SocialNext

Facebook Fan Box Fails on MySpace

Facebook has added a very cool embeddable Fan Page widget, dubbed the ‘Fan Box’, that allows users to advertise their Fan pages on external websites and blogs. Here’s an example of a Fan Box for my sketch comedy group's Fan Page:

Train of Thought Sketch Comedy on Facebook

Ironically the Fan Box doesn’t work on MySpace. I tried to embed the code into our profile and it didn’t work as you can see from the screenshot below.  I don't know if this is intentional or not but it would certainly help users like me who want to interact with Fans on both social networks.

 

Interview: Ford Fiesta Movement Agent Dartanion London

Ford’s new social media campaign for the upcoming 2011 Ford Fiesta is pretty darn impressive. Via an online contest, they selected 100 “agents” to drive the car and complete different “missions”. All the while the agents use social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to share their experiences and adventures.

It’s a great way to virally spread Ford’s message and showcase the car online. Imagine my surprise when I found out that one of my friends, up and coming comedian Dartanion London, was selected as an agent by Ford!

It seemed like a great opportunity to ask him about his experiences with the project, dubbed the Fiesta Movement, and the car itself.

John Boyle: Tell me about how you discovered the Fiesta Movement contest and why you entered.

Dartanion London: Someone told me about it on Twitter, which is this new network you may have heard of. The door handle of my current car had just broken off in my hand, and I needed insurance, so I figured why not enter a contest that could take care of both of those things through a miraculous longshot win?

John: You’ll be going on “Missions” with the car. Your first one is to Mt. St. Helens. Do you get to choose your missions or do they choose them for you?

Dart: We get to pick them from a selection of pre-approved missions or we can try submitting our own ideas in advance.

John: You’ll be sharing your experiences with the Fiesta on various social networks. What’s your favorite one?

Dart: Twitter's the one I'm using the most now because it's so quick and easy to update. Of course, it can't provide the rich media of Facebook, so that's next on the list. Still, I wish I could integrate these networks into one unified interface. And I'm hoping that's what Google Wave or someone else wants to let me do too.

John: Have you met the three other Fiesta Movement Agents in Washington State?

Dart: Yes, I even pranked one of them. We all met at our orientation meeting where we got the cars. The nice thing about this program is that all the other winners are cool, creative people I might not have otherwise gotten to know.

John: Pranked? What was the prank?

Dart: Well, fellow Fiesta Agents Steve & Cherry Ouch were up from Portland, and I met up with them and Seattle Agent Bridget O'Neill. I had tracked down where the other Seattle Agent Kristina Horner was parking her car, and we decided to decorate it for her.

You can see her initial reaction on her blog here and the video I released to reveal the prank.

I wish more things like this happened in the world all the time.

John: What are you most looking forward to doing with the car now that you have it?

Dart: It's what I'm not going to do that's the most exciting: break down on the side of the road.
Other than that, I'm planning on driving across the whole durn country!

John: Have you had any comments from people about the Fiesta?

Dart: Yeah, a couple in my neighborhood left me a note saying how excited they were to see it and they couldn't wait 'till it was available to buy. I did the same thing to the guy in my neighborhood who drives a DeLorean. So, it's 1-1 Fiesta-DeLorean so far.

John: And here’s the big one: How do you like your swanky Fiesta?

Dart: It's kind of stupid how much I like it. It's such a zippy, light little car that it's practically begging to be thrown around curves. I'm already sad that I'll have to give it back.

Special thanks to Dart for taking the time to answer my questions. You can follow Dart's Fiesta missions on his Facebook, Twitter and YouTube Channel as well as his fellow agents at the Fiesta Movement site.

Coke and Pepsi Play Nice on Twitter

Here's a nice story: Coke and Pepsi are finally on speaking terms...thanks to Twitter.

What's really cool is it was instigated by Twitter users. Kudos to both Coke and Pepsi for playing along.

They both come out looking great.

Facebook URL Grab

I'm pretty darn excited about my sketch comedy group's new Facebook URL: www.facebook.com/sketchcomedy.

WIN.

That means our marketing materials will show:

www.facebook.com/sketchcomedy
www.myspace.com/sketchcomedy

Very cool. Hope you made out well too!

Contra Code Appears on Facebook

Much like on ESPN.com a few weeks ago, the famous Contra Code (up up, down, down, left right, left right, B A Enter.), has been discovered on Facebook.

Just go to Facebook, type the code and try scrolling. Also be sure to type in your status update field.

Very cool! Looks like we have a new internet meme starting. Hat tip to Mathew Ingram for the heads up.

   

Why Do Users Share With Their Friends?

Great post by Bud Caddell on breaking down why and how consumers decide to share brands with their friends. This quote from his fellow strategist Mike Arauz at Undercurrent really struck me:

“if I choose to tell my friend about your brand, it’s not because I like your brand, but rather because I like my friend.”

That's a great way to approach social media marketing. By the way both Bud and Mike's blogs are great. I've added their links here.

How to Get Around Facebook’s Lack of Vanity URLs

According to Stan Schroeder over at Mashable, Facebook is testing user interest in offering vanity URLs (example: facebook.com/johnboyle)…for money.

This is probably more of an effort to target businesses than actual users but I’m sure many users will bite regardless.

Facebook’s long cumbersome URLs can be frustrating for marketing purposes. Here’s a little trick I use to get around it – a simple redirect script on my own site.

For example instead of trying to use this link on marketing materials:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=10785050283&ref=ts

I simply use this link which redirects to the above URL: http://www.trainofthought.info/facebook/

Simple, easy and free.

Hot Chick Spam Hits Twitter

Reminiscent of MySpace, I am beginning to get hot chick spam on Twitter. I won’t link to the spam profile as I don't want to encourage it.

Anyone else seeing this? I wonder how long it will take Twitter to add a “Mark as Spam” link when a Spam Twit follows you.

Of course I could be wrong. She may really like me. ;-)