whole fleet of Facebook and Twitter pages operated by their local sales representatives, agents, and store managers. One problem with tapping into the power of all these free social media services is that managing them properly can get very complicated and expensive. That’s particularly true for organizations that are serious about maintaining a consistent brand identity or ensuring regulatory compliance across the network. Yet clamping down on these locally managed pages and insisting on central corporate management of everything would be a big mistake.”

• the i-ad and mobile marketing

“What a difference an “i” makes. When Steve Jobs introduced Apple’s very own mobile ad unit, the iAd, on a stage in Cupertino, Calif., the mobile ad industry arguably got its highest-profile endorsement to date. “It’s awesome — Steve just did a big commercial for mobile advertising,” Jason Spero, VP-general manager of Google’s AdMob, told Ad Age at the time of the announcement.”