Today's Buzz

Why social media marketers should think like revolutionaries
Former Google employee Wael Ghonim ran a Facebook page that helped spark the Egyptian revolution last year, and his experiences offer important lessons for social media marketers, Ryan Davis writes. Political and brand pages both work best when they're focused, highly engaging and have a sense of urgency, Davis writes. "[I]t's true that most of us aren't trying to topple a repressive regime (many of us are trying to sell laundry detergent) but we should manage our social networks with all the energy of a high stakes, historic cause," he writes. The Huffington Post (7/5)

Network Update

Closed-captioning tool makes it easier for deaf people to use Hangouts
Hearing-impaired Google+ users can get closed captioning for the network's video-chat tool with an application called Hangout Captions. The app still requires a human -- either a professional transcriptionist or a Hangout participant -- to record the conversation with a stenographic system or by typing into the app. Mashable (7/5)

Ideas in Action

MLB turns to Twitter to fill final All-Star spots
Major League Baseball staged a hashtag-based Twitter vote to help determine who would get the last two spots on its All-Star teams. Franchises used a variety of social media marketing techniques to rally fans, posting messages from top executives and giving away swag based on the votes their players received. "It's amazing how this is now driven by social media," said Texas Rangers communications chief John Blake. "Our director of social media ... is spending every waking hour coming up with ideas." The New York Times (tiered subscription model)/Media Decoder blog (7/5) Adweek (7/5)

Tesco gives loyalty points for Facebook sharing
Tesco is offering customers double Clubcard loyalty points when their promotion of specific products leads their friends to make a purchase. "More and more of our customers are using Facebook to chat about and recommend products they like from Tesco Direct," said Matthew Entwistle, marketing director for general merchandise online. MarketingMagazine.co.uk (U.K.) (7/5)

Birds Eye to use viral buzz to persuade kids to eat their veggies
Frozen-vegetable-maker Birds Eye says it plans to use Web-marketing techniques to pitch healthy food directly to children. The brand is using an online-only video hosted by the Nickelodeon website to launch a contest encouraging kids to create "wacky" vegetable recipes, and will also promote the contest on Facebook and Twitter. The New York Times (tiered subscription model) (7/5)

Research and Reports

The real reason it's so hard to stay away from Facebook
Researchers say that besides satisfying our needs for interpersonal communication and finding information, Facebook also is a source of entertainment, giving it an addictive quality. "The entertainment motive was shown to be the most powerful predictor of how much time participants spent on Facebook," the researchers write. WebProNews (Lexington, Ky.) (6/29)

The Takeaway

How marketers are ruining social media
Everyone thought social networks would empower, connect and inform people -- then marketers came along, turning social media into a mere broadcast platform for bland, branded messages, Shel Israel writes. The issue isn't that marketers should leave social media alone, but rather that they should learn to listen more, talk less and focus on building lasting relationships with consumers. "[M]arketers are taking control of a medium and in so doing are damaging that which makes social media special," Israel writes. Forbes (7/5)

Get the media to pay attention to your startup
News releases can be valuable for entrepreneurs who want to focus on SEO, but you shouldn't expect them to attract many readers, marketing and customer service strategist Peter Shankman says. It's important to connect with reporters who cover your industry and to determine how what you're doing connects with larger business trends, experts say. Also, be respectful of reporters to avoid annoying them. SmartBrief/SmartBlog on Social Media (7/6)

Social Shareable

Don't get into a food fight with a grizzly bear
This gallery of YouTube clips shows competitive eater Takeru Kobayashi plowing his way through hundreds of hot dogs, eggs, chicken wings, tacos, bananas and bottles of milk. Still, as one clip makes clear, even Kobayashi is no match for a hungry, hot-dog-munching grizzly bear. Eater (7/3)

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Editor's Note

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