So the first lesson of this year’s Blogworld was that Scott Stratten, from Unmarketing, is exceptionally funny. He’s also spot on about a lot of things regarding marketing and social media. In addition to some great one-liners, he had 10 key takeaways that I think serve as great reminders for anyone, or any company, that is using social media marketing.

1. You want blog traffic? Virality? Lots of tweets? Simple. Create awesome content. No one is going to share “meh” content. Anytime you phone-in a blog post, or even a tweet, you lose readers and you hurt your brand. It’s better to just forget your schedule and write when you have something good to say. (Note this doesn’t mean if you can’t think of something to write in 7 seconds, you are off the hook. Just that if you truly have nothing to say, its better to go a day without a post than to have something that will cause you to lose readers’ trust.).

2. So after you create your awesome content – don’t “stop the spread.” Scott outlined a few specific ways that you may be inadvertently hurting yourself by preventing your content from being shared:

• Thinking RSS feeds are the holy grail. Make sure people have options for reading and sharing. It’s not about how you, as the blogger, consume content, but how your readers will.
• Make sure your blog is mobile capable. People want to read your blog wherever, whenever. And even if Google Analytics is telling you that your readers aren’t coming from mobile phones, it’s possible that this is only because they can’t.
• Don’t piss people off. If you have an obscenely large pop-up ad, or if you force people to log-in to comment, you are likely going to annoy them. Annoyed people don’t share your content. Sad but true.

3. The secret to SEO is not keywords, title tags, or searchable URL’s – it’s good content. No influential blogger is going to link to your post because it is keyword rich. Since links from reputable sources are a huge factor in search ranking, your content should come before any SEO tips and tricks.

4. Social media can’t make your brand successful. In Scott’s words, “If your product sucks, social media just makes it suck harder.” This point very much resonated with me. So often we hear about companies who don’t want to fix the gaping holes in their products or services and rather turn to their shiny new tool (social media) to make them a success. I haven’t seen it work yet, and apparently Scott agrees.

5. Stop asking about what’s next in social media and focus on making what we have now work better. We already have amazing tools available to us that can accomplish our business goals. Instead of obsessing about what social network will usurp Facebook, lets spend time finessing the way in which we use Twitter, Facebook, blogs, etc, because we have only begun to tap the surface on these tools’ potential.

6. Another awesome Scott quote -  “Every time someone asks about the ROI of Twitter, a kitten dies. And a unicorn.” Twitter (and social media, really) are about talking to people – plain and simple. At the end of the day, people want to  buy from people they know, trust and like, and these tools help you do just that. While I think this so profoundly true, I know all of us in social media marketing won’t be allowed to abandon the quest for social media ROI anytime soon.

7. You can’t rock at every single platform. Choose one to focus on, and nurture it. We all hear people talk about how they don’t have enough time to do social media, so rather than trying to have a superstar presence everywhere, see what works best with your target audience and grow it.

8. You can’t shortcut relationships – social media doesn’t change the fact that relationships take time. Scott shared that 75 percent of his 60,000 tweets are @replies – aka conversation. These conversations, slowly and over time, build relationships, and relationships increase business.

9. You don’t have to believe in social media – it’s not a religion. It’s a real thing and it is happening. If you don’t want to be in social media – don’t be.

10. And finally, don’t ever justify yourself to trolls. The haters will always be there and they are just there to hate. If you engage with them they win, and you’ll never convert them. Just blog with passion and blog with awesome.

And that was really just the tip of the iceberg. As far as keynotes go, Scott’s was quite possibly one of the best I’ve ever heard. If any of my fellow 5,000 #BWE10 attendees captured some of the other amazing Scott tid-bits, feel free to share them in the comments.

It is no secret that the challenging economy of the last few years has kept more people staying home and opting for free entertainment options. The effect has been profound for venues everywhere and despite being undeniably fabulous, our client the Del Mar Racetrack had the potential to be just as affected. So for the 2010 season we powered up our PR support. BG rolled out a comprehensive social media program and an online advertising campaign to complement traditional PR, all with the goal of driving traffic on site.

Despite the economy and a surprisingly cloudy San Diego summer (still bitter about that), it worked. Attendance was up 4.2 percent for the year. Additionally we broke the all-time attendance record on Opening Day and had five days with attendance surpassing 30,000 attendees. In short, a lot of people came to the track during its seven week run.

