News Snackies: Loose lips and saucy photos

Social media truisms
I have a mental file in the filing system inside my head. (If at this point you’re wondering why I have a filing system inside my head, and suddenly realizing – oops! There she blows, the lightbulb just went on – that you have one too, that’s great. Roll with it.) The mental file is labeled “Social Media 101” and it’s where social media “truisms” go to, well, basically, die. Stuff like “social media can be useful for marketing”; “social media is a conversation”; and “it’s as easy to remove a Facepoke as it is to respond in kind”. I feel as though a lot of these social media “truths” have been bandied about over and over for a few years now, so sometimes I take them for granted and get myself in hot water with the Social Media Cult because my other observations on the phenomenon tend to run contrary, now that the truisms have been filed away. (You tend to start with the basics, the positives, and then move on to the debatable stuff once those are filed. It's like a pyramid scheme, only without the messy legal hassles when it all goes down the toilet.)

Anyway, one of these truths is that it’s probably a good idea to be at least a little bit careful of what you say and do on public SM platforms, especially if you’re job hunting or trying to get a date in time for the high school prom. But there’s been a bit of talk about it lately, and it’s quite a fun subject, regardless of its status as an SMT (Social Media Truism). In this blog post, Courtney Lambert gets paid to cyber-stalk someone. Imagine! Most of us just do it for free out of interest. (Cue job envy.)

“Before you think reputation management is just for people on E! Channel, up to 75% of hiring managers and recruiters Google candidates,” Courtney writes. “It might not be a bad idea to Google yourself on a lonely Friday night and see what comes up. You’ll be surprised.” Courtney advises to front-foot your online information. As do others, who have written about why your online reputation matters when it comes to scoring your next good work gig (where, with any luck, you’ll be paid to cyber-stalk people).

Pavel Zivnustka, publicity manager for Club PR, wrote on the PRINZ site recently about some AUT students whom PR recruitment consultant Michelle Boag cautioned over social media, loose lips, and saucy photos, all of which could come back to kick you in your sorry arse. "It may seem like a bit of a laugh now - it could be disastrous in 20 years time when you are at the top," she said. True. Tiny, throwaway comments on Facebook or Twitter can be seen and (mis)interpreted by anyone. (I’m thinking particularly here of PR people who gleefully abuse the Evil Traditional Media, forgetting that journos are everywhere, watching and making lists of flacks never to speak to again.)

Meanwhile, ex-Cosmopolitan editor Mia Freedman wrote recently about cyber-stalking potential candidates when she was recruiting for a PA. She had a good handful of them ... at the start.

“Without even consciously thinking about it, the first thing I did before meeting each candidate was to look them up on Facebook and Twitter. And then there were two. I didn’t even need to glance at a single CV to eliminate three girls based on their social media profiles alone. One had a constant stream of Facebook updates bitching indiscreetly about her current job. Another evidently spent much of her time getting drunk and a third had some very strident views I disagreed with. Stridently.”

Finally, here’s the Dom Post’s Nikki MacDonald on the good/bad/ugly of Tweeting at work.

What's a Cosmo girl to do?
Speaking of Cosmopolitan magazine, apparently it’s worth going to court over. If you’re a convicted murderer, that is. Media buyers, beware.

Well, it's the thought that counts
Westpac is doing some sort of lovely jubbly promotion where they send you a copy of Next magazine and tell you: “We think nice surprises are great, so we thought you might enjoy this complimentary copy of Next magazine.” It then launches into how great KiwiSaver is, and tries to sell you a subscription to Next at the bottom of the page. The only problem is that the letter came in a very thin envelope and unless Next magazine has downsized itself to "Size Invisible", there was no magazine to be seen. Curiouser and curiouser.

Specsavers cutting OPSM's lunch: Tasty
A little while ago I wrote about comparative advertising and how Specsavers is taking a blowtorch to competitor OPSM, which charges like a bull when faced with Quade Cooper in a matador outfit. If you missed it, the gist is that Specsavers is cheap, OPSM isn’t, and the latter now needs to do something about the former. Anyway, I went in to get new lenses for some of my old face furniture on the weekend and noticed that Specsavers is humming with life, happy life, while OPSM was deserted. Tumbleweeds, the works. And with only 10 metres or so separating the two outlets at this particular venue, it’s not a hard ask to migrate from one to the other to save yourself a stack of cash. Faced with either paying $241 at OPSM or $204 at Specsavers, I asked myself, is the spare $37 worth the 10-metre walk? And a little voice said yes Hazel. Yes, it is. Carpe diem. (I worry about those voices sometimes, but they're so good at dealing with my mental filing system.) Only problem now is one of perception, which Specsavers may have to address: letting consumers know that their previous optometrist should be able to release information on their prescription, so they are free to frolic happily amongst the eye candy at Specsavers.

Damn customers who know what they want
I actually had a really odd experience last time I was at OPSM. I knew the brand and type of frame I wanted – I’d had almost an identical one before – and just couldn’t decide between two hues of the same style. But the crazy lady wouldn’t leave me in peace to quietly inspect myself and figure out which one I preferred, no matter how many times I explained this to her. “You need a challenge,” she kept telling me. “You can’t have the same glasses again.” Handing me pair after pair of super-fugly horrid munted awful quick-and-dirty-vommy wouldn’t be caught dead in them at my own funeral styles, I eventually realized these were all much more expensive than the ones I was set on getting. Game, set, match. It wasn’t until I discussed the weirdness with a work colleague – who has the same frames and had exactly the same experience, only at a different store – that I realized how truly strange the whole shebang was.

E-commerce equally important
More on consumer stuff. I wrote a little while ago about Mons Royale, a local merino brand with groovamatic colours. Here, blogger Lance Wiggs deconstructs the website over e-commerce. Lance, by the way, is related to Glen Wiggs, who is a veritable legend in his own lunch hour and would absolutely make my list of the top five people I’ve met since I started covering advertising. He’s the director of the Foundation for Advertising Research and an Adjunct Professor of Advertising Regulation at the University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland. (Quite the title for a business card.) Glen was on the Ad Show on episode 10 talking about alcohol restriction and the madness of flagons. Check him out here.

In other news:

Pick up a copy of this week's Listener for its mint cover story on what is means to be a New Zealander. It's a DraftFCB PR coup, as the agency has commissioned research on the topic, and scores a couple of campaign mentions.

Newly minted Aussie PM Julia Gillard has put the brakes on the government’s (AUD)$38 million ad campaign around mining.

Here’s how to do magic tricks with the iPad.

Ever wanted your own Lego felt-tip printer?

Making a mockery of the BP oil spill. (Oldie but a goodie.)

And JWT creates a super-cool Perspex car for Shell Helix to show what oil would look like as it’s flowing through the engine. (Please don't tell me this has been done before.)

Finally, only two more episodes of the Ad Show left! So if you want to come along to the filming, get your skates on. Or a car, which is an equally acceptable mode of transportation. Walking is also cool. However you do it, get thee to TVNZ this Wednesday or next, 6.30pm at the Victoria Street entrance.