I just saw that Gary Vaynerchuck’s Wine Library TV turned 3-years old this week.  If you don’t know him, Gary is (arguably) one of the most successful online, social media personalities today.  He’s everywhere, both online and offline (if you go to his site, you can see all of his major media appearances).  He’s a total online success story.  He started his online life with a online video series (Wine Library TV) to educate potential customers of his family wine store about all things wine.  Since starting his little online video endeavor, he has created 629 episodes and expanded his presence to every major social media platform he could find (he’s got almost 38K Twitter followers as of today).  He Tweets relentlessly and boasts that he answers almost all the email he receives for his legions of fans.

The fact that the genesis of his online presence started 3-years ago is very interesting.  It not only shows that building an  online brand takes time (even though 3-years doesn’t sound like a lot of time…for Gary, I’m sure it feels like a lifetime), it also shows that it takes an enormous amount of persistence.  As I mentioned above, Gary created 629 episodes of his Wine Library TV show.  That’s more than 1 episode every other day…for 3 years!  That’s A LOT of work and dedication.  And while it’s easy to see now, I’m sure that during his first year, there were times that it was difficult for Gary to see the point in his efforts.

So, happy birthday Wine Library TV.  We applaud your efforts, persistence and progress.  We look forward to seeing what the next three years have in store…

DS

Case study on the power of social media in general and Twitter in particular. Or how a single tweet generated almost 2,000 clicks (granted the tweet was from Ashton Kutcher)

http://www.seoexpert.tv/social-networking/the-power-of-twitter.html

Each year, the Fast Company 50 looks for enterprises that will redefine the future and point the way to a better tomorrow. This year, Team Obama topped the list of Most Innovative Companies, for the way they used technology to connect with voters better, faster, and more cheaply than ever before.

There’s an excellent post by Joe Marchese of SocialVibe from last week entitled “The Future Agency Of Record Will Be Social“.

It’s a must read for any PR or marketer professional out there.

Marchese very clearly articulates the transition we’re in, moving from “bought media” (aka. ad placement) to “earned media.”  This is an era where online viewership and buzz on a brand’s new product or promotional campaign is achieved not through brute force advertising but rather through getting picked up by online communities.

He also shows how much of an open field this new market still is – and that it has yet to be claimed by the fastest and smartest communication agencies.  Each agency brings its own set of advantages and challenges to lead the transition.

TRAACKR’s experience to-date working with communication professionals shows 2 leading contenders to drive the change:

1- Tech savvy PR agencies who are learning to expand their process and reach beyond traditional media to influential bloggers (also v- and micro-bloggers).

2- New age creative agencies committed to renouncing 6 or 7 figure mass-media creative work in favor of small high impact initiatives with a strong social media component.

For most communication professionals out there, Social Media is still a niche opportunity representing a tiny portion of their budget.  Maybe the most important take away from Marchese’s article is the fact that this niche will inevitably represent all media soon. Still not convinced?  Have you searched for a restaurant on Google Maps or a book on Amazon?  What drives your decision? Ratings? Reviews? This is “earned” media: products and services with higher ratings and better reviews emerge on top.

Brands, products, and services are already being widely discussed online and people’s opinions impact business much more than any ad.

This shift represents a tremendous opportunity for marketers willing to take risks and experiment-  and a terrible threat for those who aren’t.

Read Joe’s article, then get your feet wet with social media.

Very cool visualization exercise of Twitter’s chatter during last Sunday’s Superbowl done by the NYT interactive team, combining time and space.