So how did we do it? Well it was the combination of social media, online advertising and PR that played a large role in getting people through the door. As we looked back on the season, our team compiled three main tips for using marketing to drive traffic to a venue.

• Brand yourself -  Knowing that people are only going to spend a limited amount of money, give them a reason to spend it at your destination over others. In the case of Del Mar, the PR team pushed the luxury and consumer side of the racetrack as a must-see destination for anyone. This year they landed stories in Glamour, LA Confidential and Sunset Magazine; all luxury, lifestyle magazines that emphasized the scene, the fashion and the people at Del Mar.

Display advertising played an important branding role for the track. To further reinforce the lifestyle side of horse racing, we ran our ads across a network of sites that were targeted to luxury and lifestyle audiences with a message that supported the brand.

You can further assist your branding efforts through the content you share on social media. In the case of Del Mar, the vast majority of what we shared was all about lifestyle – pictures of celebrities, videos from fun events, articles about fashion and anything else that supported the claim that Del Mar is the biggest party on the west coast.

• Educate your audience – For Del Mar there is a lot going on during the summer that would appeal to a wide variety of people. However, all these awesome events are useless for driving traffic on-site if people don’t know about them. Use PR to secure hits about your line-up so people are well aware of what is happening at your venue and when its happening.

Keeping the public in the know also requires reminding them from time to time. Often someone will see a great story about an event, make a mental note to attend said event, and then promptly forget about it. To avoid this and keep our events top of mind, we used re-targeting banner ads. Here’s how it works: let’s say someone saw the story on NBC about the Weezer concert at Del Mar and then went to Del Mar Scene to look at the event. We then re-targeted that person when they were browsing elsewhere and reached them with a banner ad about the Weezer concert. Reaching people through multiple avenues with the same message further increases the chances they will convert to an attendee.

Of course, social media can also support this effort by giving you a vehicle to continuously alert your online communities (and potentially any of their connections) of your events. The key is to be creative in how you share the news so you don’t become redundant and so your communities spread your news for you. Del Mar saw a lot of success in this area and on Twitter alone we had more than 550,000 impressions during just the seven week season. All of these impressions (in addition to the ones we had from all our other platforms) led to more reminders to the public about what was going on and helped ensure that attendance for these events were up.

• Convert one-time attendees to regulars - A growing segment of marketing is relationship building and social media plays a huge role in that. An emphasis of our social media program was to talk directly with our community to encourage goodwill and loyalty. By showing the 19,000 people following us on Twitter and Facebook that we still care about one-on-one interaction, it encouraged them to respond to us, which in-turn increases awareness. But best of all, one-on-one interaction makes people feel special and it makes them like you. People who like you are more likely to come visit. It’s a fact. (Or it should be).

To further capitalize on your most loyal fans, consider using a retargeting pixel on custom FBML tabs. That way, when one of your fans with whom you have been working so hard to build a relationship views that tab, you can later serve them an ad to remind them to pay a visit to their good friend the track. This just further increases the chances that they may convert to a regular attendee.

In the end, the key to our success in helping Del Mar increase attendance this year was integrating these three marketing prongs together. We wouldn’t have been able to do it without the 6.6 million impressions that came from the online ad campaign, the 29,000 brand engagements from Twitter, Foursquare, YouTube and Facebook, or the branding that came from solid media hits like the cover of San Diego Magazine. All of these, in conjunction with their other marketing efforts, were what lead to the 33 percent increase in traffic to the Del Mar Scene website and eventually to the 4.2 percent increase in attendance.

In general, museums of all kinds are often viewed with a certain stigma of being stuffy and academic.  To be honest, it may be well-deserved for the most part because of common stereotypes we associate with them and the type of people who go to them.

I am here to tell you that there is good news for museums.  I bet most museums share a similar goal in that they want to expand their customer base and attract a younger audience.  After all, this younger demographic is tomorrow’s museum member and donor, and which museum doesn’t need that?

In order to attract this younger demo, museums must go beyond their traditional ways of operating and reach out to the younger audience (ie Males/Females 25-45) in the places they frequent, which is online.  Smart museums are also catering to this younger demo by creating new events that appeal to them to get them in the doors.  An example of an event catering to a younger demo is The San Diego Museum of Art’s Culture & Cocktails.

