A Metaphor for the Sales Pitch in Social Media (a.k.a. I’ll find any excuse to flatter Doug, the orange hand puppet)
Social media is part of my day job. At night and on weekends, I am a poet, which means I am always on the lookout for good metaphors. Just between you and me, I will confess I even embrace cheesy metaphors from time-to-time. And since I have confided in you now, and that makes us friends, I will warn you I cannot vouch for the metaphor I am about to impose on you. I do, however, stand behind the idea it represents.
While reading news from RSS feeds recently on my Dell flat-screen monitor and listening to the Lynyrd Skynyrd channel via the Pandora radio app on my iPhone, I found a brandchannel article on product placement in a children’s show. Product placement. It can be blatant, like a logo plastered across a character’s costume in the cartoon referenced in that article. It can be slightly sneaky, like the first sentence of this paragraph. Or it can be ingenious and well-received, as it is in the popular TV show “Mad Men” (also mentioned in the brandchannel article).
I spend a lot of time reading about social media and how brands struggle with when and how to make sales pitches. Those without conscience (and those bound to get voted off the island) bombard fans and followers with advertisements. The only thing they know how to say is “Buy this now!” Most companies understand how inappropriate that is in the social space and genuinely want to mix the sales pitch with the right amount of engaging content.
[Enter The Metaphor. Cue camera.]
Why not think of your presence in social networks as a creative endeavor? A movie, perhaps. Or a novel. Now think of your subject matter (content) and your audience and decide how often you can showcase your brand without being intrusive. Think about clever ways to incorporate your products into your story.
Product placement in social media. It’s tricky, but not impossible. Take this Moleskine video which uses a story to introduce new, strategically placed, products:
And remember, the stealth approach is only one way to be clever in product placement. Entertainment and humor make even blatant product placement forgivable.
[Enter the handsome orange hand puppet Doug of Ford Focus fame.]
Ford’s series of YouTube videos featuring a puppet, his sidekick and his car has attracted more than a long line of poets with crushes on Doug. It has enhanced product awareness among consumers and created a buzz.