We have been entrenched in the challenge of utilizing the tools the Internet provides to accomplish various goals for our client, The San Diego Museum of Art.  We have recently rebranded the Museum and will also be unveiling a completely new, revamped website in a few short weeks.  There were many objectives that were taken into account during the website redesign, but I’d like to focus on just two. First, we wanted to utilize high quality imagery to showcase the awesome works of art on display in the Museum and second, incorporate social media tools so that people who wish to interact in that capacity can do so.

Bailey Gardiner has worked with several museums in the past so we understand the challenges they face in marketing themselves.   We redesigned the website for the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego.
Two years ago we also rebranded and designed new collateral for our client SUSHI, A Center for the Urban Arts last year (see an example below).

THE NEW BARBARIANS

Our most recent undertaking is with the Balboa Park Online Collaborative (BPOC) to redesign the website for Balboa Park. This new website will encompass roughly 85 organizations in San Diego’s famous park, including several museums and be the main portal for visitors to gather information.

Are there any museums out there that you’ve come across that you feel are innovators in regards to interacting with people and showcasing their various offerings?  I’d love to see who you think the leaders in this space are.

This week is the official launch of pedicab advertising campaign for Seaport Village.

Ten cabs from Yellow Bike Cab will be running the ads in the downtown area for the next three months. The ads are an extension of Seaport’s existing advertising campaign and coincide with summer — when Seaport sees it’s largest crowds.

What makes this campaign unique is that not only were we able to buy space on the pedicabs, we also created t-shirts with wording that ties-in to the cab messaging. The shirts will be worn by the cab drivers throughout the campaign.

Check out the photos of the final product below and this video we made showing how the pedicab company applied the artwork to the cabs. Neat!

Shirt reads: “Stop staring at my butt”

Shirt reads: “No weight limit”

Shirt reads: “My other ride is a carousel”

San Diegans didn’t know what a busker was. A busker is a sword swallower, a pancake juggler, a pogo stick-trickster hopping over a flaming shopping cart. It’s a robotic mime and a slight-of-hand master. It’s a street performer. 

At the same time, Seaport Village (our client) wanted to give San Diegans reasons to come visit.

At Bailey Gardiner we assessed this situation. We took the un-appreciated and connected it to the unknown and we created curiosity, ownership, buzz and pride. We created a Busker Festival. Without it, Seaport Village would never garner so much media in such a short period of time. An arts story in both the Union-Tribune and the LA Times, a week’s worth of TV segments, countless blog and regional print stories, I’ll stop tooting my really loud horn.

But stop for a minute and think about how simple it is. We gave our client an event to own. Our client jumped on board and embraced it. In turn, the city embraced it, bringing locals to what they used to consider a tourist destination and introducing new demographics to the spot.

The media embraced it, bringing a fresh perspective to a long-standing San Diego icon. It gave the media a reason to talk…and partner. This event in particular gave the busking art community a home in Southern California. It gave Seaport Village yet another asset to be proud of.

Media doesn’t just happen because a PR person puts a release in front of a writer. It happens because someone gives that writer something worth talking about. And if you find yourself with nothing to talk about, create something.

If you already knew what a busker was, you’re likely pulling your small bills from the ATM and heading down to the Big Bay to pay your tips to the talent. If you didn’t, it’s a good thing I’m writing this now. Come down, experience it. Seaport Village is offering to share with you an art little known to San Diegans – for free. These are some of the nation’s top buskers putting in hard work to build a respect for their acts in our hometown. It might seem strange to you, but stop and talk with any of them. One of our Canadian-born buskers, Masonious Max told me, “I’ve never seen an event bring a city together like a busker festival.”

And if you don’t believe him or me, believe the media. They don’t just write about stuff because it’s in front of them. They write about it because it’s worthy.

Do you agree? Can an event like this really change the reputation of a destination and leave a mark on a city?

We’ve selected the lineup for the Spring Busker Festival at Seaport Village. Because I’m practicing my website video production skills, I documented the selection process for you to enjoy.

Who knew our assistant could write so fast?

It’s getting very tiring to pretend here in San Diego; the fake snow, the scarves and sweaters making us sweat, Christmas trees from dirt lots and Target Garden Centers. It’s time to stop pretending and embrace San Diego’s true holiday spirit.

So while we don our flip flops, tanks and T’s, so will Seaport Village’s Santa Clause, because you know, nobody likes rockin’ all that red fur in 70 degree weather. Even Santa needs a break. He’ll make his arrival to Seaport Village this Sunday, 12/14 by sailboat on the San Diego Harbor. Then he’ll pose in his board shorts on his giant surfboard and wave for free pictures with the kiddies from 12 – 4 p.m.

So if you’re from out of town, or you’re a local and want to rub it in to the out-of-towners, grab a free picture this Sunday then go online to http://blog.seaportvillage.com to send it to your cold family out in the Northeast. They’ll reek of jealousy!

As you’ve read here before, we are thrilled to be handling the PR for Setai San Diego, the new 184-room premier luxury hotel located in downtown San Diego’s financial district, which opens next month (Dec. 2008). As Setai San Diego nears completion, the hundreds of design, art and custom-made features are being installed and really bringing the property to life. It is definitely unlike anything San Diego has ever seen and we think it will blow people away.

More pictures to come, but this gives you an idea of a standard room.

Setai San Diego has also just announced its dining and bar partner is Suite & Tender Bar, Lounge and Restaurant.  It will feature the cuisine of James Beard Award-winning Chef Christopher Lee, and will be a softer, more sophisticated take on the typical steakhouse. Suite & Tender is based on a gastro-tourism concept where diners have the chance to create an experience that is completely their own and will focus on choices, not rules. In addition to table-side cocktail service, it will offer a wine selection that gets this Napa Valley native very excited: guests will be able to sample various wines from a distinguished American-focused wine list, and create their own flights, deciding between a sip, a taste or a bottomless glass. Take a guess at which option I’ll be choosing from when dining or hanging in the Lounge…

We can now officially announce that we have been retained by the Setai San Diego to manage public relations for its grand opening. Slated to open at the end of the year in downtown San Diego, this is the first Setai to open on the West Coast. The brand is better known on the East Coast due to its luxurious So. Beach property. But pretty soon, the left side of the country will understand what all the buzz is about.

The hotel is located on Fifth Ave. in the Financial District just outside of the Gaslamp Quarter.  The ultra-chic property was designed by the Rockwell Group (and they really do rock). We did a walk through yesterday and I couldn’t stop touching the walls. I lost count of how many wall finishes there are from floor to floor, but truly it was the most touchable hotel I have every experienced. The installation art is gorgeous (and there’s quite a bit of it). The 184-room hotel, will feature a spa, rooftop pool, restaurant, lobby bar, luxe suites and the largest, most exclusive three-story penthouse on the West Coast.

Needless to say, we are stoked to be representing this luxury brand and bringing a new level of hospitality to San Diego.

Public relations is easy when you have something to say: the first, the only, the biggest, the best, the unusual, etc. But after a client gets through that initial announcement, what news do you have left to tell? Sometimes very little, and in a competitive market, that can be a scary ailment.

Our team faced a similar predicament this year with the 69th season of the Del Mar Racetrack in San Diego. While there’s always a lot going on with the track, we didn’t have a compelling answer when media asked, “What’s new?” Instead of letting that hinder our ability to garner news, we used a few PR tools to keep the community buzzing about Del Mar.

Here are my two favorite from this year’s meet:

1) Build your reputation with the blogging community– While this should always complement your PR campaigns, use slow news periods to expand your online conversations into new (and still relevant) categories and dig deeper into the blogger list. Not only will you see instantaneous results, but these results will continue to work for you through the long term.

With Del Mar, our team continually communicated with family, mom or dad, travel and “scene” bloggers. This year we expanded our list, spoke with them more often and extended free tickets to the track.

Not only did we earn coverage from this, but we even developed strong sponsorships with editorial-for-link exchanges.

2) Look back– Measuring impact and comparing “then to now” often make great pieces for media, but writers may not know enough about your product or service to put it together themselves. Lucky for us, Del Mar compiles economic impact figures every year, and we get to use them. Instead of pitching local media on “look at what Del Mar is doing this year,” our team pitched “look at what they’ve done.” We discovered that many writers didn’t know this, and we got to help several of them “discover” the facts.

Here’s an abstract from a Rancho Santa Fe Review article:

A strong public relations team should look at your product or service and see it from every angle possible. It is this creative thinking approach that will maximize your coverage in media, especially through the news droughts.

What creative angles have you used to garner media?